The Mackerel Brigade, in two parts, having reached the opposite shore of Duck Lake in safety, the Grim Old Fighting Cox ordered Captain Villiam Brown and Captain Bob Shorty to take each a regiment of spectacled veterans and cautiously feel the Confederacies' lines, while he led the remainder of the national troops to a small village at hand, which had particularly requested to be immediately destroyed. It was his great strategical plan, my boy, to form his lines in the shape of a triangle, thus inclosing the unmannerly Confederacies between three fires, and winning a great geometrical victory. The Confederacies being duly surrounded, and the village being set on fire at the apex of the triangle, the Grim Old Fighting Cox withdrew to a tent, spread a map of the world upon a camp-stool before him, and proceeded to take topographical observations. Drawing from his saddle-bags an instrument of opaque glass, of tubular character, quite large in circumference about half-way up, and then tapering into a neck, or smaller tube, of nearly the same length, he raised it in a semi-horizontal position to a point about one and a half inches above the lower circumference of his chin, until he could look through it at an angle bisecting its greater circumference upon the map below. The light, striking through the body of this instrument, cast a wavy, fluctuating sort of yellowish glare upon that part of the map representing the well-known Southern Confederacy, accompanied by a species of soft, trickling sound. After an interval of some ten minutes, the operator saw, by this contrivance, just double the number of Confederacies he had to contend with. It only remained, then, for him to divide the number thus ascertained by two, and he knew exactly the number of his foes!
You will observe, my boy, that this singularly ingenious device at once revealed to the new General of the Mackerel Brigade the true strength of his greatest enemy, and inspired him with a strong spirit.
It was immediately after this, that the Grim Old Fighting Cox issued the following
"GENERAL ORDER.
"The manner in which the crossing of Duck Lake has been accomplished proves that this is the finest Army ever seen on the plan-it, and is likely to prove equally fine on the do-it. I have now got the well-known Southern Confederacy where I wished to have her, and she must either ignominiously retreat, or come out of her works, and be annihilated by me on my own ground, which is ground-arms!
("Blue Seal.)
"The General of the Mackerel Brigade."
Having let fly this General Order, my boy, the Grim Old Fighting Cox proceeded to complete his surprise of the enemy by leading a bayonet charge from his side of the triangle, and immediately telegraphed to the base of the triangle that the enemies of human freedom were retreating before him. This was truly the case; for the unseemly Confederacies not only retreated before him, but retreated with such impetus of flight upon Captain Villiam Brown at the base of the triangle, that they actually drove him clear out of his place, and proceeded to occupy the base themselves. Thus matters stood at the conclusion of the first day.
Early on the second day, the Grim Old Fighting Cox charged again upon some fresh regiments of Confederacies, who retreated with such violence that they completely pressed Captain Bob Shorty from the right line of the triangle, and remained in that line themselves. This was the second day's battle.
On the following morning, it was discovered that fresh Confederacies had come up from Paris. These were attacked irresistibly by the whole Mackerel Brigade, and only succeeded in making a stand when they formed, as it were, the left line of the triangle.