Reflecting upon these things, on Monday last, my boy, I strolled abstractedly into an establishment where they sell army stores, such as lemons by the slice, sugar by the half-ounce, etc. I strolled dreamily in, when who should I see at the crockery-counter but the Conservative Kentucky chap, whose hat was very far down over his eyes, like one who has just come through a severe election. He appeared to be taking Richmond at the moment, my boy, with a spoon in it; and as quickly as I entered, he let the hand grasping it fall suddenly down on his obverse side, and gave his entire and most unremitting attention to the picture of a flesh-colored young lady on the farthest wall. I slapped him on the shoulder, and says I: "Well, my ancient Talleyrand, how are we?" The Conservative Kentucky chap gloomily placed his tumbler upon the stomach of a gentleman in checked pants, who was calmly sleeping on three chairs near the stove, and says he: "Kentucky can no longer blind herself to the fact that we are on the brink of a monikky. Yes!" exclaimed the Conservative chap,--wildly tearing off his hat, and then putting it on again so that it entirely covered his left eye,--"Yes, sir, a monikky with a Yankee for its Austrian tyrant!" Here the Conservative Kentucky chap deliberately buttoned his coat to the very neck, turned up his collar, and gazed sternly at a bowl of cloves near by. I called his attention to the Ten of Spades, which was edging itself down between his hat and his right ear, and says I,-- "Hast proof of this, Horatio?" "Proof?" says the Conservative Kentucky chap, with such a start that the gentleman in the checked pants vibrated as though sleeping on springs,--"Proof? You know Smith,--John Smith,--that little apothecary from Connecticut? Well, sir, he voted in this here last election for the Austrian usurper, and now he's knighted! Yes, sir, by A. Lincoln's recommendation he's now SIR JOHN SMITH!! I've heard him called so myself. And this--this--is Kentucky's reward!" At this crisis the Conservative Kentucky chap shut the stove-door with great violence, and seemed for a moment to meditate personal outrage on the young assistant oysterer, who had just arrived with the coal-skuttle. Before I could make rejoinder, my boy, there approached us a middle-aged gentleman in a shocking bad hat and an overcoat very shiny about the seams, who had cordially invited himself to take a little something that morning, and had accepted the invitation with pleasure. Straightening himself suddenly, with a violent start, to restrain an unruly hiccup, or make me believe that he made the noise with his feet, he eyed the Conservative chap with a benignant smile, and says he: