The National tribune., 1883-03-15

expedients in most voluble language. Vaughan
was rather disappointed at this result of his
| liberality, and asked Nolan eagerly what they
! said. The drops stood on poor NOlan's white
| forehead, rs he hushed the men down, and
| said:
"He says, Not PaImas' He says, take us
home, take us to our own country, take US TO
| our own house, take US to our own pickaninnieS
and our own women He says he has an old
father and mother, who will die, if they do
not see him. And this one says he left his
people all sick. and padded down to Fernando
| to beg the white doctor to come and help them,
and that these devils caught him in the bay
| just in sight of home, and that he has never
| seen anybody from home since then. And this
one says" choked out Nolan, that he has not
heard word from his home in six months
while he has been locked up in an Internal
| barraCoOn."
| Vaughan always said he grew gray himself
| while Nolan struggled through this interpreta-
| ton. /, who did not understand anything of
| the passion involved in it, saw that the very
| elements were melting with feryent heat,
| and that something was to pay somewhere.
| Even the negroes themselves stopped bowling,
| as they saw Nolan's agony, and Vaughan's
almost equal agony of sympathy. AS quick as
| he could get words, he said,-
"Tell them yes, yes yes; tell them they shall
| go to the Mountains of the Moon, if they will.
| If | sail the schooner through the Great White
| Desert, they shall go hOme!"
And after some fashion Nolan said so. And
then they all fell to kissing him again, and
| wanted to rub his nose with theirs.
But he could not stand it long; and getting
Vaughan to say he might go back, he beckoned
me down into our boat. AS we lay back in the
stern-sheets and the men gave way, he said to
me-" Youngster, let that show you what it
is to be without a family, without home, and
without a country. And if you are ever
tempted to say a word to do thing that
shall put bar between you and your family,
your home, and your country, pray God in His
| mercy to take you that instant home to His
own heaven. Stick by your family boy; for
get you have a self, while you do everything
for them. Think of your home, boy; write
and send, and talk about it. Let it be nearer
| and nearer to your thought, the farther you
have to travel from it; and rush back to it,
when you are free, as that poor black slave is
| doing now. And for your country, boy" and
the words ratified in his throat, "and for that
flag" and he pointed to the ship, "never dream
dream but of serving her as she bids you,
| though the service carry you through a thou
sand hells No matter what happens to you,
no matter who flatters you or who abuses you,
never look at another flag, never let night
pass but you pray God to bless that flag. Re-
member boy, that behind all these men you
have to do with behind officers and govern
ment, and people even, there is the Country
Herself your Country, and that you belong to
Her rs you belong to your own mother. Stand
by Her, boy, as you would stand by your
mother. if those devils there had got hold of
her tO-day!"
l was frightened to death by his calm, hard
passion but l blundered out, that L would, by
all that was holy, and that | had never thought
of doing anything else He hardly seemed to
hear me; but he did, almost in a whisper, say,
-"Oh, if anybody had said so to me when 1
| was of your agei"
/ think it was this half-confdence of his,
which l never abused, for / never told this
story till now, which afterWard made US great
friends. He was very kind to me. Often he
sat up, or even got up, at night to walk the
deck with me, when it was my watch. He eX-
planned to me a great deal of my mathematics,
and / owe to him my taste for mathematics.
He lent me books, and helped me about my
| reading. He never alluded so directly to his
story again; but from one and another officer
l have learned, in thirty years. what am tell
ing. When we parted from him in st. Thomas
| harbor, at the end of our cruise, was more
sorry than can tell was very glad to meet
him again in 1880; and later in life, when l
thought / had some influence in Washington,
/ moved heaven and earth to have him dis
charged. But it was like getting ghost out
of prison. They pretended there was no such
man, and never was such a man. They will say
so at the Department nowl Perhaps they do
service of which the Department appears to
know nothing!
There is a story that Nolan met Burr once
on one of our vessels, when party of Ameri-
cans came on board in the Mediterranean. But
this l believe to be lie rather it is
myth, ben tr0rato, involving a tremendous
blowing-up with which he sunk Burr,-asking
him how he liked to be without country"
But it is clear, from Burrs life, that nothing of
the sort could have happened; and l mention
this only as illustration of the stories which
get a-going where there is the least mystery at
bottom
So poor Philip Nolan had his wish fulfilled.
know but one fate more dreadful: it is the fate
reserved for those men who shall have one day
to exile themselves from their country because
they have attempted her ruin, and shall have
at the same time to see the prosperity and
honor to which she rises when she has rid her.
self of them and their iniquites. The wish of
poor Nolan, as we all learned to call him, not
because his punishment was too great, but be-
cause his repentance was so clear, was pre-
cisely the wish of every Bragg and Beauregard
who broke soldiers oath two years ago, and
of every Maury and Barron who broke a
sailors. I do not know how often they have
repented. l do know that they have done all
that in them lay that they might have no
country,-that all the honors, associations,
memories and hopes which belong to "cOun-
try" might be broken up into little shreds and
distributed TO the winds. L know, too, that
their punishment, as they vegetate through
what is left of life to them in wretched Bou-
lognes and Leicester Squares, where they are
destined to upbraid each other till they die,
will have all the agony of Nolan's with the
added PaGg that every one who sees them will
see them to despise and to execrate them.
They will have their wish, like him.
For him, poor fellow, he repented of his
folly, and then, like a man, submitted to the
fate he had asked for. He never Intentionally
added to the difficulty or delicacy of the charge
of those who had him in hold. Accidents
would happen; but they never happened from
his fault. Lieutenant Truxton told me- that,
when Texas was annexed, there was a careful
discussion among the officers, whether they
should get hold of Noans handsome set of
maps, and cut Texas out of it,-from the map
of the world and the map of Mexico. The
United States had been cut out when the atlas
was bought for him. But it was voted,
rightly enough that to do this would be vir-
tualy to reveal to him what had happened, or,
as Harry Cole said, to make him think Old
Burr had succeeded. So it was from no fault
of NOlans that great botch happened at my
own table, when, for a short time / was in
command of the George Washington corvette,
on the South-American station. We were lying
in the La Platte, and some of the officers, who
had been on shere, and had just Joined again,
were entertaining us with accounts of their
misadventures in riding the half-wild herses of