Читать книгу Lincolniana; Or, The Humors of Uncle Abe - Andrew Adderup - Страница 14

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Just after the retreat of the rebels from Bull Run, when it leaked out that our troops had been held at bay by wooden or Quaker guns, a Pennsylvanian Congressman remarked to Uncle Abe—"Well, Mr. Lincoln, you see that Quaker principles even embodied in wood may be of some service in war."

"Yes, but as you see in that shape, they are only substituted principles; such things may do once, but found out, they will avail worse than nothing. Your remark, however, 'reminds me of a little story.'

"When I was a youngster of fifteen or so, I went to an 'Academy' for a few weeks, just to brush up my old-field school learning. Such schools are called Academies in the East, to distinguish their intermediate position between colleges and common schools; but in Kentuck and the West, generally the high sounding title merely meant that the 'principal' taught a few branches ahead of the old-field schools. Well, the rats were thick about the old building where we daily gathered to reap the fruit of knowledge; and as many of the boys brought their dinners and threw the fragments under their old-fashioned box desks, they soon grew as bold as they were thick. The teacher had a mortal antipathy to rats, and as I didn't 'take' to the teacher, I naturally encouraged the rats. Whenever one showed himself, he was sure to get a whack from the old teacher's rattan. Sometimes he missed his aim at the rats, but never at us boys, which was owing, perhaps, to the difference in the size of the game.

"An industrious rat had made a hole from beneath the floor up under my desk, and thence out through the end, and as I fed him well he was quite tame. Often during school hours he would come up and peer out into the aisles through his hole in the end of the desk, and whenever he was seen by the teacher, he was sure to see the rattan whirling in the air. An idea struck me one day. I got a dead rat—I did not like to kill my pet—and stuffing it, made quite a good-looking 'Quaker' rat. Then I fixed some springs so I could work my rat out and in at pleasure; so whenever the teacher was looking up, my rat was always out; but when the whack came down, he was in betimes. At last he seemed to think it wondrous tame, and the ill-suppressed titter of the school boys finally made him suspicious. The boys had been let into my secret, and relished it hugely, and I was too prone to give a few exhibitions. At last the teacher watched me sharper than he did the rat, and then caught me in the act. He got hold of the rat and beat me alternately with rat and switch, and you may well guess, I was well rattaned. If soldiers who use wooden guns ever get worse usage, I pity them."

The 300 Pounder Parrot since used by the Government, shows Uncle Abe's poor appreciation of Quaker guns and Quaker principles.