The Pulaski citizen. [volume] (Pulaski, Tenn.) 1866-current, 1874-01-08
THE OLDEST INHABITANr
Interesting "reminiscences.


1t is fashionable in newspaperdOm
to interview the oldest inhabitant and
| give to the world the miraculous yarns
they tell-maraculous because it is
difficult to conceive how a mind bowed
down with decrepitude and age can
stsdy up tales so marvelously life-like.
We give below the result of an inter
view with the oldest lady in Giles
County,
"COme in, and don't stand thar and
star like fool like you'd never seed
abOdy afore. Take q cheer. Calline,
fetch the man a gourd of water, and
fetch the pan, know he'd like to
wash his hands, they're awful dirty,
my sakes p
Thank you, madam, for the chair
and the delicious draught from your
rustic dipper, but the pan is unneces-
sary, since laved my extremities in
the limpid stream that gurgles from
the hillside down the way. Pardon
any seeming impertinence on my part,
but 1 viii rest under lasting obligations
to you, if you viii divuIge the most
important events of your life, life
which 1 am led to believe, by report,
has stretched out over the waste of
time to an extent not usually allotted
to man, and which has eomprehended
events, which, but for the vital spark
that stin animates your physical frame,
would belong only to the dead past
Your Creator has endowed"
"Calline, fetch the Bible and the
hymn book. Drat a preacher what
don't take text afOre he commences.
When 1 was a gal, preachiR was
preachin, but these times people have
got mighty queer notions. But you
might as well go on with your sermon
since you've commenced"
'FYou misapprehend me entirely mad
am. simply came to ask your age
and name, and get you to tell me
what you have seen a long time ago,
what you heard and what happened"
"Lor sakes, why'nt you say so. My
name is Lucinda Smith, and I'll be
three hundred and fourteen years old
next grass. I've seed heap of things
in my day, and 1 can't tell you all, but
remember some things mabe you
never hearn of. I've been married
thirty-nine times the last time count
ed it up, and the school-marm has been
addin up my children for me three
weeks. She was little over seventeen
hundred last week, and no teIIin whar
she is now. My first husband was
Julius Caesars carriage driver, and
nussed Julius hisself. 1 was present
when POmpey the greet and Napoleon
BOnaparte fit on the Rocky Mountains.
And L seed Lord WelIin'ton take
George Washin'tOn pris'ner. Lorzy
my, how George did cuss and sware,
and he went right straight to Gen.
Grant and took the oath, and they sent
him onto island what they called the
Isle of elbow, and he came back and
fit the battle of Watterey and Monta-
lew, the same day. I bad thirteen sons
got drowned that day in the Potomac,
and Lord Corvallis wouldn't give me
their back-pay. A heap of men got killed
in that skrimage. Thar was Massado-
mia, and Mark Anterny, and Shilow, and
Sherman, and Buna Vister, and Bore
gard and heaps of 'em, and 1 recon
they'd bin fightin till yet, but Mar
tin Luther come up with his regiment
and killed Lieurgus and Bunker Hill,
and took Fort Sumpter and had all the
niggers marched out and give 'em guns
and told 'em to burn Moscow if it took
all summer. Gen. Shakespeare eat
dinner at my house that day, and Jay
Cook, and Victor Hugo, and Robinson
CrusO, and-say, Mr., what's your hur-
dred years yet. Come again and I'll
tell you ell about it. Lorzy my, how
1 remember everything same as if it
was VpsterdaVn