Pennsylvany—20,000 Ablishin!
Iowa—30,000 Ablishin!
Ablishin! Wat a dreery waste uv Ablishin! Not a single oasis uv Dimocrisy anywhere,—nary Aryrat on wich our ark kin rest in safety,—but all around us the mad waves uv Ablishnism rearin their crestid heads muchly.
I felt it my dooty to make this fact known to my neighbors; for, sposin that His Serene Highness’ trip wood secure us enuff deestricts to make the next Congress safe, and consekently make us certin uv admission, they hed been makin arrangements for restorin things to their normal condishun, ez they were before the war.
In fact, two weeks before, in view of the expected success uv the Democracy, a meetin hed bin held on the subject. Some wuz for at once seezin the niggers wherever they cood be found, and puttin em at work; but the conservatives overruled this. They held that slavery hed bin abolished, and that it ought not be restored; in fact, that, to act in good faith, it cood not be reëstablished. Deekin Pogram announced a plan. The town authorities shood pass a ordinance for the proper government uv the niggers. Their good and ourn demanded it. For instance, they shood not be permitted to be out after 7 o’clock, P.M., in the evenin; they shoodent leave the plantashen onto wich they wuz employed; they shood work every day till 7; and to do away with the pernicious work uv the Freedmen’s Bureau, no man and wife wich hed bin married by a chaplin uv the Bureau, or by any one else, shood be employed on the same plantashen, and also no father or mother and child. Sich ez violated these ordinances shood be arrested by anybody, and fined; and in default uv payment uv the fine and costs, shood be sold to the person who wood take his or her labor for the shortest number uv years, and pay the fine and costs aforesed. “Ez a conservative,” sed the Deekin, “I sejest this plan.”
“Do yoo want to know my definition uv the word ‘conservative?’” sed Joe Bigler, a returned Confederate soljer, who, I bleeve, hez seen enough uv war. “It’s a man who goes a roundabout way to do a devlish mean thing. Deekin, why can’t yoo go to the devil by a straight road, ez I do?”
The interupshen uv the demoralized wretch wuzn’t notist; and ez the trustees uv the township wuz all present, the ordinance wuz passed, and that night two thirds uv the niggers within five miles uv the Corners wuz arrested and sold, and within two weeks every one hed bin capcherd.
I hied me to the Corners, and the first man I saw wuz Bascom, the grocery keeper, engaged in the congenial biznis uv tappin a barrel uv contentment, wich he hed just receeved. I wuz a goin to tell him the dread intelligence, when he caught site uv me. “Taste that, Parson,” sed he, holdin out a tin dipper full. I drank it off, and one look at him onmand me. “Kin I o’ercloud that smilin cheek?” thot I, ez, in a fit uv absent-mindednis,—wich I hev every now and then,—I held out the empty dipper to be filled agin, wich it wuz. “No! for a time he shel be spared;” and I borrered his mule, and rode away pensively.
I wuz goin fust to Deekin Pogram’s, for he wuz the most interested uv eny in the settlement. After the meetin mentioned above, the Deekin hed caused the arrest uv sich niggers ez he cood ketch, and had had em fined in sums uv $275 and uppards, wich bein unable, ez a rool, to pay the fine, he hed kindly bid em in.
He hed picked up, here and there, all uv his old servants, ceptin those wich hed bin killed in the army, and the few misguided ones wich hed made their way North, and that mornin the plantashen wuz to be reconstructed upon the old patriarkle system. Mrs. Deekin Pogram wuz marshellin four uv the likeliest wenches I ever saw in the kitchen; his son Tom wuz chuckin a yaller girl under the chin, wich hed bin born on the place about eighteen years before, and wich, owin to a unfortunate resemblance to the Deekin, bed caused a onpleasantnis between him and his wife, wich endid in the loss uv the most uv his hair, and the sellin uv the girl’s mother to Noo Orleans. The two girls hed each their waitin-maids, and wuz a puttin them through their paces. There hed bin some trouble in gittin em reconstructed, it bein deemed nessary to take the conseet out uv em, wich they wuz all a doin. Ez I rode up, the old lady bed jest knocked one uv em down with a fire-shovel, and wuz dancin a Highland fling onto her prostrate body. Almira, the oldest gal, hed her fingers in the wool uv her gal; and tother one wuz a thumpin hern to redose her to her proper level; and the Deekin hisself wuz a deelin with one ongrateful wretch, who objected to bein put to work on them terms, not realizin that the Bureau was gone. Ez the Deekin hed a revolver he yielded the pint, and submitted to be flogged, wich the Deekin wuz doin ez neatly ez I ever saw, considerin he hed bin out uv practis four years. He had him tied up to a tree, and wuz a wollopin uv him gorjus. While he wuz a convinsin uv him with his whip that there wuz trooth in the Skripter, and that Ham wuz reely a servant unto his bretherin, I exclaimed, “Stop!” and immejitly whispered the appallin news in his left ear (tother one hed bin chawed off in a misunderstandin at Bascom’s the previous Sunday nite, after servis). Never shel I forgit the look uv woe on that eminent Christian’s face. The whip fell from his nerveless hand; and with teers streemin down his cheeks, washin up little streaks uv dirt in the most heart-rendin manner, he gasped in a husky voice to the wife uv his buzzum, “Cut him down, Mirandy! The North’s gone Ablishin, and the d——d niggers will be free anyhow!” and the old patriarch swooned away at my feet.