SOURCE: "The Old South," in Thomas Nelson Page, Twayne Publishers, 1967, pp. 39-77.

[Gross, Page's biographer, assesses three late stories in which Page illustrates the poignant aftermath of the Civil War. ]

"The Burial of the Guns," although a weak story, reveals most clearly Page's over-all attitude toward the South and the Civil War. The guns that are buried (by a company of Confederate soldiers) are of course Southern guns, and the burial is that of the South's hopes for ever winning the war. As Page describes these weapons, they seem almost human and animistic; they certainly are more human than the characters themselves. This observation is not surprising, for in "The Burial of the Guns" the author is not really interested in people or guns but in what they represent, in the concept that they dramatize. In this case, the guns symbolize the Southern honor and duty and loyalty—in a word, the Southern heroism—that have been overcome but not destroyed.

The loss of the guns is the loss of great dignity and power—almost, the reader is made to feel, a sexual power. It is a loss that is greater than that of human beings, more significant and transcending than that of human beings; and as Page extols this superhuman quality, he himself grows curiously inhuman: "Most of the men who were not killed were retaken before the day was over, with many guns; but the Cat was lost. She remained in enemy's hands and probably was being turned against her old comrades and lovers. The company was inconsolable. The death of comrades was too natural and common a thing to depress the men beyond what such occurrences necessarily did; but to lose a gun! It was like losing the old Colonel: it was worse: a gun was ranked as a brigadier: and the Cat was equal to a major-general. The other guns seemed lost without her . . .".

What counts is not so much the human beings who have been lost on the battlefield but the honor with which these human beings have fought and died. Page tells us of the effects of the Civil War—and they are certainly harrowing—but he never demonstrates dramatically the suffering of individual people; the result is experience rendered at second hand:

The minds of the men seemed to go back to the time when they were not so alone, but were part of a great and busy army, and some of them fell to talking of the past, and the battles they had figured in, and of the comrades they had lost. They told them off in a slow and colorless way, as if it were all part of the great past as much as the dead they named. One hundred and nineteen times they had been in action. Only seventeen men were left of the eighty odd who had first enlisted in the battery, and of these four were at home crippled for life. Two of the oldest men had been among the half-dozen who had fallen in the skirmish just the day before. It looked tolerably hard to be killed that way after passing for four years through such battles as they had been in; and both had wives and children at home, too, and not a cent to leave them to their names. They agreed calmly that they'd have to "sort of look after them a little" if they ever got home. These were some of the things they talked about as they pulled their old worn coats about them, stuffed their thin, weather-stained hands in their ragged pockets to warm them, and squatted down under the breastwork to keep a little out of the wind.

What the reader witnesses in "The Burial of the Guns" is pathos evoked at the moment of death; and he is reminded, once again, of the great propensity that Page has for death in his fiction, the frequency with which he presents his Southern hero dying in the moment of a glory that is certain to vanish. In this tale, the guns are the hero; and before they are dropped into the water, before the troops disband, the Colonel utters what is really a prayer and a eulogy:

My men, I cannot let you go so. We were neighbors when the war began—many of us, and some not here to-night; we have been more since then—comrades in arms; we have all stood for one thing—for Virginia and the South; we have all done our duty—tried to do our duty; we have fought a good fight, and now it seems to be over, and we have been overwhelmed by number, not whipped—and we are going home. We have the future before us—we don't know just what it will bring, but we can stand a good deal. We have proved it. Upon us depends the South in the future as in the past. You have done your duty in the past, you will not fail in the future. Go home and be honest, brave, self-sacrificing, God-fearing citizens, as you have been soldiers, and you need not fear for Virginia and the South. The war may be over; but you will ever be ready to serve your country. The end may not be as we wanted it, prayed for it, fought for it; but we can trust God; the end in the end will be the best that could be; even if the South is not free she will be better and stronger that she fought as she did. Go home and bring up your children to love her, and though you may have nothing else to leave them, you can leave them the heritage that they are sons of men who were in Lee's army.

This speech, idealistic and biased, chauvinistic and parochial, can be duplicated by similar quotations from the most sophisticated Southern authors of the post-Civil War period. It indicates, for one thing, that Page was not always successful in keeping the detachment of which he perennially boasts in so many stories and essays, and it contradicts the assertion often made that local color-fiction was disinterested and unconcerned with political issues. The Colonel's speech depends for its effects on the assumption that words like duty, honest, brave, self-sacrificing, and God-fearing are meaningful to these unsuccessful soldiers after all that they have been through; it also implies that the abstractions are intrinsically more important than the soldiers whom the Colonel addresses. Although Page is unaware of his final effect, this dedication to abstractions has led, in a curious way, to the abdication of human relations, and the connection between the individual and Virginia or the South or honor has assumed transcendent significance.

The whites honor these abstractions in other whites and more importantly in the Negro. The faithful colored man knows this axiom of Southern heroism intuitively and so never insists on his freedom, never insists on being considered a human being. In a story like "Burial of the Guns," the quality of idealism is strained to an extreme point so that it is difficult to conceive of the war as having been fought by individual people. At the end of the tale, which has concerned itself fundamentally with those moments after Appomattox when the guns must be buried, the soldiers include in the burial rites the names of the guns that they have used in combat. Those names—Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, The Eagle, and The Cat—are pointedly Christian. The implication is clear: the war these soldiers have fought has been not only religious in nature but also in the service of the highest possible cause in their lives—the honor of the South.

"Little Darby," a story in the same vein, retells the wellknown anecdote that served as the source of "Marse Chan." But in "Little Darby" Page is closer to the original material than in the more compressed and suggestive early version: the girl's letter that warns the hero, "Don't come home without a furlough," takes on greater significance, and the individual families do not have the aristocratic bearing of those in "Marse Chan"—they are poorwhites. The serenity of Virginia, the threat of oncoming war, and the rival families recall those similar elements in "Marse Chan" and the other stories of In Ole Virginia; in "Little Darby," however, Page intends to testify to the sectional loyalty of the lower classes during the Civil War. He attempts to demonstrate that heroism can exist among the poor as well as the rich, but in the process of writing the story he cannot avoid making class distinctions—Darby descends from a tradition of noble Englishmen, and his pedigree accounts for his courage during the war. Arthur Hobson Quinn, in a sympathetic estimation of Page's fiction, makes a similar point and reprints a long, significant letter that "explains the genesis of 'Little Darby' and also of his earliest stories":

I have no doubt that your estimate of the comparative merits of my short stories and of my novels is absolutely correct and I have a secret fear that my earlier stories, those in dialect, are superior in their appeal to any that I have written since. If I find you selecting "Marse Chan" and "Meh Lady" in preference to "Edinburg's Drowndin'" and "Polly," I have no right to complain and it brings me to a reflection which I have always had: as to what is the secret of the success of the story or novel. Is it the theme or the art with which any theme, reasonably broad, is handled, or is it something growing out of the union of the two? Personally I have always estimated "Edinburg's Drowndin"' as possibly the broadest of my stories, at least as the one giving a reflection of the broadest current of the old Southern life, and so far as literary art is concerned, it seems to me at least on a par with the others. I think, therefore, it must be the unrelieved tragedy in "Marse Chan" or the fact that "Meh Lady" appealed to both sides, and was written to make this appeal, that has given them a prestige, if I may use so important a word, far beyond that of "Edinburg's Drowndin"' and "Ole 'Stracted." "Little Darby," "Run to Seed" and "Elsket," which you have signalized with the stamp of your imprimatur, I also think among the very best stories I have written. The first two of these appeal to me almost as much as the dialect stories. The first of these was written on precisely the same theme with "Marse Chan" and out of the consciousness that whereas the tragedy of "Marse Chan" was laid in the highest social rank, the incident which had given rise to it was based on a letter written by a poor girl, of much lower rank, to her lover, who like "Marse Chan" had found his death on the battle-field, and I felt somehow that it was due to that class that I should testify with whatever power I might possess, to their devotion to the South. If there is a difference it seems to me that it lies rather in the fact that readers estimate as more romantic a tragedy in the upper ranks of life than in lower, whereas, we know that rank has nothing to do with it. [Arthur Hobson Quinn, American Fiction: An Historical and Critical Survey, 1936]

In the early part of "Little Darby," the pre-war South—and, more specifically, pre-war Virginia—is presented as a quiet, rural area. Political differences are the only cause for excitement, and the opposing political positions are made clear: they represent secession and national unity. Little Darby, whose family favors secession, is separated from Vashti, the girl he loves, because of the political differences of their families. When he enlists in the army, she does not permit herself to yield to him although she confesses her love to her mother. Page gives the situation the chivalric overtones that are present in his other fiction: like lovers in a courtly romance, the warrior leaves to defend his lady despite the fact that the lady rejects him.

But Darby is not so heroic in battle as those protagonists of the earlier stories in spite of Page's desire "to testify" to his "devotion to the South." He is described as a poorwhite without breeding; and though the author brings compassion to his tale, he does not assume the same attitude of admiration that he maintains toward those Southern heroes who have a more aristocratic pedigree. Consequently, Little Darby is more credible and realistic though he is smaller in scope than the figures of In Ole Virginia. He is inconspicuous as a soldier—taciturn, loyal, brave, but largely unnoticed—and Page puts him into a company of common soldiers whom he describes with restraint: "The war was very different from what those who went into it expected it to be. Until it had gone on some time it seemed mainly marching and camping and staying in camp, quite uselessly as seemed to many, and drilling and doing nothing. Much of the time—especially later on—was given to marching and getting food; but drilling and camp duties at first took up most of it. This was especially hard on the poorer men, no one knew what it was to them. Some moped, some fell sick."

Equally successful is the description of the women who stayed at home and suffered appalling poverty. Once again the mood described is credible because it is not excessive:

. . . the women of the district had a hungry time, and the war bore on them heavily as on everyone else, and as it went on they suffered more and more. Many a woman went day after day and week after week without even the small portion of coarse combread which was ordinarily her common fare. They called oftener and oftener at the houses of their neighbors who owned the plantations near them, and always received something; but as time went on the plantations themselves were stripped; the little things they could take with them when they went, such as eggs, honey, etc., were wanting, and to go too often without anything to give might make them seem like beggars, and that they were not. Their husbands were in the army fighting for the South, as well as those from the plantations, and they stood by this fact on the same level.

The arrogant looks of the negroes were unpleasant, and in marked contrast to the universal graciousness of their owners, but they were slaves and they could afford to despise them. Only they must uphold their independence. Thus no one outside knew what the women of the district went through. When they wrote to their husbands or sons that they were in straits, it meant that they were starving. Such a letter meant all the more because they were used to hunger, but not to writing, and a letter meant perhaps days of thought and enterprise and hours of labor.

Against this bleak background, the simple action of the story rises. It turns upon the hero's demonstration of honor to his lady, a demonstration that is all the more impressive for the circumstances that surround it. The lady, Vashti, finally confesses her love to Darby and writes that his mother is ill, that "he ought to get a furlough and come home, and when he did she would marry him." The letter, however, contains one crucial proviso:

At the end of the letter, as if possibly she thought, in the greatness of her relief at her confession, that the temptation she held out might prove too great even for him, or possibly only because she was a woman, there was a postscript scrawled across the coarse, blue Confederate paper: "Don't come without a furlough; for if you don't come honorable I won't marry you." This, however, Darby scarcely read. His being was in the letter. It was only later that the picture of his mother ill and failing came to him, and it smote him in the midst of his happiness and clung to him afterward like a nightmare. It haunted him. She was dying.

Darby does not wait for his furlough; when he meets Vashti, her first word is "Darby," uttered in surprise and love for the returned hero. When the subsequent conversation reveals that he has returned to his dying mother without a leave, Vashti accuses him of being a coward and a deserter, of having forsaken his honor. Honor at this point is more important than Darby himself, who grows sick and delirious because of the rejection. Ultimately, he redeems himself by dying for the South and for his heartless Lady, thus accepting the grounds on which Vashti has denied him: he prevents Northern soldiers from shooting Vashti, who is in the process of burning a bridge to prevent the Northern company from concluding a raid. Darby drowns, a fitting martyr to the abstract glory that Vashti has demanded of him.

"Little Darby" is still another retelling of that stock sentimental situation in which the hero dies in battle for his lady; and its power relies upon the dedication of the two central figures to abstractions that transcend their own humanity. Neither Little Darby nor Vashti doubts for a moment that honor transcends their individual importance; and the popularity of this tale—as well as many others like it—assumes the reader's implication in the myth of heroism, the belief in such abstractions as honor and courage.

A third story, "The Old Gentleman of the Black Stock" (1894), is not concerned with the war; it develops, in a quiet and attractive manner, some of the author's favorite themes: the superiority of the country to the city, of the past to the present, of feeling to intellect. This tale, one of Page's most popular ones, is an autobiographical recounting of his first experiences in Richmond twenty years earlier. The young lawyer's uncertainty and lack of sophistication are well presented, and his sentimental love affair, though traditional and predictable, is restrained. Most effective, however, is the description of "the old gentleman of the black stock" through whom the central ideas become evident. His life has been an economic success but an emotional failure largely because of one great fault—selfishness. "I made one mistake, sir," he tells the narrator, "early in life, and it has lasted me ever since. I put Brains before everything, Intellect before Heart. It was all selfishness: that was the rock on which I split. I was a man of parts, sir, and I thought with my intellect I could do everything. But I could not."

The old man serves as the narrator's literary and moral mentor. Having sacrificed love for the acquisition of money and the "selflessness" of family life for his own personal goals, he has since depended on books for comfort. Through the "old gentleman of the black stock," Page expresses some of his own observations on literature:

I asked him about Carlyle and Emerson, for I was just then discovering them. He admitted the sincerity of both; but Carlyle he did not like.

"He is always ill-tempered and sour, and is forever sneering at others. He is Jeremiah, without his inspiration or his occasion," he said of him. "He is not a gentleman, sir, and has never forgiven either the world or himself for it."

"Do you think he writes well?" I demanded.

"Yes, sir, he writes vigorously,—I suppose you mean that,—but it is not English. I do not know just what to term it. It was a trick with him, a part of his pedantry. But when I want acerbity I prefer Swift."

Emerson he put on a much higher place than Carlyle; but though he admitted his sincerity, and ranked him as the first American literary man, he did not read him much.

"He is a kindly man," he said, "and has 'wrought in a sad sincerity.' But he preaches too much for me, and he is all texts. When I want preaching I go to church."

Books can never supplant the emotional loss that the old gentleman has suffered—"they forsake you," he complains as he dies, "or bore you"—and he warns the young lawyer to "cultivate the affections. Take an old man's word for it, that the men who are happy are those who love and are loved. Better love the meanest thing that lives than only yourself." The narrator takes the man's advice and marries the daughter of the woman whom the "old gentleman" had given up years before.

This sentimental tale was so popular in its time because it satisfies all the demands of the popular romance: it presents love lost in the "old gentleman of the black stock" and love redeemed in the young lawyer; it emphasizes the triumph of the heart over the head, for the young lawyer wins his young lady through self-sacrifice and devotion; and it offers a tribute to the purity and innocence of rural life, for both the hero and heroine have just come from the country.

"The Burial of the Guns," "Little Darby," and "The Old Gentleman of the Black Stock" appeared in 1894. Page did not publish another work of fiction until 1898 when Red Rock, his most important novel, appeared serially in Scribner's Magazine. The human comedy that he had traced in "Run to Seed" and On Newfound River surrendered to the more tragic, more poignant, vanished glory of "The Burial of the Guns" and "Little Darby." None of these stories was so impressive as those he first published, and they all suggest a deliquescence of the clear point of view and tone in "Marse Chan" and "Meh Lady."

In the period from 1894 to 1898 Page struggled with Red Rock; in this elaborate, ambitious novel—the finest one that he wrote—he seeks to offer his ultimate defense of the South before and after the Civil War. As a work of art Red Rock does not succeed, for in spite of his attempt to be dispassionate and fair to both the North and the South, the book grows inevitably tendentious. As a defense of the South during Reconstruction, however, it remains one of the most impressive fictional accounts of the period.