I went on to the second base, which I reached just in time to see Captain Villiam Brown, on his geometrical steed Euclid, arresting the flight of Company 3, Regiment 5, under Captain Samyule Sa-mith. "Samyule! Samyule!" says Villiam, feeling behind him to make sure that his canteen was all right, "is this the way you treat the United States of America at such a critical period in her distracted history?" "I scorn your insinivation," says Samyule, "and repel your observation. I am executing a rapid flank movement according to Hardee." "Ah!" says Villiam, "excuse my flighty remarks. I do not mean to say that you can be frightened," says Villiam, soothingly; "but it's my opinion that your mother was very much annoyed by a large-sized _fly_ just before you were added to the census of the United States of America." Villiam's idea of the connection between cause and effect, my boy, is as clear as a brandy-punch when the sugar settles. The battle now raged in a manner which I am not permitted to describe, with results I am not allowed to communicate. Villiam appeared wherever the fray was the thickest, waving his celebrated sword Escalibar (Anglo-Saxon of crowbar), and encouraging all the faint-hearted ones to get between himself and the blazing Confederacy. Borne a considerable distance backward by the force of circumstances, he had reached a comparatively clear spot in the rear, when he suddenly found himself confronted by Captain Munchausen, of the Southern Confederacy. Captain Munchausen was mounted upon the thinnest excuse for four legs that I ever saw, my boy; and what tempted nature to form such an excuse when the same amount of bone-work would have brought more money, it was not for mortal man to know. "Ha!" says Villiam, hastily reining-up Euclid, and touching his sword Escalibar, ominously, "we meet once more to discuss the great national question of personal carnage." "Sir," says Captain Munchausen, superciliously waving his keen edged poker and drawing his fiery steed up from his knees, "it is my private intention to produce some slaughter in a private family of the name of Brown." Fire flashed from Villiam's eyes, he replaced a small flask in his bosom, and says he: "Come on, and let the fight come off." Then, my boy, commenced a series of equestrian manoeuvres calculated to exemplify all the latest improvements in cavalry tactics and patent circusses.--Round and round each other rode the fierce foemen, bobbing convulsively in their saddles like exasperated jumping-jacks, and cutting the atmosphere into minute slices with their deadly blades. Now did the determined Villiam amble sideways toward the rebel, thrusting fiercely at him when only a few yards intervened between them; and anon did the foaming Munchausen wriggle fiercely backward against the haunches of the steed Euclid, slashing right and left with tumultuous perspiration.