Next night the long-talked-of entertainment came off duly, and Miss Blair Cary and Miss Elizabeth Dockett and the other girls who had waited so long, showed their little plain, sweet, white and pink dresses which they had made themselves, and their prettier white throats and pink faces, and lovely flashing eyes which God had made; and danced with their gray-jacketed escorts, their little feet slipped in their little slippers, many of which were high-heeled and faded with age, having belonged to their mothers, and grandmothers—even great-grandmothers—and enjoyed it all as much as ever the former wearers of the slippers did in their full glory of satin and lace. For of such is the Kingdom of Youth. The Yankee officers attended, very dignified, and were treated politely, but not warmly, of course, only just so civilly as to show that Southerners knew what was due to guests even when they were enemies; but not so warmly as to let them forget that they were foes. This, however, made little difference to the young men, for the civility which it was felt was “their due as guests” was sufficient to make a marked contrast with a past in which not a soul in petticoats had noticed them, and the girls were pretty enough to satisfy them at first, even if there was no other privilege conferred than merely that primal right of the cat in the proverb. Everyone, however, meant to be civil, and for the time, at least, at peace. But there was more than this; the night was perfect; the breath of flowers and shrubbery came in through the open windows; the moon was almost at her full, and her soft light was lying on the grass, mantling the trees, and filling the night with that amber mellowness which sometimes comes in summer, and seems to bring a special peacefulness. The camp lay hidden in the distance, and the throng in the streets hung on the fences, listening to the music, or laughed and danced in full sympathy with the occasion. Steve Allen constituted himself the especial host of the two officers. It was by him that Middleton and Thurston were introduced to most of the girls, and to the older ladies, who sat at the end of the room farthest from the music, their eyes, filled with light, following their daughters or others whose success was near to their hearts, or, like Miss Thomasia, beaming a benediction on the whole throng of happy dancers.