The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman PotterAdams, F. Colburn (Francis Colburn)
General
The Life and Adventures of Maj. Roger Sherman Potter
Adams, F. Colburn (Francis Colburn)
Political fiction
LET me avail myself of your good nature, reader, for I am a man who
would not artfully conceal truth to the injury of a friend; but I
am, at the same time, conscious of the heavy penalty incurred in
speaking the honest, unembroidered truth of some of our well
tailored heroes, who open and shut like sunflowers under a vertical
sun, and present an excellent object to attract the admiration of
your fine ladies in Broadway. Heaven knows I appreciate the true
hero, and am ready to favor an honest purpose with a joyful heart;
but your political general of militia is a model of coxcombry, a
creature ready to faint when you want service of him, and the best
imposture known at this day. I, however, hold it not well to turn
the wheel too far against men who are harmlessly inclined, and in
whose marching and countermarching up Broadway (with the pomp and
circumstance of men about to face blood and flames) the juvenile and
other lighthearted portions of the community find an excellent fund
of amusement. Indeed, I remember that others may love what I have no
taste to appreciate; and that when fortune turns against me, which
is the case at this moment, I had better keep my thumbs out of my
neighbor's finger glass. Nor would I knowingly wound with my remarks
on General Benthornham's merits as an officer, the pride of one of
his many admirers. Suffice it to say, then, (as the learned Doctor
Easley would say,) that although his coat had received a rent or two
in the back, no sooner was his truant horse brought back to him than
he mounted with the daring of a book publisher, and, after evincing
no small desire to ride over the brigade a dozen times, and putting
it through a series of intricate evolutions, which the various
regiments forming it performed with great credit to themselves, he
ordered them dismissed and sent home, there to look well to their
good behavior during the rest of the day. And for this last and very
kind service, they thought him the bravest general history had any
account of. In accordance, then, with this parental admonition, they
betook themselves home, well fatigued, but as ready to fight as any
good men ought to be when satisfied that arms were necessary to the
maintenance of law; which, however much I may blush to acknowledge
it, was the case in Gotham, which was in sad disorder-not from any
bad spirit between its citizens, but merely the curious antics of a
very ambitious mayor. Having made an amende I hope will prove ample,
let us turn to the patient at the New York Hotel.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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