The Man in Gray | Page 3

and faces the
eager youth.
He was dressed in his young master's last year's suit, immaculate blue
broadcloth and brass buttons, ruffled shirt and black-braided watch
guard hanging from his neck. His eyes sparkled with pride and his rich,
sonorous voice rang over the crowd like the deep notes of a flute:
"Choose yo' pardners fur de fust cowtillun!"
Again the quick rustle of silk and tulle, the low hum of excited, young
voices and the couples are in place.
A boy cries to the leader:
"We're all ready, Sam."
The young caller of the set knew his business better. He lifted his hand
in a gesture of reverence and silence, as he glanced toward the library
door.
"Jes' a minute la-dees, an' gem-mens," he softly drawled. "Marse
Robert E. Lee and Missis will lead dis set!"
The Colonel briskly entered from the library with his wife on his arm.
A ripple of applause swept the room as they took their places with the
gay youngsters.
Sam lifted his hand; the music began--sweet and low, vibrating with the

sensuous touch of the negro slave whose soul was free in its joyous
melody.
At the first note of his triangle, loud above the music rang Sam's voice:
"Honors to yo' pardners!"
With graceful courtesies and stately bows the dance began. And over
all a glad negro called the numbers:
"Forward Fours!"
The caller's eyes rolled and his body swayed with the rhythm of the
dance as he watched each set with growing pride. They danced a
quadrille, a mazurka, another quadrille, a schottische, the lancers,
another quadrille, and another and another. They paused for supper at
midnight and then danced them over again.
While the fine young forms swayed to exquisite rhythm and the music
floated over all, the earnest young Congressman bent close to his host
in a corner of the library.
"I sincerely hope, Colonel Lee, that you can see your way clear to make
a reply to this book of Mrs. Stowe which Ruffin has sent you."
"I can't see it yet, Mr. Pryor--"
"Ruffin is a terrible old fire-eater, I know," the Congressman admitted.
"But Uncle Tom's Cabin is the most serious blow the South has
received from the Abolitionists. And what makes it so difficult is that
its appeal is not to reason. It is to sentiment. To the elemental emotions
of the mob. No matter whether its picture is true or false, the result will
be the same unless the minds who read it can be cured of its poison. It
has become a sensation. Every Northern Congressman has read it. A
half million copies have been printed and the presses can't keep up with
the demands. This book is storing powder in the souls of the masses
who don't know how to think, because they've never been trained to
think. This explosive emotion is the preparation for fanaticism. We

only wait the coming of the fanatic--the madman who may lift a torch
and hurl it into this magazine. The South is asleep. And when we don't
sleep, we dance. There's no use fooling ourselves. We're dancing on the
crust of a volcano."
Pryor rose.
"I've a number with Mrs. Pryor. I wish you'd think it over, Colonel.
This message is my big reason for missing a night session to be here."
Lee nodded and strolled out on the lawn before the white pillars of the
portico to consider the annoying request. He hated controversy.
Yet he was not the type of man to run from danger. The breed of men
from which he sprang had always faced the enemy when the challenge
came. In the carriage of his body there was a quiet pride--a feeling not
of vanity, but of instinctive power. It was born in him through
generations of men who had done the creative thinking of a nation in
the building. His face might have been described as a little too
regular--a little too handsome perhaps for true greatness, but for the
look of deep thought in his piercing eyes. And the finely chiseled lines
of character, positive, clean-cut, vigorous. He had backbone.
And yet he was not a bitter partisan. He used his brain. He reasoned. He
looked at the world through kindly, conservative eyes. He feared God,
only. He believed in his wife, his children, his blood. And he loved
Virginia, counting it the highest honor to be--not seem to be--an
old-fashioned Virginia gentleman.
He believed in democracy guided by true leaders. This reservation was
not a compromise. It was a cardinal principle. He could conceive of no
democracy worth creating or preserving which did not produce the
superman to lead, shape, inspire and direct its life. The man called of
God to this work was fulfilling a divine mission. He must