there so's the surgeons kin take keer of me." Well--the feller,
as luck would have it, ricko-nized him and run to him and throwed down
his own musket, so's he could pick him up; and he stooped down and
picked him up and kindo' half-way shouldered him and half-way helt him
betwixt his arms like, and then he turned and started back with
him--ha! ha! ha! Now, mind, the fight was still a-goin' on--and right
at the hot of the fight, and the feller, all excited, you know, like
he was, and the soldier that had his leg shot off gittin' kindo fainty
like, and his head kindo' stuck back over the feller's shoulder that
was carryin' him. And he hadn't got more'n a couple o' rods with him
when another cannon-ball come along and tuk his head off, shore
enough!--and the curioust thing about it was--ha! ha!--that the feller
was a-packin' him didn't know that he had been hit ag'in at all, and
back he went--still carryin' the deceased back--ha! ha! ha!--to where
the doctors could take keer of him--as he thought. Well, his cap'n
happened to see him, and he thought it was a ruther cur'ous
p'ceedin's--a soldier carryin' a dead body out o' the fight--don't you
see? And so he hollers at him, and he says to the soldier, the cap'n
did, he says, "Hullo, there; where you goin' with that thing?" the
cap'n said to the soldier who was a-carryin' away the feller that had
his leg shot off. Well, his head, too, by that time. So he says,
"Where you goin' with that thing?" the cap'n said to the soldier who
was a-carryin' away the feller that had his leg shot off. Well, the
soldier he stopped--kinder halted, you know, like a private soldier
will when his presidin' officer speaks to him--and he says to him,
"W'y," he says, "Cap, it's a comrade o' mine and the pore feller has
got his leg shot off, and I'm a-packin' him back to where the doctors
is; and there was nobody to he'p him, and the feller would 'a' died in
his tracks--er track ruther--if it hadn't a-been fer me, and I'm
a-packin' him back where the surgeons can take keer of him; where he
can get medical attendance--er his wife's a widder!" he says, "'cause
he's got his leg shot off!" Then _Cap'n_ says, "You blame fool you, he's
got his _head_ shot off." So then the feller slacked his grip on the
body and let it slide down to the ground, and looked at it a minute,
all puzzled, you know, and says, "W'y, he told me it was his leg!" Ha!
ha! ha!

SOMEP'N COMMON-LIKE

Somep'n 'at's common-li