The Orpheus C. Kerr Papers, Series 2

  LETTER LXXV.

  SETTING FORTH THE FALSE AND TRUE ASPECTS OF BEAMING OLD AGE RESPECTIVELY, AND SHOWING HOW THE UNBLUSHING CONFEDERACY MADE ANOTHER RAID.

  WASHINGTON, D. C., October 19th, 1862.

  It is a beautiful and improving thing, my boy, to see the wise andpolished mob of a great nation paying unmitigated reverence to fussygray hairs, and much shirt collar; and hence I never grew tired ofconsidering the dignified case of the Venerable Gammon, whom everybodyregards as the benign paternal relative of his country. When I seeGenerals, Senators, and other proprietors of Government property,hanging breathlessly upon the words of this sublime old man, just asthough such words were so many gallows, I feel the cause of Justicetypified to my mind's eye, and am myself enthusiastic enough to believethat hanging is too good for them. Whether at Willard's, the WhiteHouse, the Capitol, or in his native Mugville, the Venerable Gammon isever the same beneficent being, beaming blandly upon the whole universefrom above his ruffles, and paternally permitting it to exist in hispresence.

  The precise thing he has done in his fearfully long lifetime, my boy,to beget such an agony of love and worship from everybody, has not yetcome to the immediate knowledge of anybody; but he is the moss-grownoracle of the United States of America, and it gives me unspeakablesatisfaction to reproduce as follows, his benign letter of advice tothe idolized General of the Mackerel Brigade:

  MUGVILLE, July 4, 1776.

  DEAR SIRRAH,--Justly regarding you as the next President of the UnitedStates, and an honored successor of my old friend, Georgey Washington,I deem it proper, by reason of my great importance and infirmities, torepeat in writing with a pen what I have before spoken to you with mytongue--this supplement to my printed views (dated April the First) onthe highly inflamed condition of our glorious and distracted Union.

  To meet the expectations of a populace admiring my venerable shape, Ideem it consistent with my retiring modesty and infirmities to dictateto you the four plans you may pursue by way of making yourselfPresident of our distracted Commonwealth in 1865.

  I.--Throw off the old and assume a new designation--the sly old party;give the South entire control of the whole country, and, my wig uponit, we shall have no secession; but, on the contrary, an early returnof the entire Confederacy to Washington. Without some equally benignantmeasure, we shall be compelled to fight all the Border States and putthem down at once, instead of keeping two hundred thousand soldierspeaceably employed in making their loyalty continually sure.

  II.--Collect the war taxes outside of the States where the tax-payerslive, or declare upon paper that they are already collected.

  III.--Conquer the seceded States by the unheard-of agency of an actualarmy. I think this might be done in a few hundred years by a young andable general to be found on some railroad, with six hundred thousanddisciplined spades. Estimating a third of this number to remain forever stationary on the Potomac, and a loss of a still greater number byconsummate strategy and changings of base. The loss of chickens andcontrabands on the other side would be frightful, however great themorality of the mudsills.

  This conquest would cost money that might otherwise go to beautify theSouth, secure fifteen swearing and deeply-offended provinces, and beimmediately followed by a new election for President in 1865.

  IV.--Say to the Seceded States, in one of which I own some mortgages:"_How are you, Southern Confederacy?_"

  Deliberately, I remain, Your father and the country's, V. GAMMON.

  This touching letter, my boy, I recommend to your most prayerfulconsideration, as a paternal outpouring of shirt-collared old age.

  Old age! how beautiful art thou in the glory of thy spectacles, and thesublime largeness of thy stomach and manner. And yet, would you believeit, my boy? I am sometimes possessed of great doubtings as to thegenuineness of that majesty which makes a continually-looming VenerableShape such a great blessing to an imperiled land. Sometimes there comesto me a rickety vision of:

  AGE BLUNTLY CONSIDERED.

  As Age advances, ails and aches attend, Backs builded broadest burdensomely bend; Cuttingly cruel comes consuming Care, Dealing delusions, drivelry, despair.

  Empty endeavor enervately ends, Fancy forlornly feigns forgotten friends; Gout, grimly griping, gluttonously great, Hasten's humanity's hard-hearted hate.

  Intentions imbecile invent ideas Justly jocunding jolly jokers' jeers: Knowledge--keen kingdom knurlyably known-- Lingers, lamenting life's long lasting loan,

  Mammonly mumming, magnifying motes, Nurtures numb Nature's narrowest nursery notes, Opens old age's odious offering out-- Peevish punctilio, parrot-pining pout.

  Qualmishly querrying, quarrelsomely quaint, Rousing rife ridicules' repealed restraint; Speaking soft silliness--such shallow show That tottering toysters, tickled, titter too.

  Useless, ungainly unbeloved, unblest, Virtue's vague visor, vice's veiling vest, Wheezingly whimpering, wanting wisdom, wit, Xistence, Xigent, Xclaims--Xit!

  Youths, you're yelept youth's youngest; yet you'll Zestless zig-zaggers zanyable zealed.

  I exhibited that pleasing little poem to a Mackerel chap, whostuttered, my boy; and he came so near going into apoplexy through hisendeavors to read it, that I was obliged to make a joke, in order thathe might smile, relax, and recover.

  And now let your mind fly, like a wearied dove, to the celebratedArcadian scenes of festive Accomac, where the Mackerel Brigadecontinues to reconnoitre in force, and awaits the death of theConfederacy by old age. Men, my boy, who entered this strategic war inthe full bloom of youth, now go with stooping shoulders and totteringgait when they have a barrel of flour to carry, and the bloom hasdeparted from every part of them save the extreme tip of that handle ofthe human countenance which first meets the edge of an open door in thedark. Even the Mackerel brass-band begins to grow feeble, often makingpitiable attempts to execute stirring strains on his night key bugle,as though unconscious that by long disuse in his pocket it had becomeclogged with bread and cheese.

  There is, on the Southern border of Accomac, my boy, a solitary house,containing furniture and the necessaries of life, which the ConicSection of the Mackerel Brigade had been ordered to guard. It standsimmediately on the verdant banks of Awlkwyet River, where that streammust be at least ten inches deep; and as the first regular bridge isten miles below it, of course the Conic Section, to guard the house,was placed at the end of that bridge--it being a principle of nationalstrategy never to recognize any Confederate raid not made across aregular bridge.

  Now it chanced, that while the Conic Section at the bridge was taking ashort nap, having been up very late the night before; and while thebeloved General of the Mackerel Brigade was visiting a portion of hisbeautiful home-circle in Paris, that a very dirty Confederacy, ridingin a seedy go-cart, made his appearance on the bank of the riveropposite the house, and commenced to make a raid right through thewater to the shore this side. His geometrical steed wet his feetthereby, and the wheels of his squeaking vehicle were damped by thisbarbarian way of offering irregular opposition to the Government; butwhat cared he for the rules of civilized warfare, which are the onlyauthorized West Point editions? Like all his infatuated countrymen, hewas rendered less than strategic by the demon of Secession, and hecrossed by the unmilitary ford instead of by the military bridge.

  This is, indeed, heart-sickening.

  There was a Mackerel chap who slept in the house to take care of alarge black bottle, and when he heard the go-cart driving up before thedoor, he stuck his head out of the window, and says he:

  "What is it which you would have in these irregular proceedings, Mr.Stuart?"

  The Confederacy dismounted from his chariot, tied a bag of oats overhis charger's head, and says he:

  "I'm making a raid."


  The Mackerel waved his hand southward, and says he:

  "You'll find the bridge just below. Don't stay here," says theMackerel, earnestly, "or you'll exasperate the North to fury."

  Here the Confederacy made some remark in which the name of the Northand a profane expletive were connected very closely, and proceeded tobring from the house a hobby-horse which stood in the hall. Afterplacing this valuable article in his go-cart, he next brought out acooking-stove; closely following this with some chairs, a dining-table,two feather beds, a tea-set, four wine-glasses and some tumblers, alooking-glass, four sheets, two cottage bedsteads, a Brussels carpet,and a Maltese cat. With these and a few other exceptions, my boy, hemade no attempt to disturb private property; thereby proving that thePresident's Proclamation has already produced a wholesome effect in thedegenerate South.

  While this was going on, the vigilant Mackerel guard descendedprivately from a back window, and made a forced march to where theConic Section were watching something which looked like a man in theSouthern horizon--instantly making known the audacious raid of thethieving Confederacy, and asking whether the new levies of theExecutive's last call were likely to arrive early enough to takemeasures for the prevention of the capture of Washington.

  While the question was in debate, my boy, the beloved General of theMackerel Brigade arrived with his trunk and umbrella from Paris, andhaving caused it to be telegraphed to all the reliable morning journalsthat the Confederacy were now in a fair way to be captured alive, he atonce took measures to cut off the retreat of the latter. CaptainVilliam Brown, with Company 3, Regiment 5, was at once ordered toconstruct a pontoon bridge across the river some miles below, and watchit vigilantly day and night; Captain Bob Shorty and Colonel WobertWobinson, with the Anatomical Cavalry, were dispatched to takepossession of a railroad leading to Manassas; whilst Captain SamyuleSa-mith with the balance of the Conic Section, was commanded to make adetour of three hundred miles, and endeavor to reach the invaded housebefore midwinter set in.

  All these movements were in accordance with profound strategy, my boy,and cut off the Confederacy from retreat by every route in the world,except the insignificant one he came by.

  Satisfied that the war was going to end in about sixty days, afterwhich we should have time to defeat combined Europe, the Mackerel guardhastened back to the domicil, which he reached just in time to find theConfederacy topping his go-cart with some kindling-wood from the cellar.

  I regret to say, my boy--I blush for my species as I make theincredible revelation--that upon receiving the information of hissurrounding and probable strategic capture by the vigilant MackerelBrigade, the irreverent Confederacy burst into a hideous horse-laugh,and at once proceeded to appropriate the poor Mackerel chap's own shoesand stockings. With the deepest horror I record, that he also tweakedthe Mackerel's nose.

  "I did not intend this as a permanent invasion," says the impiousConfederacy, as he remounted his go-cart and turned his geometricalArabian toward the water again; "but I have just married a daughter ofSouth Carolina--one of two twins--and reckoned that I needed somethings to set up housekeeping. Farewell, foul Hessian," says theConfederacy, as he splashed through the water to the oppositebank--"fare thee well, and tell your fiendish ruler, that it issomewhat impossible to conquer the sunny South."

  The Mackerel chap gazed thoughtfully after the go-cart as itdisappeared on the other side of the balmy Awlkwyet stream, and sayshe: "Rail on, my erring brother; but if you'd only stayed here one moreweek, you might not have escaped thus for seven whole days. Had thearmy been insufficient to secure you," says the Mackerel to himself,"had the army been insufficient to secure you, why, there's the police."

  Raids, my boy, are so intrinsically irregular in their character, thatno provision can be made for them in a regular army; hence they aresometimes necessitated to take provisions for themselves as they go on.

  Yours, radiantly, ORPHEUS C. KERR.