HEAVEN WORKETH WITH THE BAMBOOZLERS, CONFIRMING THEIR
WORDS, WITH SIGNS FOLLOWING.—GREAT EXPERIENCE MEETING
AROUND THE FLAG.—HARRY GRANDDADHAT TELLS WHAT THE FLAG
HATH DONE FOR HIS SOUL AND BODY.—LIKEWISE ANDRONICUS
CARNIVOROUS.—WONDERFUL PROOFS OF THE FACT THAT GOD HELPS
THOSE WHO ARE NOT SLOW AT HELPING THEMSELVES.
WHEN Chancy Mountebank Dephool Flea had got through with his highly
successful oration, he ordered the loud-noise-producing instruments
to strike up their loudest, and the pretty cloths to be waved on high
with the greatest vigor, in order to keep up the effect that had been
produced, and to scare away from the doorways of the dogs’ brains, any
sober reflections that might, perchance, be seeking entrance there; and
at a given signal, a very large and pretty cloth—which until then,
had been kept hidden—having on it a number of white spots and red
streaks, was run up to the top of a tall pole and thrown to the breeze.
Whereupon, the whole multitude of the fleas, rose up, and prostrated
themselves to it, crying:
“Hail! All Hail! All Holy Flag,
Source of our life, we bow to thee,
The Flag, the Flag, the Flag of the Free,
The Flag of the dog, and Flag of the flea.”
And there came a great darkness over all the land; and the atmosphere
was suffused with ghostly green and yellow lights, that cast a lurid
gloom over the whole assembly; and out of the darkness there came
lightnings and a voice of thunder, saying:
“Who doubteth that this is the Flag of the Free,
And boweth not down, thrice cursed be he.”
And all the multitude of the fleas, cried out in chorus, “Amen.”
By this time, all the poor dogs were shaking like leaves in the breeze,
and they cried out: “What shall we do? What shall we do?”
And the voice thundered again:
“Bow down, bow down to the Flag of the Free,
Bow down, and thank God for sweet Liberty.”
And all the multitude of the prostrate fleas, cried out again in chorus:
“Aye! Bow down.”
And again the ghostly lights flashed, and all manner of solemn and awful
noises were heard.
And the dogs being dazed and dazzled and confused with the awful sights
and sounds, began everywhere to fall down and worship the Flag, and,
catching the enthusiasm, they soon were shouting as loud as they could,
which with many of them was not very loud; for they were so hungry and
weak that their breath failed them, but they did the best they could.
Then was lifted up the voice of the Reverend Tee de Little Wit
Blatherskite, proclaiming: “Let there now be a time of silent lifting up
of the heart in thanksgiving to God for this our Flag, the most glorious
on earth, and for these our liberties, the only real ones on earth.”
And it was so. And there came a solemn hush over all the bowed assembly,
broken only by pious sighs, groans and ejaculations from the fleas,
which, by contagion, was taken up by the dogs, who were soon sighing
and groaning and ejaculating too, until the air was heavy with a solemn
buzz. Then there blew a holy wind from Heaven, that lifted up the folds
of the beautiful flag and caused it to wave with solemn flappings
most beautifully; and the solemn darkness began to pass away, to the
accompaniment of low, soft music, as of angel songs stealing down from
Heaven; and the sun shone out in splendor, and cast his brilliant beams
right on the beautiful Flag, that was transfigured in the glory of it.
Then proclaimed the Reverend Tee de Little Wit Blatherskite—who seemed
to have naturally become the Master of Ceremonies—“Brethren, let us
sing:
“My Country, ’tis of Thee,
Sweet land of Liberty,
Of Thee I sing.
Land where my fathers died,
Land of the pilgrim’s pride,
From every mountain side,
Let Freedom ring.
“My native country! Thee,
Land of the noble Free,
Thy name I love.
I love thy rocks and rills,
Thy woods and templed hills,
My heart with rapture thrills,
Like that above.
“Let music swell the breeze,
And ring from all the trees,
Sweet Freedom’s song.
Let mortal tongues awake;
Let all that breathe partake;
Let rocks their silence break:
The sound prolong.”
Then the whole assembly arose, and the loud-noise-producing instruments
joined in. And the fleas being very vigorous, and fat and strong, lifted
up their voices with tremendous energy; and all the salaried barkers,
and the police dogs, and all the other dogs that were well-fed and
rotund of belly, were in good voice, so that they all sent up a volume
of glad sound that made the air shake and caused the great Flag to give
an extra flap; but the other dogs, being very weak with hunger, and
short of wind, could not do so well, but they, nevertheless, made a very
respectable noise and were very happy.
When the singing was over, the Reverend Tee de Little Wit Blatherskite
lifted up his right paw, commanding attention, and said: “Brethren,
both dogs and fleas—I may call you brethren, for beneath the
all-encompassing folds of this glorious Flag, we are all equal [mighty
applause from the fleas, echoed by the dogs]—I think it would be very
appropriate upon this occasion, and well pleasing to God, to turn this
into an experience meeting; and let each of us testify to the blessings
of Liberty, that our beloved Flag has conferred upon us. Let any dog
or flea get up and speak, for all are equal here. Brother Grandadhat,
suppose you cheer us with your experience.”
Brother Grandadhat, being thus exhorted, arose, and bowing low to the
Flag, said: “I bless God for that Flag, and I bless God that under its
protecting and blessing-scattering folds I was born, as were my father
and my father’s father. I am proud to live under it. I am proud to
boast that from the very first day, when our fathers first flung it to
the breeze, and bade tyranny fly trembling, with its tail between its
legs—which it did—it has been giving us more and more freedom every
day, until now we are the freest, grandest and noblest nation on the
face of the great round globe. Yea, I will go further, and declare that
there is no freedom on earth, save here.
“Brethren, all, God gave us that Flag; it was designed in Heaven, and
God has been ever with it, and acknowledged it for his own. Never,
never, never has it floated—never, never, never can it float—over
any wrong, injustice or tyranny. Under the effulgent splendor of its
beautiful white spots and red streaks, wrong, injustice and tyranny
wither and wilt as would toadstools before the midsummer midday
sun. [Tremendous explosion of applause from the fleas, joined in by
the dogs.] When God gave us that Flag, he, with it, threw wide open
the windows and doors of Heaven, and poured out from his infinite
cornucopiæ, such a deluge of blessings upon us as no nation on earth
ever got or ever will get, and forthwith made us the pride of ourselves
and the envy of the whole world. [A most awful burst of applause from
the fleas, all the fleas rising up to give it. Several very weak, hungry
and woe-begone dogs, carried away by the whirlwind of excitement, drop
dead of heart failure.]
[Illustration]
“‘The gifts of God to our people have been so abundant and so special,
that the spirit of devout thanksgiving awaits but the appointment of a
day when it may have a common expression. He has stayed the pestilence
at our door,’ and caused all evil to turn aside from touching us. ‘He
has given us a love for our free civil institutions,’ and grace to abhor
and hang all who do not believe we are free, and dare to say so. ‘He
has widened our philanthropy by calls to succor the distress in other
lands; and he has given us’ such ‘a great increase in material wealth,
and’ such ‘a wide diffusion of contentment and comfort in the homes of
our’ dogs, that we are the wonder of the whole world, and the joy of
ourselves. [Grand crescendo of applause from the fleas, and penitent
ejaculations from the dogs of: “Lord, forgive our past repinings;”
“Lord, help us to feel how full we are;” “Lord, take away our blindness,
that our wealth may be disclosed to us;” and much winking amongst the
Bamboozling Committee, at the satisfactory working of the Bamboozle.]
Oh, beloved brethren, ours is _the_ Flag, the _only_ Flag in the world
worth having, and _we’ve got it, and don’t you forget it_; [Screams,
yells, and deliriums of applause.] the world envies us its possession;
they would like it, but they shall not have it; for my part, I will
never desert the Flag. No! I will never do it. It’s of no use asking
me. That Flag has blessed me; it has given me and mine prosperity, so
that I am comfortably rotund and fat; it is the object of my love, my
adoration, and I _never_ will desert it; no ne—ver. I will not live
under any other; so it’s of no use asking me; I would not take the
riches of the whole world for the daily sight of it; so it’s no use any
one offering them to me. I am perfectly happy now, and I shall go to
Heaven when I die. And when the death dew lies cold on my brow, may my
last words be:
‘Oh, Flag of the Free! I would die for thee;
Emblem of Libertee, Libertee—ee.’”
And making again obeisance to the emblem, he sat down amid a thunder of
applause, and the hullabaloo of the loud-noise-producing instruments.
Then spake the Reverend Tee De Little Wit Blatherskite, “Brethren, that
testimony must have done us all good, I am sure. Will some other good
brother favor us with his experience?”
Then stepped forth Andronicus Carnivorous, and, making three very low
obeisances to the Flag, said in a voice low and broken with emotion:
“Brother dogs and fleas: This is the proudest and solemnest moment of my
life. When I look on that glorious Flag, amongst whose bright spots and
broad red streaks, I can, with my mind’s eye, see, traced in lines of
refulgent brightness, ‘LIFE, LIBERTY, HAPPINESS, EQUALITY, FRATERNITY,’
my heart swells to bursting with gratitude, that some God, Providence or
other beneficence, did, in boundless mercy, direct my wandering feet,
when a young and poverty-stricken dog, to the shores of this glorious
free land, so bountifully blest with the milk and honey of prosperity;
and that I was privileged—for it _was_ a privilege—to rest and dwell,
and make my home under the great broad shadow of that grand old Flag
[making obeisance thereto] of the Free [Flea applause].
“Oh, Brother dogs—for though that blessed Flag has prospered me
immensely, and made me as corpulent a sucker as the most monstrous of
your fleas, I am not puffed up with pride, but still deem it my highest
honor to count myself as one of you, and to share with you the dignities
of your citizenship. [Applause from the dogs and a mysterious voice from
the rear, “Yes, but not the hunger of it,” and cries of “Put him out.” ]
“Oh, brother dogs, if it is such a blessed privilege to come in as a
ragged stranger, and with the brogue of a foreign dog on my tongue,
under the folds of this Flag, Oh! what must it be to be born under
it, of parents born under it, too! Oh! I cannot enough congratulate
the dogs here, who were thus blessed, upon the unutterably precious
heritage they have in that fact. Neither can I forgive the irreparable
wrong—unintentional though it might have been—my parents did me, in
having brought me into the world in a foreign land, in the midst of the
darkness, heathenism, want, misery and tyranny that reign wheresoever
that Flag fluttereth not. [Tumultuous applause from dogs and fleas.]
Yet, though I cannot help that wrong, I yield to no dog and no flea
in the width, length, depth and intensity of my love and adoration of
that blessed emblem of the liberty, equality and fraternity that all
enjoy that live under it. Yea, I believe that I, carrying about with
me the agonizing consciousness of my foreign origin, am more acutely
appreciative of the blessedness of living under it than they who are
born under it, and can claim the Flag as their very own. Often and often
am I amazed that so many of our native dogs seem so little to appreciate
their blessings. Instead of living in a state of perpetual thankfulness,
that they were born and live under this Flag, and participate in the
wealth, protection and liberty it scatters over all that are worthy,
they go about discontented and complaining of hunger and hard work; and
I have often been shocked by hearing some of these very native dogs say,
‘Damn Flags when you’ve nothing to eat.’ I think all such dogs are blind
and ungrateful, and should be punished as infidels and blasphemers.
[Applause.]
“Oh, Brethren, I can testify that the Flag has abundantly blessed _me_,
though a foreigner born. And what I say is, that what it has done for
me, it stands ready to do for all. I love it. I live for it; I would die
for it if need were, and I should happen to be in the country at the
time. I would abide ever under its great, wide, brooding folds, but that
an imperious and inevitable duty drives me to spend most of my time away
over the pond.
“Like my dear friend, Dephool Flea here, it is with a high and lofty
purpose I go abroad. Upon me is laid the solemn duty to go and testify
to my old kin beyond the pond, what great things this glorious Flag
hath done for my soul and body. Over there are divers cantankerous and
evil-minded carpers and jibers against our glorious liberties, who
allege that our dogocracy is all snide; our equality all fake; our
fraternity all buncombe and gaseous boast; our liberty all a gorgeous
mendacity. Therefore deem I myself charged with the responsibility of
putting to silence and shame these calumniators, by frequently dropping
myself amongst them, a visible, tangible, audible proof and specimen
of the product of our Flag. It is laid on me to be the exponent of
Triumphant Dogocracy under the Flag of the Free; and woe is me if I
shirk to discharge this duty.”
“I can understand the pain it gives our beloved Chancy to be away
from under his beloved Flag, three or four months every year, and the
overwhelming joy he always feels in getting back again; for it is
martyrdom to me to be expatriated so long; but I bear up under it as
well as I can, cheered by the reflection that I have a mission that none
but I can fulfill, and that I am performing the incalculably beneficent
service of disseminating correct notions about this great country and
its Flag, and creating friendly feeling towards it.”
“When this my duty shall be finally accomplished—as I pray it soon
may be—and I shall be privileged to come home finally, and rest me
forevermore under the proud flutter of its waving, and daily bathe
my glad soul in the healing beams of its shining, then alone shall
Andronicus Carnivorous be happy.” [Immense and prolonged applause, amid
which the Bamboozling Committee get around him, and hug and kiss him.
And the Holy One a Maker of long prayers, regretfully sighs and says to
himself, “Oh, Andy, Andy! One thing only thou lackest. If thou wert only
a Christian, thou wouldst be _quite_ perfect.” ]