following 'authentics':
Sometimes I have thought that the reply our Irish girl gave the
other day, was of the nature of her usual blunders, and again that
it meant a good deal. On her return from a funeral, where a man,
who had previously lost his wife, had buried his only child, an
infant a few weeks old, I asked her how the father appeared?
'Oh! he was a dale sorry; but I guess _he's glad to get rid of
it_!'
_It was only a_ WAY _he had._--Whiggles, on being told that a boy
down-town, only sixteen years old, weighed six hundred and fifty
pounds, was further enlightened by the information that he weighed
that amount of coal on a platform Fairbanks.
The Southern press has proposed that, even in case of defeat, the
wealthy class shall retire to their plantations, 'live comfortably' on
what they can raise, let cotton go for two years, and thereby starve
Europe and the North into a conviction that Cotton is King.
But how will the poor whites of the South like this? What is to become
of _them_? Or what, indeed, is to become of us, if no cotton be
forthcoming? The truth is, and every day makes it more apparent, _the
raising of cotton must pass into other hands_. The _army_ has its
rights--the right to land-grants--and the _only_ effectual means of
putting an end to our dependence on the South will be found in settling
soldiers in the cotton country. Texas would be, perhaps, best suited for
the purpose, and other regions may be selected as opportunity may
suggest. With this course fully determined on, it would hardly be
necessary to further agitate Emancipation, it would come of itself, and
slave-labor would yield to the energy of the free Northern farmer.
Very little has been said as yet on this subject of properly rewarding
our troops. But it is destined to rise into becoming the great question
of the day; and if the Democratic pro-slavery party sets itself in
opposition to it, it will be ground to powder. Events are tending to
this issue with irresistible and tremendous power, and the days of
planterdom are numbered.
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES
[Footnote A: This anecdote has frequently gone the rounds in an
abbreviated form. It may interest the reader to see it in authentic
detail.]
[Footnote B: Richmond _Examiner._]
[Footnote C: To which we add, 'An Account of the Proceedings preliminar
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