“A letter from brother Tom,—I am so glad. It’s an age since he wrote, and I’ve been dying to hear from home. Dear old Tom!” and dropping parasol in one place, gloves in another, and shawl in another, Rose Mather, who had just come in from shopping, seized the letter her husband handed her, and seating herself upon an ottoman near the window, began to read without observing that it was dated at _Washington_ instead of Boston, as usual. Gradually, however, there came a shadow over her face, and her husband saw the tears gathering slowly in her eyes, and dropping upon the letter she had been “dying to get.” “What is it, Rose?” Mr. Mather asked, as a sob met his ear. “Oh, Will,” and Rose cried outright, “I didn’t believe Tom would do that! I thought people like him never went to the war. I ’most know he’ll be killed. Oh, dear, dear. What shall I do?” and Rose hid her face in the lap of her husband, who fondly caressed her chestnut hair as he replied, “You’ll bear it like a brave New England woman. We need just such men as your brother Tom, and I never respected him one half so much as now that he has shown how truly noble he is. He was greatly opposed to Lincoln, you know, and worked hard to defeat him; but now that our country is in danger, he, like a true patriot, has thrown aside all political feeling and gone to the rescue. I honor him for it, and may success attend him.” “Yes,” interrupted Rose, as a new idea struck her, “but what will his Southern friends think of him? and he has got a heap of them. There are the Birneys and Franklins from New Orleans, the Richardsons in Mobile, and those nice people in Charleston,—what will they say when they hear he has taken up arms against them? and he always used to quarrel so with those stiff Abolitionists in Boston, when they said the Southerners had no right to their slaves. Tom insisted they had, and that the North was meddling with what was none of its business, and now he’s turned abolitionist, and joined too,—dear, dear.” Mr. Mather smiled at Rose’s reasoning, and after a moment, replied, “I have no idea that Tom has changed his mind in the least with regard to the negroes, or that he loves his Southern friends one whit the less than when defending them from abuse. Negroes and Southern proclivities have nothing to do with it. A blow has been struck at the very heart of our Union, and Tom feels it his duty to resent it. It’s just like this: suppose you, in a pet, were trying to scratch your mother’s eyes out, and Tom should try to prevent it. Would you think him false to you, because he took the part of his mother? Would you not rather respect him far more than if he stood quietly by and saw you fight it out?” “It is not very likely I should try to scratch out mother’s eyes,” said Rose, half laughing at her husband’s odd comparison, and adding, after a moment, “I don’t see how folks can fight and love each other too.”