126. CXXVI.
MR. NASBY TRIES TO WEEP AT THE TOMB
OF A FRIEND.
Post Offis, Confedrit × Roads }
(wich is in the Stait uv Kentucky),
December 15, 1866.
I heerd, nearly two months ago, that my old friend, John
Guttle, uv Mobeel, hed departed this life, and gone to that
other and better world where the wicked cease from troublin
and the weery are at rest, and wuz profoundly shocked. John
Guttle wuz my friend, and I much feer his like I ne'er shall
look upon agin. He wuz a Democrat uv the old skool, one uv
the few links wich remaned to connect the present generation
with the past. Well do I remember the glorious old man!
How often hev I sat in the square room in his country residence,
and drunk whisky and water with him till we neither
on us could see a hole thro a forty-foot ladder; how many times
hez he flogged niggers for my amoozment, to show me the
proper way uv managin uv em; and how many times hez he
lent me small sums uv money, varyin from five to thirty-one
dollars, akkordin to the state uv mellernis he wuz in when I
approached him on the delikit subjik! Alas! poor John Guttle.
Let not the skoffer say that I regret his death becoz his
sons will be apt to try and collect the notes the old man
departed holds uv mine! No, no! they know me too well to
waste any time on that. I mourn becoz I loved him, and becoz
uv the misfortunes which druv him to a prematoor grave.
A. Linkin is responsible for this dark shadder onto my pathway.
John Guttle hed three hundred niggers on his plantashens
and in his house in town — these wuz wrencht from him by the
Proclamashen, and turned out from his paternal care to starve,
which the most uv em are industrously doin at $3 per day.
He hed em uv all hues — there wuz the full-blooded Black, the
disgustin Mulatter, the pleasant Quadroon, the beautiful Octoroon,
and them which hed so nearly lost the cuss of Ham ez to
be hardly distinguishable from the pure Caucashun; and it
wuz noticeable that the nearly white niggers on the Guttleses
plantation wuz all beautiful. The Guttleses theirselves wuz
perfeck specimens uv manly beauty, and it probably hed its
effeck upon the blacks. The nigger is a imitative animal.
It wuz this robbin uv him uv his property — this overturnin
uv the normal condishn uv things — which killed John Guttle.
He never held up his head after the Proclamashen, but faded
away like a frostid flower!
I wuz in Mobeel last week on biznis connected with our
college (it wuz solisitin funds to endow my Professorship), and
I felt that I cood not leave the sity without droppin a dozen
teers or sich onto the grave. I felt, ez he hed contribbitted
at various times so much to moisten my clay, that it wood be
ungentlemanly not to do suthin toward moistenin hizzen. And
in pursuance uv my resolve, I wended my way sadly to the
cemetary, and, findin the tomb, struck an attitood uv dispair,
and leanin pensively onto the monument, strove, to the best uv
my ability, to weep, but it wuz a futile endeavor. My eyes
woodent give down. I strove to recall his virchoos, but sich
is the weaknis uv human nacher that whenever his form rose
in my memory, my mind involuntarily wandered to his whiskey,
and my mouth would water to sich an extent ez to monopolize
all the moisture in my sistem. I cood hev spit onto his grave,
but weep I cood not. Alas for poor humanity!
When I wuz a standin there tryin to weep, and makin bad
work uv it, I notist three beautiful young ladies approachin,
with baskets ov hot-house flowers a hangin onto their arms.
I recognized em to-wunst. They were John Guttle's daughters,
and they wuz a comin to strew flowers onto the grave uv
their paternal ancestor on their father's side. It wuz a techin
site; and feelin that I wuz a introoder, not bein a blood relashun,
and only connected with the deceest by notes uv hand, I
withdrew a short distants. Skasely hed they got to the tomb,
when from the other side approached three more ravishinly
beautiful young ladies, with baskits uv hot-house flowers onto
their arms. The last ones resembled in a strikin manner the fust
ones, exceptin they wuz a shade darker, and their hare waved
bootiful, whereas the hare uv the fust wuz perfeckly strate.
The two parties faced each other on opposite sides uv the
toom, and party Number One glared fiercely at party Number
Two.
“Lize! Flora! Jane!” sed the oldest uv party Number
One, “wat are yoo doin here?”
“Sisters,” sed the eldest uv party Number Two, “we're
here dischargin a fillyel dooty. Beneeth these sod lies the
remains uv our father, and we are goin to strew these flowers
onto his toom. Jine us in the strew.”
“Father?” shreeked the three uv party Number One.
“Yoor all niggers, and wuz servants unto —”
“Our half-sisters,” sed the spokesman uv party Number
Two; “but Linkin removed the cuss uv Ham, and we're now
free, and hev as much rite to strew the grave uv our common
parient, which wuz John Guttle, ez yoo. O! our sisters, our
father wuz a good man — let us bedew his grave with our
teers and —”
“Wat impudence!” shreeked party Number One, all in
korious.
“Impudence yoorself!” retorted party Number Two, getting
red in the face. “We are John Guttleses daughters percisely
ez much ez yoo, and the only advantage yoo hev over us is in
the article of mothers. Yoo three hev wun, which wuz John
Guttleses wife, while we three hev three — one apiece eggsackly
— which wuz John Guttleses servants; but we can't,
nevertheless, stifle our emoshuns. I shel command myself,
and thus perceed to perform a act uv fillyel dooty.”
And she histed out the flowers and commenced to strew.
The tother wuns wuz a gettin hot. The oldest wun cood
stand this impudence no longer, and droppin her basket, went
for her, followed by her sisters. It wuz a sperited conflict,
and lasted perhaps four minits, or until I parted em, when they
gathered themselves together, and departed — one party went
one way, and tother, tother.
Fillyel love hed done more in the strewin biznis than it sot
out to do. The six lovin daughters uv the deceest John hed
not only strewed flowers onto his grave, but hair, and collars,
and buzzum pins, and shreds uv silk, and water-falls, and
cotton, and false teeth, and pieces uv almost everything which
goes to make up the sum total uv female attire.
Ez I gazed at the wreck and saw their tattered forms vanish
in the dim distance, I could not help admittin that when it
come to strewin the graves uv deceest ancestors, there wuz
sum disadvantages attending the patriarkle system.
Petroleum V. Nasby, P. M.
(wich is Postmaster), and likewise Professor uv
Biblikle Politics in the Southern Classikle &
Military Institoot.
