“Wasn’t it great?” he cried. “You ought to have seen those Yankees--three hundred of ’em, commanded by a major. They were cocksure they had you, Captain Isabey. They surrounded the whole place, garden and all, and then searched the house. Father harangued them, and a private soldier told him to shut up, which made father very angry. Then the soldier was cuffed by another soldier, who said to father: ‘Go on, old cock; I like to hear you talk--just as if you had two hundred niggers to jump when you spoke.’ ‘Niggers!’ roared father. ‘That word, sir, is not admissible in polite society. Negro is the name of the black race, and any diminutive of it is a term of contempt of which I strongly disapprove.’ ‘By Jiminy!’ said the soldier, perfectly delighted. ‘Give us some instructions in manners, my old Roman gent, and if you would throw in a few dancing lessons we would be a thousand times obliged.’ Then mother, quite angry, said to him, ‘How dare you speak so irreverently to my husband? He is seventy-two years old, and this is the first disrespectful word that was ever uttered to him.’” As neither of his auditors spoke, the boy went on: “All the soldiers around were laughing, but they quieted down as soon as mother spoke. Then an old sergeant came up and touched his cap and said very respectfully to mother, ‘Don’t be frightened, marm; we ain’t a-going to do you or this gentleman here any harm. We’re jest looking for that Rebel captain that we know came this way before twelve o’clock to-day, but we wouldn’t alarm you for nothing, marm.’ ‘Alarm me,’ said mother, smiling. ‘I can’t imagine myself alarmed by you.’ Then a young rough-looking fellow, a lieutenant, came up, and my mother’s words seemed to make him mad. ‘Very well, madam,’ he hollered, ‘I’ll show you something to alarm you.’ He picked up a newspaper, twisted it up into a torch, and lighted it at the candle on the hall table. ‘Now,’ he said, ‘if you don’t tell me within one minute by the clock where that Rebel rascal is, I’ll set fire to this house and burn up everything in it.’ ‘Just as you please,’ replied mother, exactly in the tone when she says, ‘Archibald, my son, come in to prayers.’ The soldiers around her all stood and looked at her and my father while the lieutenant kept his eyes on the clock. ‘My dearest Sophie,’ said father, ‘this is most annoying, and it is peculiarly humiliating to me that it is not in my power to demand satisfaction from these villains for their discourtesy to you.’ ‘Pray, don’t let it trouble you, my dear,’ replied mother. ‘The only thing that distresses me is that you should be subject at your time of life to such insults.’