Judge — May 23, 1885 — page 6: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

CHAPL, *Tain’t you? 0, be joyful! Why, hello well, it’s goin’ on twenty five years since T'saw you, — How've n? O, first rate. Don’t get onto my rig, eh? © Well I spoze not. ‘Taint exactly the same we used to wear in the old days. I'm a soldier of Ziio now, a fightin’ sin and a Captin in the Salva- tion Army. Well, yes, ‘tis a change, for | own up I was purty tough in them old days and it was only by a miracle of mercy | was , I don’t never touch the intoxicatin’ bowl, thank nd’—does St. Paul say that, sure? A little for stomach’s sake Well, Tain’t feelin vi well and [ s'poze it ‘Il brace me up a little. Well, I'll tell you all about it. You know our regiment left the brigade on the Potomac and went downto Tent under Rosencrans, where we did some purty tall fightin’, You recollect the battle ?—well, itll happened there. It was a hot fight t boom- in’ and the muskets a rattlin’ lik I was layin’ down behind a a restin”. use I'd been in the thickest of the ze-wagons all day and Kind 0” tired 0” dodgin’ the provost-guard | —and I was a layin’ there listenin’ to. the bullets a rattlin’ through | the limbs, a thinking of the time when the Angel of Peace would | spread her white wings over the country and the cruel war would be over, and a think- in’? what good times I'd ave when I got back home. when all to once it struck me that them d-d- -ah bullets was | gettin? rather thick and L thought [’d just reconnoitre a lit- tle; so T raised my nose above the lo; and took a look. By thun-—ah, that is, Halleluja! there was them d-d-[ should say misguided Jobnny rebs no more’n four rods off—a whole de- tachment of ’em— deployin’ about, with a couple of cannon, too. Then I just ducked down agin to think “The first thought that struck me was that I to help the cause any by layin’ behind that log any more and—well, you know ie. I come from a family that 4il/—my father wasa doctor—and, first off I thought I'd draw my trusty blade. Well, you're right, that’s so. 1 dida’¢ have n ord, speakin’ after the manner of men, ‘cause I was a private. What I mean is that my first idee was to charge on them cus single-handed and alone, like Sampson went for the Philistines, but I didn’t see no jaw-bone of no ass—not even @ mule’s—and then I was a soldier, too, and you know a military man who's had any eddication in tactics knows the value of strategy. So I thought I’d jest control my burnin’ ardor and try a stragetic movement. I concluded the best thin, lo was to out flank the durned cusses and operate on the rear. ‘o carry out my plan successfully you know, I'd have to make considerable of a ‘detour’, and bein’ an old soldier yourself, you know as well as me that when you make a ‘detour’ you don’t go d’rectly toward the enimy. **So up I jumps and starts to make my ‘detour’ as fast as I could, for everything depends on Promptness in military manquvres, you know, “Well, as | was adetourin’ along, lickety ‘split, who should I see ahead of me but our chaplain a detonrin’ too. I didn’t know he had got army tactics down so fine, before, but it’s amazin’ how soon a fellow picks up pints in the army. Well, I had a little more experience than him, and when I was purty nigh up to him—gr guns! what should come along but one of them forty pound cannon n't going ‘THE JUDGE. ARMY REMINISCENCES AIN'S LEG makin’ a detour along our line of march. Well, I jest felt a nd set down minus my right leg—-took clean off at the thigh, and the next minit that poor preacher was in the same fix and we was both settin’ in the road lookin’ at our legs lyin’ cross-wise to- gether li k-s “T don’t mind if I do. “Well, as [ was s «for the stomach’s sake,’ you know. aplain sittin’ in the ro: nd we didn’t —what on earth to do, when a merciful Provider 1 our bad fix and who should come a ridin’ along but the brigade surgeon. He was one of them young fellers with a good deal of ambition in his perfeshion and jest liked to saw off arms and legs, for the fun of it, but as our logs was off already he didn’t have no show in that line, so he jest jumps off his horse and grabs the legs and takin’ out his instruments, findsa long needle and some thread and begins to sew our legs on to us agin, Well, yes, it did hurt, but not bein’ anxious to stump around on a wooden leg all the rest of my life I didn’t squeal. Finally he got us into an ambulance an’ took us to the hospital and we was there quite a spell till our legs and bodies grew solid together, “I recollect when I first tried to walk on that there leg how skittish it acted, and I noticed it didn’t seem natural, One day 1 was a settin’ on the bed a lookin’ at itand I noticed it looked a little skinny since. the accident, so Te amined it pretty se and I found several odd things about that there leg. First [come across a big mole on myankle that I hadn’t never noticed before and then a bunion on my heel and a rh on my. toe. Now [didn’t never used to have none of them things and it set meathinkin’, so [ put my two feet together and I’m durned if one wasn’t a hell inch longer than t’other, and then the truth come to me like a revolution and I went and called on the Chap- lain. “Yes, sir, that’s jest what we did do—we compared legs, and there n’ y room for doubt—that fresh doctor had stuck my leg onto the Chaplain and his'nonto me. Do? Why, what could a feller do but let it stick? and as thi turned out it proved to be one of them mysterious workin’s of Providence for my benefit. Ah, I tell you Cap, the ways of Providence is inscrutable and there ain’t no use of tryin’ to scrute ‘en! What at one time scems to be a great misfortune often turns out to be a blessin’. “After a while I got kinder used to the ways of the Chaplain leg and we got along tolerably well together. Of course there w: little friction now and then owin’ to the different trainin’ of my | and t’other one. For instance, when I was a goin’ to bed there would always be a difference of opinion between them two h One was for gettin’ right into bed and the other was always flop down on its knee and upsettin’ me. — But there wa’n’t no serious disturbance until one d. y I got. well enough to go out for a walk, and as I was a walkin’ along—thankful enough to have two legs to go on if one wa’n’t my born leg—I met some boys I knew and they was so glad to see me out agin, we all concluded to celebrate. So we started for the nearest saloon. [had some difficulty with my adopted leg at the door of the gin mill, but after a little rubbin’ and coaxin’, I got it in and we ordered our drinks, And. by gosh! I hadn’t more’n touched my liquid before the Chaplain’s leg begun comicbooks.com