“That’s nothing, for you know one Southerner was equal to five Yankees.”
“And so he is, and always will be! But you had to get the niggers to help you.”
“What are a few niggers? They would always run, you know, at sight of their masters, while of course such a thing was never known as their masters running from them!”
The unhappy member of the “overpowered” party flushed and fumed a while, not knowing what answer to make, then burst forth,—
“It was the foreigners! You never would have beaten us if it hadn’t been for the foreigners that made up your armies!”
“What!” said my friend, “you, an American, acknowledge yourself beaten by foreigners! I am ashamed of you!”
And the wagon arriving, he jumped into it with a laugh, leaving the Southerner, not whipped of course, but decidedly “overpowered” in this little contest of wit. It was quite evident that he was not equal to five Yankees with his tongue.
“That young fellow you was talking with,” said our driver, “was one of Mosby’s guerrillas. There are plenty of them around here. They are terrible at talking, but that is about all.”
The wagon was an ambulance which had cost the government two hundred and fifty dollars a few months before. The springs proving inferior, it was condemned, and sold at auction for twenty-four dollars. “I paid a hundred and twenty-five for it the next day,” said the driver; “and it’s well worth the money.” It was a strong, heavy, well-built vehicle, well suited to his business. “I was down here with my regiment when I got my discharge, and it struck me something might be made by taking visitors out to the battle-fields. But I haven’t saved a cent at it yet; passengers are few, and it’s mighty hard business, the roads are so awful bad.”
Worse roads are not often seen in a civilized country. “It makes me mad to see people drive over and around these bad places, month after month, and never think of mending ’em! A little work with a shovel would save no end of lost time, and wear and tear, and broken wagons; but it’s never done.”