LETTER LV.

Here Smith-Brown, who happened to be awake, coughed intrusively, my boy, and says he:

"The fault is not the General's, my friend. The Secretary of War is alone to blame for it. He has killed literature."

How true was that speech, my boy. The Secretary is indeed responsible for this literary disaster, as well for everything else; and if he ever undertakes to stand on his own responsibility, he will find plenty of room to move about.

Yours, droopingly,Orpheus C. Kerr.

SETTING FORTH A NEW VILLAINY OF THE INSIDIOUS BLACK REPUBLICANS, AND DESCRIBING THE THRILLING CONSTITUTIONAL BATTLE OF DUCK LAKE.

Washington, D. C., July 12th, 1862.

Owing to the persistent stupidity of Congress and the hideously-treasonable machinations of the unscrupulous black republicans, my boy, the weather still continues very hot; and unless the thermometer falls very soon, an exhausted populace will demand an immediate change in the Cabinet. I am very warm, my boy—I am very warm; and when I reflect upon the agency of the abolitionists, who have brought this sort of thing about for the express purpose of injuring my Constitution, I am impelled to ask myself: Did our revolutionary forefathers indeed expire in vain? O my country! my country! it is very warm.

Such weather, my boy, is particularly trying to Sergeant O'Pake's friend,

THE IRISH PICKET.

I'm shtanding in the mud, Biddy,With not a spalpeen near,And silence, spaichless as the grave,Is all the sound I hear.Me gun is at a showlder arms,I'm wetted to the bone,And whin I'm afther shpakin' out,I find meself alone.This Southern climate's quare, Biddy,A quare and bastely thing,Wid Winter absint all the year,And Summer in the Spring.Ye mind the hot place down below?And may ye niver fearI'd dhraw comparisons—but thenIt's awful warrum here.The only moon I see, Biddy,Is one shmall star, asthore,And that's fornint the very cloudIt was behind before;The watchfires glame along the hillThat's swellin' to the south,And whin the sentry passes themI see his oogly mouth.It's dead for shlape I am, Biddy,And dramein shwate I'd be,If them ould rebels over thereWould only lave me free;But when I lane against a shtumpAnd shtrive to get repose,A musket ball he's comin' shtraightTo hit me spacious nose.It's ye I'd like to see, Biddy,A shparkin' here wid meAnd then, avourneen, hear ye say,"Acushla—Pat—machree!""Och, Biddy darlint," then says I,Says you, "get out of that;"Says I, "me arrum mates your waist,"Says you, "be daycent, Pat."And how's the pigs and ducks, Biddy?It's them I think of, shure,That looked so innocent and shwateUpon the parlor flure;I'm shure ye're aisy with the pigThat's fat as he can be,And fade him wid the best, becauseI'm towld he looks like me.Whin I come home again, Biddy,A sargent tried and thrue,It's joost a daycent house I'll buildAnd rint it chape to you.We'll have a parlor, bedroom, hall,A duck-pond nately done,With kitchen, pig-pen, praty-patch,And garret—all in oneBut, murther! there's a baste, Biddy,That's crapin' round a tree,And well I know the crature's thereTo have a shot at me.Now, Misther Rebel, say yere prayers,And howld yer dirthy paw,Here goes!—be jabers, Biddy dear,I've broke his oogly jaw!

This Southern climate's quare, Biddy,A quare and bastely thing,Wid Winter absint all the year,And Summer in the Spring.Ye mind the hot place down below?And may ye niver fearI'd dhraw comparisons—but thenIt's awful warrum here.

The only moon I see, Biddy,Is one shmall star, asthore,And that's fornint the very cloudIt was behind before;The watchfires glame along the hillThat's swellin' to the south,And whin the sentry passes themI see his oogly mouth.

It's dead for shlape I am, Biddy,And dramein shwate I'd be,If them ould rebels over thereWould only lave me free;But when I lane against a shtumpAnd shtrive to get repose,A musket ball he's comin' shtraightTo hit me spacious nose.

It's ye I'd like to see, Biddy,A shparkin' here wid meAnd then, avourneen, hear ye say,"Acushla—Pat—machree!""Och, Biddy darlint," then says I,Says you, "get out of that;"Says I, "me arrum mates your waist,"Says you, "be daycent, Pat."

And how's the pigs and ducks, Biddy?It's them I think of, shure,That looked so innocent and shwateUpon the parlor flure;I'm shure ye're aisy with the pigThat's fat as he can be,And fade him wid the best, becauseI'm towld he looks like me.

Whin I come home again, Biddy,A sargent tried and thrue,It's joost a daycent house I'll buildAnd rint it chape to you.We'll have a parlor, bedroom, hall,A duck-pond nately done,With kitchen, pig-pen, praty-patch,And garret—all in one

But, murther! there's a baste, Biddy,That's crapin' round a tree,And well I know the crature's thereTo have a shot at me.Now, Misther Rebel, say yere prayers,And howld yer dirthy paw,Here goes!—be jabers, Biddy dear,I've broke his oogly jaw!

I was talking some moments ago with a Regimental Surgeon, who has more patients on a monument than Shakspere ever dreamed about, and says he: "In consequence of the great number of troops now about this city, all the oxygen in the atmosphere is exhausted, and we are very warm. Had all these troops been sent to McClellan two weeks ago," says he, using his lancet to pick a dead fly out of his tumbler, "we might be able to keep cool now. There is a terrible responsibility on somebody's shoulders."

That's very true, my boy, and it's very warm.

There was a panic this morning in financial circles, owing to the frantic conduct of a gambling chap from the Senate, who has been saving up money to bet on the fall of Richmond, and was trying to put it out at interest. "I'll take seven per cent. for it the first year," says he, anxiously, "and leave it standing until national strategy comes to a head."

A broker took it for five years, my boy, with the privilege of extending the time after each fresh victory.

Speaking of victories, my boy, I was present at the recent series of triumphs by the Mackerel Brigade, on the left shore of Duck Lake, and witnessed a succession of feats calculated to culminate either in the fall of Richmond or the fall of the year.

From the head-quarters in the city of Paris to the brink of Duck Lake, the Mackerels were drawn up in gorgeous line of battle, their bayonets resembling somewhat an uncombed head of steel hair, and their noses looking like a wavy strip of summer sunset. By their last great stragetical manœuvre, they had lured the Southern Confederacy to court its own destructionby flanking them at both ends of the line, and they were only waiting for the master-mind to give them the signal.

Samyule Sa-mith advanced from this place in the staff as I rode up, and says he:

"Comrades, the General depends on you to precede him to glory. We had hoped," says Samyule, feelingly, "to have the company of two French counts in this day's slaughter; but those two noble Gauls had not time to wait, as they desired to visit the Great Exhibition in London."

These remarks were well received, my boy; and when the order was given for Company 3, Regiment 5, to detour to the left, it would have been promptly obeyed but for an unforeseen incident. Just as Captain Villiam Brown was about to break line for the purpose, an aged chap came dashing down from a First Family country-seat near by, and says he to the General of the Mackerel Brigade:

"I demand a guard for my premises immediately. My wife," says he, with dignity, "has just been making a custard-pie for the sick Confederacies in the hospital, and as she has just set it out to cool near where my little boy shot one of your vandals this morning, she is afraid it might be taken by your thieving mudsills when they came after the body. I, therefore, demand a guard for my premises, in the name of the Constitution of our forefathers."

Here Captain Bob Shorty stepped forward, and says he:

"What does the Constitution say about custard pie, Mr. Davis?"

The aged chap spat at him, and says he:

"I claim protection under that clause which refers to the pursuit of happiness. Custard pies," says he, reasoningly, "are included in the pursuit of happiness."

"That's very true," says the General, looking kindly over his fan at the venerable petitioner. "Let a guard be detailed to protect this good old man's premises. We are fightingforthe Constitution, not against it."

A guard was detailed, my boy, with orders to make no resistance if they were fired upon occasionally from the windows of the house; and then Captain Villiam Brown pushed forward with what was left of Company 3, to engage the Confederacy on the edge of Duck Lake, supported by the Orange County Howitzers. Headed by the band, who played patriotic airs as soon as he could shake the crumbs out of his key-bugle, the cavalcade advanced to the edge of the lake and opened a heavy salute of round shot and musketry on the atmosphere, whilst Commodore Head kept up a hot fire at the horizon with his iron-plated fleet and swivel gun.

Only waiting to finish a game of base ball, in which they had been engaged, four regiments of Confederacies, at whom this deadly assault was directed, threw aside their bats and ball dresses, put on their uniforms, loaded their muskets and batteries, and sent an iron shower in all directions. Greatly demoralized by this unseemly occurrence, a file of Mackerels under Sergeant O'Pake immediately threw down their muskets and knapsacks, emptied their pockets upon theground, piled their neckties in a heap, and were making a rapid retrograde movement, when Villiam suddenly threw himself in their path, and says he:

"Where are you going to, my fearless eaglets?"

"Hem!" says the sergeant, with much French in his manner, "we thought of visiting the Great Exhibition in London."

"Ah!" says Villiam, understandingly, "you have acquired French in one easy lesson, and—"

Here an orderly rode up with an order for the Mackerels to fall back from the edge of the Lake immediately, leaving their artillery, bayonets, havelocks, and baggage behind them; and Villiam was obliged to conduct the movement, which was a part of the strategical scheme of the General of the Mackerel Brigade. As we retreated back into Paris, my boy, we were joined by the Conic Section, and shortly after by the Anatomical Cavalry, both of which had succeeded in leaving all their accoutrements on the field.

As we all rushed together before head-quarters in perfect order, and while the Confederacy was eating some provisions, which we had refrained from bringing off the late scene of conflict, the General of the Mackerel Brigade came from under a tree, where he had been tanning himself, and says he:

"My children, we have whipped them at all points, and the day is ours."

"Ah!" says Villiam, abstractedly, "the day is hours."

"My children," says the General, in continuation, "we have pushed the enemy to the wall without fracturing the Constitution, and have only put the warback six months. We can say with pride, my children, that we belong to the Army of Duck Lake, and shall have no more Bull Runs. My children, I love you. Accept my blessing."

We were reflecting upon this soul-stirring speech, my boy, and silently admiring the strategy which had brought us all together again so soon, when the sound of drum and fife called our attention to a club of political chaps who had just arrived by steamer from the Sixth Ward, and were filing past us to a platform recently erected in the very centre of Paris.

"I do believe," says Captain Bob Shorty, whisperingly, "I do believe we're going to have a mass meeting."

Onward went the political chaps to the platform.

A delegation mounted the steps, advanced to the front rails, and commenced unfurling a vast linen banner. The sun was just setting, my boy, and as his parting beams fell upon the uplifted faces of the political chaps, a soft breeze unrolled the standard, and the Mackerels read upon its folds—

REGULAR CONSERVATIVE NOMINATIONFORPRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATESIN 1865.THE GENERAL OF THE MACKEREL BRIGADE.

Shall it be said, after this, that republics are ungrateful? I think not, my boy—I think not. Wehave won a great and glorious victory, and the only question remaining to be answered is, Who is responsible for it, my boy—who is responsible for it?

Yours, in bewilderment,Orpheus C. Kerr.

WHEREIN ARE PRESENTED SOME FEMININE REFERENCES, AN ANECDOTE BY THE EXECUTIVE, AND CERTAIN NOTES OF A VISIT TO THE FESTIVE SHENANDOAH VALLEY.

Washington, D. C., July 19th, 1862.

Permit me to return thanks through your mail, my boy, for a large feather fan recently consigned to my address by one of the admiring Women of America. It looks like a tail freshly plucked from a large-sized American eagle, and is decorated with a French-plate mirror in the centre and other French plates around the edges. The kind-hearted woman of America (who writes from Boston) says in her presentation note—"I admire to see a fan in the hands of the sterner sex; for it shows that the same hero-fist that grasps the sword has enough inherent gentleness to wave the cooling bauble. Such is life. The hand which falls like a hundred pounds of granite on the flinty eye of his ke-yuntery's foes has the softness of a blessing when it caresses the golden head of plastic childhood.

Yours, gushingly, Zephyrina Percy."

I find the "cooling bauble" very useful to brush the flies from my gothic steed Pegasus, my boy, and am a fanatic "to this extent, no more."

And here is what another young woman of America says to me in a note:

"My ma requests me to tell you that you ought to be ashamed of yourself, you hateful thing, for encouraging the vulgar people to be in favor of this nasty war, that is causing their superiors so much trouble, and has driven away the opera, and made enemies of those nice Southerners, with their beautiful big eyes and elegant swearing. Why don't you advocate a compromise, or a Habeas Corpus, or some other paper with names to it, and get Mr. Lincoln to stop the Constitution and order the war to be ended before there's any more assassinations and things? My pa was once a leather banker, and sold shoes for plantation servants, and made a great deal of money by it; but now he's a captain, or a surveyor, or some ridiculous thing, of the Home Guard, and may be massacred in cold blood the first time there's a battle in our neighborhood. My pa has to go to drill every night, and when he comes home in the morning he's so worn out with exhaustion that I've known him to lay right down in the hall and shed tears. My ma often says, that if Beauregard, or Palmerston, or any other foes should attack our house while pa is in that state, it would kill her dead. And I know it would make me so nervous that I should be a perfect fright for a week. My brother, Adolphus, has likewise joined the Home Guard, and has already had a bloody engagement with a Southerner named Tailor, who used to sell him clothes when the two sections were at peace. Adolphus says if it hadn't been for his double-quick, or some ridiculousmilitary thing or other, he would have been made a prisoner. It makes me sick to see how much lowness there is about Adolphus since he joined the ridiculous army; he calls his dinner 'rations,' and addresses me as 'Corporal Lollypop,' (the absurd thing!) and calls ma's crinoline a 'counter-scarp.'

"My pa says that he shall have to sell the carriage and the beautiful dog-cart if this hateful war don't end by the first of next month; and when I asked him yesterday if we couldn't have the gothic villa next to the Jones's at Newport this summer, he actually swore! The Joneses, you know, are very pleasant, sociable, vulgar sort of people, with a little money; and it would kill me to see them putting on airs over us because we didn't happen to take a cottage with bow-windows like them. My pa says that old Jones has got a contract to make clothes for the soldiers, and has made a great deal of money by manufacturing coats and other ridiculous things out of blue paper instead of cloth. Augustus Jones says if he don't meet me at Newport this summer he will enlist as soon as he comes back; and it would be just like the absurd creature to do it. I don't see why pa can't get out an indictment or something against the blockade, and call on the postmaster or some other ridiculous thing to send his new stock of plantation shoes to Alabama under a guard, and bring back the money. I don't see the use of living in a republic if one can't do that much. My ma says that you newspaper people could stop the dreadful war if you would only advocate compromises and things, and not be so ridiculous. Why can't you leave out some of those absurd advertisements, andpublish an article telling Mr. Lincoln that the war is ruining society? If it continues much longer, I shall have to wear my last year's bonnet a whole month, and I'd rather die. Do say something absurd, you ridiculous thing."

Have the war stopped right away, my boy,—have the war stopped right away.

Matters and things here are still in a strategic condition, and naught has disturbed our monotony, for a week, save a story they tell about the Honest Old Abe. It seems that two of the conservative Border State chaps, who are here for the express purpose of protesting against everything whatever, had a discussion about the Honest Abe, and one chap bet the other chap five dollars that he couldn't, by any possible means, speak to the President without hearing a small anecdote.

"Done!" says the other chap, gleefully, "I'll take the bet."

That very same night, at about twelve o'clock, he tore frantically up to the White House, and commenced thundering at the door like King Richard at the gates of Ascalon. The Honest Abe stuck his night-capped head out of the window, and says he:

"Is that you, Mr. Seward?"

"No, sir," says the Border State chap, glaring up through the darkness. "I'm a messenger from the army. Another great strategic movement has taken place, and our whole army have been taken prisoners by the Southern Confederacy. In fact," says the conservativechap, frantically, "the backbone of the rebellion is brokenAGAIN."

"Hem!" says the Honest Abe, shaking a musquito from his nightcap, "this strategy reminds me of a little story. There was a man, out in Iowa, sat down to play a game of checkers with another man, inducing his friends around him to lend him the change necessary for stakes. He played and he played, and he lost the first game. Then he played much more cautiously, and lost the next game. His friends commenced to grumble; but, says he: 'Don't you worry yourselves, boys, and I'll show you a cute move pretty soon.' So he played, and he played, and he lost the third game. 'Don't be impatient, boys,' says he; 'you'll see that great move pretty soon, I tell you.' Then he played with great care, taking a long time to consider every move, and, by way of change, lost the fourth game. Close attention to what he was about, and much minute calculation, also enabled him to lose the fifth game. By this time his friends had lent him all their change, and began to think it was time for that great move of his to come off. 'Have you any more change?' says he. 'Why, no,' says they. 'Then,' says he, with great spirit, 'the time for that move I was telling you about has come at last.' As he commenced to rise from his chair, instead of continuing to play, his cleaned-out friends bethought themselves to ask him what that famous move was? 'Why,' says he, pleasantly, 'it's to move off for a little more change.'"

At the conclusion of this quaint tale, my boy, the Border State chap fled groaning to his quarters atWillard's, stuck a five-dollar Treasury Note under the pillow of the other Border State chap, and immediately took the evening train for the West.

Such is the story they tell, my boy; but I'm inclined to accept it merely as a work of fiction, with a truthful moral. Certain it is, that as strategy increases, small change grows scarcer, and it is the general opinion that no small change is needed in military matters.

In company with a patriotic democratic chap, who had come up from New York, for the express purpose of seeing that the negroes of the Southern Confederacy were not permitted to inform our forces of the movements of the enemy in contravention of the Constitution, I made a reconnoissance in force, on Monday, to the festive Shenandoah Valley. On our way thither, the democratic chap was greatly bitten by musquitos, for which he justly blamed the black republicans, who are trying to break up this Government, and on our arrival near Winchester, we stumbled upon a phlegmatic fellow-man in a swallow-tailed coat and green spectacles, who was seated on a stone by the roadside, reading the "Impending Crisis." The democratic chap passed on, swearing, to the nearest camp; but I paused before this interesting student.

"Well, old swallow-tails," says I, affably, "what are you doing in this section?"

He looked up at me with great severity of countenance, and says he: "I have come here, young man, to agitate the Negro Question; to open African schools;and, peradventure, to start a water cure establishment."

"What for?" says I.

"For the love of my species," says he, eagerly, "and for any little contract in the way of red breeches and spelling books that may be required for the reclaimed contrabands?"

Was this a case of purely disinterested philanthropy? Perhaps so, my boy, perhaps so; but the old swallow-tails reminded of a chap I once knew in the Sixth Ward. He was a high toned moral chap of much shirt-collar, with a voice that sounded like a mosquito in the bottom of a fish-horn, and a chin like a creased apple-dumpling. Years before he had married a Southern crinoline and talked about the glories of slavery in a polished and high-moral way; but as there happened just then to be a chance for him to run for alderman on the abolition ticket, he experienced a change of heart, and addressed a meeting on the evils of human bondage: "My friends," says he, patting his stomach in a heartfelt manner, "I once lived at the South and owned slaves; but never could I feel that it was right. My pastor would say to me: 'These men-slaves are black, you say; but have they not the same feelings with you, the same features—only handsomer?' I felt this to be so, my friends; I commenced to appreciate the enormity of holding human souls in bondage."

Here a susceptible venerable maiden in the audience became so overpowered by her emotions, that she placed her head in the lap of a respectable single gentleman, and fainted away.

"My friends," continued the high-toned moral chap, "I could not bear the stings of conscience; my nights were sleepless, but I slept during the day. There was I, pretending to be a Christian, yet holding men and women as chattels! Heavens himself was outraged by it, and I resolved to make a sacrifice for the sake of principle—to cease to be a slaveholder! I called my slaves together: I addressed them paternally and piously, and then I—(here the great, scalding tears rolled down the cheeks of the orator, and the audience sobbed horribly)—I bade them be good boys and girls, and then I—SOLD EVERY ONE OF THEM!"

* * * * *

There was a movement of the audience toward the door. Men and women went out silently from the place, exchanging covert glances of smothered agitation with each other. Only one person remained with the orator. It was an old file with a blue umbrella, who had occupied a back seat and paid breathless attention to all the performances. After the others had left the hall, he walked deliberately from his seat to where the high-toned moral chap was still standing, and gazed into the face of the latter with an expression of unmitigated wonder. He then walked twice around him; having done which he confronted him again, thumped the ferule of his umbrella on the floor, and says he: "Well!" The old file paused an instant, and then says he: "well, I'll be dam," and waddled precipitately from the place.

I've often thought of it since then, my boy; and I've always wondered why it was that the solitaryold file with the blue umbrella should say that he be dam.

To return to Western Virginia; I found, upon my arrival in one of the camps near Winchester, that the patriotic democratic chap was making arrangements to divide the army there into Wards, instead of regiments, in order, as he said, that the returns might come in systematically.

"For instance," says he, "suppose that in the skirmish with the Confederacy which is going on just ahead of us, we should lose—say seventy-five votes; how much easier it would be to say; the 'Fourth Ward shows a decrease since last year of seventy-five Republicans', than to say that such a regiment, of such a brigade, of such a division, has lost so and so?"

I was reflecting upon this novel and admirable way of putting it, my boy, when an orderly came tearing in, with a report of the skirmishing going on.

"Ha!" says the patriotic chap to him; "how does the canvas proceed?"

"Well," says the orderly, breathlessly, "Banks' outpost has lost twenty votes in the Tenth Ward by desertions, and has thirty double-votes wounded; but I think Banks can still keep neck-and-neck with McDowell."

"You do, hey?" says the patriotic chap, in great excitement. "Then McDowell must not lend Banks a single vote. Tell him to keep his Ward Committees under cover until Banks gets through with his canvas; for if he takes part in that, and the election results in a victory over the Confederacy, Banks will get all thecredit of it, and win the card in the next Nominating Convention."

So McDowell's votes didn't re-enforce Banks in the skirmish, my boy, and Banks lost much popularity by being worsted, by the Confederacy.

As soon as the firing had ceased, I went out to meet some of the returning Wards, and came plump upon the swallow-tail chap, who was agitating the negro question in a corner of the late battle-field, surrounded by fugitive contrabands.

"Friend of the human race," says I, "how now?"

"Young man," says he, hastily tying a red silk pocket-handkerchief about his head, "I am teaching these oppressed beings to spell, having extemporized a college on the very scene of their recent emancipation."

"How far have the collegians progressed?" says I.

"They have got," says he, "to their a-b, abs. Thus; a-b, ab; o-abo; l-i li, aboli; t-i-o-n shun—abolition."

Shameful to relate, my boy, the swallow-tailed chap had no sooner said this, than a cavalry ward came charging helter-skelter, right through the college, tumbling the faculty into the mud, and bruising several sophomore graduates. Simultaneously, the patriotic democratic chap appeared on the scene, and insisted upon it that the contrabands should be immediately returned to the Southern Confederacy, as this is a white man's war. "Otherwise," says he, cholerically, "future reconciliation and reconstruction will be impossible."

Fearful that I should become confused a little if I remained there any longer, my boy, I at once retiredfrom the place, in company with two sick votes, who were going home on furlough, and reached this city again in good order.

Almost the first fellow-being I met on my return was a seedy and earnest chap from New York, who was worth about a quarter in ready money, and had come to Washington post-haste to pledge the Empire State's last dollar, and last drop of blood for the vigorous prosecution of the war.

"See here, my self-denying Brutus," says I, as we took Richmond together at the bar, "who commissioned you to pledge so much as all that?"

"To tell the truth," says the seedy chap, confidentially, "it's all I've got left to pledge. I pledged my pinchbeck chronometer for three dollars," says he, sadly, "just before I left New York; and I'm trying this pledge on speculation."

I have sometimes feared, my boy, that our Uncle Samuel's concern is turning into a pawnbroking establishment on a large scale, where they make advances on everything tangible and intangible, except Richmond, my boy—except Richmond.

Yours, with a presentiment,Orpheus C. Kerr.

SUGGESTING MENTAL RELAXATION FOR A TIME, AND INTRODUCING A FAMILIAR SKETCH OF THE WAR-STRICKEN DRAMA IN THE RURAL DISTRICTS.

Washington, D. C., July 23d, 1862.

Yesterday morning, my boy, I refreshed myself by a lounge across Long Bridge to the fields about Arlington Heights, where blooming Nature still has verdant spots untrampled by the iron heel of strategic war.

How pleasant is it, my boy, to escape occasionally from the society of Congressmen and brigadiers, and take a lazy sprawl in the fragrant fields. It is the philosopher's way of enjoying Summer's

DOLCE FAR NIENTE.

Still as a fly in amber, hangs the worldIn a transparent sphere of golden hours,With not enough of life in all the airTo stir the shadows or to move the flowers;And in the halo broods the angel Sleep,Wooed from the bosom of the midnight deepBy her sweet sister Silence, wed to Noon.

II.

Held in a soft suspense of summer light,The generous fields with all their bloom of wealthBask in a dream of Plenty for the years,And breathe the languor of untroubled Health.Without a ripple stands the yellow wheat,Like the Broad Seal of God upon the sheetWhere Labor's signature appeareth soon.

III.

As printed staves of thankful Nature's hymn,The fence of rails a soothing grace devotes,With clinging vines for bass and treble cleffsAnd wrens and robins here and there for notes;Spread out in bars, at equal distance met,As though the whole bright summer scene were setTo the unuttered melody of Rest!

IV.

Along the hill in light voluptuous wraptThe daisy droops amid the staring grass,And on the plain the rose and lily waitFor Flora's whispers, that no longer pass;While in the shade the violet of blueFinds in the stillness reigning nature through,That which her gentle modesty loves best.

The mill-wheel motionless o'ershades the pool,In whose frail crystal cups its circle dips;The stream, slow curling, wanders in the sunAnd drains his kisses with its silver lips;The birch canoe upon its shadow lies,The pike's last bubble on the water dies,The water lily sleeps upon her glass.

VI.

Here let me linger, in that waking sleepWhose dreams are all untinged with haunting dreadOf Morning's finger on the eyelids pressed,To rouse the soul and leave the vision dead.And while deep sunk in this soft ecstasyI count the pulse of Heaven dreamily,Let all life's bitterness behind me pass!

VII.

How still each leaf of my oak canopy,That holds a forest syllable at heart,Yet cannot stir enough in all its veinsTo give the murmured woodland sentence start!So still—so still all nature far and near,As though the world had checked its breath to hearAn angel's message from the distant skies!

VIII.

This one last glance at earth—one, only one—To see, as through a vail, the gentle faceBent o'er me softly, with the timid loveThat half distrusts the sleep which gives it grace.The thought that bids mine eyelids half uncloseFades to a dream, and out from Summer goes,In the brown Autumn of her drooping eyes.

Thus irregular in rhythm and vagrant in measure, my boy, are the half-sleeping thoughts of a summer noonin Virginia; and it was fully an hour before I could summon enough strength of mind to peruse a letter recently consigned to me by a rustic chap in my native village.

This chap describes to me what he calls the "Downfall of the Dramy," and says he:

The Dramy is a article for which I have great taste, and which I prefer to prayer-meeting as a regular thing. Since the time I wore breeches intended to facilitate frequent spankings, I have looked upon theatrical artiks with a speeshees of excitement not to be egspressed. I was once paying teller to a barber artik who shaved a great theatrical artik, and although the theatrical artik never could pay for his shaving until he drew his celery, he always frowned so splendidly when he turned down his collar, and said: "What ho! there Figaro," that my infant mind yearned to ask him for a few tickets to the show.

This great respek for the dramy has grown with my hair, and since this high old war has desolated the dramy, my buzzom has been nothing else but a wilderness of pangs. The other evening, my fren—which is courting a six story house with a woman in the title deed—called at my shattoe, and proposed that we should wander amid the ruins of the dramy. "It's rejooced to a skellington," says he, quite mournful, "and itsE pluribus Onionis gone down into the hocean wave." As my friend used this strong egspression, he tried to wink at me, but didn't get farther than a hik-cup. Arm in-arm, like two Siamese-twins in rejooced circumstances, we walked in speechlesssilence to what was formerly the entrance half of a theatre in the pallermy days of the dramy. It was like the entrance to the great desert of Sary, and as we groped our way through the grass to the ticket office, I observed six wild geese and a raccoon in a jungle that was a umberella stand in the pallermy days. The treasurer was entirely covered with cobwebs, which had been accumulating since the day he last saw speshee, and when he at last tore himself out, the sight of the quarter which I handed in sent him into immediate convulsions.

"Excuse me," says he, "if I weep over this preshus coin; but the force of old associations is too much for this affectionate heart."

He then sent a fly-blown little boy for a tumbler of brandy, and was weeping into it copious when we emerged from his presence. Upon entering the shattered temple of the dramy, we found a vetrun of 1812, which the manager had hired to keep company with the man what lit the gas, that artik having declared that if he was kept in solitude any longer he should shoot himself from sheer melancholy. It was the vetrun's business to keep moving from seat to seat until the performance was over, so that the artful cuss of a manager could say "every seat was okipied" in the next morning's newspaper. When the manager, who was representing the orkestra with a comb wrapt in paper, saw me and my fren, he paused in the middle of his overture, and said we should have a private box, but that the families of his principal artiks were keepin' house in the private boxes, and wasrayther crowded for room. Seeing me put my hand in my pocket, he said, tearful:

"Tellum me, I conjure ye, are there any such things as quarters in the round world? It is now six months since I last mingled with the world, and I really forget how many make a dollar."

Touched to the quick by his plaintiff tone, I drew forth a quarter, and held it before his anguished vision. Never shall I forget how his eyes was sot on that ravishing coin.

"Can it indeed be real?" says he, "or is it but a quarter of the mind?"

I was afeard he might come the "let me clutch thee" dodge if I inflamed his imagination any longer; so I put it back into my pocket, and axidently revealed the handle of my revolver.

When my fren had cut the damp grass away from one of the orchestra seats with his jack-knife, we sat down and put up an umbrella to keep off the dew. Being a little nervous, I asked the manager if there was any snakes about; and he said he see a couple in the parroquet last night, but didn't think they had got down to the orkestra yet. The vetrun, which was the audience, stoppd chasing a bull-frog in the vestibule when the manager struck up "Days of Abstinence" on his comb, and immediately took his seat on chair No. 1, with which he always commenced. The curting was then unpinned, and disclosed a scene in a lumber-yard, with a heavy mortgage on it. The Count de Mahoginy is discovered in the ak of leaving his young wife, who is seated on a pile of shavings, for the purpose of obtaining immediate relief from theUnion Defence Committee. The vetrun received him with great applause, and moved from seat to seat as though he was in a hurry to reach the gallery. When the artik spoke, there was so much empty stomik in his tones, that my fren said he seemed like a bean from another world. My fren is a spiritualist. The artik then went off at the left entrance, and immediately returned in the character of his own uncle, which had come home from California with two millions of dollars, and wished to give it to his affectionate nephew and niece. He found his niece in the lumber-yard, and having heard her sad story, divulged his intention to her and she immediately danced a Spanishpar(which is French), and sung four songs in honor of the sixty-ninth regiment. Then the uncle danced a hornpipe, which he learned on the hocean; and so they kept agoin till about nine o'clock, when the countess said she heard her husband coming. The uncle was so taken aback by this, that he immediately made himself into a tableau representing the last charge of the Fire Zouaves at Bull Run: and as the comb struck up "I'm a loan, all a loan," the curtain was pinned up again. Just as the performance ended, the manager explained that he could only aford to keep two artiks—a male and female, andtheyonly stayed because he had a mortgage on their wardrobes for over-drawed celery. "I'll light you to the door," says he, taking up one of the foot-lights, which was a turnip with a candle in it; "and I hope you'll come again when we projooce our new play. It's called 'The gas man's last charge,' and introjoces a real gas-meter and the sheriff."

My fren and I made no reply, but walked sadly from the ruins with tears in our eyes.

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