Spirit of Jefferson. [volume] (Charles Town, Va. [W. Va.]) 1844-1948, 1867-10-22
OVER ON THE BORDER.

make ourselves agreeable to our radical
friends, we visited Shepherdstown on Tues.
day, where we spent nearly three days profit
ably, if not pleasantly. With laudablc de.
sire to transmit to posterity at least discon-
nected history of the present remarkable
era, in our county, under the regime of West
Virginia, and her enlightened officials, we
propose to speak in brief of some of the
sights we saw, and to note partially few of
the impressions made upon US. In the per-
formance of this most Ouerous task, We shall
strive to divest our undertaking of that bit
terne5s which the subjects of whom we treat
so eminently deserve, aud will, for the time
at least, eudeayor to think of them as por>
ton of Adams progeny, in an advanced stage
Of civilization, and under a reign of peculiar
beneicence-so far as they are concerned.
If comparisons are Odious, as has been al
legged by some one whose authority we have
no right to question, then to contrast the pre-
sent with the past of this county, would be
abominabie, ana must uRquestionably cause
the crimson to tinge the cheek Of every indi-
vidual who feels spark of affection for the
homo Of his nativity-the land of his birth.
We won't make the comparison, but will only
give our iEk sketches of the present, and let
the imagination of our readers fill up the pic
ture. We therefore proceed and first introduce
THE COURT.
The judge, or "NIny it Please your Honor" as
he is sycophantly called by an admiring bar,
is an individual of respectable dimensions,
and is hearty eater. He was born in the
hill,country of Marion, near river village or
railroad station known as Fairmont. The
exact date of his birth We are not at present
able to chronicle, but think it likely it was
somewhere about the beginning Of the first
year of his life. His age though not OK
tremc, must have passed the point of matu-
rity, as the capillary substance which once
adorned his perecranium has ceased to vege>
tate, and his brain holder is now covered by
a mulatto colored wig, which naturally leads
to the belief that his Honor is an advocate of
colored suffrage, not having yet fully digest
ed the result of the election in Ohio. Wheth-
or the wig aforesaid ovcrshadOws greater
amount of brain in its present position than
it did where it originally sprou;ed, is ques-
ton which phrenOlo2ists have not yet deter
mined, and perhaps never will. The early
years of the subject of our sketch were spent,
Ike those Of young Norval, on the Grampian
hills, where his father fed his focks, and it
was not until mans estate was reached, that
the beauties of the law, with all their untold
destinations, fastened themselves upon his
mind. Coke and Blackstone, were then
made the objects Of his alteration, aud at the
mature age Oftwenty- the present judge
became a practising attorney in his native
county, where he would have remained to the
present day but for the fact that the radicals of
this district had no material out of which to
manufacture a judge suited to their tastes,
and felt it necessary to 60 beyond the bounds
of the district to obtain one. During the
first year after his birth he was christencd
'EphTdim Bee" after an eccentric individu-
al who bore the same cognomen in DOddridgc
county, and who, at the time of which we
write, held a commission from the Emperor
of China as ''Grand Hotc- Tote of the ancient
order of L. Clamps IUdS." From the
prominence which the "B" holds in the
judges name, some have supposed him to be
4 descendant Of Shakespeare ITO Be, or not
to BE" but this superstition is refuted by the
fact that the poet used but one whilst the
Bee in the judges name is spelled with two
ee'S. here is one connection, however,
which he may hold to the parties referred to
and that is mot to be" judge of this dis
trict after the Supreme Court of the United
States decides that the counties of Jefferson
and Berkeley are no part of the State of West
Virginia, which it is likely soon to DO.
The next prominent figure in the trans
planted judiciary, is a character without char
acter, named ChGpIine. If our readers have
carefully read the Spirit for the last few
months, they may have heard of this indivd
ual before. Indiscreet persons have SANDER
ed the county of Jefferson by alleging this as
the place of his nativity, but We have never
been satisfied that there was not some mis-
take in the allegation. If he was born here,
he must have had his 'broughtcn up" in
some other quarter. One thing is certain, it
such characters, and if she did it in this
instance. she did it through mistake
Chapline has been very prominent in this
county since its transfer to West Virginia,
and with all his mcanucss has been idoIized
by his party, who worship him with an in-
tense devotion. 1t is their purpose, we learn,
to have his body embalmed after death, and
to use it as figure head for the ferry boat
now running between the shores of Maryland
and Virginia, to perpetuatc his repeated cross
ings of the Potomac during the late rebellion,
in which he only figured as refugee and