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A Change of Base—Kentucky.—A Sermon which was interrupted by a Subjugated and Subdued Confederate.

Confedrit × Roads

(wich is in the Stait uv Kentucky),

December 9, 1865.

Here in the grate Stait uv Kentucky, the last hope uv Democrisy, I hev pitched my tent, and here I propose to lay these old bones when Deth, who has a mortgage onto all uv us, shall see fit to 4close. I didn’t like to leave Washinton. I luv it for its memories. Here stands the Capitol where the President makes his appintments; there is the Post Offis Department, where all the Postmasters is appinted. Here it was that Jaxon rooled. I hed a respex for Jaxon. I can’t say I luved him, for he never yoosed us rite. He hated the Whigs ez bad ez we did, but after we beat em and elevated him to the Presidency, the stealins didn’t come in ez fast ez we expected. Never shel I forgit the compliment he paid me. Jest after his election I presented myself afore him with my papers, an applicant for a place. He read em, and scanned me with a critic’s eye.

“Can’t yoo make yoose uv sich a man ez me?” sez I, inquirinly.

“Certinly,” sez he; “I kin and alluz hev. Its sich ez yoo I use to beet the whigs with, and I am continyooally astonished to see how much work I accomplish with sich dirty tools. My dear sir,” sed he, pintin to the door, “when I realize how many sich cusses ez yoo there is, and how cheap they kin be bought up, I really tremble for the Republic.”

I didn’t get the office I wantid.

Yet ez much ez I love Washinton, I wuz forced to leave it. I mite hev stayed there, but the trooth is, the planks uv that city and the pavements are harder, and worse to sleep on, than those uv any other city in the Yoonited Staits. I hed lived two months by passin myself off ez Dimekratic Congressmen, but that cood only last a short time, there not bein many uv that persuasion here to personate. I had gone the rounds uv the House ez often ez it wuz safe, and one nite commenced on the Senit. Goin into Willard’s, I called for a go uv gin, wich the gentlemanly and urbane bar keeper sot afore me, and I drank. “Put it down with the rest uv mine,” sez I, with a impressive wave uv the hand.

“Yoor name?” sez he.

Assoomin a intellectual look, I retorted, “Do you know Charles Sumner?”

DO YOU KNOW CHARLES SUMNER?

Here I overdid it; here vaultin ambition o’er-leaped herself. Hed I sed “Saulsbury,” it mite have ansered, but to give Sumner’s name for a drink uv gin wuz a peece uv lunacy for wich I kan’t account. I wuz ignominiously kicked into the street. Drinks obtained at the expense uv bein kicked is cheep, but I don’t want em on them terms; my pride revolted, and so I emigrated. The gentlemanly and urbane conductors uv the Pennsylvania Central passed me over their road. They did it with the assistance uv two gentlemanly and urbane brakesmen, wich dropped me tenderly across the track, out uv the hind eend uv the last car.

I found here a church buildin, uv wich the congregation had bin mostly killed in bushwhackin expeditions, and announsin myself ez a constooshnel preacher from Noo Gersey, succeeded in drawin together a highly respectable awjience last Sunday.

Takin for a text the passage, “The wagis uv sin is death,” I opened out ez follows:—

“Wat is sin? Sin, my beloved hearers, is any deviashen from yer normal condishen. Yoor beloved pastor hez a stumick and a head, wich is in close sympathy with each other, so much so, indeed, that the principal biznis uv the head is to fill the stumick, and mighty close work its been for many years, yoo bet. Let yoor beloved pastor drink, uv a nite, a quart or two more than his yoosual allowance, more than his stumick absolootely demands, and his head swells with indignashen. The excess is sin, and the ache is the penalty.

“The wagis uv sin is death! Punishment and sin is ez unseperable ez the shadder is from the man—one is ez shoor to foller the other ez the assessor is to kum around—ez nite is to foller day. The Dimekratic party, uv wich I am a ornament, hez experienced the trooth uv this text. When Douglas switched off, he sinned, and ez a consekence, Linkin wuz elected, and the Sceptre departed from Israel. When—”

At this pint in the discourse, a old man in the back part uv the house ariz and interrupted me. He sed he hed a word to say on that subjick which must be sed, and ef I interrupted him till he got through he’d punch my hed; whereupon I let him go on.

“Trooly,” sez he, “the wages of sin is deth. I hev alluz bin a Dimecrat. The old Dimocracy hez bin in the service uv sin for thirty years, and the assortment uv death it hez received for wages is trooly surprisin. Never did a party commence better. Jaxon wus a honist man, who knew that righteousnis wuz the nashun’s best holt. But he died, and a host uv tuppenny politicians, with his great name for capital, jumped into his old clothes, an undertook to run the party. Ef the Dimocracy coold hev elected a honist man every fourth or fifth term, they mite hev ground along for a longer period, but alars! Jaxon wuz the last of that style we hed, and so many dishonist cusses wuz then in the Capital that his ghost coodent watch the half uv them.

“The fust installment uv deth we reseeved wuz when Harrison beet us. The old pollytishens in our party didn’t mind it, for, sez they, ‘The Treasurey woodent hev bin wuth mutch to us ennyhow after the suckin it has experienced for 12 years; it needs 4 years uv rest.’ We elected Poke, and here it wuz that Sin got a complete hold uv us. Anshent compacts made with the devil wuz alluz ritten in blud. We made a contract with Calhoonism, and that wuz ritten in blud wich wuz shed in Mexico. Here we sold ourselves out, boots and britches, to the cotton Democricy, and don’t our history ever sence prove the trooth uv the text, ‘The wages uv sin is deth?’ O, my frends! in wat hevy installments, and how regularly, hez these wages bin pade us.

“Our men uv character commenst leavin us. Silas Write kicked out, and wood hev gone over agin us hed he not fortunately died too soon, and skores uv uthers followed soot. Things went on until Peerse wuz elected. The Devil (wich is cotton), whom we wuz servin, brot Kansas into the ring, and wat a skatterin ensood.

“Agin, the men uv character got out, and gradually but shoorly the work uv deth went on. Bookannon wuz elected, but wuz uv no yoose to us. After Peerse hed run the machine four yeers, wat wuz there left? Eko ansers. Anuther siftin follered, and the old party wich wunst boasted a Jaxon hed got down to a Vallandigum. The Devil, to wich we hed sold ourselves, wood not let us off with this, however. ‘The wages uv sin is deth,’ and we hed not reseeved full pay ez yet. He instigated South Karliny to rebel; he indoosed the other Democratic States to foller; he forced the Northern Democrisy to support em, and so on. That wuz the final stroke. Dickinson, and Cass, and Dix, and Todd, and Logan, all left us, and wun by wun the galaxy uv Northern stars disappeared from the Democratic firmament, leaving Noo Gersey alone, and last fall, my brethrin, she sot in gloom.

“Oh, how true it is! We served sin faithfully, and where are we? We went to war for slavery, and slavery is dead. We fit for a confederacy, and the confederacy is dead. We fit for States Rites, and States Rites is dead. And Democracy tied herself to all these corpses, and they hev stunk her to death.

“Kentucky went heavy into the sin biznis, and whar is Kentucky? We sent our men to the confedrit army, and none uv em cum back, ceptin the skulkers, who comprised all uv that class wich we wood hev bin glad to hev killed. Linkin wantid to hev us free our niggers, and be compensatid for em. We held on to the sin uv niggers, and now they are taken from us with nary a compensate. In short, whatever uv good the Devil promised us in pollytix hez resulted in evil. My niggers is gone, my plantashen here hez fed alternately both armies, ez they cavorted backerds and forrerds through the Stait, my house and barns wuz burnt, and all I hev to show for my property is Confedrit munny, which is a very dead article uv death. I know not what the venerable old sucker in the pulpit wuz a goin to say, but ef he kin look over this section uv the heritage, and cant preach a elokent sermon on that text, he aint much on the preach. I’m dun.”

Uv coarse, after a ebulition of this kind, I cooldn’t go on. I dismist the awdience with a benedickshun, hopin to get em together when sich prejudiced men aint present.

Petroleum V. Nasby,

Lait Paster uv the Church uv the Noo Dispensashun.