A song of Mississippi negroes in the Vicksburg Campaign.

Darkies has you seed my massa
Wid de mustache on his face?
He came along dis morning
As dough he’d leave de place.
He saw de smoke way up de river,
Where de Lincum gunboats lay:
He took his hat and he left mighty sudden,
I speck he’s runned away.

Chorus.—Massa run, aha!
Darkey stay, aho!
It must be now dat de kingdom’s comin’,
In the year of Jubilo.
He’s six feet one way, four feet t’other,
And weighs three hundred pounds;
His coat’s so big he can’t pay de tailor—
Den it don’t go half around.

“Massa run, aha.”

He drills so much dey call him cap’n;
And he am so very tan,
Speck he’ll try to fool dem Yankees
And say he’s contraban’.
Chorus.
Dis darkey gets so very lonesome,
In de cabin on de lawn;
He moves his things to massa’s parlor,
To keep ’em, while he’s gone.

There’s wine and cider in de cellar,
And de darkies dey’ll have some;
I speck it will be confiscated,
When de Lincum soldiers come.
Chorus.
De overseer will give us trouble,
And run us round a spell;
We’ll lock him up in smoke-house cellar,
Wid de key thrown in de well.
De whip is lost, and de handcuffs broken,
And massa’ll lose his pay;
He’s big enough and old enough,
Dan to gone and runned away.
Chorus.

SONG OF HOOKER’S PICKET.

Southern Illustrated News, Feb. 21st, 1863.

I’m ’nation tired of being hired
To fight for a shillin’ a day;
Richmond to gain I’ll hev to strain,
And travel some other way.
Darn Ole Abe and Ole Jeff Dave!
Darn the day I ’listed!
When I came down to this ’ere town,
Jerushy! how I missed it.

All day I’ve stud in rebel mud
A watchin’ North Calinians.
I might a bin safe up to Lynn,
A eatin’ clams and inions.
All night I sit in straw that’s wet,
Ketchen fleas and other critters;
The boys down East are at a feast
With gals, doughnuts and fritters.
I hain’t no pay for many a day;—
Nigh unto a year I guess,
Since a new Greenback hev crosst my track—
That’s so with all my mess.
To pull my trigger for a big buck nigger
That lives on hog and hominy,
While on hard tack my jaws I crack,
Ain’t war “accordin’ to Jomini.”
It’s monsus fine for the Bobolition line,
With mouths full o’ pumpkin pie,
To preach in meetin’ agin’ retreatin’—
Why don’t they come theirselves and try?
They’d find the Confed’s hev mighty hard heads,
And are pow’ful smart at shootin’;
Their love for the old flag would very soon drag—
Lord! how you’d see them scootin’.
That fool Burnside deserves a cowhide,
Coz he’s got neither pluck nor sense;
He shook like souse at the Phillip’s house,
While we was murder’d at Marye’s fence.

But it is all one to me who our Gen’ral may be,
If I’ve got to die for the nigger,
While Greeley steps on feathers, and Beecher’s patent leathers,
Sets Plymouth Church in a snigger.
War is mighty fine to them that’s drinking wine
At the big hotels in York;
But as for lousy me, that’s lost his liberty,
Peace is the right sort o’ talk.
I calk’late to stay, until next May,
A shiv’rin’ in all this slush;
But when I git paid, I’m a leetle kinder ’fraid
I’ll back out hum with a rush.
I’ll pitch this gun into old Bull Run,
Like I did when I follered McDowell;
Secesh may go his ways, and I’ll spend my days
With my gal, my gin and my trowel.
Oh! I’m sick as a dog, or a mangy hog,
Of this ’tarnal nasty fightin’,
That’s all gone wrong, and lasts too long
For a man that’s thinkin’ o’ kitin’.
I’ll tell you, Mississip, you’re an ugly looking rip,
And if you’ll keep your side o’ the water,
You may save your powder, and I’ll take to chowder,
And come no more where I hadn’t oughter.