When the festival was in full operation, my boy, the General of the Mackerel Brigade arose to his feet, and waved his straw for silence. Says he:
"My children, though this strawberry festival is ostensibly for the purpose of encouraging fruit culture by the United States of America, it has yet a deeper purpose. The democratic party," says the general, paternally, "is about to be born again, and it is time to make preparation for the next Presidential election in 1865. I must go to Albany and Syracuse, and see the State Conventions; after which I must attend to the re-organization of the party in New York city. Then I go to Pennsylvania to do stump duty for a year; and from thence, to—"
Here a serious chap, who had taken rather too much Strawberry Festival, looked up, and says he:
"But how about the war all that time?"
"The war!—the war!" says the general, thoughtfully. "Thunder!" says the general, with such a start that he spilt some of his Festival, "I'd really forgotten all about the war!"
"Hum!" says the serious chap, gloomily, "you're worth millions to a suffering country—you are."
"Flatterer!" says the general blandly.
"Yes," says the chap, "you're worth millions—with a hundred per cent off for cash."
In vino veritas is a sage old saying, my boy, and I take it to be a free translation of the Scripture phrase, "In spirit and in truth."
Our brigadiers are so frequently absent-minded themselves, my boy, that they are not particularly absent-minded by the rest of the army.