Читать книгу The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales - Francis A. Durivage - Страница 10

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It was a great day for Dogtown, being no other than the anniversary of the annual militia muster; and on this occasion not only the Dogtown Blues were on parade upon the village green, but the entire regiment of which they formed a part, commanded by the gallant Colonel Zephaniah Slorkey, postmaster and variety-store keeper, was to engage in a sham fight, representing the surrender of Cornwallis. There was no attempt at historical costume, but it was understood that Slorkey, with his cowhide boots and rusty plated spurs, his long, swallow-tailed blue coat, and threadbare chapeau with a cock's tail feather in it, mounted on his seventy-five dollar piebald mare, promoted from the plough and "dump cart," was the representative of General Washington. Major Israel Ryely, his second in command, a native of the rival village of Hardscrabble, was to figure as Lord Cornwallis; and the selection was the more appropriate, since the private relations of these two great men were any thing but amicable, and they espoused opposite sides in politics. Dr. Galenius Jalap, an apothecary and surgeon of the regiment, a man with a hatchet face, hook nose, and thin, weeping whiskers, the color of sugar gingerbread, undertook the character of La Fayette at very short notice, and a very dim conception of the character he had.

The entire population of Dogtown and Hardscrabble turned out to witness the stupendous military operations of the day. On the American side were the Dogtown Blues, with four companies of ununiformed militia, armed with rifles, fowling pieces, and rusty muskets, and typifying the continental army. Their artillery consisted of two light field pieces, served by a select band of volunteers. These pieces were posted on an eminence commanding the entire plain. At the foot of this hill, Colonel Slorkey drew up his troops in line of battle, his left wing protected by an impassable frog pond, and his right resting on a large piggery, whose extent prevented the enemy from turning his flank in that direction.

On the descent of an opposing eminence, likewise strengthened by two guns, Major Ryely placed the Hardscrabble Guards, the Sheet Iron Riflemen, the Mudhollow Invincibles, the Dandelion Fireeaters, and the Scrufftown Sharpshooters. A thousand bright eyes, from the commanding eminences, looked down on the serried ranks of bayonets, the brazen-throated artillery, the panoplied plough horses, the plumed commanders, the rustling banners, and all the "pomp, pride, and circumstance of glorious war."

Preliminaries being thus settled, the commanding officers put spurs to their horses, and met in the centre of the plain, there saluting with their scythe-blade swords.

"Major Ryely," said the colonel, rising in his stirrups, "the follerin' are the odder of pufformances: we open with eour artillery—you reply with yourn. Under kiver of eour guns we advance to the attack. You do the same to meet us—firin' like smoke. Arter a sharp scrimmedge you retire—send us a flag of truce with terms—and finally lay down your arms."

The major bowed till his ostrich feather touched the mane of his wall-eyed plough horse, then turned bridle, and regained his ranks at a gait something between a stumble and a rack. The representative of General Washington rejoined his men at a hard trot, rising two feet from his saddle at every concussion of his bony steed.

"Fellur sogers!" roared the temporary father of his country; "yonder stands Cornwallis and his redcoats—only they haint got red coats, partickerlarly them in blue swaller-tails. We air bound to lick 'em—hurrah for our side! Go inter 'em like a thousand of bricks fallin' off 'n a slated rufe. The genius of Ammerikin liberty, in the shape of the carnivorous eagle, soarin' aloft on diluted pillions, seems to mutter E Pluribus Unum—we are one of 'em! Hail Columby happy land! Sing Yankee Doodle that fine tune—cry havock! and let looset the dogs of war."

Then commenced the horror of the sham fight. The continental guns opened in thunder tones. The British artillery hurled back their terrific echoes. Bang! bang! boom! boom! The canopy of heaven was stained with the sulphurous smoke. The drummers rattled away on their sheepskins—the fifers distended their cheeks till they resembled blown bladders. In the midst of all this noise and tumult, the undaunted Slorkey, and the indomitable Jalap, rushed to and fro, with clanking scabbards, and brandished scythe blades, twin thunderbolts of war.

"Forrard march!" roared Slorkey. With the yell of demons, his fierce followers advanced to the onset, firing their blank cartridges with desperate valor.

Equally alert were Major Ryely and his followers.

"Their swords were a thousand, their bosoms were one."

Their faces begrimed with powder, their eyes gleaming with ferocity, they descended to the plain—an avalanche of heroes. The soul of Headly would have swelled within him had he seen them.

For more than one hour that deadly consumption of blank cartridges endured, and then Ryely and his troops retired in good order.

"Boys," said the major, "old Slorkey wants us to gin out—send a flag of truce—a white pocket handkerchief on a beanpole—and propose to surrender. But it goes agin my grit for Hardscrabble to cave in to Dogtown, when we could knock the hindsights off 'em, if we was only a mind to."

"Hurray for the major!" responded the Hardscrabblers.

"I've got a grudge agin the kurnil," said the major, "and if you'll stand by me, I'll take it out of 'em. What say?"

"Agreed!" was the spontaneous response.

While Slorkey was waiting for the covenanted flag of truce, he saw the hated Ryely rise in his stirrups, and heard his stentorian voice roar out the word, "Charge!"

A deafening shout answered his appeal. In an instant Hardscrabble and its allies were down on Dogtown and its defenders. The latter stood it for a moment, but Ryely knocked the colonel off his horse, the surgeon had his nose pulled, the Dogtown Blues justified their name by their looks, and, seized with a sudden panic, fled—fled ingloriously from their native training field. The audacious outrage was consummated—history was violated—and General Washington was beaten by Cornwallis.

Dire were the threats against Ryely uttered by the colonel, as he was carried home on a shutter; nothing short of a court martial was his slightest menace. But no court martial ever took place. The military pride and glory of Dogtown were wounded to the quick; the force of popular opinion compelled Slorkey to resign, and to consummate his chagrin, his treacherous rival was chosen colonel of the regiment. So unstable are human honors—so ungrateful are republics.