ton above; or "Arlington, Washington City, D. C," or "Arlington, Washington City P. O.," but never "Arlington House."[1]
(c.) Passing by the first two sentences, with their bald blunders which have been sufficiently exposed, the third sentence is remarkable. General Lee is made to say, "I have but little to add in reply to your letters of March 26, 27 and 28." Is it probable that Custis Lee, a cadet at West Point, would write to his father on three successive days? Further comment on this sentence will be made in the sequel.
(d.) In genuine letters, General Lee's style is severely plain. He does not use metaphors or superlatives. But the writer of The Duty Letter says: "Your letters breathe a true spirit of frankness"; "Frankness is the child of honesty and courage"; "Duty, then, is the sublimest word in our language," which has been commented on above by Dr. Joynes.
(e.) In genuine letters, General Lee's grammar and syntax, though not always faultless, are free from gross errors. But in The Duty Letter (waiving a mistake in the second sentence) he is made to say, "myself and your mother," "me and your mother," for which cannot be pleaded Cardinal Wolsey's excuse for "Ego et Rex meus," which so offended Henry VIII. And then there is the extraordinary sentence: "We should live, act, and say nothing to the injury of another." Live nothing to the injury of another! Act nothing to the injury of another! Shade of Lindley Murray!
(f) The story of the old Puritan, which awakens the suspicion of both Dr. Joynes and Dr. Bradford, is found in "Barber's Historical Connecticut Collections," a purely local book giving an account of the counties, towns and cities of that State, the first edition of which was published in 1838.[2]
- ↑ See the Repudiation Letter, ante, from a "source entitled to know.". In a letter to the writer, Miss Mary Custis Lee declares that General Lee never wrote "Arlington House," but that his father-in-law, G. W. P. Custis, did. The writer has scrutinized many letters, published and unpublished, of General Lee, and has never seen "Arlington House" save in the disputed Duty Letter.
- ↑ The Old Puritan anecdote, as given in Barber, page 403, is as follows:
"The 19th of May, 1780, was a remarkable dark day. Candles were lighted in many houses; the birds were silent and disappeared, and the
