29. XXIX.
WAILETH.
Church uv St. Vallandigum, }
October the 14th, 1863.
[1]
I'm sad — and sick. My hed is a fountain uv teers, and
mine eyes distil dilootid corn-joose. My hart is lead, and my
sole is pot-bellied with greef. My lims ake with woe, my
manly form is bowd, and my venrable lox is turned white. O,
Vallandigum, thou hast gone to the grave, and in the same
toom is berrid all my hopes. Adoo, vane world, adoo! I'll be
a nunnery.
The fate uv the peeple uv Ohio is seeld. Vallandigum is not
only a exile far away, but there is a cheerful prospek, wich is
daily improvin, uv his continnerin in the exile biznis fer an indeffynit
period uv time. A tyrannikle President hez taken our
old habis corpusses from us, and persistently refuses to furnish
us new wuns; and the people, hevin acquiest by their votes,
we lay bound hand and foot. Men fleein from conskripshen,
and sich, kin be seezed and dragged into slavery; cavalry,
drest in odjus bloo, hez licence to hunt the pantin fugitive,
who, after drawin his bounty and pay, changis his mind, and
desires to return to the buzum uv his family, and the shootin
uv enrollin orfisers and tax assessors will now be considered
a crime. Alas!
The news affectid me variously. I hed our township all
fixt, hevin distribitid tikkits, and knowin none of uv em cood
skratch em, ez they don't rite enny, I reseevd the returns
with a gratifide smile. “Bless you, my children! you hev
done nobly,” sez I. Presently a currier arrivd, bringin the
disturbin intellygens that the northern countis give Bruff thirty
thousand, and two minnits thereafter another arrivd, statin that
the suthrin countis had got loonatik and given Bruff thirty-five
thousand. With a hart-rendin and sole-tarin shreek, I fell a
inannymait corps on the flore.... I awoke. An odor
uv suthin natrel filled the room, givin me life agin. It wuz
whisky. The worthy woman at whose house I board, hed bin
rubbin the soles uv my feet with a jug, and givin me small
doses uv the restorer thro a funnel. Her exershens restord
me to life again. I presume the fact uv my owin six months
board did not nerve her frajile arm. It wuz revrence.
Despondent and weery uv life, I attempted sooiside. I mixt
my licker fer a day; I red a entire number uv the Crisis; I
peroozed “Cotton is King,” “Pulpit Pollytiks,” and “Vallandigum's
Record,” but all in vane. Ez a last desprit resource,
I attemptid to pizon myself by drinkin water, but that failed
me. My stumick rejected it — I vomited.
I am to much prosterated to offer either advice or consolashen
to my Dimekratick friends. We air in a stait uv abgect
cussitude. To see Waid, and Chase, and Oin Luvgoy, and that
3-ply Abolishnist, Horris Greely, feelin good, is prusic acid
and stricknine to us. I shell seek releef from my sorrers in
the floin bole.
