To speak once more in a past tense:--Forward rolled the Mackerel tide of battle the whole length of the line, with skirmishers thrown out to catch Confederate chickens, and the deadly peal of treason's duck-gun mingled hoarsely with the angry bang of loyalty's random musket. Heading Regiment 5, and mounted on his geometrical steed, Euclid, Captain Villiam Brown essayed a daring charge at the front door of Paris; while Captain Bob Shorty, with a portion of the Conic Section just arrived from Accomac, thundered toward the window of the first floor; but here a female Confederacy opened a heavy fire of pokers and gridirons from the basement, and there was too much danger to the spectacles of the ancient Brigade to warrant persistence in the bold attempt. Far to the left, with his eyes blazing like the ends of two cigars, and his nose glowing like a transparent strawberry, Captain Samyule Sa-mith got himself and his celebrated horse-marines so ingeniously entangled and mixed up with Captain Munchausen's and everybody else's command, that the Schleswig-Holstein question was a very ordinary conundrum in comparison, and the fight in that part of the field bade fair to last for a few years without much definite carnage. Then, again, on the calm waters of Duck Lake (now too deep for wading in consequence of recent rains), that hoary old salt, Rear Admiral Head, unhooked his famous flagship, the "Shockingbadhat," and set out with his improved swivel-gun and agile Mackerel crew to take a hand in the carnival of conquest. "Loosen my plates!" swore the aged son of Neptune in his iron-clad manner, as he adjusted his spectacles and extracted a slow-match from one corner of his snuff-box,--"Loosen my plates! but the navy must kill a few Confederate insects,--bark my turret, if it mustn't." It was really beautiful, my boy, to see an iron-clad tar of such great age light the slow-match with his own meerschaum, and aim the improved artillery directly at the rear-elevation of a Confederacy tying his shoe in one of the side windows of Paris. Ker-bang! went the triumph of naval ingenuity, causing the flag-ship to hop only a few inches into the air; and a Confederacy with amputated coat-tails was instantly seen to spin wildly around and rub himself like one in a bath. Not to sicken you, my boy, with too much of such heart-rending slaughter, let me say that a dense cloud of sulphurous smoke soon entirely veiled the doomed City of Paris, into which the strategical Mackerels continued for hours to pour such torrents of lead as no number of windows could stand. Finally, as night approached, a person of black extraction, with wool on the brain, emerged from the cloud quite close to Villiam, and says he: "De place hab surrender, sah." "Ah!" says Villiam, pulling out his ruffles, "is the conflick too much for the scorpions?" The faithful black arranged a silver cake-basket more firmly under his coat, and says he: "Dey's all gone over Jordan."