Having purchased a few other household utensils, Mrs. Wentworth proceeded to the Bowman House, from which, after paying her bill, she removed her children, and, followed by the dray with her furniture, proceeded to the wretched hovel site had rented.  Her stock of money had now been reduced to less than sixty dollars, and with this she embarked upon the world with two tender children.

After paying the drayman, who was a kind-hearted negro, and getting him to erect the bedstead, he departed, and a feeling of desolation and loneliness spread its dark shadows over the heart of Mrs. Wentworth.  Seating herself on a chair, with her two children clinging to her knees, the long pent up fountain of grief burst forth, and tears bedewed the cheeks of the Soldier’s Wife; tears, such as only those who have felt the change of fortune, can shed; tears, which, like the last despairing cry of the desolate, can only be answered in heaven!

CHAPTER ELEVENTH.

THE ATTEMPTED ESCAPE.

We must now return to Alfred, whom we left in a disconsolate mood at Camp Douglas, with his friend trying to cheer his spirits.  But he could think of nothing else but his absent wife, until at last he determined to attempt an escape.  The idea once in his mind could not be dismissed.  He, therefore, informed Harry of his intention, and asked if he thought it feasible, or likely to result in success.

“So far as the feasibility of the attempt is concerned,” observed Harry, as soon as Alfred had concluded, “I think it could be attempted.  But about the result, you will have to trust to luck.”

“I am aware of that,” he replied.  “But I do not know how the attempt can possibly be made.  The camp is so well guarded, that an attempt to escape is almost hopeless of success.”

“Pshaw!  If you are determined to go, I see nothing to prevent your making the attempt.  If it even fails, the most that will be done to you by the Federals is closer confinement.”

“I do not care much about that risk,” he replied.  “My desire is to form some plan of escape.  Can you devise one by which I can get away?”

“That is a difficult task,” said Harry.  “But as we are of the same desire, I suppose something must be done.  What do you say about digging a tunnel, and escaping by that route?”

“That is a very good idea; but it will take too long,” replied Alfred.  “Besides which, what are we to do with the dirt that is dug up?”

“I never thought of that,” he answered.  “But now that you have reminded me of it, I do not believe the plan will suit.  Some other must be devised, but what it is to be, I cannot, for the life of me, imagine.”

“What do you say to scaling the walls?” asked Alfred.

“A very good idea it would be, if we had anything to scale them with,” he replied.

“Suppose we tear up our blankets and make a rope of them.”