STREAK THE FIRST.
* * * *
And now the sacred rite was done, and the marriage-knot was tied,
And Colt withdrew his blushing wife a little way aside;
“Let’s go,” he said, “into my cell; let’s go alone, my dear;
I fain would shelter that sweet face from the sheriff’s odious leer.
The jailer and the hangman, they are waiting both for me,—
I cannot bear to see them wink so knowingly at thee!
Oh, how I loved thee, dearest! They say that I am wild,
That a mother dares not trust me with the weasand of her child;
They say my bowie-knife is keen to sliver into halves
The carcass of my enemy, as butchers slay their calves.
They say that I am stern of mood, because, like salted beef,
I packed my quartered foeman up, and marked him ‘prime tariff;’
Because I thought to palm him on the simple-souled John Bull,
And clear a small percentage on the sale at Liverpool;
It may be so, I do not know—these things, perhaps, may be;
But surely I have always been a gentleman to thee!
Then come, my love, into my cell, short bridal space is ours,—
Nay, sheriff, never con thy watch—I guess there’s good two hours.
We’ll shut the prison doors and keep the gaping world at bay,
For love is long as ’tarnity, though I must die to-day!”
STREAK THE SECOND.
The clock is ticking onward,
It nears the hour of doom,
And no one yet hath entered
Into that ghastly room.
The jailer and the sheriff,
They are walking to and fro:
And the hangman sits upon the steps,
And smokes his pipe below.
In grisly expectation
The prison all is bound,
And, save expectoration,
You cannot hear a sound.
The turnkey stands and ponders;—
His hand upon the bolt,—
“In twenty minutes more, I guess,
’Twill all be up with Colt!”
But see, the door is opened!
Forth comes the weeping bride;
The courteous sheriff lifts his hat,
And saunters to her side,—
“I beg your pardon, Mrs C.,
But is your husband ready?”
“I guess you’d better ask himself,”
Replied the woeful lady.
The clock is ticking onward,
The minutes almost run,
The hangman’s pipe is nearly out,
’Tis on the stroke of one.
At every grated window,
Unshaven faces glare;
There’s Puke, the judge of Tennessee,
And Lynch, of Delaware;
And Batter, with the long black beard,
Whom Hartford’s maids know well;
And Winkinson, from Fish Kill Reach,
The pride of New Rochelle;
Elkanah Nutts, from Tarry Town,
The gallant gouging boy;
And ’coon-faced Bushwhack, from the hills
That frown o’er modern Troy;
Young Julep, whom our Willis loves,
Because, ’tis said, that he
One morning from a bookstall filched
The tale of “Melanie;”
And Skunk, who fought his country’s fight
Beneath the stripes and stars,—
All thronging at the windows stood,
And gazed between the bars.
The little boys that stood behind
(Young thievish imps were they!)
Displayed considerable nous
On that eventful day;
For bits of broken looking-glass
They held aslant on high,
And there a mirrored gallows-tree
Met their delighted eye. [49]
The clock is ticking onward;
Hark! hark! it striketh one!
Each felon draws a whistling breath,
“Time’s up with Colt! he’s done!”
The sheriff cons his watch again,
Then puts it in his fob,
And turning to the hangman, says—
“Get ready for the job.”
The jailer knocketh loudly,
The turnkey draws the bolt,
And pleasantly the sheriff says,
“We’re waiting, Mister Colt!”
No answer! no! no answer!
All’s still as death within;
The sheriff eyes the jailer,
The jailer strokes his chin.
“I shouldn’t wonder, Nahum, if
It were as you suppose.”
The hangman looked unhappy, and
The turnkey blew his nose.
They entered. On his pallet
The noble convict lay,—
The bridegroom on his marriage-bed
But not in trim array.
His red right hand a razor held,
Fresh sharpened from the hone,
And his ivory neck was severed,
And gashed into the bone.
* * * *
And when the lamp is lighted
In the long November days,
And lads and lasses mingle
At the shucking of the maize;
When pies of smoking pumpkin
Upon the table stand,
And bowls of black molasses
Go round from hand to hand;
When slap-jacks, maple-sugared,
Are hissing in the pan,
And cider, with a dash of gin,
Foams in the social can;
When the goodman wets his whistle,
And the goodwife scolds the child;
And the girls exclaim convulsively,
“Have done, or I’ll be riled!”
When the loafer sitting next them
Attempts a sly caress,
And whispers, “Oh, you ’possum,
You’ve fixed my heart, I guess!”
With laughter and with weeping,
Then shall they tell the tale,
How Colt his foeman quartered,
And died within the jail.
The Death of Jabez Dollar.
[Before the following poem, which originally appeared in ‘Fraser’s Magazine,’ could have reached America, intelligence was received in this country of an affray in Congress, very nearly the counterpart of that which the Author has here imagined in jest. It was very clear, to any one who observed the then state of public planners in America, that such occurrences must happen, sooner or later. The Americans apparently felt the force of the satire, as the poem was widely reprinted throughout the States. It subsequently returned to this country, embodied in an American work on American manners, where it characteristically appeared as the writer’s own production; and it afterwards went the round of British newspapers, as an amusing satire, by an American, of his countrymen’s foibles!]
The Congress met, the day was wet, Van Buren took the chair;
On either side, the statesman pride of far Kentuck was there.
With moody frown, there sat Calhoun, and slowly in his cheek
His quid he thrust, and slaked the dust, as Webster rose to speak.
Upon that day, near gifted Clay, a youthful member sat,
And like a free American upon the floor he spat;
Then turning round to Clay, he said, and wiped his manly chin,
“What kind of Locofoco’s that, as wears the painter’s skin?”
“Young man,” quoth Clay, “avoid the way of Slick of Tennessee;
Of gougers fierce, the eyes that pierce, the fiercest gouger he;
He chews and spits, as there he sits, and whittles at the chairs,
And in his hand, for deadly strife, a bowie-knife he bears.
“Avoid that knife. In frequent strife its blade, so long and thin,
Has found itself a resting-place his rivals’ ribs within.”
But coward fear came never near young Jabez Dollar’s heart,—
“Were he an alligator, I would rile him pretty smart!”
Then up he rose, and cleared his nose, and looked toward the chair;
He saw the stately stripes and stars,—our country’s flag was there!
His heart beat high, with eldritch cry upon the floor he sprang,
Then raised his wrist, and shook his fist, and spoke his first harangue.
“Who sold the nutmegs made of wood—the clocks that wouldn’t figure?
Who grinned the bark off gum-trees dark—the everlasting nigger?
For twenty cents, ye Congress gents, through ’tarnity I’ll kick
That man, I guess, though nothing less than ’coonfaced Colonel Slick!”
The Colonel smiled—with frenzy wild,—his very beard waxed blue,—
His shirt it could not hold him, so wrathy riled he grew;
He foams and frets, his knife he whets upon his seat below—
He sharpens it on either side, and whittles at his toe.
“Oh! waken snakes, and walk your chalks!” he cried, with ire elate;
“Darn my old mother, but I will in wild cats whip my weight!
Oh! ’tarnal death, I’ll spoil your breath, young Dollar, and your chaffing,—
Look to your ribs, for here is that will tickle them without laughing!”
His knife he raised—with fury crazed, he sprang across the hall;
He cut a caper in the air—he stood before them all:
He never stopped to look or think if he the deed should do,
But spinning sent the President, and on young Dollar flew.
They met—they closed—they sank—they rose,—in vain young Dollar strove—
For, like a streak of lightning greased, the infuriate Colonel drove
His bowie-blade deep in his side, and to the ground they rolled,
And, drenched in gore, wheeled o’er and o’er, locked in each other’s hold.
With fury dumb—with nail and thumb—they struggled and they thrust,
The blood ran red from Dollar’s side, like rain, upon the dust;
He nerved his might for one last spring, and as he sank and died,
Reft of an eye, his enemy fell groaning by his side.
Thus did he fall within the hall of Congress, that brave youth;
The bowie-knife has quenched his life of valour and of truth;
And still among the statesmen throng at Washington they tell
How nobly Dollar gouged his man—how gallantly he fell.
