CHAPTER XX.
Two Stay-at-Homes.
“If wantin’ to was doin’ an’ they weren’t no weemen, I’d ’a’ ben in Sandyago long ago,” said the G. A. R. Man. He rolled a nail-keg close to the stove, seated himself upon it, dipped a handful of crushed tobacco leaves from his coat pocket into his pipe and lighted the odorous weed with a sulphur match. Then he wagged his beard at the assembled company and repeated, “Yes, sir, I’d ben in Sandyago long ago.”
“Weemen ain’t much on fightin’ away from home,” observed the Chronic Loafer, biting a cubic inch out of a plug of Agriculturist’s Charm which he had borrowed from the man who was sitting next him on the counter. The charm had passed half way around the circle and the remaining cubic inch of it had been restored to its owner, when the veteran, not catching the full intent of the remark, replied: “Yas. They’s a heap o’ truth in that there. Weemen is sot agin furrin wars. Leastways my weemen is. Now——”
“Do they prefer the domestic kind?” asked the School Teacher.
“Not at all—not at all,” said the old soldier. “Ye see, my missus passed th’oo sech terrible times back in ’60, ’hen I was bangin’ away at the rebels down in the Wilterness, that ’hen this here Spaynish war broke out she sais to me, sais she, ‘Ye jest sha’n’t go.’
“‘Marthy,’ sais I, ‘I’m a weteran. The Governor o’ Pennsylwany hes call fer ten thousand men, an’ he don’t name me, but he means me jest the same. Be every moral an’ jest right, I bein’ a weteran am included in that ten thousand.’
“With that I puts on me blues, an’ gits down me musket, an’ kisses the little ones all ’round, an’ starts fer the door. Well, sir, you uns never seen sech a time ez was raised ’hen they see I was off to fight the Spaynyards. Mary Alice, the eldest, jest th’owed her arms ’round my neck an’ bust out with tears. The seven others begin to cry, ‘Pap, Pap, you’ll git shooted.’
“‘Children,’ I sais, sais I, ‘your pap’s a weteran an’ a experienced soldier. Duty calls an’ he obeys.’