ctural steed, the gothic Pegasus, conveyed
me once more, by easy stages, to the outskirts of Paris, where I found
the aged and respectable Mackerel Brigade cleaning their spectacles and
writing their epitaphs preparatory to that celebrated advance upon the
well-known Southern Confederacy which is frequently mentioned in
ancient history. The Grim Old Fighting Cox, my boy, has rashly
determined, that the unfavorable weather shall not detain our national
troops another single year, and there is at last a prospect that our
grandchildren may read a full and authentic report of the capture of
Richmond in the reliable morning journals of their time. And here let
me say to the grandchild Orpheus: "Be sure, my boy, that you do not
permit your pardonable exultation at the triumph of your country's
arms, to make you too severe upon the conquered foes of the Republic."
I put in this little piece of advice to posterity, my boy, because I
desire to have posterity magnanimous.

I was conversing affably with a few official Mackerels about several
mutual friends of ours, who had been born, were married, and had
expired of decrepitude during the celebrated national sieges of
Vicksburg and Charleston, when a civilian chap named Mr. P. Greene came
into camp from New York, with the intention of proceeding immediately
to the ruins of Richmond. He was a chap of much spreading dignity, my
boy, with a carpet-bag, an umbrella, and a walking-cane.

"Having read," says he, "in all the excellent morning journals, that
Richmond is being hastily evacuated by the starving Confederacy, I have
determined to precede the military in that direction. Possibly," says
he, impressively, "I may be able to find a suitable place in the
deserted city for the residence of my family during the summer."

Captain Villiam Brown listened attentively, and says he:

"Is your intelligence official, or founded on fact?"

The civilian chap drew himself up with much dignity, and says he:

"I find it in all the morning journals."

Certainly this was conclusive, my boy; and yet our supine military men
were willing to let this unadorned civilian chap be the first to enter
the evacuated capital of the stricken Confederacy. Facing toward that
ill-fated place, he moved off, his carpet-bag in his left hand, his
umbrella In his right, and his cane under one arm, a perfect
impersonation of the spirit of American Progress. By slow and dignified
degrees he grew smaller in the dis