Virginia free press. (Charlestown, Va. [W. Va.]) 1832-1916, 1888-12-27
VIRGINIA, THURSDAY, DECEMBER 81. 1888.

sa how little of genuine satisfaction ther
is in hard life of sleepless vigilance
losing two for every one they gained
Tha vii tel, too, how clos, keen, and des
tructive the competition, and how calling
to their sensiiiv pride as the % per center
slung his sledghamers around loose anc
careless and achieved in fu years o.
brilliant work crater results than his long
patient, thankles lifetime has yielded
him. Even thes results ar in inconverti
bic shape that may only be turned once
in lifetime and even then at fearful sac
rifce-miles of pinehil and mountain
land that can be turned over but once q
lifetime saw and cider mills that wd cost
more to repair than their valu turnpike
building stock, ledger and negotiables
market valu penny a pound-iarms
morgaged 10 the hilt with pressing wants
and diets, due and overdue, in the hands
of hungry lawyers. Suppose this poor
crippled unfortunate is worth twenty
thousand in this distressing condition, what
shape is he in to meet the unconditional
nockdown, chain-shot sharp shooter with
bis thunderbolts from under the hamer
| recall a paralel-a quarter Of century
ago, in the war times, when Sheridan was
sweeping up the old valley with fire and
sword with barbaric savagry, he had sent
three hundred old delenceles people to
prison, among them MY FATHER. He
had just burned the town of Dayton be-
caus one of his plunderers had been shot,
and he had heard of the meeting Of a
few rebel daredevls on the Shenandoah
and sent a Lieutenant Holcomb, of the
1O5th Ohio, with one hundred pickt blue
coats to kil or capture the thirty desper-
ates who had ventured so far within his
lines. There was some miscaIculation as
to time, however, Holcomb had been thor,
and was leisurely returning, disappoint-
ed in his game, had ransacked every
chicken coop and smoke house and dwell
ling, and his hired boys wer loaded down
with pigs, duX, turkeys, hams, egs, and
the devil only knos what lha hadn't.
Thus they wer loaded down with colate-
rails and Vegetables when that hungry,
reckles little band of rut riders struk them
without counting, and charged with the
old rebel vel. 1t was al over in les time
than rite it. We got 90 prisoners; 80
were kid and wounded II got awa-we
would hav had them all, but one big Ger
man Iank stood square in the road
brandishiDg his sword. He cud not get
out of the wa nor cud we stop. Baylor
and I, side by side, struk him first. The
collision was terifc-rite after us cam,
laundering the rest. Some had a dozel
pistols. had seven on my belt that da
yes, that big fellow that cudn't say
word in English piled us al up in the road
and saved the balance of his comand. !
found myself twenty feet ava. Inevei
saw Baylor agen til mite, but the 300
FOUNDER lay coiled up in a fence corner
ded as Julius Cesar, and the fect-footed
few escaped, or we wd bav had every one.
The heroic lieutenant was as ferc and
fearless as a lion, but his men were maset
in the road, paralyzed and pulverized be
for tha had time to fife or surrender
Like the rich old hundred percenter il
the swet box, his asets wer in bad shape
and on that country road, within rife
shot of the camp fires around old Win
chester, by the Timborlake farm, that
splendid soldier yielded up his life
1t reminded this ritter Of the charge OF
that chivalrous advocate Of free trade
and low tarif, North Carolina Davis, AZ
he thundered down upon slumbering old
Charlotte and surprised her aristocratic
but longwinded high tariiers. OF Jone,
who fel ike an arolite into Ashville and
broke the fak bone of credit barbarism-
and Of Purcell as he poured his grape
canister into the old fashioned hundred
percenters Of Lexington. 1t was the
same, asets were inconvertible and IL
shapeless condition, and the bolt fel from
the deep blu sky, and the withering, des
tructiv FIRE from the fierce cash before de
livery batteries made it hot. / hav seen
concerns as solid as our own smasht into
powder for a mere trihe-A given sum il
a given time-3 p. m. Like Holcomb
the material cd not be gotten in shape OF
time. After o'clock it was two late,
the run began and at the end Of the day
it was ruin, utter and absolute. Yes, thai
mite on the Blu Ridge, that tired little
iron band Of victors had chicken and pies
and cake and lamb and sausage, and real
coffee, and we fed the Yanks on COnfed-
crate hard tax and water The Great