Chapter 31

_Departure from Sharpsburg Camp--The Old Woman of Sandy Hook--Harper's Ferry--South sewing Dragon's Teeth by shedding Old John's Blood--The Dutch Doctor and the Boar--Beauties of Tobacco--Camp Life on the Character--Patrick, Brother to the Little Corporal--General Patterson no Irishman--Guarding a Potatoe Patch in Dixie--The Preacher Lieutenant on Emancipation--Inspection and the Exhorting Colonel--The Scotch Tailor on Military Matters._

October was drawing to a close rapidly, when, at last, after repeated false alarms, the actual movement of the army commenced. No one, unless himself an old campaigner, can appreciate the feelings of the soldier at the breaking up of camp. Anxious for a change of scenery as he may be, the eye will linger upon each familiar spot, the quarters, the parade ground, and rocky bluff and wooded knoll, until memory's impress bears the lasting distinctness of a lifetime. Those leaving could not banish from their minds, even if disposed, the thought that, although but a temporary sojourn for them, it had proved to be the last resting-place of many of their comrades. The hospital, more dreaded than the field, had contributed its share to the mounds that dotted the hills from the strife of Antietam.

"There is not an atom of this earth But once was living man--"

was a day dream, doubtless, of the poetic boy of eighteen; but how suggestive it becomes, when we consider how many thousands and hundreds of thousands of mounds rising upon every hill in the border States, attest devotion to the cause of the Union, or treason, in this foulest of Rebellions.

The route lay, after passing the village of Sharpsburg, through a narrow valley, lying cosily between the spurs of two ridges that appeared to terminate at the Ferry. On either hand the evidences of the occupation of the country by a large army were abundant. Fences torn down, ground trampled, and fields destitute of herbage. The road bordering the canal, along which is built the straggling village of Sandy Hook, was crowded with the long wagon trains of the different Corps. A soldier could as readily distinguish the Staff from the Regimental wagons, as the Staff themselves from Regimental officers. The slick, well fed appearance of the horses or mules of Staff teams, usually six in number, owing to abundance of forage and half _loaded_ wagons, were in striking contrast with the four half fed, hide-bound beasts usually attached to the overloaded Regimental wagons. Order after order for the reduction of baggage, that would reduce field officers to a small valise apiece, while many line officers would be compelled to march without a change of clothing, did not appear to lessen the length of Staff trains. That the transportation was unnecessarily extensive, cannot be doubted. That the heaviest reduction could have been made with Head-quarter trains, is equally true.

"Grey coats one day and blue coats the next," said an old woman clad in homespun grey, who came out of a low frame house as the troops slowly made their way past the teams through the village of Sandy Hook.

"Right on this rock is where General Jackson rested hisself," continued the old woman.

"Were there many Rebs about?" inquired one of the men.

"Right smart of them, I reckon;" replied the old woman; "but Lord! what a lookin' set of critters. Elbows and knees out; many of them hadn't shoes, and half of them that had had their toes out. You boys are dandies to them. And tired too, and hungry. Gracious! the poor fellows, when their officers weren't about, would beg for anything almost to eat. Why, my daughter Sal saw them at the soap-fat barrel! They said they were nearly marched and starved to death. And their officers didn't look much better. Lord! it looks like a pic-nic party to see you blue coats, with your long strings of wagons, and all your other fixins. You take good care of your bellies, the way you haul the crackers and bacon. Old Jackson never waits for wagons. That's the way he gets around you so often."

"Look here, old woman," roared out one of the men, "you had better dry up."

"Yes, and he'll get around you again," continued the old woman in a louder key. "You think you're going to bag him, do you. You're some on baggin'; but he'll give you three days' start and beat you down the valley. They acted like gentlemen, too, didn't touch a thing without leave, and you fellows have robbed me of all I have."

"They were in 'My Maryland,' and wanted to get the people all straight," suggested one of the boys.

The old lady did not take the hint, but kept on berating the fresh men as they passed--taunting them by disparaging comparison with the Rebel troops. A neighbor, by informing them of the fact of her having two sons in the Rebel service, imparted the secret of her interest.

* * * * *

And there is the Ferry, so often pictured, or attempted to be, by pen and pencil. Either art has failed, and will fail, to do justice to that sublimely grand mountain scenery. Not quite three years ago, an iron old man, who perished with the heroism of a Spartan, or rather, to be just, the faith of a Christian; but little more than a year in advance of the dawn of the day of his hope, centred upon this spot the eyes of a continent. A crazy fanatic, was the cry, but--

"Thy scales, Mortality, are just To all that pass away."

Time will reveal that it was not the freak of a madman, but rather a step in the grand progress of universal emancipation, and that Old John had foundations for his purposed campaign, quite as substantial as those upon which better starred enterprises have succeeded.

"Lor, Massa, if Old John had only had these men," said a wench to one of Patterson's Captains, as he paused for a few moments while drilling his command at Charlestown, during that fruitless campaign, so formidable in preparation, and so much more disgraceful than that of Old John in its termination, for the latter, in his dying heroism, won the admiration of a world.

"Why, what could Old John have done with them?" replied the Captain.

"Golly, Massa," said the wench, with a knowing grin; "he would have walked right through Virginny, and he'd have had plenty of help too. I knows, many a nigger about here that didn't say nuthin', would have jined him."

"Why didn't they join him?"

"Lor, Massa, they didn't know it in time. Hadn't any chance. Massa wanted us to go see him hung; but only the youngsters went. We colored pussons neber forget Old John. No sah!"

The men wound their way as best they could beneath the precipitous and towering rocks of the Maryland Heights, through the teams that blocked up the road, and a short distance above the Railroad Bridge, filed to the left, and crossed upon the pontoons. As they passed the Engine House, the utmost endeavors of the officers could not prevent a bulge to the right, so great was the anxiety to see the scene of Old John's heroic but hopeless contest. Denounced by pro-slavery zealots as a murderer, by the community at large as a fanatic, who fifty years hence will deny him honorable place in the list of martyrs for the cause of eternal truth!

The town itself was almost a mass of ruins; both sides, at various stages of the war, having endeavored to effect its destruction. Another pontoon bridge was crossed, bridging the Shenandoah--sparkling on its rocky bed--the _Dancing Water_, as termed by the Aborigines, with their customary graceful appropriateness. To one fond of mountain scenery, and who is not? the winding road that follows the Shenandoah to its junction, then charmingly bends to the course of the Potomac, is intensely interesting. But why should an humble writer weary the reader's patience by expatiating upon scenery, the sight of which Jefferson declared well worth a visit across the Atlantic, at a day when such visits were tedious three month affairs, and uncertain at that? War now adds a bristling horror to the shaggy mountain tops, and from the hoarse throats of heavy cannon often "leap from rock to rock the beetling crags among" well executed counterfeits of "live thunder."

The Potomac is followed but a short distance, the road winding by an easy ascent up the mountain ridge, and descending as easily into a narrow and fruitful valley. In this valley, four miles from the Ferry, a halt was ordered, and the Division rested for the night and succeeding day, in a large and well sodded field.

"Gentlemen," said our Brigadier, in a sly, good-humored way, as he rode up to the field officers of the Regiment, "the field upon which you are encamped, and all the land, almost as far as you can see, on the left of yon fence, belong to a Rebel now holding the rank of Major in the Rebel service. All I need say, I suppose, gentlemen," and the General left to communicate the important information to the other Regiments of the Brigade. As a fine flock of sheep, some young cattle, a drove of porkers that from a rear view gave promise of prime Virginia hams, and sundry flocks of chickens, had been espied as the men marched into the field, the General's remarks were eminently practical and suggestive.

"Charlie, what's the state of the larder?" said the Major, with his usual thoughtfulness, addressing the cheerful mess cook.

"Some boiled pork and crackers. Poor show, sir!" Such fare, after a hard day's march, in sight of a living paradise of beef, mutton, pork, and poultry, would have been perfectly inexcusable; and forthwith, the Major, "the little Dutch Doctor," and a short, stoutly-built Lieutenant, all armed to the teeth, started off to reconnoitre, and ascertain in what position the Rebel property was posted. As they went they canvassed the respective merits of beef, mutton, pork and poultry, until a short grunt from a porker, as he crossed the Doctor's path, ended the discussion. The Major and Lieutenant cocked their pistols, but withheld firing, as they saw the Doctor prostrate, holding by both hands the hind leg of a patriarch of the flock.

"Oh, Heavens! we don't want that old boar!" cried out at once both the Major and Lieutenant.

"Goot meat, make strong, goot for health, very," said the Doctor, holding on with the grasp of a vice, while the boar fairly dragged him, face to the ground, "after the manner of all creeping things." The Doctor was in a fix. Help his companions would not give. He could not hold the boar by one hand alone. After being considerably bruised, he was compelled to release his hold, to his intense disgust, which he evinced as he raised himself up, puffing like a porpoise, by gesticulating furiously, and muttering a jargon in which the only thing intelligible was the oft-repeated word, "tam." A well-directed shot from the Major, shortly afterwards, brought down a royal "Virginia mutton," as the camp phrase is. Another from the Lieutenant grazed the rear of a fine young porker's ham; but considerable firing, a long chase, and many ludicrous falls occurred, before that pig was tightly gripped between the legs of the Lieutenant.

The expedition was so successful that the aid of some privates was called in to help carry to quarters the rich spoils of the chase. As for the Doctor,--after the refusal of assistance in his struggle, he walked homeward in stately but offended dignity, and shocked the Chaplain, as he was occasionally in the habit of doing, by still muttering "tam."

A person enjoying the comforts of home, testy as to the broiling of a mutton-chop perhaps, for real, unalloyed enjoyment of appetite should form one of a camp circle, toasting, at a blazing fire, as the shades of evening gather round, steaks freshly cut with a camp-knife from flesh that quivered with remaining life but a moment before, assisting its digestion by fried hardees, and washing both down by coffee innocent of cream. That is a feast, as every old campaigner will testify; but to be properly appreciated a good appetite is all essential. To attain that, should other resources fail, the writer can confidently recommend a march, say of about fifteen miles, over rough or dusty roads.

And then, as the appetites of the men are sated by the hardy provender of Uncle Sam, varied, as in this instance, by Virginia venison, and they respectively fall back and take to

"Sublime Tobacco! glorious in a pipe;"

what more pleasant than the discussion of the doings of the day, or of the times, the recital of oft-repeated and ever-gaining yarns, or the heart-stirring strains of national ballads, while each countenance is lit with the ever-varying glow of the fire.

Upon this evening not only Head-quarters but the Regiment was exultant in the feast upon the fat of a rebellious land. To add to their comfort several large stacks of hay and straw had been deprived of their fair proportions, and preparations had been made for the enjoyment of rest upon beds that kings would envy, could they but have the sleepers' sound repose.

The morrow had been set apart as a day of rest--a fact known to the Regiment, and their fireside enjoyment was accordingly prolonged.

The camp, more than any other position in life, develops the greatest inconsistencies in poor human nature. The grumbler of the day's march is very frequently the joker of the bivouac. The worse, at the expense of man's better qualities, are rapidly strengthened, and the least particle of selfishness, however concealed by a generous nature at the period of enlistment, fearfully increases its power with every day of service. The writer remembers well a small, slightly-built, bow-legged fellow, who would murmur without ceasing upon the route, continually torment his officers for privilege to fall out of ranks to adjust his knapsack, fasten a belt, or some such like purpose, who, on the halt, would amuse his comrades for hours in performing gymnastic feats upon out-spread blankets. Another, who at home flourished deservedly under the sobriquet of "Clever Billy," became, in a few brief months of service, the most surly, snappish, and selfish of his mess.

Pipe in mouth, their troubles are puffed away in the gracefully ascending smoke. Many a non-user of the weed envies in moody silence the perfect satisfaction resting upon the features of his comrade thus engaged. Non-users are becoming rare birds in the army. So universal is the habit, that the pipe appears to belong to the equipment, and the tobacco-pouch, suspended from a button-hole of the blouse, is so generally worn that one would suppose it to have been prescribed by the President as part of the uniform.

The crowd gathered about the Head-quarters had largely increased, and while luxuriating upon the straw, time passed merrily. The Colonel, who never let an opportunity to improve the discipline of his command pass unimproved, seized the occasion of the presence of a large number of officers to impress upon them the necessity of greater control of the men upon the march. The easy, open, but orderly route-step of the Regulars was alluded to--their occupying the road alone, and not spread out and straggling like a drove of cattle. A stranger seeing our Volunteers upon the march would not give them credit for the soldierly qualities they really possess. Curiosity, so rampant in the Yankee, tempts him continually to wander from the ranks to one or other side of the road.

"Well, Colonel," said a tall Lieutenant, "the Regulars look prim and march well, but they have done little fighting, as yet, in this Army of the Potomac."

"You forget the Peninsula," replied the Colonel.

"Oh, there they were caught unexpectedly, and forced into it. In this Corps they are always in reserve; and that's what their officers like,--everything in reserve but pay and promotion. It is rather doubtful whether they will fight."

"Ov coorse they'll fight," said the little Irish Corporal, half rising from his straw on the outskirts of the crowd; "Ov coorse they will. They're nearly all my own countrymen. I know slathers of them; and did you iver in your born days know an Irishman that wouldn't fight, anywhere, any time, and for anything, if he had anybody to fight?"

"And a quart of whiskey in him," interrupts the Adjutant. "As Burns says of the Scotch--

"'Wi' Tippeny they fear nae evil, Wi' Usquebagh they'll face the Devil.'"

"Now, don't be comparing an Irishman, if you plaze, Adjutant, to a scratch-back Scotchman. The raal Irishman has fire enough in his bluid; but there's no denying a glass of potheen is the stuff to regulate it. Talk about Rigulars or Volunteers fighting;--it's the officers must do their duty, and there's no fear thin of the men."

"What did you enlist for, anyway, Terence?" broke in a Second Lieutenant.

"It's aisy seeing that it wasn't for a Lieutenant's pay," retorted Terence, to the amusement of the crowd, and then, as earnestness gathered upon his countenance, he continued: "I enlisted for revinge, and there's little prospect of my seeing a chance for it."

"For revenge?" said several.

"Yis, for revinge. I had worked early and late at a liv'ry stable, like a nagur, to pay the passage money of my only brother to this country. Faith, he was a broth of a boy, the pride of all the McCarthy's,"--tears welled in his eyes as he continued,--"just three years younger than mysilf, a light, ruddy, nately put togither lad as iver left the bogs; and talk about fightin'!--the divil was niver in him but in a fight, and thin you'd think he was all divil. That was Patrick's sport, and fight he would, ivery chance, from the time whin he was a bit of a lad, ten years ould, and bunged the ould schoolteacher's eyes in the parish school-house. Will, he got a good berth in a saloon in the Bowery, where they used Patrick in claning out the customers whin they got noisy, and he'd do it nately too, to the satisfaction of his employer. He did well till a recruiting Sergeant--bad luck to him--that knew the McCarthys in the ould country, found him out, and they drank and talked about ould times, and the Sergeant tould him that the army was the place for Irishmen,--that there would be lots of fightin'. The chance of a fight took Patrick, and nixt day he left the city in a blouse, as Fourth Corporal in an Irish Rigiment, and a prouder looking chappie, as his own Captain tould me, niver marched down Broadway. And thin to think he was murthered by my own Gineral."

"Who? How was that?" interrupted half a dozen at once.

"Gineral Patterson, you see, to be shure."

"Why, Terence," broke in the Lieutenant, "you shouldn't be so hard upon General Patterson; he's of an Irish family."

"The Gineral an Irishman! Niver! Of an Irish family! must have been hundreds of years back, and the bluid spoiled long before it got into his veins, by bad whiskey or something worse. It takes the raal potheen, that smacks of the smoke of the still, to keep up the bluid of an Irishman. Rot-gut would ruin St. Patrick himself if he were alive and could be got to taste it. Gineral Patterson an Irishman! no, sir; or there would have been bluidy noses at Bunker's Hill or Winchester, and that would have saved some at Bull Run."

"On with your story, Terence," said the crowd.

"Beggin' your pardon, there's no story about it,--the blissid truth, ivery word of it.

"Will, you see, while our ould Colonel, under the Gineral's orders, had me guarding a pratie patch--"

"Set an Irishman to guard a potato patch!" laughed the Second Lieutenant.

"It wasn't much use," said Terence, smiling, "for they disappeared the first night, and the slim college student that was Sergeant of that relief was put under guard for telling the officer of the guard, next morning, that there had been a heavy dew that night, and it evaporated so fast that it took the praties along. We lived on praties next day, but the poor Sergeant had to foot the bill.

"Well, as I was going on to say, while I was helping guard a pratie patch, an ice-house, corn-crib, smoke-house, and other such things that were near our camp ground, and that belonged to a Rebel Colonel under Johnston;--Johnston himself was staling away with all his army to help fight the battle of Bull Run. Patrick--pace to his sowl--was in that battle and fought like a tiger, barrin' that he would have done better, as his Captain tould me, if he hadn't forgot the balls in his cartridge-box, and took to his musket like a shelaleh all day long. Patrick's regiment belonged to a Brigade that was ordered to keep Johnston in check, and there stood Patrick in line, like a true lad as he was, clubbing back the Butternuts, striking them right and left--maybe the fellows belonged to this same Rebel Colonel's regiment--until a round shot struck him full in the breast, knocking the heart out of as true an Irishman as iver lived, and killing dead the flower of the McCarthys.

"I didn't know it till we got to Baltimore, and thin whin I riflicted how the poor boy marched up to fight the bluidy Rebels, and how they killed him, my own brother, while I--I, who would have given my right hand to save him,--yis," said Terence, rising, and tears streaming from his eyes, "would have waded through fire and bluid to help the darlin', the pride of his mother,--I was guarding a Rebel Colonel's property, whin the whole of us, if we had fought Johnston, as we ought to have done, might have kept him back and saved our army, and that would have saved me my brother. And thin whin I remimbered how thick the Gineral was with the Rebel gentry, and how fine ladies with the divil in their eyes bowed to him in Charlestown, and spit at and cocked up their noses at us soldiers, while their husbands were off, maybe, murthering my brother; and how the Gineral, proud as a paycock on his prancing chestnut sorrel, tould us in the meadow that Johnston was too strong for us to attack, but that if he would come out from behind his big guns the Gineral would lay his body on the sod before he'd lave it, whin he intended his body to lie on a soft bed the rest of his life, and how he said and did all this while our men, and my brother among them, were being murthered by this same Johnston that he was sent to hould back,--I couldn't keep down my Irish bluid. I cursed him and all his tribe by all the Saints from St. Peter to St. Patrick, until good ould Father Mahan tould me, whin I confessed, that he was afraid I would swear my own sowl away, and keep Patrick in Purgatory; and the Father tould me that I should lave off cursin' Patterson, for the Americans thimselves would attend to that, and take to fighting the Rebels for revinge; and he said by way of incouragement that at the same time I'd be sarving God and my adopted country. And here I am, under another safe Commander. Four months and no fight,--nearly up to the ould First, that sarved three months without sight of a Rebel, barrin' he was a prisoner, or in citizen dress, like some we have left behind us."

"Boys, Terence tells the truth about Patterson's movements," said the tall Lieutenant. "The day before we left we were ordered to be ready to move in the morning, with three days' cooked rations. We were told that our Regiment was assigned a place in the advance, and it was semi-officially rumored that a flank attack would be made upon Winchester. At this day the whole affair appears ridiculous, as Johnston had at that very time left Winchester, leaving only a trifling show of force, and he never, at his best, had a force equal to Patterson's. Half of his troops were the raw country militia. But we under-officers were none the wiser. It was rumored that Bill McMullen's Rangers had found charts that informed the General of the extent and strength of the Rebel works and muster-rolls, that showed his force to be over 50,000. That those works had no existence to the extent alleged, and that the muster-rolls were false, are now well known. But that night it was all dead earnest with us. Rations were cooked and the most thorough preparations made for the expected work of the morrow. Sunrise saw the old First in line, ready for the move. Eight o'clock came; no move, Nine--Ten, and yet no move. Arms had been stacked, and the men lounged lazily about the stacks. Eagle eyes scanned the surrounding country to ascertain what other Brigades were doing. At length troops were seen in motion, but the head of the column was turned towards the Ferry. 'What does this mean?' was the inquiry that hastily ran from man to man; and still they marched towards the Ferry. By and by an aide-de-camp directed our Brigade to fall into the column, and we then discovered that the whole army was in line of march for the Ferry, with a formidable rear-guard to protect it from an enemy then triumphing at Bull Run.

"Well, Patterson's inertness, to speak of it tenderly, cost the country much blood, millions of money, and a record of disgrace; but it gave a Regiment of Massachusetts Yankees opportunity to whittle up for their home cabinets of curiosities a large pile of walnut timber which had formed John Brown's scaffold, and to make extensive inroads in prying with their bayonets from the walls of the jail in which he had been confined pieces of stone and mortar. Guards were put upon the Court House in which old John heard his doom with the dignity of a Cato, at an early date, or it would have been hewn to pieces. A fine crop of corn in full leaf was growing upon the field of execution, and for a space of ten feet from the road-side the leaves had been culled for careful preservation in knapsacks. The boys had the spirit. Their Commander lacked capacity or will to give it effect. A beggarly excuse was set up after the campaign was over,--that the time of service of many of the Regiments was about expiring, and that the men would not reënlist,--not only beggarly, but false. The great mass volunteered to remain as it was, with no prospect of service ahead. All would have stayed had the General shown any disposition for active work, or made them promise of a fight."

"Golly," said a tall, raw-boned Darkie, showing his ivories to a crowd of like color about him, as the fine band of the Fencibles played in front of the General's Head-quarters. "Dese Union boys beat de Mississippi fellurs all hollur playing Dixie."

Hardly a face was to be seen upon the streets, but those of these friendly blacks. They thronged about the camps, to be repulsed by stringent orders at all quarters. Property they were, reasoned the commander, and property must be respected. And it was; even pump handles were tied down and placed under guard. Oh! that a Ben Butler had then been in command, to have pronounced this living property contraband of war, and by that sharp dodge of a pro-slavery Democrat, to have given Uncle Sam the services of this property. Depend upon it, that would have ended campaigning in the valley of the Shenandoah, that store-house of Rebel supplies, as it has turned out to be; supplies too, gathered and kept up by the negroes that Patterson so carefully excluded from his lines.

"And would have saved us this march," says the Colonel, "a goose chase at any rate."

"Yes, and had the policy of using the negro been general at the commencement of this Rebellion, troops would not be in the field at this day," responded the Lieutenant.

"Why do they not now, come boldly out and acknowledge that slavery is a curse to any nation?" said the Preacher Lieutenant. "It caused the Rebellion, and its downfall would be the Rebellion's certain and speedy death. Thousands of years ago, the Almighty cursed with plagues a proud people for refusing to break the bonds of the slave. The day of miracles is past. But war, desolating war, is the scourge with which He punishes our country. The curse of blood is upon the land; by blood must it be expiated. We in the North have been guilty, in common with the whole country, in tolerating, aiding, and abetting the evil. We must have our proportion of punishment. Why cannot the whole country meet the issue boldly as one man, and atone for past offence by unanimity in the abolition of the evil?"

"On the nigger again," said his Junior Lieutenant, assuming, as he spoke, an oratorical attitude. "Why do you not go on and talk about them working out their own salvation, with muskets on their shoulders and bayonets by their sides, and with fear and trembling too, I have no doubt it would be. Carry out your Scripture parallels. Tell how the walls of Jericho fell by horns taken from the woolly heads of rams; but now that miracles are no more, how the walls of this Jericho of Rebeldom are destined to fall before the well-directed butting of the woolly heads themselves. You don't ride your hobby with a stiff rein to-night, Lieutenant."

The taunting air and strained comparison of the Lieutenant enlivened the crowd, but did not in the least affect the Senior, who calmly replied:

"If our Government does not arm the negro on the basis of freedom, the Rebels in their desperation will, and although we have the negro sympathy, we may lose it through delay and inattention, and in that event, prepare for years of conflict. The negroes, at the outset of this Rebellion, were ripe for the contest. Armies of thousands of them might have been in the field to-day. Now the President's Proclamation finds them removed within interior Rebel lines, and to furnish them arms, will first cost severe contests with the Rebels themselves."

The toil of the day and the drowsiness caused by huge meals, gradually dispersed the crowd; but the discussion was continued in quarters by the various messes, until their actual time of retiring.

* * * * *

"Inspection! inspection!" said the Adjutant, on the succeeding afternoon, to the Lieutenant-Colonel for the time being in command of the Regiment, handing him, at the same time, an order for immediate inspection. "Six inspections in two weeks before marching," continued the Adjutant, "and another after a day's march. I wonder whether this Grand Army of the Potomac wouldn't halt when about going into battle, to see whether the men had their shoe-strings tied?"

The Adjutant had barely ceased, when the Inspecting officer, the ranking Colonel of the Brigade, detailed specially for the duty, made his appearance. He was a stout, full-faced man of fifty or upwards, with an odd mixture in his manner of piety and pretension. Report had it that his previous life had been one of change,--stock-jobber, note-shaver, temperance lecturer, and exhorter--

"All things by turns, and nothing long."

The latter quality remained with him, and it was a rare chance that he could pass a crowd of his men without bringing it into play. His "talks," as the boys called them, were more admired than his tactics, and from their tone of friendly familiarity, he was called by the fatherly title of "Pap" by his Regiment, and known by that designation throughout the Brigade.

The Regiment was rapidly formed for inspection, and after passing through the ranks of the first Company, the Colonel pompously presented himself before its centre, and with sober tones and solemn look, delivered himself as follows:

"Boys, have your hearts right," the Colonel clapping, at the same time, his right hand over his diaphragm. "If your hearts are right your muskets will be bright." The men stared, the movement not being laid down in the Regulations, and not exactly understanding the connexion between the heart and a clean musket; but the Colonel continued, "the heart is like the mainspring of a watch, if it beats right, the whole man and all about him will be right. There is no danger of our failing in this war, boys. We have a good cause to put our hearts in. The Rebels have a bad cause, and their hearts cannot be right in it. Good hearts make brave men, brave men win the battles. That's the reason, boys, why we'll succeed."

"Can't see it!" sang out some irreverent fellow in the rear rank.

The Colonel didn't take the hint; but catching at the remark continued, "You do not need to see it, boys, you can feel whether your heart is right." This provoked a smile on the faces of the more intelligent of the officers and men, which the Colonel noticed. "No laughing matter, boys," he said emphatically, at the same time earnestly gesticulating, "your lives, your country, and your honor depend upon right hearts." And thus the old Colonel exhorted each Company previous to its dismissal, amusing some and mystifying others. The heart was his theme, and time or place, a court-martial or a review, did not prevent the introduction of his platitudes.

Said the Major, after inspection, "The Colonel, in the prominence he gives the heart in its control of military affairs, rather reverses a sentiment I once heard advanced by a little Scotch tailor, who had just been elected a militia colonel."

"Let's have it, Major," said the Adjutant.

"The little Scotchman," continued the Major, "had been a notorious drunkard and profane swearer. Through the efforts of a travelling Evangelist, he became converted and joined a prominent denomination. His conversion was a remarkable instance, and gave him rapid promotion and a prominent position in the church. While at his height, through some scheme of the devil, I suppose, he was elected colonel of militia. The elevation overcame him. Treat he must and treat he did, and to satisfy the admiring crowd in front of the bar drank himself, until reason left, preceded by piety, and his old vice of profanity returned, with seven-fold virulence. He was discovered by a brother of the church, steadying himself by the railing of the bar, and rehearsing, amid volleys of oaths, the fragments that remained in his memory of an old Fourth of July speech. 'Brother,' said his fellow church-member, as he gently nudged his arm. 'Brother!' in a louder key, and with a more vigorous nudge, 'have you forgotten your sacred obligations to the church, your position as a--'

"'The church!' echoed the tailor, all the blood of the MacGregor rising in his boots, with an oath that shocked the brother out of all hope--'What's the church to military matters?'"