The October Elections.--The Effect the Result produced in Kentucky.
[Illustration: AFTER THE FALL ELECTION.]
CONFEDRIT × ROADS
(wich is in the Stait uv Kentucky),
October 14, 1866.
There is mournin in Kentucky. The results of the elections in Ohio,
Injeany, Pennsylvany, and Iowa reached me yesterday through a Looisville
paper, wich wuz dropped off the cars at Secessionville, wich is the
nearest station to us, and wich, I hapnin to be there, I picked up.
Ohio--40,000 Ablishin!
Injeany--20,000 Ablishin!
Pennsylvany--20,000 Ablishin!
Iowa--30,000 Ablishin!
ABLISHIN! Wat a dreery waste uv Ablishin! Not a single oasis uv
Dimocrisy anywhere,--nary Aryrat on wich our ark kin rest in
safety,--but all around us the mad waves uv Ablishnism rearin their
crestid heads muchly.
I felt it my dooty to make this fact known to my neighbors; for, sposin
that His Serene Highness' trip wood secure us enuff deestricts to make
the next Congress safe, and consekently make us certin uv admission,
they hed been makin arrangements for restorin things to their normal
condishun, ez they were before the war.
In fact, two weeks before, in view of the expected success uv the
Democracy, a meetin hed bin held on the subject. Some wuz for at once
seezin the niggers wherever they cood be found, and puttin em at work;
but the conservatives overruled this. They held that slavery hed bin
abolished, and that it ought not be restored; in fact, that, to act in
good faith, it cood not be reëstablished. Deekin Pogram announced a
plan. The town authorities shood pass a ordinance for the proper
government uv the niggers. Their good and ourn demanded it. For
instance, they shood not be permitted to be out after 7 o'clock, P.M.,
in the evenin; they shoodent leave the plantashen onto wich they wuz
employed; they shood work every day till 7; and to do away with the
pernicious work uv the Freedmen's Bureau, no man and wife wich hed bin
married by a chaplin uv the Bureau, or by any one else, shood be
employed on the same plantashen, and also no father or mother and child.
Sich ez violated these ordinances shood be arrested by anybody, and
fined; and in default uv payment uv the fine and costs, shood be sold to
the person who wood take his or her labor for the shortest number uv
years, and pay the fine and costs aforesed. "Ez a conservative," sed the
Deekin, "I sejest this plan."
"Do yoo want to know my definition uv the word 'conservative?'" sed Joe
Bigler, a returned Confederate soljer, who, I bleeve, hez seen enough uv
war. "It's a man who goes a roundabout way to do a devlish mean thing.
Deekin, why can't yoo go to the devil by a straight road, ez I do?"
The interupshen uv the demoralized wretch wuzn't notist; and ez the
trustees uv the township wuz all present, the ordinance wuz passed, and
that night two thirds uv the niggers within five miles uv the Corners
wuz arrested and sold, and within two weeks every one hed bin capcherd.
I hied me to the Corners, and the first man I saw wuz Bascom, the
grocery keeper, engaged in the congenial biznis uv tappin a barrel uv
contentment, wich he hed just receeved. I wuz a goin to tell him the
dread intelligence, when he caught site uv me. "Taste that, Parson," sed
he, holdin out a tin dipper full. I drank it off, and one look at him
onmand me. "Kin I o'ercloud that smilin cheek?" thot I, ez, in a fit uv
absent-mindednis,--wich I hev every now and then,--I held out the empty
dipper to be filled agin, wich it wuz. "No! for a time he shel be
spared;" and I borrered his mule, and rode away pensively.
I wuz goin fust to Deekin Pogram's, for he wuz the most interested uv
eny in the settlement. After the meetin mentioned above, the Deekin hed
caused the arrest uv sich niggers ez he cood ketch, and had had em fined
in sums uv $275 and uppards, wich bein unable, ez a rool, to pay the
fine, he hed kindly bid em in.
He hed picked up, here and there, all uv his old servants, ceptin those
wich hed bin killed in the army, and the few misguided ones wich hed
made their way North, and that mornin the plantashen wuz to be
reconstructed upon the old patriarkle system. Mrs. Deekin Pogram wuz
marshellin four uv the likeliest wenches I ever saw in the kitchen; his
son Tom wuz chuckin a yaller girl under the chin, wich hed bin born on
the place about eighteen years before, and wich, owin to a unfortunate
resemblance to the Deekin, bed caused a onpleasantnis between him and
his wife, wich endid in the loss uv the most uv his hair, and the sellin
uv the girl's mother to Noo Orleans. The two girls hed each their
waitin-maids, and wuz a puttin them through their paces. There hed bin
some trouble in gittin em reconstructed, it bein deemed nessary to take
the conseet out uv em, wich they wuz all a doin. Ez I rode up, the old
lady bed jest knocked one uv em down with a fire-shovel, and wuz dancin
a Highland fling onto her prostrate body. Almira, the oldest gal, hed
her fingers in the wool uv her gal; and tother one wuz a thumpin hern to
redose her to her proper level; and the Deekin hisself wuz a deelin with
one ongrateful wretch, who objected to bein put to work on them terms,
not realizin that the Bureau was gone. Ez the Deekin hed a revolver he
yielded the pint, and submitted to be flogged, wich the Deekin wuz doin
ez neatly ez I ever saw, considerin he hed bin out uv practis four
years. He had him tied up to a tree, and wuz a wollopin uv him gorjus.
While he wuz a convinsin uv him with his whip that there wuz trooth in
the Skripter, and that Ham wuz reely a servant unto his bretherin, I
exclaimed, "Stop!" and immejitly whispered the appallin news in his left
ear (tother one hed bin chawed off in a misunderstandin at Bascom's the
previous Sunday nite, after servis). Never shel I forgit the look uv woe
on that eminent Christian's face. The whip fell from his nerveless hand;
and with teers streemin down his cheeks, washin up little streaks uv
dirt in the most heart-rendin manner, he gasped in a husky voice to the
wife uv his buzzum, "Cut him down, Mirandy! The North's gone Ablishin,
and the d----d niggers will be free anyhow!" and the old patriarch
swooned away at my feet.
And sich an expression of anguish ez distorted the face uv the Deekin's
wife I hope never to see agin. Droppin the shovel, she stood ez one
petrified, with her foot elevated in mid air, ez in the act uv stompin,
and uttering a shreek wich methinks I hear ringing in my ears yet, she
fell precisely ez she stood, with her leg crooked ez ef 'twuz froze
there. Tom released the gal he wuz subdooin, and mountin his horse rode
off to the Corners without saying a word; and unable to witness the
distress uv that stricken family, I made haste to mount my mule and go
to; while the niggers, feelin that they were wunst more their own men
and women, scattered in every direction.
"Sich is the froots uv Radikelism," murmured I. "Sich is the bitter cup
fanaticism hez put to our lips;" and castin one lingring look at the
prostrate forms uv the Deekin, his wife (with her foot insensibly
raised), and their two gushin daughters, I spurred the mule, and
departed.
Wood that every Ablishnist in the North hed seen that site, and wuz
possessed uv a sole to appreshate it! Then would they vote differently.
PETROLEUM V. NASBY, P.M.
(wich is Postmaster).