"They'd otta have us fellers go on over there an' beat 'em all up. We cud do it easy," opined Ziemer Whitmarsh, who had a prominent chin and the long arms and heavy shoulders of a prize fighter. "'Twouldn't be no chore fer us, would it, Bob?"
"No, siree," chimed in young Bob Crupper. "They'd otta let us at 'em." Bob's chin did not protrude unduly; but he had eyes fearless and dreamy, like those of his father. He was ripe for adventure of any kind: war, women, anything. His eyes wistfully sought the horizon.
"I wish 'twa'n't so durn fur away," he fretted.
Bob's father, old Amos, who was a veteran of the Civil War, had subscribed to a Georgetown paper, and was thus placed in a position of authority as regards facts. But it was the romantic and chivalrous aspects of the war that most appealed to the old soldier, as in the days of his youth; and out of his rich nature he was quick to set up heroes to worship and weave a mythical fabric of glory and chivalry.
"Some o' them generals must be powerful men," he would thunder out in a deep rumble of bass ecstasy. "This here von Kluck, he must be a mighty powerful man. An' the Roosians is a fine people, a strong, powerful people. Them Roosians hain't afraid to die fer their country."
"It'll fetch up the price of tebaccer," mused Uncle Sam Whitmarsh, sagely stroking his lean jaw, "—an' hosses. Terbaccer and hosses is things they used up fast in war. An' terbaccer an' hosses is what we got here in Kentucky. An' everything else'll go up too: hog meat and butter and eggs."
"Yaas, an' flour an' sorghum an' coffee alongside of 'em," grunted old Jonah Cobb pessimistically. "I mind me in Civil War times—"
"Aw, don't croak, Jonah. War times is good times fer the farmer. If we kin git a good price for our terbaccer, we hain't a-goin' to kick about payin' a little extry fer a sack o' biscuit flour."
"A sound of battle is in the land and of great destruction," quoted Uncle Jabez Moorhouse. "Woe onto them, for their time is come, the time of their visitation. The earth shall be utterly emptied and utterly laid waste. Behold, Jehovah maketh the earth empty and maketh it waste and turneth it upside down and scattereth abroad the inhabitants thereof. The earth shall stagger like a drunken man."
He loved the sound of the sonorous rhythms and rolled them on his tongue ecstatically.