St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1868-08-07
SdUed 6y q Bullet.


weakest ul Us dil-"GO yea know, ]
should like to experience the sensation of
L1lio'1 somcjody!'
Everybody sniled-some laughed-at
the idea Of poor little timid Aiinimus, be
coming Il homicide; but the train Of lho't
suggested 10y Ills quaint remark was one
HAT stimulated comment, and for the
next halt hour Speculation ran riot thro
the csthctics of murder, suicide. an
chance medley.
1t has wcll-nigh become provcrLial
that the present situation, more c>peci-
ally, perhaps, if 1t be Il pleasant one, /,
very apt to remind Us OF It's antipoIc>
/ Peri-hing travellers amid the snow wastes
of Siberia. are said to coniurc up tor
menting Visions OF feather icl-. hot
chimney corners, and dclectablc whisi>cy
! toddies. The miserable mortal. -asp;ug
| in the last pangs of starvation, VIII PIC
ture to his hungry soul such feast a.
never graced the board of Lucul!us ; and
| here we. round halt-duzen OF city chums
| wing laXiiy On our backs on the velvet
Sward OF Staten Island, ON Il delicious.
drowsy afternoon ot summer, watchiu-.
through the riffs in our cigar smoke. the
white sails of the pilot-boats -klming tie
bay, and the lengthening black trails
from the pipes OF the steamers-hrre We
must needs turn away from the Arctdiau
,opIcs suggested by our surroundings, and
talk of blood, war and violence. After
each OF us but one had said his say, Mini
mus called for Crocker whereupon that
one aroused him from his tobacco trance,
and emphatically inquired what we We're
masking such row about, and as 10 why
Il fellow couldn't be allowed 10 smoke hi>
pipe in peace.
But | say, Crockcr,' persisted Mini
mus, did you ever Kill Il man ,"
Il suppose so lots of 'cm. Didn't
the United States pay me for doing just
that for four years or more
''Oh Yes, of course; but that was all
confusion and butchery, You know
, There wasn't any individual KILN.
about it, and none of that queer sensation
that man must feel when he puts steel
or bullet right into the other fellow be
fore him
And which isn't half as queer, |
tancy," said Crockcr, in his drye,t way,
. .'as the sensation of the other fellow"
Then there was Il laugh at Miuimu-.
But the little one was Oh the knee
scent after Il story, and was not to II,
ridiculed out oft, So he returned to the
charge.
''Well, Colonel, you know what l
= mean. if | can't philosophers correctly
over H. SO tell us all YOU can about II,
tor ii viii! interest us all. Do YOU real,
know OF any one man YOU ever killed ! Il
= yea, tell us how it happened. and inst
how you felt
Our Crockcr was a pretty fair sp"ci-
men OF the high order OF Young Amcri-
"a. and as he now sat and smoked. cross
legged, searching the stores of lis fertile
memory for an experience such ~ Mini.
mus had requested. there was much O
positive character to he seen IN his strong
iy-cut profile and steely-blue eve, Barc.
" turned thirty. he had already been il
almost every nook and corner ot th'
world had run away 10 sea when les
than fifteen, and voyaged /" the suUi!
seas in "A New Bedford whaler had beef
y round the world before the mast heiur,
- twenty; graduated at Yale few year
after: made and spent two fortunes Il
California and Australia; had dabpled ;
little at the stock board, and won an,
- lost fabulous sums in horse flesh an'
iinallv, had fought the war through. lctv
lng an arm at Pleasant ill.up Rcd River
where he commanded his regiment II
- that desperate fight We considered hin
i fellow entirely after his own kind, an'
of no ordinary kind, too. 80. whrr
i, NIinimus began to call him out, we ed4e'
II II closer about him, quite sure that W
t. should have a red -lettered leaf from hi
n, teeming experience. And we had 1t, Il
follows:
= Modern warfare is too scientific TO b
called Lutchery or murder. The ten
dency of all these astonishing improve
ments in ordnance is to keep the combat
ants widely apart, us if to leave no posi-
BILE opportunity for individual bad blood
Generally, our fighting is Il kind Of III
ID tangible warfare, in which the soldier be
comes kind Of automaton he load
and fires like well regulated machine
and at the end of an hour he has poSsibl
killed two men, and put three more h0'
5, de combat but he can't and don't reallz
nd any such thing. We march our arml(
ice up TO within half mile OF each othcl
& and there hammer and pound till one {
the two gets an over dose OF lead, an
has to withdraw; and no man OF fl
% twenty thousand victors can walk ovC
S the bloody field and select his own VIZ
Tins Sometimes, rarely enough, W
have bayonet rush or cavalry chase
n but these are very exceptional. Th;
u Jolly piralical style of slaughter in whc
the Romans and Africans elighted, ,whe
they sailed into each other with sword
m slings, and javelins, has disappeared b
fore organization and mechanism 1t
thu steadiness of the mass, not the prov
ess of the individual, that prevails nov
and close hugs on the battle field ha
pretty much gone out of date. Thras
: meme land Gettysburg were both b
fights, but there was very decided dl
ference in the way the combatants kill
each other.
Well, and what of it ID? Merely to
lustrate to you that Mlnimus Is r@
when he says that there can't be mu
of the real sensation of killing III our IL
ter day fighting. But can tell you