"
This she actually did. With her old empty horse-pistol she cleared the house
of the mob, and then vowed that if they burned the house she would burn up
in it, and finally saved it by singing "Home, Sweet Home", for the colonel.
She could not have done much better even if she had not been an old maid.
I did not see much of her after I grew up. I moved away from the old county.
Most others did the same. It had been desolated by the war,
and got poorer and poorer. With an old maid's usual crankiness
and inability to adapt herself to the order of things,
Cousin Fanny remained behind. She refused to come away; said, I believe,
she had to look after the old place, mammy, and Fash, or some such nonsense.
I think she had some idea that the church would go down, or that
the poor people around would miss her, or something equally unpractical.
Anyhow, she stayed behind, and lived for quite awhile
the last of her connection in the county. Of course all did the best
they could for her, and had she gone to live around with her relatives,
as they wished her to do, they would have borne with her and supported her.
But she said no; that a single woman ought never to live in any house
but her father's or her own; and we could not do anything with her.
She was so proud she would not take money as a gift from anyone,
not even from her nearest relatives.
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