79. LXXIX.
SUGGESTS A “PSALM OF SADNESS” FOR HIS
FRIENDS SOUTH.
Saint's Rest (wich is in the Stait uv Noo Jersey), }
September the 12th, 1865.
The utter and abject state uv cussitood into wich the Dimokrasy
find theirselves, North and South, makes a day uv
fastin approprit. Ef the Lord is ever a goin to help us, now's
his time.
Ef my clerikle brethrin uv the Church South decide to
appint a day uv fastin and prayer, I submit the follerin ez a
sam uv agony, approprit for the occasion:—
A SAM UV AGONY.
On the street I see a nigger!
On his back a coat uv bloo, and he carryeth a muskit.
He is provo-guard, and he halteth me, ez wun hevin authority.
And my tender daughter spit on him, and lo! he arrested
her, and she languisheth in the guard-house.
My eyes dwell on him, and my sole is a Artesian well uv
woe; it gusheth with grief.
For that nigger wuz my nigger! I bought him with a
price.
Alas! that nigger is out uv his normal condishn; he is a
[ILLUSTRATION]
THE "NIGGER" — AS HE SHOULD BE — AS HE IS. Page 192.
[Description: 635EAF. Illustration page. A man facing two images; on the left is an image of an African American slave tied to a cross being whipped; on the right is an African American in a uniform holding a musket.]
star out uv its speer, which sweepeth thro the political hevens,
smashin things.
Normally, he wuz wuth gold and silver — now he is a nitemare.
Wunst I wuz rich, and that nigger wuz the basis thereof.
Woe is me! I owned him, soul, body, muscles, sinews,
blood, boots, and briches.
His intelleck wuz mine, his body wuz mine, likewise his
labor and the fruits thereof.
His wife wuz mine, and she wuz my conkubine.
The normal results uv the conkubinage I sold, combining
pleasure and profit in a eminent degree.
And on the price thereof I played poker, and drank mint-juleps,
and rode in gorgus chariots, and wore purple and fine
linen every day.
Wuz this miscegenashun, or negro equality? Not any.
For she wuz mine, even as my ox, or my horse, or my sheep,
and her increase wuz mine, even as wuz theirs.
Ablishn miscegenashun elevates the nigger wench to his
level. I did it for gain, wich degraded her muchly.
And when the wife uv my buzm lifted up her voice in
complaint, sayin, “Lo, I am abused — this little nigger resembleth
thee!” half the price uv the infant chattel wood buy a
dimund pin with wich to stop her yawp.
And my boys follered in my footsteps, and grate wuz the
mix, but profitable.
But my dream is bustid.
The nigger is free, and demands wages for the work uv his
hands.
His wife is free, and she kin decide whether she'll cleave to
her husband, or be my conkubine.
Yisterday I bade her come to me, and, lo! she remarkt,
“Go 'way, white man, or I'll bust yer head.” And I gode.
Her childern are free — they are mine, likewise, but I can't
sell em on the block, to the highest bidder.
Therein Linkin sinned — he violated the holiest and highest
instincts uv our nacher; he interposed a proclamashen atween
father and child.
We took the heathen from Africa, and wuz a makin Christians
uv em. Woe to him who stopt us in our mishnary
work.
It is written — “Kin the Ethiope change his skin?” I wuz
a changin it for him, I and my fathers, and we hed mellered it
down to a brite yaller.
Dark is my fucher.
I obeyed the grate law uv labor, ez I served in the army
by substitoot. Now shel I hev to stain my hands with labor,
or starve.
In what am I better than a Northern mudsill?
I kin git no more diamond pins for the wife uv my buzm,
and she yawpeth continually.
Arrayed in hum-spun, she wrastles with pots and kettles in
the kitchen.
Weighed down with woe, she dips snuff in silence.
She asks uv me comfort — wat kin I say, whose pockets
contain only Confedrit skrip?
Save us from Massachusits, wich is ornery and cussid.
Protect us from nigger soljers, wich is grinnin feends.
Shelter us from the ghost uv John Brown, wich is marchin
on.
Petroleum V. Nasby,
Lait Paster uv the Church uv the Noo Dispensashun.
