Old Shoddy sits in his easy-chair,
And cracks his jokes and drinks his ale,
Dumb to the shivering soldier's prayer,
Deaf to the widows' and orphans' wail.
_His_ coat is warm as the fleece unshorn;
Of a 'golden fleece' he is dreaming still:
And the music that lulls him, night and morn,
Is the hum-hum-hum of the shoddy-mill.
Clashing cylinders, whizzing wheels,
Rend and ravel and tear and pick;
What can resist these hooks of steel,
Sharp as the claws of the ancient Nick?
Cast-off mantle of millionaire,
Pestilent vagrant's vesture chill,
Rags of miser or beggar bare,
_All_ are 'grist' for the shoddy-mill.
Worthless waste and worn-out wool,
Flung together--a specious _sham_!
With just enough of the 'fleece' to pull
Over the eyes of poor 'Uncle Sam.'
Cunningly twisted through web and woof,
Not 'shirt of Nessus' such power to kill.
Look! how the prints of his hideous hoof
Track the fiend of the shoddy-mill!
A soldier lies on the frozen ground,
While crack his joints with aches and ails;
A 'shoddy' blanket wraps him round,
His 'shoddy' garments the wind assails.
His coat is 'shoddy,' well 'stuffed' with 'flocks';
He dreams of the flocks on his native hill,
His feverish sense the demon mocks--
The demon that drives the shoddy-mill.
Ay! pierce his tissues with shooting pains,
Tear the muscles and rend the hone,
Fire with frenzy the heart and brain;
Old Rough-Shoddy! your work is done!
Never again shall the bugle-blast
Waken the sleeper that lies so still;
His dream of home and glory's past:
Fatal's the 'work' of the shoddy-mill.
Struck by 'shoddy,' and not by 'shells,'
And not by shot, our brave ones fall.
Greed of gold the story tells.
Drop the mantle and spread the pall.
Out! on the vampires! out! on those
Who of our life-blood take their fill.
No _meaner_ 'traitor' the nation knows,
Than the greedy ghoul of the shoddy-mill!
* * * * *
Some years ago, a German writer informed his astonished readers:
'Thieves are so rare in America, that I observe, from reading their
journals, that those who are curious in such studies are obliged to
offer a reward to find them.' To judge from a recent attempt at
imposition in New-York, one might suppose that negroes were so rare in
this country that we are obliged to imitate them, by way of keeping up
the supply. Not long ago, a young woman, named Perry, and a Dr. Perkins,
of Oneida county, engaged with a broker of the curb-stone persuasion to
show off the lady as a case of gradual external carbonization; it being
asserted that for four years her body had gradually been turning to
charcoal! Examination by Dr. Mott and others revealed the fact that 'the
supposed epidermis was made of woven cotton, into which charcoal mixed
with gum had been worked.' This was tightly gummed to the fair dame, who
was to have been exhibited 'in style' in a stylish house in Fourth
street; but who was taken to Bellevue Hospital, to be 'ungummed,' as the
French say of people who are turned out of place and lose their
chances--as this damsel did. The incident will doubtless, at a future
day, find a conspicuous place in the history of remarkable impostures.
As it is, we conclude with the remark of a friend, to the effect that
the lady, by putting the Coal On, had brought herself to a Full Stop!
* * * * *
We are indebted to the Amsterdam (N. Y.) _Weekly Dispatch_ for remarks
to the effect that THE CONTINENTAL MAGAZINE is reaching a point in
American literature seldom gained at so early a period by any young
magazine. 'We hail its independence of thought as the development of a
new era in the literature of our land. Its matter is high-toned and
interesting, it is the _most outspoken_ print we know of, and its
outspokenness is the result of a fresh and vigorous life that is not
warped by petty conventionalities.'
We thank our editorial friend for his compliment, and sincerely trust
that those who have followed us in our career will not disagree with
him. We honestly and earnestly believe that we _are_ outspoken and
independent, and accountable in no earthly way to any one, or aught save
our conscience and the public. We can imagine no measure for the good of
the people, which we would not urge heart and soul, and we most
certainly know of no public official, in any capacity, whom we should
feel bound to spare in the event of his unworthiness becoming patent. We
are neither Radical nor Conservative, neither anti-capital nor
anti-poor-man's rights, but hold to the great and glorious creed of
Labor and Intelligence hand in hand with Capital, and the harmony of
their interests. We believe in constantly enlarging the area of human
freedom, holding that the freer and more responsible you make a man,
the more, as a rule, will you stimulate him to improve himself.
And we detest from our very soul the Southern-planter and
Northern-democratic-conservative doctrine that society should consist of
two grades, the first being the mudsill poor, to whom certain
protections and privileges should be granted, and are due by the second
or the 'higher classes;' holding that a free American, beyond a good
education (to which every tax-payer contributes) should claim 'nothing
from any body,' and that the less use is made of such phrases as 'lower
orders,' 'aristocracy,' and 'social nobility,' the more creditable will
it be for man or woman, let their 'position' be what it will.
This war has inaugurated a new era when earnest, honest thought, and
bold straightforward speech alone can effect any thing. It is the time
for fearlessness and straightforwardness if there ever was one in our
history. We have a great war in hand, and great political reforms and
measures of tremendous importance are crowding thickly around it, while
others, not less mighty, are looming dimly behind them. The great
principles of Republicanism, of man's capacity for self-government, of
freedom and of progress, have been brought to 'the struggle for life,'
and it depends upon our national American energy and _honesty_ to
determine whether they shall live. If they _are_ to live, we shall be
first among nations, not in the narrow, wretched sense of old-fashioned
diplomacy, but in the high Christian sense of aiding all oppressed
humanity in their hopes of attaining their rights. But if these
principles are to perish--better would it be for this whole land to
become a wilderness, and every life a death, than that we should survive
the degradation. We have not yet sunk so low that there is no truth left
worth dying for. There was a time when men, women, and children were
martyred by countless thousands for their fidelity to the faith that
extended the same religious rights to all, and now that time has come
again to us, calling for fresh sacrifices to the same principle as
regards earthly rights and the common happiness of mankind.
But we believe that the truth will prevail, after a sore trial, and that
we shall be rewarded to the full. 'No cross, no crown.' But there is a
crown after the cross, and God will give it to us. We are passing
through the baptism of fire--and verily we needed it, both South and
North. The South had become mad with vanity and aristocracy; the North
was, is still, corrupt and rotten beyond all healthy life, with such
villainy in 'politics,' and such indifference to all that was noble and
honorable through the greed of gold, that honest and able men were cast
aside, or at best, used as mere tools by the 'intelligent.' Now we are
in the struggle for life, and rascals, whether of the Union or of the
confederacy, will sooner or later be tried, tested, and rejected. The
people are very patient, and they can be for a long time fooled with
this or that man's reputed honesty and ability. But we have come to the
time of trial, and the people will soon find who is false and what is
_true_.
It is not to be expected that in one year, or in two, the country will
be rid of all the old, corrupt politicians and demagogues who
continually work every subject of public interest into the question of a
'party.' But it is gratifying to observe that, whether Radical or
Conservative, such men are beginning to be regarded with contempt. In
times like these, _we_, at least, blame no man for honestly advocating
any policy which he thinks will aid the Union cause. But the country was
never more disgusted than it is at present, with men who use politics as
a mere trade by which to live. The infamy which has attached to the
miserable and imbecile Buchanan, that type of degraded, pettifogging
diplomacy, is rapidly extending to his whole tribe--and their name is
legion. It is significant that a bank, whose notes bore as vignette a
portrait of the ex-honorable ex-President, has been obliged to call them
in, and substitute another device, since so many of the bills were
marked beneath the picture with such words as 'traitor,' and 'Judas
Iscariot.'
The _people_ are 'all right' in this struggle: but they are awaking very
rapidly to the fact that those in power _must_ be honest or able. The
coming year is to witness either a grand sifting or a tremendous
protest, whose thunder-tones will be heard through all history. It is
all very well for conservatives to lay the blame on their enemies and
yell for their blood; to recommend the assassination of Charles Sumner,
as has been done by one Boston journal; or the hanging of all leading
Radicals, as recommended time and again by the New-York _Herald_; but
this will not satisfy the people who can not see how the country is to
be saved by holding up and aiding the enemy. Neither, on the other hand,
will the people long regard with favor any persons of the opposite
party, who are suspected of having managed the war for their own selfish
purposes. The old hacks who can only live for personal preferment and
for plunder, will be found out, and their places taken by honester and
younger men, whose minds will have been shaped, not in by-gone political
pettifogging, but in the great earnest needs of the times--in honor and
in truth.
* * * * *
Even before authentic copies of General Butler's famed 'Woman Order' had
reached us, it was generally understood that he had really done very
little more than enforce an already existing local law; yet 'with the
word' there went up a squall from the democratic press, clamoring for
his instant removal; so angry were the 'Conservatives' that any thing
should be said or done which would in any way injure the
'susceptibilities' of their beloved rebel friends.
If we are really _at war_, it is neither fit nor proper that such
expressions of sympathy for the enemy should continually appear, to keep
alive in the heart of the foe continual hopes of Northern aid. What does
the reader think, for instance, of such a paragraph as the following
from the Washington correspondence of the New-York _Herald_--which has
been copied with commendation by its colleagues:
'All conservative men here are shocked at the sweeping measures of
confiscation proposed by the radicals. They provide substantially
for the abolition of slavery, because slaveholders, for the most
part, are considered as rebels by these bills. _There are a quarter
of a million of slaveholders_, and a quarter of a million of other
property-holders in the South, _that would be made beggars by the
execution of this programme_. It is pretended that this wholesale
confiscation is for the purpose of compensating for the expenses of
the war; but none will dare to go into the Africanized South among
an infuriated people to purchase estates. It is proposed, also, to
arm the negroes, and in effect make them superior to the million of
whites, who are to be deprived of their property. Of course, under
such circumstances, there will be no cotton or other crops, nor any
demand for Northern manufactures from the South.'
Really! and so legislation at Washington is to be conducted with special
reference to protecting the property of the rebels! No confiscation,
forsooth, because the half million of rebels who have plunged us into
this iniquitous and horrible war, in the hope of utterly ruining us,
might thereby be reduced to poverty! Northern men may pay a million a
day in taxes, but the select slaveholding few who caused the taxation
are to be exempted. How shallow is the concluding '_of course_, under
such circumstances there will be no demand for Northern manufactures
from the South.' Will there not? Wait until the South has been well
subdued, thoroughly Butlered and vigorously Northed; wait till the
Yankee is at home there, and then see if there will be 'no demand for
Northern manufactures.' Quite as tender to the rebels is the spirit of
the following from the Boston _Post_ of May 31st:
'Senator Sumner,' a correspondent writes, 'in an argument against
the proposed tax on cotton, not only opposed it as _an act of
injustice to the unrepresented South_--for grain, hemp, and flax
are left untouched--but as oppressive on manufacturers.' Mr.
Sumner's sense of justice is called into exercise only when it
suits its owner's convenience. He has no thought of 'injustice to
the unrepresented South,' when he wishes to tax negroes, emancipate
slaves, and confiscate Southern property.'
Such remarks require no comment. If a rebel in arms, disgraced by every
infamy of treason, is only to be treated as his representatives would
like, then it is indeed time for the honest friends of the Union to
inquire what safeguard we have in the future against national ruin?
* * * * *