Part 58 (1/2)
I felt, I swon, ez though it wuz a dreffle kind o' privilege Atrampin' round thru Boston streets among the gutter's drivelage; I act'lly thought it wuz a treat to hear a little drummin', An' it did bonyfidy seem millanyum wuz acomin'
Wen all on us got suits (darned like them wore in the state prison) An' every feller felt ez though all Mexico wuz hisn.[P]
[Footnote M: i hait the Site of a feller with a muskit as I du pizn But their _is_ fun to a cornwallis I aint agoin' to deny it.--H. B.]
[Footnote N: he means Not quite so fur I guess.--H. B.]
[Footnote O: the ignerant creeter means Sekketary; but he ollers stuck to his books like cobbler's wax to an ile-stone.--H. B.]
[Footnote P: it must be aloud that thare's a streak o' nater in lovin' sho, but it sartinly is 1 of the curusest things in nater to see a rispecktable dri goods dealer (deekon off a chutch mayby) ariggin' himself out in the Weigh they du and struttin' round in the Reign aspilin' his trowsis and makin' wet goods of himself. Ef any thin's foolisher and moor d.i.c.klus than militerry gloary it is milishy gloary.--H.
B.]
This 'ere's about the meanest place a skunk could wal diskiver (Saltillo's Mexican, I b'lieve, fer wut we call Salt-river); The sort o' trash a feller gits to eat doos beat all nater, I'd give a year's pay fer a smell o' one good blue-nose tater; The country here thet Mister Bolles declared to be so charmin'
Throughout is swarmin' with the most alarmin' kind o' varmin.
He talked about delis.h.i.+s froots, but then it wuz a wopper all, The holl on't 's mud an' p.r.i.c.kly pears, with here an' there a chapparal; You see a feller peekin' out, an', fust you know, a lariat Is round your throat an' you a copse, 'fore you can say, ”Wut air ye at?”[Q]
You never see sech darned gret bugs (it may not be irrelevant To say I've seen a _scarabus pilularius_[R] big ez a year old elephant,) The rigiment come up one day in time to stop a red bug From runnin' off with Cunnle Wright,--'t wuz jest a common _cimex lectularius_.
[Footnote Q: these fellers are verry proppilly called Rank Heroes, and the more tha kill the ranker and more Herowick tha bek.u.m.--H. B.]
[Footnote R: it wuz ”tumblebug” as he Writ it, but the parson put the Latten instid. i sed tother maid better meeter, but he said tha was eddykated peepl to Boston and tha wouldn't stan' it no how. idnow as tha _wood_ and idnow _as_ tha wood.--H. B.]
One night I started up on eend an' thought I wuz to hum agin, I heern a horn, thinks I it's Sol the fisherman hez come agin, _His_ bellowses is sound enough,--ez I'm a livin' creeter, I felt a thing go thru my leg,--'t wuz nothin' more 'n a skeeter!
Then there's the yaller fever, tu, they call it here el vomito,-- (Come, thet wun't du, you landcrab there, I tell ye to le' _go_ my toe!
My gracious! it's a scorpion thet's took a s.h.i.+ne to play with 't I darsn't skeer the tarnal thing fer fear he'd run away with 't.)
Afore I come away from hum I hed a strong persuasion Thet Mexicans worn't human beans,[S]--an ourang outang nation, A sort o' folks a chap could kill an' never dream on't arter, No more 'n a feller 'd dream o' pigs thet he hed hed to slarter; I'd an idee thet they were built arter the darkie fas.h.i.+on all, An' kickin' colored folks about, you know, 's a kind o' national; But wen I jined I worn't so wise ez thet air queen o' Sheby, Fer, come to look at 'em, they aint much diff'rent from wut we be, An' here we air ascrougin' 'em out o' thir own dominions, Ashelterin' 'em, ez Caleb sez, under our eagle's pinions, Wich means to take a feller up jest by the slack o' 's trowsis An' walk him Spanish clean right out o' all his homes an' houses; Wal, it doos seem a curus way, but then hooraw fer Jackson!
It must be right, fer Caleb sez it's reg'lar Anglosaxon.
The Mex'cans don't fight fair, they say, they piz'n all the water, An' du amazin' lots o' things thet isn't wut they ough' to; Bein' they haint no lead, they make their bullets out o' copper An' shoot the darned things at us, tu, wich Caleb sez aint proper; He sez they'd ough' to stan' right up an' let us pop 'em fairly, (Guess wen he ketches 'em at thet he'll hev to git up airly,) Thet our nation's bigger'n theirn an' so its rights air bigger, An' thet it's all to make 'em free thet we air pullin' trigger, Thet Anglo Saxondom's idee 's abreakin' 'em to pieces, An' thet idee's thet every man doos jest wut he d.a.m.n pleases; Ef I don't make his meanin' clear, perhaps in some respex I can, I know thet ”every man” don't mean a n.i.g.g.e.r or a Mexican; An' there's another thing I know, an' thet is, ef these creeturs, Thet stick an Anglosaxon mask onto State-prison feeturs, Should come to Jaalam Centre fer to argify an' spout on't, The gals 'ould count the silver spoons the minnit they cleared out on't.
[Footnote S: he means human beins, that's wut he means, i spose he kinder thought tha wuz human beans ware the Xisle Poles comes from.--H. B.]
This goin' ware glory waits ye haint one agreeable feetur, An' ef it worn't fer wakin' snakes, I'd home agin short meter; O, wouldn't I be off, quick time, ef't worn't thet I wuz sartin They'd let the daylight into me to pay me fer desartin'!
I don't approve o' tellin' tales, but jest to you I may state Our ossifers aint wut they wuz afore they left the Baystate; Then it wuz ”Mister Sawin, sir, you're middlin' well now, be ye?
Step up an' take a nipper, sir; I'm dreffle glad to see ye”; But now it's ”Ware's my eppylet? here, Sawin, step an' fetch it!
An' mind your eye, be thund'rin' spry, or, d.a.m.n ye, you shall ketch it!”
Wal, ez the Doctor sez, some pork will bile so, but by mighty, Ef I hed some on 'em to hum, I 'd give 'em link.u.m vity, I'd play the rogue's march on their hides an' other music follerin'-- But I must close my letter here, fer one on 'em 's ahollerin', These Anglosaxon ossifers,--wal, taint no use ajawin', I'm safe enlisted fer the war,
Yourn,
Birdofredom Sawin
.
[Those have not been wanting (as, indeed, when hath Satan been to seek for attorneys?) who have maintained that our late inroad upon Mexico was undertaken, not so much for the avenging of any national quarrel, as for the spreading of free inst.i.tutions and of Protestantism. _Capita vix duabus Anticyris medenda!_ Verily I admire that no pious sergeant among these new Crusaders beheld Martin Luther riding at the front of the host upon a tamed pontifical bull, as, in that former invasion of Mexico, the zealous Gomara (sp.a.w.n though he were of the Scarlet Woman) was favored with a vision of St. James of Compostella, skewering the infidels upon his apostolical lance. We read, also, that Richard of the lion heart, having gone to Palestine on a similar errand of mercy, was divinely encouraged to cut the throats of such Paynims as refused to swallow the bread of life (doubtless that they might be thereafter incapacitated for swallowing the filthy gobbets of Mahound) by angels of heaven, who cried to the king and his knights,--_Seigneurs, tuez! tuez!_ providentially using the French tongue, as being the only one understood by their auditors. This would argue for the pantoglottism of these celestial intelligences, while, on the other hand, the Devil, _teste_ Cotton Mather, is unversed in certain of the Indian dialects. Yet must he be a semeiologist the most expert, making himself intelligible to every people and kindred by signs; no other discourse, indeed, being needful, than such as the mackerel-fisher holds with his finned quarry, who, if other bait be wanting, can by a bare bit of white rag at the end of a string captivate those foolish fishes. Such piscatorial oratory is Satan cunning in. Before one he trails a hat and feather, or a bare feather without a hat; before another, a Presidential chair, or a tidewaiter's stool, or a pulpit in the city, no matter what. To us, dangling there over our heads, they seem junkets dropped out of the seventh heaven, sops dipped in nectar, but, once in our mouths, they are all one, bits of fuzzy cotton.
This, however, by the way. It is time now _revocare gradum_.
While so many miracles of this sort, vouched by eyewitnesses, have encouraged the arms of Papists, not to speak of Echetlaeus at Marathon and those _Dioscuri_ (whom we must conclude imps of the pit) who sundry times captained the pagan Roman soldiery, it is strange that our first American crusade was not in some such wise also signalized.
Yet it is said that the Lord hath manifestly prospered our armies. This opens the question, whether, when our hands are strengthened to make great slaughter of our enemies, it be absolutely and demonstratively certain that this might is added to us from above, or whether some Potentate from an opposite quarter may not have a finger in it, as there are few pies into which his meddling digits are not thrust.
Would the Sanctifier and Setter-apart of the seventh day have a.s.sisted in a victory gained on the Sabbath, as was one in the late war? Or has that day become less an object of his especial care since the year 1697, when so manifest a providence occurred to Mr. William Trowbridge, in answer to whose prayers, when he and all on s.h.i.+pboard with him were starving, a dolphin was sent daily, ”which was enough to serve 'em; only on _Sat.u.r.days_ they still catched a couple, and on the _Lord's Days_ they could catch none at all”?
Haply they might have been permitted, by way of mortification, to take some few sculpins (those banes of the salt-water angler), which unseemly fish would, moreover, have conveyed to them a symbolical reproof for their breach of the day, being known in the rude dialect of our mariners as _Cape Cod Clergymen_.
It has been a refreshment to many nice consciences to know that our Chief Magistrate would not regard with eyes of approval the (by many esteemed) sinful pastime of dancing, and I own myself to be so far of that mind, that I could not but set my face against this Mexican Polka, though danced to the Presidential piping with a Gubernatorial second. If ever the country should be seized with another such mania _de propaganda fide_, I think it would be wise to fill our bombsh.e.l.ls with alternate copies of the Cambridge Platform and the Thirty-nine Articles, which would produce a mixture of the highest explosive power, and to wrap every one of our cannon-b.a.l.l.s in a leaf of the New Testament, the reading of which is denied to those who sit in the darkness of Popery.