Harry also saw the growth of the hero-worship accorded to his great commander.  He did not believe that any other general, except perhaps Napoleon in his earlier career, had ever received such trust and admiration.  Many soldiers who had felt his guiding hand in battle now saw him for the first time.  He had an appearance and manner to inspire respect, and, back of that, was something much greater, a firm conviction in the minds of all that he had illimitable patience, a willingness to accept responsibility, and a military genius that had never been surpassed.  Such was the attitude of the Southern people toward their great leader then, and, to an even greater degree now, when his figure, like that of Lincoln, instead of becoming smaller grows larger as it recedes into the past.

Harry often rode with him.  He seemed to have an especial liking for the very young members of his staff, or for old private soldiers, bearded and gray like himself, whom he knew by name.  Far in October he rode down toward the Rapidan where Stuart was encamped, taking with him only Harry and Dalton.  He was mounted on his great white war horse, Traveller, which the soldiers knew from afar.  Cheering arose, but when he raised his hand in a deprecating way the soldiers, obedient to his wish, ceased, and they heard only the murmur of many voices, as they went on.  The general made the lads ride, one on his right and the other on his left hand, and brilliant October coloring and crisp air seemed to put him in a mood that was far from war.

“I pine for Arlington,” he said at length to Harry, “that ancestral home of mine that is held by the enemy.  I should like to see the ripening of the crops there.  We Virginians of the old stock hold to the land, and you Kentuckians, who are really of the same race, hold to it, too.”

“It is true, sir,” said Harry.  “My father loves the land.  After his retirement from the army, following the Mexican war, he worked harder upon our place in Kentucky than any slave or hired man.  He was going to free his slaves, but I suppose, sir, that the war has made him feel different about it.”

“Yes, we’re often willing to do things by our own free will, but not under compulsion.  The great Washington himself wrote of the evils of slave labor.  The ‘old fields’ scattered all over Virginia show what it has done for this noble commonwealth.”

Harry remembered quite well similar “old fields” in Kentucky.  Slaves were far less numerous there than in Virginia, and he was old enough to have observed that, in addition to the wrong of slavery, they were a liability rather than an asset.  But he too felt anew the instinctive rebellion against being compelled to do what he would perhaps do anyhow.

General Lee talked more of the land and Harry and Dalton listened respectfully.  Harry saw that his commander’s heart turned strongly toward it.  He knew that Jefferson had dreamed of the United States as an agricultural community, having no part in the quarrels of other nations, but he knew that it was only a dream.  The South, the section that had followed Jefferson’s dream, was now at a great disadvantage.  It had no ships, and it did not have the mills to equip it for the great war it was waging.  He realized more keenly than ever the one-sided nature of the South’s development.