“Where, where, is it a drawin' 'em to? Where is it a drawin' the hull nation to? Is it' a drawin' 'em down into a slavery ten times more abject and soul-destroyin' than African slavery ever was? Tell me,” says I firmly, “tell me.”
His mean looked impressed, but he did not try to frame a reply. I think he could not find a frame. There is no frame to that reply. It is a conundrum as boundless as truth and God's justice, and as solemnly deep in its sure consequences of evil as eternity, and as sure to come as that is.
Agin I says, “Where is that Ring a drawin' the United States? Where is it a drawin' Dorlesky?”
“Oh! Dorlesky!” says he, a comin' up out of his deep reveryin', but polite,—a politer demeanerd, gentlemanly appeariner man I don't want to see. “Ah, yes! I would be glad, Josiah Allen's wife, to do her errent. I think Dorlesky is justified in asking to have the Ring destroyed. But I am not the one to go to—I am not the one to do her errent.”
Says I, “Who is the man, or men?”
Says he, “James G. Blaine.”
Says I, “Is that so? I will go right to James G. Blaineses.”
So I spoke to the boy. He had been all engaged lookin' out of the winders, but he was willin' to go.
And the President took the boy upon his knee, wantin' to do something agreeable, I s'pose, seein' he couldn't do the errent. And he says, jest to make himself pleasant to the boy,—
“Well, my little man, are you a Republican, or Democrat?”