The Orpheus C. Kerr Papers Volume I Part 16

"Hoss!" says Missouri, spitting with exquisite precision on one of De Mortimer's new boots. "No, I aint seen no hoss, my Fejee bruiser; but there's an all-fired big crow-roost down in that corner, I reckon; and it must be alive, for I heard the bones rattle when the wind blew."

My _valet_, Mr. De Mortimer, paid no heed to his satirical lowness, my boy, but proceeded majestically to where my gothic beast was eating the remains of a straw mattress. Brus.h.i.+ng a few crows from the backbone of the fond charger, upon which they were innocently roosting, he placed the saddle amids.h.i.+ps, and conducted the fiery stallion to my hotel.

Mounting in hot haste, I was about to start for Accomac, when the General of the Mackerel Brigade came down the steps in hot haste, and says he:

"Is the Army of the Potomac about to advance?"

"Why do you ask?" says I.

"Thunder!" says he, "I've been so long in one spot that I was going to get out my naturalization papers as a citizen of Arlington Heights.

Ah!" says he, with a groan, "when the advance takes place I shall be too old to enjoy it."

I asked him why he didn't make arrangements to have his grandson take his place, if he should become superanuated before the advance took place; and he said that he be dam.

On reaching Accomac, my boy, I found the Conic Section of the Mackerel Brigade reconnoitering in force after a pullet they had seen the night before. Which they couldn't catch it.

Captain Villiam Brown, my boy, has his head quarters in a house with the attic and cellar on the same floor. I found two fat pickets playing poker on the roof, six first cla.s.s pickets doing up Old Sledge on the rail-fence in front of the door, and eight consumptive pickets eating a rooster belonging to the Southern Confederacy on the roof of a pig-pen.

As I entered the airy and commodious apartment of the commander-in chief, I beheld a sight to make the muses stare like the behemoth of the Scriptures, and cause genius to take another nip of old rye. There was the cantankerous captain, my boy, seated on a keg of gunpowder, with his head laid sideways on a table; one hand grasping a bottle half full of the Oath, and the other writing something on a piece of paper laid at right angles with his nose.

"Hallo, my interesting infant," says I, "are you drawing a map of Pensacola for an enlightened press?"

"Ha!" says Villiam, starting up, and eyeing me closely through the bottom of a bottle, "you behold me in the agonies of composition. Read this poickry," says he, "and if it aint double X with the foam off, where's your Milton?"

I took the paper, my boy, which resembled a specimen-card of dead flies, and read this poem:

"The G.o.d of Bottles be our aid, When rebels crack us; We'll bend the bottle-neck to him, And he will Bacchus.

"By Capt. VILLIAM BROWN, Eskevire."

I told Villiam that everything but the words of his poem reminded me of Longfellow, and says he:

"Don't mention my undoubted genius in public; because if Seward knew that I wrote poickry, he'd think I wanted to be President in 1865, and he'd get the Honest Old Abe to remove me. I think," says Villiam, abstractedly, "that the Honest Old Abe is like a big b.u.mble bee with his tail cut off, when his Cabinet comes humming around him."

Villiam once stirred up the monkeys in a menagerie, my boy, and his metaphors from Natural History are chaste.

At this moment a file of the Mackerel Brigade came in, bringing a son of Africa, who looked like a bottle of black ink wrapt up in a dirty towel, and a citizen of Accomac, who claimed him as his slave.

"Captain," says the citizen of Accomac, "this n.i.g.g.e.r belongs to me, and I want him back. Besides, he stole a looking-gla.s.s from me, and has got it hid somewheres."

Villiam smiled like a pleased clam, and says he: "You say he stole a looking-gla.s.s?"

"I reckon," says Accomac.

"Prisonier!" says Villiam, to the Ethiop, "did you ever see the devil?"

"Nebber, sar, since missus died."

"Citizen of Accomac," says Villiam, sternly, "you have told a whopper; and I shall keep this child of oppression to black the boots of the United States of America. You say he stole a looking-gla.s.s. He says he has never seen the devil. Observe now," says Villiam, argumentatively, "how plain it is, that if he _had_ even _looked_ at your looking-gla.s.s, he _must_ have seen the devil about the same time."

The citizen of Accomac saw that his falsehood was discovered, my boy, and returned to the bosom of his family cursing like a rifled parson.

Villiam then adjourned the court for a week, and sent the contraband out to enjoy the blessings of freedom, digging trenches.

It is pleasing, my boy, to see our commanders dispensing justice in this manner; and I don't wonder at the President's wanting to abolish the Supreme Court.

Yours, judicially,

ORPHEUS C. KERR.

LETTER XXIII.

CONCERNING BRITISH NEUTRALITY AND ITS COSMOPOLITAN EFFECTS, WITH SOME ACCOUNT OF HOW CAPTAIN BOB SHORTY LOST HIS COMPANY.

WAs.h.i.+NGTON, D.C., December 20th, 1861.

When Britain first, at Napoleon's command, my boy, arose from out the azure main, this was her charter, her charter of the land, that Britains never, never, never shall be slaves as long as they have a chance to treat everybody else like n.i.g.g.e.rs. Suffer me also to remark, that, Britannia needs no bulwarks, no towers along the steep; her march is o'er the mountain wave, her home is on the deep--where she keeps up her neutrality by smuggling contraband Southern confederacies, and swearing like a hard-sh.e.l.l chaplain when Uncle Sam's ocean pickets overhaul her.

Albion's neutrality is waking up a savage spirit in the United States of America, as you will understand from the following Irish Idle which was written

PRO PAT-RIA.

Two Irishmen out of employ, And out at the elbows as aisily, Adrift in a grocery-store Were smoking and taking it lazily.

The one was a broth of a boy, Whose cheek-bones turned out and turned in again, His name it was Paddy O'Toole-- The other was Misther McFinnigan.

"I think of enlistin'," says Pat, "Because do you see what o'clock it is; There's nothin' adoin' at all But drinkin' at Mrs. O'Docharty's.

It's not until after the war That business times will begin again, And fightin's the duty of all"-- "You're right, sir," says Misther McFinnigan.

"Bad luck to the rebels, I say, For kickin' up all of this bobbery, They call themselves gintlemen, too, While practin' murder and robbery; Now if it's gintale for to steal, And take all your creditors in again, I'm glad I'm no gintleman born"-- "You're right, sir," says Misther McFinnigan.

"The spalpeens make bould to remark Their chivalry couldn't be ruled by us; And by the same token I think They're never too smart to be fooled by us.

Now if it's the nagurs they mane Be chivalry, then it's a sin again To fight for a cause that is black"-- "You're right, sir," says Misther McFinnigan.

"A nagur's a man, ye may say, And aiqual to all other Southerners; But chivalry's made him a brute, And so he's a monkey to Northerners; Sure, look at the poor cratur's heels, And look at his singular s.h.i.+n again; It's not for such gintlemen fight"-- "You're right, sir," says Misther McFinnigan.

"The nagur States wanted a row, And now, be me sowl, but they've got in it!

They've chosen a bed that is hard, However they shtrive for to cotton it.

I'm thinkin', when winter comes on They'll all be inclined to come in again; But then we must bate them at first"-- "You're right, sir," says Misther McFinnigan.

"Och hone! but it's hard that a swate Good-lookin' young chap like myself indade, Should loose his ten s.h.i.+llins a day Because of the throuble the South has made: But that's just the raison, ye see, Why I should help Union to win again It's that will bring wages once more"-- "You're right, sir," says Misther McFinnigan.

"Joost mind what ould England's about, A sendin' her throops into Canaday; And all her ould s.h.i.+ps on the coast Are ripe for some treachery any day.

Now if she should mix in the war-- Be jabers! it makes me head spin again!

_Ould Ireland would have such a chance!_"-- "You're right, sir," says Misther McFinnigan.