<h3><SPAN name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI.</SPAN></h3>
<div class="chapquot">
<div>
<p>And thus the whirligig of Time brings in his revenges.</p>
<p class="citation">Twelfth Night, or What You Will.</p>
<p>Bloody instructions, which being taught, return<br/>
To plague the inventors.</p>
<p class="citation">Macbeth.</p>
</div>
</div>
<div class="sidenote">The Retributions of Time.</div>
<p>On the 15th of June I returned from Cairo to St. Louis. Lyon had gone
up the Missouri River with an expedition, which was all fitted out
and started in a few hours. Lyon was very much in earnest, and he
knew the supreme value of time in the outset of a war.</p>
<p>How just are the retributions of history! Virginia originated State
Rights run-mad, which culminated in Secession. Behold her ground
between the upper and nether mill-stones! Missouri lighted the fires
of civil war in Kansas; now they blazed with tenfold fury upon her
own soil. She sent forth hordes to mob printing-presses, overawe the
ballot-box, substitute the bowie-knife and revolver for the civil
law. Now, her own area gleamed with bayonets; the Rebel newspaper was
suppressed by the file of soldiers, civil process supplanted by the
unpitying military arm.</p>
<p>Governor Claiborne F. Jackson, in 1855, led a raid into Kansas, which
overthrew the civil authorities, and drove citizens from the polls.
Now, the poisoned chalice was commended to his own lips. A hunted
fugitive from his home and his chair of office, he was deserted by
friends, ruined in fortune, and the halter waited for his neck.
Thomas C. Reynolds, late Lieutenant-Governor, by advocating the
right of Secession, did much to poison the public mind of the South.
He, too, found
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</SPAN></span>
his reward in disgrace and outlawry; unable to come
within the borders of the State which so lately delighted to do him
honor!</p>
<div class="sidenote">A Railroad Reminiscence.</div>
<p>I followed Lyon's Expedition by the Pacific railway. The president
of the road told me a droll story, which illustrates the folly
that governed the location of the railway system of Missouri. The
Southwest Branch is about a hundred miles long, through a very thinly
settled region. For the first week after the cars commenced running
over it, they carried only about six passengers, and no freight
except a live bear and a jar of honey. The honey was carried free,
and the freight on Bruin was fifty cents. Shut up in the single
freight car, during the trip, he ate all the honey! The company
were compelled to pay two dollars for the loss of that saccharine
esculent. Thus their first week's profits on freight amounted to
precisely one dollar and fifty cents on the wrong side of the ledger.</p>
<p>The Rebels had now evacuated Jefferson City, and our own troops,
commanded by Colonel Bœrnstein, a German editor, author, and
theatrical manager, of St. Louis, were in peaceable possession. The
soldiers were cooking upon the grass in the rear of the Capitol,
standing in the shade of its portico and rotunda, lying on beds of
hay in its passages, and upon carpets in the legislative halls. They
reposed in all its rooms, from the subterranean vaults to the little
circular chamber in the dome.</p>
<div class="sidenote">Untainted with "B. Republicanism."</div>
<p>Governor and Legislature were fled. With Colonel Bœrnstein, I went
through the executive mansion, which had been deserted in hot haste.
Sofas were overturned, carpets torn up and littered with letters
and public documents. Tables, chairs, damask curtains, cigar-boxes,
champagne-bottles, ink-stands, books, private letters, and family
knick-knacks, were scattered everywhere
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</SPAN></span>
in chaotic confusion. Some of the Governor's correspondence was
amusing. The first letter I noticed was a model of brevity. Here it
is—its virgin paper unsullied by the faintest touch of "B.
Republicanism."</p>
<div class="blockquot">
<p class="quotdate">
<span class="smcap">Jefferson City</span>, fed. 21nd 1861.</p>
<p>"<em>to his Honour Gov.</em> <span class="smcap">C. F.
Jackson</span>.—Please Accept My Compliments. With a little
good Old Bourbon Whisky Cocktail. Made up Expressly in St Louis.
fear it not. it is good. And besides it is not even tainted with B.
Republicanism. Respectfully yours,</p>
<p class="quotsig">"<span class="smcap">P. Naughton.</span>"</p>
</div>
<p>There was a ludicrous disparity between the evidences of sudden
flight on all sides and the pompous language of the Governor's latest
State paper, which lay upon the piano in the drawing-room:</p>
<div class="blockquot">
<p>"Now, therefore, I, C. F. Jackson, Governor of the State
of Missouri, do issue this my proclamation, calling the
militia of the State, to the number of FIFTY THOUSAND, into
the service of the State. * * * Rise, then,
and drive out ignominiously the invaders!"</p>
</div>
<p>Beds were unmade, dishes unwashed, silver forks and spoons, belonging
to the State, scattered here and there. The only things that
appeared undisturbed were the Star Spangled Banner and the national
escutcheon, both frescoed upon the plaster of the gubernatorial
bedroom.</p>
<p>As we walked through the deserted rooms, a hollow echo answered to
the tramp of the colonel and his lieutenant, and to the dull clank of
their scabbards against the furniture.</p>
<p>General Lyon opened the war in the West by the battle of Booneville.
It lasted only a few minutes, and the undisciplined and half-armed
Rebel troops, after a faint show of resistance, retreated toward the
South. Lyon's command lost only eleven men. </p>
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</SPAN></span></p>
<div class="sidenote">A Belligerent Chaplain.</div>
<p>During the engagement, the Rev. William A. Pile, Chaplain of the
First Missouri Infantry, with a detail of four men, was looking
after the wounded, when, coming suddenly upon a party of twenty-four
Rebels, he ordered them to surrender. Strangely enough, they laid
down their arms, and were all brought, prisoners, to General
Lyon's head-quarters by their five captors, headed by the reverend
representative of the Church militant and the Church triumphant.</p>
<p>Messrs. Thomas W. Knox and Lucien J. Barnes, army correspondents,
zealous to see the first battle, narrowly escaped with their
lives. Appearing upon a hill, surveying the conflict through their
field-glasses, they were mistaken by General Lyon for scouts of the
enemy. He ordered his sharpshooters to pick them off, when one of his
aids recognized them.</p>
<p class="quotdate">
<span class="smcap">Booneville, Mo.</span>, <i>June 21</i>.</p>
<p>The First Iowa Infantry has arrived here. On the way, several slaves,
who came to its camp for refuge, were sent back to their masters.</p>
<div class="sidenote">
<span class="smcap">Humors of the Iowa Solders.</span></div>
<p>The regiment contains many educated men, and that large percentage
of physicians, lawyers, and editors, found in every far-western
community. On the way here, they indulged in a number of freaks which
startled the natives. At Macon, Mo., they took possession of <cite>The
Register</cite>, a hot Secession sheet, and, having no less than forty
printers in their ranks, promptly issued a spicy loyal journal,
called <em>Our Whole Union</em>. The valedictory, which the Iowa boys
addressed to Mr. Johnson, the fugitive editor, in his own paper, is
worth perusing.</p>
<div class="blockquot">
<p class="center">"VALEDICTORY.</p>
<p>"Johnson, wherever you are—whether lurking in recesses of
the dim woods, or fleeing a fugitive on open plain, under
the broad canopy
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</SPAN></span>
of Heaven—good-by! We never saw your countenance—never
expect to—never want to—but, for all that, we won't be
proud; so, Johnson, good-by, and take care of yourself!</p>
<p>"We're going to leave you, Johnson, without so much as
looking into your honest eyes, or clasping your manly
hand—even without giving utterance, to your face, of 'God
bless you!' We're right sorry, we are, that you didn't stay
to attend to your domestic and other affairs, and not skulk
away and lose yourself, never to return. Oh, Johnson! why
did you—how could you do this?</p>
<p>"Johnson, we leave you to-night. We're going where bullets
are thick and mosquitos thicker. We may never return. If
we do not, old boy, remember us. We sat at your table; we
stole from your 'Dictionary of Latin Quotations;' we wrote
Union articles with your pen, your ink, on your paper. We
printed them on your press. Our boys set 'em up with your
types, used your galleys, your 'shooting-sticks,' your
'chases,' your 'quads,' your 'spaces,' your 'rules,' your
every thing. We even drank some poor whisky out of your
bottle.</p>
<p>"And now, Johnson, after doing all this for you, you won't
forget us, will you? Keep us in mind. Remember us in your
evening prayers, and your morning prayers, too, when you
say them, if you do say them. If you put up a petition
at mid-day, don't forget us then; or if you awake in the
solemn stillness of the night, to implore a benison upon
the absent, remember us then!</p>
<p>"Once more, Johnson—our heart pains us to say it—that
sorrowful word!—but once more and forever, Johnson,
<span class="smcap">Good-By</span>! If you come our way, Call! Johnson,
adieu!"</p>
</div>
<p>One of the privates in the regular army has just been punished with
fifty lashes on the bare back, for taking from a private house a
lady's furs and a silk dress.</p>
<p>This morning I passed a group of the Iowa privates, resting beside
the road, along which they were bringing buckets of water to their
camp. They were debating the question whether a heavy national debt
tends to weaken or to strengthen a Government! These are the men whom
the southern Press calls "ignorant mercenaries." </p>
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</SPAN></span></p>
<p class="quotdate">
<span class="smcap">St. Louis</span>, <i>July 12</i>.</p>
<p><cite>The Missouri State Journal</cite>, which made no disguise of
its sympathy with the Rebels, is at last suppressed by the military
authorities. It was done to-day, by order of General Lyon, who is
pursuing the Rebels near Springfield, in the southwest corner of the
State. Secessionists denounce it as a military despotism, but the
loyal citizens are gratified.</p>
<div class="sidenote">Camp Tales of the Marvelous.</div>
<p>Are you fond of the marvelous? If so, here is a camp story about
Colonel Sigel's late engagement at Carthage:</p>
<p>A private in one of his companies (so runs the tale), while loading
and firing, was lying flat upon his face to avoid the balls of the
Rebels, when a shot from one of their six-pounders plunged into the
ground right beside him, plowed through under him, about six inches
below the surface, came out on the other side, and pursued its
winding way. It did not hurt a hair of his head, but, in something
less than a twinkling of an eye, whirled him over upon his back!</p>
<p>If you shake your head, save your incredulity for <em>this</em>: A captain
assures me that in the same battle he saw one of Sigel's artillerists
struck by a shot which cut off both legs; but that he promptly raised
himself half up, rammed the charge home in his gun, withdrew the
ramrod, and then fell back, dead! This is, at least, melo-dramatic,
and only paralleled by the ballad-hero</p>
<div class="poem">
<div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">——"Of doleful dumps,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">Who, when his legs were both cut off,<br/></span>
<span class="i0">Still fought upon his stumps."</span></div>
</div>
<hr class="chap" />
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</SPAN></span></p>
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