Miscellaneous.
_THE ANDERSONVILLE POST-OFFICE._
The following touching lines, by George H. Hollister, Esq., of
Litchfield, Connecticut, are descriptive of an incident in the _pen_ of
the Union prisoners at Andersonville, Georgia. The war has elicited
nothing more beautiful in description or of sadder interest:—
“No blanket round his wasted limbs,
Under the rainy sky he slept,
While, pointing his envenom’d shafts
Around him Death, the archer, crept.
He dream’d of hunger, and held out
His hand to clutch a little bread,
That a white angel with a torch,
Among the living and the dead,
Seem’d bearing, smiling as he went:
The vision waked him, as he spied
The post-boy follow’d by a crowd
Of famish’d prisoners, who cried
For letters—letters from their friends.
Crawling upon his hands and knees,
He hears his own name call’d, and, lo!
A letter from his wife he sees!
“Gasping for breath, he shriek’d aloud,
And, lost in nature’s blind eclipse,
Faltering amid the suppliant crowd,
Caught it and press’d it to his lips.
A guard who follow’d, red and wroth,
And flourishing a rusty brand,
Reviled him with a taunting oath,
And snatch’d the letter from his hand.
‘First pay the postage, whining wretch!’
Despair had made the prisoner brave:
‘Then give me back my money, sir!
I am a captive,—not a slave.
You took my money and my clothes;
Take my life, too,—but let me know
How Mary and the children are,
And I will bless you ere I go.’
“The very moonlight through his hands,
As he stood supplicating, shone,
And his sharp features shaped themselves
Into a prayer, and such a tone
Of anguish there was in his cry
For wife and children, that the guard—
Thinking upon his own—pass’d by
And left him swooning on the sward.
Beyond the ‘dead-line’ fell his head:
The eager sentry knew his mark,
And with a crash the bullet sped
Into his brain, and all was dark.
But when they turn’d his livid cheek
Up toward the light, the pale lips smiled,
Kissing a picture fair and meek
That held in either hand a child.”
_A CHAPTER OF ACCIDENTS._
“The Wheeling Intelligencer” (1865) gives the following “chapter of
accidents”: it says,—
“We received a letter several days ago from a gentleman, enclosing an
announcement of his marriage, and stating that he had also enclosed the
sum of seventy-five cents to pay for it. The letter did not enclose the
money; but the next day we got another letter from the same gentleman,
stating that it had occurred to him, after he had mailed the first note,
that he had not enclosed the money; ‘and I therefore,’ says the second
epistle, ‘enclose to you the amount;’ but, instead of seventy-five
cents, the letter only contained twenty-five. A day or two afterwards we
received two more letters from the same person, each enclosing fifty
cents. The first of the two letters stated that the writer, having
discovered his mistake, enclosed fifty cents more to make up the amount.
In the second letter the gentleman says, that ‘having learned that the
mail containing my last letter was destroyed by fire, I enclose now
another fifty cents.’ Our friend’s singular confusion is no doubt
attributable to the fact which in his original note he requested us to
announce.”
_A SCENE AT THE PHILADELPHIA POST-OFFICE._
DIDN’T LIKE THE IDEA.—A single female, apparently forty-five years of
age, with a very scraggy neck and weazened features, made her appearance
yesterday afternoon at the ladies’ window in the post-office.
“I want to get back a letter.”
“What for, madam?”
“Why, I dropped it in the box over yonder. I want to take it back
again.”
“That’s against our rules, ma’am; I am not allowed to give back a letter
unless I know all about it.”
“Well, then, there’ll be a fuss here, that’s all: I want my letter
again.”
“I’ll call the chief clerk, then, ma’am. You can make the fuss with him,
if you must have one.”
Mr. Booth was summoned. With his usual blandness he asked the lady how
the letter was directed, and to whom. He obtained a prompt reply. He
found that the lady had dropped the letter into the box under the
general delivery-window. He produced it from the basket after a little
search, and returned it to her. She appeared considerably pleased,
brushed off the letter with her handkerchief, and at once dropped it
into the basket under the ladies’ window, before which she was standing.
“Why, I thought you wanted to take out the letter!” said Mr. Booth, in
some surprise. “Here you’ve mailed it again.”
“That’s all right now,” said the woman. “That’s what I wanted. I dropped
the letter in the wrong place fust, among the men’s letters. I hate the
men, so I do. I hain’t goin’ to have my letter mixed up with men’s
letters, nohow.”
“You dislike the male sex then, madam?”
“I don’t hate you mail folk, as I know on, wuss than the rest on ’em.”
“I mean the men, madam; you dislike them?” said Mr. Booth, emphasizing
the title of masculinity.
“Oh, the men! Of course I hate ’em. I wouldn’t trust one of ’em anigh
me. They’re a deceivin’, lyin’”——
How the sentence would have been completed is more than we can say. At
this moment somebody trod upon the tail of a vixenish-looking dog that
followed the lady, and, as she rushed out, others took her place at the
window. Mr. Booth feels flattered that, while hating the male sex in
general, she doesn’t hate the mail folks in particular.
_THE POST COMES IN._