John Smith's Funny Adventures on a Crutch: Or The Remarkable Peregrinations of a One-legged Soldier after the WarHill, A. F. (Ashbel Fairchild)
History
John Smith's Funny Adventures on a Crutch: Or The Remarkable Peregrinations of a One-legged Soldier after the War
Hill, A. F. (Ashbel Fairchild)
Disabled veterans -- United States -- Fiction; United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Veterans -- Fiction
While I was sitting in my hotel, not far from the depot, a Lancastrian,
who lounged in, got to telling the proprietor a very interesting story,
of an adventure he had recently met with while hunting ducks. He was
relating the story in English, and I listened with interest. The purport
of the story was that he and another man had shot at a duck
simultaneously; it had fallen, and a dispute had arisen as to which had
brought it down. Just as he reached the crisis of the story, where the
dispute was about to be decided, against the other fellow, of course—and
there seemed some funny circumstance about it, for they laughed
immoderately—he jumped off the track, as it were, and finished in Dutch,
something like this: “Undsehrichtienochtuchuherkroshomlustienblosterb
hionmemmtehtehtchtchch-h-h—h-h-h—h——h——h —— ——-h—— — —h— — —h—cht—AUGH!”
Imagine how tantalizing this was to me. My knowledge of German or Dutch
is very limited. Beyond _Lager Bier und Schweitzer Kase_, _ein_, _swei_,
_drei_ I simply know nothing of any of those Teutonic languages; and I,
therefore, do not, to this day, know the _denouement_ of the
Lancastrian’s story.
While in Lancaster, I took the liberty of calling on two prominent men
of opposite political parties, both of whom have since passed away. I
allude to James Buchanan and Thaddeus Stevens. Each received me
cordially and conversed with me in an easy and pleasant manner. From the
citizens of Lancaster, I learned that they were kind-hearted and noble
men, and that their private characters were above reproach. Those two
public men were regarded with some bitterness during their lives; but
whatever may have been their errors, I believe they were errors of the
head and not of the heart. They are at rest now, and I earnestly ask the
whole people of our Country to join me in saying—“PEACE TO THE ASHES OF
BOTH!”
I shall never forget the extraordinary courage I saw displayed by an
hotel clerk, in Columbus, Ohio, while sojourning there during the little
tour in question. I was in the sitting-room, one day, when a large,
rough-looking man, in a state of inebriation, came in, took a seat in
one of the arm-chairs, and manifested symptoms of slumber. The clerk
soon saw him, went promptly to him, and gave him to understand that that
state of things wouldn’t do.
“Come,” said the clerk, “this won’t do. You must get out of this. We
don’t want a man to come in here drunk, and sit around half asleep.”
“Wha-at?” growled the inebriate.
“I say you must get out of this,” said the clerk, laying his hand on his
shoulder. “Come!”
He said this in a decided tone, as though he expected the drunken
gentleman to get up and be led out. But the man made no move toward
getting up, and, moreover, didn’t appear to be much afraid of the clerk.
“Did you hear what I said?” demanded the latter, shaking him slightly.
“Well, s’pose I did? What then?”
Such impudence to an hotel clerk!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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