George: Ef that hain't de most disrisponsible niggah gal dat eber breaved de bref o' life! If I's lak she am I'd run off tomowow and jine dem Linkum sojas, but I jes' cain't do it. I jes' keep a-wonderin' what dey all will do at home widout me. Well, I reckon I'll go hunt up mammy. (_Exits at right._) Sally (_enters at left carrying open letter_): Poor Cousin Bessie Helen, she has left her beautiful Alabama home with all its grand furniture and has run away with her brothers and sisters to grandpa's home here in Tennessee. What a foolish thing for her to do. (_Reads from letter_): "When they told me the Yankee soldiers were coming I couldn't think of anything but to get away safely with the children before the soldiers came in and butchered us all." How _foolish_ she was! I am sure the officers would have seen that she came to no harm. (_Goes to Lincoln's portrait and places her hand upon it._) It is plain that she has never looked upon _your_ noble face. If she had she would have felt, as I do, that at least some small measure of your beautiful spirit must be scattered abroad through your army to keep the men from harming helpless widows and children. But, poor Bessie! she has only heard dreadful stories about you, and so, with her mother in her grave, and her father fighting against the Yankees she could see no safety except in flight. I must write to her and tell her something of our beloved Lincoln and the army which he controls. (Albert _enters at left._) O, Albert, I am so glad you have come in just now. I have here a letter from Cousin Bessie; she is at grandfather's here in Tennessee. Albert: In Tennessee? Sally: Yes, read her letter; she was so afraid of the Yankee soldiers. Albert: And well she might be, the hounds! Sally: Hush! (_placing right-hand forefinger to lips_): Albert, do you forget that our father is one of them? Albert (_walking up and down excitedly_): Indeed, I _don't_ forget! I think of it every hour, and it is _that_ which makes me so furious. How can he accept those low-down Northerners as his associates? Sally: Brother, be still! Look at that face! (_Points to Lincoln's portrait._) _He_ is a Northerner, altho' he was born in Kentucky, and for his sake I love them all. Albert: Then you must hate all your friends and relatives that are fighting against him. Sally: No, no, dear brother, I do not. Don't you remember how the grand Lincoln closed his inaugural address? "We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearthstone,----" Albert (_interrupting_): There, stop, I will not listen to any more of his stuff. Sally (_continuing rapidly_): "All over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature." Are those not wonderful words?