Chapter 30
"That cotton-gin I haven't paid for yet-- The Yankee trusted for it, dear, you know, And it's a most (hic) 'stremely doubtful thing, Whether it's ever used again, or no.
"If Yankee's agent calls while I am gone, It's my (hic) 'spress command and wish, that you Denounce him for an abolition spy, And have him hung before his note is due.
"That octoroon--who made you jealous, love-- Who sews so well and is so pale a thing; She keeps her husband, Sambo, from his work-- You'd better sell her--well, for what she'll bring.
"In case your purse runs low while I'm away-- There's Dinah's children--two (hic) 'spensive whelps; They won't bring much the way the markets are, But then you know how every little helps.
"And there's that Yankee schoolmistress, you know, Who taught our darlings how to read and spell; Now don't (hic) 'spend a cent to pay _her_ bill; If she aren't tarred and feathered, she'll do well!
"And now, my dear, I go where booty calls, I leave my whisky, cotton-crop, and thee; Pray, that in battle I may not (hic) 'spire, And when you lick the n.i.g.g.e.rs think of me.
"If on some mournful summer afternoon They should bring home to you your warrior dead, Inter me with a toothpick in my hand, And write a last (hic) _jacet_ o'er my head."
We found this in the shed lately used by the chivalric Constarveracy as a guard-house, my boy, and read it with deep emotion.
Yours, Mana.s.sastonished,
ORPHEUS C. KERR.
LETTER x.x.xVI.
CONCERNING THE WEAKNESSES OF GREAT MEN, THE CURIOUS MISTAKE OF A FRATERNAL MACKEREL, AND THE REMARKABLE ALLITERATIVE PERFORMANCE OF CAPTAIN VILLIAM BROWN.
WAs.h.i.+NGTON, D.C., March 20th, 1862.
When a wise, benign, but not altogether Rhode-Island Providence saw fit to deal out a few mountains to Eastern Tennessee and Western Virginia, my boy, it is barely possible that Providence had an eye to the present crisis of our subtracted country, and intended to furnish the coming Abe with a fit place for the lofty accommodation of such great men as were not in immediate demand among the politicians. I am not topographical by nature, my boy; I never went up to the top of the White Mountains to see the sun rise, and didn't see; nor did I ever scale Mount Blanc for the purpose of allowing a fog to settle on my lungs; but it's my private opinion, my boy, my private opinion, that, were it not for the perpendicular elevations of the earth's surface in the States named, it would be necessary for the honest Old Abe either to turn General Fremont into a reduced Consul, and commission him to furnish proofs of the nation's reverence for the name of Lafayette, or coop him up somewhere in solitary grandeur, like a rabbit in a Warren.
"Great men," says the General of the Mackerel Brigade, as he and I were looking at some sugar together, the other night, through concave gla.s.ses--"great men," says he, "are like the ears of black-and-tan terriers; they are good for ornaments, but you must cut off some of them when you would give them rats. Thunder!" says the general, taking a perpendicular view of the sugar--"if we didn't cut off great men occasionally, there'd be more presidential nominations
But you have yet to learn, my boy, what was _the_ great reason for sending Fremont to the everlasting hills. On Tuesday I asked a knowing veteran at Willard's what it really was. He looked at me for a moment in immovable silence; then he softly placed his spoon-gymnasium on a table, looked cautiously in all directions, crept up to my ear on tiptoe, and says he:
"_Kerridges!_"
"Son of a bottle!" says I, "your information is about as intelligible as the ordinary remarks of Ralph Waldo Emerson."
The knowing veteran suffered his nose to take a steam-bath for a moment, and then says he:
"Kerridges! Kerridges with six horses and the American flag flying out of the back window. Fremont's great mistake at the West was kerridges--_and_ six horses. Did he wish to buy some shoe-strings for his babes--'Captain Poneyowiski,' says he to his chamberlain, 'order the second steward to tell the scarlet-and-grey groom to send the kerridge and six horses round to the door, with a full band on the box.' Did he wish to make a call on the next block and obtain some Bath note-paper--'General Nockmynoseoff,' says he to his first esquire in waiting, 'issue a proclamation to my Master in Chancery to instantly command the Master of the Horse to get ready the kerridge with six horses, and send the Life-Guard to clear the way.' In fact," says the knowing veteran, frowning mysteriously, "it is rumored that when he came home from Debar's theatre one night, and found the front door of his head-quarters accidentally locked, he instantly ordered up the kerridge _and_ six horses, to take him round to the back entrance.
Now," says the knowing veteran, suddenly striking the table a gla.s.s blow that splashed, and a.s.suming an air of embittered argument--"they've sent him to the mountains to suppress his kerridge."
This explanation, my boy, may be all a fiction, but certain it is that General Fremont has not the carriage he had six months ago.
On Wednesday the gothic steed Pegasus bore me once more to Mana.s.sas, where I found the Mackerel Brigade vowing vengeance for the recent rebel atrocities, of which I found many outrageous evidences.
Just as I arrived on the ground, my boy, a Mackerel chap came running out of a deserted rebel tent with a round object in his hand, and immediately commenced to tear his hair and speak the language of the Sixth Ward.
"My brother! my brother!" says he, eyeing his horrible trophy with tearful emotion. "O! that I should live to see your beloved skull turned into a cheese-box by rebels! You was a Boston alderman, a moral man, and a candidate for the Legislature, before you came to this here horrid war to be killed by rebels, and have your skull aggravated into a secession utensil."
Here the General of the Mackerel Brigade glanced at the heart-sickening trophy, and says he to the Mackerel chap:
"Why, you poor ignorant cuss! that there is nothing but a cocoanut-sh.e.l.l hollowed out."
"Is it?" says the inferior Mackerel, brightening up, "is it? Well,"
says he, feelingly, "I took it for the skull of my brother, the Boston Alderman--it's so hard and thick."
These beautiful displays of fraternal emotion are quite frequent, my boy, and are calculated to shed a l.u.s.tre of sanct.i.ty over the discoveries of our troops.
The capture of Richmond being deferred until the younger drummers of the brigade are old enough to vote in that city, I found Captain Villiam Brown and Captain Bob Shorty seated at a table in a tent--the former being engaged with a pen and a decanter, while the latter drew a map of the campaign with a piece of lemon-peel dipped in something fragrant.
It was beautiful to look at these two slas.h.i.+ng heroes, as they sat there in the genial glare of canvas-strained noon-day, with a quart vessel between them.
"Comrade," says Captain Bob Shorty to me, cordially, "this here is what we call intellectual relaxation, with a few liquid vowels to make it consonant with our tastes."
"Yes!" says Captain Villiam Brown, with a fascinating and elaborate wink at the decanter, "the physical man having taken Mana.s.sas, the human intelleck is now in airy play. Ah!" says Villiam, majestically pa.s.sing me the disentangled curl-paper on which he had been writing, "read what I have penned for the perusal of the United States of America."
I grasped the doc.u.ment, my boy, and found on it inscribed the following efficacious effusion:
FLOYD.
Felonious Floyd, far-famed for falsifying, Forever first from Federal forces flying, From fabrications fanning Fortune's flame, Finds foul Fugacity fact.i.tious Fame.
Fool! facile Fabler! Fugitive flagitious!
Fear for Futurity, Filcher fict.i.tious!
Fame forced from Folly, finding fawners fled, Feeds final Failure--failure fungus-fed.
By CAPTAIN VILLIAM BROWN, Eskevire.
"Well, my juvenile Union-blue," says Villiam, smiling like a successful cherubim, "what do you think of that piece of American intelleck?"
"I think," says I, "that it is worthy of an F. F. V."
What followed, my boy, is none of your business, though a sentry near by subsequently observed that he heard the sound of soft, mellifluous gurgles come from the interior of the tent.
Poetry, my boy, is man's best gift; and that, I suppose, is the reason why it is so popular in young women's boarding-schools.
Yours, in particular metre,
ORPHEUS C. KERR.
LETTER x.x.xVII.