119. CXIX.
THE OCTOBER ELECTIONS. — THE EFFECT THE
RESULT PRODUCED IN KENTUCKY.
Confedrit × Roads (wich is in the Stait uv Kentucky), }
October 14, 1866.
[1]
There is mournin in Kentucky. The results of the elections
in Ohio, Injeany, Pennsylvany, and Iowa reached me
yesterday through a Louisville paper, wich wuz dropped off
the cars at Secessionville, wich is the nearest station to us, and
wich, I hapnin to be there, I picked up.
[ILLUSTRATION]
NASBY EXCITED OVER THE NEWS. Page 338.
[Description: 635EAF. Illustration page. A man holding a newspaper opened in
front of him runs next to a railroad tracks.]
Ohio — 40,000 Ablishin! Injeany — 20,000 Ablishin! Pennsylvany
— 20,000 Ablishin! Iowa — 30,000 Ablishin!
Ablishin! Wat a dreery waste uv Ablishin! Not a single
oasis uv Dimocrisy anywhere, — nary Aryrat on wich our ark
kin rest in safety, — but all around us the mad waves uv Ablishnism
rearin their crested heads muchly.
I felt it my dooty to make this fact known to my neighbors;
for, sposin that His Serene Highness' trip wood secure us enuff
deestricts to make the next Congress safe, and consekently
make us certin uv admission, they hed been makin arrangements
for restorin things to their normal condishun, ez they
were before the war.
In fact, two weeks before, in view of the expected success
uv the Democracy, a meetin hed bin held on the subject. Some
wuz for at once seezin the niggers wherever they cood be
found, and puttin em at work; but the conservatives overruled
this. They held that slavery hed bin abolished, and that it
ought not to be restored; in fact, that, to act in good faith, it
cood not be reëstablished. Deekin Pogram announced a plan.
The town authorities shood pass a ordinance for the proper
government uv the niggers. Their good and ourn demanded
it. For instance, they shood not be permitted to be out after
7 o'clock, P. M., in the evenin; they shoodent leave the plantation
onto wich they wuz employed; they shood work every
day till 7; and to do away with the pernicious work uv the
Freedmen's Bureau, no man and wife wich hed bin married by
a chaplin uv the Bureau, or by any one else, shood be employed
on the same plantashen, and also no father or mother and child.
Sich ez violated these ordinances shood be arrested by anybody,
and fined; and in default uv payment uv the fine and
costs, shood be sold to the person who wood take his or her
labor for the shortest number uv years, and pay the fine and
costs aforesed. “Ez a conservative,” sed the Deekin, “I sejest
this plan.”
“Do yoo want to know my definition uv the word `conservative'?”
sed Joe Bigler, a returned Confederate soljer, who, I
bleeve, hez seen enuff uv war. “It's a man who goes a roundabout
way to do a devlish mean thing. Deekin, why can't yoo
go to the devil by a straight road, ez I do?”
The interupshen uv the demoralized wretch wuzn't notist;
and ez the trustees uv the township wuz all present, the ordinance
wuz passed, and that night two thirds uv the niggers
within five miles uv the Corners wuz arrested and sold, and
within two weeks every one hed bin capcherd.
I hied me to the Corners, and the first man I saw was Bascom,
the grocery keeper, engaged in the congenial biznis uv
tappin a barrel uv contentment, wich he hed just receeved. I
wuz a goin to tell him the dread intelligence, when he caught
site uv me. “Taste that, Parson,” sed he, holdin out a tin
dipper full. I drank it off, and one look at him onmand me.
“Kin I o'ercloud that smilin cheek?” thot I, ez, in a fit uv
absent-mindednis, — wich I bev every now and then, — I held
out the empty dipper to be filled agin, wich it wuz. “No! for
a time he shel be spared;” and I borrered his mule, and rode
away pensively.
I wuz goin fust to Deekin Pogram's, for he wuz the most
interested uv eny in the settlement. After the meetin mentioned
above, the Deekin hed caused the arrest uv sich niggers
ez he cood ketch, and had had em fined in sums uv $275 and
uppards, wich bein unable, ez a rool, to pay the fine, he hed
kindly bid em in.
He hed picked up, here and there, all uv his old servants,
ceptin those which hed bin killed in the army, and the few misguided
ones wich hed made their way North, and that mornin
the plantashen wuz to be reconstructed upon the old patriarkle
system. Mrs. Deekin Pogram wuz marshellin four uv the likeliest
wenches I ever saw in the kitchen; his son Tom wuz
chuckin a yaller girl under the chin, wich hed bin born on the
place about eighteen years before, and wich, owin to a unfortunate
resemblance to the Deekin, hed caused a onpleasantnis
between him and his wife, wich ended in the loss uv the most
uv his hair, and the sellin uv the girl's mother to Noo Orleans.
The two girls hed each their waitin-maids, and wuz a puttin
them through their paces. There hed bin some trouble in
gittin em reconstructed, it bein deemed necessary to take the
conseet out uv em, wich they wuz all a doin. Ez I rode up,
the old lady hed jest knocked one uv em down with a fire-shovel,
and wuz dancin a Highland fling onto her prostrate
body. Almira, the oldest gal, hed her fingers in the wool uv
her gal; and tother one wuz a thumpin hern to redose her to
her proper level; and the Deekin hisself wuz a deelin with one
ongrateful wretch, who objected to bein put to work on them
terms, not realizin that the Bureau was gone. Ez the Deekin
hed a revolver he yielded the pint, and submitted to be flogged,
wich the Deekin wuz doin ez neatly ez I ever saw, considerin
he hed bin out uv practis four years. He had him tied up to
a tree, and wuz a wollopin uv him gorjus. While he wuz a
convinsin uv him with his whip that there wuz trooth in the
Skripter, and that Ham wuz reely a servant unto his brethrin,
I exclaimed, “Stop!” and immejitly whispered the appallin
news in his left ear (tother one hed bin chawed off in a misunderstandin
at Bascom's the previous Sunday nite, after servis).
Never shel I forgit the look uv woe on that eminent Christian's
face. The whip fell from his nerveless hand; and with teers
streemin down his cheeks, washin up little streaks uv dirt in
the most heart-rendin manner, he gasped in a husky voice to
the wife uv his buzzum, “Cut him down, Mirandy! The North's
gone Ablishin, and the d—d niggers will be free anyhow!” and
the old patriarch swooned away at my feet.
And sich an expression of anguish ez distorted the face uv
the Deekin's wife I hope never to see agin. Droppin the
shovel, she stood ez one petrified, with her foot elevated in mid
air, ez in the act uv stompin, and uttering a shreek wich methinks
I hear ringing in my ears yet, she fell precisely ez she
stood, with her leg crooked ez ef 'twuz froze there. Tom
released the gal he wuz subdooin, and mountin his horse rode
off to the Corners without saying a word; and unable to witness
the distress uv that stricken family, I made haste to mount
my mule and go too; while the niggers, feelin that they were
wunst more their own men and women, scattered in every
direction.
“Sich is the froots uv Radikelism,” murmured I. “Sich is
the bitter cup fanaticism hez put to our lips;” and castin one
lingering look at the prostrate forms uv the Deekin, his wife
(with her foot insensibly raised), and their two gushin daughters,
I spurred the mule, and departed.
Wood that every Ablishnist in the North hed seen that site,
and wuz possessed uv a sole to appreshiate it! Then would
they vote differently.
Petroleum V. Nasby, P. M.
(wich is Postmaster).
