84. LXXXIV.
HAS A CONVERSATION WITH THE DEVIL.
Saint's Rest (wich is in the Stait uv Noo Jersey), }
September the 30th, 1865.
Nite afore last, I wuz at a gatherin uv the faithful, in the
next town to Saint's Rest, and wuz a comin back on the nite
train uv the Camden and Amboy, wich is the beauty and glory
uv Noo Jersey. I wuz somewat elevatid, hevin hed a need uv
inspirin flooids, there bein two or three returned soljers in the
meetin, who kept a provokin me with irrelevant and irritatin
remarks, sich ez pullin me off the stand, and pintin revolvers
at me.
When the conductor cum around, I told him that I wuz a
humble worker in the great field uv Dimekratik reform, and
wuz, uv coarse, without funds, and that I expected to be passed
to my home, FREE! The poor man wuz thunder-struck! Staggerin
against the side uv the car, pale ez a ghost, and speechless,
he beckoned to a brakesman, and pinted me out. In a instant I
wuz seized and bundled out uv the car. The next mornin I
saw the incident noticed in the daily papers, under the follerin
hed lines: —
“THE BULWORKS UV SOCIETY A BRAKIN AWAY!” — “NOO JERSEY
IN DANGER!” — “A FEEND DEMANDS TO BE DEAD-HEDED
OVER THE CAMDEN AND AMBOY!” — “PROMPT AND HEROIC ACTION
UV A CONDUCTOR!”
How long I lay alongside uv the track I know not; but
when conshusnis returned, I saw, settin on the fence, the figure
uv Satan hisself.
“Avant!” cried I. “Why comest thou to torment me afore
my time?”
“Don't skeer,” sez he; “I don't want yoo yet. Remember
the old man's remark: `Why shood men club apples off uv
trees, when, ef they let em alone, they will fall off themselves?'
I woodent take the trouble to cum after yoo, and sich ez yoo.
I often take a toor thro Jersey. It's my best harvest-field.
I'm pleasurin now.”
Reassured, I asked the old gentleman some questions as to
what kind uv biznis he wuz a doin these times, et settry.
He replied that biznis wuz good. The Suthern States hed
bin his grate field uv labor, and when they rebelled agin the
guverment he thot he hed dead wood on them localities. His
soul expanded with joy ez he saw the Churches South plunge
into the seceshn biznis, and their preachers throw off the
sacerdotle robes and put on butternut uniform. They never
hed much religion down there, anyhow; but when they went
into seceshn, they threw away that little.
“Ez Linkin's hellions advanced,” he sed, “my soul shrunk
— only occasionally wuz I elevatid ez yoo Copperheds riz in
the North. Finally, when Lee and Johnson surrendered, I
give up all hopes. That, I thot, settled the question. The
niggers will be emancipated and I'll lose them, for they'll learn
to read, and they'll diskiver that virchoo is the best road to
travel. Also —”
“Hold!” sez I; “do niggers go to hell?”
“Uv course, when they die in their sins,” sez he.
“Farewell, hope!” exclaims I, in agony, “for all is lost! At
the last end the entire Dimokrasy will be on a equality with
the nigger, and will hev to mix with em.”
“Also,” sez he, a goin on, “I wuz satisfied I shood lose the
whites South, for when they can't live on nigger labor, and hev
to go to work, they won't hev time to gamble nor drink. They
won't hev $2500 to pay for pretty octoroons, and, per consequence,
one uv the commandments will be better observed.
So I wuz lo-sperited, and conclooded that the Almity had taken
that part uv the country out uv my hands.”
“How, then,” sez I, “is it that yoo feel so well to-night?”
“For two reasons,” sez he. “I alluz feel at home in Noo
Jersey; and besides that, things don't look so bad after all.
You folks up North are doin things to soot me, and so they are
South. Uv what account is Linkin's proclamashen, when sich
men ez now controle the South, are in power? Them Sutherners
are men I like. Guvner Perry talks uv `Radikle
Republikins,' wich shows he's bound to make head agin the
only enemies I ever hed in the North. The nigger is free, but
only in name. That blessid doctrin uv Stait Rites allows each
wun uv the States to oppress jist which class they please, and
ez the North will certainly pass all sorts uv laws agin their
escapin in that direcshun, it seems to me ez tho Cuff wuz
between the upper and nether mill-stun, after all. Five dollars
a month they will agree to pay him, but that he'll never git.
Then follers stealins, and stabbins, and shootins, and hangins,
and arsons, and insurrections [here he rubbed his hands], and
more sich fun than we ever saw. Then when the South gets
strong agin, and they and yoo, united, make a majority in Congris,
won't them Yankees git? Won't we (I speak uv yoo
Northern Dimekrats and the South and me, wich hez alluz bin
pardners) make the North pay the Suthern war debt? Won't
we re-establish slavery in the South and extend it over all the
territories, and finally over all the Northern Staits, makin it
universal? I rather think so. Ef the North refuses, then agin,
yoo and the South and I will make another war, and that time
we'll succeed, for we'll know how, better, and the guverment
overthrowd, we'll fix it jist ez we want it. And then —”
At this pint he threw his left arm about my neck in a
extasy uv irrepressible love. It scorched ez tho a hot bar
uv iron hed bin twisted around me, and, shreekin with agony
— I awoke.
It wuz only a dream, and I found myself a lyin in the identikle
ditch into wich I hed fallen when the conductor threw me
off the trane.
I cood not help wondrin at the correctnis with wich my
visitor guessed the purposes uv our party.
Petroleum V. Nasby,
Lait Paster uv the Church uv the Noo Dispensashun.
