He spent the winter at Point Clear on Mobile Bay, where he was
greatly invigorated by the sea breezes and the air of the pine forests.
After these months of sorrow and struggle he settled in Montgomery, Ala.,
as clerk in the Exchange Hotel, the property of his grandfather
and his uncles. His first feeling as he faces the new conditions
which he is trying to explain to Northrup, his Northern friend,
is one of bewilderment, -- the immense distance between
the beginning and the end of the war: --
"So wild and high are the big war-waves dashing between '61 and '66,
as between two shores, that, looking across their `rude, imperious surge',
I can scarcely discern any sight or sound of those old peaceful days
that you and I passed on the `sacred soil' of M----.
The sweet, half-pastoral tones that SHOULD come from out that golden time,
float to me mixed with battle cries and groans. It was our glorious spring:
but, my God, the flowers of it send up sulphurous odors,
and their petals are dabbled with blood.
"These things being so, I thank you, more than I can well express,
for your kind letter. It comes to me, like a welcome sail,
from that old world to this new one, through the war-storms.
It takes away the sulphur and the blood-flecks, and drowns out
the harsh noises of battle. The two margins of the great gulf
which has divided you from me seem approaching each other:
I stretch out my hand across the narrowing fissure,
to grasp yours on the other side.
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