Recollections of a Rebel surgeon, and other sketches : or, in the doctor's sappy days

PutMc Ubrary

RECOLLECTIONS

c

OF A

Rebel Surgeon

(AND OTHER SKETCHES)

OR

IN THE DOCTOR'S SAPPY DAYS.

BY

,>y>'^"'c'^'^

F. E DANIEL, M. D, ^^^v\^\^

ILLUSTRATED.

igoi

CLINIC PUBLISHING C<
CHICAGO

,4...>,awBie,\

j THE NEW YORK

PUBLIC LIBRARY

100^214

ASTOR. LENOX ANB

TILDEN FOUNDATIONS

K 1 923 L

CONTENTS

Introductory i

The Old Doctor Talks , . 9

Sunshine Soldiering 15

Disinterested Solicitude 22

The Doctor Gets Dinner 25

How the Big Dog Went 30

Bill and the Bumble-bees' Nest ; 35

Supper With one of the F. F. V's 38

The Doctor Routs the Federal Army 45

A Violent Eruption of "Lorena." 53

Crossing the Cumberland ... 55

An Extensive Acquaintance 58

A Brush with the Seminary Girls 64

Breakfast with the Yankees 69

Scents the Battle From Afar 78

Questionable Spoils 88

Recollections of Bacon 91

Somebody's Darling 93

A "Small Game" for a Big Stake 97

The Bushwhackers After the Doctor 107

A Frog Story 113

Poking Fun at the Medical Director 118

Dr. Dick Taylor, of Memphis 126

Presumptive Evidence 13^

A Close Call 134

Smuggles Contraband Supplies . 142

The Hospital Soldier 147

The Hospital Dietary 150

A ^ledical "High Daddy" 155

His Idea of Happiness 158

Why He was Weary 160

Hospital Experiences 163

Enchanted and Disenchanted 169

The Clever Quartermaster 175

Love's Stratagem 191

What Puzzled the Doctor 199

The Story of a Stump 201

Old Sister Nick 208

When the Dogwoods Were in Bloom 213

Confederate States Shot Factory 224

Doctor Yandell and the Turkey 226

Wisdom in a Multitude of Counsel 231

A Night in ^Meridian 235

A Chapter for Doctors 247

In the Land of the Blue Dog 260

Jimmy was All Right 274

Circumstances Alter Cases 276

Uncle Hardy Mullins 281

The Little Hu-gag 285

The Doctor Sees a Lady Home 291

Fine Points in Diagnosis 297

One on Thompson 300

Halcyon Days 3^2

Seeks Comfort in the Bible 310

ILLUSTRATIONS

Our Genial Friend Frontispiece

"Doctor, is that a 'Porgie' or a Trout?" 4

"Did You Ever Look Through the Butt-end of a

Telescope ?" 12

"Every Feller Had a Sweetheart." 17

"Heigh-ho," I Wish I Had Some Buttermilk 23

"Lit Out After George and Me" 28

"How Did That Big Dog Go?" 32

Fighting Those Bumblebees 36

Yerger Was Mad Anyhow 42

You Bet We Ran 49

"How Are You Dickey?" 61

"Doctor, Can I Help You?" 85

A Fatal Assault loi

"We Fairly Flew." 109

Recognized the Major 1 14

"Wha— What's This?" 124

Making the Atmosphere Purple 130

Cleared the Fence 137

The Worst You Ever See'd 152

What Command Do You Belong To? 156

"Why— He W^as Weak and Weary" 161

Hauled Off and Struck Me 166

A Standing Dare to Kiss Her 170

OUR GENIAL FRIEND.

INTRODUCTORY.

The Old Doctor — the narrator of these remin-
iscences— is well known to the readers of The
Texas Medical Journal. He is the JournaVs
"Fat Philosopher," "Our Genial Friend," "The
Jolly Old Doctor," etc., as he is variously called,
through whom the editor has for some years
gotten off "good jokes," especially on himself;
and who, now and then, has been in the habit of
dropping in in the JoiirnaVs sanctum and regal-
ing ye tired editor and employes with his humor-
ous view of things.

It is an interesting and somewhat remark-
able fact that most Southern men, especially of
the older generation, however well educated,
and who write and speak the English language

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

correctly, nevertheless, in their familiar social
intercourse make use of expressions which they
know to be grammatically incorrect. I attribute
it largely, if not altogether, to early associations
with the black slaves of the South, our nurses
in childhood. It is disappearing with the younger
generations. It is not "slang" so much as a cor-
ruption or mispronunciation of words, or the
lack of a distinct pronunciation of each syllable,
and the consequent running together of words.
For illustration, take the very general use of
such words as "can't," "don't," "ain't," "wan't,"
"narry," (never a) etc., words proper enough if
pronounced and used as they should be ; but cus-
tom has sanctioned the use of a plural noun
with a verb singular, and vice versa, and we have
such vulgarisms as "they das'nt" (dares not),
and "he don't," etc.

There are many words and expressions m
general use in the South which have become idio-
m.atic, having lost their original meaning and
acquired a significance altogether different.
"Shonuff," one of the commonest words in daily
use in the more familiar intercourse — for in po-
lite society when one is on his "p's" and "q's"
he doesn't use such words — is used in a sense
of "real" or "true," as opposed to false or pre-
tended, and not in the sense of "sure enough" or
of "certainty." Another word of the kind is

INTRODUCTORY.

"sorter." One would think it was used in a sense
of ''sort of" or "kind of," but not so. "Sorter"
indicates degree. But of all the words of this
kind in general use, and with a perverted mean-
ing, I believe that "tollible" is the commonest
and most generally employed by black and white,
and by well educated persons. Naturally one
would suppose that it meant "tolerable," that
v/hich can be tolerated, or borne. But it has
acquired a meaning altogether different, and is
used and intended as a qualifying adverb. Few
persons seem able to find any other word with
which to express the state of health of either
themselves or their family ; and when interro-
gated on that head, the invariable reply is "tol-
lible," or "just tollible." I have been told of an
old farmer who looked up the word in the dic-
tionary, and vv^as much disgusted to find it
spelled, as he said, "entirely wrong," and hav-
ing a meaning altogether different from the ac-
ceoted one ; and he said :

"Webster is away off on 'tollible.' He spells it
Vvith an 'er,' and says it means 'that which can
be endured or tolerated,' when you and I and
every other fool knows that it don't mean any
such thing. I say 'my health is tollible.' Don't
any fool know that good health is not endured or
borne or tolerated?"

Notwithstanding what has been said about en-

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

during or tolerating good health, there is a large
class of Southern people who invariably speak of
''enjoyin' very poor health," in a sense of "hav-
ing" poor health.

Of this class of expression I must mention the
very general use of *'I used to could," or *'I used
to couldn't," do a certain thing.

"DOCTOR, IS THAT A 'PORGIE' OR A TROUT?

There is another peculiarity of the Southern
vernacular : It is the pronunciation, or rather the
mispronunciation, of certain words. For in-
stance : We do not say "corn," but "cawn" ; New
York is "New Yawk" ; Saturday is "Saddy,"
and dog is "dawg."

INTRODUCTORY.

Some years ago while attending a meeting of
the American Medical Association in Washing-
ton city, as a delegate from Texas, I had the
honor to be the guest of my distinguished friend,
the late Doctor Baxter, Surgeon-General of the
army. He, like myself, was very fond of fishing ;
and after the business was finished which took
me to Washington, we went down the Potomac
to 'Tour-Mile-Run" fishing for "porgies," the
doctor called them. I didn't know what a "por-
gie" was ; they don't grow in Texas. Presently
tlie doctor caught a fish that was new to me, and
I asked:

"Doctor, is that a 'porgie' or a trout?"

He laughed immoderately at my pronunciation
of "trout."

He said : "Listen at Dan'els calling a *trowt'
(heavy accent on the "w") a 'trut.'"

I said : "Listen at Baxter calling a trout a
'trowt'."

That was Vermont against Virginia; and
v/hile there was a big diflference in our pronun-
ciation, I observed with some surprise that he
said "listen at." Until that time I had supposed
that "listen at" was a Southern vulgarism.

Many words are pronounced differently north
and south. There are many exceptions. There
is one brilliant exception which I trust indulgent
readers will pardon me for mentioning In this

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON".

connection : It Is a proper noun, and is univer-
sally mispronounced. Yea, from Maine to Mex-
ico ; from Key West to Klondike ; from Carolina
to far Cathay ; from Alabama to the Aleutian
Islands, by native and foreign, by Jew, Gentile,
Pagan and Poet ; by Scot and Hun, Frank and
Celt, saint and sinner, the patrician patronym
'•Daniel" is called "Dan'els," with a long accent
on the first syllable, and an extra ''s" tacked on.

I have studied "Trenck on Words," I have
dipped more or less into philology, and I can
understand how the beautiful Virginia name
"Fauntleroy" came down through the genera-
tions from "Ejifants de la Roi," the inscription
on the banner of the Crusaders carried by the an-
cestors of that old family; I can understand that
"Tolliver" and "Smith" are the same name ;
"Tolliver" being a corruption of "Talliaferro,"
which means a "worker in iron" — hence, a
smith — hence, "Smith." But for the life of me I
cannot understand by what universal perverse-
ness my name should be and is distorted into
"Dan'els." It is provoking; but then, what are
you going to do about it?

For the purposes of these few brief and un-
pretentious sketches the Old Doctor is a portly
gentleman of sixty years of age, with a benevo-

INTRODUCTORY.

lent countenance which is always upon the point
of breaking out into wreaths of smiles, while
little dabs of humor hang from the corners of his
mouth, and fun twinkles in his honest blue eyes.
He resides at the classical village of "Hog Wal-
low," this county, and he honors the
Journal with a visit every time he comes
to Austin. He is a typical Virginia gen-
tleman of the older generation, and like all
others of his class, when his reserve is thrown
off, in familiar social intercourse, he uses the
idioms that characterize the educated men of the
Old South. Unknown to the doctor, we rigged
up a phonograph inside of the desk at which he
always sits, concealed by a thin curtain, and we
have been enabled thus to catch his interesting
talks with all the sparkle and snap of spon-
taneity— their principal charm.

As will be seen upon examination, the follow-
ing reminiscences are mostly humorous (al-
leged) ; some are sad; some pathetic; and they
were all actual occurrences; no fiction, but all
fact. They do not relate to the professional
duties of the army surgeon (as might be sup-
posed from the title of the book), or but veiy
little; but are for the most part recollections of
fun, frolic, fishing or flirting, as the case may be,

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

"endurin' of the war," in the doctor's ''sappy"
days. To these have been added a few of the
Old Doctor's later-day observations.

F. E. Daniel, M. D.

8

RECOLLECTIONS

OF A

REBEL SURGEON

THE OLD DOCTOR TALKS— HIS
RETROSCOPE.

The Old Doctor sat down in our easy chair
as usual, it being by common consent, even of
the office-boy, understood to be pre-empted by
and for him whenever he should drop in; and
without any preliminaries began:

When the war broke out I was not quite
twenty-two. The battle of Bull Run (i8th of
July, 1861) was fought on my twenty-second
birthday, and I was there with a musket, a pri-
vate soldier.

I cast my maiden vote against secession, I want
it remembered ; by posterity especially, as it is a
matter of great importance to the truth of his-
tory. I was opposed to secession, not because I
thought the South was not justified, under the
circumstances, but because I did not believe there
was a possibility of the South's being permitted

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

to "go in peace." The love of the U/iion was
strong, and the opposition to slavery, the result
of the fifty years' quarrel over it, had attained
almost the aspect of a religious crusade. What
the South claimed as a right, guaranteed by the
Constitution, the North regarded as a monstrous
v.Tong, an evil which had been tolerated as long
as an advanced civilization and a growing hu-
manity would permit; and the abolition party,
the strongest in the North, practically said :
"Constitution be hanged ! The evil of slavery is
a blot on civilization and must go." And it went
■ — and I am glad it went. Although a slave-
owner myself, and my family had been for gene-
rations, I was an advocate of gradual emanci-
pation. Hence, recognizing that, call it by what-
ever name we will, put the pretext for secession
on "principle," State Rights, or what not, refine
it as we will, slavery was the real issue of the
war ; and it goes without saying that had the
South gained independence slavery would, in all
human probability, have still been an "institu-
tion" in the country. Hence, as I said, I was op-
posed to the war from every standpoint. In the
first place the hope of coping successfully against
such great odds as the South had to encounter
was a forlorn hope, indeed ; and if there were any
in the South who hoped for "peaceable secession"
they were badly left. But when the State, my

10

THE OLD DOCTOR TALKS.

State, then Mississippi, seceded, and the alter-
native was to take up arms for or against the
South, there were no two ways about it, and I
joined the first compaix/ ready to leave my town.

So, the war came on ; my vote didn't stop it,
you see, and everybody had to go in the army.
Those that didn't volunteer were made to "vol-
unteer." See? Funny thing how some fellers
can sit in offices and send you and me and every
other feller out to fight, whether we want to go
or not ; when, in fact, we had rather stay at home
and play marbles, or hunt the festive squirrel, or
spark the girls; eh, Dan'els?

And, Dan'els (he always would call me "Dan-
'els," confound him), looking back at it now
through the vista of thirty-odd years, you are, I
believe, a just man, a good man — my wife says
I am, but then she is partial, you know I don't
see how you and I and others of our sort could
ever for a moment have tolerated, condoned,
thought slavery was right. Well, we were born in-
to the world and found it here, and thought not
much about it at first. But there is no consideration
that could now induce us to have it restored ; we
are happily rid of it. Why, we smile at the blind-
ness and bigotry of good "old Mrs. Watson,"
who was so grieved because she could not
Christianize Huck Finn; at the same time she
was offering a reward of $200 for the arrest of

II

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

her runaway nigger, Jim, and proposed to sell
him for $800. Yet she was but the type of many
thousands of truly pious people in the South,
who saw nothing un-christian in selling a "nig-
ger." And that, Dan'els, only thirty-odd years

03

'DID YOU EVER LOOK THROUGH THE BUTT-END
OF A TELESCOPE?"

ago. Doesn't it look paradoxical even to us,
the survivors of the terrible struggle?

But look here, Dan'els, I don't like to talk
about unpleasant things ; it's against my princi-

12

THE OLD DOCTOR TALKS.

pies, and it's against the principles of my Retro-
scope.

''What is your Retroscope, Doctor?"

"Dan'els," said he, "when you were a boy did
you ever look through the butt-end of a tele-
scope?"

"Yes, of course," said I; "why?"

Didn't it make things look away off yonder?
That's the way the war looks now ; it seems like
it was a thousand years ago. But I have an in-
strument of my own invention which not only
brings things near, like a telescope does when
the little end is used, but when I look into the
past it has the faculty of making things look like
'twas only yesterday, and it brings the past in re-
view before me in sections, with the added effect
of bringing out, conspicuously and in bold relief,
all the pleasant things, all the funny things, all
the amusing or ridiculous memories, and of sup-
pressing or effacing the painful, disagreeable
ones, or rounding off the rough edges, at least.
It's a fact. When we look back at the war, with
all its horrors and sufferings, it is remarkable
that my memory brings to light mainly the funny
side, or the pleasant side, of those days of pri-
vations and sacrifice and suffering.

I reckon my Retroscope is something like Edi-
son's great invention, whereby he grinds granite
mountains into fine dust, and separates all the

T3

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

iron ore, the only valuable part, and sells it. My
"machine" extracts and parades before my mind
only the laughable or pleasant incidents of that
painful period; and there is a lot of it; and,
good Lordy, what a lot of worthless "sand."
They say, tho', that Edison has found a market
even for his sand ; the iron sells itself.

(Here the Old Doctor took out his knife and
chipped a splinter from the edge of the desk, and
shaping out a toothpick, leaned back in my easy
chair, and closing his eyes ruminated a little.)

Sell the best part of my "siftings?" Make
marketable my recollections of the funny things
that happened during the war? Jokin, ain't you,
Dan'els? Well, I'll ask my wife about it. There's
a lot of ''trash" on the literary market now, and
they do say there's money in "junk." We would
have to call it "Placer Mining for Jokes," eh,
Dan'els? But I tell you here and now, I can't
talk to order, nor talk to a machine ; so, if you
want to get down any of my recollections you'll
have to stenograph it without my knowledge ;
and if you sell it you've got to give me half ; you
hear ?

(It was then we put in the phonograph, as
stated in the Introductory, and the Doctor does
not know to this day that he has been "taken
down;" a pretty good joke itself.)

SUNSHINE SOLDIERING.

SUNSHINE SOLDIERING.

"There's a fascination in the beginning- of all things."

What crude conceptions of war we did have,
to be sure! said the Old Doctor. (He had come
into the office in a reminiscent mood, it was evi-
dent; and taking his customary seat began at
once to talk of the past, all unconscious of the
fact that even his gurgling laugh was being
faithfully recorded. What a pity it cannot be
reproduced on paper!)

When we went into camp, out in an adjoining
old field near our town, each company had its
clean new tents, and every man a cot and. com-
fortable things, and it was a picnic. It was real
fun. Nothing to do but drill a little, and have
dress parade, and the balance of the day lie in
our tents or under the shade of the big oaks and
read. It was in the lovely month of May, a time
when Nature is at her best and all things are
lovely. Oh, the recollection of those days ! The
ladies would come out from town to visit the
boys and witness dress parade; and the cakes,
and the pies, and the roast turkeys, and the
sv/eets of all kinds! The boys — they were all
"boys" however mature — were simply deluged
with flowers. The bouquets we did get, to be

15

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

sure! And every feller had a sweetheart, of
course. Such times ! Oh, the glorious days of
youth, when the blood is warm and quick, and
''the heart beats high at the glance of Susan
Maria's "eye," or words to that efifect. We just
ate, and flirted, and drilled, and played soldier.

It was too good to last ; and bye and bye com-
panies began to be assembled at various rendes-
vous, and regiments to be formed, and we went
to Corinth. Now, as James Whitcomb Riley says
of "Jim," that he was just as good soldierin' as
he was "no-'count farmin'," Corinth was just as
disagreeable as Jackson had been pleasant. We
left all the girls behind — and the pies made by
feller's mothers — not your army pies of a sub-
sequent date, of which I will tell you some day.
We left the bouquets and the good victuals, and
the smiles all behind us ; tho' the soldier was
smiled on all along the road, and everywhere, at
first, by all the ladies, and there was an added
charm to the soldier's life. All conventionalities
were set aside ; every soldier was petted, and he
could talk to the girls without an introduction.
All social distinctions were brushed away, and
every soldier, however humble, was a hero. The
ladies would give him flowers and praise him ;
tell him what a fine soldier he was as they pinned
them on for him. And, Dan'els, between me
and you, that is one thing that made our boys so

t6

SUNSHINE SOLDIERING.

brave and made them endure privations with
such fortitude, the thought of what would be

"EVERY FELLER HAD A SWEETHEART."

^aid of them at home. It is pride, pride of char-
acter that makes a soldier brave. But for that,

17

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

there are few who would **seek the bubble repu-
tation at the cannon's mouth," I tell you ; for it
ain't any fun, you bet.

To give you an idea of my conception of war —
notwithstanding I had read a great deal of his-
tory, of course — I took along a sole-leather valise
with me, full of broadcloth suits, patent leather
shoes, linen shirts, fancy socks and ties. I had
an idea (what a fool I was) that both armies
would march out in an open place and meet by a
kind of understanding, and after a few selections
by the band, go to fighting; and at sunset, or
sooner, the one that whipped would have some
more music by the band, and then we'd retire.
We v/ere to be the ones that whipped, of course ;
and then for the social part of it, and there is
where the good clothes were to come in, see?

And, do you know, every feller in our com-
pany— it was made up of college boys or young
professional men, society men, the "better class"
so-called, took along a trunk full of the same
kind of clothes? The last I ever saw of my sole-
leather valise and my good clothes, my long-
tailed coat and my pretty socks and cravats and
things, was at Manassas Junction. Came an
order that all baggage was to be sent to the rear
that every feller was to carry his outfit on his
back, like a snail or turtle (except that we had a
knapsack and the turtle didn't). And one blan-

i8

SUNSHINE SOLDIERING.

ket, rolled lengthwise and swung around the neck
was to be his bed. This, with the old Spring-
field rifle (with which we were first armed,
weighing about fifteen pounds), a heavy leather
cartridge box full of bullets, a tin canteen, a
white cotton bag swung from the neck to hold
your grub, constituted our outfit; and instead of
fine clothes we were reduced to a coarse gray
flannel shirt, blue cotton pants and a belt. That
was our summer rig; pretty tough, wasn't it?

At first we all had tents, each tent a fly, which
we stretched in front of the tent as a kind of
front gallery, a tent to each eight boys. We
had, each mess, a camp-kettle of sheet iron, about
the size of a small nail-keg, and we had tin cups,
and tin plates, and iron knives, forks and spoons.
Our rations consisted of fresh beef, corn meal,
rice, molasses, salt, and at first a little sugar.
This was seldom varied (tho' we could buy milk,
butter, eggs, poultry and anything else — those
who had money). And a little bacon at intervals
was esteemed a great luxury. Camp life was still
a picnic ; we did nothing but drill a little, and
laze. How distinctly I remember the sensations
of early camp life just after our arrival at Ma-
nassas. We were amongst the first to arrive.
Our white tents spread over a lovely green lawn,
speckled with white clover-blossoms, a snow-
white village, surrounded by thickets of pine, the

19

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

dark green contrasting so beautifully in the sum-
mer sun with the white tents, made a picture long
to be remembered.

Under the shade of the pines and cedars the
boys picked the wild strawberries and dewber-
ries; and the cool, clear little stream, as yet un-
defiled by aggregations of men, that within a
stone's throw of us wended its way to the sea,
was a source of keen enjoyment to the young fel-
lows. Privileges were easily obtained from the
officers, then ; we were all "chums" at home, and
discipline was as yet unknown. Such bathing in
the little stream, and such trying to fish, for
there were no fish in it larger than a minnow.

But, oh, Lordy ! That didn't last long. When
we started on the march — all baggage sent to the
rear — tents ditto, or given to the staff-officers —
cooking-utensils followed next, till later we had
to carry all on our backs, fry our meat on the
end of a ramrod, and make bread in a silk hand-
kerchief, or in the company's towel.

"Tut, tut. Doctor, what are you giving us?"
Hudson said, while Bennett grinned.

Fact, said the Old Doctor; you ask any of the
boys who were soldiers in Old Virginia, and
they will corroborate my statements. Ask Dan-
'els.

On our first march I found my knapsack too
heavy, and I went through it to lighten it. I

20

SUNSHINE SOLDIERING.

took out my extra drawers, my extra undershirt,
my extra socks (we wore a flannel top-shirt all
the while; didn't need change) I couldn't throw
any of them away ; my towel and soap, couldn't
spare them ; my smoking-tobacco — couldn't find a
blessed thing that I could throw away, except
two sheets of letter-paper and two envelopes, on
which I had expected to write to my sweetheart ;
fact!

21

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

AT MANASSAS.

DISINTERESTED SOLICITUDE.

"A fellow-feeling makes us wondrous kind."

In the company was a fat young fellow about
twenty-two, named Bright. Ke was real fat ;
about the size of Governor Hogg, and like all
fat men, but me, he was jolly. He was the life
of the camp. The least exertion would make him
blow like a porpoise. He wasn't fit for a sol-
dier; had no business being there. He was a
college boy, and a great Shakesperian quoter.
We had also in the company an elderly gentle-
man about fifty, Mr. Russell, and his two grown
sons. Mr. Russell was a quiet, grave gentleman,
a,nd the boys all looked up to him and showed
him respect. He was a strong, healthy man, in
the prime of life, but the others, so much younger
than he, screened him whenever they could from
exposure to night-duty and labor as much as
possible.

I was first sergeant, and the captain had re-
quested me to practise the men in running — i. e.,
in the double-quick movement.

It was a lovely June morning, getting pretty
warm. The band out in the edge of the pine
thicket was practising a new piece; the air was

22

DISINTERESTED SOLICITUDE.

odorous of clover blossoms and sweet peas, and
young grass rudely trodden by the feet of the
men as they were put through the company drill ;
and at the command "double-quick — march!"
away we went, up one slope, down another, over
the lovely green sward — practising how we could
run (away from the Yankees, had such a contin-
gency ever suggested itself to any of us). Oh,
it was a frolic. At the command "halt!" such a
merry, ringing laugh v/ent up from the young
scamps, who really enjoyed it.

HEIGH-HO," I WISH I HAD SOME BUTTERMILK.

Mr. Russell had taken a seat on a log, and
was gently fanning himself with his hat — cool
and collected — when Bright wobbled up to me,
swabbing his face with a red handkerchief,

23

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

whose color his face discounted ten per cent., and
in disjointed ejaculations as he could get his
breath, said:

"Sergeant — I wouldn't — make — the — men dou-
ble-quick up hill ; it tires Mr. Russell so bad !"

At night, while the "pale inconstant moon rode
majestically thro' the blue cloudless sky" (see
G. P. R. James' novels), we boys lying outside
of the tent on the grass, gazing skyward, were
thinking of the loved ones at home, of our sweet-
hearts, and of course many of the chaps were
homesick. Billy Lewis, who was a nice, clean
little law student, as much fit for a soldier as a
canary bird is to make a chicken pie, he had it
bad. '

"Heigh-ho," he said, "I wish I was at home.^'

"Heigh-ho," said Bright, just as solemnly, "I
wish I had some buttermilk."

And as the "Liztown Humorist" says, "You'd
oughter heard 'em yell."

..i..

If w%

ii

-24

THE DOCTOR GETS DINNER.

THE DOCTOR GETS DINNER.

Before we struck camp and went to marching,
said the Old Doctor, before they took our tents
away, and our camp-kettles, we fared nicely.
Nearly every mess in our company had a negro
servant, belonging to some one of the boys ; and
thus our cooking was done as it should have been
done — considering. Our cook belonged to Gwyn
Yerger, as fine a young fellow as you ever saw,
and as gallant as Custer, whom, by-the-bye, he
strikingly resembled; tall, straight, a blue-eyed
blonde. Of course he was very popular with the
ladies — tell you a good one on him some day.

Well, Gus, that's the negro cook, got sick, and
we fellers had to take it turn-about cooking. I
was a httle pale-faced, beardless, dandified med-
ical student, and knew about as much about
cooking as a cat; but it came my turn. I never
let on, but went and got the rations for the mess
from the commissary, and put it all on to cook
for one meal. I was a little jubous about the
rice. I had seen a roast on the table at home as
large as our piece of beef, and I thought I was
doing the right thing to cook it all at once, so
as to have it cold for luncheon, as I had seen

25

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

done at home. But the rice — there was about
two gallons of it, I suppose — so I said to George
Newton, one of my mess-mates :

"George, how much rice ought we to cook for
dinner?"

''Oh, I don't know," said George; "about a
peck, I reckon."

Thus assured, I was confident that our water-
bucket half-full would be none too much ; so I
put her in, and

"George," said I ; "how much water ought I
to add to the rice?" George was trying to go to
sleep; he had just come off of guard.

"Oh, I don't know," said George, "fill the ket-
tle, I reckon." He turned over to get a fresh
hold on his nap.

So, I filled the four-gallon camp-kettle about
half-full of rice, and poured' in water up to the
brim, and set it on a roaring fire. Presently it
began to boil, and, oh, horrors ! to slop over.
That would never do ; we had none to spare, and
couldn't afford to waste it,

"George," I called out again, "this dawgawnd
rice has swelled; its boiling over; what shall I
do?"

"Oh, don't bother me so, Dick. Scoop her out
and put it into the vessels we eat out of," said
George; and he went back to sleep.

I filled the coffee-pot; I filled all the tin cups.

26

THE DOCTOR GETS DINNER.

and tin plates and pans, and it kept boiling over.
Every time I would dish out about a gallon, it
would fill up, and in a minit began to run over.
I was in despair.

"George, do for the Lord's sake get up and
come and help me. I'll relieve you from guard-
duty if you will" said I, in a low tone, for I
dasn't let any one hear me ; I was the boss ser-
geant, don't forget, and made the details for
work, guard, etc.

So George came, hitching up his gallusses with
one hand, and rubbing his eyes with the other.
He had a keen sense of the ridiculous, and he
took in the situation at a glance. Every tin thing
was full of half-done, seething rice ; and still she
swelled and swelled and slopped over. My ! it
looked like there was rice enough for the regi-
ment.

George looked around for something to help
hold the surplus, and a twinkle came in his eye,
as he spied Bright, asleep on his back, and snor-
ing like a trooper. His big horse-leather boots
stood at the head of his cot, and as quick as
thought, George got them and said :

"Here, put it in this ; it will get cool before
Bright wakes up, and it will be a good joke on
him!"

I was as full of fun and deviltry as George;
so no sooner said than done. We filled both

27

'lylT OUT AFTER GEORGE AND ME

THE DOCTOR GETS DINNER.

boots to the ankle, and set them back; and still
the confounded cataract of boiling rice was roar-
ing.

Just then the captain called :

"Bright! Oh, Bright! come quick, here's a
lady wants to see you !"

"The ladies'' were Bright's great weakness.
Fat as he was, he was as vain as Beau Brunimel,
and set up for a Lothario.

Bright sat up, rubbing his eyes ; and as quick
as he could, seized one boot, and socked his foot
into the scalding rice ; wdien, gee- whiz ! what a
hovvd went up, of mingled pain, wrath and sur-
prise ! He made the atmosphere thick with a
most florid rhetoric ; and with his scalded foot
still smoking, and redolent of rice, lit out after
me and~ George with a six-shooter in each hand.
Fact. He'd have killed us, but we took refuge in
the captain's tent, and slid out the back way, and
each one sheltered himself behind a big oak tree.

Well, Bright sat down on a rock near by, and
with cocked pistol ready, swore that he'd kill the
first one of us who put his head out. He kept
us there till roll-call, and would have had us there
yet, if he had not been called to go on regimental
guard.

He got even with us later; tell you about It
sometime.

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

HOW THE BIG DOG WENT.

In my company was a big, strong jolly fellow
named Bill Hicks. He was a great story teller,
and was always welcome at any of the camp-
fires or mess-tables. I'm speaking still of the
times, you remember, at Manassas, before the tug
of war came; when we actually had candles, as
well as tents and cots and other comforts. It was
a common thing for Bill to get a lot of the boys
around him, and tell them yarns. One night he
told us of a dog-fight he had witnessed, and he
depicted it with the greatest reality, imitating
the big dog how he ''went," and the little dog
how he "went" ; and he had gotten the boys very
much interested.

"The big dog would jump at the little dog, and
go 'gh-r-r-rh,' " Bill said, imitating a hoarse
growl. "And the little dog, he'd jump at the big
dog, and catch him by the leg, and go 'br-e-w-r-r-
rer,' " said Bill, imitating a shrill bark and growl.

He had gone over this two or three times, illus-
trating it with his whole body, and had gotten
to the point where the laugh comes in. The boys
enjoyed it immensely.

Just at that point, in stalked Tump Dixon, a
burly bully from an adjoining camp; a rough,
disagreeable fellow, drunk or drinking whenever

HOW THE BIG DOG WENT.

he could get whisky, and half of his time in the
guard-house.

"What's that you are telling, Bill ?" said Tump,

"Oh, nothing," said Bill ; "nothing worth hear-
ing."

"Tell it over. I want to hear it; I heard a
part of it."

"Oh, go 'way, Tump Dixon, I ain't agoin' to
make a fool of myself just to please you," said
Bill, looking rather sheepish.

"You ain't f' said Tump.

"No, I ain't," said Bill, doggedly.

Tump poked his head out towards Bill, and
looked him steadily in the eyes ; meantime slowly
reaching behind him, he drew out and cocked a
big six-shooter, and pointing it at Bill's head
said:

"How-did-that-big-dog-go ?"

"Gh-r-r-rr-h," said Bill, gruffly, imitating a
hoarse growl as before.

"How-did-that-little-dog-go?" said Tump.

"Brew-er-rrh," said Bill, imitating a shrill
bark.

"How-did-that-big-dog-go?" said Tump.

"He went 'g-h-r-r-rrh'," said Bill, the boys just
yelling with laughter.

"How-did-that-little-dog-go?" said Tump,
pistol still in Bill's face, dangerously near, in the
hands of a half-drunk rowdy.

31

'HOW DID THAT BIG DOG GO.

HOW THE BIG DOG WENT.

"He went 'b-r-e-w-r-rh'," said poor Bill, still
feebly imitating the actions of the dog.

"How-did-that-big-dog-go?" said Tump.

**He went 'g-h-rr-rh','' said Bill bursting into
angry tears, and saying what he'd do if Tump
Dixon would put up that pistol.

Tump had the drop on him, else there would
have been a fight, for Bill was brave, while Tump
was a coward, and he knew it wouldn't be safe.
Tump left presently, and any time after that, if
one wanted to get a fight on his hands he had
only to ask Bill "how the big dog went?"

Bill was sleeping one day under a big tree —
he had been on guard all night, and he slept the
sleep of the just. George Newton and a lot of
the other young scamps tied up his jaws, crossed
his hands on his breast — "laid him out" — and
getting the prayer-book, George was delivering
the burial service over him with variations, when
Bill was called to report at the captain's tent.
Whoopee! If he didn't larrup me, and George
Newton and Thad Miller, the smallest of us and
all he could catch !

Well, that's one of the disagreeable, unpleasant
things which I told you my Retroscope rounded
off so nicely or obliterated ; but, my stars, I ain't

33

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

done aching yet when I think of the pounding
Bill gave me for playing he was dead. Poor
fellow, he's dead to stay, though, now; long
since. Peace to his ashes.

34

BILL AND THE BUMBLEBEES NEST.

BILL AND THE BUMBLEBEES' NEST.

On the march to Leesburg that lovely early
autumn day — oh, how vividly the scenes at
Goose Creek and the crossing of Bull Run at
McLean's Ford appear still. There is where
Stonewall Jackson was dubbed "Stonewall." I
witnessed the charge and the repulse at McLean's
Ford, of Bee and Bartow, and the arrival on the
cars of Johnston's reinforcements from Win-
chester just in time to save the day. But I'm
not going to bore anybody with that.

We moved up to Leesburg (our brigade,) in
August or September, 1861. I know blackberries
were still plentiful. On the road Bill and I strag-
gled, that is, fell out of ranks, and followed along
slowly at our leisure. You must remember that
we were all from the same section, all friends
and acquaintances, and were "hail-fellow" with
the officers ; there was no such thing as discipline
then. Bill and I picked blackberries leisurely
along the roadside, when, looking back, we saw
three mounted field-officers coming — strangers to
us ; they were brigade-officers. Two of them had

General B under arrest. Bill and I thought

we had better not let them see us, — so we dodged
off the road into a deep wood, and hid behind a
log. To our horror, one of them apparently fol-

35

:^'^'^^.|?

Vis

lip'

\

FIGHTING THOSE BUMBLEBEES.

BILL AND THE BUMBLEBEES^ NEST.

lowed US, and the other two rode rapidly after
him, and I heard one of them say ,"General, what
does this mean? You are under arrest; come
with us."

Now, I never did know what that meant. But
Bill and I thought they were after us, so we ran
again, and Bill threw himself down behind a
great big old sycamore log, and, by Jo, right
plump into a bumblebees' nest ! He ran again —
you bet he did! and such a sight I never saw —
Bill running like a scared deer, and fighting those
bumblebees oflf with both hands, and every now
and then, as one would get in his work, to hear
Bill yell was just too funny for anything in this
world, unless it be a Wild-west show.

Bye-and-bye when the excitement was over, we
resumed our march leisurely. Our regiment had
halted in an old field about a mile from Lees-
burg, stacked arms, and the men were unloading
the wagons, throwing out the tents and things.
Every wagon we would pass the men stopped
work, and straightening up, would gaze at us like
we were strangers.

I said: "Bill" (I noticed that he kept a little
behind me), "what does this mean?"

"Don't know," said Bill.

But it got worse and worse. A crowd began
to gather towards us, gazing at me, like I was a
Yankee. I looked around at Bill for an explana-
tion— and I found it. Bill was marching me into
camp at the point of a bayonet, confound him !

37

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

THE DOCTOR TAKES SUPPER WITH ONE OF
THE F. F. VS.

There was but one good coat in our com-
pany, said the Old Doctor on this occasion, and
that belonged to Dick Ledbetter. Poor fellow,
he's dead, too; the bravest boy and the luckiest.
He participated actively as a private, with a
gun, in seventeen of the big pitched battles in
which Longstreet's famous division was engaged
in Virginia and elsewhere, and in hundreds of
skirmishes, and never received a scratch, nor lost
a day from duty.

Speaking of Dick, reminds me to tell you of
the time when our regiment was making a charge
on the Yankees during the battle of Bull Run
(July 1 8, 1861). Dick and I were side by side.
We had a big ditch or gully to cross, and in doing
so, Dick exclaimed:

"Gee ! Dick ! look at the dewberries !" and
throwing down our guns we went to picking and
eating the delicious berries, and — got left.

But about Dick's coat, and the tea-party. The
coat was a pretty, bluish-gray frock coat, with
pretty brass buttons on it. It was the most ac-
com.modating garment that ever was made, I do
reckon. It would fit all of us, every man in the
company.

38

SUPPER WITH ONE OF THE F. F. V S.

One night our captain was invited to take sup-
per at the residence of one of Leesburg's fore-
most citizens, a Mr. Hempstead. He was re-
quested to bring with him two of his young
friends, and he invited Gwin Yerger and me.
Yerger was the handsomest young fellow in the
company. I shan't say anything about myself
on that score, but as Mr. H. had three pretty
daughters, it is reasonable to suppose the cap-
tain, who was very vain, thought to please the
girls in the selection; hence (ahem!). Yerger
was a blonde, and a great lady's man. He had
borrowed Ledbetter's pretty coat, and Lieutenant
Session's shoulder-straps, — the bars that a lieu-
tenant wears on his collar, rather, and rigged
himself out for conquest, as "Lieutenant" Yer-
ger. That evening it was "Lieutenant" this, and
"Lieutenant" that. Already so early in the war
a preference was shown by the fair sex for of-
ficers.

With the three handsome daughters we were
lions. It was a picnic. They had an elegant sup-
per, such as peace times knew ; something we had
not seen nor tasted for many weary months;
strawberries, broiled chickens, hot rolls, cream,
coffee, butter, preserves, cakes, umph ! but it was
a feast. The girls were charming. Old Bon-
taine, the captain, tried to monopolize the con-
versation with the girls, all three of them. But

39

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Yerger and I were something of drawing-room
adepts ourselves. We used at home to ''court the
amorous looking-glass," and were not unpro-
ficient at "capering nimbly in my lady's cham-
ber."

The conversation was general at first, and
amongst other things it turned naturally on hos-
pitality, and Virginia's fame for hospitality, the
symbols of hospitality with different peoples and
nations, etc. You bet I lost no time in letting
them know that I was one of the F. F. V's my-
self. But poor Yerger put his foot into it, if he
did have on the best coat, and was playing he was
an officer. He spoke of his State, Mississippi,
and the hospitality of her people, when presently
one of the young ladies said :

"Lieutenant Yerger, what is regarded as the
symbol of hospitality in your old home, Missis-
sippi ?"

"Well," said Yerger, "I hardly know; but
amongst men, usually about the first thing set
out when a neighbor calls, is whisky, I believe;
eh, Captain?"

Before the captain could reply, as quick as a
wink (the lady of the house, the mother, had just
glanced at the pretty yellow maid who was wait-
ing on the table), there was a decanter of whisky
sitting by Yerger's plate.

Poor Yerger! he looked as if he wished the

40

SUPPER WITH ONE OF THE F. F. V S.

earth would open and swallow him up, Ledbet-
ter's coat and all. He never used liquor in any
way in his life, that I know of.

Of course the ladies were invited to visit our
camp, papa, too, especially, to witness dress pa-
rade. They came sooner than we expected.

Next evening, just as luck would have it, Gus
was sick again — that's the cook — and it was Yer-
ger's time to get supper. He had built the fire
and made every preparation to get supper, and
was sweating and fussing over the fire, face be-
grimed with smoke, he in his shirt-sleeves and
hair all towseled. The regiment was on dress
parade at that moment, and Yerger was mad any-
how. Just at that juncture up came a cavalcade
of ladies on horseback, foremost amongst whom
were the Misses Hempstead. They rode up to
the fire where Yerger was, and asked for **Lieu-
tenant" Yerger. Well, he was covered with con-
fusion, as well as with sweat and soot ; but being
ready-witted, everything passed oflf nicely ; but
you bet Yerger didn't invite them to stay to sup-
per.

* * * *

While telling my recollections of my short ser-
vice in the ranks in Virginia, and of the boys'
first lessons in cooking — for you must know that
by-and-by they had to cook or go hungry; the
negro cook business soon played out — I'll tell

41

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

YOU another one on Bill ; that same Bill Hicks I
was telling you about.

One day, or one night, rather, we had gone into

YERGER WAS MAD ANYHOW.

camp for the night (I mean our regiment), and
Bill was trying to cook some rations for next

42

SUPPER WITH ONE OF THE F. F. v's.

day's march. He mixed his corn meal and water
all right nicely in the company towel, and put in
a little grease and salt, and turned out a real nice
"pone," ready to cook. He first thought he'd
make an ash-cake of it — roast it in the ashes, you
know — but luckily, finding a clean flat rock near
by, he put that on the embers, and when it got
hot he spread out his pone on it, and sat down to
watch it. By-and-by Bill thought it wasn't
browning fast enough, so he thought to acceler-
ate it by turning it over and giving the other side
a chance. In attempting to do so, the plagued
thing crumbled and fell to pieces.

Bill just made the woods ring with remarks
much louder and more emphatic than elegant, or
than the occasion called for ; so George Newton
thought. George was a terrible wag. He said:

"Oh, Bill, don't take it so hard. The Saviour
once broke bread, you remember !"

Bill looked at him for about a minute, a dark
look, and then in a tone of contempt said :

"The hell he did! He didn't drop it in the

ashes, did he?"

* * * *

Alas, poor Bill ! He was a fine young man, an
Apollo in form, and a model of strong physical
manhood. Had he lived he would surely have
had a career of usefulness. But like thousands
of others of the flower of the youth of the South,

43

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

he was needlessly sacrificed to what the South
believed to be a principle ; rights guaranteed the
South under the Constitution, violated and no
other recourse for redress, they thought. Bill
lost a leg in battle, and after the war, although
he began the practice of law with flattering pros-
pects, the loss of his leg so preyed on his mind,
the thought of going through life such a cripple,
in a fit of despondency he blew out his brains.

44

THE DOCTOR ROUTS THE FEDERAL ARMY.

THE DOCTOR ROUTS THE FEDERAL ARMY.

Sitting by the fire at home one day lately,
said the Old Doctor, our Fat Philosopher (by
which cognomen we had just saluted him on his
entering our sanctum), mentally figuring to see
how I was going to make that $5, which Bill
Jeffries promised to pay me next Saturday week,
pay my subscription to the Texas Medical Jour-
nal, buy a pair of red-top boots for Johnny, and
get my wife that pattern of calico she saw in
Simon's window for Christmas, and still have
some left for tobacco, when my wife — who was
mending my other shirt — looked up and said :

''Doctor, do you reckon Dr. Daniel ever heard
of that ten-dollar fee you got last year for a
surgical operation?"

''Why, no," said I. "What put that in your
head?"

"Why, I don't know why else he would call
you the 'fat-fee-losopher'," she said. "That's
the only fat fee you ever made, ain't it, honey?"
And the old fellow just shook with suppressed
merriment at the recollection.

Promised to tell you about our captain, did I ?
Oh, yes ; so I did.

45

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

The old man was a scholar. Many people here
in Texas remember him well. He was a nat-
uralist. He was also an Episcopal minister. But
I must say, he had less common-sense than any
man I ever saw, and was as ugly as the devil 1
He was a man of the most inordinate vanity,
moreover ; vain of his personal appearance ! His
face looked like a gorilla's ; high retreating fore-
head, narrow but high ; large superciliary ridges,
high cheek bones, a real prognathous skull ; eyes
deep-set and cavernous; little, twinkling, rest-
less eyes, and a mouth like a catfish. He wore
his hair in little tight corkscrew curls, and when
he spoke there was a kind of whistling sound fol-
lowed. To see him rigged out in his full fighting
paraphernalia was a sight to make Ajax green
with envy, and Achilles and Hector go ofif and
grieve. But — well, he got to be the captain of
our company in some way — after Captain Burt,
for whom the company was named, was made
colonel of the regiment.

At Manassas, up to the time when our tents
were taken from us, he used to have prayer-
meeting at his tent every night, and the spoony
and homesick boys all attended with a religious
regularity that was most commendable. He sud-
denly discontinued it; and when asked why, he
said that he had been fighting the devil all his
life, and now that he had the Yankees to fight

46

THE DOCTOR ROUTS THE FEDERAL ARMY.

in addition, doubling teams on him as it were, he
couldn't do justice to both. He was brave. I
don't think he knew what personal fear was.

The battle of Manassas was fought on a lovely
summer day (July 21/61), beginning about sun-
rise. Our regiment was not engaged until late
in the afternoon. Somebody blundered. I'm
glad of it. I might have been killed, and see
what the world v/ould have lost if I had! As it
was, I got to see it all, from a safe distance ; an
experience that few can boast of.

Early in the morning we were marched ahead
of and at right angles with the line of battle, for
about a mile; and there on top of a high hill,
overlooking the entire battlefield, we were halted,
and there remained inactive till about five o'clock.
It was the intention, we learned afterwards, that
we should charge by the flank — swing around,
you know, and shut in, like a knife-blade. The
idea was to get in behind the enemy, and some
think that had this been done late in the after-
noon, as was intended, when the rout came we
would have bagged the whole shooting-match. It
seems that the courier carrying the order was
killed, and the other regiments which, with ours,
were to do this swinging-around-act, didn't come
up ; so we waited in vain nearly all day for them,
as stated. In the meantime, resting here on that
hill, we had a most excellent view of the battle,

47

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

almost from beginning to end, participating only
slightly, as I will tell you, in the final charge
about sundown.

I wish I could describe the scene to you. We
looked west from where we were ; that is, up the
run or creek; Bull Run. We could see almost
every movement ; see the charges which have be-
come historic, as I told you on a former visit, I
believe. We saw every cannon discharge, saw
the curl of smoke before we heard the report;
we saw the train arrive from Winchester bring-
ing Generals Joseph E. Johnston and Kirby
Smith with reinforcements ; saw them disembark,
form column and forward on the run; saw them
halted and thrown into line; saw them charge,
and turn the tide of battle. Oh, it was a most
glorious sight — from a distance. The battle
raged nearly all day.

Byme-by the order came to forward — our regi-
ment that had been lying there all day just look-
ing on, and skinnin' slippery-elm trees of the
bark and chewing it — the boys were very fond of
slippery elm bark, and they skinned every tree on
that hill. We were told to throw away our blan-
kets, or rather to leave them there, and we could
get them after we had run the Yankees oflF.

So, late in the afternoon, the sun was setting
and shone in our faces by that time, we went for-
ward on a brisk trot till all of a sudden wc were

48

THE DOCTOR ROUTS THE FEDERAL ARMY.

on the brink of a precipice, steep, deep, rocky and
with almost perpendicular sides. And there we
were; could get no further. The ravine (it was

'fwm^^ t

YOU BET WE RAN.

the bed of Cub Run, a tributary to Bull Run,
when it rained; it was dry now) was fifty yards
or more wide, and on the opposite bank stood the

49

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Yankees, infantry, regulars, concealing a terrible
battery. It looked like there were a thousand of
them in line. It seemed to me that their coat-
tails were all exactly the same length, from the
glimpse I had of them; for we stood not there
long idle. They saw us, and just poured grape
and canister into us from that battery, while this
line of infantry just mowed us down like grass.
There was but one thing to do ; that vv^as to I'lin.
You bet we ran. And as we scattered, the shots
just whistled after us "through the emerald
woods where the breezes were sighing."

About that time, panic having seized the enemy
at the other end, where, it seems, our men hac;
charged them with the bayonet, and spread to
the line in front of us, bless your soul, unexpect-
edly to us, and without the least cause that we
knew, they just limbered up their cannon, about-
faced, and got. That is a fact. They had noth-
ing to fear from us, our regiment, for as stated
we couldn't get near them.

But do you know, or rather would you be-
lieve it, when I was discharged later, of which
I have told you, haven't I, and went home, the
old captain gave me a letter — I have it yet; I
prize it as a curiosity, and am keeping it as an
heirloom — in which he testified that I "had al-
ways been a good soldier; had always done my
full duty," and that he would "never forget the

50

THE DOCTOR ROUTS THE FEDERAL ARMY.

day, nor my gallantry, when I helped him strike
the last blow to the enemy's reserves, when they
fled, panic-stricken from the field" ; thus "helping
him save the honor of the Confederacy." Fact —
a positive fact — verbatim. I have that letter yet.

When I got home I showed it to my mother.
I asked her to feel of me. I asked her if there
were any birth-marks on me by which my iden-
tity could be positively established. I said that
it was not I — impossible. It must surely be the
spirit of Napoleon Bonaparte, Julius Caesar and
Wellington all rolled into one and personated by
me on the occasion referred to. I didn't know I
was such a warrior.

Now, the fact is — I ran. But he didn't. He
just stood there like a fool, popping away at
those U. S. Regulars, fifty yards off or more,
with a little 22-caliber Smith & Wesson pistol,
and they just pouring grape and canister-shot at
him and at us at random — till the big scare struck
them. It's a fact ; the enemy fled when no one,
from our crowd at least, pursued them.

The old captain did then rally a few of our
scattered company, and attaching them to the
tail-end of another command, marched us off the
field to where we had left our blankets, fortu-
nately. A great many of our company were

killed.

* * * *

51

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

After the regiment moved up to Leesburg after
the battle of Manassas (first Manassas), I pro-
cured a discharge. I had ascertained that fight-
ing as a private was not my specialty, and didn't
fit in at all with either my talent or my taste. Mr.
Davis had issued a proclamation stating that the
war would last some years, and ofiicers would be
needed ; that it was like ''grinding seed-corn"
to kill up the students (in which sentiment I
fully concurred), and oflfered to release from the
ranks all who were studying medicine. I re-
turned home and immediately went to New Or-
leans and took another course of lectures, got my
diploma and got out, just before Ben Butler cap-
tured the city. In less than six months more, to-
wit : July 8th, 1862, I was examined by the Army
Board of Medical Examiners for Bragg's army
at Tupelo, Miss., and greatly to my surprise, I
was given a commission by the Secretary of War
as Surgeon, upon the report and request of this
board. I was just ten days less than twenty-three
years of age. I was at once assigned to duty with
the examining board as secretary, at the request
of the president of the board, the late Dr. David
W. Yandell.

A VIOLENT ERUPTION OF LORENA.

INVADING KENTUCKY.

A VIOLENT ERUPTION OF LORENA.

The Doctor walked into the office one morn-
ing, looking very sober, and gently whistling
*'Lorena." Taking his accustomed seat, my easy
chair, he said :

Dan'els, did you ever notice how any tune, onc«
familiar, will bring back recollections of the time
you heard it? Memories long dormant? How
certain thoughts and recollections are associated
in some way with certain airs? Yes, and even
with the odor of certain flowers?

"Oh, yes," said I, "often."

Well, "Lorena" is associated in my mind with
more pleasant memories of war-times than any
other song; for it had its birth, lived its little life,
and perished, was sung to death during those stir-
ring times. It is essentially a war-song; and in
my mind is associated peculiarly with Bragg's
celebrated Kentucky campaign :

"The sun's low down the sky, Lorena,

The snow is on the grass again ;

Er-rer-something-or-other-Lorena,

The frost gleams where the flowers have been,"
sang the Old Doctor, low to himself, with an ex-
pression on his face of mingled gravity and hu-
mor.

53

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

I was thinking of the time, said he, speaking of
Lorena, when the snow was on me about a foot
deep, before we got out of Kentucky, those of us
who did get back ; for there was many a poor
fellow who went with us, gaily singing "Lorena"
all along the road who — staid there — alas ; most
of them at Perryville and Munfordsville.

On the march going in — it was glorious weath-
er in the early fall, when the leaves in the forest
were putting on their earliest fall tints, when the
grapes with their purple lusciousness hung
temptingly near the roadside, when the apples,
red-ripe, were dropping of their own plethora of
sweetness on the march, "Lorena" was sung
morning, noon and night. The forests rang with
it. "Every lily in the dell knows the story —
knows it well" — ought to, at least; lily, leaf and
bird, forest, stream and valley, heard it often
enough, the Lord knows, and loud enough, to re-
member it forever.

54

CROSSING THE CUMBERLAND.

CROSSING THE CUMBERLAND.

It brings to my mind especially, and in vivid
pictures, continued the Old Doctor, after refresh-
ing himself with a cigarette, the scene at Mussel
Shoals where the army crossed the Cumberland
one lovely October morning at sunrise. I shall
never forget it. The soldiers were in fine spirits ;
it was a frolic for the youngsters.

I can see now, gathered on the near bank, gen-
erals and staff-officers in brilliant uniforms, di-
recting the Vv^ork of putting over the wagons and
the artillery ; wagons with snow-white covers
gleaming in the clear morning light, each wagon
drawn by six stout mules — see the ambulances —
now the artillery, with mounted drivers in gay
colors — the guns and caissons — descending cau-
tiously the grade to the water; see those already
over, slowly pulling up the opposite bank — the
forest-covered hills not yet lighted up for the
day, giving a glorious dark background to the
brilliant picture; see the horses, interspersed
here and there amongst the wagons and the cais-
sons and the cannons, their riders rattling with
carbine and spur ; see those amid-stream, wagons,
horses, guns. I hear the striking of the hoofs
against the boulders as a horse impatiently paws
the water, drinking leisurely and little at a time,

55

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

or as I suspect, making believe he was drinking,
by burying his nose in the water as a pretext to
lave his tired legs in the delicious limpid coolness
of the water. I see again the shallow but broad
stream, clear as ice, slowly crawling along, fret-
ted here by a rock, checked and diverted there
by the bank, but still on, on, as in ages past it has
been going, as it is now ; ever changing its par-
ticles, yet ever the same river; on, on, to finally
mingle with the great gulf. The birds in the
forest, "winged songsters," chirping their early
matins, looking on with curious eye at the un-
accustomed scene, all unconscious of the deadly
nature of our mission. As an accompaniment to
the drama — a lovely scene of action set to music
— rang out, clear and strong on the morning air :
"A hundred months have passed, Lorena,
Since last I held thy hand in mine."

Lorena palled after awhile, and I felt some-
what by "Lorena" as I suppose Nanki Poo in
Mikado did about Yum Yum : "Well, take Yum
Yum, and go to the devil with Yum Yum," said
he. And so I said about "Lorena."

How like life was that stream. Every particle
of the water changing every mmutc at a given
point, passing on, its place taken by a new one —
and yet — it is the same river. ,

Now, here am I — old, gray and grizzled. There
is not a particle of bone, blood, muscle or sinew,

56

CROSSING THE CUMBERLAND.

not a cell in my body, that was there that bright
morning thirty-five years ago, when throbbing
with the pulse of youth, fired by hope and ambi-
tion probably, I gazed upon that scene of life,
pulsing like a locomotive impatient to be going.
And yet, it is the same, the identical ego ; and like
that stream I am still going on, on, checked here,
fretted there, turned out of my course yonder,
buffeted about by ''circumstances over which I
have no control," here, there, anywhere ; but still
on, on, I go with the years, to mingle finally with
the great gulf — eternity. And then?

57

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

AN EXTENSIVE ACaUAINTANCE.

The army had halted after all had gotten
safely over; the infantry, cavalry, artillery, the
wagon train bringing up the rear. It was
stretched out along the road about six miles.
Here and there dashed a staff-officer carrying a
message ; some were eating, some lying down by
the side of the road, some doing one thing, some
another; the army had halted. The men were
resting, "resting at ease," but ready to resume
the march at a word. Everywhere was heard
"Lorena." She was epidemic. You could hear
her far off; you could hear her near by, played
by the band, whistled, hummed and sung, always
the same, until I begun to think that "a. hundred
months" was about all there was of her, till I
learned the balance, later, about the snow and
the flowers and the grass.

The medical director had requested me to ride

ahead up the road till I had found the regi-

mxnt, and to tell the surgeon of that regiment,
Doctor — somebody, something. He might have
sent a courier, but he didn't.

Now there I was, a stripling of a young fellow,
just past 23, a full surgeon, with the rank and
pay of major, and with a high staff position.
That is to say — and here you will have to pardon

58

AN EXTENSIVE ACQUAINTANCE.

a slight digression, for these recollections are
nothing if not veracious — Dr. Yandell of Louis-
ville was Medical Director of Hardee's corps. He
was President of the Army Board of Medical
Examiners, and when I passed my examination at
Tupelo, Miss., in July, 1862, before we started on
this Kentucky march — you remember my telling
you ? — my first assignment to duty was at his re-
quest, as secretary of the board. The board was,
therefore, attached to General Hardee's head-
quarters, and was a part of his military family;
and when in camp my duties were, as secretary of
the board, clerical. On the march and in battle
they were various. I was surgeon to the cavalry
escort, one thing; I had to pull the men's teeth,
dress any little (or big) wound, prescribe for
their numerous ailments, on the march assist the
medical director and medical inspector, and dur-
ing and after a fight I had charge of the ambu-
lance corps and the litter-bearers. I'll tell you
about Perryville some day, if I don't forget it.

Well, as I said, there I was, a young fellow
about as fat as a match, delicate physically, hold-
ing a surgeon's commission, and away up ; wear-
ing on my collar a gold star on each side, and
trimmin's to match — gold lace galore. That is : I
was entitled to do so, if I had had a uniform,
but the fact is, I didn't. I had on a little thread-
bare citizen's frock coat which had been a "Prince

59

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Albert," once, — and on the lapels of it, you bet,
I had the gold stars, at least, as big as a silver
quarter.

My cap was a dilapitated affair, brim torn half
off, and it flopped up and down as I paced along,
jiggity-jig on my little mustang mare. I must
have cut a comical figure, I reckon ; but I had the
rank — had the position of dignity, and wore con-
spicuously on my lapels the insignia of it; be-
sides— I had on military gloves. True, they were
a great deal too big for me — but what matter?
I tried to look the soldier, at least.

Now, Dan'els, lookin' back at that time, and
the occurrences as memory recalls them, either
through my Retroscope, or as they are conjured
up by the magic of "Lorena," through the long
vistas of years that have intervened, years bringing
experience, poverty and gray hairs, but alas, not
wisdom, I fear, I am impressed with the convic-
tion that at that time I thought I was some
pun'kins. I'm sure of it. The panorama of life
opened up before my vision, painted in glowing
colors. I was going to do great things — I didn't
exactly know how or what ; I was going to dis-
tinguish myself in some way — probably get to be
a great surgeon, compared to whom Velpeau,
Gross, Erichsen, wouldn't be in it at all. As I
rode along on that errand what thoughts of glory
and of future greatness did not come to my mind !

60

HOW ARE YOU DICKEY."

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Did you fellers ever read "Bud Zuntz's Mail"
(by Ruth McEnery Stewart) ? Bud thought he
would return from the war at least a colonel. He
would ride up to his sweetheart's father's front
gate on a fine white charger, carrying a Con-
federate flag in one hand and a brevet-general's
commission in the other, and demand the fair
one's hand as a reward for his valor. '"Stid of
that," he says, ''they fetched me home in an
amb'lance, with a sore laig, and I've been a driv-
in' that team of oxen for a livin' ever since ; 'Bud
Zuntz's fiery untamed chargers,' as old Mrs.
Pilkins calls them." Now, I didn't fare quite as
badly as Bud ; I came out without the "sore laig,"
at least.

I rode along gaily that bright October morn-
ing, wrapped in delicious visions of future great-
ness, and, as said, evidently thinking I was some
pun'kins. In the infantry line, which was
stretched out along the roadside for miles and
miles, was my old regiment, and my old com-
pany with which I had served as a private soldier
in Virginia the year before. There were George
Newton, Dick Ledbetter, Gwyn Yerger, Bill
Hicks, Bright, and all of my old chums — who had
not been killed or sent to hospital. Most of these
had known me since childhood, and they called
me by my familiar nickname. As I rode past
them with my head up and my thoughts away

62

AN EXTENSIVE ACQUAINTANCE.

off yonder, Bill, or George, or some of them
sang out :

"How are you, Dickey?"

"How are you Dick ?" and the others took it up,
and it spread along the line like fire when you
touch off a field of dry broom-sage. All along
as I passed, I was hailed with: "How are you,
Dickey?" "How are you, Dickey?" from regi-
ment to regiment, clear to the end of the line,
where I found my man and delivered the mes-
sage.

Beginning with my home boys, the army told
me, or asked me, rather, "How are you, Dickey?"
for about six miles. It fetched me to the earth
again, and took the conceit out of me, quite.

63

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

A BRUSH WITH THE SEMINARY GIRLS.

COLD COMFORT. AND SOME OTHER THINGS.

About the snow? said the Old Doctor. The
army went as far as Bardstown and went into
camp. We staid there about three weeks. I did
not know what for, till afterwards. All I knew
was that the young officers had a glorious time
flirting with the pretty Kentucky girls, and being
entertained and feasted by the Confederate sym-
pathizers ; but the greater part of the people were
"Union," and from them we got only scowls.

I remember, the medical director sent me to
select and ''press" suitable buildings for addi-
tional hospital accommodation ; and I went to the
big female seminary, first pop ; a big two-story
brick building with plenty of room, situated in a
lovely lawn. It would make an ideal hospital, I
thought.

At the door I was met by the principal, a schol-
arly looking spare-made gentleman, who was
very courteous to me. With him on the big front
gallery — ''porch" they call it there — were about
fifty girls of the seminary age and type. I made
my mission known, and such a hum of protest —
such an outburst of indignation — amongst the
"Union" girls. The principal was very nice about

64

A BRUSH WITH THE SEMINARY GIRLS.

it, and begged that I would take his school build-
ings only as a last resort and emergency, to which
request the girls added their petition ; and I
hadn't the heart to interfere with such a happy
combination. Another building was found and
made to answer the purpose.

But those bright-eyed little rogues ! They made
a picture there is no use trying to describe. I
could tell every "reb" sympathizer in the bunch
by the cut of her eye, the silent welcome she
gave; and tho' she didn't say so, I could clearly
see and understand that she felt that if the poor
sick soldiers of the Confederacy needed the build-
ings, they ought to have them, that's all.

When I told them that I would not press the
academy unless we had a battle and it became
absolutely necessary, you ought to have seen the
grateful expressions of gladness on their faces ;
and one real pretty little black-eyed beauty, evi-
dently ''Southern" in sentiment, stepped boldly up
and pinned a geranium blossom on my coat. Her
lips were much redder, and looked much sweeter
than the geranium, and when she looked up in
my face her lips and eyes had such an inviting
look, that — I couldn't have helped it if my life
had depended on it — just as quick as a wink, and
before she had time to dodge, or say "don't," I
kissed her right smack on the mouth and ran.
Such a fuss ! Such a ''my, Jennie !' 'and "Did you

6s

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

ever!" and "the hateful thing!" and "impudent
fellow !" and similar expressions, you never did
hear.

But I was a young officer; vain enough ,to be-
lieve that there were uglier men in the army than
I — and I bet Jennie didn't cry.

^ *j* ^ >}i

My stars, I have straggled so I forgot all about
the snow. I am worse than Widow Bedott for
branching off.

When the army retreated after the battle of
Perr3^ville, at Camp Dick Robinson General Har-
dee turned over the command of his corps to
General Buckner, the late "gold-bug democrat"
candidate for President. General Buckner had
been bom and raised in that section of Kentucky,
and when Bragg's army captured Munfordsville
going in, General Buckner, out of consideration
of the fact that he had gone to school at that
place, was granted the honor of receiving the
surrender and the Federal general's sword. The
surrender took place at a big spring, where,
Buckner said, he had toted water to the little
schoolhouse many a time in boyhood days. Don't
forget to remind me to tell you about the capture
of Munfordsville, for my Retroscope brings out
some two or three humorous reminiscences of it
as well as some sad ones.

After the battle of Perryville, General Hardee

66

A BRUSH WITH THE SEMINARY GIRLS.

with his staff pushed on ahead, making a hurried
retreat out of Kentucky ahead of the army. He
had pressing business, I reckon. I know it was
considered mighty dangerous for so small a force,
or party, rather, as a general with only his staff
and escort of a cavalry company to go through
those mountains alone. At night we slept with
our saddles for pillows, arms handy, and our
horses picketed right at hand. In fact, men and
horses slept together, if any sleeping was done ;
we didn't "retire," in the sense of "going to bed,"
but slept with both eyes open.

Coming through Cumberland Gap, — it was the
most God-forsaken, the most desolate looking
country I ever saw — it was late in November,
and getting to be very cold — the only living thing
I saw on that day's march through the Gap was
an old lean ewe sheep, up on the side of the moun-
tain. Dave, Dr. Yandell's colored cook, cook for
our mess, whom the doctor had brought with him
from Louisville when he first came to join the
army, bought, borrowed, begged or stole that lone
old ewe ; most likely the latter, for there was no
one in sight from whom to borrow or buy. Dave
was a famous cook; had been cook for a toney
restaurant in Louisville; and when we arrived at
Crab Orchard Springs we had roast mutton and
mushrooms for dinner. Dave found plenty of
nice mushrooms there, out in the old orchard in

67

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

which we bivouached, and he knew what to do
with them. It was a feast for ye tired soldiers.

It was a clear, cold, November afternoon. We
dined about sunset and I went early to bed. Do
you know — I hadn't yet gotten "Lorena" out of
my head — and that night I spread out my vulcan-
ized rubber sheet on the ground, laid my quilt
on it, and my gray blanket on that, and with
boots, clothes, overcoat and all on, I laid down on
the edge of my pallet and rolled myself up in it,
like dried apples in a dried-apple roll. I went
to sleep, thinking, if not singing —

"The sun's low down the sky, Lorena,
The snow is on the grass again."
I don't know what put it in my mind, particu-
larly ; it was only incidental to ''Lorena" ; there
wasn't a speck of cloud nor the slightest indica-
tion of snow, but it fell all the same, and I tell
you now, that night was the most comfortable,
it was the sweetest night's sleep, the soundest and
the warmest sleep I ever had. Talk about "cold
comfort." That was comfortable cold, at least.
I had covered up, head and ears with the bed-
clothes, and my hat was over such of my hair as
was not protected ; and when I 'woke early next
morning, without a suspicion of the snow, I dis-
covered that there was about six inches of it cov-
ering me and my pile like a shroud, and covering
everything else.

68

BREAKFAST WITH THE YANKEES.

THE DOCTOR TAKES BREAKFAST WITH THE
YANKEES.

While the surrender was taking place at Mun-
fordsville, Ky., of which I told you, began our
Philosopher, assuming an easy attitude in his ac-
customed seat, and throwing his fat legs over the
edge of the desk, from which movements we felt
assured that he was in a talking humor, and we
prepared for a good one ; it was about sunrise one
lovely October morning, an order came to me
from Dr. Yandell, Medical Director of Hardee's
corps, to go into the village, take possession and
make an inventory of the medical and surgical
supplies of the garrison, that were to be turned
over to us along with other property.

I hastened to dress, when — horrors ! — my horse
was gone. On making inquiry the colored driver
of the headquarters amb'lance told me that my
white orderly had gone off on him to forage.
Do you fellers know what foraging is ? I bet you
don't. It is to hunt up something good to eat.
This feller was a famous hand at finding it, and
altho' we had nothing but Confed. money — which
wouldn't pass muster in Kentucky — he managed
somehow to always come back with chickens,
eggs, milk, honey, potatoes, fruit — something
good, always.

69

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

This confounded fellow played the shrewdest
trick on me I reckon, that ever was. He was so
addicted to stealing, that, like the nigger we read
of in the joke books, who used to slip up behind
himself and pick his own pockets to keep his hand
in, this feller, while we were camped at Bards-
town, came to me one morning with a distressed
look and stated that my best horse was missing,
along with one belonging to Captain somebody,
I've forgotten, as that part of it was only to make
the story go, as I learned too late. As the horse
was in his charge and keeping, he was responsi-
ble. "That's what hurt" him so, he said. The
fact that I looked to him to see that my horse was
safe and cared for, he said, made him feel the
responsibility dreadfully, and he vowed that he
was determined to get that ''boss" back, if he was
in the county; if he had to go right into the
Yankee's camp to get it. He denounced the thief
who had been so slick as to steal two horses, he
said, from right under his nose, and made ter-
rible threats of what he would do to him if he
just could get his hands on him. Well, of course,
I gave permission to him to go and search for my
horse, and told him to be sure and find him before
he came back. He went in search of the horse
and was gone all day. Late in the afternoon he
came into camp on a pony, and leading my pet
horse, which looked as if it had been ridden very

70

BREAKFAST WITH THE YANKEES.

hard, and had not been fed. He told a plausible
story of heroic daring on his part, and described
how he had found the horse in the stable of a
man ten miles off, and how near he was to being
killed when he claimed the horse, and told thq
man he would have it at the *'resk of his life."

Now, you boys will hardly think I was green
enough to swallow that stufif, but I was. I was so
rejoiced to get my horse, that in addition to
thanking the fellow I gave him a $50 Confed. bill.
Tt is unnecessary to say that the whole thing was
a lie, a put-up job to blackmail me and have a
day's frolic. He and a chum had ridden our
horses to a frolic some distance off and stayed
all night. Afraid to be seen coming in after day-
light, riding our horses looking so jaded, he hid
them out and took all next day to find them.

But I am away off of my story again. Con-
found this chair. Every time I sit in it, it makes
me scatter. Get a new one.

So, to resume where I left off, when I found
that this fellow was gone on my horse foraging
(it was before the occurrence just related, and
was all right), my only recourse was to use one
of the amb'lance horses. When I searched for
my saddle and bridle, behold, they were gone also;
my orderly had taken the rig. Hence my only
show for a ride was an amb'lance horse with a
blind-bridle and bare-back. 'Twas that or walk.

71

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

You can imagine what a figure I cut as I rode into
that village on such a turn-out, and dressed as I
\vas, in a little, thin, black, cloth frock coat, very
threadbare, — heavy horse-leather boots, in which
my legs looked like a straw stuck in a bottle ; great
yellow gauntlets much too large for me, and
reaching to the elbows. My slim little arms
would rattle in them. I had on a military cap
with the brim, or visor, as it is called, half torn
off. Notwithstanding the incongruity of the get-
up, I had a big gold star on each lapel ; you bet
I did. Of course such an odd specimen would
have attracted attention anywhere. I was a
source of curiosity to the gayly dressed young
officers of the garrison with their bright spick-
and-span uniforms on. They eyed me with great
curiosity, yet treated me with the utmost respect.

Presently one of the young fellows stepped up
to me with a very respectful manner, saluting as
to a superior officer, and said :

'Will you kindly decide a dispute for us, sir,
as to your rank in the Confederate army? Your
insignia — two stars — indicate that you are a gen-
eral ; that is the rank in our army — and surely
you are too young (and, he might have added,
but he didn't, tho' no doubt he thought it: 'too
dilapidated and no-count') to be a general?"

''Certainly, sir," I said. "I am a surgeon ; and
the military rank of surgeon with us is major;

72

BREAKFAST WITH THE YANKEES.

and a star on each side is the badge or insignia
of that rank — the branch of service or staff to
which the wearer belongs being determined by,
his colors. For instance : a surgeon wears black
(that was a lie; the uniform consisted of black
pants, it is true, and gray coat with black collar
and cuffs), cavalry, yellow; artillery, red; in-
fantry, blue trimmin's, etc. One star on each side
and black-trimmed clothes (I wouldn't say 'uni-
form'), means a surgeon-major; stars, with yel-
low trimmin's, a major of cavalry, etc. The badge
or decoration for a colonel is three stars on each
side ; a lieutenant-colonel, two stars ; a captain,
three bars, etc. ; while a general wears three stars
surrounded by a wreath."

He thanked me, and saluting, backed off to his
companions to enlighten them on the mysteries
of the Confederate decoration, and explain if he
could how it happened, as Dick Ledbetter would
say, that "every feller was uniformed different."

I was asked to take breakfast with the sur-
geons, one of whom was a big fat old fellow
whose name I have forgotten. The other was
Dr. A. Flack, a slim, middle-aged man. I shall
never forget him, and I would like to know if he
is still living. He was surgeon of an Indiana
cavalry regiment, a part of the garrison of the
little town that had just surrendered.

There was a lot of amputating cases amongst the

73 '

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

stores turned over to me, and as I did not have
any instruments, I remarked that I was going to
buy one of these cases from our quartermaster
when they were turned over to him. Dr. Flack
said :

''Doctor, those are contract instruments. They
are no account for service; here is a Tieman's
case which I will make you a present of, if you
will accept it, as under the terms of the surrender
the surgeon's personal effects, instruments and
side-arms are not spoils. But as I will have to
walk back to Louisville, I don't want to carry this
case. Please accept it with my compliments,"
and he scratched his name on the brass plate with
his knife-blade: "A. Flack, 54 Ind." (I think
it was the 54th).

Amongst the horses turned over to our quarter-
master there were some magnificent ones. You
bet we young officers were properl}^ mounted
after that capture. I got a splendid iron-gray, a
fast single-foot racker. Instead of his being
afraid of anything, say, a hog on the side of the
road, for instance, he would make fight and would
attack what would make most horses shy from
under a saddle. The quartermaster had to ap-
praise the value of a horse when an officer wanted
to buy, and had, of course, to take Confederate
money. It would have been unbecoming a Con-
federate officer to depreciate the money; we had

74

BREAKFAST WITH THE YANKEES.

to make believe amongst ourselves that it was
equal to gold ; so prices put on such property were
low. Just think : I paid $65 for that horse. The
money then was worth about 20 cents on the dol-
lar, but the quartermaster dasen't depreciate it.

I sold that horse in Chattanooga subsequently
for $4000.

They had for breakfast — those surgeons did —
fried breakfast bacon (after beef thirty days out
of every month, and three times a day, the most
delicious thing that could have been set before
a famished Confed. sawbones), corn meal muf-
fins, boiled eggs, battercakes with nice fresh but-
ter and honey, and just oodles of milk — cream,
bless you ! After breakfast the old fat doctor
handed me a cigar. It was the first cigar I had
smoked since the beginning of the war. He re-
marked, "that is a real Havana cigar." I never
let on but that I was used to smoking that kind

every day. But he knew better.
* * * *

By-the-by, you all knew Dr. Bemiss — of course
— late Professor of Practice in the New Orleans
Medical School ; everybody knew him as a yellow
fever expert. Well, we got him in Kentucky on
this raid. He and Dr. Joshua Gore, and a young-
doctor named Bedford, joined us as soon as we
entered the State. But after the bloody battle of
Perryville Dr. Bedford backed out; went back

75

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

to his **old Kentucky home" ; couldn't stand it ;
too sanguinary for him. Dr. Bemiss and Dr.
Gore stuck, however, and followed the fortunes
of the Confederacy till its banner went down in
defeat to rise no more. Dr. Bemiss early left the
army in the field (like I did; wanted a softer
place). After serving a short time in hospital
he was taken into the office of the Medical Di-
rector of Hospitals, Dr. Stout, succeeding me as
chief clerk. I found that place most too soft.
You will say I was hard to please. Remember,
I was young; I was ambitious, also. I stated to
Dr. Stout,* the Medical Director of Hospitals,
that in a position in his office, however soft and
secure from shot, shell and capture, likewise from
cold and exposure ; however honorable, it afford-
ed no opportunities for getting any practical
knowledge of surgery ; that wars didn't occur
every day, and that the chances for operative ex-
perience afforded by the war were too rare to be
wasted ; that I didn't care to be carried through
**on flowery beds of ease" in so soft a place, while
others were, figuratively, wading through "bloody
seas ;" and that I wanted a place in some good
warm and safe hospital, where I could study and
practice surgery. Thus it was that Dr. Bemiss
having, I presume, all the practical knowledge of
surgery that he needed in his business — he was

*Dr. S. H. Stout, now of Dallas, Texas.

76

BREAKFAST WITH THE YANKEES.

considerably older than I — was content to take
my seat. After he was inaugurated into my
place, confound it, the position which had been
nothing more than a head clerkship, and known
as such, was dignified by being called "Assistant
Medical Director of Hospitals." I can account
for that only on the grounds that Bemiss was
larger than I, as well as older.

77

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

PERRYVILLE.

THE DOCTOR, LIKE THE WAR-HORSE, SCENTS THE
BATTLE FROM AFAR. A CAVALRY CHARGE. ETC.

Now, said the Old Doctor, taking his seat de-
Hberately, and putting a big "chew" in the south-
west side of his mouth, don't you think for a mo-
ment that in telling you about some things that
happened at the battle of Perryville, I'm going
to bore you with a description a la war-corres-
pondent, about pouring volleys into them, and
so forth, for I ain't. I'm just going to give you
a few remarks, my way — my recollections of what
I saw, not what I did. I reckon I saw more bat-
tles and participated in fewer than most any-
body. You remember, I saw Manassas nearly all
day before being ordered up. Well, I saw this
one all day, and when ordered up it was not to
"charge," but to help bring away the wounded.

The battle began early — I had nearly said "just
after breakfast." It is told of one of the Confed-
erate brigadiers that he divided time by the
meals, they were with him the eras of each day,
and that on one occasion he reported to his su-
perior that he would "start in pursuit of the Yan-
kees immediately after breakfast, and if they
didn't cross the creek by dinner-time, he thought

78

SCENTS THE BATTLE FROM AFAR.

he would be able to overtake them about supper-
time."

I remember, it was a pretty clear, sunshiny day.
Early in the morning I was ordered to take a po-
sition, with all the ambulances belonging to that
army-corps, and some litter-bearers, in a deep
ravine, and there await orders. Our position was
between two big hills, and well sheltered from the
enemy's fire, unless our army should be driven
back, which it wasn't. Well, I waited all day, the
battle raging furiously with varying fortunes, till
near sundown, when there was a charge which
seemed to be the deciding "throw" in the game,
and our folks threw sixes and won. I wish I
had the powers of Stephen Crane to describe that
charge a la "Red Badge of Courage," but I have-
n't, and for fear of a flat, I'll go slow. I'll tell
you how it was from my standpoint, literally.

First part of the day I staid with the men, for
the most part down in the hollow, out of danger.
We could hear the battle; hear the rattle and
bang, and now and then the bullets would come
uncomfortably near us; so would cannon-balls.
They went over our heads, cutting limbs, but not
doing any damage. By-and-by, I got sorter used
to it, and attracted by curiosity I suppose, more
than anything else, I went up on top of the hill
where I could see what was going on. The fight
was, say, half a mile off, and seemed to stay in

79

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

one place all day. I had noticed that our folks
had a battery right in front of where I was stand-
ing. It had been booming all day. It was Swett's
battery, of Vicksburg, and was commanded on
that occasion by Lieutenant Tom Havern, a
brother-in-law of Colonel Swett. Tom Havern
did valiant service that day and — it is another one
of those instances of the irony of fate, like
Colonel (Lord) Cardigan, who led the charge of
the Light Brigade at Balaklava and came out un-
scathed, was killed, was killed some years later
by the kick of a horse — Havern was killed by the
falling of a limb of a tree.

Screened by a big white-oak I witnessed this
charge. It became so interesting that I didn't
mind the bullets a bit. They were hitting around
me pretty peart, and grapeshot were limning my
tree same time, but, like Casablanca, I hadn't per-
mission yet to "go."

This charge, I say, ended the battle. It surely
was the grandest sight I ever witnessed. The
battery had evidently been a source of much an-
noyance to the enemy all day, and they made one
determined effort to take it. They imdertook to
capture it by a charge in force.

Away on my left, and the left of the line of
battle, in front of this battery, and between us
and the setting sun, I saw vast bodies of horse-
men being massed. The dark blue uniforms made

80

SCENTS THE BATTLE FROM AFAR.

the body look like a great black cloud gathering
in the west. They formed in platoons ; that is,
about twenty or thirty abreast, and came towards
us, at first at a trot. After they had gotten un-
der way, it seemed to me, at the sound of a shrill
call on the bugle every man drew his saber, and
holding it aloft where the rays of the setting sun
were reflected and multiplied a thousand times,
they stood up in their stirrups and came at a
sweeping run. Havern, having meantime ceased
to fire, double-shotting each gun, held it till the
charge was nearly on him ; till "we could see the
whites of their eyes," as one of the gunners told
me afterwards. On they came like a blue tornado
— a black cyclone, bent on death and destruction,
as it was in very truth. The earth trembled.
There was a roar as of a whirlwind, or the "rush-
ing of many waters." Picture the scene if you
can. "The sheen on the spears" of the Assyrians,
that time they "came down like a wolf on the
fold," you remember, when, Byron says, it

" was like the stars on the sea,

Where the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Gali-
lee"

wasn't a circumstance to the myriad of sunflashes
glinting from that sea of uplifted sabers, as that
mighty mass came on, hurled by the Titans of
war upon the handful of devoted gunners in gray.

8i

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Oh, it was as if all the furies of hell had been
loosed for the occasion.

Havern held his fire until the cavalry seemed
to me to be about to run over the battery, when
six double-shotted guns, charged with canister-
shot, were turned loose at once. Such a blow,
right in the face, of course staggered them. The
charge was arrested in mid-career, horses and
men hurled back on those behind them, hundreds
going down under the fearful discharge, to be
trampled by the horses' hoofs out of all semblance
of humanity,

" horse and rider,

In one red burial blent."

Oh, it was dreadful ! Horrible beyond the power
of language to describe ! The charge recoiled up-
on itself, staggered, then the trumpeter sounded
"The Retreat," and not a man reached the guns.

That settled it. The battle was lost and won.
"Grim-visaged war" for the nonce "smoothed his
wrinkled front," and whistling to his "dogs,"
now full fed on "havoc," they licked their gory
chops as Ihey slunk away in the gathering
gloom. Pity wept. Mercy, frightened away by
the din early in the day, now returned, and driv-
ing away the black angel, summoned her minions,
the surgeons, to come and repair the damage.

I went up with the ambulances. Oh, horrors

82

SCENTS THE BATTLE FROM AFAR.

Upon horrors. Who can depict the horrors of a
battlefield after such butchery. Shame upon
shame ! Brothers, of one blood, of one race ! Let's
drop the curtain. It makes m.e sick even now to
think of what I saw that night, and the next, and
the next. I wouldn't, if I could, describe it. My
Retroscope goes back on me, and I am glad o£
it ; don't know how I ever got onto such a dis-
agreeable subject, unless it was that bad cigar I
smoked awhile ago.

With my ambulances and litter-bearers I went
up to the scene of conflict, and all night and all
next day I was engaged in hauling off the
wounded ; first to temporary or field hospitals, as
they are called, where the wounded received the
first attention ; then to Harrodsburg ten miles dis-
tant, where there Vv'ere general hospitals already
established for the continued treatment of the
wounded. Of course, all these wounded fell into
the hands of the enemy, as General Bragg got out
of Kentucky as fast as possible. The battle was
conceded to the Confederates as a victory. It
was a dearly-bought one, a few more of which
would have soon ruined us. True, v/e took many
guns, and got a lot of stuff, but I'll tell you of
that later ; the subsistence stuff, stuff we needed in
our business and could use.

At Harrodsburg all night, along with a score or
so of other surgeons I operated or dressed

83

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

wounds. That was the second night, mind yon,
without rest and without food. I was nearly
starved.

I was adjusting a splint to the arm of a
wounded man, when a pretty, plump girl of about
twenty came to me and said :

"Doctor, can I help you?"

I thanked her, and said that if the ladies would
see that the wounded got something to eat, it
would be greatly appreciated. (I was unselfish
in the request. I wasn't wounded, tho' I wanted
something to eat pretty bad myself. I said noth-
ing about that, however.) She said:

'T helped Dr. Bateman amputate a man's leg
just now; see?" and raising up her skirt, the
skirt of her dark calico dress, showed me where
her underskirts were bespattered with the char-
acteristic spirting of an artery.

*Tf that is what you mean," said I, ''you can
help me, and thank you, too."

Well, sirs, that girl just pitched in — she had
been pitching in before I made her acquaintance
— and rendered as intelligent assistance as a sur-
geon could have done, after showing her a little.
Why, she could pick up an artery with the
tenaculum as quick as a wink, and put a string
around it before you could say ''scat" to a rat.
Besides that she administered chloroform for me
more than once. Oh, she was a brave girl. She

84

'DOCTOR, CAN I HELP YOU?"

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

was a heroic girl, a Southern sympathizer. She
said her name was Betty Johnson. I wonder what
ever became of her?

In connection with that night's work I am re-
minded of a circumstance that may be thought
interesting. There was a man who was shot in
the left side, just below the ribs. A buckshot had
entered his body, and if it came out there was
nothing to show for it. There was a little bit of
a hole just over the spleen, and from it protruded
a tongue-like slip of flesh about as big as one's
forefinger. It was part of the spleen. It was
clasped tightly by the orifice of the wound, and
looked bluish. I just tied a silk string around it,
cut it oflf close up and dropped the stump back in
the abdomen. I didn't know what else to do. I
washed it, of course — we didn't knov/ anything
about antiseptics then, you know. There was
nothing else to do, in fact. It so turned out that
that was just the correct thing. I had not read
much medical literature at that time, and did not
know, and for many years afterwards did not
know, that there was no record of anybody ever
having amputated the spleen or a part of the
spleen for gunshot wound. Some years after the
war, after "Otis' History of the Surgery of the
Rebellion" was published, some one told me that
this case was mentioned in that work; that the
Federal surgeons on taking charge of Harrods-

86

SCENTS THE BATTLE FROM AFAR.

burg and the wounded we left there, had noticed
this case, the man stating to them what I had
done; "just cut her off and dropped, her, string
and all, back into the cavity." The chronicler re-
gretted being ''unable to get the name of the
operator." Well, I was the operator. I was
thus, unconsciously, the first surgeon to "ampu-
tate the spleen or a part of the spleen for gun-
shot wound." I am late claiming it. It ain't any
great glory, and I wouldn't care a cent if it had
never been heard of. I ain't proud a bit.

S?

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

QUESTIONABLE SPOILS.

Just before we reached Glasgow, a small
town in Kentuclcy, we came to a cross-roads store.
I was told that on arrival of the first of our folks
they found the store deserted and locked up. Who
opened it I do not know. When our party ar-
rived I found gray-backs swarming inside like
bees in a hive, and they were mostly officers.
Some of our party, myself amongst them, got suf-
ficient cloth to make us a suit, each, and I took
possession of a two-ounce vial of prussic acid.
I was afraid some fellow would get hold of it who
did not know what it was, — did not appreciate the
beauty of its uses upon proper occasions. After
my observations on the field of battle and in hos-
pitals I regarded it as a boon to be cherished in
case of being badly wounded, or, what I regarded
as worse, being sent a prisoner to Johnson's
Island. In either case it would make my quietus,
give me the means of euthanasia. It's the stuff,
you remember, that stood Jonas Chuzzlewit so
w^ell in hand in a tight, enabled him to cheat the
gallows, and ''fool" the police. It enabled the
Oily Gammon to do likewise, and in addition
he worked the insurance company, you remember,
in favor of a little girl he had wronged ; about
the only virtuous act he ever did ; virtuous, even

88

QUESTIONABLE SPOILS.

if it were criminal. See "Ten Thousand a Year,"
the best novel in the English language.

Now, you fellers needn't ask ; of course we
would have paid or offered to pay for the things
we took, if there had been anybody there to pay ;
but as we had nothing but Confed. scrip, I sup-
pose it is all the same ; they wouldn't have re-
ceived it — but we just had to have the cloth and
things, you see? Retribution overtook every one
of us. I'm glad of it. I could never have worn
that cloth with my customary pride and self-re-
spect. I'm sure it would have been a Nessus'
shirt on my back.

Now, I see you smirking ; t'ain't no "sour
grapes" at all. It was just fate. When we ar-
rived at Glasgow, of course we under-officers did
not know how long we were going to stay, and
had not doubted that we would rest long enough
at least, to have a suit of clothes made. So we —
those of us who had "provided" for an outfit
(self-respect will not allow me to call a spade a
spade in this case) — had our measures taken, and
the old tailor promised us our suits in a week.
Before sundown that same day we were out of
Glasgow, and going west. At the appointed time
— we were at or near Munfordsville by that time
— one of the staff-officers who was "in it," that is.
had a suit in prospective, detailed one of the pri-
vates of the escort and sent him back to Glasgow

89

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

with a note for our suits. We never saw the
''hair nor the hide" of the feller afterwards. His
name was Corey (it's unnecessary to say that
our name was ''Dennis"). Whether he was shot
by the bushwhackers, arrested and shot as a spy,
or whether he got away^with our outfits, deserted,
go ask ye whisperin' winds ; / don't know.

90

RECOLLECTIONS OF BACON.

RECOLLECTIONS OF BACON— LIKEWISE OF

PORK.

When Bragg's army was retreating from Ken-
tucky— and we came as rapidly as circumstances
would admit, for, you see, we were loaded — said
the Genial Philosopher on this visit to our sanc-
tum, when he had "blowed a little," he said, after
pulling up those steep steps (Hudson grinned and
said to Bennett, sotto voce, that the Doctor
"blowed" most of the time — good thing he didn't
hear it), we had to pass through Cumberland
Gap again. It was a most desolate country, and
was swarming with bushwhackers at the time.
We had bitten off more than we could chew,
to use a more recent aphorism. Our quarter-
master and commissary officers made hay to some
purpose while the sun shone; that is, they col-
lected supplies of every kind and stored them at
various points along our line of retreat in greater
quantities than we could handle for want of
transportation. As it was, the wagon-train
stretched over miles and miles of road, and great-
ly retarded the retreat of the army. I have for-
gotten how many thousand wagon-loads we had,
and how many droves of fat beeves we got away
with. But at several points there were stored
churches full of stuff — guns, bacon, jeans, Ken-

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

tucky jeans (homespun and highly prized),
pickled pork, etc., and having no transportation
for it, it had to be burned up. What a pity ! But
that's war, you know ; "I can't have it, and you
shan't." Well, at Camp Dick Robinson, it was
necessary to do the burning act, and the infantry
men passing along were told that they could have
all they could get away with. Well, sirs, it was
the funniest sight you ever saw (however, as you
didn't see it we'll say the funniest sight imagina-
ble), to see about six miles of bayonets, each one
bearing aloft a side of bacon, or a ham, or a bolt
of jeans ! The hot sun made the grease run out
of the meat in streams, and it trickled down on
the feller's faces, and necks, and backs, and then
the red dust would settle on it, and it was a funny
combination ; they looked like a bedraggled Mardi
Gras. Some of the officers had a side of bacon
strapped behind their saddles.

92

SOMEBODY S DARLING.

SOMEBODY'S DARLING.

Many of the soldiers were barefooted, con-
tinued the Doctor, after a moment's hesitation.
Cold weather was coming on, too. It was painful
to see the boys, some of them hobbling with sore
and bleeding feet over the stony mountain roads,
but they were always cheerful, even merry, and
ever ready for a joke or to guy some comrade. It
it astonishing what kept up their spirits, for they,
suffered every privation and hardship. At Cum-
berland Gap, going in, I saw shelled com issued
for the ''ration" for supper and breakfast. Rid-
ing along in the headquarters amb'lance of which
I told you, coiled up snugly with comforts, etc.,
I overtook a ''Johnny" — the name of all and sin-
gular of the Confederate soldier — a boy of per-
haps eighteen years, barefooted, limping along
with bleeding feet. As he went along with gun
on shoulder — he had dropped out of the ranks
and was "going it alone" — he was throwing
grains of com into his mouth, and seemingly en-
joying his breakfast. I said :

''Hello, Johnny, have you had any breakfast?"

"Yes," said he, "had what the others had —
cawn."

I took from my haversack a piece of meat and
a piece of bread that Dave, the cook, had put up

93

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

for my noon lunch, and gave it to him. He ac-
cepted it without thanks or comment, and went
to eating it in a very matter-of-course way. I
said:

"Where are your shoes, Johnny?"
"Havn't got any/' was the laconic reply, be-
tween mouthfuls. I took out my best boots, for I
had this extra pair, which were really too light
for service and I only kept them for social affairs,
and asking him 'Svhat size do you wear?" and if
he thought he could get his hoofs into these,
threw them to him. He said he could wear any-
thing he could get his foot into, and while they
"wem't any great shakes," he said "they beat no
shoes, pretty bad." The last I saw of Johnny
he was sitting on a rock on the roadside tugging
at the boots.

^ *i* *?* ^

It was a little after daylight that morning when
I came upon a company of infantry, just break-
ing camp ; or rather about to leave the spot where
they had bivouacked, and resume the march.
Some eight or ten men were standing around the
remains of a camp-fire, by which was lying a boy
of perhaps sixteen or eighteen years of age, ap-
parently in a trance. As I rode up one of the
party said :

"Here comes a surgeon now."

They told me that "Henry" (they called him

94

SOMEBODY^S DARLING.

"Henry") had sat up late the night before cook-
ing rations for the march; that they all went to
sleep and left him cooking, and when they got
up they found him "just like he is now," they
said, and "couldn't wake him." I dismounted,
and carefully examined the poor boy, and there
were no signs of life, tho' he was still warm.
Artificial respiration was tried ; hot water dashed
over the region of the heart also failed to start
the pulsation. I held a small pocket-mirror over
his mouth and nose, but there was not a sign of
respiration. The boy was dead.

He was roughly clad and looked like a farmer
boy. In one hand he held an ambrotype (that
was the prevalent kind of pictures then ; photo-
graphs had not come into use in the South). It
is evident that the last thing the boy did before
the death-angel closed his young eyes, was to
gaze on that picture, lovingly. We took it ten-
derly from his grasp ; it was the picture of a plain,
faded, wrinkled old woman of the commoner sort,
the poorer country people. It was his mother.
Ah, to his childish eyes she v/as not old, nor
wrinkled, nor ugly, nor faded, nor common. To
him she was beautiful ; she was young ; she was
the apotheosis of all that was lovely and lovable.
She was "mother." Alas, poor mother. It is
doubtful if she ever heard when, where or if he
died. She may be waiting yet for his coming.

95

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Poor mother. * * * "Plain," "common," "only a
private," a "conscript" most likely — his loss will
not be felt ; "only one of the men" — a unit in the
great whole, he will not be missed. But oh, how
dear was he to that simple old mother! He was
her "boy," her son, her darling.

Weep, poor mother, as weep thousands of
hearts wrung by a common grief, and each with
a grief of its own.

In the distant Aiden shall she clasp her long
lost boy? Away beyond the skies, where there
are no wars, no conscript officers, no partings, no
death; before that great white Throne where
there are no distinctions of persons, shall her
grief be 'suaged, her tears dried?

96

'a small game^' for a big stake.

A "SMALL GAME" FOR A BIG STAKE.

THE LITTLE CAPTAIN S TOAST^ AND WHAT HAP-
PENED.

The Old Doctor came in late one afternoon,
and taking his seat, said he could only stay a
few minutes ; and that he wasn't in a talking
humor. He didn't want anybody to ask him any
questions.

I expressed the hope that he wasn't sick.

Oh, no, he said ; only I've been lookin' thro' the
wrong end of my Retroscope, contrary to my
principles, and before I was aware of it, there had
come trooping before my mental vision a whole
lot of unpleasant recollections, and it has de-
pressed me somewhat, and I havn't gotten entire-
ly over it, altho' I have taken a bath and disin-
fected myself.

"How on earth do you disinfect yourself. Doc-
tor?" said I.

Why, by reading up on James Whitcomb "Riley
and Mark Twain. They are the best antidotes for
the "blues" I know of; they are antiseptic, for
"blues" is pisen. It will take me a week to goX
into good talking trim, at least, and then I'll tell
you about the time we captured Munfordsville.
Kentucky, and what happened about three days

97

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

before the arrival of the army ; I mean the main
army — Bragg's army.

You see, the army was composed of two army-
corps ; one commanded by General Leonidas Polk
(an Episcopal minister, a Bishop, by-the-bye, you
remember), who was killed later by a cannon-shot
at Kenesaw Mountain in sight of Marietta, Ga.,
where I was stationed at the time ; and the other
by General Hardee; both lieutenant-generals.

Brigadier-General James R. Chalmers, after-
wards Congressman from Mississippi, and lately
deceased, was in command of a brigade of Mis-
sissippi troops that had won the name of "The
Fighting Brigade" (as if all brigades were not
"fighting brigades"), and he thought he could
just do anything with them. He had assaulted
the place and was repulsed with a loss of two
hundred of his Mississippi boys killed, and twice
as many wounded. He was much censured for it,
because, acting as advance guard of the army, he
had no instructions to make an attack on a for-
tified place, especially when he did not know the
strength of the garrison, which was the case in
this instance.

The little village of Munfordsville nestles down
between three mountains, separated by two little
clear streams which unite there and form Green
river; part of the town is on each side of the
river. It was held by Brigadier-General Wilder,

9S

'a small game'' for a big stake.

of the Federal army, with a brigade of splendid
cavalry, 4500 strong; Chalmers had 2800 infan-
try.

The place was fortified by pine poles six or
eight inches in diameter, split in two pieces and
driven in the ground, slantin' outv/ards. They
were about fifteen feet high. Under the slope, all
around, was a ditch full of water. These poles
were not an inch apart; they formed an almost
solid wall, with loop-holes through which to fire ;
and the trees and bushes all around had been cut
down, and the trunks and limbs were so arranged
as to obstruct a charge by the enemy, and sub-
ject him to a fire from the loop-holes while tan-
gled up in the abattis. Even if Chalmers' men
could have charged through the clearing, and got-
ten over this terrible abattis, a veritable death-
trap, when they had reached the ditch they could
not cross it ; nor was it possible to scale the walls
without ladders. The fort was simply impreg-
nable.

But Chalmers charged it. My brother, who
commanded a company in the Tenth Mississippi,
informed me lately that after Chalmers had got-
ten his nien tangled up in the abattis he could
neither advance nor retreat — had to "get some-
body to help him let loose" — and that it was only
by a ruse that he was enabled to withdraw his
men. At nearly night he sent in a flag of truce

99

10 O ^!r o -* i

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

and asked permission to carry off his wounded.
It was of course granted, and under cover of
darkness and this truce he withdrew his men.

It was currently reported, and generally be-
lieved, that General Chalmers was in doubt as to
whether he should attack the place or wait till
the arrival of the main army, and that he and his
young staff-officers played a game of "seven-up""
to decide it. Chalmers won, and that meant "as-
sault," and he "assaulted" — butted his brains out,
figuratively.

I do not know whether this is true or not, con-
tinued the Old Doctor, but it probably is. Those
gay youngsters would play cards, you know, and
they'd bet on anything. They were very dare-
devils, and did not stop at anything.

It is a very remarkable coincidence that this
same General Chalmers attacked Fort Pickens
earlier in the war, and was badly repulsed, and
that the same General Wilder was in command of
the garrison at Fort Pickens, Looks like having
had his fingers burnt once would have made him
a little more cautious how he tackled Wilder.

Chalmers was only about 26 years of age, and
was as ambitious as he was handsome and brave.
In that fatal assault, amongst the other gallant
Mississippians, needlessly sacrificed, was the
brave and much-beloved colonel of the loth Mis-
sissippi Infantry, Colonel Bob Smith, of Jackson,

100

A FATAL ASSAUI^T.

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Miss. I went in under a flag of truce to see him,
when Bragg had arrived with his army two or
three days later, but Colonel Smith was past
knowing any one. I noticed in the ''Confederate
Veteran" that a granite shaft has been erected
by the Mississippi people to his memory, on the
spot where he fell. My brother, captain of one
of Smith's companies, and whom you all know,
was desperately wounded while leading his men
over that murderous abattis.

5|C 3^ JjC 3jC

About 2 o'clock on the third day after the as-
sault the army arrived, and bivouacked all around
the little town on the mountains. That night,
when the camp-fires were lighted. General Wil-
der saw that an army had arrived in force, and
sent out a flag and offered to surrender, or in
reply to a demand to surrender, I do not know
which. That is the surrender of which I told you,
I believe, before ; the one conducted by General
S. B. Buckner, out of compliment to him, he hav-
ing gone to school at Munfordsville when a boy.

After General Wilder had handed his sword to
General Buckner, the men all having stacked
arms and were prisoners, he asked General Buck-
ner what force we were in, as he wished to know
whether he had surrendered to anything like an
equal number without making a fight. General
Buckner said:

102

"a small game'' for a big stake.

"I shall not tell you anything more than if you
had not surrendered at daylight, in an hour, we
would have opened fire on the fort with seventy-
eight cannon."

"Good Lord," said General Wilder, "you would
have blown us off the face of the earth."

H: * n" *

But I'm getting ahead of my story.

About 2 p. m. General Hardee, with his staff
and escort, arrived on the south side of the town,
on top of one of the mountains, on which there
was a road, and we rode into a little grove on the
roadside, and dismounted to go into camp, or
bivouac, rather; no tents, you know.

Now, I had a nice saddle-horse, and a white
"orderly" (servant) ; besides, the amb'lance that
belonged to headquarters, driven by a negro boy,
was in my charge; and in it were carried the
medical supplies for headquarters, as well as my
valise and blankets, etc., on the march. When I
got tired riding horseback I'd coil up in the amb'-
lance and take it easy, see? To tell you the truth,
I early developed a wonderful faculty for finding
comfortable places, and I somehow escaped much
hardship that others felt. You bet I got out of
the field before the severity of winter set in, and
the offer of the empty honor, later, of being ap-
pointed assistant medical director on Bragg's
staff, could not — did not — tempt me to go back.

103

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

When, after leaving the Medical Board and Gen-
eral Hardee's party later, I was assigned to duty
at Chattanooga, Dr. Richardson of New Orleans,
now deceased, was then medical director. He was
transferred to Richmond at his request, and Dr.
Llewellyn, of Georgia, was made medical director
in his stead. Dr. Llewellyn did me the honor to
ask me to accept the position of assistant medical
director, made vacant by his promotion. Declined
with thanks. I had then a soft thing, and I pre-
ferred it to a hard thing with more "honors" ;
and life in the field, in the mountains of Tennes-
see in snow-time, was a hard thing, you bet. But
I have scattered again. Dan'els, can't you hold
me down to a steady gait? I'm awful at break-
ing.

Amongst other "medical stores" in that amb'-
lance in my charge, was a five-gallon demijohn
of real good old Kentucky whisky — Bourbon.
That I was popular with the staflf (on that ac-
count) goes without saying. Excepting Dr.
Yandell and the members of the Board of Exam-
iners, the staff-officers were young men. There
was Captain Wilkins, aid-de-camp, the same
Judge Wilkins now of Sherman, Texas ; Cap-
tain Roy, A. A. G. ; Captain Dave White, aide ;
Major Hoskins, chief of artillery; Dr. Breysach-
er, medical inspector, now living at Little Rock,
Ark. ; Dr. Lunsford P. Yandell, Jr., the late popu-

104

A SMALL GAME FOR A BIG STAKE.

lar lecturer in Memphis Medical College, brother
to the medical director, several others, and last
but not least (tho' he Zi'as the smallest one in the
lot), was Captain Harry Dash, aide, the same
Harry Dash now of the big grocery firm of Dash,
Lewis & Co., New Orleans. Dash was a poet ;
had written a small volume of poems at that time.
Well, when we halted, dismounted and hitched
our horses, the first thing was — to see how the
"medical stores" were holding out. The exam-
ination extended only to the demijohn, however.
I made my orderly get out the demijohn, and
seated on the grass with the demijohn in the
center of the circle formed by the young staff-
officers just mentioned, we had each poured out
about two fingers in our tin-cups, and Captain
Dash had said :

"Hold up, boys, I want to propose a toast."
So, with cup in hand — no thought of the old
adage, "many a slip" — each sat. expectant, cup
uplifted, listening to the toast. It was long, aye,
very long, to thirsty, weary pilgrims, and before
it v/as finished — Dash was saying something
about an elephant having a trunk, and not being
allowed to cross the Cumberland with it ; I didn't
hear it out — here came a shot from the besieged
garrison, a Parrott shell, screaming over our
heads and it burst right in our midst. Before
it exploded every feller had thrown himself down

105

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

flat on the ground, and in so doing had not only
spilt his whisky, but we kicked over the demijohn
and lost the last drop of the precious medical sup-
ply. Fortunately nobody was hurt. But that was
the most indignant crowd of youngsters you ever
saw.

What did we do? Why, Wilkins and White
just seized the little captain, after damning his
toast and damning his eyes, and taking him by
the legs and arms, with his back swung near the
ground, just bumped him — bumped his seat
against a black-jack tree about twenty bumps ;
that's all.

Here the Old Doctor took out a cigar, which
he said somebody had given him, and lighting it
puffed away with much relish.

"Thanks, Doctor," said I. "That's a pretty
good story for a man who wasn't going to stop
but a minute, and wasn't in a talking humor. Sit
longer! No? Well, do come. Doctor, some time
when you are in a talking humor; it must be a
sight to see."

The Doctor grunted a good-natured grunt, and
said:

I can't help talkin' ; I've just got to talk, and
you fellers are about the only ones I know who
will listen to me about "war times." They say,
"oh, g'wan, Doctor, we live in the present." Well,
boys, I reckon I am an anachronism, a back num-
ber. So long, boys.

THE BUSHWACKERS AFTER THE DOCTOR.

THE BUSHWHACKERS AFTER THE DOCTOR.

After operating all night and otherwise at-
tending to the wounded at Harrodsburg after the
battle of Perryville, said the Old Doctor, resum-
ing his account of the occurrences in Kentucky,
about daylight I mounted my horse and lit out
to overtake General Hardee and his party. I had
not had anything to eat in nearly forty-eight
hours, and was nearly starved. I rode rapidly.
It was a cold, clear morning, late in October, and
on the beautiful macadamized road my swift sin-
gle-foot racker fairly flew.

I had gone perhaps six miles before it occurred
to me that I might be on the wrong road — going
the wrong way. Presently I met a man in a cart,
and I asked :

"Is this the road to Camp Dick Robinson?"
(I knew that was the general's objective point.)

"My! — No!" said the man. "You are on the
Versailles road, and going right t'wards the Yan-
kees ; they are coming this way."

Here was a predicament. All those six miles
to retrace, and the danger of being captured— r
perhaps shot for a spy — ^being alone, and away
from my command. But I turned back and went
flying, I tell you.

107

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

A little after sun-up I came in sight of the
general's party, just breaking camp and about to
be off. They had bivouacked inside of a far-
mer's stable-lot where there was plenty of oats,
cawn and fodder ; something my horse needed
mighty bad. The general and his staff and escort
had mounted and were off before I had dis-
mounted. Dave, the black cook, had saved me a
mutton-chop and some bread, and the coffee-pot
was still on the fire. He was busy packing the
camp-chest and loading the camp things into the
wagon. I put my horse in the stable, after giving
him his fill at the trough, and shaking down some
oats and cawn for him, I prepared to take a nap
on a pile of straw while he was feedin'. I had
devoured my breakfast meantime.

Before I had gotten a good hold on my nap,
"bang," "bang" and keep-on "bang"-ing, went
the guns close by, the bullets whistled through
the bam like hail. It was our rear-guard. Gen.
Joe Wheeler, keeping back the enemy's advance,
which was crowdin' us. General Hardee had a
closer call than he knew, being already detached
from his command and goin' it alone. My horse
feeding at the trough was frightened, and jumped
around considerable. I hastily put on the saddle,
and in doing so I dropped this ring from my
hand, said the Old Doctor, here removing from
his finger a large, well-worn onyx seal ring.

io8

THE BUSHWACKERS AFTER THE DOCTOR.

which he said his father gave him on his sixteenth
birthday, and which he prized very highly.

My hands were cold and the ring, always a
little too big for me, slipped oft* and fell in the

l^-r.. '-

"WE FAIRLY FLEW."

straw. I was terribly distressed at the thought
of leaving it, yet the bullets kept warning me that
it was about time I was thinkin' of gettin' fur-
ther. It was dark in the stable, and just as I had

109

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

despaired, and was about to mount, a movement
of my horse threw a gleam of Hght on the ring.
I grabbed it, with a handful of straw, and at a
single leap was in the saddle and out of that like
an arrow. My horse seemed to be as much im-
pressed with the necessity of getting away as I
did. A volley from the enemy followed us — they
were now in sight, and our men driven back,
were in the stable-yard. We fairly flew.

A mile away the road ran along at the base of a
low range of mountains for several miles. As I
went flying along — ring still clasped in my hand
— hadn't had time to put it on — ''biz" went a
rifle from somewhere on the side of the moun-
tain, and the bullet cut my cap. "Bing" went an-
other rifle, further down, ahead of me; and
glancing up I saw the little ring of smoke made
by the old-fashioned Kentucky rifle, the old muz-
zle-loader, with which I was so familiar in my
boy days as a squirrel-hunter — the most accurate
firing rifle of them all.

I realized that I was now running the gauntlet
of bushwhackers ; stay-at-homes — Union men —
guerillas, as they were variously designated. I
just laid flat down on my horse's neck, making
myself as small as possible, wishing I could make
it invisible, and giving him rein — no need of spur
— he was as much impressed with the "gravity of
the situation" as was yours truly — we went like

no

THE BUSHWACKERS AFTER THE DOCTOR.

an arrow. I have no idea how many cracks they
took at me, but it seemed like several hundred
thousand. It was "whiz," as a bullet would go
by me ; "twang," as another would ring just over
my head; "bang," "pop," "biz," for several miles.

Presently I came in sight of some of our party,
an officer of the staff and some teamsters. As I
rode up — they were dismounted at a little road-
side "store," or "grocery" — one said:

"Here comes the surgeon, now."

I rode up, dismounted, and put on my ring.
One said:

"Doctor, Bogle is shot."

Bogle was the wagon-master of our headquar-
ters. He had gone into a field near by, with two
of the men and a wagon, by orders of the captain
of the cavalry escort, to get some cawn. They
were engaged in gathering and loading the wagon
with cawn, and while so engaged Bogle was shot
thro' the fleshy part of the shoulder with a minie
ball ; while the horse of one of the men was shot
thro' the head and killed. The horse was killed
by the bullet from a Kentucky rifle, small bore;
and the third shot took effect in the horn of the
saddle of the other man. It was evident that three
persons had fired, and that each of the party was
a target.

The captain took a squad of men and went up
on the mountain-side where the shots came from,

III

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

and in a little cabin they found an old, gray-
bearded man, and two strapping mountain boys,
of some eighteen or twenty. They were bush-
whackers, and were by the rules of war, outlawed.
The men found secreted in the cabin a minie rifle
and two small-bore Kentucky rifles, the calibers
of all of which corresponded with the bullet-holes
in Bogle's shoulder and in the horse's head, and
in the saddle, and all three rifles were still warm,
showing that they had just been discharged.

That was proof enough. Without judge or jury,
or the form of a trial or investigation, the old
man and the two boys were taken out — some-
where— I didn't go; I was busy dressing Bogle's
wound. But one of the men told me that the old
man never said a word, but manifested the
stoicism of an Indian.

112

A FROG STORY.

A FROG STORY.

Said the Old Doctor on this occasion, seating
himself with his usual make-yourself-at-home

air:

While the army was around about Tupelo, Miss.,
after the battle of Shiloh, and General Hardee's
headquarters were at Tupelo, one afternoon in
August, after the day's work of the board of
medical examiners was over, I remember that
Drs. Yandell, Pim, Heustis, the members of the
board, and myself (I was secretary, you remem.
ber I told you), were sitting in camp talking and
smoking. There were other officers of the staflf
present also, as all of the officers' quarters were
near together in a nice grove; and some one of
the party, I have forgotten whom, but I think it
was Major Kirkland, one of the engineer officers,
stated it as a fact that a toad would swallow coals
of fire, and that it would not hurt him. He could
not explain it, he said, as it would hardly do to
say that the toad thought the coal was a "light-
ning bug," or that he ''thought" at all. But what-
ever be the reason, it was a fact, he said.

The party laughed at him, and said that his
credulity was of a robust and full-grown sort;
that he was easily imposed upon, and the state-
US

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

ment was scoffed at and ridiculed. Dr. Yandell
said :

"Come, Kirkland, what do you take us for?
That's an old woman's tale that I have heard all
my life, but it is not to be supposed that anybody
would believe it."

RECOGNIZED THE MAJOR.

I didn't say anything. I was too young, and
too green, and altogether too inexperienced to
take a position on so momentous a question in
natural history. I had read, however, a good deal
about toads and frogs, and other reptiles, in
works on physiology, and amongst other things I

114

A FROG STORY.

had read, somewhere, that away back yonder in
the early days of Egyptian civiHzation the
tenacity with which a toad cHngs to Hfe had been
observed and recorded ; that they had been known
to be found walled up in solid masonry, I don't
know how many centuries old; and I remember
an instance being cited of a toad having been
found in the reign of Ram-Bunk-Shus III, or
Ram Shaklin, or some of those old Egyptian
rams, that had been buried a thousand years.
But I kept mum.

The major was a little ruffled at the merciless
way the party guyed him ; so he offered to prove
it. That made matters worse. They laughed
more than ever, and that made the major mad.
Luckily for him and for science, and for the
truth of this story —

''Come, now, Doctor; you are not going to tell
us that yarn for straight, I hope," said Dr. Hud-
son, Junior Editor of the Journal. "What do
vou take us for?"

''Ain't T, though?" said the Old Doctor. "It's
gospel straight, laugh if you will."

As I was saying, it being summer time and
toads were plentiful in that country, and it being
about sunset, presently the major spied a large
warty toad hopping about as if he were out for a
lark ; a comfortable looking old fellow, and send-
ing Henry the colored boy for some coals, we

115

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

prepared for a circus — a demonstration — a fail-
ure (of course), a fight or a foot-race. There was
great interest manifested. A crowd assembled.

The major, now thoroughly on his mettle, kept
saying, "I'll show you."

He went cautiously towards the toad, and with
thumb and finger thumped a live coal right plump
in the frog's path — right before his face. Well,
sirs, that old toad stopped, straightened up,
turned his head on one side and took a square
look at the coal. It must have been just what he
was looking for, as he seemed pleased to meet
it. His eyes shone with a new light, and he made
a grab at the coal and swallowed it with apparent
relish. Fact. His eyes sparkled still more, and
beyond doubt he registered the mental reflection
that that certainly was the much talked of "hot
stuflf." He set out to look for more I suppose ;
but we were not done with him yet.

Dr. Yandell said that the major had taken an
unfair advantage of the toad ; that he was evi-
dently getting old, from his looks — and his eye-
sight was not good ; that "the shades of eve were
falling fast," etc., and that he would bet the toad
wouldn't eat another. The major repeated the
trick with success several times, till every one was
satisfied that the toad had not swallowed the fire
under a delusion ; he seemed to know it was hot,
and rather liked it. But Dr. Yandell insisted that

ii6

A FROG STORY.

it would kill the frog; it would surely produce
inflammation of the stomach ; no living creature
could take fire into its stomach and live, he said.
Well, sirs; the major said he would make good
his whole story. He declared that the frog would
be none the worse for his hot supper. He had
Henry to get a wooden box and put the toad in it,
and shut him up over night. As I live, boys, next
morning that toad was not only alive, but gave
unmistakable evidences of being hungry ! He
recognized the major and winked at him; and
when a candle-bug, one of those yellow fellows
with a hard shell, was thrown in the box, the frog
snapped him up like a trout would a minnow;
fact.

117

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

POKING FUN AT THE MEDICAL DIRECTOR.

During the siege of Atlanta, said our Genial
Friend on this occasion, looking radiant and
happy in a new suit of linen, his blue eyes twink-
ling with merriment, when Atlanta was head-
quarters of Hood's army, the Medical Director of
Hospitals, the venerable Dr. Samuel Hollings-
worth Stout, now living at Dallas, Texas, for-
merly of Giles county, Tennessee, issued orders
that every patient at the hospital-post of Coving-
ton, Ga., forty miles below Atlanta, should be
sent further down into the interior, so as to make
room at that, the nearest and largest hospital-
post, for the wounded expected during the battle
which was daily expected, but which hung fire,
literally speaking, for many weeks.

There were at Covington some six large hospi-
tals ; I mean, there were six separate hospital or-
ganizations of large accommodating capacity, but
some of them occupied four, five or six separate
buildings. The Hill hospital was all under one
roof, the only one that was — a female college
building ; but the others were simply beds on each
side of the room in every little "store," little
rough plank one-story buildings, arranged on the
four sides of the public square, in which stood
the court-house; the stereotyped plan of little

ii8

POKING FUN AT THE MEDICAL DIRECTOR.

towns throughout the South. The churches were
also filled with bunks. We didn't have any nice
little enameled bedsteads, or iron-framed cots; —
ours were just rough, undressed scantlings,
knocked together ; and our feather beds were
sacks filled with hay; pillows ditto.

Well, there were on duty at that post seventeen
medical officers, I amongst the rest. When the
patients, all that were able to bear transportation,
vvcre sent away, and the battle didn't take place,
and no new arrivals came, there were more doc-
tors at the post than patients, and we Hterally had
nothing to do but frolic, ride with the girls, have
picnics and fishing parties. But Dr. Stout issued
an order that each day one of the medical officers
should be detailed by the post-surgeon — of whom,
by-the-bye, I'll tell you a good story — to serve as
"Officer of the Day." From 7 a. m. one day,
till 7 a. m. the next day, he was to be "on duty".;
that is, he was to wear a sash and sword, and
stay where he could be called at night if wanted :
and during the day he was to strut around (that
wasn't in the order, however) and do nothing.
There just wasn't anything to do, I tell you ; nev-
ertheless, the order was that the officer of the day
should visit and inspect each ward (most of them
were empty; we were to look for spooks, I reck-
on), and visit every department, kitchen, laun-
dry— everywhere; inspect the food, the cooking,

119

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

etc., and to make a written report every morning
to headquarters.

All this red-tape was nonsense, and the report
soon degenerated into a mere statement that ev-
erything was O. K. — a perfunctory performance
of about four lines.

The officer of the day was the only one who
would stay in town ; all the others would go off
frolicking or fishing. By-and-by Dr. Stout wrote
down to the post-surgeon, saying that the medical
officers did not show zeal enough in their duties,
and that they must be required to make more de-
tailed reports. I made one of twenty-four pages
of foolscap, which was all words. I didn't say
a thing more than I had been saying in four lines,
but said it differently ; rang all the changes on it.

It began by saying:

"The English language is happily so constructed
that a great many words of diverse origin and
derivation can be so brought to bear as to convey
one and the same idea ; and consequently, one best
versed in the resources of the language will
naturally be most facile in its use." "Thus," I
said, to give an illustration : "Instead of saying
as Dr. Brown did yesterday, that the bread was
a little scorched, it might be expressed thus :

"In consequence of inattention, ignorance, in-
competence, temporary absence or preoccupation

120

POKING FUN AT THE MEDICAL DIRECTOR.

of the colored divinity who presides over the cul-
inary establishment of Ward 3, vulgarly called
the 'cook/ a part of the nutriment, the subsis-
tence, the 'grub,' a very essential part, which was
that day being prepared and intended for the ali-
mentation and sustenance of the unfortunate be-
ings who, by accident, exposure or fate were at
that time sick or wounded, and lying prone on a
roughly extemporized bunk in a building near by,
by courtesy called a hospital, sick, wounded or
else convalescent, and dependent on others, our-
selves, to-wit, and deprived, doubtless much to
their sorrow and regret, of the privilege of being
at the front in the trenches or on the line of battle,
battling for their country ; to-wit, the bread, being
too long exposed to the oxidizing influence of the
oven, had been somewhat scorched, burnt, or
otherwise injured, being thereby rendered un-
wholesome and unfit for the purposes for which
it was intended ; to-wit, the nourishment of the
said sick, wounded or convalescent soldiers."

Or the fact that the bread was burnt, I said,
"might be thus expressed, if one were very scru-
pulous as to the elegance of his diction, and
wished to be exact, and not in the least to mislead
or disappoint the Honorable Medical Director
who, we knew^ in his zeal, was famishing for tid-
ings from the half-dozen patients and the seven-
teen doctors at that post, saying nothing what-

121

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

ever as to the condition of the bunks and their
sole tenants, the Lectularius family," and so
forth, and so forth. I strung her out twenty-four
pages, and didn't say anything except that the
bread was burnt in cooking.

Dr. Warmuth (now living at Smyrna, Tenn.),
came into the post-surgeon's office one morning
where all the officers assembled once a day at
least, to make his report as officer of the day for
the preceding twenty-four hours. Dr. Macdon-
ald, an old U. S. army surgeon, and a strict dis-
ciplinarian, was the post-surgeon — a good one
on him presently. Dr. Warmuth wrote out his
report and handed it to Dr. Macdonald. He said
there was nothing to report, as usual, except that
a pig had fallen into the sink in the rear of Ward
3, and he respectfully suggested that Surgeon

, who would now come on as officer of the

day, be requested to get him out.

Of course they had the laugh on me, and rigged
me no little about the pig.

I put on my uniform — coat buttoned up to the
chin and devilish uncomfortable, I tell you ; sum.-
mer time ; fly-time — fishing time, and the trout
were striking like all-possessed. I put on my
sword and sash and went on duty as "Officer of
the Day:" all the other fellers went fishing, and
took all the ladies, girls and wives, with them,
leaving me, I do believe, the sole occupant of the

122

POKING FUN AT THE MEDICAL DIRECTOR.

town, outside of the hospital people; big fish-fry
and dance at the mill. Just my luck, I said.

I never once thought of the pig; there was no
pig in it, of course ; Dr. Warmuth was only pok-
ing fun at me and the medical director.

Next morning when we were all assembled in
the post-surgeon's office, and Dr. Dick Taylor
was telling how big that fellow was that broke his
hook and making me green with envy, I was re-
minded that my report was then due, and I
thought for the first time of that pig. I took
a piece of paper and a pen, and knocked oflf this
(here the Old Doctor handed Dr. Hudson a news-
paper clipping) without a break, and gave it to
Dr. Macdonald :

"Surgeon Warmuth in reporting mentioned
that a pig in sporting on the brink of the sink,
attracted by the od'rous vapors began to cut up
divers capers, and essayed at last to take a peep
into the depths of the nasty deep ; but owing to
a little dizziness he got his pig-ship into business.
I heard a squealing, which, appealing to every
feeling of my nature, I quickly ran to get a man
to lend a hand to help the porcine creature. The
pig, in the meantime, became apprehensive that
the stink of the sink (which was very oflfensive),
would produce a fit of indigestion, revolved in his
mind the knotty question, To be, or not to be.*
He soon decided that if taken by our hands weM

123

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

save his bacon (not the Friar, but the fried), then
another effort tried. Striving then with might
and main, he landed on the land again, and
scampered off with caper fine, a happier and
wiser swine."

Dr. Macdonald began to read :

'*Wha — what's this ?" he said ; "- - pig in sport-
ing on the brink of the sink ?"

WHA— WHAT'S THIS?"

"That's my report as officer of the day, sir,"
I said.

"Respectfully forwarded to the medical di-
rector, not approved," he wrote on the back of it.

Dr. Stout returned it "not approved," and
added "this dignified officer is expected to make
a more dignified report."

124

POKING FUN AT THE MEDICAL DIRECTOR.

But the young fellows in Stout's office ''ap-
proved" of it, and they made copies of it, and it
got into the Atlanta Constitution. There is where
I got this; my wife found it with my old war-
things lately.

125

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

DR. DICK TAYLOR, OF MEMPHIS.

Among the medical officers at Covington at the
time I speak of, said the Old Doctor, was Dr.
Dick Taylor, of Memphis. He was a rattler —
full of fun as a kitten, and as chuck full of fight
as a buzz-saw. He is living yet, I believe. He
was an impetuous, hot-headed little fellow, but
withal a genial and most companionable one. He
had his wife with him, and they had a little boy
about three 3^ears old, named "J^^se Tate." Mrs.
Taylor, like Mrs. Boffins in "Our Mutual
Friend," was a "high-flyer at fashion" — a society
lady. She was very proud of her little boy, and
took great pains to train him in the way he should
go, so that in the sweet bye-and-bye, he would not
depart therefrom, but follow in the footsteps of
his pa (nit). She had taught him the name of
the President of these United States (tempora-
rily, then, dis-"United"), the name of the Presi-
dent of the Confederate States, the Queen of
England, and a whole lot of other information
that it is thought all children should possess, and
her great pride was to have the little fellow show
oflF before company.

"Jesse Tate," his mother would say, "Who is
President of the Confederate States?"

"Jeff Davis," the little chap would say.

126

DR. DICK TAYLOR OF MEMPHIS.

"Who is Queen of England ?"

"Victoria," Jesse would answer stoutly, and so
on ; she would put him through his paces before
all callers.

Dr. Dick got tired of this nonsense, and he
purposely confused the boy for a joke.

"Jesse Tate," he would say, "Who is President
of the United States?"

"Abraham "

"Tut, tut," his daddy would say. "Queen Vic-
toria is President of the United States." "Now,
who is Queen of England?"

"Vic ."

"Tut, tut," his father would say, "You mean
Jeff Davis," and so on, until he got the little fel-
low so confused that he didn't know which from
'tother.

One day some fashionable ladies called, and of
course Jesse Tate had to go through his perform-
ances.

"Jesse Tate," his mother said, "tell Mrs. Hen-
derson, like a good little boy, who is President of
the United States."

"Queen Vic Davis," said Jesse stoutly.

"Oh, no, my son ; you forgot ; Abraham Lin-
coln is the President of the United States."

"Abraham Lincoln," said the child.

"Now tell Mrs. Henderson ; who is the Queen
of England?"

J 27

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

"Jeff Toria," said Jesse Tate.

Poor Mrs. Taylor was mortified beyond expres-
sion. She said :

"That's some of Dr. Taylor's work; he's al-
ways spoiling the child."

'K *!* *** •!*

One morning when we had assembled in Dr.
Macdonald's office as usual, Dr. Macdonald who,
you remember, had been a U. S. army officer, and
was a great stickler for etiquette, said to Dr.
Taylor :

"Doctor Taylor, I am much pained and sur-
prised to hear that you so far forgot yourself
yesterday, as I understand, as to curse one of the
men, — a private. Kennedy, the ward-master,
complained to me yesterday that you cursed him.
You ought to remember, Doctor, that in this war,
we are engaged in a cause almost holy ; we are all
brothers ; our soldiers are citizens, not hirelings,
and at home, for all you may know, Kennedy's
social position may be as good as yours. It is
only the accident of war that makes you an officer
and him a private. Reverse the situation ; and
suppose that you were a private ; how would you
like for any one to curse you, just because he was
an officer? You should treat the private soldier
with all kindness and cgn^ideration, because of
their defenseless position and the hardships — "

Just then Kennedy burst in at the door, which

128

DR. DICK TAYLOR OF MEMPHIS.

had been closed, and in great excitement, ex-
claimed :

"Doctor Macdonald, the house is on fire."

Macdonald, furious with rage and anger, had
already, before Kennedy had gotten the words
out of his mouth, jumped up, and had seized a
chair and was in the act of knocking Kennedy
into kingdom-come, saying:

"You d - -'d scoundrel ! — how dare you enter
my office without knocking?"

"But, Doctor, the house is on fire !" said poor
Kennedy.

"I don't care if it is," said Macdonald; "I'll
teach you to knock at my door when you have
anything to communicate to me !"

We pacified him bye-and-bye. Kennedy had
gone, crestfallen and much hurt.

"Doctor Macdonald," said Dick Taylor, "I am

pained and surprised to see that you would so far

forget yourself as to curse a private. You should

remember. Doctor, that we are engaged in a holy

cause, and that we are all brothers, and "

"Oh, you be hanged," said Macdonald.
* * * *

I had rooms in the house occupied by Dr. Tay-
lor and his wife and Jesse Tate. It was a little
cottage of four rooms and a hall through the
center. It was Dr. Taylor's invariable custom to
take a nap after dinner. It was summer. He

129

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

would Spread a pallet on the floor in the hallway,
and would snooze an hour or so every afternoon.
I used to sit on the little gallery, or "porch"
as they called it in Georgia, and read, usually,
meantime. I had brought with me from Missis-
sippi one of my men, a slave, a big black fellow
named Jim. Jim was a kind of Jack-at-all-trades.
I had given him permission to open a barber shop

MAKING THE ATMOSPHERE PURPLE.

on his own account on the corner near our house.
Of course he went by my name, and he had up a
little sign, ''Barber Shop," and his name under-
neath.

One afternoon the shop was closed, I suppose,
for a big strapping fellow, a "sick soldier," — a
"hospital rat" as the chronic stayers were called,

130

DR. DICK TAYLOR OF MEMPHIS.

~a great gawky six-footer,— had been there to
get shaved, I suppose, and not finding Jim, made
inquiry for him, and had been directed to me, his
owner, for information as to his whereabouts, as
Jim went by my name So, this "grim, gaunt and
ungainly" specimen came up to the little porch
where I was sitting, reading, and with an at-
tempt at a salute that looked more like grabbing
at a fly than a salute, said :

"Is you the man what keeps the barber-shop?"
The spirit of mischief, always on me, prompted
me to say, very kindly :

"No ; there he is, lying down in the hall. He

told me to call him if anybody came; walk in."

So, the big fellow went in, and waked Taylor

up. I dodged behind the comer of the house, for

I knew what was coming.

Out came the fellow, at double-quick, and Tay-
lor right at his heels, smashing Mrs. Taylor's lit-
tle rocking chair over his head and back, and at
every lick making the atmosphere purple with
remarks that won't do to print.

"The confounded scoundrel!" said Taylor,
when he was able to speak ; "To have the impu-
dence to wake me up, and, damn him, to ask if I
was the man that keeps the barber-shop !— your
nigger r'

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

PRESUMPTIVE EVIDENCE.

My wife had a pretty, bright little darkey
named "Flora." She was about ten years old,
and while not old enough or trustworthy enough
for nurse for the baby, she was an excellent hand
to amuse him, and to keep him from swallowing
the tack-hammer, for instance. She was an ad-
mirable mimic, and, like many of her race, was a
bom musician. I remember she got hold of a
harmonicon, somewhere, one of those little cheap
toy things that now sell for a dime, and it is as-
tonishing the amount of ''harmony" she could
get out of it.

My wife undertook to teach Flora to read. She
got one of those little blue-back primers, in which
there is a picture to illustrate the simple words.
Like Smike in "Nicholas Nickleby," whom old
Squeers, the Yorktown schoolmaster made spell
"horse," and then go and curry his horse and
feed him, so as to impress it upon the mind ; there
was "a-x, ax," and a picture of an ax ; "o-x, ox,"
and a picture of an ox, and so on. Flora learned
very rapidly to spell "a-x, ax," and "o-x, ox,"
and "j-u-g, jug," etc., and could rattle it off
nicely.

One day my wife, suspecting that Flora was
getting along too fast, — that she was not leam-

132

PRESUMPTIVE EVIDENCE.

ing to connect the sound of the letters with the
object, after putting her through all of the "a-x,
ax," and *'b-o-x, box," exercise, put her thumb
over the little picture of the ox, and said:

"Flora, what is that?"

"0-x, ox," said Flora.

"How did you know that was "o-x, ox," said
my wife.

"I see'd his tail," said Flora, with a shame-
faced grin.

133

EFCOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

A CLOSE CALL— A BAD STAND AND A WORSE

RUN.

I've been tellin' you fellers about Covington
a good deal, said the Fat Philosopher at his next
visit, but I b'lieve I didn't tell you about the time
I was killed, did I? No?

Well, it was while there were so few patients
there and so many doctors, that General Stead-
man, or Stoneman, I don't recollect which, don't
make much difference — raided the place. We
thought maybe he had heard of the state of af-
fairs there, and being short on real good doc-
tors sought this opportunity to replenish.

Now, surgeons, non-combatants, are usually
not taken prisoners ; but on this occasion we
feared that finding so many of us, and with noth-
ing to do, he'd relieve the Southern Confederacy
of the tax of feedin' us. At any rate, we feared
that the Yanks might take along some of us, at
least, if only as specimens, leaving only enough
to care for the few remaining sick and wounded
at that post.

Now, like the parable in the Bible about all
those fellers who were invited to a party and
didn't want to go, every feller had some excuse.
For my part, like also one of the aforesaid, I had
"married a wife," and we had a baby, and it

T34

A CLOSE CALL.

would have been exceedingly inconvenient, to say
the least, for me to make a trip North, even at
the invitation of so distinguished a gentleman as
General Whateverhisnamewas, without the wife
and baby especially. I particularly didn't relish
the idea of visiting Johnson's Island at that sea-
son of the year, however attractive that place
might be thought by others to be; so, when the
news of the approach of the raiders was received
every man at the post lit out for the timber to
hide and wait till the clouds rolled by. We never
dreamed that they would want us so bad as to
pursue us. It never occurred to any of us that
the Federal army might be so short on doctors
as to have these fellers scour the woods for a
lot thought to be particularly choice. But they
did.

Lesassieur and I (Lesassieur of New Orleans;
he was bookkeeper at the hospital), we hid in a
thicket, down in a little creek bottom about two
miles from town, and kept as still as mice. By-
and-by we heard the Yanks talking, and heard the
rattle of their accouterments and the tramp of
their horses' hoofs up on the hill to our left, and
quite near us. It is likely, if we had staid still
they would have passed us unobser^^ed ; but Le-
sassieur, like a fool, jumped up and ran. And I,
like another fool, did the same. ^

There was a dense woods, the river bottom or

135

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

swamp, about half a mile off, and that was our
destination. We knew if we could reach that
cover, pursuit would be impossible and would
cease. But we had to cross an *'old field" of
broom sage before getting to it, and it was sepa-
rated from the old field by a ten-rail fence. Across
the field Lesassieur went like a scared rabbit,
and cleared the fence at a single bound, as easily
as a buck could have done it.

Now, as a jumpist I was never regarded by
my many admiring friends with that degree of
enthusiasm with which they regarded my many
other accomplishments ; and as for running —
well, I never practised, you know. I followed
as fast as I could, however, but not near fast
enough to keep even in speaking distance of Le-
sassieur. He was scared — that's what ailed him.
I thought, however, that a bad run was better
than a bad stand, so I put in the best licks I
knew how. Of course I wasn't scared — oh, no. I
just desired to advise Lesassieur to hurry up. He
had an old mother, he said, who would grieve for
him if he came up missin'.

I hadn't gotten half way across this field when
the Yankees hove in sight. They were in hot
pursuit — seven of them, well mounted. They be-
gan to fire at me about three hundred yards off,
and came with a whoop. They yelled like
Comanche Indians. Thev were elated, I don't

ClyEARED THE FENCE.

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

doubt, at the prospect of capturing an unusually
fine specimen, — a young one.

They were getting uncomfortably near, and
"bang," "zip," "bang" went the guns, the bullets
hitting the ground all around me. The situation
was getting serious. Lordy — everything mean
that I had ever done in my life went through my
mind like a panorama in brilliant colors. I re-
called without an efifort all those things that I
had done which I hadn't orter done, and similarly
all those things that I had left undone, etcetera,
and I felt that there was "no health in me" (see
Sunday School books) ; and it did look as if very
soon there would be no breath in me. At least
that wasn't a very healthy place for doctors about
then. Something had to be "did," and that pretty
quick, or I'd be a cold corpus, and my wife a
widow, to say nothing of the great loss to science
and the Confederate army.

I had in my hand a small mahogany watch-box,
in which was my wife's watch, her diamond ring,
and some eighty dollars in gold coin. (Lordy,
if those Yanks had known it.) My own fine
watch I had in my pocket, but no sign of it was
visible, you bet. I had prudence enough to not
tempt those young men ; it would have been
wrong. Presently a bullet struck that box and
shattered it, scattering the contents "promis-
cuous." ,

138

A CLOSE CALL.

I saw that I would be killed before I could
reach the fence, and you know a feller thinks
mighty fast when death is looking him in the face
at short range. Stratagem came to my mind. I
stopped, faced my pursuers, who, by that time
were coming on the run, one feller checking up
now and then to take a crack at me — and throw-
ing up my hands, waved my handkerchief in to-
ken of surrender. But, confound them, their early
education in the ethics of war had evidently been
neglected ; they didn't know what a flag of truce
was (it was a clean handkerchief, or I would not
have much blamed them for not recognizing it).
"Zip," "zip," went the bullets still, cutting pretty
close, but missing me. At the pop of the next
shot, I threw up both hands, and fell heavily for-
ward— dead — they thought.

"Oh, I fetched him that time," said one.

In an instant they were all around me. I laid
still. One fellow was drunk, and when he found
I was not dead he pointed his gun at me and
fired. He would have unquestionably finished me
but for the boy, the youngest of the party, who
knocked the gun up just in time to save me.

"Oh, don't shoot a wounded prisoner," said he.

"Are you much hurt?" asked one of them.

"No," I said, very much at a loss how to round
it off, fearing that when they found I had tricked
them they would kill me. "I am not hit at all;

139

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

but I saw I would be killed, so I offered to sur-
render, but you kept shooting, and that was the
only way I could think of to make you stop. I
surrender to this man," said I, pointing to the
boy.

I got up on the boy's horse behind him, and
slipped a $5 gold piece in his hand (one I had
picked up of my scattered coin). The drunken
man still wanted to shoot me. The boy gave me a
pull at his canteen, for I was nearly famished for
water. I was "spittin' cotton." Do you fellers
know what that is? The boy said:

"I'll protect you and take you to the general."

The general, as soon as he saw that I was a
surgeon, released me and said:

"What did you run for ? You might have been
killed. We don't take medical officers prisoner."

You bet I had a big attack of glad. I went
home to my wife and baby with a light heart.
Dinner was about ready; we had a good dinner,
too, and I made that Yankee cavalry boy sit right
down to the table with us, and we just treated him
like a brother. We stuffed his haversack with
pies and apples, and gave him a bottle of home-
made Scuppernong wine, ten years old, a product
for which the Georgia people are famous. I wish
I knew what became of that boy. I kept his name
and home address a long time, but lost it, some-
how.

140

A CLOSE CALL.

Find my stuff? Well, yes, most of it. Next
day I went to the spot. ( I thought at one time of
erecting a monument to me on the spot where I
fell a martyr to the Lost Cause — where the Yan-
kees killed me — as they thought.) I hunted
around in the broom sage where I fell, and was
lucky enough to find most of the contents of my
box. I've forgotten now, how much of it was
missin'.

^^^S^^^-

141

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

THE DOCTOR SMUGGLES CONTRABAND STJP-

PLIES.

After the storm was over the post was broken
up — we were then in the enemy's Hnes — and I
was left there (at Covington), in charge of a lot
of bad cases that couldn't be moved. Old man
Giles, who had a little drug store, which, like
everything else, was rifled, gutted — robbed, came
to me and said :

''Doctor, the Yankees in plundering my store
overlooked twenty bottles of chloroform. It
was in the bottom of a box, with a false bottom
over it. They took everything else that was in
the box, and thought they had gotten to the bot-
tom, when they hadn't. Let me sell it to you for
the Southern Confederacy."

"What will you take for it, Mr. Giles?'* I said.
"You know I have nothing but Confederate
money."

"That's good enough for me," said the loyal
old fellow. "I reckon it's worth fifteen dollars a
bottle, ain't it ? And as the bottles are only about
two-thirds full, we'll call the twenty bottles fif-
teen." (The fact is, there was a pound of chlo-
roform in each bottle ; but I didn't know it till I
went to dispose of it in Augusta later.) So, I

142

SMUGGLES CONTRABAND SUPPLIES.

paid him for fifteen bottles at $15 a bottle, $225
Confed.

I took my twenty bottles of chloroform to my
room, and by filling each one reduced them to
fifteen, thus saving space in packing. I hid them
securely in the bottom of a small trunk, and tak-
ing the hint from Mr. Giles' experience, I put a
bottom over them, a false bottom, for, being in
the enemy's lines, I didn't know, if overhauled by
a picket at any time on my way to Augusta, when
I should be ready to go, but that the precious
chloroform would be taken from me, which it
surely would have been ; it was contraband, and
much needed by our people. Well, sirs, I finally
got away the last of my sick and wounded, all
who didn't die, poor fellows, and with my wife
and young baby, and my cook and nurse, I went
to the nearest place where the railroad was not
torn up, and took a train for Augusta, which
place we reached without accident or incident
worth mentioning.

The very first person I met whom I knew was
Peterson, of the medical purveyor's department,
out looking for — chloroform ! Said he :

"Fm on track of a lot of chloroform that I was
told a blockade-runner has brought in. I want to
see what else she has."

I said: "What are you paying for chloro-
form?"

143

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

"We need it dreadfully, and Dr. Young sent me
out to look for some, and if I came across any,
to get it, at whatever price," said Peterson.

"Perhaps I can put you onto a lot, say, fifteen
or twenty pounds ; — what shall I say to the party
it is worth?" I said.

"That ain't the question; can I get it?" in-
sisted Peterson excitedly.

"I'll see the party by 4 p. m. and let you know ;
but a price will have to be fixed, some time,"
said I.

"Ofifer her" (the most fearless and successful
smugglers thro' the lines were "shes"), "offer
her two hundred dollars a pound," said Peterson,
getting more excited, "and if she says that is not
enough, make it three hundred. Anything to get
the chloroform."

I then told him that I had fifteen bottles, and
stated that I had bought it in twenty bottles, but
that they were not full, and that I had consolidat-
ed it to reduce bulk. I told him that I had
brought it purposely to turn over to the Confeder-
ate authorities, knowing how much it was needed,
and that I would not accept any such price for it
as he was recklessly offering ; that I had only paid
$15 per bottle, and called it fifteen bottles, and
that the government should have it for what it
cost me.

He wouldn't hear to the proposition.

144

SMUGGLES CONTRABAND SUPPLIES.

"Why," said he, "I would have to pay anybody
else a big price for it, and would be glad to get
it. You had all the trouble and risk of smuggling
it in, and if you had been caught you would have
been sent to prison at Johnson's Island, or else-
where, and I ain't a going to rob you in any such
way."

And in spite of my protests he made out du-
plicate papers at $150 per pound, and informed
me that there were full twenty pounds in the lot,
— just ten times as much per pound as I had paid
for it, and I got a pound and a quarter to the
pound. He paid me $3000. My stars, Dan'els,
if such speculations were possible now. wouldn't
a feller get rich?

"No, Doctor; not your sort of 'fellers' and
mine. It would be a case like the man who, at
one time in his life, he said, could have bought a
league of land in Texas for a pair of boots — ^but

he didn't have the boots," I answered.

* * * *

At that time you could buy anything at any
price asked for it, with the absolute certainty of
doubling your money on it next day, perhaps, in
a short time, at least, things rose so fast, or,
rather, Confed. script declined so fast. Why, an
officer couldn't live on his pay, and but for specu-
lations, opportunities for which were frequent,
he would have been confined to the army ration of

145

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

beef and hard tack; couldn't afford sweetnin' and
coffee ; I mean, real, shonuff coff'ee, or anything.
I recollect, my pay and commutation for quarters
and fuel and horse feed amounted to $365 a
month. Think of that, and coffee scarce at $50
to $75 a pound.

I remember one day I bought a wagon-load of
home-tanned leather from a countryman, and'
without unloading it from the wagon, sold it to
the town storekeeper at $1200 profit; and made
$2000 on a barrel of peach brandy after drinking
off of it a week. Fact. (And the Old Doctor
smacked his lips at the bare recollection of the de-
licious aroma of the Georgia home-made peach
brandy.)

I believe, said he, that what Homer called the
"Nectar of the Gods" was Georgia peach brandy.

When left at Covington, as stated, in charge of
the few bad cases after the raid, I found on hand
at the hospital quite a supply of New Orleans
molasses, and a deficit of nearly everything else.
I sent four barrels to Augusta and sold it, and
with the money bought chickens and such things
as the men needed. They couldn't live on mo-
lasses, you know, tho' I, myself, am pretty fond
of sweet things. I can show you fellers today, the
account of sales of that molasses at $37.50 per
gallon.

THE HOSPITAL SOLDIER.

THE HOSPITAL SOLDIER.

Said our ever welcome visitor on this occasion :
The hospital soldier — the "convalescents," they
were generally called — tho' many of them had
convalesced so long ago that they had forgotten
they were ever sick — were omnipresent and all-
pervading. About towns and villages they were
simply everywhere. They invaded premises on
any and all and no pretexts ; loafed, stole fruit —
well, as they say now, the woods were full of
them. Go where you would, there you would see
more or less gaunt, gray-clad figures, usually
very dirty. Of course this was a class of soldiers,
mostly conscripts, who would resort to almost
anything to escape duty in the field. The better
element were true Southerners, and as soon as
able to leave the hospital would hasten back to
their commands. It was not uncommon to see
a soldier twice or thrice wounded. But there
were a host of pretenders, called, in war times,
"malingerers." I do not know the etymology of
the word. It often required much watching and
some ingenuity on the part of the surgeon to de-
tect these fellows.

I remember one fellow who pretended to have
a stiff knee. He played it on the surgeons for
nearly a year. We were deceived by the fact that

147

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

this party was an educated man and of good fam-
ily. He should have been too proud to shirk
duty and play off, but he wasn't. I say, should
have been too proud. It is pride, pride of charac-
ter, self-respect, regard for the opinions of others,
that makes a man brave. But for this element
in the soldier's make-up, there are few who would
face a charge. There would be no Hobsons, no
Cushings.

This man had a soft position as bookkeeper in
one of the hospitals. By-and-by we began to
suspect that that knee was not quite as stiff as he
made believe, and we proposed to put him under
chloroform to break up the adhesions, we told
him ; not intimating, of course, that we suspected
him. He had said it was the result of rheuma
tism, and adhesions were supposed to exist. He
expressed himself as being very anxious to have
his leg restored to usefulness, and he could not
very well do otherwise than consent to the propo-
sition. Some of the hospital attendants had told
us that this fellow was a fraud, and that they had
seen him when off his guard, skipping along as
brisk as a mink ; but when he was hailed, the leg
immediately got stiff, and he went to limping.

Three of the surgeons had an understanding
that they would get everything ready to operate,
and at the last moment remember that something
was forgotten, so as to create a delay while the

148

THE HOSPITAL SOLDIER.

patient was in position, in order to test the powers
of the voluntary muscles of the leg.

The man was accordingly put upon the table,
the leg laid bare, and everything gotten ready for
the chloroform. He was lying on his back, with
the legs just far enough down to bring the edge
of the table under the knee. Just then I said :

"Here — this is not the bottle of chloroform I
want ; there is a better sort on my desk I got out
for this case; go and bring it quick."

(The messenger, however, had his cue that he
was not to bring it quick.)

The stiff leg held out manfully; but it must
have looked to the poor fellow that the man
would never come with that chloroform. Pres-
ently the leg couldn't stand the strain any longer.
It began to weaken and droop. As quick as a
flash he would jerk it up, — but d-o-w-n it would
go again, until the extensors just became paral-
yzed ; human nature couldn't stand it, and the leg
and foot just slowly went down, down, till that
leg was as limber as the other. The game was
up. He saw he was caught. He just got up, and
putting a bold front on said :

"Well, gentlemen, you have beat me. I reckon
I had better go back to my command."

"Yes," said I, "I think you had."

And he went.

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

THE HOSPITAL DIETARY.

NICE DISTINCTIONS WITH LITTLE DIFFERENCE.

As might be expected from the character of
the food, the cooking, which was of the most
primitive sort, the irregular Hfe and the exposure
— the vicissitudes of the soldier's life, diarrhea
was the prevalent, the almost universal disease,
both in camp and in hospital. No matter what
else a patient had, he had diarrhea.

The Medical Director of Hospitals arranged a
diet table, and all the hospital medical officers
were required to prescribe what was theoretically
supposed to be appropriate diet for each patient.
There was 'Tull Diet," "Half Diet," and "Low
Diet," but the victualing range was so limited
that there was more of a distinction than a dif-
ference between them. Full diet was beef and
cawn bread, and whatever else could be had, such
as vegetables. Half diet was soup and toast, and
such like; while low diet was rice and milk, — if
you could get the milk. The poor fellows got
awfully tired of rice. I remember one poor fel-
low, a delicate, thin boy, convalescent from a long
spell of typhoid fever, the curse of camp and hos-
pital. He needed nothing so much as wholesome,

150

THE HOSPITAL DIETARY.

nourishing food. Rice and milk was his portion
day in and day out. At last he revolted :

"Take it away," he said; "I had just as soon
lie down and let the moon shine in my mouth as
to eat rice."

And I am much of his way of thinking.

*»* ^ *** T*

On the surgeon's rounds every convalescent
was expected and required to be at or on his
bunk. We would go to each one and ask about
his bowels, and prescribe ''low diet." In a half
hour after, if one should go out behind the barn
or elsewhere, those convalescents would be found
with haversacks full of green peaches, or green
apples, or cucumbers, or whatever else they could
get, devouring them ravenously. Of course, they
never got well. Diarrhea got to be second na-
ture with many of them.

Speaking of malingerers, there was a class of
older men, for the most part conscripts of the
farmer, or tramp class, who did hate the very
sight of a gun, and many of them would manage
to get sent to the hospital on some pretext or an-
other, and as said, they made a protracted visit
in most cases. A specimen of this class was an
old ignorant fellow named Dusenberry. I found
him amongst some new arrivals one morning, sit-
ting on the side of a bunk, all drawn up. Of
course, his name and regiment had been entered,

151

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

and the diagnosis, ''diarrhea" recorded by the
clerk, — diarrhea, if nothing else. It was always
a safe refuge: "Di-ur-ree," most of them called
it.

When I got to him on my rounds, I said :
''Well, my friend, what is the matter with

you

"Well, Doc,"— they would call all of the med-

THE WORST YOU EVER SEE'D.

ical officers "Doc," the familiarity of the style,
it seems, was intended as a manifestation of a
friendly regard and to propitiate ; I need not say
it was not always appreciated, nor accepted in
the spirit in which it was offered. "Well, Doc,"
he answered, "I mostly don't know 'zackly what
ails me. I've got a misery in my chist, a sore-
ness in my jints, a-a-kinder stiffness in my back,
and a hurtin' a-1-1 over!"

152

THE HOSPITAL DIETARY.

"Got the 'di-ur-reer said I recognizing a
make-believe at once.

"Yes, yes, Doc," he eagerly assented, "got it
purty bad."

"Got the hypochondriasis ?" said I, with a show
of concern.

"The worst you ever see'd, Doc," replied the
man.

"Put this man on low diet," I said to the nurse,
and later, I told him to "watch him."

I found at another bunk a burly Irishman, who
was real sick. I will say here, I never found an
Irishman "malingering" — playing off. They
made the best soldiers, as a rule, of any class,
and you bet I am a friend to the whole race!
God bless them, and give them "Ould Ireland,"
a free country, as a rightful inheritance ! I said
to him, with a view of finding out what was the
matter, and what had been done for him before
he came to me:

"What treatment have you had, my friend?"

(meaning medical.)

"Dom'd bad. Doc," said he.
* * * *

One night there was an arrival of a large num-
ber of sick and wounded, and every bunk was
filled. All hands (but one, I learned later) went
to work to relieve their necessities. I was busy
with them when one of the young assistant sur-

153

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

geons who had lately been sent to report to me,
came and said that a lot of new patients had been
sent to his ward, and asked me if I ''wanted him
to attend to them tonight?"

I just looked at him, a straight look, full of
meaning, but said not a word. He attended to
them. I mention this to show that there were
doctors and doctors, then as now, and that the
''beats" were not all conscripts and privates.

154

A MEDICAL ''high DADDY.'

A MEDICAL "HIGH DADDY/'

When I took charge of one of the hospitals
at Marietta, said the genial Old Doctor, I found
a great many soldiers there, apparently well and
able to do duty in the field. There seemed to be
as many attendants as patients. So, I had a
cleaning up, a sifting out, and thus recruited the
ranks in the field, considerably. Every man capa-
ble of bearing and shooting a gun was needed at
the front.

I had noticed a very officious chap acting as
ward-master or nurse in one of the wards; a
big, strong, country fellow, strapping and hale.
He is the fellow Dr. West told me of afterwards,
who, on being instructed to give a certain patient
a pill every two hours during the night, counted
up that there would be six times to give medicine,
and, I suppose, he reasoned that if one pill is
good, six are better ; he just gave the patient all
six at one dose, and laid down to sweet repose.

When I got to this fellow— they were all stand-
ing in a row, the attendants and supernumeraries,
and I would question them and dispose of them
"on their merits," as the saying is— I said :
"Well, sir, what command do you belong to?"
He was the most impudent looking fellow im-
aginable. He had a supercilious look, and when

155

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

he spoke he turned his head on one side, after
the manner of Mr. Pecksniff ; he evidently had a
good opinion of himself. He had been sent to
hospital for some sickness (probably), but had
been well so long he had forgotten it. He had
probably gone from one hospital to another down
the road as the sick were shifted lower down.

WHAT COMMAND DO YOU BELONG TO?

It was a great trick for convalescents, his sort, to
get to accompany the sick to hospital, and they
managed to make a good long stay, on one pre-
text and another.

"What command do you belong to?" I said.

"Me?" said he.

"Yes, you."

156

A MEDICAL HIGH DADDY/'

"1 belong to the 42nd," he replied.
"The 42nd whatr said I.
He looked at me in pity and surprise, and said :
"The 42nd regimenf (with accent on "ment").
"Yes, I know," I said, "but what State? The
42nd regiment of what State troops?"

His surprise increased, and with astonishment
depicted on his countenance, not unmixed with
commiseration for my ignorance, he said:

"Why— the 42nd GEORGIA, of course," as if
there were no other troops in the field that he
had ever heard of.

"Well," I said, — "what are you doing here?
You are not sick now?"
"ME?" he said.
"Yes ; you."

"Wh}^— I'm— er -er —I'm the chief— head—
medical, ^r-tv -medical medicine-giver of ward
three !" in tones of surprise, that I should not be
aware of a fact of such stupendous importance.
He gave it to me slowly, for fear, evidently, of
collapse. As it was, it had a most prostrating
effect on me.

"Well," I said, "I think you ought to be pro-
moted. Go back to the 42nd 'v\g\ment' and tell
your colonel to make you head chief, medical or
otherwise, bullet-arrester; you'll be good to stop
a bullet from some less important person."

^S7

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

HIS IDEA OF HAPPINESS.

I REMEMBER once I was standing at the gate
of the hospital talking to Dr. Pringle, the village
doctor, who had by some means escaped conscrip -
tion, or was exempt in some way from military
service, for you must know that before the war
was ended everybody had to go ; everything that
could shoot a gun had to go to the front. Oh, war
is just hell, as Sherman said, and no mincing it, if
you'll excuse an emphatic remark by way of
parenthesis. At first the best men volunteered.
As they were killed or died their places had to be
filled, and if there were not volunteers — and later
there were not many — the conscript officers got
what was left. The first conscription took all
men between 20 and 45 ; then between 45 and 60 ;
then between 16 and 20. "Robbing both the cra-
dle and the grave," one fellow expressed it.
Hence, to' see a man at home and in citizen's
clothes was indeed a rare sight.

Dr. Pringle was a handsome, dapper little fel-
low of the band-box sort. He was about forty,
very dressy and smelt of sweet soap. His shirt
front was starchy and stiff, and his black cloth
suit was neatly brushed. He was real pretty to
look at ; such a contrast to his surroundings.

While we were in conversation, some half

158

HIS IDEA OF HAPPINESS.

dozen or more ''hospital soldiers," "convales-
cents," had gathered around, and with mouths
agape were listening to our conversation. Pres-
ently one cadaverous looking cuss, the very pic-
ture of diarrhea and the effects of diarrhea,
drawled out :

"Doctor, you ought to be a mighty happy
m-a-n" (with rising inflection on "man.").

"Why so, my friend?" said the doctor.

"'Cause you've got on a biled shirt, and your
bowels ain't outen order," replied the poor fel-
low.

159

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

WHY HE WAS WEARY.

That reminds me of a good one, said the Old
Doctor, when he could get his breath after laugh-
ing over the recollection of the fellow and his
notion of perfect happiness.

There was a dandified little chap, a sweet-
scented chap, literally, for he was always per-
fumed with Lubin's extract, who was on duty,
detailed as clerk in the commissary department.
He claimed to be a nephew of General Joseph E.
Johnston, and was generally known as, and called
by the officers at that post, "Uncle Joseph's
Nephew." He was a pretty blonde ; parted his
hair in the middle. It was curly and pretty, and
he had the loveliest little blonde mustache. His
name was Mitchell, but he called it "Meshelle."
He was immensely fond of ladies — the young
ones — who petted him and made him^ a bigger
fool than he was naturally. He was great on the
sing ; had a . little creaky falsetto voice, and he
trummed a little on the guitar. He wrote
'"poetry" ; quoted sentimental pieces, particularly
from Tom Moore. In brief, he was a pretty good
specimen of Hotspur's "fop."

One summer afternoon, lolling in an easy chair,
surrounded by a bevy of pretty girls, I saw him
on the little gallery or porch of the residence of

i6o

WHY HE WAS WEARY.

one of Covington's best families. The girls, half
dozen of them, perhaps, were fanning him and
petting him as he leaned back with the most af-
fected air, and they were importuning him to
sing. The balcony extended out to, and was
flush with the sidewalk. Of course, a lot of

"WHY— HE WAS WEAK AND WEARY."

''convalescents" had assembled to listen ; they
were everywhere where there was a prospect of
anything whatever going on, or happening, or
likely to happen. They would seem to spring out
of the ground. One of the girls was saying:

"Now, Captain Meshelle (with accent on
'shelle'), you must sing some for us." (Captain,

i6i

fc ECOLLEC'i IONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

nothin'; he was just a private. The only thing
''Captain" about him was the trimmin's on his
coat.)

"Oh, Miss Sue, — I cawn't sing, you know;
only a little for my own amusement," said this
swell, with an air that, as Sut Lovingood would
say, made my big toe itch; I felt like kicking
him.

"No, Captain, but we know you can sing, and
do sing. Maggie says you sing just too lovely
for anything, and we will take no denial," urged
one of the girls.

"Do sing some for us. Captain," said another,
— a pretty little black-eyed miss ; "Puss has come
over to-night just especially to hear you sing,
and it will be such a disappointment if you don't."

"What then, shall I sing?" said the "Captain."

"Oh, — just an^z-thing; anything you like," said
all of the girls in chorus ; "We'll leave it to you."

Thus encouraged and urged, our little dude
straightened up, and with a finicky air, his eyes
turned up like a dying goose, in a little falsetto
voice he began :

"W-h-y — am / so w-e-a-k and w-^-a-r-y — "
(with a heavy prolonged accent on "we").

At that interesting point one of the graybacks
who had been peeking through the ballusters of
the little gallery, sang out :

"Hits 'cause you've got the di-ur-r^^, you Sun-
day galoot!"

162

HOSPITAL EXPERIENCES.

HOSPITAL EXPERIENCES.

On one occasion while serving in the hospi-
tals in Georgia— it was at Marietta, and we had
"Officer of the Day" there, too, and it was my
day on, and I had to sleep at the hospital — on
entering my ward one morning — there had been
an arrival of sick and wounded early that morn-
ing, and the wards were all filled up — the most
pathetic, the most doleful, yet the most ludi-
crous sight met my eyes. In the central tier of
the bunks was a young boy seated on, or rather
sitting propped up in bed on one of the bunks,
who had been shot through the mouth while in
the act of hollerin' (began the Old Doctor on this
visit to the Journal office). The ball had passed
clear through both cheeks, cutting the dorsum or
upper part of the tongue pretty bad. There he
sat, bolt upright, his face swollen till his eyes
looked ready to pop out ; the skin drawn tight, the
tongue swollen to tremendous size, and hanging
out about three inches, with ropes of saliva drip-
pin' off; his face framed in by a handkerchief
passed under the chin and tied on top of his head.
It gave him the most distressed and the most dis-
tressing, the most awful appearance imaginable.
Well, sirs, he had an old screechy fiddle to his

163

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

shoulder and was just making ''Arkansaw Trav-
eler" howl.

That's the spirit, Dan'els, that made the "Rebs"
almost invincible. But, excuse me, I should ad
dress such remarks to Hudson and Bennett and

the boy ; Dan'els knows.

* * * *

Amongst the new arrivals of sick and wounded
on another occasion, whom I found in my ward,
was a small dark-skinned man, apparently twen
ty-eight or thirty years old, who couldn't speak
a word of English. I never did find out what
nationality he belonged to. He had fine white
teeth, coal-black hair, scant beard and small mus-
tache, also very black. He had small sharp black
eyes that twinkled. I think he was a Syrian, or
Egyptian, or belonged to some of those eastern
tribes ; and his eyes had the look, and he had the
general aspect of a hunted animal.

As I entered he was lying on a bunk near the
door, and he was watching the door narrowly as
if expecting something or somebody, with fear
and dread. When I approached him and spoke
to him, he made no answer, as he could neither
understand nor speak United States, but his eyes
showed some concern ; he appeared to be anxious
to know what I was going to do to or with him.
I had no means of finding out what ailed him,
as I was not up in Syrian nor Sanscrit nor Egyp-

164

HOSPITAL EXPERIENCES.

tian, nor yet any other language except my own
mother tongue ; so, physical examination was my
only recourse for making a diagnosis. By signs
I made him understand that I wanted to look at
his tongue. When that dawned upon him he
poked out his tongue, readily, eagerly, it seemed
to me, watching my every movement narrowly.
But horrors! I couldn't get him to take his
tongue in any more; he kept it out as long as I
remained in the ward, following me with his eyes
everywhere I went; and not till some time after
I had finished my visit and left the room, the
nurse told me, did he venture to draw in his
tongue.

The next visit, as soon as I entered — he was
watching for me — out went the tongue, and noth-
ing could induce him to retract it as long as I was
in sight.

I sat on the edge of his bunk, and in my efforts
to find out what was the matter with him, for I
had as yet no clew except that he had a rise of
temperature, and I suspected typhoid fever, the
most common form of fever those times — doctors
will readily understand why I palpated his in-
guinal region, and I'm a'talkin' to doctors now —
I stripped up his shirt over the abdomen, and
placing my left hand over the suspected region I
palpated, tapped the fingers with the other hand

i6s

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

— you all know — to ascertain if there was tym-
panites there, or "dullness."

Well, sirs ; with tongue still protruding, a look
as dark as his own Egypt (his or somebody
else's) came on his face, and he just hauled ofif
and struck me just as hard as ever he could ; re-

HAUI^ED OFF AND STRUCK ME.

sented it as an indignity, or an undue familiarity
with his "in'ards."

Ah, the surgeons saw many things never
dreamed of by other people. I could talk for
hours on unusual things, even in surgery, wit-
nessed by them in times of war.

I found in my ward one afternoon at my usual

1 66

HOSPITAL EXPERIENCES.

evening visit, a young man sitting on the side of
his bunk eating his supper of rice, beefsteak and
tea (the tea made of sassafras, most Hkely, for
"store" tea was not to be had). I asked him
where he was wounded. He had just arrived on
the train from the front with a large number of
others ; they had all received their first dressings.
He had a handkerchief tied under his jaws and
over his head, covering the ears. With his finger
he touched one ear then the other.

I took the handkerchief off ; the bullet had
gone in at one ear and come out at the other,
literally. Of course nothing could be done for
him.

In an hour afterwards the nurse came for me ;
the young man was dying from internal hemor-
rhage.

3(C 5Ji 2)C *fC

A large shipment of wounded arrived at the
Marietta hospitals about noon one day and were
immediately distributed to the wards, and we
went at once to work on them, of course. The
first one I saw and went to on entering my ward
was a young man from Swett's battery, who was
shot through the right lung with a minie ball.
I knew him well. We had gone to school to-
gether in Vicksburg when we were boys. His
name was Walter Fountain. He was sufiFering
great pain, and I placed a full dose of morphine

167

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

on his tongue, and remarking, "You will be easy
presently, Walter," proceeded to examine, wash
and dress his wound. (You know we had no hy-
podermic syringes then ; that was before their
day.)

"Yes, I'll be easy presently," he said.

When I got through with him I had occasion
to leave the room for a few minutes, and hardlv
had the door closed behind me when I was star-
tled by the report of a pistol, I hastened back.
Fountain had blown his brains out. The poor
fellow was "easy" now. I reprimanded the nurse
for not taking away his arms on entering the
ward, as was the rule. He said that he had con-
cealed one pistol, giving up the other. He said:

"I was standing at the table with my back to
him, rolling a bandage. When you went out T
heard him say :

" 'Farewell, father and mother,' and before I
could look around, he had shot himself.'

i68

ENCHANTED AND DISENCHANTED.

ENCHANTED AND DISENCHANTED.

Ah — my recollections of Chattanooga are ever
fresh and green; they are delightful. In the
springtime of life everything looks rosy; the
prospect opens up hefore the vision most in-
vitingly. The blood is warm, the fancy free,
and oh, what possibilities occur to one who, hav-
ing health and strength, properly directs his en-
ergies ! To many of us, however, it is the story
in the end, of Dead Sea apples; ashes on the
lips. We don't pan out always, remarked the
Old Doctor with a sigh.

I had much leisure and you bet I enjoyed it.
Oh, the rides with the girls in the beautiful
woods. The horseback trips to the summit of old
Lookout Mountain, the fish frys, the picnics. Of
course, a good-looking young officer, with hand-
some uniform and apparently plenty of money,
plenty of spare time, a fondness for young ladies'
society, and a liberal share of impudence, was
necessarily popular. It seems to me now, to look
back upon those days and scenes, that the girls
were prettier than they are now. In their "home-
spun" dresses, and often home-made hats, they
were as pretty as pictures. It may be that 'tis
distance (of time) that "lends enchantment to

169

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

the view," but I know distance couldn't "robe"
those girls in homespun dresses.

There was one in particular whose image
dwells with me to this day. Her name was Van-
nie Vogle. She was ''the daintiest little darling of

f'&mM

•^

A STANDING DARE TO KISS HER.

them all." She had the brownest hair, the fairest
skin, the reddest lips, the most laughing, love-lit
eyes, the lightest figure, the smallest foot, the
highest, most aristocratic instep, the softest touch
— oh, she was just too sweet for anything in this
world except to roll into strips of peppermint

170

ENCHANTED AND DISENCHANTED.

candy. An anchorite could not have been in-
different to the charm of her presence. It looked
to me that on her lips and in her eyes there was
a standing dare to kiss her ; it was audible in ev-
ery glance of her gazelle-like eyes, every gleam
of her rosebud mouth, every smile ; and it was as
much as I could do to keep my hands off of her.

One afternoon I called and found her sitting
alone on the little sofa in her parlor, the scene
of many pleasant tete-a-tetes with her.

I went in on her unexpectedly — unannounced.
She smiled sweetly but said nothing, and did not
rise. Her eyes twinkled mischievously — she kept
her lips closed, and to any remark or question she
made not a spoken reply. I was puzzled. I said :

"What's the matter with you, you little witch?"

She smiled, but said not a word. I said :

"I'll make you speak" — and with that I threw
my arms around her; I could stand the dare no
longer — and tried to kiss her.

She jumped up and throwing me off, managed
to evade me — and running out on the little gal-
lery or porch, spat out a mouthful of brown juice.
Looking reproachfully at me as she wiped heu
mouth on the back of her hand, she said :

"You fool — didn't you see I had snuff in my
mouth ?"

A FRIEND IN DTTRANCE VILE.

The guard-house was on the main street of the

171

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

town. It was a two-story brick store which had
been converted into a prison by putting bars
across the windows. Vannie and I often rode
by there. I had a lovely racking horse, the one
I got at Munf ordsville ; 'member ? and she had a
thoroughbred of her own. {She was a thorough-
bred, you bet.) Back in my town where I had
been raised, there was a particularly bad young
fellow, almost a criminal, whom the young men
would not associate with ; he was a low-down fel-
low, but a company of his sort had been formed
(conscripted no doubt) and brought out of Jack-
son. Of course I knew the fellow and he knew
me. His name was Dan Kerry.

As Vannie and I rode down by the guard-house
one afternoon in gay spirits, I brave in my fine
uniform with oodles of gold lace on the sleeves
and my cap covered with ditto ; stars on my collar
— oh, I was gay ! As we passed the guard-house,
old Dan Kerry, for it was he, looking through the
bars, yelled :

"Hello, Dickey, where the hell did you get them
good clothes?"

I felt like I could have crawled through a crack
half-inch wide ; and Vannie, the little minx, said,
with a sly look out of the comer of her pretty
eyes:

** Who's your friend, Doctor?"

172

ENCHANTED AND DISENCHANTED.

A LOOKOUT MOUNTAIN SPRITE.

But Vannie was not the only pretty girl there,
by a jug-full; there were lots of them, said the

ON THE BRINK OF A PRECIPICE.

Doctor. Of course, the time I speak of was be-
fore I got married, you goose, said he indignant-
ly, in reply to a question from Hudson.

173

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

There was one we called 'The Daughter of
the Eagle's Nest," because she lived up on top
of Lookout Mountain. She was a brilliant beauty,
and the most dashing, fearless horsewoman I ever
saw. I was riding up the mountain one after-
noon, alone, and happening to look up overhead,
away out on the very brink of a precipice five
hundred feet above me there stood a magnificent
horse, on whose back sat a lady with a scarlet
jacket on, and her hair fallin' loosely down her
back. It was she — "The Daughter of the Eagle's
Nest." I thought it was the prettiest picture
I ever saw ; the most romantic scene. She was
the impersonation to my mind of Scott's Di Ver-
non.

174

THE CLEVER QUARTERMASTER.

THE CLEVER aUARTERMASTER.

A ROMANCE OF ARMY LIFE IN CHATTANOOGA.

The Old Doctor entered the Journal office on
this occasion looking unusually radiant. I saw
at once that he was * 'loaded" ; so, giving him a
good cigar, showing him courteously to his cus-
tomary seat, while I in default occupied the nail-
keg, I proceeded to draw him out.

"Got something on your mind that pleases you,
I see. Doctor," said I. "Let's have it."

After a few preliminary puffs of the Havana,
the curling smoke of which he regarded with the
eye of a connoisseur as it circled in blue rings
above his head, he said :

I reckon, Dan'els, my being detailed by General
Bragg at Chattanooga to serve on a general
court-martial was an experience unique in the his-
tory of wars; a surgeon, a non-combatant, serv-
ing as prosecuting attorney of a military court.
Fortunately for me I had acquired considerable
knowledge of the law, having begun its study be-
fore I studied medicine, and I was able to acquit
myself with credit, so I was assured by the late
Judge Jno. B. Sale, of Aberdeen, Miss., and later
of Memphis. Judge Sale was one of the great
lawyers of the South in that day, and why he

175

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

was not then made Judge Advocate instead of me,
is one of the unfindout-able things of the past.
He was a captain of the Hne, having raised and
brought out of Mississippi a splendid company of
volunteers. He was at Chattanooga, convalescent
from a wound, I think, at the time the court was
organized. He was detailed as a member. Know-
ing his ability and having a great admiration and
friendship for him, of course I got points from
him in making up my "briefs" or indictments, as
the case may be. Later, Judge Sale was appoint-
ed and commissioned Judge Advocate-General on
Bragg's staflF.

While serving on that court, of course I was
relieved of all other duty, and it was a picnic.
Court was called at lo a. m., and usually ad-
journed at 2 p. m.. Why, I had more leisure
than I could dispose of ; couldn't give it away. I
tried everything; fishing, frolicking, flirting.
That's how I saw so much of Vannie and the
other girls.

But boys it was too funny to see a big, six-
foot Tennesseean, a soldier detailed as guard and
stationed at the door of our court, salute me as T
entered of mornings, with a bundle of papers
under my arm for appearances ; I, a smooth-faced
chap of 23, as unsoldierly a looking chap as one
would expect to see in a day's march. He would
make a grab at me as I entered, intending it for

176

THE CLEVER QUARTERMASTER.

a salute. The military salute of a soldier to a
superior consists of raising the right hand rapidly
to the visor of the cap, palm outwards, fingers
erect, and lowering it to the side with a graceful
sweep outward. This fellow had an idea of the
salute, but he grabbed at me instead. He would
raise his hand to about the chin, fingers half
closed and pointing outward, and the manoeuvre
looked more like he was trying to catch a fly "on
the fly" than salute an officer. It was too funny
especially as he would call me "Jedge."

But I set out to tell you about the clever quar-
termaster. He was my room-mate, and he was
just the cleverest fellow that ever was. Hi?
name was Riddle, Captain Riddle; and he was
the post-quartermaster. He was universally called
the "Clever Quartermaster," because he was so
accommodating — especially to the ladies. His
home was in New Orleans, and he was engaged
to be married, should he live to return, to a young
lady of that city, and he did live, and did return
and did marry her, and, as they say in the story
books, they "lived happily forever afterwards."
He was fidelity itself. He was very fond of la-
dies' society, and while he couldn't help flirting
a little, for the same reason that the Irishman
struck his daddy — because "it was such an illigant
opportunity," he was true to his love. He car-
ried her picture "over his heart," he said, but I

1/7

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

saw him take it out of his coat tail pocket, and
couldn't help reflecting that if one's heart can only
"be aisy if it's in the right place," he must have
had a troublesome time, if there was where he
carried his heart. I used to catch him looking
at the picture, often. He was about twenty-five
years old, but everybody called him "Old Riddle"
— I don't know why. I can see him now — his
laughing face covered with a full, auburn beard,
and his laughing blue eyes twinkling with merri-
ment. One reason I liked him was because he
would laugh at all my jokes ; he'd laugh at any-
thing. A man who will do that for a feller gets
mighty close to his affections, don't he, Dan'els?
Riddle was a number-one business man, as well as
a most genial and delightful companion ; still
there was something about him suggestive of a
pet cub bear. I was devoted to him. We roomed
together, as I said, and my chief delight was to
"rig" him ; tell jokes on him of which he was in-
nocent. If I made any fmix pas, or got into any
scrapes, which I often did, I'd make a "scape-
goat" of Riddle and tell it as having happened to
him and not to me; see? Oh, he was an ideal
room-mate. In fact I was a young rascal. I kept
his secret for him, but got out a report on him
that he had addressed the young lady referred to
in another place as the "Daughter of the Eagle's
Nest," and that she had kicked him.

178

THE CLEVER QUARTERMASTER.

I told one of the girls that I had a good joke
on the captain, and promised to make a romance
out of it for her — for — don't laugh, Dan'els, you
nor Hudson ; I know Bennett won't, for he's in
love now, and all such matters are with him sorter
"holy" you know — I used in the sappy days of my
adolescence, the "'fuzzy" days of my green youth,
to — to attempt poetry! Fact!

Well, Riddle had a clerk named Bingham,
who, somehow got the nickname of "Binging-
ham," and another clerk, a spoony, wormy look-
ing little fellow named Dent, who worked in the
quartermaster's department. Dent affected the
flute, and was sentimental as well as wormy, or
because he ivas wormy, I don't know which, and
I suppose it don't make any difference.

I wrote out a rig-a-marole in doggerel about
Riddle and his imaginary love-affair, and sent it
to Miss Maggie Magee, who used to love to tease
old Riddle ( I think, now, she was trying to catch
him, herself ; oh, Bennett, the ways of girls are
past finding out; you might as well surrender).

On her way to church, Miss Maggie, who had
it in her bosom and intended to show it to the
other girls (in the choir), dropped the manu-
script on the street. It was picked up and some-
how it got into the papers.

Well, sirs — I like to have gotten a duel on
hand; not with Riddle, oh, no; he liked it; he

179

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

thought it was just too good for anything and
had Dent busy a month making copies of it — but
with the young lady's father, bless you — and I
had to do some tall lying to keep him from just
frazzling me into small pieces; he threatened to
"wear me out."

It created no end of fun. One paper after an-
other published it, till finally it got into the North-
ern illustrated papers, and I saw a copy of it with
the funniest Httle pictures imaginable, and an
editorial about it. It was given in a sort of de-
rision as an illustration of the efforts of "Secesh
poets."

Here is the plaguey thing now. You can have
it if you want it. My wife came across it the
other day, along with my "oath of allegiance to
the United States," some assignments to duty —
Provost Marshal's permits to walk about, etc.
I had clipped it from the Chattanooga Rebel, then
edited by Henry Watterson ; he hadn't gotten to
be "a bigger man than Grant" then. My wife
thinks it is real smart. Here it is ; read it, Dan-
'els."

THE CLEVER QUARTERMASTER, OR THE FATE OF
THE FLIRT.

Chattanooga, Tenn., May 12, 1863.
Miss Maggie:
Let me tell you a good story

180

THE CLEVER QUARTERMASTER.

On my room-mate, Captain Riddle ;

Captain Riddle, Quartermaster

Of the Post of Chattanooga ;

Riddle, with the auburn tresses

All combed back so slick and shiney ;

Riddle, with the whiskers auburn, —

{He says auburn; / say sunburn [t]).

Tell you of his many virtues,

Tell you of his winning ways ;

Of how he came, and how he tarried,

How he courted — would have married

Chattanooga's fairest daughter.

But she thought he "hadn't ought to"

"Shake" the "girl he left behind him."

Now, how she knew that he was "mortgaged" ;

How she knew that he was joking.

When he told her of his feelings,

Feelings of a tender passion,

Which he told her, she had 'wakened,

'Wakened by her smiling eyes,

I know not ; nor do I reckon

Anybody else can tell.

It's not the province of us poets

To sing of things unless we know it

All "by heart."

But who he is, and where he came from;

How he came, and what he did;

When he did it, and how he did it,

What he said, and how he said it,

i8i

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Be my theme, and you will know it
Like a book, when you have read it.

2fC ^ ^ >TC

In a far-off Creole city, —

In the land of milk and honey;

Land of beauty rich and rare, —

Beauty that's not bought by money ;

(That just fits, and it's so funny

That I'm bound to put it in) ;

Where the sun forever shines

(On this far-off Creole city) ;

Shines so steady, shines so hot it

Melts a fellow (what a pity

That the Yankees ever got it) ;

In this far-off Southland city,

Where the cactus rears its head ;

Where the groves of orange blossom ;

Where the gentle South winds speak

Nought but love.

Where the magnolia's lily cheek,

Fairer than the fairest maiden's.

Is kissed by the gentle evening zephyrs ;

In this land, and in this city —

In Union street and near the city

Livery stables — stables that do smell offensive,

There lived a youth, not sad or pensive,

But a gay and festive cuss ;

Gayer than Old Will-the-weaver,

Gayer than a gay deceiver,

182

THE CLEVER QUARTERMASTER.

Gayer than a peacock gaudy,
Gayer than a speckled puppy
With a ribbon 'round his neck.

This the youth and this the hero
Of the many deeds I sing;
Hero of this song subHme ;
Hero of my first attempt,
In writing which I spend my time,
Time more precious than is money ;
Time more precious than are shin-
Plasters of the bank of Chatta-
Nooga, or the many-colored plasters
Which are now so very plenty.

This the youth and this the hero;
This the Clever Quartermaster;
This the favored of the ladies,
This the favored of the press.
Girls, to gain his good opinion
All consult him as to dress,
As to every little matter,
Whether picnic, dance or soiree,
Buggy ride or small tea-party;
Whether fancy dances dizzy.
With some fellow slightly boozy
Are a la mode.
If Riddle shakes his head,
Big old head with whiskers shaggy,

183

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

The fiat's made, and all the Misses
Lift their hands in holy horror,
And exclaim, "Oh, shocking taste
To have an arm around one's waist."

Shall I tell you how he met her?
Where he met her ? What he said ?
Met Chattanooga's fairest daughter,
Daughter with the flowing tresses ?
With a laugh like gushing waters.
Making music in the air?
With the eyes so soft and tender.
Full of love and soft emotion?
Eyes, beneath whose silken lashes
Soft and warm the love-light dwells;
And whose lips are so bewitching
That a fellow's fairly itching
To kiss from their cherry softness
The fragrant nectar nestling there?
Tell you all about the nonsense
He had whispered in her ear,
Ear forever lent to listen
To the siren song of love?

Yes; but all you girls have had experience

In this pleasant sort of thing,

And all of this you'll take for granted ;

They were pretty well acquainted ;

Had met at evening's twilight hour,

184

THE CLEVER QUARTERMASTER.

Had met beneath the vine-clad bower,
Bower through whose vine-clad lattice
Fell soft Luna's silv'ry rays.
Had met at church, at choir, at tea ;
Had met at tea at some kind neighbors ;
Had met and mingled at their neighbors.

'Twas in Tennessee,

In Chattanooga,

At Mrs. Blankse's

In the parlor —

Behind the door —

In a chair.
There he met this lovely maiden —
Lovelier far than the most radiant
Dream of love that ever flitted
With a form, oh, light and airy,
Flitted like a winsome fairy
Thro' the poet's burning brain.

T cannot now put in rhyme

All that was said on that occasion.

The fact is — I haven't time,

Even to tell how the dancers

Mingled in the mazy dances ;

How they danced and how they chatted, '

How the music's 'livening strain

Thrilled the dancers as they chatted,

Chatted as they moved along ;

i8s

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Chatted like some young canaries,

Chattered Hke a lot of squirrels ;

Chatted like the very dickens.

Nor to tell of how Mechelle —

"Me-shelle''—"Unc\e Joseph's nephew"

Put on the fancy licks and "did

The thing up brown."

How this beau with eyes so tender —

How this beau with form so slender,

Swayed his figure to and fro;

How this heaviest "heavy coon-dog"

Turned the ladies in the quadrille,

Turned the ladies on the corners.

Turned them while they gaily chatted,

Chatted as they moved along ;

While old Adam played and patted

On the floor with even measure,

Measure keeping to his song.

* * * *

In the dance they met each other ;
Met — and turned — and moved along ;
Moved through dance without emotion.

* * * jf:

Now the dance was done and over ;
All the guests had now departed,
Departed, sleepy, to their homes.

But, alone, this happy couple
Arm in arm moved gently 'long;

i86

THE CLEVER QUARTERMASTER.

Moved gently 'long the long piazza;
Moved along in the silv'ry moonlight —
Moonlight falling gently o'er them —
Falling o'er them like a dream.

Thus they walked, with hands entwining ;
Thus she walked with head inclining —
With her tresses gently resting —
Resting on his manly breast.
Thus he woo'd her — didn't win her,
Woo'd her with this siren song:

"Chattanooga's fairest daughter,
'Daughter of the Eagle's Nest' ;
Daughter of the fertile valleys ;
Daughter of the laughing waters;
This fond heart for thee is pining,
This fond heart is yearning for thee —
Yearning for thee as its mate.
Thy loved image in it dwelling
Rules supreme in every thought.
The mistress of each kind emotion,
Mistress of each rising joy,
Mistress of each aspiration.
In my room so sad and dreary.
In my room so bleak and drear,
Sit I, lonely, making abstracts,
Abstracts of my daily 'issues.'
There my sweetness daily wasting,

187

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Wasting on the desert air.

Come with me to my own country ;

Come with me and be my mate.

There old 'Bingingham' shall please thee

With his songs of glories past.

Songs of how he always used

To "do" the vendors of produce,

Produce offered in our markets,

In our far-off Southland city.

There old Dent, the funny fellow,

Good old Dent, the story-teller

(Tells them better when he's 'mellow').

Shall regale thy leisure moments

With sweet music's softest strain.

There with (f) lute so sad and plaintive,

Plaintive as the cooing dove,

Shall woo thee for me, sing to thee,

And tell thee of my speechless love."

Then this maid so meek and modest,
Gently turned her head away;
Turned her soft eyes from his face ;
Turned her fairy form around;
Turned her back upon old Riddle.
Raised she then her fairy hand,
Raised her hand with tiny 'kerchief,
Raised it to her ruby lips.
Raised it to her eyes so meek,
Gentle eyes, suffused with tears;

i88

THE CLEVER QUARTERMASTER.

Ope'd her lips — and after sneezing,
Thus replied :

"Go away, you gay deceiver,
Gayer than is speckled puppy;

"GO AWAY, YOU GAY DECEIVER."

Go away you heartless wretch!
Leave the maiden whose affections
You have won, to die alone.
Your soft words have waked the passion
Slumb'ring in her maiden breast —
The infant passion struggling there.

189

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Chattanooga's lonely daughter

Will not go to your distant country,

Will not believe a word you've told her;

Let her ('pine'),

You've got a girl in Lou' siana,"

5ji >fC >fC y^

Old Riddle shook his shaggy head,
And scratched it, too ; was sore perplexed
To know by what means she discovered
His faith and love already plighted
To "the girl he left behind him."

He tarried not. but straight he left her ;
Left her to her thoughts alone;
Left her, without another word,
And straight way home he toddled ;
Saying, as he moved along,
Moved along with pace unsteady:
"I wonder who the thunder told her?
It must have been that frisky doctor.'*

190

LOVERS STRATAGEM.

LOVE'S STRATAGEM.

THE DOCTOR PUTS UP A JOB ON THE MAJOR.

I ALWAYS had a mighty sharp eye for pretty
girls, said the Old Doctor, as he seated himself
in our office chair. If there was one in the neigh-
borhood I'd find her. A regular "butterfly-
lover," I flitted from flower to flower, always
deepest in love with the last girl I met.

There was one in the neighborhood when we
were camped near Chattanooga, some two weeks
before Bragg invaded Kentucky. I found her of
course, and "had it pretty bad." She lived down
the valley some three miles below our camp. Her
name was Mary CoflFey. Her father was a rich,
pompous old fellow named "General" CoflFey.
Why "General," I don't know; militia general
once, I reckon, away back in the forties. In the
South in those days, everybody who was anybody
in particular had a military title, and the titles
were graded according to one's importance in his
vicinity, and ranged all the way from "Cap,"
bestowed on the postmaster and the city mar-
shal, through "Major," the title of the editor,
"Colonel," the title of the town lawyer and poli-
tician, to "General" for the fat, old rich fellows.
Hence "General" Coflfey, I suppose. He had the

191

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

gout — one foot all swelled up and bandaged, and
he hobbled about, when he hobbled at all, on a
stick and a crutch. He was a typical old-school
gentleman of the South, hospitable, fond of com-
pany, a great talker and a great reader; had
nothing else to do but talk and read, when he
could get anybody to sit still and listen to him. His
"overseer" attended to business — the general was
a planter — and the general staid indoors mostly,
taking his toddy, smoking his pipe and reading
He was a widower and lived alone with his one
child, this pretty daughter. Well, I became very
fond of Miss Mary and went to see her every
night ; but, confound it, the old general would
hobble in the parlor and anchor himself and stay
till I left. He had a yam about some seven or
eight foolish virgins who didn't keep their lamps
trimmed, and got out of oil on a critical occasion
(see the Bible). He drew an analogy between
these negligent virgins and the Confederate gov-
ernment, applying it in some way that I never did
understand, altho' he told it to me every evening
for a week. It took him about an hour to tell it,
and he would tell it with as much gusto and relish
as if it were the first time. So Mary and I could
do nothing but grin and bear it, casting loving
looks at each other whenever the old man would
stoop over to spit ; or "play hands" on the sly.
That would never do in this world. I'd get out

192

LOVE S STRATAGEM.

of practice making shonuff love, and I was just
dying to get Mary by herself. Love laughs at
locks, they say. I set to work a scheme, and
finally put up a job on the major. The major
was a fat fellow named Robison, a bachelor,
about forty years old. He was an aide, or some-
thing, on the general's staff; our general, not
General Coffey. He was as vain as a peacock,
a regular "masher," and prided himself on his,
(to him) good looks and his "conversational pow-
ers." Next day I said:

"Major, don't you want to call on a pretty
young lady to-night?"

"Yes," said the major, as he glanced at himself
in the little pewter-rimmed mirror hanging on
the tent-pole, and stroking his mustache lovingly,
"who is she?"

"It's Miss Coffey, only daughter of General
Coffey, a rich old Southern planter down the
valley a little way. He's a fine old gentleman, a
fine scholar, a great reader, and you will enjoy
his society, I am sure, as only one of your literary
attainments can," said I.

The major swelled with pride, and took another
side glance at himself. "All right," said he;
we'll go tonight. The nights are lovely now;
moon about full, and if there is anything I do
love it is to talk to a pretty girl by moonlight.

I didn't say anything to this sentiment, tho' I

193

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

could have said with Piatt, "me, too," and added
— "yes, I see you at it now; something I have
been trying to do for a week, but the general — ."
Instead, I said:

"Major, I ought to warn you now, that the
general will talk you to death if you let him."

The major drew himself up proudly, and with
a scornful look and a most conceited smirk, said :

"You forget, my son, that I'm a lady's man and
something of a talker myself."

"All right," said L

So, we went, that very night. The major got
himself up in his best shape, dress-parade uni-
form, epaulets, plumed hat and all ; coat but-
toned up to the chin, which must have been very
uncomfortable, as it was September and pretty
hot. He was so fat the buttons were on the
strain, and he looked like a stuffed frog. I wore
a "fatigue" coat — loose and easy-like. The major
had a horse he called "Flop." I rode my little
bay.

Entering the parlor on invitation of a servant,
we found the general and Miss Mary both there.

"General Coffey, this is my distinguished
friend, the gallant Major Robison, of the gen-
eral's staff; Miss Coffey, Major Robison."

After a cordial welcome, the general and the
major were soon engaged in an animated run-
ning talk, the major getting in his licks with

194

love's stratagem.

commendable and encouraging skill, and he was
in fine spirits. I gave Miss Mary my arm, and
excusing ourselves we went out on the long front
galler} in the moonlight. We staid out till eleven.
Oh, it was a lovely night, indeed; full moon,
cloudltss sky, clear Southern atmosphere, and so
still I could hear myself think what a good joke
I was having on the major. The lovely valley,
of which the gallery commanded a fine view, lay
peacefully spread out before us, and there was
nothing to suggest that "grim-visaged war" was
snoring all along the banks of the Tennessee, in
about two miles of us, and that to-morrow we
should see him shake himself and put on the
Byronic "magnificently stern array." In fact.,
the stillness was unbroken, except by the barking
of a little dog away over yonder, who, hearing
the echo of his voice, would bark at it, and thus
keep up the endless chain all night, I reckon. But
I wasn't thinking of the night, nor the army, nor
war, nor the valley, nor the little dog, just then.
I was in better business. Ever been there, Dan-
'els?

Byme-by Mary said:

"I reckon we'd better go in and see how father
and the major are making it. It won't look right
if we stay out all evening."

So, we went in. As we entered the light of
the hall, she dexterously flipped oflF a little face-

195

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

powder which had somehow gotten on the left
breast of my coat, and picked off a long yellow
hair, which somehow had got tangled on a but-
ton. We entered the parlor. The general had
gotten the bulge on him and was doing all the
talking, long since. The major whose face was
red, eyes ditto, jumped up quick and swallowing
a yawn, said :

"Well, Doctor, it's about time we were going" ;
and was about to be off.

Miss Mary said : "Oh, it's early yet, and such
a lovely night." (I could have hugged her, then
and there, or anywhere else). I took out my
watch. It was eleven o'clock. I didn't announce
the fact, however, but said :

"Major, has the general told you his beautiful
allegory of the seven virgins, yet?"

"No," said the old general, quickly; "I'm glad
you reminded me of it. Sit down, major, and
let me tell it to you."

And the major had to sit down, but he did it
with a bad grace, and with a glance at me as
dark as Erebus.

I again gave Miss Mary my arm, and asking
them to excuse us, as we had had the pleasure of
hearing it, we went out on the gallery again, and
had another picnic. (More face-powder and yel-
low hairs to brush off.)

I said it took the general an hour to tell the

196

LOVES STRATAGEM.

yarn. I knew just how to time our stay on the
gallery, and made hay, figuratively, while the
(moon) sun shone. Presently a rooster away
over yonder waked up and gave the midnight sig-
nal. Another took it up and passed it down the
line our way, till the general's chickens caught it,

i^^.

HE EVEN SNORTED.

and repeated it about a thousand times, seemed
to me ; crowing for midnight. We went in. The
general was nearing the climax, and was as wide
awake as a mink. But the major. My stars ! He
was mad ; mad as a wet hen. He was so mad he

197

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

looked, as big as he was, to be actually swelled.
His eyes were red; he was sleepy shonuff, and
couldn't swallow the yawns, but had to let them
come out. He jumped up, cutting off the gen-
eral about at "lastly," and was hardly civil in
leave-taking, notwithstanding the old gentle-
man's courteous invitation to call again, which
was repeated so sweetly by Mary. He bolted
out of the door and made for "Flop," muttering
between his clenched teeth : "Yes, I'll call again."
He was so mad he blowed like a porpoise; he
even snorted. I didn't say a word ; dasn't. Neither
did he. We mounted in silence and rode away,
I keeping just a little behind the major, and as
mum as an oyster. We rode out of the lawn —
rode across the peaceful valley, up the slope of a
hill, from the summit of which could be had a
fine view of the old colonial manor house of the
general's we had just left. Arrived at the sum-
mit the major turned his horse around, reined in ;
"Whoa, Flop," he said, and then, slowly and de-
liberately and for about a minute, shook his fist
in the direction of the house, and said, with great
deliberation :

"General Coffey ; G — d d — n you and your sev-
en virgins and their oil !"

I fell off my horse and just rolled on the ground
and hollered. I didn't go near the major for a
week, and when I did he threw a rock at me.

WHAT PUZZLED THE DOCTOR.

WHAT PUZZLED THE DOCTOR.

Dan'els, said the genial old gentleman, the
next time he favored the Journal office with a
visit, continuing his remarks anent ''commuta-
tion," touched upon in a former recital; Dan'els,
speaking of commutation for quarters, fuel, ra-
tions, horse-feed, etc., durin' the war, I know you
fellers don't understand what it was. I'll ex-
plain it to you, as well as I can, for there is one
thing connected with it that I can't get thro' my
head, and never did :

A colonel (of whatever arm or staff) is when
on post-duty entitled, in addition to his pay, to be
furnished with four rooms or tents for "quar-
ters" ; feed for four horses, and four cords of
wood a month; a major to three, and a captain
to two of each item mentioned ; while a lieutenant
is entitled to only one room, feed for one horse
and one cord of wood a month. Or, if they pre-
fer, they could procure these things on their own
hook, and the government would allow them pay
in lieu of furnishing them. Most all of the of-
ficers preferred to draw the pay and provide for
themselves ; there was money in it.

Now, I never could understand the discrimina-
tion. It surely doesn't take any more room for
a colonel to sleep in than it does for a captain,

199

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

and no more wood to keep a major warm than it
does a lieutenant. There was I, a ''Major," en-
titled to my three cords of wood, and old Doctor
Barker, as big as two of me, but only a "Captain"
and assistant surgeon — he had to keep warm as
best he could on two measly little cords of wood.
See? It ain't fair. And bless your soul, he had
to sleep in two rooms, while little / could spread
myself around loose all over three rooms and
warm myself by three fires at once.

And the Philosopher shook with merriment
at his alleged wit.

200

THE STORY OF A STUMP.

THE STOEY OF A STUMP.

When the Old Doctor was last in Austin and
honored the Journal office with a visit, I said to
him :

"Doctor, did you ever notice that old crippled
Confederate soldier sitting on the steps at the
capitol ?"

Yes, said he, — I know him well. I amputated
his leg at Atlanta.

It is a very common thing these days, and has
been for many years, to see a stump, continued
the Doctor, to see some ex-Confederate stump-
ing his weary way through life on crutches or a
wooden leg ; so common that it does not challenge
a remark, or hardly a notice ; we do not give it a
thought.

But, oh, how eloquent is that stump, or that
empty sleeve ! What a tale it could tell — if any-
body had time to listen to it. See that old fellow,
now, pegging along there on his wooden stump,
too poor to buy even an artificial limb. Old,
gray and grizzled. Time was when he was
young. Time was when he too was fired with
patriotism — shall we say? — or misdirected zeal?
— to take up arms against his flag, and thought
it was a religious duty. Time was when the hot
blood of youth coursed through his veins, and he

20I

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

throbbed with the exhilaration of love, and hope,
and ambition, perhaps; when the light of love
shone in his eyes, as he pressed Mary to his
bosom ; when, knapsack on back and gun in hand,
he hurried from home to join the boys going to
the front — or stole a kiss, perhaps, from timid,
trusting little Lucy — a meek-eyed maiden who al-
ready saw in her soldier lover a hero, and to
whom he had pledged his undying faith.

Time was when with recollections of Mary, or
Lucy — perhaps with the fragrance of that last
kiss lingering still in his memory, he joined the
terrible charge, to "seek the bubble reputation at
the cannon's mouth" — to prove himself worthy
of her; and like "Brunswick's fated chieftain,
foremost fighting, fell."

Time was when fainting from the loss of blood,
he was carried to the field hospital, where the first
dressing was put on his wounds and the blood
stanched; when, delirious with fever and pain,
later, at the general hospital, the bearded and the
beardless surgeons consult, and decide that the
loss of a leg is necessary to save life ; when con-
sciousness is restored and the alternative is told
him — quick as a flash he sees the long years
ahead, when lame and old, and perhaps friend-
less, he shall drag out a miserable old age in
some "Home" or asylum; or die of hunger and
neglect on the roadside. But he loves life; he

202

'Ml

FOREMOST FIGHTING FEtL.

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

clings to delusive hope. "Cut her off, Doctor,'*'
he says stoutly, but with a suppressed sigh.

The fumes of chloroform are suggested to me
by every stump. I see a strong man stretched
prone on the table. I see the aproned surgeons

■•Ts«

"^^v^.>

CARRIED BLEEDING TO THE REAR,

— stem of visage — kind and gentle of heart; I
see the gleam of a long knife; I see the warm
life-blood spurt out as it cleaves the quivering
white flesh. I hear the grating of the saw as it cuts
its way thro' the bleeding bone. I see the ghastly

204

THE STORY OF A STUMP.

wound, gaping, gory; its flabby flap weeping
crimson tears. The thirsty sponge drinks them
eagerly; they are quickly dried, closed, stitched;
and a roller bandage is turned around the stump.
The form is transferred to a cool cot beneath the
shade of a wide-spreading oak, and a nurse sits
by to fan him and keep off the flies.

He rallies from the sleep of the merciful anes-
thetic. He slept all through the ordeal. A min-
ute seems not to have elapsed since the first whiff
of the chloroform ; he felt nothing, knew noth-
ing. He wakes to find his leg gone. He brushes
away a tear, and a big lump comes in his throat,
as he thinks of Mary, in the little house on the
hill ; or of Lucy, may be — if it be she — the meek-
eyed maiden to whom he is promised; who sees
in the army but one figure, in the list of wounded
but one name, and it is burned into her very soul
as she reads opposite that name in the paper,
"desperately wounded."

Then the long, long days of fever and pus ;
for in those days, you know, Dan'els, we knew
nothing of "germs" and "antiseptics," nor how
to prevent suppuration ; we believed it necessary
to healing. Oh, the suffering, the days of agony
and the nights of torture, as the wound became
dry and hot, and the temperature rose.

By-and-by he is convalescent. He can sit up
on the side of his bunk and scrawl a repetition

205

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

of his oft-told taie of love to her at home; but
hope is dead in him. He is of no use in the army

POOR OLD CONFED. DESPISED OLD REBEL.

now; he is discharged; turned loose on a cold
world, maimed and broken in health and spirit,
to shift for himself as best he can.

206

THE STORY OF A STUMP.

He survives the war. He is buffeted about
here and there, living God knows how, as best
he can. Now he sells lead-pencils on the granite
steps of the Texas capitol.

"Buy a pencil, Doctor?"

*'Yes, my boy, a dozen of them. Here, give
me two dozen ; I'm clean out of pencils at home,"
I say (pardonable lie, God knows). Neglected—
despised — alone. Had he been on the other side,
where his brother was, he would now be draw-
ing a pension from the government. Poor old
Confed. Despised old "rebel." They told you a
wound would be an honor — and you a hero. Cruel
mockery. Bitter deception. Your life-blood shed,
your youth wasted ; all in vain. The "Lost Cause"
is a memory. So is Lucy. She married the
butcher, who staid at home and got rich.

Now you are waiting — only waiting — the time
when you may join your comrades in arms and
misfortune on the other side. You see already
the "bivouac on the shores of eternity" ; you hear
the ripple of the waves as they dash upon its
banks. You hear the bugle call to arms no more ;
you hear the "tattoo" and "lights out" — and long
for the time when your tired old bones may

" softly lie and sweetly sleep.

Low in the ground; when

The soul — God's glorious image, freed from clay,

In heaven's eternal spheres shall shine,

A star of day."

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

OLD SISTER NICK.

PIES AND PIETY.

When I was stationed at Lauderdale Springs,
Miss., in the extreme eastern part of the State,
in the piney woods region, where I had charge
of a ward in one of the general hospitals, said
our Genial Visitor on another occasion, there
was amongst the refugees, quite a number of
whom had flocked there out of the way of the
Yankees after Vicksburg fell, the most comical
old lady you ever saw. She was generally called,
by everybody, "Sister Nick," or "Old Sister
Nick." She was "a lone widder woman," she
used to say, and she had several slaves.

Her piety was something awful. It was
simply overwhelming. She had a son, an only
child, whom she affectionately called "my little
Jimmie," who having been slightly wounded
once, by pure accident no doubt, for he was not
of the kind to go where people get hurt — "not if 1
can help it," he used to say — was now on detail
service, doing hospital guard duty. Jimmie was a
great big six-footer, strong as an ox, and had
great shocks of fiery red hair, heavy eyebrows,
white eyelashes, and keeping his mouth open con-
stantly he had a startled, idiotic appearance;

208

OLD SISTER NICK.

looked more like an astonished hog than anything
I can think of. He had freckles on his face the
size of a dime, and great warts on his hands that
rattled like castanets.

"Oh, Doctor, don't make fun of your friend
that wav," I said.

THE I^ORD WILL PURVIDE.

It's a fact, said the Old Doctor, and he shook
with good-natured mirth at the recollection.

But Jimmie was "a good boy," as his mother
often declared.

"The Lord will purvide,'' she used to say, as
she sat knitting socks for Jimmie — she was eter-

209

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

nally knitting — and I reckon Jimmie had as many
socks as Bud Zuntz had undershirts, and like
Bud's shirts they were, as Ruth McEnery Stew-
ard says of them, ''all Ma-knit." ''Ef He will
only spare me my little Jimmie, I will always
bless and sarve Him."

Jimmie and I used to go fishing together ;
good fishing about Lauderdale; tell you a good
one about it some day, if you will remind me.

Sister Nick was a little pudgy old lady with
small gray watery eyes, a little dab of a nose
that looked like it had been stuck on after she
was built, as an afterthought; thin brown hair,
turning gray, parted in the middle, and wound
into a little dab at the back of her head not big-
ger than a hickory nut; a watery mouth sugges-
tive of a kind of a juiciness not very appetizing
to look at, especially so because of its being al-
ways the amber hue of snuff, which she was
never without. She wore a faded calico wrap
per — apparently an orphan — the only skirt she
had on — looked so, anyhow — run-down slippers
— and she had the general appearance of a bolster
with a string tied around it in the middle.

"Talking of good eatin', Sister Partrick," she
said one day to Mrs. Patrick, my good mother-
in-law — heaven rest her — she always pronounced
it "Partrick"— "talkin' of good eatin', Sister Par-

2IO

OLD SISTER NICK.

trick, jest set me down all by myself to a good
biled hen, and I'm satisfied."

Ellen, her colored slave, was her mainstay and
support. She was a famous "pieist," if not so
famous for piety — for Ellen would cuss some-

SOLD PIES TO THE SICK SOLDIERS.

times — and I don't blame her. Ellen made and
sold pies to the sick soldiers, — and they had a
perfect mania for pies. We forbade the sale of
them at the hospitals ; they — her kind — being the
most indigestible things imaginable ; but the men

211

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

would have them, and would get them all the
same. Rain or shine, frost, snow or blizzard,
Ellen had to be at every train that came in, early
or late, to sell pies to the soldiers. "The Lord
will purvide," Sister Nick would say. "As long
as my little Jimmie is spared to me, and Ellen
holds out to make pies for the poor sick soldiers,
I hope we won't starve, Sister Partrick," and she
would spit out about a pint of snuff-juice.

"I puts my trust in Him, Sister Partrick," she
said often. She was so pious she would cry; her
little watery eyes — always watery — would slop
over every time she mentioned the Lord's name;
and she was so famous for the quantity and
quality of her piety and for Ellen's dyspeptic pies,
that the boys used to say she had Ellen to sell pies
at the morning trains to encourage "early piety."

"Oh, pshaw. Doctor, that's the very worst pun
I ever did hear in my life. I do believe you
made up that whole yarn to get off that out-
rageous pun ; go ahead with your story," said L
And Hudson and Bennett did not crack a smile.

Humph, said the Doctor; it's finished. You
don't know a good thing when you hear it — and
he gave me and B. and H. a look of ineffable
disgust.

212

WHEN THE DOGWOODS WERE IN BLOOM.

WHEN THE DOGWOODS WERE IN BLOOM.

A FISH STORY.

Lauderdale was a big hospital post, there be-
ing four large hospitals there, built out on the
lovely pine-clad hills, and built of rough pine
lumber. There were assembled there quite a lot
of congenial doctors and others, and of evenings,
around the stove in the office of some one of the
hospitals they would assemble more or less, and
talk.

The druggist at the hospital where I was on
duty was named Armstead. By his accounts he
was a tremendous fisherman. Oh, the trout he
had caught, and the tales he could tell of wonder-
ful exploits with rod and fly, to say nothing of
"wurrums," as he called them. Well, all winter
he was talking of going fishing as soon as the
dogwood trees put out; "a. sure sign," he would
say, that "the fish are biting." There was a pretty
considerable-size creek running through these
hills near the hospitals, and in the swamps or bot-
toms as they were called were myriads of squir-
rels, wild ducks, 'possums, coons, pigeons and
even wild turkeys; and further oflf, deer. Fine
sport I used to have with the gun. Some other
time I will tell you of our make-shift for ammu-

213

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

nition, if you will remind me. You must recollect
that every Southern port was blockaded, trade
and commerce with the outside world was cut off,
and manufactured goods of every kind soon
played out throughout the South. We were
thrown on our own resources. The native cotton
was spun and woven, and plain or striped cotton
cloth, — "homespun," was the almost universal ar-
ticle of feminine wear. Of course, we could not
buy powder and shot. Not a piece of calico was
to be seen or had except perhaps in the larger
cities. Even home-made hats, home-made shoes,
the ladies had to come to. And. I tell you now,
some of those pretty "homespun" dresses, the cot-
ton dyed with the walnut bark or some other in-
digenous dye, were not to be laughed at. A
calf-skin would bring a big price — and even cat-
skins, if nicely tanned, were in demand. I had
some satisfaction in wearing a vest made of the
untanned, hair-on, pelt of a certain predatory
tom-cat that kept up a famine of frying-size
chickens on my premises. I remember that I
gave $600 for a pair of home-tanned cow-leather
boots ; and the last sugar I had before the break-
up cost $80 a pound.

But I am away off; I started to tell you fel-
lers a fish-story, and promised to tell you how we
made shot.

"Now, look here, Doctor," said Hudson and

214

WHEN THE DOGWOODS WERE IN BLOOM.

Bennett at once; *'we want you to understand,
we beg to gently intimate that there is a Umit to
our creduHty. Making shot — you know ."

But, boys, I'm teUing you the gospel truth, said
the Old Doctor, with a hurt look. Confederate
money, based on nothing whatever on this earth,
nor in heaven either as to that, got to be so worth-
less that it hardly had any value, tho' you could
buy anything that was for sale if you had enough
of it; but there was no powder and shot, nor
"store-cloze" for sale, I tell you. Why, I'll show
you bills I have to this day, bills that I have kept
as heirlooms and curiosities, where I paid $io
per pound for butter, for instance, late in the
war; and as early as '63 I saw a soldier draw a
month's pay and immediately give it for a dozen
apples. I have bills for bacon at $5 per pound,
and lard ditto. In Covington, Ga., in 1863 (I
forgot to tell you about it while I was telling you
other Covington experiences), I had occasion to
amputate the leg for a lad in the country, the
son of a wealthy flour-mill man. He asked my
bill, and I told him that in peace times it would
be $50. A calculation based on that, at the then
rate of discount, would make it $2500 in Con-
federate money; but that I would be glad if he
would let me have its equivalent in bacon. I have
the bill for that bacon to-day ; it was $5 a pound.

But, my stars — I'll never get to the fish-story

215

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

at this rate, said the Old Doctor; I'm worse at
straggling than I was in the ranks. To resume
where I broke off, tho' I've got another pretty
good one about Confederate prices if you will
just say ''Meridian" some day:

One day Armstead said:

"Doctor, spring is here; the dogwoods are in
bloom, the fish are biting, sure."

"Reckon they are," said I.

"Wish I could get off one day to try 'em," said
he.

"I think I'll try them to-morrow," said I.

"Oh, the trout, the trout I used to catch," said
he. "Why, Doctor ."

"Oh, dry up, Armstead ; you've been telling me
trout yams all winter. I'll show you something
to-morrow," I said ; and Armstead drew a deep
sigh at the recollection, I reckon, of the fish he
didn't "used to catch."

There is a big mill-pond up the creek some dis-
tance above the hospitals, and I was sure there
were good large trout in it. In fact, I had been
told so by the owner of the mill. So Jimmie Nick,
as we called him (Nicholas was his name, really),
and I went up there next day. Below the mill
there was a small but deep hole, into which the
water fell from the "sheet" or shed, which laid on
a level with the surface. We had no bait but red
worms — first rate perch bait, — but we fished dili-

216

WHEN THE DOGWOODS WERE IN BLOOM.

gently up the creek all the way to this hole under
the mill, without getting a nibble.

While standing there we noticed a bream (a
black, striped perch, the size of your hand ; very

NOTICED A BREAM.

plentiful about Jackson where Jimmie and I were
raised, and their favorite bait is crickets — those
little black-winged crickets — you know what

217

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEGI^.

crickets are, surely?). The bream had "shot"
the Uttle fall, and was floundering on the planks
on which there was not an inch of water.

I knew a bream was a bream, at Lauderdale
as at Jackson, and we knew they would bite at
crickets. So, Jimmie and I dropped our poles,
and went out into a corn-field near by, and caught
us a lot of crickets, and returning, rigged our
lines for bream. To catch bream you have to be
very careful of your tackle. The)^ are a wary
fish, easily scared away. They won't bite if they
see a line, so you have to have a line that is very
slim, a small hook, fastened to a snood, or piece
of "catgut," it is called — but it is not catgut. It
is invisible in water, and that is the secret of suc-
cess in fishing for them. Remember that ; there-
by hangs a tale.

In a little while Jimmie and I had rigged our
lines, and soon had caught a long string of beau-
tiful bream. Then we thought we'd try the trout.
We call them trout in Mississippi, but it is the
black bass as we see him in Texas, and they at-
tain a weight from six to eight pounds ; the usual
size is from one to three pounds ; three pounds is
a large one in that section.

We got a boat from the mill-man, got a net
also, and going on the pond above the mill, we
soon had a lot of fine minnows or "roaches" for
bait; and the best luck you ever did see we had

218

WHEN THE DOGWOODS WERE IN BLOOM.

that day. I got a three-pounder, a shonuff big
fellow, and a lot of smaller ones, none under a
pound and a half. We were proud.

"Jimmie," I said, "we'll make Armstead go
off and grieve, won't we? We'll make him bust

'GEE WHILLIKENS

wide open with envy — for he's a fisherman, he

IS.

Returning to the hospital I walked proudly into
the drug-room where Armstead was putting up
prescriptions behind the counter, with my hand
behind me, and without a word I just flopped my
big trout upon the counter right under his nose,

219

IvECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

the fish still alive and kicking. Oh, he was a
beauty.

Armstead's eyes nearly popped out of his head.
He sprang back in surprise, and exclaimed :

"Gee whillikens !— what a b— i— g sil— ver-

side!"

I was too disgusted for utterance. I just walked
out without a word. The fool didn't know a trout
when he saw it, after all his blowing and brag-
ging. Silversides are those little roaches — look
like sardines — that we use as bait, to catch trout

with.

* * * *

Next day every man, woman and child, negro
and dog in Lauderdale was out there at that hole
fishing. Our strings of bream and trout had set
the village wild. Every vehicle and "animule"
available was pressed into service, and such an
exodus to Moore's mill you never saw. The
commandant of the post, Colonel Nuckles (one
leg off), and his wife were there; Captain Catlin,
the provost marshal (crippled, of course, or he
wouldn't have been on post duty — such was the
exigency of the service, every man able to bear
arms had to be at the front, I tell you) — he was
there with his wife ; Surgeon Kennedy, the post-
surgeon and his wife ; oh, everybody and his wife,
and sister, and sweetheart was there. "Sister
Nick?" Yes, she was there, too, of course; and

220

WHEN THE DOGWOODS WERE IN BLOOM.

all the young ladies — and that being a refugee
town there were lots of them; pretty, too.

Well, as Reel Kerr used to say, they chunked
the fish with buckshot. They had every imagin-
able kind of rig ; — fish-poles, corn-stalks, limbs of
trees, for rods ; fish-lines, cotton twine, spool
thread, carpenter's chalk-line, and even clothes-
lines for lines ; and corks, and even quinine-bot-
tle stoppers for floats ; and buckshot, nut-screws,
nails, for sinkers; liver, raw beef, grubworms,
toads — everything for bait but the right kind —
enough to scare every fish out of the creek.

Jimmie and I couldn't get off to go with the
caravan, but we told them where to fish — ^below
the mill ; that 'twa'nt no use wasting time any-
where else; that at that season bream were run-
ning up stream to spawn, and not being able to
get past the mill — why, of course, that hole was
full of them.

About ten o'clock Jimmie and I went out. The
party had surrounded the hole, literally. They
were sitting in almost elbow touch all around
the hole, and poles and lines innumerable were
dangling over the water, but — na-a-rry a fish.

"Why, what's the matter, Colonel? I thought
you'd have the frying pans going by the time
we got here ; you said you would, and wouldn't
leave a fish in the creek for me and Jimmie to
catch if we didn't hurry up?" said I.

221

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

"Ah, Doctor, you fooled us. Ain't no fish in
this hole — else you caught 'em all yesterday,"
said the colonel, unmindful of the paradox.

Jimmie and I soon got our rigs ready, and
were in the act of putting a cricket on the hooks
when some one exclaimed excitedly :

"The Colonel's got a bite !"

"Pull him out, Colonel !"

"Give him line, Colonel !"

"Don't let him get the slack on you. Colonel !''

"Play him awhile. Colonel!" was the advice
given the colonel all at once. Every one dropped
his pole and gathered around the colonel to see
the sport ; the colonel had been doing some brag-
ging as well as Armstead, and had the reputation
of being a tremendous fisherman. There was
great excitement.

The colonel was cool and collected, and he
"let him play"— that is, he didn't pull "him" out
right away ; that, he said, wasn't "science." When
he thought it would be "science" to pull him out,
he said:

"Now, then, watch me land him. Get the net
ready, quick, and be careful — for he's a whop-
per !" And bracing himself he gave a pull — and
out came — a miserable little skillipot terrapin
about as big as your fist.

Jimmie and I put on our crickets, and in a few
minutes had bream enough to start the frying

222

WHEN THE DOGWOODS WERE IN BLOOM.

pan. After dinner we cleared away a place on
the grass, and such a ''swing corners," and such
sparking and flirting we did have, to be sure;
while old Dan, the colonel's colored carriage-
driver, played his fiddle with uncommon unction.

223

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

CONFEDERATE STATES SHOT-FACTORY
(LIMITED—VERY.)

Oh, yes, said the Doctor, so I did ; I promised
to tell you how we got ammunition for shooting
squirrels, etc.

We would get a lot of minie balls, or cart-
ridges, if we just had to have it— which was gen-
erally the case, the squirrels were so bad that it
was dangerous to be without powder and shot;
I knew one to bite a feller once, who was out of
powder and shot. It was by some thought to
be sinful to so waste cartridges — they were to
kill Yankees, you know. So loose balls or bul-
lets, that was different, were the main source of
supply.

One would take a piece of the native pine, a
piece of plank about four inches wide and sixteen
inches long — but it was not necessary to be ex-
act in these measurements — "any old'' piece of
pine would do — and cut grooves in it length-
wise, some five or six grooves. Then, tilting this
plank against the inside of a vessel of water so as
to make an inclined plane, the lead was placed on
the upper end of the wood, and fire set to the
wood. A piece of "fat" pine was selected — that
is, a piece rich in turpentine, as it would bum
readily. Why, sirs, "fat light'ood" (lightwood),

224

CONFEDERATE STATES SHOT FACTORY.

as it is generally called in the South, was the
main source or resource rather, for light, after
''store" candles gave out, and especially far in
the interior. True, many families made "tallow
candles," but many persons also used lightwood ;
in fact some old ladies I knew said they "pre-
ferred" it when they couldn't get the tallow to
make "dips," as they were called.

The bullets would melt gradually, and the
molten lead would run down the grooves and
drop in the water in the kettle. Well, now, they
were not round — that's a fact ; but they were
more or less — generally less — round, and as the
Johnny Reb, who was laughed at for riding a
calf on the march, said, it beat walkin' — so these
fragments of lead beat no shot at all ; and by
rolling them under a flatiron we managed to
make pretty good shot of them ; good enough to
kill a turkey with, even. By-the-bye, Dan 'els, re-
mind me to tell you about one I did kill at Lau-
derdale ; its' a good one, as Dr. Billy Yandell, the
State Quarantine Officer at El Paso, Texas, will
testify; he helped eat it.

No — we didn't get a patent on the process of
making shot. We gave the public the benefit of
the invention, and the process came into general
use wherever the blessing of fat light'ood was
known.

225

RECOLLFXTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

DR. YANDELL AND THE TURKEY.

Tell you about the turkey, now ? said the Doc-
tor. After a short breathing-spell he said: As
well now as any other time. All right.

Back of Dr. Yandell's hospital — that was Dr.
Henry Yandell of Yazoo county, Mississippi, a
cousin of Dr. Bill Yandell, who, by-the-by, was
only a big ''kid" at that time, an undergraduate
in medicine, and was a sorter hospital steward
or something at his cousin's hospital — there was
a swamp, of which I told you, through which
the creek runs and where there was such good
hunting. One afternoon I took my gun, and pass-
ing through Yandell's yard one of the men said :

"Doc, I seen turkeys down by the bridge yis-
tiddy."

"I'll go look for them," said I. "Thanks."

I hadn't gotten more than a mile from the
hospital before I heard a turkey, "put" — "put."
The woods were very thick. Looking cautiously
thro' the underbrush I saw two turkeys on the
ground, with their necks stretched, looking
scared, and as if about to fly. Trembling with ex-
citement (I had what is known amongst hunters
as a "mild buck-agre" — ague), I let drive with
one barrel and knocked over one of the turkeys,
the other one running off yelping.

226

DR. YANDELL AND THE TURKEY.

I ran to my turkey, terribly excited and all over
of a tremble. The turkey was fluttering on the

I Iff

ONE WING WAS CLIPPED.

ground, and I caught it and holding it up, dis-

22^

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

covered — oh, holy horrors! — that one wing was
dipped! The truth flashed on me in an instant.
They were Dr. Yandell's turkeys, strayed off
from the hospital. I could understand, now, why
the other fellow didn't fly, but ran off yelpin' —
something no well-bred wild turkey was ever
known to do.

I had no idea of throwing it away. I was
ashamed to take it to the hospital and own up
like a little man. No Sir — ree! In fact, I was
turkey-hungry, and wanted the meat. Turkey
was turkey in those days. So I just plucked out
the cut quills and bviried them. The head of a
''tame" turkey is much redder, of lighter color
than that of a wild turkey. This one fortunately
for me was a black one, and looked very much
like a wild turkey. I took my knife out of my
pocket, and cut gashes on the head — on the "wat-
tles," as the children call the nodulated growths
on a turkey's head — to let out some of the blood
so as to make it look sorter blue — like a wild
turkey's head, you know. I picked her up by the
head, squeezing it so as to aid the bluing process,
and marched boldly through Dr. Yandell's hos-
pital yard.

"Hello!" said the doctor and young Yandell
(now "Old" Yandell). "You got one, shonuff,
Doctor?"

"Yes," I said; "There were about twenty (that

228

DR. YANDELL AND THE TURKEY.

was a whopper), but I only got one shot; they
were so wild."

Yandell didn't notice the quills being pulled
out; if any one had said anything about that, I
had a lie ready to explain it : I was "going to
make pens out of 'em (for you boys must know
that even the steel pens gave out, and we had to
fall back on the primitive quill pens of the daddys.
I was taught to write with one, and I'm not a
Methuseleh, however).

I invited Dr. Yandell, Dr. Seymour and young
Yandell to dine with me next day and help me
eat the turkey. It was brown and savory, and
quite fat. It was served with "fixin's," and was
a real treat. Dr. Yandell in particular was in
ecstasies. Said he:

"Anybody v/ho ever tasted wild turkey can
recognize the superiority, the sweetness of the
flesh over that of a domestic, yard-raised, hand-
fed turkey. This one, now, has a most delicious
aroma of beech nuts — a "nutty" taste, which is
characteristic of the wild bird. This is delicious.
Doctor ; you may help me to another piece of the
dark meat, please. We have turkey at the hos-
pital, frequently, of course," continued the doc-
tor between mouthfuls, "but I never eat it; tame
turkey ain't -fit to eat, in fact."

I was just ready to burst with amusement, and
could with great difficulty keep my face straight ;

229

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

but I did it — looked as solemn as a judge, or as
Hudson there does, when the bill-collector comes
around. I hadn't even told my wife, or I couldn't
for the life of me have kept from laughing^ it was
such a good joke.

To this day Dr. Yandell does not know the
trick I played on him, nor does Dr. Billy. Sey-
mour? Dead I reckon; haven't heard of him
since. Yandell, while one of the jolliest fellows
in the world, was still somewhat touchy — would
shoot as quick as a wink, and to tell you the truth
I was always afraid to let him know that he had
made such an ass of himself — doing all that blow-
ing while eating one of his own old hospital tur-
key-hens. It's safe, now ; he's in Mississippi.

230

WISDOM IN A MULTITUDE OF COUNSEL.

WISDOM IN A MULTITUDE OF COUNSEL

(NIT.)

Among the medical officers at Lauderdale at
the time I am speaking of, continued the Old
Doctor, the winter preceding the general smash-
up of the Confederate States in April, 1865, there
was a Dr. Thombus of Kentucky, a surgeon. He
knew it all. He was my senior by about fifteen
years, say about forty years old. To tell you the
truth he reminded me more of ''Tittlebat Tit-
mouse" (Ten Thousand a Year) than any one I
ever knew. Like Tittlebat T., he used to address
the young ladies as "gals," and say "how you
was?" He had charge of a hospital, and I had
only a ward in his hospital. In my ward the head
nurse, or ward-master, was a young man named
Newt Swain (I wonder what ever became of
him? I'd like to know). Newt was reading med-
icine under my instruction, and he swore by me
both as a diagnostician and as an operator.

In our ward was a man who had had a heavy
fall some years previously, striking on the right
shoulder. It gave him no trouble for a while,
but then the shoulder began to swell and pain
him some at times, and he came to that hospital
for treatment. Before coming he had received
another fall, striking on the same shoulder. The

231

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

shoulder was greatly swollen, the swelling ex-
tending up the neck till it began to oppress his
breathing; impinging on the phrenic nerve.

This man had been in this hospital a long time,
the swelling being treated empirically, with iodine
and blisters, without any one ever having made a
diagnosis. No one knew just what the trouble
was.

PROVING IT.

One day I noticed that the swelling was grow-
ing faster, and it was beginning to interfere seri-
ously with the man's breathing ; he had to take to
bed. I called a consultation of all hands at the
post, some fifteen doctors, big and little, and
asked for an opinion on the case as to diagnosis,
and what ought to be done.

After all of them had examined the patient Dr.
Thombus said:

232

WISDOM IN A MULTITUDE OF COUNSEL.

"It's a fatty tumor and ought to be cut out,"
giving his reasons for his diagnosis, and "proving
it," he said, by Gross' Surgery, a copy of which
he produced and showed us. Furthermore Gross
said it ought to be cut out. All the others agreed
with him until it came my turn ; it being my pa-
tient and I being the youngest of the party, I was
last.

"What do you think, Doctor?" said Thombus
to me.

"I have no definite opinion as to diagnosis,"
said I. "I'm rather puzzled over the case; that's
why I called you all. But from the man's his-
tory I very much suspect that it is a diffused
aneurism, and that capillary hemorrhage going on
in there now accounts for the gradual swelling.
I feel quite sure it's not a fatty tumor and I dis-
sent from the proposition to cut it. If you cut
down there (over the scapula) you'll get into a
bleeding cavity, and not be able to reach the sub-
scapular artery to tie it."

Thombus gave a horse-guffaw. He said :

"By the time you've cut as much as me and
Yandell and Henson (naming nearly all the
others), you won't be so scarey of the knife,
young man," attributing my dissent to timidity
on my part, confound him, when at that mo-
ment I had probably already done more "cuttin' "
than he had.

233

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

''Well," I said, "If you will open it I'll get
everything ready for you, as it is my ward and
my patient, and I'll turn him over to the surgeon
in charge (T.), but you must ^^--cuse me if you
please. As Pontius Pilate said on a certain oc-
casion I need not more specifically refer to, 'this
man's blood be upon your heads' (or hands, I've
forgotten P. P's exact expression) ; I'm going
fishing." And after clearing the deck for action,
as we would say now ; war phrases are on again ;
that is, after making every preparation for the
operation, I lit out.

Late that afternoon as I came up the road to
the hospital, my string of perch swinging by my
side, I caught sight of Swain, my ward-master
and student, away down at the big gate, waiting
for me. As soon as I came in sight he waved his
hand and hollered :

"Aneurism, by Jo ! Man's dead !"

234

A NIGHT IN MERIDIAN.

A NIGHT IN MERIDIAN.

While stationed at Lauderdale, Miss., of
which I have been teUing you boys some things,
I had occasion to run down to Meridian, which,
as everybody knows, is on the M. & O. Railroad,
some thirty miles below Lauderdale, and is the
junction of the Southern and some other roads.
Every Confederate soldier, if not everybody in
the United States, knows Meridian. It had the
hardest name during the war of any place, un-
less it be Andersonville, Ga., the memorable
prison. By-the-bye, let me digress here long
enough to say that at one time I was ordered to
Andersonville to take charge of that ill-fated
prison hospital ; and had I gone I should have
suffered martyrdom instead of Dr. Mudd. It
was perhaps, nay, no doubt, the most fortunate
escape I ever made, not excepting that at Cov-
ington. I got off somehow, I do not now re-
member on what pretext.

I had heard enough of the hotel at Meridian
to know that it was the best place in the world
to not stop at. Where is the Confederate now
living who had not either been a victim of "Room
40," or heard tell of its horrors by surviving suf-
ferers ?"

The only alternative to going to that hotel of

235

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

such notoriety was to go to a little so-called hotel
kept by an old man named Dr. Johnson. It was a
little log house of two rooms and a passageway
between them, to the back of which had been
added two "shed" rooms, which including the;
space corresponding to the passageway, made two
longer rooms, one of which was used for the
"dining room." There was a front gallery, as it
is called in some places, "porch" in others, ex-
tending the length of the building in front, and
on each end of this gallery after the demand for
accomodation set in, a little room was boarded off
with rough lumber. These rooms — if they can
be called rooms were the width of the porch, say,
eight feet, and were eight feet in length ; 8x8
feet "bed-rooms." One of these cells was my
bed-room that night. There was no ceiling or
plastering; nothing between me and the outside
world — the winter blasts — except the "weather-
boarding," the studding or uprights to which it
was nailed being visible on the inside. It was a
mere shell ; there was no ceiling overhead. As I
lay in, or rather on, my bunk, I could see the star*
in the sky through the chinks and crannies of the
roof.

It was a dreadful cold night, during the winter
that preceded the general break-up, the winter of
1864-5 i the surrender took place the following
April. By that time Confederate money had

236

A NIGHT IN MERIDIAN.

gotten to be almost worthless, but it was the only
currency — circulating medium — we had. We
were less fortunate than our friends in North
Carolina, who, it was said, used herrings for
small change, and it was a common thing to hear
a chap at a "store" say: "Mister, gimme a her-
rin's worth o' snuff." So Confederate scrip had
to go — at some valuation. ^^

I had to choose between this lay-out and that
"hotel" down town of which so many tough
stories were told. This "Retreat," as the propri-
etor called it (mind you, in dead sober earnest,
he was), was about half a mile from the business
center — "far from the world's ignoble strife,"
and from the "madding crowd" — for there was
most assuredly a mad crowd there at least, al-
ways ; and the maddest of the crowd was a fellow
who having spent the night before in "Room
forty" declared that he had had his socks stolen
off his feet, notwithstanding he had gone to bed
with his boots on.

Tell you about room forty? You never heard
of it ? Well, that's a fact ; you belong to the new.
issue; Dan'els has been there.

It was called "room forty" because there were
forty bunks in it, and it was made to lodge forty
graybacks. Soldiers were arriving at all times of
the night, and after the other rooms were filled
the overflow — and there was always an overflow

237

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

— were sent to room forty. The hotel was right
at the depot, and was a two-story and attic plank
building in a lamentable state of incompleteness
— was never finished. Room forty was the space
up under the roof, between the floor and which
there was nothing except the rafters, which "came
handy," the proprietor said, ''to hang things
from." As an illustration of its utility there were
hung from the center joist an old smoky lantern,
and some forgotten or abandoned canteens. The
floor space to the uprights or studding on each
side, and not including the unavailable space un-
der the eaves of the roof, unavailable except as a
repository of odds and ends of rubbish, and as a
den for rats, cats and other varmints, was about
40x60 feet, and on each side of the room and
down the center were rough deal bunks, each
with its feather bed of straw and two gray horse-
blankets. That they were occupied by represen-
tatives of the Cimex L. family as well as by nu-
merous pedicnli is to be understood as a matter
of course. Soldiers have told me that some fel-
lers knowing this, yet being compelled to sleep,
would swig enough Meridian whisky to stupefy
themselves, and would snore through the night
in defiance of the first settlers. Others who could
not sleep would play cards, smoke and cuss all
night, and hence the aisles between the rows of
bunks were often filled with a rowdy crowd of

238

A NIGHT IN MERIDIAN.

soldiers. You can readily understand the de-
lights of a night in room forty. Your slumbers
would be accompanied by a chorus of snores,
snatches of ribald songs, coarse jests and coarser
oaths, all seasoned and scented with the fumes of
villainous tobacco smoked in old stinkin' pipes,
to say nothing of the rumbling, the whistling, the
lettin' off steam of numerous locomotives just be-
neath your bunk. "Which is why I remark,"
that hotel was the very best place in the world to
not stop at; and that is why I sought Dr. John-
son's "Retreat."

The "Retreat was situated on a hill west of
town and just at the edge of the almost inter-
minable pine forest that stretched away for miles
in every direction. I registered — there being
some two or three other unfortunates there, and
they had just finished supper — finished it in a
literal sense, as I will presently show. It was
the invariable rule at that and all other "hotels,"
those times, to require payment in advance. I
stated that it was my wish to have supper, lodg-
ing for the night, and breakfast. I was told
that my bill would be $300, which I paid of
course. It would have been the same at "room
forty," and the alternative was — pay or spend
the night outdoors.

I was shown into supper. The table was there,
and some crumbs of cawn bread the others had

239

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

not eaten and in a large blue-edged dish was a
piece of very fat bacon about as large as an egg,
swimming in an ocean of clear grease — simply
lard in a liquid state. There was a bottle of
alleged molasses — it was home-made sorghum
syrup. These dainties, with a cup of ''coffee"
made of parched cawn meal and sweetened with
the sorghum syrup, was the ''menu." (Between
me'n you I didn't eat a whole lot. There was
nothing to eat.)

So, like Jack in the story, I retired supper-
less to — I had nearly told a lie; I was going to
say "bed." I retired to my room. It was lighted,
or it would be more proper to say the darkness
was intensified by a solitary tallow candle (home-
made, of course), about two inches long, stuck
in the neck of an empty whisky bottle. This
the "landlord," as all proprietors of "hotels" in
the South are called — I don't know why — set up
on a little shelf nailed to the wall. I seated my-
self after having received the well-meaning old
gentleman's "good night," on the stool-chair,
the sole representative of the chair family
present, and it without a back, and calmly sur-
veyed my quarters; "viewed the prospect o'er."
It wasn't "pleasing"; and "man" was not the
only thing that was "vile" thereabouts.

The bed, which with this stool constituted the
entire equipment, was a bunk two and one-half

240

A NIGHT IN MERIDIAN.

feet wide, built in one corner of the room, of
rough scantHng. On this was a coarse cotton
sack filled with straw, and a pillow of the same
soothing materials. There were the inevitable
two gray horse-blankets for covering — no sheets
— and so help me Moses, this was the lay-out in
which I was expected to get $300 worth of the
* 'balmy." It was the longest night that ever
was. I did not undress but just laid down on
the bunk with clothing, boots, overcoat and all on,
and drew the blankets over me.

By that time my candle was burned out. They
say "men love darkness because their deeds are
evil." "There are others" who like darkness, or
rather (as do certain of the genus homo) take
advantage of it to get in their work. In Meridian
at that time sand-bagging, garroting and similar
pastimes were of nightly occurrence. I soon
discovered that there were "others" claiming this
luxurious couch ; it had been pre-empted and
was held by a large colony of the cimex lectular-
ius family; they were there in force, and assert-
ing their rights I had to vacate — give possession.
I did so with alacrity on the first "notice to quit."
They began work on the tenderest parts of my
anatomy the moment the candle went out.

Having before going up to the "Retreat" trans-
acted the little business I had to attend to, and
which brought me to Meridian, it was my inten-

241

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

tion to return home on the morning passenger
train which passed up usually at 8 o'clock. What
to do with myself meantime was the problem
that confronted me. Sleep was out of the ques-
tion. No fire, no light, as dark as Erebus and as
cold as church charity. I had to exist in some
way thro' the tedious hours of that long cheerless
night. The very stillness of the small hours
was oppressive. It was broken at intervals by
the snort of some lodger more thick-skinned than
I, and who was evidently defying the cimex
family, a sharp snort, with which his constant
snoring was punctuated. The room was too
small to permit any exercise, and I thought I
would freeze.

Finally I became so drowsy, so overcome with
the cold, that I concluded that as the the least of
two evils I would try the bunk again, more for
the warmth of the blankets than in any hope
of sleep. I laid down again flat on my back, and
pulled the blankets up to my chin.

In a short time I was in that strange condition
known as sleep-waking, in which the body is
asleep but the mind is awake, though the co-
ordination of thought is interrupted. There was
no fastening to the door — the only aperture to
the room — and I went to sleep watching that
door.

Presently it seemed that something, something

242

A NIGHT IN MERIDIAN.

horrible and undefined and undefinable — entered
that door and came and tried to smother me with
a black blanket, or something, and sat all over
me, literally. I didn't know what it was ; it was
something black, and you know in dreams we
are never surprised at any incongruity, at any-
thing, because it always seems quite natural. I
could not get my breath. I tried to holler out

TRIED TO HOLLER OUT.

but I couldn't. I felt that I would be smothered
before I could cry out. It seemed tho' that I
slid from the bunk and got to the door, tho' the
bed-covers tangled my legs, and they felt like
they weighed a thousand pounds, and I finally
got out of the door and ran, with the black thing
pursuing me like an overgrown and very ugly
Xemesis. I suddenly found myself going head-
foremost over the precipice of an iceberg, that

243

RECOLLECTIOKS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

black thing right after me. The sensation of
falHng, which no doubt you fellers have ex-
perienced in sleep, aroused me, broke the spell,
and with a start I sat up, throwing off of me
a great gaunt gray cat. It had entered my
boudoir from overhead, crept in on the rafters
with which the overhead was ornamented, and
dropping down noiselessly on my bunk, was
calmly sitting on my chest looking at me. Ugh !
As I threw him, her or it off, I don't know
which was the worst scared, the cat or yours
truly. As he, she or it crouched in the corner
its eyes shone like the headlights of two loco-
motives. I opened the door, and striking a match,
ran the cat out.

The prisoner of Chillon turned gray in a single
night — no, I believe he said ''my hair is gray,
but not with years, 7ior turned it white in a single
night." However, be that as it may, I think I
turned blue, black, green, gray and yellow by
turns that night. It's horrors will live in my
memory as long as memory lasts.

I still couldn't get my breath, notwithstand-
ing the nightmare was gone. The blood all
seemed to be centered at my heart and I was
nearly frozen. I swung my arms, stamped my
feet and beat my chest to see if I couldn't start
the sluggish blood. I was afraid to go out-doors
and run; even if there had not been the danger

244

A NIGHT IN MERIDIAN.

of my freezing, and as said, inside the room there
was not space enough to even walk about.
"Eagerly I wished the morrow ;

Vainly I sought to borrow

From my (pipe) surcease from sorrow."
Narry morrow — narry borrow. Luckily I had
a supply of smoking tobacco and some matches,
and I just sat bolt upright on that backless chair
all night and smoked my pipe. I thought of
everything mean I had ever done, and wondered if
hell wasn't something like this — cold, instead of
hot, and where you have nightmare with cats
perched on your thorax. If not, I should have
liked to make the exchange then and there.

Byme-by, away long yonder when Orion had
dipped below the horizon, and the Little Dipper
was getting ready to dip; when the stars gen-
erally, preparatory to going off duty, were ex-
tinguishing their little lamps and had suspended
the twinklin' business — realizing that the sun was
coming, and that they couldn't *'hold a light"
to him ; when the first streaks of gray made their
appearance in the east I heard a lonesome rooster
crow — away over yonder. I heard the big
shanghai next door answer his challenge, going
him considerable "better" on the final syllable of
his remarks. I heard a belated owl hoot from,
the bosom of the adjacent thicket. I heard the
frantic scream of the coming engine, coming as

245

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

if it were in a hurry to get in out of the cold.
I could almost in the mind's eye — see it blow on
its hands to keep them warm, as you have seen
schoolboys do on a frosty morning. It was an
up-train ; going my way.

Ah, to the frozen, famished Greeley party on
their monopoly of ice, the sound of the steam
whistle of the rescue ship was not more welcome
than was that screamin' locomotive, running like
a scared wolf, to my anxious ears. Not to the
besieged at Lucknow was the "pibroch's shrill
note," announcing the coming of Campbell with
the camels, more welcome than was that same
screamer, screaming as she approached Meridian,
to yours truly. It was to carry me away from
Meridian, from the scenes of that dreadful night.

By the time the train had arrived at the station
I was there, and was soon snugly seated by the
stove in the conductor's caboose (it was a freight
train), thawing and thinking. In an hour I was
telling my wife the adventures over a cup of sho-
nufif coffee, and smoking waffles weltering in
fresh butter.

I shall never forget Dr. Johnson's "Retreat,"
nor the hotel-bill. I have no doubt it is the
champion hotel-bill of all creation, the biggest
one on record for a night's lodging (alleged).
I arrived after supper, sat up all night, left be-
fore breakfast, and paid $300.

A CHAPTER FOR DOCTORS.

A CHAPTER FOR DOCTORS.

Surgery during the war was a very different
thing from what it is now, said the Old Doctor,
leaning back in my editorial chair, with his
thumbs in the armholes of his vest, and with a
dignified expression on his usually jolly, coun-
tenance, as if to say, "I'm going to talk sense
now." For even at the best, with the best appli-
ances, you know that it was practiced upon an
entirely different theory. It was before anything
whatever was known of the "germ-pathology."
It was believed that suppuration was necessary
to healing by second intention, and as healing
by first intention could not be hoped for in larger
wounds, and rarely in gunshot wounds at all,
the aim of the surgeon was to promote suppura-
tion as rapidly as possible; and the appearance
on the third or fourth day of a creamy pus was
hailed with satisfaction. It was called "laudable
pus" (which clearly enough indicates what was
thought of it). To that end hot cloths were
applied, hot cloths wet in hot water and even in
some instances poultices.

I should state, however, that notwithstanding
what I have said, it was routine practice after an
operation, large or small, to put on "wet com-
presses," cold dressings, and to fix a tin cup over

247

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

the wound, filled with cold water, and a cotton
thread led the water to fall drop by drop on the
wound. It was only in the larger cities that ice
could be had. I suppose the theory was that cold
would keep down excessive inflammation. When
suppuration began the dressings were changed to
warm applications to promote it.

In light of our present knowledge does it not
look ridiculous? The intentional though uncon-
scious propagation of millions of pathogenic
"germs," the prevention of which is the great
object now and constitutes the greatest triumph
of surgical art in the century! Think of the
thousands of precious lives that could have been
saved if Lister's great work had come fifty years
sooner.

Experience soon demonstrated that a gunshot
wound of any joint was almost invariably fatal,
and even a gunshot fracture of the femur by the
methods of treatment was so nearly always at-
tended with fatal results, that it became early in
the war the rule to amputate for both, and that
primary operation gave the best chances for re-
covery; that is, amputation as soon after the
wound was made as possible. Think of the
thousands of limbs that were sacrificed that
could, under modem methods, have been easily
saved. And as to bruised, "contused" or lacer-
ated fractures, not a moment was wasted but am-

248

A CHAPTER FOR DOCTORS.

putation was at once done. How many thousand
lives were lost through ignorance, want of ex-
perience, want of skill, want of suitable appli-
ances, will of course never be known. I myself
once performed an amputation with a pocket-knife
and a common saw. But for the most part the
Confederate surgeons had instruments, such as
they were ; and it was a work of love with the
women of the South to make bandages and lint.
They often stripped their families and their
household of sheets, spreads, and even skirts in
order to supply bandages and lint to the hos-
pitals. For the most part the women regarded
the cause as holy, or next to holy, and they stop-
ped at no sacrifice of personal possessions or
comfort.

Hospital gangrene and erysipelas were the
great scourges of the hospitals, and carried off
more soldiers, I dare say, than Yankee bullets
did. We knew nothing, as I told you, of germ
causation, and therefore nothing of germicides
and antiseptics. The treatment was altogether
empirical. I remember somebody said that sul-
phide of lead was a sovereign application for
hospital gangrene. It was not stated upon what
principle it was supposed to act; but was just
"good for" gangrene. I can recall now the zeal
with which most surgeons took hold of the new
treatment, and we had to extemporize the

249

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

remedy. I can see now the crude iron pot In
which a lot of minie balls are being melted.
When melted, flour of sulphur was industriously
stirred in until the mixture became of the proper
consistency, and when cool it was a gray-black
powder. This was liberally sprinkled on th^
wound ; more often the wound was filled with
it. I do not remember that I ever knew it to
do any good. In this connection I recall an ex-
perience that I shall never forget.

As officer of the day I had to sleep at the hos-
pital a certain night. Gangrene was amongst the
wounded. There was a boy whose wound, in
the center of the left hand, of course making a
compound fracture of the metacarpal bones, was
attacked with gangrene. It was being treated by
the method in vogue, when that night an artery,
the palmar arch, sprang a leak; that is, hemor-
rhage set in. The nurse called me, and by the light
of a single smoky coal-oil lamp, and with the as-
sistance of a very stupid and sleepy nurse, one of
the convalescent soldiers, I had to amputate the
hand. What is worse, for some reason not now
recalled the instruments were either out of place
or locked up, or at any rate were not available,
and I did the operation with the contents of a
small pocket-case and the saw that belonged to
the carpenter, while my assistant held the lamp.

Think of the situation, ye up-to-date surgeons.

250

A CHAPTER FOR DOCTORS.

I administered the chloroform and had one eye
on his respiration, while with the other eye I
directed as best I could the cutting process and
ligating of the arteries. The boy recovered; but
the surgeon in charge — it was Dr. Charles E.
Michelle, still living I believe in St. Louis, gave
me hail Columbia for not saving that boy's hand,
or at least the little finger and the thumb; and

HAD TO AMPUTATE THE HAND.

he demonstrated to me ( I was but a kid in years,
remember, tho' a surgeon of rank with him and
the best of them ; I was 24), and to the assembled
wisdom of the hospital, how nicely the little
finger and thumb might have been saved, and
what a comfort they would have been to the
boy in after years in picking cotton, for instance.
(He did not say ''picking cotton"; that's a

251

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

'Voluntary.") I had kept the hand for his in-
spection, and *'hail Columbia" was what I got.

RECOLLECTION OF HAWTHORN.

You all knew Professor Frank Hawthorn of
the University of Louisana, of course, continued
the Doctor, after resting a little from the above
recitation. Speaking of that case reminds me
of an experience of his. He had a case with
hemorrhage adjuncts. His man had been shot
through the flesh in the bend of the elbow, but
the artery had not been cut. Secondary hemor-
rhage set in, however, and as a lot of the big
surgeons (he vvasn't a very big one then, but he
got to be later) were at that post, inspecting and
operating, Hawthorn put on a tourniquet and
controlled the bleeding till he could have them
see the case and advise what was best to do.
There were Dr. Ford, medical director of the
army ; Dr. Stout, medical director of hospitals ;
Dr. Pim, Dr. Saunders (now of Memphis) and
others. Hawthorn showed the case and said :
"What is the best to do?" turning to Medical
Director Ford.

"Well, I don't know, er — rer; what say,
Stout?"

"Well, I don't know, er — rer; what say,
Saunders ?"

"Well, I don't know; what say, Pim?"

252

A CHAPTER FOR DOCTORS.

Hawthorn got impatient, and picking up a
bistoury said :

''Here's what / say do"; suiting the action to
the word, laying the wound wide open at one
sweep, and taking up the ends of the artery
had a Hgature around it quicker than a wink.

This party of big surgeons came to the hos-
pital where I was stationed. All the wounded
tiiat were thought subjects for operation were
brought out one at a time, under the shade of
the trees in the beautiful yard of the Hill hospital
at Covington, for examination and operation or
otherwise, as decided by this tribunal.

Amongst those brought out on this occasion was
a large Swede who had received a gunshot frac-
ture of the radius near the wrist. The ques-
tion was, to resect (it was called "resect," tho'
*'exsect" seems to me would be more proper),
that is, cut out the jagged ends of the bone, or to
let it alone. It was decided to saw off the ends
of the bone, of course.

The man was put on the table, but before
chloroform v/as given he said:

''Gentlemen, have I any say-so about this
operation ?"

"Why, certainly," replied several of the boss
surgeons.

The man looked around at each face in turn,
then pointing to me, the only beardless one in

253

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

the lot, and looking like a kid, he said:
"There's the man I want to do the cutting on

my arm."

I did the operation like a little man, and my

grateful Swede made a splendid recovery.
But I have digressed; I was telling you of

Hawthorn.

THAT'S THE MAN.

Hawthorn went out as a private soldier in the
loth Alabama infantry when he was a fresh
graduate of medicine. His regiment was at Pen-
sacola. One of his company got shot through
the foot, and all the surgeons were absent fish-
ing, it was said. Some one said : ''Hawthoi;n in
this man's company is a doctor — get him !" They
got him. He cut down and tied the posterior

254

A CHAPTER FOR DOCTORS.

tibial artery — the correct thing to do — and when
the surgeon returned — it was Dr. Ford — a Httle
later, the medical director I have been speaking
of, he asked who had done that operation; say-
ing it was a neat operation and a creditable job.
He was told that the operator was Private Haw-
thorn of the loth Alabama. Dr. Ford immedi-
ately appointed him assistant surgeon, and a little
later he passed examination and was made sur-
geon, and soon became known throughout the
army as one of the ablest surgeons we had.

I want to record here, while I think of it, what
has always seemed a very remarkable fact; it is
this: The Confederate surgeons were handi
capped in many ways. We were short on chloro-
form and had to use it as economically as pos-
sible— we had none to waste. We had to use
such as we could get and could not be choice as
to quality. We couldn't specify that it was to
be "Squibb's." Some that we used I know was
adulterated. I remember a lot that smelled like
turpentine. Well, sirs, I want to tell you now
that I administered chloroform and had it ad-
ministered for me many scores of times, for all
manner of operations and on all sizes and ages
and conditions of men, and I never had a serious
accident, never a death from chloroform, nor
had a man to die on the table during my whole
experience as a surgeon during the war. I do

255

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

think it remarkable when I recall the perfect
abandon, the almost reckless manner in which
it was given to every patient put on the table,
almost without examination of lungs or heart
and without inquiry. I can only attribute it in
part to the fact that it was given freely, boldly
pushed to surgical anesthesia, and no attempt was
made to cut till the patient was limber.

Nathan Smith's wire splint was a blessing to
the Confederate surgeons, a refuge and a tower
of strength. It is so simple, so easily and quickly
made, so cheap, and so easily adapted to almost
every fracture, that it was generally used. We
had no ready-made splints, such as are now on
sale everywhere. We made our own splints.

Before the war pneumonia was, in the South,
nearly always of the sthenic type, and the lancet
and antimony were the sheet-anchors of treat-
ment ; followed by quinine, as the disease was
most rife in malarial sections. The disease not
only stood depleting, but demanded it. Natur-
ally, when we first encountered pneumonia in
the hospitals the customary treatment was in-
stituted. It was exceedingly fatal, and it was
soon seen that from the inception a sustaining
treatment was demanded, and was found to be
successful. That is, brandy (or whisky if brandy
could not be had) and opium and quinine became
the standard. The disease seemed to have en-

256

A CHAPTER FOR DOCTORS.

tirely changed its form; became asthenic, and
the Surgeon-General, Dr. S. P. Moore, actually
issued orders prohibiting the use of antimony or
the lancet, and I am not sure it did not include
veratrum.

Well, sirs, wlien we returned to civil practice,
naturally we followed the stimulating plan,
brandy and opium, only to find that in many
cases it was disappointing, and hence there was
a revival in the South of the lancet to quite
a considerable extent, and that the disease in
private life was again of the robust or sthenic
form. I remember following the stimulating
treatment and seeing others do it, and I can look
back now and realize that many patients were
actually killed by whisky pushed too far.

You can readily understand that drugs and
medicines, being what was called ''contraband of
war," soon became scarce and high priced. We
were very soon thrown on our native resources,
and had to make use of the valuable indigenous
plants with which the South abounds. Practis-
ing medicine in the army was not like it is now ;
now, it is almost a luxury. A Dr. Porcher, of
South Carolina, issued a book of the medicinal
plants of the South, and it became a text-book.
The surgeons would send the convalescents to
the woods to get willow bark, oak bark, black-
berry root, dewberry root, sassafras bark, skull-

257

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

cap root, etc., and the bark of the sHppery-ehii
tree was a blessing ; we made poultices of it. Oh,
the poor soldiers hadn't much of a chance in
the hospitals, compared to those of the Federal
army, whose surgeons had every necessary ad-
junct for the skillful practice of medicine and
surgery. Think of treating the long fevers and
the amputations in the long hot summer months
without ice. The mortality was fearful at best.

But, boys, I have violated my principles and
the principles of my Retroscope in indulging in
the gloomy reflections of the last hour — but [
promise you I will not do it again. I did it be-
cause I have been telling you fellows so many
funny and ridiculous recollections that I fear
I have conveyed but a feeble idea of what a
hospital surgeon's life was during those terrible
times.

Moreover we lived under the most absolute
tyranny that ever existed. The conscript officers
were everywhere, and guards on the lookout for
stragglers and deserters, and even an officer on
leave of absence had to be very securely armed
with the proper kind of papers to go anywhere.
I was on a train once and saw the conscript offi-
cers take off to camp a man who was beyond the
then conscript age, because he did not have satis-
factory papers ; and a man without them was
arrested wherever found, and had to give a good

258

A CHAPTER FOR DOCTORS.

account of himself, else a gun was put into his
hands and he was sent off to camp, even if he
had come to town to sell a load of wood to get
bread for his family. I saw such an arrest made
once, and the poor devil's wagon and team and
load of wood were left standing in the street.

I procured leave of absence once, and went
home. The first thing on arrival was to get a
permit to pass unmolested throughout the
county. If I went out of town a mile on any
road I was halted and made to show my papers
at every forks of the road.

But, upon the whole, I am glad I lived in war-
times. I trust to God that I may not live to see
another war— but I am glad to have been
through that one, and to have seen and ex-
perienced what I did. First, I had a taste of a
private's hardships, and I tell you it was play
then, to what it became later ; and I shall never
cease to wonder how the boys stood it, and what
it was that kept up their courage to such a won-
derful degree, for it is admitted that seldom in
the history of the world, since the days of Sparta
and Troy, perhaps, has such undaunted courage
been seen in the face of untold dangers and hard-
ships. But, boys, I'm done. Good bye.

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

IN THE LAND OF THE BLUE DOG.

A LONESOME RIDE.

Said the Old Doctor, taking his usual seat:
Just after the war, when I was practising medi-
cine at Jackson, the capital of Mississippi, the
home of my earlier days, I was requested by
letter to go to one of the extreme eastern coun-
ties to see a case with a view to a surgical
operation.

The eastern counties are, as I once told you,
for the most part piney woods, heavy sandy
lands, no soil to speak of, except here and there
where a creek or ''branch" meanders through.
These little creek bottoms, as they are called,
afford at intervals little patches of tillable soil,
and at long intervals you will come across a
cabin, with its household of white-headed child-
ren, and a yellov/ dog — or a blue one most
likely — and near by a small clearing, fenced in
by brush interwoven so as to even turn a rabbit,
in which enclosure you will see a little crop of
stunted yellow corn, or a patch of bumble-bee
cotton .

"What is 'bumble-bee' cotton, Doctor?" said
Hudson.

You are a greeny, shonuff. Dan 'els knows.

260

IN THE LAND OF THE BLUE DOG.

It's cotton that a bumble-bee can suck the top
blossoms standing flat footed on the ground, said
the Old Doctor, nearly strangling, he laughed so
hard at Hudson's unsophistication, and presently
resumed his narrative.

The country is of course very sparsely settled
off of the line of railroad, and mostly by the
poorer classes — "tackeys," "po' white trash," the
negroes call them. Now and then there is a more
pretentious farm and a fairly well-to-do-family;
such an one as I was now on my way to visit.
The stretches of pine trees and sand are inter-
minable, and sometimes in a day's ride you will
not see a living soul nor a sign of habitation;
and they do say that when a jay bird or a crow
has occasion to fly over, say Jasper county, for
instance, if he is an experienced traveler or a
close observor of events, or if he takes the
papers, he always carries along a little sack of
shelled corn.

In that section of country they have two or
three names for a postoffice settlement; for in-
stance, Damascus the natives call "Sebastopol" ;
Fairfield is "Bucksnort," etc. This I learned on
the trip, as I will presently tell you.

Arriving at the nearest railroad station, I hired
a double team, and getting my directions to Mr.
Garrett's, near Damascus, I lit out for a thirty-
mile ride, all by my lonesome. It was early fall,

261

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

a gloomy day, the skies were overcast and the
pines were soughing, as they do at the approach
of rain. Oh ! it's the lonesomest f eehng im -
aginable. I rode and rode, mile after mile,
through an unbroken monotony of those stately
columns of long-leaf pine and sand. Not a liv-
ing thing did I see except a buzzard, and he had
evidently neglected to carry the essential bag of
corn, and had fallen exhausted by the roadside
before he had crossed the desert.

By-and-bye, away towards sunset, my eyes
were gladdened by the sight of a clearing.
There was the little patch of stunted yellow corn,
burnt up by the drought and the sun, and a little
patch of bumble-bee cotton, and a rank growth
of gourd vines on the fence of what had
evidently been attempted for a vegetable garden
and abandoned in despair. There had been a
rail fence around the house once, but it was down
and scattered; the yard was littered with paper
and trash, and the house, which was a one-
room log cabin, with a dirt-and-stick chimney,
was closed and looked deserted. The lethean
stillness, stirred — ^not broken — by the funereal
soughing and sighing of the pines, dying away
in the bosom of the interminable forest, like the
wail of some lost spirit, was only accentuated by
the rapping of a red-headed woodpecker on the
sonorous boards of the gable. My heart sank

262

IN THE LAND OF THE BLUE DOG.

within me. I thought I would make one effort
anyway, so I hailed :

"Hello !"

No reply.

''Hello ! !" said I, louder.

Thereupon a blue and white hound dog, of the
flop-eared species, crawled out from under the

WH-I-C-H.

cabin, and putting all four feet together humped
his back, gaped, protruding a long, pointed
tongue, turned up at the end like a hook, yawned,
thus giving himself a good stretch, lazily re-
marked :

"Brew-er-er-er-erh !" — something between a

26z

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

howl and a bark, curling it up at the end with a
rising inflection on the last syllable.

"Hello! !" said I again, louder.

The door opened and a strapping girl of about
sixteen, perhaps, bare-legged to the knees, bare-
footed, with a dirty homespun dress on, came
out on the porch, her yellow hair, cut off square
all around, falling loosely on her neck.

''Can you tell me how far it is to Damascus,
please?" said I.

'Wh-wh-i-c-hr said she.

*'How far is it to Damascus, please?"

"I kin tell you how far it is to the p-o-o-o-1?"
she said, turning the "pool" up at the far end.

"What pool is it you are speaking of, Miss?"
said I.

"They call it the scT/o^terpool," said she.

"Well, how far is it to Sebastopol, then ?" said
I, jumping at the conclusion that Sebastopol was
the home name of Damascus, my place of desti-
nation.

"Hits about /o'-miles," said the girl. "You jes
git inter ther road again, and keep on twell you
git to the top of ther hill, and then you jes keep
on twell you git to ther bottom of ther hill, and
then you cross ther creek, and then you keep ther
straight pool road twell you git thar."

"Thank you. Miss," said I, and I drove on.

"Bre-w-er-er-erh !" howled the blue dog, and

264

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

crawled back under the cabin grumbling at hav-
ing had his nap interrupted.

I had gone not over three quarters of a mile,
I think when I came to a log blacksmith shop
on the side of the road, and a plank cabin about
10x12 feet — a country "store" — closed. The
smith was sitting in his door smoking a corn-cob
pipe, and looking very lonely, and well he might,
for of all the God-forsaken, desolate wildernesses
I ever saw that was the worst. It was near night,
and a white hen and a red rooster had already
retired for the night on the bed of a broken
wagon, while two lean shoats were quarreling
over the warm side of a litter pile against the
end of the store. I said:

''My friend, can you tell me how much farther
it is to Sebastopol?"

''This is hit," said the man, without rising or
taking his pipe from his mouth,

''Which is 'it'?" said L

"This," he said.

"Meaning ?" I said, glancing around.

"Yes ; this shop and that store ; that Ratlifif's ;
he's got the chillunfever ; hits the posto^c^, too,"
said the man, with, I thought, a show of local
pride.

Rejoiced that I was so near the end of my
journey, I dismounted, stretched my legs, and
made inquiry how to reach Mr. Garratt's, and

266

IN THE LAND OF THE BLUE DOG.

in a little while was safely beneath that gentle-
man's hospitable roof.

On another occasion Dr. Bob Homer, a class-
mate of mine, practising at one of the railroad
stations in east Mississippi, sent for me to meet
him at his place and go with him in consultation
to see a surgical case in the interior. You know
I had come out of the war with a considerable
reputation with the home folks of Mississippi as
a surgeon, and Bob thought a good deal of
my attainments, anyhow. Arrived at the station
at an early hour I was met by Dr. Bob with his
spanking double team, and everything in readi-
ness for the trip and the proposed operation.

We had to go about thirty miles, an all-day
ride. Driving is tedious in that heavy white
sand, and there are the same monotonous, in-
terminable stretches of long-leaf pine. We had
talked out, having kept up a pretty lively chatter
up to and including our noon rest and lunch.
The lunch consisted of two cans of cove oysters,
two bottles of ale and some crackers.

At noon we unhitched our team by a clear
little stream that crossed the road, gave the
horses some feed and let them drink. Before
opening up our lunch Dr. Bob said :

"Hold on a moment. Doctor; there's white

267

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

perch in this creek and I'll catch some for our
dinner."

I didn't argue the question with him; I sup-
posed he knew what he was talking about. So
Bob rigged up a hne and hook which he took
out of his clothes somewhere, and turning over
a log secured some beetles or other bugs for
bait, and going a little way up the creek was soon
angling for perch, while I was making a fire
as he had requested me to do.

He was not gone over fifteen minutes I should
say, when he returned holding up for my inspec-
tion four beautiful speckled perch, each about
ten inches long. They were the prettiest fish I
ever saw, tho' I was accustomed to what they
call white perch at Jackson. These were silver
white, mottled with purplish blotches, and as
the little stream was as clear as crystal and as
cold as ice, you may imagine they were a delicate
morsel. I said :

"How are you going to cook them. Bob?"

''Watch me," he said.

Raking away the sand in a clear nice place,
he put some coals in the opening. Killing the fish
by a blow on the back of the head, and opening
them, removing the gills and entrails, and sprink-
ling on them some salt which he produced from a
paper taken from his vest pocket, he wrapped the
fish in several thicknesses of newspaper and thor-

268

"DOIN'NOTHIN- BUT LOOKIN- SORRY."

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

oughly soaked tlie paper in the creek; then he
laid them on the coals and covered them with hot
ashes and coals on top of that. "When the paper
bums they are done," said Bob.

Meantime he had taken out the lunch, and
spreading the lap-robe on the ground for a table-
cloth, we spread our feast ; and I tell you now I
never in my life tasted anything that met my
demands better than those white perch Bob
roasted in the ashes.

We resumed our journey and by four o'clock
the horses were much jaded, and we had to take
it slowly. We soon relapsed into silence, each
one busy with his own thoughts ; it was awfully
*'bore-ous."

Presently, at the bottom of one of those long
red hills that characterize a portion of that sec-
tion, though for the most part the land is level, we
came upon a covered wagon drawn by two lean
ponies, and filled with white-headed children.
Under the wagon a tar bucket hung loosely, and
by it was tied a blue dog of the genus ''hound."
Out by the roadside lay a larger, yellow and
white dog — dead. An old man with long gray
beard was standing by, doing nothin' but lookin'
sorry; a typical specimen of the "mover" class,
or, as Dr. Willis King in "Stories of a Country
Doctor," calls them, "branch water men." The
old man had evidently just dragged the dog

270

IN THE LAND OF THE BLUE DOG.

there and left him. By the man stood a tow-
headed boy in butternut-dyed jeans pants, a
coarse cotton shirt, and gallusses of striped bed-
ticking, with his hands stuck in his pockets up
to his elbows, for it was a little coolish.

The scene was so desolate, the old man looked
so sad, I thought to say a cheering word and
perhaps get him into conversation ; I didn't of
course, know what killed the dog; so in the ab-
sence of anything better to begin with I sung out
cheerily :

"My friend, did your dog die?"
He looked at me sorter sideways for about a
minit:— 'T reckin so, by G — d— he's dead," said
he with a scowl and a look as if he'd like to
cut my throat for a darned fool.

Dr. Bob knocked me on the back and just
"ha — ha'd." "A good one on you, Doctor," he
said; "Now don't you wish you hadn't said
anything?"

"I do indeed," I said, much disgusted.
Bob said that class resent anything of the
kind, and that it is best to speak to them when
spoken to. I told him that I had just been told
as much by the "other fellow."

Bob called my attention to the fact — he says it
is a fact — that this class is as much characterized
by the blue dog as the negro is by the "yaller"
dog ; and that the blue dog is found nowhere else

271

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

than in the piney woods among the "poor folks,"
as they are universally called by the darkies.

But Dr. Bob's time came soon, said the Old
Doctor. Just before dark — the chickens were
flying up— we came in front of a nice white
house, a Mr. Gregory's, a pretty well-to-do
farmer. The house sits back from the road some
little distance in a pretty lawn, surrounded by a
neat white fence — evidences everywhere of thrift,
contrasting strikingly with the absence of it
almost everywhere else, and with the desolate-
ness of the surroundings generally. Bob said:

"Here Doctor, hold the reins ; I've got to give
these horses some water ; they looked fagged out
and we have eight miles to go yet."

Just then a great big black dog, a fierce look-
ing fellow, got up and gave a low growl.

"I'm awfully afraid to go in there ; that's a ter-
rible dog. I knovv^ this country from one end to
the other and I've heard of Dave Gregory's dog."

"Here boy," said the doctor to a lad standing
near the dog. "If you'll hold that dog till I get
two buckets of water I'll give you a quarter."

"All right," said the boy, and he seized the
dog around the neck. "Come ahead," said he,
"I'll hold him," and he pushed the dog to the
ground, and with his arm around him laid down
on top of him.

The doctor, taking the bucket from the foot

272

IN THE LAND OF THE BLUE DOG.

of the buggy in one hand, and the heavy driving
whip in the other, holding it by the small end,
ready to use it as a club if necessary for de-
fense, went cautionsly in, circling around the
dog and keeping a sharp eye on him.

He got the water and watered both horses;
and just before getting into the buggy said :

"Boy — don't turn that dog loose till we g^t
started — and here's your quarter on the gate-
post."

"All right," said the boy; "down, sir" (to the
dog.)

As Bob got into the buggy and took hold of
the reins he said :

"That's a pretty savage dog,ain't he Bud?"

"He uster be," said the boy.

"Use to be?" said the doctor; "ain't he bad
now ? Won't he bite ?"

"Bite nothin'," said the boy, pocketing the
quarter. "He's b-b-b-blind, and so old his teefs
is all dropped out."

"One on you now. Doc," said I. "Don't you
wish you had your quarter back ?"

^7Z

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

JIMMIE WAS ALL RIGHT.

In my neighborhood, said the Old Doctor,
lazily throwing one leg over the other and bor-
rowing a chew of tobacco from Hudson, the
only one of the Journal staff that uses it that
way, there was a nasty little cock-eyed
bricklayer named Lynch. He was a "Hinglish-
man," he said, from "'Arrowgate." His wife
was a pretty decent sort of a feller; but he was
too mean to eat enough.

He had a way of coming over to the drug-store
— I had a drug-store then — and asking Bob, the
clerk, what was "good for" so and so. He
never sent for me in his life, and never bought
over ten cents worth of anything in the drug-
store. His big *'holt," as he said, was "Seen-na"
and salts. Jimmie, his son, was down with chill
and fever, and he was giving him calomel and
about three grains of quinine a day — he was too
mean to buy enough ; and Jimmie got no better
fast. About the fourth chill Jimmie had they
gave in, and sent for me. I prescribed enough
quinine and prevented the paroxysm. At my
next visit I found him well and I accordingly
said:

"Jimmie's all right now ; he can get up to-
morrow."

274

JIMMY WAS ALL RIGHT.

"Yes, Jimmies all right," said his mother; ''1
knowed that last doste of calamy I gi' him would
set Jimmie all right."

I went out and kicked myself, said the Old
Doctor.

^ 2{C ^ 2fC

Lynch had a dog and wouldn't feed him. The
dog, thrown on his own resources for a living,
used to go hunting for young rabbits, which in
summer were plentiful even on the outskirts of
town. Lynch saw him with a rabbit one day,
and took it azi'ay from him. Fact ! Talk about
mean men — and the Doctor looked just too dis-
gusted for anything.

275

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

CIRCUMSTANCES ALTER CASES.

ANY PORT IN A STORM.

After the surrender, you know, the South
was garrisoned with negro troops, said Our Fat
Philosopher, seating himself, and with a reminis-
cent, far-away expression on his usually jolly
phiz. It was exceedingly offensive and humiliat-
ing to the people, and was very bad judgment
on the part of the authorities — if it was their de-
sire to have peace and kindly feeling; for it
often provoked clashes that should have been
avoided.

At Jackson, my boyhood home, the negro sol-
diers of the garrison committed many depreda-
tions ; stole fruit, hogs, poultry, anything they
took a fancy to or needed, and it was winked at
by the officers, white men tho' they were. Thev
were very insolent also, to the "conquered rebels,"
as they contemptuously stigmatized the whites.
No use to appeal to the commandant, there was
no redress. So citizens now and then got into
very serious trouble by taking matters in their
own hands. You all may remember that Colonel
Ed Yerger of Jackson, was so outraged because
the commandant at that post in his absence sent
and seized Mrs. Yerger's piano, because the

276

(^/

DRAGGING HIM THROUGH THE STREETS.

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

colonel had not paid his share of the tax levied
by the commandant for street improvement or
something, that on meeting him on the street
Yerger stabbed him to death. It was Colonel
Crane I think his name was.

But, well, I'm off; Colonel Fleet Cooper, the
editor of the Jackson paper at that time — ^no, he
wasn't a shonuff "colonel," you know. In the
South all editors are "Colonels," you know — saw
some negro soldiers in his orchard and shot at
them, but without injury. I think it was bird
shot, and it was only done to scare them.

He was roughly seized and hurried into town,
(he lived in the suburbs), and taken to the lock-
up. He was roughly handled ; unnecessarily so,
for he made no resistance — and was even beaten
over the head. They were in such a hurry to get
him locked up that they would'nt even give him
time to get his hat. I can see the crowd now,
rushing, almost dragging him through the streets
approaching the center of town, bare-headed, in
the broiling hot July sun, his poor old bald head
glistening in the sun like burnished brass as they
hurried him along to the jail. It created a good
deal of excitement. But what could the people
do? Disarmed, subjugated, had taken the oath —
entirely at the disposal of a provost marshal.
Nothing. But they talked. They could express

278

CIRCUMSTANCES ALTER CASES.

their indignation in impotent cuss-words; that
was all.

That night in the lobby of the hotel there was
quite a crowd collected and they were discussing
the outrage. On the outskirts of the crowd there
was a stranger — a man in a long linen duster and
a black slouch hat pulled well over his eyes. He
had the appearance of having been riding, and
had just arrived, dusty and untidy. His presence
did not attract attention, because at that time
there was a great deal of traveling and there
were a great many strangers coming and going.

In the crowd was an old citizen-farmer, an old
toothless feller, well known thereabout, named
Major Lanier — why ''Major," I don't know. He
was too old to have been in the army or to have
taken any part in the war. His nose and chin
were about to meet over the remains of a mouth
now shrunken and flabby. He was particularly
indignant.

"Served 'em right ! Served 'em right ! — the
black scoundrels," said the major, emphasizing
his words with a thump on the floor with his
big stick. "No business stealin' Colonel Cooper's
apples. I wish he'd killed all of 'em. Served
'em right, says I."

The stranger, whom no one had noticed par-
ticularly before, stepped up to him, and open-

279

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

ing his dust-coat and throwing it back revealed
the chevrons on his collar — it was the colonel
commanding the garrison of negro soldiers —
said:

"You damned old rebel scoundrel — you say it
is right to shoot a union soldier for taking a few
green apples?"

"Was they green? Was they green?" quickly
exclaimed the old major, who was terribly fright-
ened and began to tremble and apologize. "Oh,
no ; not if they was green. I wouldn't shoot a sol-
dier for taking a few green apples. No, / thought
they was ripe. No, not if they wasn't ripe. No ;
I wouldn't if they was green — ." And he backed
out of the crowd still mumbling his disclaimer
amidst shouts of laughter. A close call, but the
major thought, "any port in a storm."

280

UNCLE HARDY MULLINS.

UNCLE HARDY MULLINS OR THE WAYS OF
PROVIDENCE.

Uncle Hardy Mullins? Did I promise to
tell you about him? said our ever welcome Fat
Philosopher this bright morning. So I did.

''Reverend Hardy Mullins," or "Uncle Hardy
Mullins/' as he was universally called, had been
raised in the piney woods of Mississippi, the be-
nighted section of sand, blue dogs, white-headed
children and ''po' folks," as the negroes called the
whites of that section. He had been ''called to.
preach," a sort of superstitious belief still held by
certain people. You all know how it is — "called,"
well, "by a voice in the air," — or somewhere,
or as Dr. Willis King says of Joe's excuse to the
teacher, "hit moughter been a boss a 'nickerin,."

Uncle Hardy was about 75 years old, totally
illiterate, but he had been preaching so long he
knew the Bible almost by heart, but was not able
to locate any quotation. He used to say : "You'll
find my text betwixt the leds of the book." He
looked like one of the Patriarchs mentioned in the
"book," his long white beard reaching nearly to
his waistband ; of course he was itinerant ; hadn't
charge of any fixed "work" or congregation,
hence he preached mostly in the country, amongst

281

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEI, SURGEON.

people for the most part as untaught as himself.

Just after the war, preaching in the little log
schoolhouse to the neighbors over in Rankin
county, across the river from Jackson, he said on
the occasion when I had the privilege of hearing
him:

"My brethren, all things happen for the best.
That's been my doctrin' and my belief all my life.

x3;=S^

UNCLE HARDY MULLLSS.

Hits recorded in the scripters that to him as has
faith, all things happens for the best in God's
good time. I have faith. I b'l'eve everything
happens for the best; I zvill b'l'eve it; I must
b'l'eve it, because the good book says so. But,
my Christian friends, we has our trials and our
temptations, our hours of unbelief, and I has
mine, and I pray, ''Oh, Lord, help my unbelief,"

282

UNCLE HARDY MULLINS.

and he hears me. Sometimes hits mighty hard
to b'l'eve. When we loses a child, or a friend,
for instance, hits mighty hard fur to b'l'eve that
hits for the best, 'spec'ly when hits a man he
leaves a pore lone widder 'ooman and six little
orphan children, but God knows best, and we
must bow to His will.

"Now, I come home from the army after the
break-up, and my little house was burnt ; all the
fences burnt ; my two mules stolen' and nothin' on
this green yerth left me 'cept a blue sow — and
hy the grace of the Lord she pigged in the spring.
— givin' me a show for my meat in the fall, and
the mule I rid all endurin' of the war where I
was chapling to Captain Carr's comp'ny.

"But I took heart. I got the nabers to jine in,
and we put up a little log house. I horrid a plow,
and with that one pore so' back mule, I broke up
a little patch for cawn. The cawn was up and in
the tassel, and needed one more plowin' to lay it
by. Hit was promisin' ; and with my growin'
shoats I thought to stave off starvation for a
while longer, and I was puttin' my trust in Provi-
dence, when what should happen but some of
them nigger sogers from the garrison over thar
(pointing with his thumb over his shoulder in the
direction of Jackson), jes' stole my mule, and
killed and carried ofl^ the l-a-s-t one of my shoats,
not even sparin's the old blue sow."

283

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Here the old fellow paused and "wiped away a
tear" ; and leaning over the pulpit, said with emo-
tion:

"Now, brethren and sistern : That may have
all been for the best — but I'll jest be everlastin'ly
durned my old buttons if I can see it!"

284

THE LITTLE HU-GAG.

THE LITTLE HU-GAG, AND THE GREAT
AMERICAN PHIL-LI-LIETJ.

Amongst the renters on my place just after
the war, said the Old Doctor, for you must know
that at the break-up when we came home from
the war we were all dead broke; and those who
had once owned cotton plantations and slaves and
mules, etc., found themselves possessed of noth-
ing on this earth but barren land. Houses
burned, slaves freed, fences destroyed, mules
stolen or taken for the army, by one side or the
other. Well, we had to do something or starve.
I put up a dozen or more log cabins and rented
twenty or more acres to small white farmers (not
that the farmers were small, but they farmed on a
small scale). They were of the class of people
w^ho before the war lived in the poor, piney v/oods
portion of the State; a class who never owned
any slaves, and for whom the negroes, slaves as
they were, entertained a cordial contempt. "Poor
white trash," they called them. Well, as I started
to say : Amongst those who rented from me and
occupied my tenant houses was a family named
Parsons. The family consisted of the father,
mother and two cubs — boys about 14 and 16
years of age. No use trying to describe them;

28s

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

you fellers must be familiar with the ''cracker"
or "tackey" type of Southren people, especially
common in Georgia.

The two boys were good workers, and were in
the field soon and late, and made good crops. But
their daddy — the "old man" — he was not old —
but do you know the women of that class always
call their husband ''old man," even tho' he may
be 20, and vice versa, he calls her "old 'ooman"
— he was the apotheosis of laziness. He was too
lazy to stop eating when once under good head-
way (provided the grub didn't give out). He
rarely ever got to the field till near knocking-off
time for dinner at noon, on one excuse and an-
other.

I remember one spring morning when corn was
growing, and then was the time, or never, to
work it to insure a crop, Tom and Bill were in
the field and had been since daylight. Parsons
hung around the steps of our back porch, where
Robert and I and some others were sitting smok-
ing and talking, telling of what he had seen and
done in Georgia, an inexhaustible subject with
him. There was nothing anywhere, and never
had been, except in Georgia — "Jawjie," he pro
nounced it. Why, sirs, he even declared that in
"Jawjie" postage stamps were larger, "purtier,"
would last longer and carry a letter farther than

286

THE LITTLE HU-GAG.

elsewhere on earth, and that moreover they didn't
cost over half as much as they did in Mississippi.
He yawned, and looking up at the sun — by now
nearly overhead — said :

''Gee — I didn't know it was so late. I have
made arrangements to borry some meal for din-
ner, and I guess I'll be gettin' to the field."

He was the most intolerable brag. Nothing
you could relate but he could cap it with some-
thing he had seen in "Jawjie."

One afternoon in summer, after crops had been
"laid by," and the men had some leisure. Par-
sons and several others of the tenants were gatli-
ered around the back steps of my house talking to
Robert and John, when I came up with my gun
from a ride to see a neighbor's sick child. I
cfidn't take my gun to see the sick child, you un-
derstand— I see you smirking — but thinking I
might shoot some squirrels on the road, as it lay
through some hickory and oak timber, and nuts
were getting big enough for them to sample. As
I dismounted and approached the group Parsons
said:

"Didn't see nothin' to shoot at, eh. Doc?"
"No," said I— "nothing but a miserable little

hu-gag and I wouldn't shoot him"— looking at

John and Robert with a wink.

"A hu-gag?" said Parsons ; "I reckin' we call it

287

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

by a different name in Jawgie; what sort of a
thing was it you saw ?"

"Why," said I, "don't you know what a hu-gag
is? You must have seen many a one."

"Of course I have," said Parsons, "but I don't
know it by that name."

"It's a small gray animal — ."

Parsons nodded his head :

"Just so," he said.

"with sharp ears like a fox," continued I,

he interrupting me, giving assent to each item as
I progressed; "Oomph-hno" (a very common
form of assent in the South, unspellable, but you
all know what it means, said the Old Doctor
aside), "Oomph-hno," said Parsons, "the same
thing exactly."

" — "Hind legs a little longer than front legs,"
said I, "and—."

"Exactly," said Parsons, "same thing; plenty
of them in Jawgie, only larger "

" dark stripe running down his back to his

tail," said I.

"Same thing," said Parsons, — "we call em

" short stump tail," I continued, Parsons

nodding assent to everything and much inter-
ested.

" with a little brass knob on the end," said

I, with perfect gravity.

"Eh? eh?" said Parsons, caught in the act of

288

THE LITTLE HU-GAG.

nodding assent ; and you ought to have seen how
cheap and sheepish he looked, and how he slunk
off while the boys just hollered.

And here the Old Doctor laughed his good
natured chuckle.

Another time, said the Old Doctor, Parsons
and a lot of the farm hands, tenants, were lying
on the grass late one afternoon in summer as I
came up again with my gun, for, understand, I
was a scandalous rifle-shot, as the niggers say,
and always toted my squirrel rifle when I went to
see patients in the immediate neighborhood. I
glanced at Robert, who knew that something was
coming. I said:

"Robert, over there back of Waller's corn field,
in that ravine, you know, where the niggers say
"sperits" live, I saw the darndest animal I ever
saw in my life. (I wouldn't look at Parsons, for
fear of a "give-away.") "I described it to old
Dixon, and he knows it all, you know, to hear him
tell it. He said he had never seen one, did not
know there were any in this country ; thought
they belonged to a mountainous country ; but
from my description, he said, he had no doubt
that it was the Great American Phil-/t-lieu."

"What sort of a looking thing was it?" asked
one of the men.

289

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

( Parsons was lying on his side, propped up on
one elbow, chewing the end of a straw and try-
ing to look indifferent.)

"It was just the queerest looking thing imagi-
nable," said L ''It had a great thick-set head like
a boar, bristles on its back, was a dark brown
color and about the size of a rabbit; and the
strangest part of it was, that it had two short legs
on one side and two long legs on the other, 'espe-
cially adapted,' Mr. Dixon said, 'for running
around the side of a hill' ; and Dixon says the only
way it can be caught, being very fleet of foot, is
to head him off, turn him back, thus causing his
long legs to be up-hill, and his short legs down-
hill, when, unable to run, he just rolls down to
the bottom of the hill and is easily caught."

"Ever see one. Parsons ?" said one of the men.
"Got any of 'em in Jawgie?"

Parsons yawtfed and stretched himself, and
with as much unconcern as he could assume said :

"Never seen but one, and hit was a young one."

290

THE DOCTOR SEES A LADY HOME.

THE DOCTOR SEES A LADY HOME.

A DOCTOx^ has a heap of funny experiences,
said the Old Doctor, but some doctors are so
solemn that they have no sense of fun, and some
are so darned pious — or stupid — which ? that they
cannot see the point of a joke. The best of them
don't always appreciate a joke on themselves; it
requires something of a philosopher to do that;
eh, Dan'els ?

I was thinking of a good joke on myself that
occurred in my dandy days, when I was a con-
siderable of a "s'ciety man" ; when I used to put
grease on my hair, and wear kid gloves and pretty
neckties with a pin stuck in 'em, and visit the
girls. Why, I used to dance even — the round
dances — .

Now, look a'here, you feller^; I see it on your
faces that you don't believe it. Because I am so
fat now you needn't think I was always clumsy.
Why, once I was nearly as skinny as Dan'els —
and here the Doctor shook all over with merri-
ment at the contemplation of such an absurd pos-
sibility— and they do say, he continued, that
Dan'els was so slim that at the San Antonio
meeting of the State Medical Society a dog fol-
lowed him around all day, thinking he was a
bone. And here the old fellow just made the

291

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

furniture rattle, he shook so, and his face was so
red I thought he was going to have apoplexy.

At that meeting, he resumed (the fellers told
it on him), a country man asked Dan'els if he
had ever had the dropsy? Dan'els was indignant
and said :

"No; what on earth makes you ask such a
question ?"

"I didn't know," said the feller, "and I was
jest a reflectin' that if you had, you was the best
cured case I ever sazv; and I've got a sister what's
got the dropsy, and I was a'goin' to ask you to
recommend me your doctor."

You bet he lit out when he saw that Dan'els
was mad. But I've got off the track again ; where
was I at?

Oh, yes. I was a very considerable of a beau
at that period. I attended receptions, and went
with "the best society" ; went everywhere — pic-
nics, boat-sailing, etc. ; even took buggy rides
with the girls. I was a young widower — and
they do say that a widower in love is just the
biggest fool on earth. Now, I wasn't in love, I
want you to understand; but I was just sorter
"lookin' around," as Tim Crane said to Mrs. Be-
dott. I went to church — always ; the fashionable
church. It was in Galveston, directly after the
war. Coming out of church one bright sunny
Sunday morning, with a sharp eye on the alert

292

THE DOCTOR SEES A LADY HOME.

for pretty girls, I saw a pair of bright black eyes
looking through the most provoking veil, as
presently a neat figure, clad in nice silk dress with
all the trimmin's — parasol, gloves — stepped up
by my side and said :

"Good morning. Doctor."

I said : ''Good morning, Miss er — rer," not
recognizing her, but I didn't of course want her
to see that I didn't ; so I pretended to know her.
My first impression was that it was Miss Fannie
Blank, whom I had met at a dance the night be-
fore, and who had impressed me so favorably that
I had mentally determined to cultivate her ac-
quaintance. So I thought, what a lucky chance
to make a beginning ! I said :

*'Allow me to see you home." (That was the
''conventionality," the correct thing, at that day.)

"Certainly," she said, and seemed much pleased
at the prospect. All the while I had been trying
to get a good look at her face, but on account of
that confounded veil I couldn't see anything but
a pair of very black eyes ; couldn't, as the doctors
say, make a diagnosis.

We chatted along indiflferently, I keeping on
safe ground and feeling for light, till we had
reached the corner where I knew Miss Fannie
should turn ofif ; but this one didn't turn oflf ; she
kept straight ahead. By-and-bye talk ran out. I
was gettin' mighty scarce of something to say. I

293

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

said to myself : "Well, now, here's a pretty situa-
tion. A practising physician, a college professor
at that (I was at that time professor of anatomy
in the Texas Medical College), and a lady's man,
a society high-flyer, walking home from church
with a black-eyed woman whom he can't diag-
nose." But I had to keep up appearances that I
knew her and was perfectly at home, you under-
stand. (I wished I had been literally at home.)
But I was nevertheless hard up for something to
say. Observing for the first time that she was
accompanied by a little girl of about 12 years of
age, rather cheaply but cleanly dressed it is true,
I said :

"Bye-the-bye, who is this little girl with you?
I really do not recognize her?" (I thought her
answer would perhaps give me a cue.)

"Why, that's Maggie," said the black-eyed un-
known ; "don't you know Maggie ?"

"Why, bless my soul," said I. "So it is Mag-
gie. How de do, Maggie? You have groimi
so, I didn't know you."

"Why," said the woman, "you saw her yes-
terday."

Thus trapped I didn't know what to say, so
said nothing, but kept up a mighty sight of think-
in' ; reflecting what a good joke was then goin'
on on a stuck-up feller about my size.

Presently she said something about her hus-

294

THE DOCTOR SEES A LADY HOME.

band. ''Heaven and earth," I mentally ejacu-
lated ; "worse and worse. Walking home from
church with a Strang? woman married at that,
whose husband, when I get there, may not be
fond of jokes; may not like it a little bit"; but
catching at anything to relieve me of the Maggie
faux pas, I said cheerily :

''By-the-bye, where is your good husband? I
have not seen him for some time?"

*'Oh, he's dead, you know," reproachfully re-
sponded the unknown.

"No!" said I; "surely not deadf I hadn't
heard of it; I'm very sorry — ."

"Why, Doctor, you attended him; don't you
remember ? Only a short while ago. He died of
yellow fever on his lumber schooner," replied she.

"My stars," I said to myself." "Here am I, a
fashionable high-stepping society swell, a tony
physician, and a college professor (for I zvas
a stuck-up fool, sure enough), walking home
with a black-eyed woman, a zvidozv at that, whose
husband was in the lumber trade and died on a
schooner ! My ! what a joke if Miss Fanny and
Miss Bessie and my runnin' mates amongst the
society fellers should ever get hold of it."

But I was determined to see it out.

By this time we had arrived at a part of the
city rather disreputable; straggling shanties and
poor folks, down towards the bay shore, and I

295

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

was utterly bewildered, so much so that I didn't
recognize her even then. So, opening a dilapi-
dated gate and kicking a yellow dog out of the
path, the woman said:

*' Won't you come in. Doctor?"

''Come in?" Why, of course, I'd come in. I
wanted to see her take that confounded veil off.
Bless your souls, boys, it was my washerwoman !
Fact. And Maggie was the little bare-legged gal
that brought my shirts home of a Saturday even-
ing. I collapsed. She had to fan me ten minutes
before I could speak and she thought it was the
heat.

You bet I was the worst crestfallen dude in that
town, as I slunk home the back way.

But it was too good to keep, even if it zvas
on me, and I told it. How they did rig me, to be
sure.

296

FINE rOINTS IN DIAGNOSIS.

FINE POINTS IN DIAGNOSIS.

The Journal's genial philosopher, who occa-
sionally illumines the hard-worked editor's dreary
office with his glowing countenance and drives
away the blue-devils, dropped in one day lately,
as fat and jolly as ever. He is kind enough to
say he has to come in once a month to "load up"
— on what, he does not say; like the cars that
carry the storage battery have to go to the dy-
namo for their supply of lighting, we suppose.
My private opinion is, he comes to unload, and
we are always glad to receive the discharge. At
any rate there is a kind of mutual admiration ex-
isting between the office and the Philosopher.

Without any ceremony the Doctor sat down
and began, in medias res.

Hudson, he said (Hudson was closely engaged
in footing up expense account, to see if he could
m_ake it come inside of receipts — I was laboring
on a manuscript that would have discounted
Horace Greeley's worst specimen — Bennett was
writing a love-letter — while the office-boy was
whistling ''Henrietta, have you met her," keeping
time by a tattoo with both hands and both feet) ;
Hudson, said the Doctor, I've got a good one on
Dan'els — and here he chuckled till the shovel and
tongs and the other costly office furniture rattled.

297

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

You know Dan'els is a great dermatologist (I
don't think) — got a big reputation for skin dis-
eases— down at the Wallow, anyway. I've got a
case of skin trouble down there that's pestering
me, and after I had done for him everything
/ knew, I brought him up here to consult Dan'els.
I thought it was eczema, and treated it as such;
told Dan els I thought so. Well, the patient — his
name is Skaggs — he is a sorry^ lookin' cuss — said
he had scratched till he was paralyzed in both
arms. He rolled up his sleeves and his britches
legs, and Dan'els put on his specs and examined
it carefully, asking him some questions. Then he
raised up and removing his eye-glasses, said, im-
pressively, and in that grand oracular manner he
has — emphasizing with his forefinger :

"It's psoriasis, doctor; psoriasis gyrafa — a well
marked case; a heaiitiful case. You see, doctor,
the distinguishing features are, the uniform ele-
vated areas of infiltrated tissue, and the enclosed
areas of sound skin, and the uniform redness,
and the persistent dryness; but more than all,
its occurrence only on the extensor surfaces.
Now you see, doctor, this man has it on the ex-
tensors of arms and legs, and on his back — the
absence of it on the breast and abdomen — ."

"Here, you," turning to Skaggs, "Never had it
on your belly, did you, Skaggs?"

"Belly nothin'," said that individual; "Why,

298

FINE POINTS IN DIAGNOSIS.

Doc, hits all over me; wuss in front than any
place else."

And here the jolly doctor laughed till the tears
ran down his cheeks in streams a foot deep.

299

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

ONE ON THOMPSON.

Reminds me, said the Doctor, when he could
quit shaking, reminds me of my old partner,
Thompson, when we were practising together
down at Hog- Wallow. He had a case of chill
and fever that gave him a lot of trouble. He had
done for it about all that could be done, but the
chills wouldn't stay broke more'n about three
v/eeks. One day we were sitting in the office
criticising Dan'els' last editorial in the ''Red
Back," Texas Medical Journal, and Thompson
was telling about a case he had cured after every-
body else had given it up, when in comes his ague
case.

''Well, Doc," says he, with a most woe-begone
expression; "I had another one of them shakin'
agers yistiddy."

"Well, Lorenzo," said Thompson, throwing
himself back with an air, and sticking his thumbs
in the armholes of his vest, "I'll tell you what you
do: You know that big spring down back of
your house? The run, you know, always keeps
up a big damp place there; that's the cause of
your chills ; it's malaria, you know. Now, you
plant sunflozvers all down that spring branch;
sunflowers absorb all the malaria, you know ; that

300

ONE ON THOMPSON.

will break 'em up sure pop; never knew it to

fail."

"Lor, shucks, Doc," said Lorenzo, with a ca-
daverous smile, "that spring run's been growed

"THEN CUT 'EM DOWN."

Up with them sunflowers for four years and more
acres of um."

"Damn it," said Thompson, "then cut 'em

down."

301

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

HALCYON DAYS.

I SEE by the papers, said our Genial Visitor,
that to-day is Commencement Day at the Texas
Medical College. Dan'els, do you ever think of
the time when you got your sheepskin? To me
it was one of the most trying ordeals of my life,
except, perhaps, that time when the Yankees killed
me, and I reckon it's the same with most boys.
'Tn the spring the young man's fancy lightly
turns to thoughts of love," says Tennyson; but
the average medical student crams on Smith's
Compend, and prepares for examination. With
hesitation, trepidation and perspiration, he ap-
proaches that green baize door which, veiling his
future, conceals a terror in the shape of a bald-
headed professor, in whose hands hangs the des-
tiny of many fellers, each not by a thread but by
a string — of hard questions. ''Happy they, the
happiest of their kind," to whom Pat, the janitor,
hands a long round tin box next day, while with
a grin he suggestively protrudes his left hand for
the expected fee, never less than a V.

Who so proud, then, as they, the fledghngs,
the new-born medicos? as when next they meet,
the old familiar 'Tom" and "Harry" are dropped,
and it's "Good morning. Doctor; accept my con-

■ 302

HALCYON DAYS.

grats. Didn't old Blimber make a fellow sweat?"

"Oh, pshaw, Doctor, he was nothing to old
Bones when he got me on the ligaments. I was
up-to-date, tho', you bet; crammed. So long,
Doctor."

(Another two) :

"Ah, good morning, Doctor; got through, I
hear. Yes, it zvas tough. Be on hand to-night,
of course, with your swallow-tail." (Exit.)

The palpitating part of it had only begun, how-
ever, in the greenroom. (How provokingly old
Bones did grin when he asked them to "give him
the ligaments of the neck.") All those young
M. D.'s have to stand the battery of bright eyes
to-night at the Opera House; and in that large
and fashionable audience, all a-flutter with fans
and furbelows, every young feller has a bright
particular pair of eyes that to him look like the
rising sun, as he steps out in response to his name
to get his sheep-skin ; while to the owner of said
pair of rising-sun orbs, that particular name on
the program, it may even be "Grubs," blazes with
a holy light, quite eclipsing all the others. (And
the band played Annie Laurie.)

Then, the first time she calls Harry "Doctor"
— oh, not for the crown of an Indian prince would
he exchange that proud title. (We've been there,
tho' it was in the long, long ago, memory brings
back the days that are no more.)

303

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

And at the ball ; and after the ball ; what "med-
icine" (heart-excitants mostly, I fear) is talked,
as arm in arm each happy couple promenades be-
neath the vine-clad trellis, or drop the cur-
tain here; the ''sweetness" of that "faithful
watch-dog's honest bark," that Byron tells us
about, "baying deep-mouthed welcome," as in
after years we "draw near home" — any rainy
dark night after a ten-mile ride for a bare
"thankee," is just only brown sugar to double dis-
tilled saccharine, compared to the bliss of those
moments spent with Dulcinea the first evening he
wore his title and his pigeon-tailed coat ; as they
told and listened 'neath the umbrageous shades of
those grand old oaks, to the old, old tale; it is
always the same ; told with variations often, per-
haps, but always the same old tale — and ever
new ; told with the eyes, for "the heart doth speak
when the lips move not" — so that when flashed
from a woman's eyes even a savage can compre-
hend "two souls with but a single thought," etc.
Ah me ; would I were a boy again — or rather a
young doctor sprouting his first mustache. How
much medicine we did know at that time, good
gracious ! "The wonder grew," sure enough with
me, that "one small head could carry" it.

Now, I'm going to tell you a joke about that
same head. I haven't got a small head ; I've got
a big head.

304

HALCYON DAYS.

About six years subsequent to the events I'm
telling about (that is, the occasion on which I
received my diploma), I was myself a professor,
and had to ask the boys hard questions; I was
*'01d Bones" myself. One day coming out of the
hospital where I had just been lecturing — I had
on a new spring style hat. One of the students
admired it and asked to look at it. I took it off
and handed it to him. He tried it on and it came
down over his ears. The boys laughed at him
and he remarked :

''Doctor, you have a very large head."

I said : "Yes, larger than the average I be-
lieve."

One young scamp looked roguishly out the cor-
ners of his eyes at me and said slyly:

"It's a little swelled, ain't it, Doctor?"

Well, yes; I believe now that it was swelled.
I can look back at that period of my life — In fact
at most of it, and realize what a fool I was. I
do think now that it was a mercy that the fool-
killer never got me, and sometimes I think it's
a pity he didn't.

But I've digressed. I was saying that in our
young days we are very conceited and think we
know a great deal of medicine. It takes an aver-
age lifetime to find out that we don't know any-
thing worth mentioning, as Dickens said of Mr.
Bailey's nose ; he had none "worth speaking of."

305

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

Somehow one's head seems to leak medicinal
knowledge as the bones harden and the sutures
close up. Just the reverse of what we would ex-
pect, but it is a fact. I think most doctors of my
age will admit it — the older we get the less we
know. Crowded out, p'raps, to make room for a
recollection of our uncollected bills (or unpaid
ones), or by family cares and calculations how
we are to make a $2 fee buy shoes and stockings
for the baby, and a new bonnet for the dear wife,
— her of the sunrise eyes of long ago.

Ah yes ; springtime is "commencement" time ;
and the output of the new issue of — I like to have
said "greenbacks," or "government bonds," so
absorbed was I in studying out the above financial
sphynx — the output of the new generation of
doctors is large. I have not kept a memorandum
of the total ; each college is making them by the
score, out of raw material (very raw, some of it),
that beyond a doubt will make the future Sir
Andrew Clark, the S. D. Gross, the Austin Flint
and the Marion Sims of the next generation.

To them all, to those who are properly im-
bued with the love of science, who have chosen
medicine not as a money-getter alone, I say —
"aim high.'* What was possible to the poor
Southern boy, Sims, Wyeth, Nott; or to the la-
mented Quimby, or Jno. B. Hamilton — a far-
mer's boy^s possible to you. Do not put away

306

HALCYON DAYS.

your books now that you have your diploma;
you have only graduated — you have not finished
— you have only begun, prepared yourself to
study and learn. To-day is truly your ''com-
mencement" day. ''Drink deep, or touch not the
Pierian spring." Let not alone the sunrise eyes
of your beloved inspire you; determine to win
for her a place where in after years she may not
be ashamed of her young doctor. "The hill
whereon Fame's proud temple shines afar" is
hard to climb; but it has been climbed. What
others can do, you can do; so my dear boys — I
beg your pardon — dear young doctors — aim
high!

But after the new has rubbed off, after a life of
toil, too often thankless, most often unremunera-
tive, things look a little different to the doctor,
don't they, Dan'els? You know; you've been

through the mill; so've I.

* * * *

Now, by contrast (I've just given you fellers a
glimpse of the panorama as she spread out at the
start), I'll give you a picture drawn later in life.
I'm reminded of it by the foregoing reminis-
cences of commencement day. This thing I'm
a giving you now — here, Hudson, read this —
was written by yours truly for a young lady
whom I thought a heap of, one time. She jok-
ingly said that doctors "put on" a good deal ; that

307

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

it was all stuff about their having a hard time, etc.
Just for fun I wrote this for her and my wife got
hold of it, and like everything else I ever wrote
she^ kind, trusting soul, thought it was "smart."
(Hudson reads) :

THE DOCTOR'S LAMENT.

(to his LADY LOVE.)

That's what I called it, said the Old Doctor,
before Hudson began to read, but it might appro-
priately be called "Days that weren't quite so
halcyon" — eh, Dan'els? (Hudson reads) :

"Your life leads down by peaceful, tranquil rivers
Whose shady bank the cool sea-breeze invites ;

While mine — alas ! is spent 'midst torpid livers,
And similar sad and melancholy sights.

To you the perfumed air is rich with sounds
As sweet as when first Seppho's harp was strung;

While I in sun and dust must take my weary rounds
To feel a pulse or view a coated tongue.

The choicest books beguile your leisure hours,
And sooth to sleep, or wake to sympathetic tears;

But woe is me, I spend my feeble powers
'Midst fever's fervid heat, or checking diarrheas.

You sleep in peace on soft and downy beds,
And dream, perhaps, of flowers in sunlit lands ;

While I, no doubt, am soothing aching heads.
Or humbly giving aid by pulling hands.

Your lovers kneel before you in rapturous adoration,
And tales of love in mellifluous measures pour ;

Creditors besiege me — they are my abomination,
And moneyless patients daily throng my office door.

308

HALCYON DAYS.

Thy gentle pen, anon, the choicest thoughts indite,
That dwell within thy gentle breast, or tender mem'ry
fosters ;

Prescriptions I, with stubby pencil write: —
'Recipe : misce et Hat haustus.'

Alas ! alas ! my lady love ! I tire indeed of these

Old scaly scalps of seborrhea and eczematous hands;

Let's trim our sails to catch an outward breeze,
And endosmose in pleasant foreign lands —

Away beyond the seas, on some peaceful, starlit isle,
Where rhythmic wavelets break on coral strands;

There, there'll be no fever, pus nor bile.
And a'down the happy years we'll pull each other's
hands."

309

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

THE DOCTOR SEEKS COMFORT IN THE BIBLE.
WHAT HE FOUND.

Dan''els, said our jolly, fat friend, as he
dropped lazily into our easy chair this sultry
afternoon, and wheeled himself in front of the
electric fan, do you ever read the Bible?

"Cert," said I, too much overcome by the heat
of the weather and the coolness of our visitor,
acting alternately on our sensibilities, to even
finish the sentence ; but added mentally, ''what do
you take us for?"— ''Why, Doctor?"

Oh, nothing, said the Doctor, as he touched the
button of our electric "hand-em-around," which
we had recently put in, and helped himself to a
twenty-five cent Havana, which we keep on hand
only for paying subscribers ; only I was thinkin.'
I have heard the dear, good, old people say there
is a deal of comfort in the Bible, and recently I
was feeling very uncomfortable, in fact I was
sick and thought I was going to die ; I was scared
I reckon, and I got down the Bible and began to
look for comfort; but — here the Doctor sighed,
and shutting his eyes evidently was deriving com-
fort from the fragrant weed.

"Didn't you find it?" I inquired.

Find nothin'. There was mostly "begittin's"
and "begots" in the part I read ; and there ain't

310

fEFKS COMFORT IN THE BIBLE.

much comfort in that — to the other feller — is
there, Dan'els? and he chuckled a good-natured
chuckle and went on :

But I found something there that set me to
thinking, Dan'els, what are mandrakes?

''Podophyllum peltatum, commonly called May-
apple; purgative — plenty of 'em in Mississippi
where you and I came from; ask us something
hard," said I, holding up from proof-reading a
moment; "why, Doctor?"

You are away off about your podophyllum,
Dan'els, said he. Mandrakes, in Bible days at
least, were something valued very highly, espe-
cially by the women folks.

Well, I'll tell you the story and then you'll see
what I'm driving at.

It's the 30th chapter of Genesis. You know
Jacob got stuck on his uncle's little daughter,
Rachel — Miss Rachel Laban was her name — and
made it all right with her, but the old man was
close at a bargain and he made Jake serve him,
'tending cattle, etc., seven years, before he would
agree to the marriage; and then put up a job on
him. When the seven years were out the old man
shoved the oldest daughter off on him. Miss Leah.
Of course Jacob kicked, but the old man says,
says he:

"Why, Jake, you soft head — didn't you know
'twas unlawful to give the youngest daugltter in

311

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

marriage before the older sister has stepped off?
Go to."

So Jake took him at his word and zvent the
two, as we will see presently, as it was agreed if
he would serve another seven years he could have
Rachel also, and it came to pass ; in seven years
more he got the one he was after and shook Miss
Leah.

Meantime, however, Leah had a nice little boy
named Reuben, and by-and-by, when Jacob and
Rachel were dwelling together in bliss and har-
mony (and a tent I suppose), and poor Leah, the
cast-off, was scuffling for a living, with no one
to help her but little Reube — something hap-
pened with mandrakes in it. The Bible records it
and it must be so, and it must be very important ;
that's what's puzzling me.

In the 14th verse, chapter 30, of Genesis, it
says:

"And at harvest time, in the wheat-fields,
Reuben found some mandrakes and took them to
his mother." Rachel says : "Give me of thy son's
mandrakes." Leah says : "Is it no small matter
that thou hast taken away my husband, that thou
wouldst take away also now my son's man-
drakes?" "Therefore" (there/or, I suppose), "he
shall lie with you to-night," says Rachel. "Done,"
says Leah. So, late that evening, when Leah saw

312

SEEKS COMFORT IN THE BIBLE.

Jacob returning from the field she ran out to meet
him, and says, says she :

"See here ; you have to stay with me to-night,
for I have hired you with my son's mandrakes/'

'Tut, tut, Doctor; hold up there. What are
vou giving us?" said Bennett, Hudson and I, all
in chorus — while the office-boy went into a parox-
ysm of dry grins.

Fact, says the jolly doctor. Now, what are
mandrakes? What did Rachel want with them
so bad that she was willing to lend her husband to
a rival woman for just a few of them?

As showing they were not the May-apple, as
you say, which ripens in May — Reuben found
them in harvest-time, which must have been in
AugUbt or September; and as illustrating the
valwe of them, in addition to the fact of hiring out
her husband for them— Leah rated them of value
next to her husband — she says :

"You have taken my husband ; now would you
take away also my son's mandrakes?"

As a man would say: "You have taken my
houses and lands, now will you take also my cat-
tle and horses and money?" He wouldn't say:
"You have taken my land and houses, now would
you take away also my cat?" If mandrakes had
been some trifle Rachel would have offered some
trifle for them, and not the very first pop offered

313

RECOLLECTIONS OF A REBEL SURGEON.

that which was dearest to her — it usually is to
most women — her husband's caresses.

Now I've got an idea, continued the fat Old
Doctor, as he touched the other electric button
and poured himself out a sherry cobbler with ice
in it and a straw, from our other patent electric
automatic dumb-waiter, which the Journal, like
all other truly wealthy people, keeps for the con-
venience of callers at our sanctum. I'm of the
opinion that it was a ''yarb" of some kind — good
for female complaints, and that Rachel was the
original Lydia E. Pinkham, the concocter of the
celebrated "vegetable compound."

I can imagine now with my eyes shut her ad-
vertisement in the Judah Herald, or the Canaan
Evening News, something like this :

"Mrs. Rachel Jacobs {nee Laban) announces
to her suffering female friends and the world at
large, that she has at an enormous sacrifice ob-
tained a supply of fresh mandrakes, which she
has put into her justly celebrated vegetable com-
pound, and now offers it at a dollar a bottle (6
bottles for $5 ) ; warranted to cure all female com-
plaints, etc., etc. Get the genuine."

If not, Dan'els, what are mandrakes, and what
do you think of the incident recorded in Genesis ?

With that the good doctor unlimbered, and tak-
ing his feet off of the desk slowly got up to leave,
and looking back over his shoulder said :

314

SEEKS COMFORT IN THE BIBLE.

"If you find out about those mandrakes let me
know. I'm going to search the Scriptures again;
there's no telHng what I may find. Ta-ta, Dan-
'els ; so long, boys ; see you again."

And the sunshine went out with him.

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