_Peter_—Well, Jack, where are all the boys you promised me?
_Jack_—They are asleep in the market.
_Peter_—Zounds! Jack! Arouse them, or we are lost.
_Jack_—They have one eye open, and the gilded stuff will soon open the
other.
_Peter_—Jack, what do you mean? Have I not kept open house for three
days and nights, and swilled yourself and comrades with liquor for a
week, and haven’t you all been drunk at my expense for several days? By
Jupiter! Jack! you won’t desert me, after drinking so much of my best
rum, will you?
_Jack_—The boys won’t expose their eyes and nose, and teeth and skulls,
and bellies to the sharp claws and big fists, and stones and clubs of
your political adversaries, without some money in advance, to tickle the
palms of the surgeon and nurses at the Hospital. For doctors and nurses
won’t trust the poor, you know, and especially the boys who get their
skulls cracked at the primary elections.
_Peter_—Well, Jack, tell the boys that I will fill them with good rum
until the primary election is over, and then, if I am victorious in the
Nominating Convention, I’ll reward them liberally with money.
_Jack_—(With his fingers whirling like a windmill over his nose)—The
boys an’t so green as to trust the politicians until they have fought
their bloody sieges, and elected them to offices where they can steal
fortunes from the people, including many a chunk of choice grub from our
own mouths. No, no, Peter. It won’t do. Down with the cash, and all will
go well.
_Peter_—Have I not often got yourself and friends out of the Watch
House?
_Jack_—And have we not long bought your grog, although you adulterated
it more than other liquor dealers? And have we not fought your public
battles, and exposed ourselves to imprisonment, and periled our lives to
give you political influence to liberate us from the Watch House, when
we got into a bad scrape on your account?
_Peter_—You lie, you thief and drunken vagabond, if you say I
adulterated my liquor more than other rum sellers.
_Jack_—Have a care, Peter, have a care, for did I not catch you in the
very act of pouring water by the pailfull into a rum hogshead last week,
that was only about half full of spurious alcohol, when you began to
adulterate it?
_Peter_—I was afraid the boys would drink so much, that they would not
be sober enough to whip my political enemies to-day, if I did not
adulterate my pure and strong rum, which came from Jamaica only last
week.
_Jack_—That will do, Peter—that will do, for you always could tell a
smoother and bigger lie than me, and I give it up.
_Peter_—Come, come, Jack—this won’t do. The sun will soon be climbing
the eastern hills, and there’s no time to be lost. What’s to be done?
_Jack_—Fork over, Peter, and we’ll die, if necessary, in our effort to
stuff the ballot boxes, and keep them stuffed all day, and drive your
foes from the polls, and seize the boxes at sunset, and count the votes
in favor of your delegates to the Convention.
_Peter_—Will you be true?
_Jack_—As money to the poor man.
_Peter_—Then awake the boys, and let them all come quickly, and get some
stuff.
_Jack_ (Scampers to the market)—Get up, you lazy drunken thieves, and
run for your lives to Peter Cooper’s, and get some precious stuff. (They
all spring from the butcher stalls, and run like bloodhounds for Peter’s
groggery.)
_Jack_—Here we are, Peter.
_Peter_—So I perceive. (They all slyly smile and wink, and screw their
expressive mouths.)
_Jack_—Shall I help the boys to some grog, Peter, while you are counting
out our primary wages?
_Peter_—O yes, but don’t give them too stiff a horn, Jack, as I fear
they will all get dead drunk before sundown, and then I’ll surely be
defeated, as the hardest fighting will be after the poles are closed.
So, boys, please drink moderately until the election is over, and fight
like bull dogs till the result is declared, and then, if I am the
conqueror, you can all get drunk on my toddy for a week or month.
_Jack_—That’s the talk. Them’s our views, an’t they, boys?
_All_ (drinking)—Well—they are.
_Peter_—There, Jack, there’s your share, and now you divide the balance
among your honest and noble companions.
_Jack_—Boys—do you hear the compliments of our candidate?
_All_—Well—we do, and he is a man of his word, and we’ll put him
through.
_Jack_—(Putting all the money in his pocket)—Scissors! boys! Look down
the Bowery! There come, on the full jump, about forty bullies with Ned,
the murderer, at their head, screaming and beckoning his bloody gang to
follow him.
_Peter_—O God! Stand by me, friends, or I’ll be murdered before the
polls open. For Ned threatened to kill me yesterday, if I didn’t
withdraw my name as a candidate. So, don’t let him and his desperate
band murder me. For I’m sure they will, if you abandon me. O dear! Do
stand by me, brave young gentlemen! Won’t you? Please do? (He begins to
cry.)
_Jack_—Here they come, and they are armed with clubs, knives and
pistols.
_Peter_—O Lordy! (And he crawls under the counter, and gets behind a rum
cask, and is as quiet as a young rat.)
_Ned_ (bursting through the door, and his cronies smashing the
windows)—I understand you stuffed the ballot-box last night for Peter
Cooper, and intend to carry the election to-day, by spurious ballots
already deposited.
_Jack_—You are a liar. (They close, and Ned throws Jack, and mauls him
awfully.)
_Ned_—Go in, boys, and give no quarter, and drag Peter Cooper from
behind the rum cask, under the bar, and give him a dreadful flogging,
for not withdrawing in favor of my candidate.
_Peter_—O spare me, Ned, spare me, and I’ll withdraw from the field.
_Ned_—Shut up, Snarlyow. Give it to him, boys, and knock his teeth down
his throat, and make his nose as red as his crimes, and his eyes as
black as his heart. Hit him again, and avenge his robbery of his poor
old Aunt.
_Peter_—O spare me, kind gentlemen, and I’ll give you all the rum I’ve
got in the bar, and down cellar, too.
_Ned_—Close your jaws, Shylock. Your time is come. (Jack now rallies,
and a bloody collision ensues, and two are stabbed, and one shot, and
Peter is terribly beaten, and thrown into the cellar, but soon crawls up
stairs, and Peter’s friends fly for their lives.)
_Peter_—(sitting on a rum cask, with his nostrils blocked with
coagulated blood, and his face mashed to a jelly, and Ned and his
bullies drinking, laughing, singing, and dancing)—O dear me, I wish
somebody would come and relieve me from the clutches of these awful men.
_Ned_—(throwing a glass of rum in the face of Peter)—No impudence,
Peter. Another insolent word, and I’ll skin you. (The Police now rush
in, and, after a bloody struggle, arrest Ned and all his followers, and
drag them to prison.)
(To be continued.)
Stephen H. Branch’s Alligator.
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