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03dZITEL WRIGME, Editor and. Proprietor.
VS LITME %XXIV, NUMBER 11.1
.PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY MORNING. ,
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besny s v . ertisersostoare striel4eonfined
lattg.
The Battle Autumn of 1862.
BY JOHN G. IVBITTIER.
The flags of war like morns-bias fly.
The charg:ng trumpets blow;
Vet rolls no thunder in the sky.
No earthquake wives below.
And. calm and patient, Nature keeps
Her ancient promise well, -
Though o'er her bloom and greenness sweeps
The battle's breath of hell.
And mill she walks in golden hoots
Tnrough Itarvest•huppy farms,
And mill she wears her fruits and dowers
Like jewels on her anus. •
What mean the gladness of the plain,
Thin joy of eve and morn.
The mirth that shakes the beard orgruin
And fellow loeL of earn!
Ali! eyes may well be full of tears,
And hearis with hub• pro ho , ;
Lint even pneed - inate round ilk years;
And Nature changes um.
the meets with ;miles our [Amor grief.
With song. our groan. of pain;
She mock• with tint of dower and leaf
The war•field+e erito•on
Sall in the C. 111110104 pause. we hear
Her sweet thanlopoing p•alu;
Too near lo God for doubt or fear,
She ' , floret. the eternal calm
She know* the seed lee wife below
The fires that lola.' and bum;
For all •helearaof blood we tow
She waite the rich return.
She *e-s with clearer eye than ours
The good of *offering bran,—
The hearts that blossom like her lowers
And ripen Hie her corn.
Oh, give to in times Zile theft,
The vision of her eyep;
And make her acids and fruited trees
Our golden proplaceie4Z
Oh, give to us her fi.ter ear:
Above this cortay diu,
We, too. woad hear the bells of cheer
Emir peace and freedom in:
Niagara.
BY !TOWARD WORCESTER GILBERT.
Far stretching in the morning beams,
And blazing in the golden gleams.
The mingling of a thou-and streams!
And trembling many-hued among
Thy shifting raiw, the rainbow, hung
Before thee, o'er thy golf it. dung;
Over thy wave of elenreet green
That falls t down eerene,
Then toameth into whiten sheen,
In gauzy veil the min-film throws
Through which .lie ohimmertng sunlight glows
Down to thy deep of wa'ery snows.
The avalanche from raountaiwheight.
Sweeps, trembling in its awful might,
-
And clothed in man:le dim and white,
Slow.mahenng in its downward sweep,
Into some gulf's unfathom d deep,
With wild. and long. and fearful leap;
And !Hence all the alr doth
Save of some moorland-bird the trill,
Or trickling of the mountain nil.
Bat ever changing then dolt pour,
Vet still the same, with solemn roar,
O'er thy dim else forevermore.
And standing on the shore I seem
As one who, in a silent dream,
sid launched on vonse mysterious' stream,
Is borne. from whence be knows not, hither,
And with vast sweep is harried thither,
He knows oat why, he know,, not whither. '
While through my brain, in sounding rhyme,
All thoughts eternal and sublime
Course slow, the universe, and:time,
And endless change that ceaselessly
Hymns of eternity through thee,
Aid I eater into Infinity!
grttutiong.
The Eternal Fires of Ban.
A Traveller residing in the city of Shama
kis, at the foot of Mount Caucasus. on the
western shores of the Caspian Sea, is gener-
Ally induced. by the representations of the
natives, to visit those little known Phlegman
Fields which eternally HUM and smoulder
in the vicinity of Baku. Probably no por
tion of the earth's surface is more replete
with natural' wonders ; Tlit, summits, and
:npper or the' Cionessim - in t many
parts as lade luiown as 'the Mountains of
tliellain, are said 'at times to milt time
and smoke, and to distil strange oleaginous
substances. which, trickling down through
rooky . veins and- crevices, ooze out 'of the
earth at considerable diets - tams. and *redes
ignated by various senses. At the foot of
the vast-Faropsimisan range, on_ which the
Arabs bestow gist name of-Kaf, and regard
As the girdle of the earth e ssmall peninsula,
about nine miles in length by 6:11U1 and a
half in breadth, lonian* into the Caspian.
and is known among the natives by the
nausea (Mama. On this stands the sitj of
Bohn, whose origin is lost in remote anat.
shy. A body . of ;emtindit,;wriech — wonld fill
a volume. eliogaabout the ruins of thisi fa
tigue dwelling' of the blades, and modified
by credulity; and. pperatittoo, , has worked
its way into the Islamitic mythology of Per
sia, and been carried by Parsee pilgrims to
the shores of [lndia, where it sparkles • or
glooms about the hearth.. nfsthe..'rr.hip
pars, many of whom, at the hazard of their
lives, have sought to obtain a glimpse of the
sacred flame, ever burning clear and bright
on the margin of the Caspian wave, around
which their ancestors once knelt and wor
chipped in countless multitudes.
Along the neck of the peninsula runs a
chain of mountain spurs, the valleys be
tween which are fertile and carefully culti
vated; but as you advance southwards, the
ground becomes barren, consisting in some
parts of shifting sand, in others, of dark
mud, while elsewhere the naked rock, pdr
ous as pumice -stone, and almost entirely
composed of the debris of sea-shells, crops
out of the earth. Here and there are small
conical hills, crested sometimes with the
tombs of saints in ruins, nodding over salt
lakes, or crumbling away particle by par
ticle into the eircumjacent marches. On one
side, you behold a cone of black oaptha look
ing like a mountain of pitch; on another, a
hill - of fuller's-earth, through which, as
through an artificial tube, nature forces up
the clay in one huge cylinder, which' when
it attains a certain height in the sir,_ bursts
by its own weight, and falls in :a shower
over the bill, the height of which is
thus incessantly augmented. Down yonder,
in a spacious depression in the plain, you
observe an expanse of whiteish sand, inter
spersed with heaps of gray ashes, and here
and there tall bright flames, like immense
gas jets, surging upwards everlastingly,
sometimes with a low crackling sound, but
generally - in profound silence. About these
fires, men, more or less in number, are con
gregated day and night, some for secular
purposes, others with motives of devotion.—
' The industrial divisions of the crowd are
cookland lime-burners, the former repairing
thither from all the neighboring villages to
roast and boil, and prepare pilaus for the
wealthier children of El Islam; while the
latter stack up over the flaming fissures
heap• of atone, whieh, when they have con
verted into lime, they beer down to the coast,
to be shiped fur Russia, Dugbestan, and
the country of the. Usbek Tartars.
Near the largest of the salt-lakes stands a
village, which, like many of the temples and
cities of the ancient world, enjoys the privi
ledge of sanctuary. Formerly, they say,
while the calif.' of the race of Omar reigned
in Bagdad, a prince of rare sanctity, but
who entertained opinions somewhat differ_
ent from those of tl.e Commanders of the
Faithful, fled from persecution, and took
refuge beyond Kaf in the burning peninsu
la of Baku. Here, in a castle oq the top of
a rock, and surrounded by his attached fol
lowers, he lived to extreme old age; and
when he died, was interred among the flags
on the edge of tlio lake. Presently au arch.
el tomb, like those in which the traveller
site at night on the.brink of the Upper Nile,
rose over his remains, and by degrees a
village was built about the tomb, with wall,
and moat, and gates. Public opinion attach
ed the idea of sanctity to this place, so that
to pursue any one who took refuge in it was
deemed an inexpiable offence. Nothing
was required of the fngitive but to stoop
and kiss the threshold of the gate, or to
press his lips against the links of an iron
chain which hung suspended from the arch
way within reach, and in time was almost
worn away by the grasp and kisses of the
pious refugees, aided perhaps a little by ac
tion of rust. 0 ce within the walls he
might taste of the sweet waters, which,
through respect fur holiness of the dead
saint, Heaven had bestowed upon the village.
The good people of Okeara, little vers ed
. in
geography, could account no otherwise than
by miracle for the existence of a well of
fresh water in the midst of salt pools and
springs. fountains of naptha, black and
white, rooks dripping with bitumen, and
veins of fiery gasses bursting forth on all
sides through cracks in the soil.
Persons of cool northern temperaments
find it difficult to comprehend the state of
mind which induces men to travel from the
plains of Multi= or the fertile valleys of
Guzerat. expending large sums of money
by the way merely to sit down for weeks
and months by an opening in the rock,
through which a clear white flame, from
fifteen to twenty feet in height, ascends into
the atmostphere. Here, however, their an
cestors in the remotest ages did the same,
,aught, it is said so to act by that mighty
legislator and philosopher, whose Oriental
name of Zerdusht was transformed by the
Greeks into Zoroaster. But the Parsee",
wherever they reside, are only exiles in In
dia; they may be beloved and honored for
their charity, or knighted by the Queen of
Great Britain fur, their wealth and enter
prise, but the home of their spirit lies west
ward beyond the' Salinas& range, beyond
the desert, of Khorasan. beyond the peaks
and forests of the Elburs, in the 'lands of
figs sed primogrates, of grapes sod roses, of
napthi springs end eternal fires. To them,
the followers of Mshommed are either san
grias!, conquerors, or Anise reuegades, who
may indeed be sufficiently powerful to keep
them. the true ! Weis end owners; of Persia,
far away from their ancestral possessions t but
who are dogs .at i a. infidels nevertheless. over
whom the/ seem to triumph, when hewing
their way through Abair ttitiff multitudes
by the, fords of gold. they muse back , to the
emtisming dwelling-plans of fire., and low
and worship with inexpressible reverence
beferemhst to Abeut is ,the visible, symbol
el 50
—.llnantie Monthly.
"NO ENTERTAINMENT SO CHEAP AS READING, NOR ANY PLEASURE SO LASTING."
COLWIBIA, PENNSYLVANIA, SATURDAY MORNING. OCTOBER 11, 1862
of God. If you go forth, therefore, at night
from Baku, and approach the aldin of white
sand, you will behold these disciples of
Zoroaster either seated in deep meditation
upon the earth, or bowing their turbaned
head before the mounting flame. In the
background towards the west, rises the
peaks of Caucasus, enveloped in snow, and
clustered round with stare; to the east ex
tends the Caspian, heaving gently in sum
mer, as all seas do, deriving, it may be,
their tremulous uneasiness from the rotary
motion of the earth on its axis.
Listen, and you will hear the accents of
an unknown language—that which prece
ded the dialect of the Zondavesta—muttered
ty some banker or ship builder of Bombay,
who in his own home on the Indian Ocean
speaks English, and rends Milton and Shak
speare. But here in Okesra, in face of the
sacred fire, he is another being, agitated by
feelings and sentiments which have been
wafted down to him over the waves of time
from far beyond the Deluge, perhaps from
the pre-Ademite period, when, as the Chev
alier Bunsen teaches, the countrymen of
Gog and Magog founded and governed em
pires on the table lands of Central Asia.—
To study Gibbon, Burke, and Bacon, to rend
our novels, our journals, and our philosoph
ical speculations, is found by the Parsee by
no means incompatible with a firm and
faithful acceptance of the ancient creed of
the Medea. You may tell him what you
please about civilization, about new faiths,
and improvements in ethics; after attending
politely to your discourse, his mind goes
back at a bound to its belief in that forma
tive principle, heat, caloric, fire, which in
his view created the world, and still consti
tutes the soul of all living things. Accord
ing to his theory, warmth is life, and cold
is death. Ile has never in intelligible lan
guage revealed to the profane the ideas
which float over his mind, when having
come wayworn and weary from afar, be
contemplates the surging and brilliant ele
went, which escaping from the crust of our
planet, points visibly to the stars,, with
whose substance it is obviously identical.—
Yet these luminous phenomena are only the
external manifestations of God to the "Par
see, the elemental sheath, so to speak, in
which he involves his invisible power and
creative energy. The vulgar processes of
lime-burning and cooking, the fire-worship
per regards as so many gross misapplica
tions, though perhaps necessary, of the di
vine element which pervades and vivifies
everything, and Hughes upon him brillantly
as be reclines or kneels on the soft white
sand of Okesra. If you remain near at band
all night, you wilt behold a phenomenon no
where seen but in Persia, which the fire
worshipper considers in the light of a con
firmation of the truth of his creed. About
two hours before daybreak, a mimic dawn
appears in the east, where the saffron rays
rise in a vast arch, and shooting up to the
zenith, expand and kindle the whole sky,
rendering the stars pale, and lighting up
the summits of the mountains with a glow
and splendor like that of the early morning.
This, however, is the false dawn, which
after awakening the birds, and robing the
earth with light, again fades away, and
leaves the whole hemisphere above, and the
face of our globe below, buried in darkness
we before.
Generally, the Muslims are held to be a
persecuting people—with good reason, per
haps, in one phase of their character—yet
at times they are tolerant to a marvel. They
despise the Hindus, they equally despise the
Parsecs; but they have traditions, more
than half fabulous, which attribute to both
these sections of mankind powers, acquired
by rank or otherwise, which are denied, for
good reasons, doubtless, to the believers in
the Koran. When a Parsee, therefore. ar
rives at Baku, on his way to the eternal
fires, all the true believers in the caravan
sary insk6 place for him; first, because he
inspires them with awe; and next, perhaps,
because, wise as he may be in the wisdom
of science, he is ignorant of that saving
faith which belongs exclusively to their re.
ligion. Yet they have no objection to sell
him food, or, in exchange, to take his fine
Indian gold °cohere or English-minted ru
pees. As has been seen, moreover, they
will repair with him to the place of flame,
and convert his divinity into a kitchen-fire,
or into the active agent of a limekiln. Still,
they are not without a certain mysterious
feeling on the subject of the inflammable
gases, and have invented stories, too long
and wild to be here related, about the place
whence, according to their interpretation,
the brilliant white jets ascend. It would be
useless to explain to them that beneath the
thin shell of rook which forms the surface
of the Okesran peninsula, there lie extensive
lakes of Depths, fed perpetually by subter
ranean streams from the Caucasus, inflam
mable exhalations from which, Lying made
their way to urper air, were let on fire by
accident, and have never sines been extin
guished. In certain places, however, where
the springs below are small and shallow,
you may play with the deity of the fire-en/r
-shipper with impunity. Of this 'the lime
burners are - fully aware, and by -way of
amusing or surprising strangers; will pluck
a few threads from 'their cotton garments,
and putting them on the endnf-a long rake,
and setting them on fire, will. hold them
over a cleft in the rock, through which they
know by experience that invisible e*da
dons amend. In an instant, the gases take
fire, and shoot op to a great height in the
atmosphere. 'The traveler rthipe
Ines that these flames also, like those he be
holds elsewhere in the peninsula, will con
tinue burning, but ere his amazement at
their sudden appearance has ceased, they
collapse and vanish. As a rule, these va
pors are inodorous; but there is one bill,
fortunately at some distance from the vil
lage, which emits a stench so unendurable,
that travelers are constrained to hold their
noses as they pass, which suggests to the
Mahommedans the substance of many an
offensive joke against the divinity of the
Parsees, who, according to them, is anything
but a desirable neighbor.
What perplexes them most, however, is
the immense number of monuments of re
mote antiquity existing on all sides, espe
cially the figures of lions, accompanied by
inscriptions in an unknown tongue. Though
they themselves are dwellers in Okesra, it
is past their comprehension that persons
opulent enough to select their own places of
abode, should ever have established them
selves in their fiery peninsula, amid sand
and fuller's earth, and fountains of black
and white noptha, and stagnant pools, fetid
and noisome, and the crackling of flames,
and the whirling about of dust and ashes
by impetuous winds from the mountains.—
In fact, it is by no means one of the least
clams phenomena of this place, that it
should be frequently exposed to tempests so
violent that it is matter of wonder they have
not long ago swept all Baku into the sea.—
You stand perhaps on its battlements, en
joying the stillness of the air, and admiring
the glassy surface of the Caspian, when
suddenly a gust from the Caucasus fills your
burnoose, tears OF your turban, and lays
your prone upon the earth, lashes up the
waves into white foam, dashes the ships in
the harbor against each other, and ploughs
up the sea in a straight line as far as the
eye can reach. Then the clouds gather
overhead, and lowering themselves gradu
ally f.•om the peaks of the mountains, can
opy the whole peninsula, while the loudest
thunder peals among the rooks, and light
ning so vivid flashes from east to west, that
the flames from the rocks are as little no•
tieed as those of a few farthing tapers in the
noonday sun. But the storms of Baku are
of short continuance. Bursting unexpect
edly, and raging with unexampled fury,
they clear away and disappear in like man
ner. Something similar is observable at
Nice, where the bin from the Maritime
Alps chills the whole atmosphere in a few
minutes, and send those home to put on
their cloaks who came forth in the lightest
attire to enjoy the sunshine, and the pros
pect of the calm sea. In spite of the changes
of its climate, Balm, with all the surround
ing country, was a favorite residence of the
Modes, as welt as of those fierce conquerors
from Macedonia who subverted the Persian
monarchy, and left so many traces of their
rule over the whole of Asia, from the mouths
of the Nile to the farthest waters of the Pun
jab. At Baku, the chisel of Greece was bu
sily at work, and has left upon the face of
rocks, and the facade of ruined palaces, nu
merous mementoes of its playful character,
figures of men engaged in various amuse
ments and games of chance. To the believ
ers in El Islam, all these things are so many
abominations. They hate images, they de
spise art and its creations, which to their
minds suggest no ideas save those of gross
idolatry, They can conceive no reason for
fabricating the figure of man or beast, un
less with the design to worship it. Occa
sionally, they account for the ruin of great
cities in which statues are found, by observ
ing that the inhabitants having been ad
dicted to impure forms of worship, were
changed by the wrath of heaven into stones,
and in that state left forever above ground,
to be a terror and warning to future gener
ations. As to the lions who climb and grin
on the walls of Baku, they were, say the
Muslims, the gods of its ancient inhabitants,
whom, when the day of trial came, they
were found impotent to protect.
Like all regions impregnated with fire,
this part of Persia produces exquisite fruit.
Large and delicious figs have been still
found on the trees as late as the month of
December, and the pomegrnates which na
ture brings to perfection in the hottest
months seem to be fuller of refreshing juice
than in almost any other part of the East.
When you arrive, therefore, at a caravan
sary on a july noon, the first thing with
which the attendant presents you, in a
saucer of white porcelain, is a pomegranate
—you break it, you inhale the delicious
aroma, you sip the pinky juice, and your
weariness vanishes like a dream. Along
the volosnic rocks. the vine trails its ten
drils, and early in summer is covered with
heavy clusters, purple or golden. These
the children of the Prophet, in spite of the
Koran, often convert into wine, with which
to regale themselves• in their banishment
beyond Eaf. Every one who has travelled
in volcanic countries must have observed
that the grape has there a far Haber Savor
than elsewhere. which appears at once to
excite and aUsy thirst. - This is particularly
noticeable on the slopes of Etna and Vesu
vius, but in the neighborhood of Bala it is
perhaps more remarkable still. The wines
made in this province. are those chiefly cele
brated by the Persian •poste, who, because
they drank them fn the bowers of Shires or
Is/Ashen. imagined they were the produce
of the south. In the low marshy grounds
close to the Caspian, you find waterenekons,
scarcely, if stall., inferior to those of Cala
mata in the Mores, which, °when out into
slices, look like sweet waterbold in enspee.
don by a net-work of fibres. These, with
the apples of Shirwan, and the dates of Irak
and Diarbekir, the Parsees prefer to all the
fruits of India, the anana, the mango, and
the mangostecn, because they detect in
them the flavour of their ancient fatherland.
As they eat, they dream of the past, when
the sword of the Mode was a terror to the
world—when he disciplined the finest cav
alry, and erected the finest structures in
Asia—when he was victorious wherever be
marched—and when his sacred fire threw
its glare on one side over the Nile, on the
other over the Indus. It may be that Bum
serjee Cursetjee, as he prostrates himself
before the eternal fires of Baku, dreams
that days of equal glory may yet dawn upon
his race, when he shall cease to twist ropes
and build ships for white infidels from the
West, when he shall be no longer a byword
to the Brahman or the Moslemin, but with
the sword of victory in one hand, and the
sacred fire in the other, shall drive the be
lievers in the Book out of Iran; and enjoy
a flaming millennium in the beautiful land
which was the birthplace and cradle of his
race.
~: ;
DY OEOROR ARNOLD
I have been very badly treated; very bad
ly indeed, and I feel a powerful desirele
have the finger of scorn pointed at certain
persona whose full names I intend to expose
in the public print.
I am not wanting in courage; when at
school I licked several boys bigger than my
self; but I have no especial fondness for tbe.
life of a soldier. The idea of droilitg six
or eight hours a day is distasteful to me; I
do not fancy having a thick coat buttoned
up tightly in this weather, and as for camps
they are dirty places at beat.•
Then, again, I am confident that there
are men enough to fight out this war with
out MB. I know a great luau) , uh o were
crazy to go, when the Union uprising came
off, but who haven't been yet. I never
thirsted for glory. It isn't in my line. I
am in the tallow-chandlery and soap busi
ness.
It takes a wiry, nervous, lean sort of man
to make a good soldier. lam inclined to be
stoutish; indeed, I have overheard strangers
referring to me as "that fat man." My
figure is good, I think, but unquestionably
with a tendency to embonpoint, as the French
c , '1 it. [This is pronounced "ongbong
prang," I am told.]
To sum up what I have been driving at
all this time, I didn't want to enlist. I don't
want to now. I like to take life easy, and
accumulate a little money against the time
when I am old. Martial lile doesn't suit
me, and I always said I thought John Jacob
Astor as great a man as Napoleon. That is
my idea, at least. I went to the hospital
the other day, wad saw a soldier with a mor
tified leg. Aghl All I ask is to be let
alone.
I don't know when I first heard abut the
drafting business, but it produced a great
excitement down town. The young men in
my establishment went right off and enlist
ed—lots of them. They knew there was a
big bounty then, and that when drafting
began, they might have to go without any
bounty; so off they went. It gave me a
great deal of trouble, getting new hands,
and at much higher wages. I lost over three
hundred dollars by it; and wound you be
lieve? they had the hardihood—impudence,
/call it—to ask me to give them something
for extra outfit, or, at least, to give them
their situation again if they came back!
nab! if one of the reseals dares to show his
face in my establishment again, I'll say
something that will make him feel very
badly.
As a rule, however, my employees are a
worthless set. They don't seem to have any
respect for me; so I'm not sorry to have got
a sew lot.
I will not disguise the fact that I was a
good deal worried about the drafting busi
ness. I suppose I was nervous, or some
thing. but I couldn't think of anything for
several days, except being taken away from
my business and made to go into the ranks
to fight; and every time I sat down to a
meal, I thought of that soldier at the hos
pital. That made me sick. and I couldn't
eat. Everybody noticed that I wasn't well,
and I presume I must have talked about my
fears some. Anyhow. it came to be under
stood that I disliked the Idea of being
drafted.
There are some people in this world who
set just like fools. Now, there's young
Forsyth; he's a writer by trade, and ought
to bare brains enough, but he told me, with
perfect sincerity, that the President was
about to make a third call for five hundred
thousand more men, and said that it would
require a draft of *very second man, In the
United States, capable of bearing arms. I
am surprised that an apparently intelligent
young man should have been so misinform
ed, or should have made such realms state
ments without• being sure of theii. truth. - -
The idea was absurd, of - coarse, but it did
not happen to strike me so at the time, so
my anitletywas growlyininnasid. Forsyth
had the indelioneyj too, to joke mikalboot my
liability to conscription, and mowed over
me on the ground'. that all meei r entmeeted
with newspapers were lobee:tempt anoth
er statement which I hardly think true,
now.
These - newspaper-writers are terribly ir
regular flippant young pence., and really
$1;50 PER YEAR UT ADVANCE; $2,00• IP NOT IN AOYA
seem to have hardly any respect for the vir
tues of prudence, regularity, method and
propriety. lam considered one of the most
thoroughly respectable and successful mer
chants in the tallow-chandlery line, yet hero
I was joked and ridiculed—chaffed as be'
would say—by this Forsyth, who hasn't a
peony in bank, who associates on Broadway
with actors and actresses and artists, and
who drinks openly, in bar-rooms, as if he
wasn't ashamed of anything he did!
Ile had the bad taste to allude to my fig
ure, from a military point of view; and to
draw ridiculous compori‘ons between my
self and one of the creations of the Bard of
Avon—Sir John Ea/staff.
I went down town in very bad spirits,
that morning. My desire to escape drafting
was becoming stronger and stronger, and
laboring, as I was, under the erroneous im
pression conveyed to me by Forsyth's news
I was greatly depressed. It was just my
luok,ll thought, to be drawn as a conscript,
and to receive on the gory field of battle,
just such a leg as I had seen in the hospital.
My mind dwelt upon these things all day,
and at night I determined to take some mea
sures to render myself exempt. Physical
inability, I know, is the best safeguard, so
I went at once to a physician to be exam
ined.
He took my fee, and proceeded to thump
my ribs, holding a little wooden tube,
shaped like a wine-glass, against my chest
at the same time, and listening through it.
"All right there," said he.
My spirits rank.
He the.. .Ated me a variety of questions,
and finally pronounced me as sound a man,
physically, as be had ever seen.
"A little fat," he said, coarsely, "but ex
ercise would soon take that down. Bless
you, by the time you've lived on rations a
couple of months, and been through a fight
or two, you'll be as lean us one of Abe Lin
coln's rails!"
I was shocked at this. He evidently
thought I wanted to enlist.
I then took steps to undeceive him, and
eeggeeted as delicately as I could, that he
might have overlooked some trifling symp
tom of a dangerous complaint; heart dis
ease possibly; and that it might be worth
his while to re-examine me a little.
He saw what I meant.
"I have an engagement," he said, looking
at Lis witted; "but if ,you insist I will try it
again, but I always charge mane for a sea
ond examination—"
"Go on," I said.
The second lime, as I had expected, be
found decided indications of an aneurism,
he called it, of the aorta.
"You are likely to drop dead in the street,
sir, at any moment!" he said quite trium
phantly.
A cold shudder ran down my back at
these horrible words. I feared they might
only be too true, and for the moment, wish
ed I had not asked fur another examination.
I said nothing, however, but took my hat
and gloves.
•Ten dollar., sir," said the doctor.
I paid the money, and received a certifi
cate to the effect that I was totally unfit
for military service.
On my way home, I felt, or fancied I felt,
a sharp sort of numbness in my breast. It
quite upset me for some time, but when I
reflected that I had a certificate of exemp
tion from the draft, I became better hu
mored, and went to my hotel to dinner
without fears of Forsyth's ridicule, or fore
bodings of a mortified leg. •
Forsyth was not at dinner that day. ?His
habits are so irregular that one doesn't see
him at his meals half the time. Probably
be was off taking dinner with some actress,
or other carious person. I wus sorry not
to meet him, for I still felt a little hurt at
his jokes, and wished to crow in turn over
the fact of being exempt as well as be. 1
ate a good dinner, however, and ret.red
that night with quite a light-hearted sensa
tion.
My step, as I entered my establishment,
down town, on the following day, was
really buoyant and elastic, compared to
what it had been for several' days before.
I felt like a ship-wrecked sailor, who, after
clinging to his mast, half despairing and
terrified, all the night long, sees the cheer
ing sight of a friendly sail approaching with
the dawn. This figure of rhetoric, I am
aware may be considered rather old, by
young men of Forsyth's stamp, but it was
a great favorite with me many years ago;
and I like old things the best.
While busily engaged in looking over
some samples of potash. I was called by one
of the young men in the counting room.
"Mr. Qaobyl"
"Very well!"
"Two gentlemen, sir."
I went with the potashes.
"Mr. Qaobyl"
"Very welt."
"Important bagasse, rnr."
"Very wa"
passed into the eonoting-bonee, end was
me& surprised to and two military per
sons, neither of wbom oould I recognize.
Otie of these persons toss, and said, "Mr.
4/noby, I believer'
%T.. e r e,
"Proprietor?"
"Yes sir; obis' f proprietor."
Be took a little book from the breast of
his coat, and began writing with a pre.
"Bow many met aseployedr
"Twenty-sig'ht Ism One hundred and
thirty-two Mae hietory-" ' - •
[WEGLE NUMBER 1,677.
"how many between the ages of eighteen
and fortravd?"
"I don't know their ages, air."
"Rough guess?"
"Wel!, I should say—perhaps a hun
dred: maybe more."
"Ab! A. nice compauy, maybe. Now,
would you like to command as captain? .
You'd make an excellent officei, eh? Pni ,
muking out drafting-lists, and I shall tr y to ,
have the men taken from large business,
houses placed under their patrons as m r uch:
as possible. The President and I both
think they will fight better. If you're killed
now, don't you see, these young fOleiers
would sail in to avenge you!"
I thought I had the upper hand of klicn. ,
I passed him my physician's certificate, and
gently tapped my bosiim on the left side.
"0, bah! This isn't worth a pin!' Every
conscript is extimined by the brigide pur r
geons. Bless you; any fool can buy a . cey;
tificate from some young dcctor! Allow:
me, to present my friend, Richard 'Cbtiff4,
Assistant Surgeon of Brigade;
,Regular
Army. Now, Dick, is Ibis gentlCman
capable of servivo?"
The person thus introduced came forwartl
and laughed very rudely.
"I'll bet my commission against apostage
stamp," said he, "that Mr. Quoby, hasn't a,
sign of disease about him." ,
I began to be alarmed—very ,greatlg 01 7
armed in fact.
"Gentlemen," I said, warmly. "yon have ,
no:reason to will be drafted, have
you?" . . • : • ;,•
"Yes, it is a dead --oertainty. The *Presi
dent is now preparing. a, new call for .fivo
hundred thousand additional men, anCeon.
templates a farther., draft of•four. hundred
thousand atChristmas if, the.ltebelliortien4
dead then."
"But—but—"
"Never mind. The only way is to (ace-it
pluckily. Do you refuse? There arern
aides." If I had thought -for a,
should have seen the transparent absurdity
of this; but.l was, as, I have said nervous
on the subject, and my mind was, clondy,--
Assistant-Sergeon Chaffer proceeded to ex
amine me, and declared that I was •in the
bast possible condition of body.. Some .of
his questions were rather flippant, I thought
and, to say the least, sot altogether delicate;
but I was to much trembled to comprehend,
The questions snd answers were all taken
down in the book. The first gentleman
who ealled himself Captain Garderoy, was
a very handsome and polite, young man,
though a little foppish; but he-was, after ail
just as bad as the surgeon. No took dowel
my name, age, place of residence(' might
be called upon, he said, at any time in the
middle of the night!) my business,-, the facs
of my being antanceicil, ray height-and
girth (I felt as if I were being measured for
my coffinl) and no body knows how. many
more personal items. p .
Then, with the abrupt information,that
could consider it certain that I might "um
a captaincy it I could enlist a htmdred,of
my employees, and with the advipe -that I
had best study military works as much as
possible, they departed, leaving me very
weak. how I got through that day's bus
iness, and dragged myself home I'm eat,. /
don't know. I was never so terrified : and
harrassod in my life, and the stele in . which
I arrived at the hotel that night; may lie
more easily imagined than described., Asl
took my seat at the dinner-table—which
did only for regularity; I hadn't the gbent
of an appetite-who
, should I see, just op
posite me, but Forsyth, seated betwixt?.
Captain Gardcroy and Surgeon Chaffer!
I never heard three men laugh :so outra
geously before. They bad been taking, e,
good deal of wine I judged from the empty
bottles about them, I suppose that made
merry, but they were certainlyalliii
ing at me.
"Good evening, Queby,", said Forsyth,(he
isehookingly familliar;) I understand fontre
to be captain of the Tallow-candle' Cintirdiß,
in the Soap-fat Brigade!" •
attends to the fat department," said
Chaffer: "and by Jove,-he wouldn't tryout
badly, himself!"
'Then they all lau s gbed." , !—,
"What will you take for your certificate
of heart-diseaser' asked Gardeory; Smut
it for an aunt of mine.
"Greotlemon." [mid. as ly ae I could;
I don't see the fan of this. ' If you have no
respect for yourselves, I beg lon tt'ie
some for me." , _
They laughed still loader, and Lists3the
table
Of course. I learned , very soon.: _that Am
steps had really been taken, op to that - time,
for drafting, anywhere, 'and' tbat - 7 had been
the victim of a cruel deception.
I .was plowed to see in.the •papenr• soon
after, that Captain Garderof and . Pieeten -
ant Chaffer, of General larouier's stiff,
haring concluded their business in New
York, had returned to the peninsula. *So.
it aeons that Cater was not asorgeon, after
I should be much more pleased. however,
to see both their names in one of those long
rat. of the newspapers publish after each
heavy battle.
Am for Forsyth, who evidently ,gdatmgad
the whole thing, to teams, me XI?,IO: J F,Ipt
seen him for a. week , and • beargult ..hcbsum
left the hotel ? I hope, for hiei,ebary,.that
be Will 'be really * drat*, ea 0,44 0: ta g
frimds dcrwrkin ~.7 q rsse, .r f i lki
Azi, -160120 1,1- , $ 2 t! VC
Eil
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