The Canton mail. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 18??-1882, 1875-08-28
And That's the Way He Felt.

| He had a wooden leg, three finger
were gone from the left hand, and b
had to use a crutch. In the dusk o
the evening he sat down on a good
box on the street corner, and strikin!
the ground with his crutch, ne ex
claimed
"Well, old pard, the wars over
Gimme your hand-shake hard !"
He shook the crutch with hearty goot
will. and continued:
"There's no more Reb-no more
Yank We're all Americans, and stand
ing shoulder to shoulder-South Car
DINA alongside Massachusetts car
lick the boots off'n any nation under
the sun |"
He waited awhile and then went on
"No more skirmishes no more
fouts. Uncle Robert is dead, Gen.
Grant wants peace, and they are melt
ing up swords and bayonets to make
cotton mill machinery We're about
through camping out, old pard, and we
hain't sOrry-not a bit !"
He leaned the crutch against the box,
lifted his wooden leg, and said:
"Lost a good leg up at Fredericks-
burg when was under Barksdale, and
old Burnside thought he could whip
old uncle Robert and Stonewall Jack
son together Good Lord but wasn't
it hot that day, when the Yanks laid
their pontoons and got up and got for
us And when we got up and got for
them, wasn't it red hot ?"
He stopped to ponder for a while,
and his voice vas softer when he said
"But ] forgive 'em I took the
chances-and lost. I'm reaching out
now to shake hands with the Yank who
shot me, and I'll divide my tobacco half
and half with him 1t was a big war.
Yanks aud Reh stood right up and
showed pluck, bit it is time to forgive
and to forget"
He cut a chew off his ping, took off
his battered hat and looked at it, and
continued:
"Didn't we all come of one blood ?
Hain't We the big American matte n :?
Isn't this here United States the big
gest plantation OIL the river, and is
there a nation in he world that dares
knock the chip off our shoulder?
Maryland, ny Maryland,
Michigan, m. Michigan"
He pnt down his leg, looked at his
hand and soliloquizel:
fThree fingers go1e-hand used up,
but I'm satisfied. Folks who go to
war expect to feel bullets. We stood
up to the Yanks-they stood up to us
it was a fair fout, and we got licked.
Two fingers hain't as good as five, but
they are good enough to shake hands
with Come up here you Yarks and
grip me We raise cotton down here
you raise corn up there-let's trade I"
He lifted his crutch, struck it down
hard. and went on:
"Durn a family who'll fight each
other We've got the biggest and best
country that ever laid 4 doors, and if
any foreign despot throws club at the
American eagle, Well shoulder arms and
shoot him into the middle of next
week"
He sat and pondered whb the shad-
ows grew deeper, and by and by he
said:
"There's lots of graves down here
there's heaps of war orphans up
North ; I'm crippled up and half sick,
but I'm going to get up aid hit the
emery cuss who dares say a word ag'in
either. We've got thro' fgltingSwe
are shaking hands now, and durn the
man who says a word to interrupt the
harmony It's one family-dd Uncle
Sans boys and girls and babies and
we're going to live in the same house,
eat at the same table, and turn out
bigger crops than any other r,nch on
the globe"
He rose up to go, raped on The box
with his crutch, and continued.
Resol0ed, That this glorius old
family stick right together in the old
homestead for the next million years to
come. y YickSLMr0 Herald.