The Little Things of Life, Happening All Over the World and
Caught in Ink for Trotwood’s Monthly.
War Babies.
The most gigantic struggle of modern times was the American Civil War.
In no other country but this, with its breadth of conservativeness and
its dearth of caste, could the bitterness of such a war have been so
quickly forgotten. As it is in a few more decades, if the same spirit of
good feeling continues to prevail, and the fanatics be allowed to die a
natural death, it will be a question as to which side will have the most
respect for the brave men of the other. A striking feature of the great
war, to me, has always been the unanimity with which the entire country,
with the probable exception of the military leaders themselves, expected
the war to speedily terminate. In the South the enlisted men all feared
it would end before they had time to get into a rousing good battle, and
the same feeling appears to have existed among the Northern volunteers.
As an illustration of this feeling in the South, in talking to an old
farmer the other day, and he a gallant cavalryman, who belonged to
Forrest’s immortal command, he laughingly remarked, that the greatest
number of colts he ever saw at one time was a certain Tennessee cavalry
regiment the first year after the war. “You see,” he said, “none of us
expected the war to last over three or six months, and never dreamed it
would go over a year. Nearly every man in our regiment went in on his pet
saddle mare or half thoroughbred, and fully two-thirds of us were horse
breeders, on a greater or less scale, while at home. But the war went on,
we were ordered here and there, hundreds of miles from home with plenty
of fighting and little else to think of. We were kept so busy that many
of us, in fact, had forgotten all about the spring breeding, and would
have been glad if it had forgotten about itself. But not so; the next
spring there came the colts—war babies, to be sure—dropped into a hard
world at a cruel and unmotherly time, and before we knew it our regiment
had more colts than we knew what to do with. I had to send my mare home
and get a fresh mount, and the others traded around, or left dam and
colt to shift for themselves in strange and foreign lands. I have often
wondered what became of that crop of colts, the first breeding venture of
our regiment.”
A Contest in the King’s English.
There is a young darky downtown, at a livery stable, who has been priding
himself on his ability, as he expressed it, “ter fling English.” But he
takes no pride in it any more. Old Wash cured him, and it happened this
way:
“Wheneber I goes down dar arter yo’ mare,” the old darky said, “dis heah
young niggah gins ter fling his English ’roun’ scan’lus. I tell you,
boss, I’m gittin’ tired ob dat, an’ I’m gwi’ teach ’im how ter talk
English sho’ nuff some day. I sw’ar to you, sah,” said the old man, as he
mopped his face with his red handkerchief, “It’s so hot I’ve mighty nigh
multerplied, an’ I’ve got de commissary rumertism, ter boot; but jes you
watch out fur me de naixt time dat nigger ’gins ter fling his jaw-bone
’roun’ whar I’m standin’—jes you watch me riddle ’im wid sintax an’
orfrography an’ sich! Jes you watch!”
For several days after that I noticed the old man studying an old Davies
Geometry and an obsolete work on synonyms, which I had sent to the attic
long ago—looking, as he expressed it, for “some good cuss-words to fit de
’casion.” But I had forgotten all about it until one evening I drove into
the stable with him. A sprightly young darky ran out, took the mare by
the bit, and patronizingly remarked:
“Gentermen, condescen’ to disintergrate frum de vehicle, an’ de quadruped
shall hab my unqualified solicertashun, wid abundance ob nutrititious
ellerments.” And he smirked at the old man as much as to say: “Don’t dat
parlyze you, old man?”
“Hold on dar,” exclaimed Old Wash, and his eyes flashed as he rose
quickly to the occasion: “Sonny,” he began witheringly, “it is
transparent to de interlactual apprehension ob eny disinterested
individual dat de gravertashun of special conceits described on de
hypotonuse of your simeon-headed eclipse, am entirely too cumbershum fur
de horizontal vinculum dat circumscribes de radius ob yo’ cocoanut-shaped
trapezium, sah!”
“Wha—wha—what dat you say, Unker Wash?” gasped the young darky as his jaw
began to drop.
“I merely riz ter interjec’ de mental reservashun,” remarked the old man
indifferently, “dat de interlectual hemmerage of verbosity procedin’ from
de vacuum produced by de metermorphosis ob de origonal superstructure
of de san’-stones ob yo’ cranium, am entirely incumpatabul wid de
consterpastion of ideas generated by de paralysis ob yo’ interlectual
acumen, sah!”
“Gord, what is he sayin’?” remarked the young negro sheepishly to the
crowd that had gathered to enjoy his discomfiture.
“In udder words,” shot out the old man again, “ter make hit entirely
incomprehensibul to de conglommerated hypothesis ob yo’ trapezoidal
interlec’, I simply remarked dat de corporeal superfluerty ob yo’
physical insigniferkance am entirely too cumbersome fur de belly-band ob
yo’ mental confermashun, sah!”
Here the crowd shouted, the young darky’s eyes looked like moons, his
legs shook, and he gasped out: “Wha—wha—what dat old man talkin’ ’bout,
man?”
“How long since this nigger wus cotch in the jungles of Africa,”
asked Old Wash quietly of the proprietor of the stable, “dat he can’t
understan’ de simples’ remark in de plaines’ of English?”
And then the old man tried again. He rolled up his sleeves, and with the
air of one who was trying to make himself exceedingly plain he began
laying it off on his fingers and palm:
“Sonny, de equilateral altertude of de comprehenserbility ob my former
observations wus to de effect dat, if in de course of a cummercial
transacshun, I shu’d onexpectedly negotiate fur yo’ habeas-corporosity
at its intrinsic invalidity an’ quickly dispose of it at de exaggerated
hifolutiness of yo’ own colossal conceitability an’ hipnartic expectashun
I’d have sufficient commercial collateral to transpose my present
habitation to de perennial localization of de avenue called Easy.”
By this time the young darky was fairly groveling in the dust.
“Do yo’ comprehen’ dat,” yelled the old man, “yo’ po’ benighted
parallelergram, distended from de apex of a truncated coon (cone), yo’
bow-legged son of a parallelopipedon—”
But the old man got no further with his geometrical swearing, for
amid the shouts of the spectators his opponent had vanished, and
as he went up the street to have the old man arrested for swearing
in public, he remarked to the policeman as he told his tale: “I
didn’t keer, Cap’n, ’bout ’im outgineralin’ me er flingin’ English,
an’ outcussin’ me in mo’ kinder newfangled cuss words den eber cum
out ob Turkey, but when he ’flected on my mother by callin’ me de
bow-legged-son-ob-a-parrot-an-er-pigeon-roost, de nigger don’t lib dat I
gwi’ take dat frum!”
It was a week later before Old Wash and I had occasion to drive into the
stable again. We were met by the same darky, who took the mare by the bit
and meekly remarked: “Light, gentlemen; I’ll take de mair.”
And the old man said: “I am so excruciatinly rejoiced, sonny, to
recognize de rejuvernated resurrection ob de exhileratin’ perception
dat an infinertesermal ray ob common sense has penertrated de comatose
condition ob yo’ fibrous misunderstanding’. In other words,” he winked,
“I’se saved an ebononic interlec frum er new-bohn grave.”
“The Little Girl.”
Pioneer days in Texas, and the prairies unbroken by the smoke of a single
cabin. To the south the Brazos, and to the west the buffalo lands, the
herds crawling in the distance, like huge mud-waves on land, toward their
fall feeding grounds.
There had been raids by the Comanches, then hot fighting with the troops
and every settler west of the Brazos had run into the fort, each with his
family, his man-servant and maid-servant, each with his cattle and his
asses. For the Comanches are wily devils and born horsemen. One day they
are here, and the next they are not. And they go on ponies that are as
tough as their riders, and as fast and as fearless, and no man knows when
and where they will strike.
Three full companies of troops had gone north on the track of the
desperate band who, but a few days before, had surprised the settlers
on the upper Brazos and, after killing and scalping and plundering, had
fled, as the troops thought, northward. The stricken settlers had been
coming in for two days, all plundered, tired, many wounded and some still
sobbing with the grief that would never die.
There were little children—motherless, fatherless. There were mothers and
fathers who but a day before held loving ones in their arms.
Troop H, 7th Regiment, was holding the fort while the other companies
went north to avenge.
The First Lieutenant of Troop H was a beardless youth just from West
Point. He had been shot out of West Point into the saddle and to the
front. Two months of it had bronzed him and added two years to his looks;
but sentiment was still in him and Romance claimed his for her own. He
had had enough fighting for any ordinary trooper, but to-day he felt sad
that three companies had gone north after the marauders and he—he held
the peaceful fort.
The sun was setting across the great plains and shadows had lengthened to
their uttermost when a man on a cow-pony galloped in, not from the north,
but from the west.
His pony was reeling at the first gate. It was dead in the fort ten
minutes later. The man himself carried two Comanche arrows sticking
through a shoulder and an arm. A gash was in his head from a glancing
arrow and blood ran from another that had cut across his forehead.
He was unconscious before the surgeon could extract the arrows from his
body, but he said enough. The Comanches were not north, but west—they
had attacked him in his little squatter cabin forty miles west—they had
killed all his stock but one pony—he had no family but a little girl—he
had escaped on the pony. “An’ the little gal—God knows—I seed her cut
for a dug-out in the side of a hill—a kind of a cellar—where I kept
pertatoes an’ sich—then—wal—”
He went to sleep.
“Let him sleep,” said the surgeon, “he is nearly gone as it is—forty
miles and blood leakin’ out of him every jump of the pony.”
Ten minutes later the bugler called “boots and saddles,” and when Company
H wheeled in the fort’s square, the Captain said:
“Well, men, the boys are on a cold trail. You have heard where the devils
are; we can’t all go. Half of us must stay behind to hold the fort. I’ll
be fair to all, for I know you all want to go, so count by twos.”
“One,”
“Two.”
“One,”
“Two.”
It went down the line, one hundred strong.
“Numbers Two, ten paces forward, march!”
There was a happy smile on Numbers Two as they spurred forward—they knew
what it meant. They were lucky.
“Now, boys, you know I want to lead you,” went on the Captain, “but it
isn’t fair. I must take my chances, too, and tote fair with the First
Lieutenant. Lieutenant Troup will toss up with me,” he said with a laugh
as he tossed a coin from his saddle into the air. It flashed high up in
the sunlight.
“Heads for me, Lieutenant, and here’s wishing you—”
“Tails!” said the soldier who picked it up.
The Lieutenant flushed as he spurred forward saluting. Then men cheered
again and the Captain wheeled, saying:
“Take them out, Lieutenant Troup—it’s your luck, and maybe—ah, well, you
can’t tell how many there are, you know, and half a company is mighty few
after sending out three troops. Leave your trinkets, men, and any message
you may wish to send home. Yes, it’s a nasty bit of a fight you’ll be
having, likely, and I wish it had been my luck to be in it. I have been
in service a little longer, you know, perhaps the Lieutenant might—”
But the Lieutenant only smiled and saluted again.
“I’ll do my best, Captain—war is on and it’s my time, you know.”
The Captain pressed his hand as the Company filed out of the fort.
And all the time the Lieutenant kept thinking of the half-dead man who
kept saying even in his delirium: “An’ my little gal—God knows—I seed her
cut for a dug-out—”
The Lieutenant was young—very young—and he was romantic. He could see the
little girl—of course she was about sixteen—all settlers called their
grown girls little. Perhaps—well—if she hadn’t been killed—
The troup wanted to gallop, but the Lieutenant brought them to a steady
trot:
“It’s all right, men, and ten miles an hour is fast enough. We may need
our horses for all that’s in them. We’ll be there by midnight as it is.”
The moon arose and drifted higher and higher and still the troopers
struck grimly across the plain. The wind brought the howl of wolves—big
greys—and the yelp of coyotes, but the troopers turned neither to the
right nor left, and the Lieutenant rode at their head, and all the time
he was wondering what had become of the pretty girl—helpless—alone. “An’
my little gal—God knows—I seed her cut for a dug-out!”
It was the first streak of day. The men and horses had been resting for
four hours—those not on picket, and some had even slept and were fresh.
But the young officer could think of nothing but the little girl, and
wonder at her fate.
They had lined in behind a few willows that skirted a small stream and
were concealed from the view of the Indians. Then they looked well to
rifles and Colts. The light came slowly and as they peered through the
mist where the cabin stood only a burnt place blurred the dry grass of
the prairie. There were no Indians in sight.
“Thar—look!”
It was an old Indian fighter whose keen eyes saw it first—a thing which
looked like a potato-house butting out of a clay bank.
“Thar’s life in thar—see—it’s the little gal, an’ she’s alive yit—see!”
From the protection of small rises on the right three Comanches galloped
out encircling the dug-out in a very generous circle. They had slipped on
the off-side of their ponies and clung to mane and neck, with one leg and
heel thrust over the flank.
The old fighter snarled: “The cowardly coyotes! They seem ter be mighty
skeered of a little gal. Say, but they’ve got a whole lot o’ respect for
her; she must have a weep’n o’ some sort in thar an’ tort ’em a crackin’
less’n with it, or them dogs ’ud et her up befo’ now; why—thar, by gad—”
He gripped the Lieutenant’s shoulder as a puff of smoke leaped out of the
clay bank and the foremost pony stopped so quickly that it went down,
Comanche under.
“She’s killed that Indian sho’,” cried the old hunter in a whisper. “No
live Comanche was ever cocht under a fallin’ pony. See.”
The pony sprang quickly up—the bullet had creased him; but marvelous the
shot!—it had gone to the exact spot where it would bring down a pony
creased and a rider with a hole through his head.
“That’s shootin’ some,” cried the old hunter as the young officer gave
the quick commands:
“Ready!”
“Mount!”
“Charge!”
“An’ remember the little gal!” they shouted as they broke across the
plains.
It was a running fight and the Indians taken by surprise, for they were
after the thing in the dug-out. And they paid for it—sixteen dead ones
in the first half mile. The others—they had enough to get away from the
forty troopers who shot as they rode and shot to kill.
Then the Lieutenant and ten men rode back to the dug-out. They approached
it slowly—reverently, and all the time the young officer was thinking of
dark eyes and auburn curls and the beauty and bravery of the little girl.
“Hello!” he shouted, his voice trembled in spite of himself.
“Hello!—we’re your friends.”
“Hello, yo’self—mighty glad to see you.”
“It’s the little girl, men,” shouted the Lieutenant, boyishly, as he
rushed up. “She’s safe! hurrah!” and they gave it with a ring.
At the door he stopped short and looked into the hole under the
potato-house.
Then his romance went out as the tide to the sea.
A woman at least thirty-five stood there. Her hair was red, her features
hard, her face burned by the sun. Grim, square jaws set off her face.
There was a line only to show where her lips met in deadly determination.
She wore moccasins and leggins, a short skirt of deer skin and she held
in her hand a rifle that had sent a dozen Indians to death in the twelve
long hours she had held the little fort. Stuck in her belt were two good
pistols. A thousand Comanches with arrows and antiquated guns could not
have taken her.
“Oh!” she said, “but I’m glad to see you. Say, but I stood ’em off all
right, didn’t I? It was awful—’specially last night, but the moon riz
an’ saved me, for a Comanche with an arrow or a old gun is kinder techus
’bout a rifle. Is Pap safe?”
They told her he was.
“I tried to git the old fool to stay. I told him all hell couldn’t git us
out o’ this hole, armed as we wus, lessen they come with bilin’ water,”
she laughed, “but he got panicky an’ vamoosed on the only pony left. Dad
allers was a gal.”
“Good gad,” cried the old hunter bluntly at last, “an’ is you the little
gal he kip talkin’ ’bout?”
“Oh, he allers called me that,” she smiled.
“Well, you’re the gamest little gal I ever seed,” and he wrung her hand
while the others followed suit. “An’ you’re our little gal now,” went
on the old hunter, proudly, “an’ as I ain’t seed one like you since
mine died years ago, I’d—I’d—I’d lak to kiss you jes onct for her,” he
stammered.
“Oh, you shet up,” she said hotly. “D’ye think I stood off a lot o’
Comanches all night to be rewarded by kissin’ a old grizzly like you? But
say,” she added, hesitating, and with a laugh, “I wouldn’t mind kissin’
that pretty little boy thar!”
There was a wild shout from the men, but the young Lieutenant had turned
to mount his horse.
“Any way you belong to Company H,” said the old hunter.
A Preface.
At the request of the ladies of a church in Marion, Alabama, Trotwood
wrote the following Preface, a few weeks ago for a cook-book which the
ladies are publishing with a view of paying off a church debt:
The climate, the soil, the very air play their part in the art of good
recipes. The cooking of the North and West is very different from that
of the South, for Southern recipes are the products of sunshine and
Southlands, of culture, of rest, of the Old South.
And nowhere has the Old South flowered to sweeter perfume than in my
native town of Marion. Macaulay’s New Zealander, if placed in Delmonico’s
would straightway beckon for cold clam, and good King Edward, if stranded
in New Zealand, would soon fish an oyster cocktail out of some unruffled
kiss of the sea.
Recipes, indeed, are a test of one’s civilization—one’s religion—one’s
mentality. They are the products of the centuries beginning with the
primitive clam and ending with the thousand glories of the oyster. They
are the literature of the laughter which comes with good eating, the
bon mots of jolly stomachs, the sparkle of centuries of good cheer, the
morals of mucous membranes, the religion of healthy livers.
Charles Lamb tells us that roast pig, for instance, was accidentally
discovered by the primitive man in the burning of his crude stable in
which was a litter of pigs. After that, fires were frequent and log
stables few. And I doubt not if the history of every good recipe in this
splendid collection were traced to its birth, it would show an unbroken
line of progress as clearly defined as Magna Charta.
Think not lightly, then, of the book, for you have in your hand the
concentrated perfection of the culinary ages. The dash of Caesar into
Briton, the strength of the Dane, the brilliancy of the Norman, the
excellency of Angle and Saxon, the glory of the English and the old
Scotch. It is history, religion, progress. It is a novel more interesting
than all novels, a poem which made Tennyson possible.
I have not read these recipes. I speak from higher authority. I have
tasted them. From my infancy up I have known them. They are part of my
life and this article returned to them is a feeble result of their cause.
They are interwoven with the memory of my home, in the song of the pine
tree, in the opal gleam of the old red hills, in the sweetness, the
culture, the religion of Marion. And to-night, should Abou Ben Adhem’s
Angel come to me and ask for the name of one blessed beyond his dues, I
would answer: “It is I, O Angel, blessed beyond words in the mother I
had, in the father; blessed in my birthplace, in the people among whom I
grew up, in the moral sweetness of their schools and churches, blessed
that I was born in