Mr. Scranton arrives, receives the congratulations of his friends,
gets the negroes to brush him down,--for it is difficult to
distinguish him from a pillar of dust, save that we have his modest
eyes for assurances-takes a few glasses of moderate mixture, and
coolly collects his ideas. The mixture will bring out Mr. Scranton's
philosophical facts: and, now that he has got his face and beard
cleanly washed, he will proceed to the stand. Here he is received
with loud cheering; the gentleman is a great man, all the way from
the city. Sitting on a chair he is sorry was made at the north, he
exhibits a deal of method in taking from his pocket a long cedar
pencil, with which he will make notes of all Colonel Mohpany's loose
points.
The reader, we feel assured, will excuse us for not following
Colonel Mohpany through his speech, so laudatory of the patriotism
of his friends, so much interrupted by applause. The warm manner in
which his conclusion is received assures him that he now is the most
popular man in the State. Mr. Scranton, armed with his usually
melancholy countenance, rises to the stump, makes his modestly
political bow, offers many impressive apologies for the unprepared
state in which he finds himself, informs his hearers that he appears
before them only as a substitute for his very intimate and
particular friend, General Vardant. He, too, has a wonderful
prolixity of compliments to bestow upon the free, the patriotic, the
independent voters of the very independent district. He tries to be
facetious; but his temperament will not admit of any
inconsistencies, not even in a political contest. No! he must be
serious; because the election of a candidate to so high an office is
a serious affair. So he will tell the "Saw-pit men" a great deal
about their noble sires; how they lived and died for liberty; how
the tombstones of immortality are emblazoned with the fame of their
glorious deeds. And he will tell these glorious squatters what
inalienable rights they possess; how they must be maintained; and
how they have always been first to maintain the principle of keeping
"niggers" in their places, and resisting those mischievous
propagators of northern villainy-abolitionists. He will tell the
deep-thinking saw-pit voters how it has been charged against them
that they were only independent once a year, and that was when
herrings run up the Santee river. Such a gross slander Mr. Scranton
declares to be the most impious. They were always independent; and,
if they were poor, and preferred to habit themselves in primitive
garbs, it was only because they preferred to be honest! This, Mr.
Scranton, the northern philosopher, asserts with great emphasis.
Yes! they are honest; and honest patriots are always better than
rich traitors. From the san-pit men, Mr. Scranton, his face
distended with eloquence, turns to his cracker and "wire-grass"
friends, upon whom he bestows most piercing compliments. Their lean
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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