[Trees-outreach] Als with what is forever ex

[Harelson Fitsgerald]

-horse. Stealthily the fair ones dismounted, and stealthily crept along
the low piazza, through the side room, carefully past the pretentious
"big room," and up the stairs, a narrow little wooden concern, each
tenderly
hugging her precious band-box. There were but three rooms below, barring

the dining-room which was cut off by the low piazza. The stairway went
up from Mrs. Jackson's little bedroom into a duplicate guest-chamber
above. Two others, as diminutive, one above and below, were tucked onto
these. And this, with the big room, was the Hermitage. A very
unpretentious cabin was the first Hermitage;

the humble and honored roof of Rachel and Andrew Jackson, the couple
standing under the
waxen candles in the big room waiting to receive their
guests. The master was resplendent, if uncomfortable, in his silken
stockings, buckles, and powder, and rich velvet. For, whatever his
faults, he was no coxcomb, and the knee breeches and finery had only
been assumed for that one occasion, at the "special request" of
_charity's_ fair committee. The vest of richly embroidered silk was held
at the waist with a glittering brilliant, and left open to the throat,
as if in deference to the flutes, and frills, and delicate laces of the
white shirt bosom. There was a glitter at the knees where the silver
buckles caught now and then a gleam from the waxen candles dangling from
the low ceiling in a silver and iridescent chandelier, to the imminent
peril of the white roll of powdered hair surmounting

the tall general's forehead. At his side, proud, calm, and queenly in
her womanly dignity and virtue, stood Rachel, the beloved mistress of
the Hermitage. Her dress of stiff and creamy silk could add nothing to
the calm serenity of the soul beaming from
the gentle eyes, whose glance, tender and fond, strayed
now and then to the figure of her husband, and rested for a brief moment
upon the strong, gentle face with something akin to reverence in their
shadowy depths. Her
face, beautiful and beneficent, was not without a shadow: a shadow which
grief had set there to mellow,
but could not mar, the gentle sweetness
of the patient features. T
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