ONE: TWO:On the second night after that morning of frantic mortification I was riding at Ned Ferry's side, in Louisiana. The camp of the brigade was a few miles behind us. Somewhere in front of us, fireless and close hid, lay our company of scouts, ahead of whose march he had pushed the day before to confer with the General, and we were now on our way to rejoin them. Under our horses' feet was that old Plank-road which every "buttermilk ranger" must remember--whether dead or not, I am tempted to say,--who rode under either flag in the Felicianas in '63 and '64.

ONE: TWO:The spectators gave themselves up wholly to the fun. It must have seemed to them that this extraordinary cricketer was also gifted with a sense of humour, however eccentric; and that his nonsensical action was intended by way of retaliation for the ironic cheers that had greeted his running at all. Nobody, except Arthur Withers, realised that the Clockwork man run thus far because for some reason he had been unable to stop himself. It may be remarked here that many of the Clockwork man's subsequent performances had this same accidental air of humour; and that even his most grotesque attitudes gave the observer an impression of some wild practical joke. He was so far human, in appearance and[Pg 35] manner, in spite of those peculiar internal arrangements, which will be dealt with later, that his actions produced an instantaneous appeal to the comic instinct; and in laughing at him people forgot to take him seriously.

ONE:As a result of this affair, the Japanese government was compelled to pay a hundred thousand pounds sterling to the family of Mr. Richardson, or submit to the alternative of a war with England. In addition to this, the city of Kagoshima, the residence of the Prince of Satsuma, was bombarded, the place reduced to ashes, forts, palaces, factories, thrown into ruins, and thousands of buildings set on fire by the shells from the British fleet. Three steamers belonging to the Prince of Satsuma were captured, and the prince was further compelled to pay an additional indemnity of twenty-five thousand pounds. The loss of life in the affair has never been made known by the Japanese, but it is certain to have been very great. It would not be surprising if the Japanese should entertain curious notions of the exact character of the Christian religion, when such acts are perpetrated by the nations that profess it. The blessings of civilization have been wafted to them in large proportion from the muzzles of cannon; and the light of Western diplomacy has been, all too frequently, from the torch of the incendiary. TWO:All the while that I recount these scenes there come to me soft orchestrations of the old tunes that belonged with them. I am thinking of one just now; a mere potsherd of plantation-fiddler's folk-music which I heard first--and last--in the dance at Gilmer's. Indeed no other so widely recalls to me those whole years of disaster and chaos; the daily shock of their news, crashing in upon the brain like a shell into a roof; wail and huzza, camp-fire, litter and grave; battlefield stench; fiddle and flame; and ever in the midst these impromptu merrymakings to keep us from going stark mad, one and all,--as so many literally did.