I found John M. Daniel in his house on Broad Street, as before; perched
still in his high chair of black horse-hair, all alone. His face was
thinner; his cheeks more sallow, and now haggard and sunken; his eyes
sparkling with gloomy fire, as he half reclined beneath the cluster of
globe lamps, depending from the ceiling, and filling the whole
apartment with their brilliant light--one of his weaknesses.
He received me with grim cordiality, offered me a cigar, and
said:--
"I am glad to see you, colonel, and to offer you one of the last of my
stock of Havanas. Wilmington is going soon--then good-bye to blockade
goods."
"You believe Wilmington is going to fall, then?"
"As surely as Savannah."
"Savannah! You think that? We are more hopeful at Petersburg."
"Hopeful or not, colonel, I am certain of what I say. Remember my
prediction when it is fulfilled. The Yankees are a theatrical people.
They take Vicksburg, and win Gettysburg, on their 'great national
anniversary;' and now they are going to present themselves with a
handsome 'Christmas gift'--that is the city of Savannah."
He spoke with evident difficulty, and his laboring voice, like his
haggard cheeks, showed that he had been ill since I last saw him.
"Savannah captured, or surrendered!" I said, with knit brows.
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