In all their wondering whether Douglas
would ever come back to them or would prove the blind Samson
pulling down their temple about their ears, there was never a
word about the approaching shadow which was so much more real
than the shades of the falling night, and yet so entirely shut
away from their observation.
In this summer, Stephens withdrew as he thought from public life.
With an intensely sensitive nature, he had at times flashes of
strange feeling which an unsophisticated society would regard as
prophetic inspirations. When he left Washington "on the
beautiful morning of the 5th of March, 1859, he stood at the
stern of the boat for some minutes gazing back at the capital."
He had announced his intention of not standing again as a
Representative, and one of his fellow-passengers asked jokingly
whether he was thinking of his return as a Senator. Stephen's
reply was full of emotion, "No, I never expect to see Washington
again unless I am brought here as a prisoner of war." During the
summer he endeavored to cast off his intuition of approaching
disaster. At his plantation, "Liberty Hall," he endeavored to be
content with the innumerable objects associated with his youth;
he tried to feel again the grace of the days that were gone, the
mysterious loveliness of the Southern landscape with its immense
fields, its forests, its great empty spaces filled with glowing
sunshine.
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