The draft in Accomac, my boy, is positively to take place on the 11th of September; but it is not believed that the enrollment can be finished before the 15th; in which case, the draft must inevitably take place on the 20th. In fact, the Judge-Advocate of the Accomac states positively that the conscription will commence on the 1st of October; and volunteering is so brisk that no draft may be required. At least, such is the report of those best acquainted with the more decisive plans of the War Department, which thinks of joining the Temperance Society.
The exempts were filing their papers of exemption with Colonel Wobert Wobinson, my boy, and amongst them was one chap with a swelled eye, a deranged neck-tie, and a hat that looked as though it might have been used as an elephant's foot-bath. The chap came in with a heavy walk, and says he:
"Being a married man, war has no terror for me; but I am obliged to exempt myself from military affairs on account of the cataract in my eyes."
Colonel Wobert Wobinson looked at him sympathizingly, and says he: "You might possibly do for a major-general, my son, as it is blindness principally that characterises a majority of our present major-generals in the field; but fearing that your absence from home might cause a prostration in the liquor business, I will accept your cataract as valid."
The poor chap sighed until he reached the first hiccup, and then says he: "I wish I could cure this here cataract, which causes my eyes to weep in the absence of all woe."
"Do your orbs liquidate so freely?" says the Colonel, with the air of a family physician.
"Yes," says the poor chap, gloomily, "they are like two continual mill streams."
"Mill streams!" says Colonel Wobinson meditatively, "mill streams! Why, then, you'd better dam your eyes."
"I think, my boy, I say I think, that this kindly advice of Colonel Wobert Wobinson's must have been misunderstood in some way; for an instant departure of several piously-inclined recruits took place precipitately, and the poor chap chuckled like a fiend.