"Well, if I don't understand it," resumed the Captain, "it is high time that Uncle Sam understood it. If these men are half-hearted, they will write no better than they fight, and I guess if the truth could be got at, they are responsible for most of the clogging in the Commissary and Quarter-Master Departments. But you've got me off my story. At ten o'clock I staved in, just as I was,
my uniform shabby, and my boots with a tolerably fair representation of Aquia mud upon them. Passing from one orderly to another, I brought up at the Adjutant-General's office, and there I was referred to the head clerk's office, and there a pleasant-looking, gentlemanly Major told me that the matter would be certainly set straight as soon as the court-martial records were forwarded; that they had telegraphed for them again and again; and that at one time they were reported lost, and at another carried off by one of General Burnside's Staff Officers. As I had heard of records of the kind being delayed before, I intimated rather plainly what I thought of the matter, and told him that I wanted to see the Secretary himself. He smiled, and told me to take my place in the rear of an odd-looking mixed assemblage of persons in the hall, who were crowding towards an open door. It was after two o'clock and after I had stood until I felt devotional about the knees, when my turn brought me before the door, and showed me Mr. Secretary himself, standing behind a desk, tossing his head, now on this side and now on that, with quick jerks, like a short-horned bull in fly time, despatching business and the hopes of the parties who had it from their looks, about the same time. Right manfully did he stand up to his work; better than to his word perhaps, if reports that I have heard be true."
"A pretty-faced, middle-aged lady approached his desk, and I thought that I could see a rather awkward effort at a smile hang around the upper corners of his huge, black beard, as his eye caught her features through his spectacles, and he received her papers. But the gruff manner in which he told her
the next moment that he would not grant it, showed I was mistaken.
"'But I was told, Mr. Secretary,' said the woman, in tremulous tones, 'that my papers were all right, and that your assent was a mere formality. I have three other sons in the service, and this boy is not'——
"'I don't care what you have been told,' retorted the Secretary, in a manner that made me so far forget my reverence that my toes suddenly felt as if disposed to propel something that, strange to say, had the semblance of humanity, and was not distant at the time. 'You had better leave the room, madam!' continued the same voice, somewhat gruffer and sterner, as the poor woman burst into tears at the sudden disappointment. 'You only interrupt and annoy. We are accustomed to this sort of thing here.'
"I looked at him as he took the papers of another for examination, and wondered whether we were really American citizens—sovereigns as our politicians tell us when on the stump, and whether he was really a public servant. But I couldn't see it.
"Now, civility is a cheap commodity, and, in my humble opinion, the least that can be expected of men filling public positions is that they should possess it in an ordinary degree.
"Three o'clock came, but it was not my turn yet. In fact, the treatment of the lady had so disgusted me, that I was quite ready to leave when a servant announced that business hours were over. That evening, I found out to my great satisfaction that men considerably more influential than myself had held the Secretary to the promises he had made them, and that notwithstanding all his backing and filling the order for their return would be issued."