PART V

CONDITIONS OF WAR

CHAPTER XIII-THE NORTHERN PEOPLE

75. Good Advice to J. Davis (1861)

BY CHARLES FARRAR BROWNE (ARTEMUS WARD)

Under the nom de plume of " Artemus Ward," Mr. Browne, originally a journalist in Cleveland, became, during his brief career, the most famous and original of American humorists; and his satires on the causes and objects of the war were widely read. Lincoln much enjoyed his writings.. Bibliography of the conditions of the war: Channing and Hart, Guide, § 213.

IN

N my travels threw the Sonny South I heared a heap of talk about Seceshon and bustin up the Union, but I didn't think it mounted to nothin. The politicians in all the villages was swearin that Old Abe (sometimes called the Prahayrie flower) shouldn't never be noggerated. They also made fools of theirselves in varis ways, but as they was used to that I didn't let it worry me much, and the Stars and Stripes continued for to wave over my little tent. Moor over, I was a Son of Malty and a member of several other Temperance Societies, and my wife she was a Dawter of Malty, an I sposed these fax would secoor me the infloonz and pertectiun of all the fust families. Alas! I was dispinted. State arter State seseshed and it growed hotter and hotter for the undersined Things came to a climbmacks in a small town in Alabamy, where I was premtorally ordered to haul down the Stars & Stripes. A deppytashun of red-faced men cum up to the door of my tent ware I was standin takin money (the arternoon exhibishun had commenst, an' my Italyun organist was jerkin his sole-stirrin chimes.) "We air cum, Sir," said a millingtary man in a cockt hat, "upon a hi and holy mishun. The Southern Eagle is screamin threwout this sunny land - proudly and defiantly screamin, Sir!"

"What's the matter with him," sez I, "don't his vittles sit well on his stummick?"

"That Eagle, Sir, will continner to scream all over this Brite and tremenjus land !”

If your Eagle can amuse hisself by screamin, men annoyed me for I was Bizzy makin

"And that's the reason you are here!" sez I, larfin one of my silvery larfs. I thawt if he wanted to goak I'd giv him sum of my sparklin eppygrams.

"Sir, you're inserlent. The plain question is, will you haul down the Star-Spangled Banner, and hist the Southern flag!"

"Nary hist!"

Those was my reply.

"Your wax works and beests is then confisticated, & you air arrested as a Spy!"...

I was carrid to Montgomry in iuns and placed in durans vial. The jail was a ornery edifiss, but the table was librally surplied with Bakin an Cabbidge. This was a good variety, for when I didn't hanker after Bakin I could help myself to the cabbige.

I had nobody to talk to nor nothing to talk about, howsever, and I was very lonely, specially on the first day; so when the jailer parst my lonely sell I put the few stray hairs on the back part of my hed (I'm bald now, but thare was a time when I wore sweet auburn ringlets) into as dish-hevild a state as possible, & rollin my eyes like a manyyuck, I cride: "Stay, jaler, stay! I am not mad but soon shall be if you don't bring me suthing to Talk!" He brung me sum noospapers, for which I thanked him kindly.

At larst I got a interview with Jefferson Davis, the President of the Southern Conthieveracy. He was quite perlite, and axed me to sit down and state my case. I did it, when he larfed and said his gallunt men had been a little 2 enthoosiastic in confisticatin my show.

"Yes," sez I," they confisticated me too muchly. I had sum hosses confisticated in the same way onct, but the confisticaters air now poundin stun in the States Prison in Injinnapylus."

"Wall, wall, Mister Ward, you air at liberty to depart; you air frendly

to the South, I know. Even now we hav many frens in the North, who sympathise with us, and won't mingle with this fight."

"J. Davis, there's your grate mistaik. Many of us was your sincere frends, and thought certin parties amung us was fussin about you and meddlin with your consarns intirely too much. But J. Davis, the minit you fire a gun at the piece of dry-goods called the Star-Spangled Banner, the North gits up and rises en massy, in defence of that banner. Not agin you as individooals, not agin the South even the flag. We should indeed be weak in the knees, unsound in the heart, but to save milk-white in the liver, and soft in the hed, if we stood quietly by and saw this glorus Govyment smashed to pieces, either by a furrin or a intestine foe The gentle-harted mother hates to take her naughty child across her knee, but she knows it is her dooty to do it. So we shall hate to whip the naughty South, but we must do it if you don't make back tracks at onct, and we shall wallup you out of your boots! J. Davis, it is my decided opinion that the Sonny South is making a egrejus mutton-hed of herself!"

"Go on, sir, you're safe enuff. You're too small powder for me!" sed the President of the Southern Conthieveracy.

"Wait till I go home and start out the Baldinsvill Mounted Hoss Cavalry! I'm Capting of that Corpse, I am, and J. Davis, beware! Jefferson D., I now leave you! Farewell my gay Saler Boy! Good bye, my bold buccaneer! Pirut of the deep blue sea, adoo! adoo!" [Charles Farrar Browne], Artemus Ward his Book (New York, 1865), 162-169 passim.

76.

"Our Country's Call" (1861)

BY WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

Bryant was the oldest of the greater American poets at the outbreak of the Civil War. He was also a journalist, and as editor of the New York Evening Post had for many years been prominent as a fearless advocate of numerous good causes, including that of anti-slavery. For Bryant, see Henry Matson, References for Literary Workers, 322-324. — Bibliography in No. 75 above.

AY down the axe; fling by the spade;

LA

Leave in its track the toiling plough;

The rifle and the bayonet blade

For arms like yours were fitter now;

And ye, who throng, beside the deep,
Her ports and hamlets of the strand,
In number like the waves that leap

On his long murmuring marge of sand,
Come, like that deep, when, o'er his brim,
He rises, all his floods to pour,
And flings the proudest barks that swim,
A helpless wreck, against his shore.

Few, few were they whose swords of old
Won the fair land in which we dwell;

But we are many, we who hold

The grim resolve to guard it well.
Strike, for that broad and goodly land,

Blow after blow, till men shall see

That Might and Right move hand in hand,

And glorious must their triumph be.

William Cullen Bryant, Thirty Poems (New York, D. Appleton & Co., 1864),

104-107.

77. A War Meeting (1862)

FROM THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE

Under the editorship of Joseph Medill, the Chicago Tribune became one of the most prominent Republican papers in the West and a firm supporter of Lincoln's administration. The meeting described in this extract is typical of those held in all the larger cities of the North in answer to the president's call, on July 1, 1862, for three hundred thousand more volunteers. - Bibliography as in No. 75 above.

ATURDAY night was a night long to be remembered in the municipal annals of Chicago, as well as in the history of the State of Illinois. One occasion only has furnished its parallel — the public gatherings at the fall of Sumter. . .

Bryan Hall was jammed to overflowing; Metropolitan Hall was full; five thousand people were in the Court House square. Earnest, able and eloquent speakers addressed them; patriotic songs were sung; voluntary contributions poured in; by unanimous vote men asked to be taxed to meet the present emergency. The vast assemblages were moved by one common impulse.

Perhaps the most gratifying feature of these meetings was the fixed