One July day the stage rattled14 over the bridge, past the mill and drew up at the store. The G. A. R. Man, the only passenger, climbed out of the lumbering15 vehicle, dragging after him a shapeless, battered16 carpet-bag. He limped up the steps in the wake of the driver, who was helping17 the Storekeeper with the mail-pouch, and when on the porch stopped and nodded a greeting to the men who were sitting on the bench kicking their heels together—the Patriarch, the School Teacher, the Miller18, the Tinsmith and the Chronic19 Loafer. The loungers gazed solemnly at the new arrival; at his broad-brimmed, black slouch hat, which though drawn21 down over his left temple did not hide the end of a band of court-plaster; at his blue coat, two of its brass22 buttons missing; at his trousers, in which there were several rents that had been clumsily sewed together.
The silence was broken by the School Teacher, who remarked with a contemptuous curl of the nose, “So you’ve got home from Gettysburg, have you? From your appearance one would judge that you had come from a battle instead of a reunion.”
“Huh! A good un—a good un!”
All eyes were turned toward the end of the bench, where sat the Chronic Loafer. He was a tall, thin, loose-jointed man. Thick, untrimmed[7] locks of tawny23 hair fell from beneath his ragged24, straw hat, framing a face whose most prominent features were a pair of deep-set, dull blue eyes, two sharp, protruding25 cheek-bones and a week’s growth of red beard. His attire26 was simple in the extreme. It consisted of a blue striped, hickory shirt, at the neck-band of which glistened27 a large, white china button, which buttoned nothing, but served solely28 as an ornament29, since no collar had ever embraced the thin, brown neck above it. A piece of heavy twine30 running over the left shoulder and down across the chest supported a pair of faded, brown overalls31, which were adorned32 at the right knee by a large patch of white cotton. He was sitting in a heap. His head seemed to join his body somewhere in the region of his heart. His bare left foot rested on his right knee and his left knee was encircled by his long arms.
“A good un!” he cried again.
Then he suddenly uncoiled himself, throwing back his head until it struck the wall behind him, and swung his legs wildly to and fro.
“Well, what air you so tickled33 about now?” growled34 the G. A. R. Man.
“I was jest a-thinkin’ that you’d never come outen no battle lookin’ like that,” drawled the Loafer.
He nudged the Miller with his elbow and winked35 at the Teacher. Forthwith the three broke into loud fits of laughter.
[8]
The Patriarch pounded his hickory stick vigorously on the floor, pulled his heavy platinum36 rimmed20 spectacles down to the tip of his nose and over their tops gazed in stern disapproval37.
“Boys, boys,” he said, “no joshing. It ain’t right to josh.”
“True—true,” said the Loafer. He had wrapped himself up again and was in repose38. “My pap allus use to say, ‘A leetle joshin’ now an’ then is relished39 be the wisest men—that is, ef they hain’t the fellys what’s bein’ joshed.’”
The G. A. R. Man had been leaning uneasily against a pillar. On this amicable40 speech from his chief tormenter, the frown that had been playing over his face gave way to a broad grin, three white teeth glistening41 in the open space between his stubby mustache and beard.
“Yes,” he said, “I hev come home afore my ’scursion ticket expired.” He removed his hat and disclosed a great patch of plaster on his forehead. “Ye see Gettysburg was a sight hotter fer me yesterday than in ’63. But I’ve got to the eend o’ my story.”
“So that same old yarn42 you’ve ben tellin’ at every camp-fire sence the war is finished at last. That’s a blessin’!” cried the Miller.
“I never knowd you was in the war. I thot you jest drawed a pension,” interrupted the Loafer.
The veteran did not heed44 these jibes45 but fixed46[9] himself comfortably on the upturned end of his carpet-bag.
“Teacher, I’ve never seen you at any of our camp-fires,” he began. “Consekently the eend o’ my story won’t do you no good ’less you knows the first part. So I’ll tell you ’bout my experience at the battle o’ Gettysburg an’ then explain my second fight there. I was in the war bespite the insinooations o’ them ez was settin’ on that same bench in the day o’ the nation’s danger. I served as a corporal in the Two-hundred-and-ninety-fifth Pennsylwany Wolunteers an’ was honorable discharged in ’63.”
“Fer which discharge he gits his pension,” the Loafer ventured.
“That ain’t so. I cot malary an’ several other complaints in the Wilterness that henders me workin’ steady. It was no wonder, either, fer our retchment was allus fightin’. We was knowd ez the Bloody47 Pennsylwany retchment, fer we’d ben in every battle from Bull Run on, an’ hed had some wery desp’rate engagements. ’Henever they was any chargin’ to be done, we done it; ef they was a fylorn hope, we was on it; ef they was a breastwork to be tuk, we tuk it. You uns can imagine that be the eend o’ two years sech work, we was pretty bad cut up. ’Hen the army chased the rebels up inter43 this state we was with it, but afore the fight at Gettysburg it was concided that sence they wasn’t many of us, we’d better be[10] put to guardin’ baggage wagons48. That was a kind o’ work that didn’t take many men, but required fighters in caset the enemy give the boys in front a slip an’ sneaked49 een on our rear.”
The School Teacher coughed learnedly and raised a hand to indicate that he had something to say. Having secured the floor, he began: “When Darius the First invaded Europe he had so many women, children and baggage wagons in his train that——”
“See here,” cried the Patriarch, testily50. “Dar’us was afore my time, I allow. We don’t care two snaps o’ a ram’s tail ’bout Dar’us. We wants to know ’bout them bloody Pennsylwanians.”
The pedagogue51 shook his head in condemnation52 of the ignorance of his companions, but allowed the G. A. R. Man to proceed.
“Durin’ the first day’s engagement our retchment, with a couple of others, an’ the trains, was ’bout three mile ahint Cemetary Hill, but on the next mornin’ we was ordered back twenty mile. It was hard to hev to drive off inter the country ’hen the boys was hevin’ it hot bangin’ away at the enemy, but them was orders, an’ a soldier allus obeys orders.
“The fightin’ begin airly that day. We got the wagons a-goin’ afore sun-up, but it wasn’t long tell we could hear the roar o’ the guns, an’ see the smoke risin’ in clouds an’ then settlin’[11] down over the country. We felt pretty blue, too, ez we went trampin’ along, fer the wounded an’ stragglers was faster ’an we. They’d come hobblin’ up with bad news, sayin’ how the boys was bein’ cut up along the Emmettsburg road, an’ how we’d better move faster, ez the army was losin’ an’ the rebels ’ud soon be een on us. Then they’d hobble away agin. Them wasn’t our only troubles, either. The mules53 was behavin’ mean an’ cuttin’ up capers54, an’ the wagons was breakin’ down. Then we hed to be continual watchin’ fer them Confederate cavalry55 we was expectin’ was a-goin’ to pounce56 down on us.
“Evenin’ come, an’ we lay to fer the night. The fires was started, an’ the coffee set a-boilin’, an’ we had a chancet to rest a while. The wounded an’ the stragglers that jest filled the country kep’ comin’ in all the time, sometim’s alone, sometim’s in twos an’ threes, some with their arms tied up in all sorts o’ queer ways, or hobblin’ on sticks, or with their heads bandaged; about the miserablest lot o’ men I ever see. The noise of the fight stopped, an’ everything was quiet an’ peaceful like nawthin’ hed ben happenin’. The quiet an’ the dark an’ the fear we was goin’ to meet the enemy at any minute made it mighty57 onpleasant, an’ what with the stories them wounded fellys give us, we didn’t rest wery easy.
“I went out on the picket58 line at ten o’clock.[12] Seemed I hedn’t ben there an hour tell I made out the dark figure of a man comin’ th’oo the fiel’s wery slow like. Me an’ the fellys with me watched sharp. Sudden the man stopped, hesitated like an’ sank down in a heap. Then he picked himself up an’ come staggerin’ on. He couldn’t ’a’ ben more’n fifty yards away ’hen he th’owed up his hands an’ pitched for’a’d on his face. Me an’ me buddy59 run out an’ carried him inter the fire. But it wasn’t no uset. He was dead.
“They was a bullet wound in his shoulder, an’ his clothes was soaked with blood that hed ben drippin’, drippin’ tell he fell the last time. I opened his coat, an’ in his pocket foun’ a letter, stamped, an’ directed apparent to his wife—that was all to tell who he was. So I went back to me post thinkin’ no more of it an’ never noticin’ that that man’s coat ’ud ’a’ fit two of him.
“Mornin’ come, an’ the firin’ begin over toward Gettysburg. We could see the smoke risin’ agin an’ hear the big guns bellerin’ tell the ground beneath our feet seemed to swing up an’ down. I tell you uns that was a grand scene. We was awful excited, fer we knowd the first two days hed gone agin us, an’ more an’ more stragglers an’ wounded come limpin’ back, all with bad news. I was gittin’ nervous, thinkin’ an’ thinkin’ over it, an’ wishin’ I was where the fun was.[13] Then I concided mebbe I wasn’t so bad off, fer I might ’a’ been killed like the poor felly I seen the night before, an’ in thinkin’ o’ the man I remembered the letter an’ got it out. I didn’t ’tend to open it, but final I thot it wasn’t safe to go mailin’ letters ’thout knowin’ jest what was in ’em, so I read it.
“The letter was wrote on a piece o’ wrappin’ paper in an awful bad handwrite, but ’hen I got th’oo it I set plumb60 down an’ cried like a chil’. It was from John Parker to his wife Mary, livin’ somewhere out in western Pennsylwany. He begin be mentionin’ how we was on the eve of a big fight an’ how he ’tended to do his duty even ef it come to fallin’ at his post. It was hard, he sayd, but he knowd she’d ruther hev no husban’ than a coward. He was allus thinkin’ o’ her an’ the baby he’d never seen, but felt satisfaction in knowin’ they was well fixed. It was sorrerful, he continyerd, that she was like to be a widdy so young, an’ he wasn’t goin’ to be mean about it. He allus knowd, he sayd, how she’d hed a hankerin’ after young Silas Quincy ’fore she tuk him. Ef he fell, he thot she’d better merry Silas ’hen she’d recovered from the ’fects o’ his goin’. He ended up with a lot o’ last ‘good-bys’ an’ talk about duty to his country.
“Right then an’ there I set down an’ wrote that poor woman a few lines tellin’ how I’d foun’ the letter in her dead husban’s pocket. I was[14] goin’ to quit at that, but I concided it ’ud be nice to add somethin’ consolin’, so I told how we’d foun’ him on the fiel’ o’ battle, face to the enemy, an’ how his last words was fer her an’ the baby. That day we won the fight, an’ the next I mailed Mrs. Parker her letter. It seemed about the plum blamedest, saddest thing I ever hed to do with.”
“I’ve allus ben cur’ous ’bout that widdy, too,” the Chronic Loafer remarked.
The Teacher cleared his throat and recited:
“Now night her course began, and over heaven
Inducing darkness grateful truce61 imposed,
And silence on the odious62 din8 of war;
Under her cloud——”
“No poetry jist yet, Teacher,” said the veteran. “Wait tell you hear the sekal o’ the story.”
“Yes, let’s hev somethin’ new,” growled the Miller.
Having silenced the pedagogue, the G. A. R. Man resumed his narrative63.
“I never heard no more o’ Widdy Parker tell last night, an’ then it come most sudden. Our retchment hed a reunion on the fiel’ this year, you know, an’ on Monday I went back to Gettysburg fer the first time sence I was honorable discharged. The boys was all there, what’s left o’ ’em, an’ we jest hed a splendid time wisitin’ the monyments an’ talkin’ over the days back in ’63.[15] There was my old tent-mate, Sam Thomas, on one leg, an’ Jim Luckenbach, who was near tuk be yaller janders afore Petersburg. There was the colonel, growed old an’ near blind, an’ our captain an’ a hundred odd others.
“Well, last night we was a lot of us a-settin’ in the hotel tellin’ stories. It come my turn an’ I told about the dead soldier’s letter. A big felly in a unyform hed ben leanin’ agin the bar watchin’ us. ’Hen I begin he pricked64 up his ears a leetle. Ez I got furder an’ furder he seemed to git more an’ more interested, I noticed. By an’ by I seen he was becomin’ red an’ oneasy, an’ final ’hen I’d finished he walks acrosst the room to where we was settin’ an’ stands there starin’ at me, never sayin’ nawthin’.
“A minute passed. I sais, sais I, ‘Well, comrade, what air you starin’ so fer?’
“Sais he, ‘That letter was fer Mary Parker?’
“‘True,’ sais I, surprised.
“‘Dead sure?’ sais he.
“‘Sure,’ sais I.
“Then he shakes his fist an’ yells, ‘I’ve ’tended most every reunion here sence the war hopin’ to meet the idjet that sent that letter to my wife an’ wrote that foolishness ’bout findin’ my dead body. After twenty-five years I’ve foun’ you!’
“He pulls off his coat. The boys all jumps up.
[16]
“I, half skeert to death, cries, ‘But you ain’t the dead man!’
“‘Dead,’ he yells. ‘Never ben near it. Nor did I ’tend to hev every blame fool in the army mailin’ my letters nuther. Because you finds a man with my coat on, that hain’t no reason he’s me. I was gittin’ to the rear with orders ez lively ez a cricket an’ th’owed off that coat jest because it was warm runnin’.’
“‘Hen I seen what I’d done I grabs his arm, I was so excited, an’ cries, ‘Did she merry Silas Quincy?’
“‘It wasn’t your fault she didn’t,’ he sais, deliberate like, rollin’ up his sleeves. ‘I got home two days after the letter an’ stopped the weddin’ party on their way to church.’”
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1
picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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2
homely
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| adj.家常的，简朴的；不漂亮的 | |
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3
edifice
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| n.宏伟的建筑物(如宫殿，教室) | |
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4
hacked
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| 生气 | |
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5
countless
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| adj.无数的，多得不计其数的 | |
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6
northward
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| adv.向北；n.北方的地区 | |
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7
ridge
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| n.山脊；鼻梁；分水岭 | |
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8
din
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| n.喧闹声，嘈杂声 | |
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9
rumbling
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| n. 隆隆声, 辘辘声 adj. 隆隆响的 动词rumble的现在分词 | |
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10
creek
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| n.小溪，小河，小湾 | |
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11
resounds
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| v.（指声音等）回荡于某处( resound的第三人称单数 )；产生回响；（指某处）回荡着声音 | |
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12
hoofs
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| n.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的名词复数 )v.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的第三人称单数 ) | |
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13
anvil
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| n.铁钻 | |
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14
rattled
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| 慌乱的，恼火的 | |
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15
lumbering
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| n.采伐林木 | |
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16
battered
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| adj.磨损的；v.连续猛击；磨损 | |
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17
helping
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| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
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18
miller
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| n.磨坊主 | |
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19
chronic
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| adj.(疾病)长期未愈的，慢性的；极坏的 | |
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20
rimmed
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| adj.有边缘的，有框的v.沿…边缘滚动；给…镶边 | |
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21
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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22
brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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23
tawny
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| adj.茶色的，黄褐色的；n.黄褐色 | |
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24
ragged
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| adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的 | |
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25
protruding
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| v.（使某物）伸出，（使某物）突出( protrude的现在分词 )；凸 | |
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26
attire
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| v.穿衣，装扮[同]array；n.衣着；盛装 | |
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27
glistened
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| v.湿物闪耀，闪亮( glisten的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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28
solely
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| adv.仅仅，唯一地 | |
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29
ornament
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| v.装饰，美化；n.装饰，装饰物 | |
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30
twine
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| v.搓，织，编饰；（使）缠绕 | |
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31
overalls
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| n.（复）工装裤；长罩衣 | |
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32
adorned
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| [计]被修饰的 | |
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33
tickled
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| （使）发痒( tickle的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）愉快，逗乐 | |
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34
growled
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| v.（动物）发狺狺声， （雷）作隆隆声( growl的过去式和过去分词 )；低声咆哮着说 | |
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35
winked
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| v.使眼色( wink的过去式和过去分词 )；递眼色（表示友好或高兴等）；（指光）闪烁；闪亮 | |
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36
platinum
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| n.白金 | |
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37
disapproval
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| n.反对，不赞成 | |
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38
repose
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| v.(使)休息；n.安息 | |
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39
relished
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| v.欣赏( relish的过去式和过去分词 )；从…获得乐趣；渴望 | |
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40
amicable
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| adj.和平的，友好的；友善的 | |
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41
glistening
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| adj.闪耀的，反光的v.湿物闪耀，闪亮( glisten的现在分词 ) | |
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42
yarn
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| n.纱，纱线，纺线；奇闻漫谈，旅行轶事 | |
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43
inter
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| v.埋葬 | |
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44
heed
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| v.注意，留意；n.注意，留心 | |
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45
jibes
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| n.与…一致( jibe的名词复数 )；（与…）相符；相匹配v.与…一致( jibe的第三人称单数 )；（与…）相符；相匹配 | |
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46
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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47
bloody
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| adj.非常的的；流血的；残忍的；adv.很；vt.血染 | |
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48
wagons
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| n.四轮的运货马车( wagon的名词复数 )；铁路货车；小手推车 | |
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49
sneaked
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| v.潜行( sneak的过去式和过去分词 )；偷偷溜走；（儿童向成人）打小报告；告状 | |
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50
testily
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| adv. 易怒地, 暴躁地 | |
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51
pedagogue
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| n.教师 | |
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52
condemnation
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| n.谴责; 定罪 | |
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53
mules
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| 骡( mule的名词复数 )； 拖鞋； 顽固的人； 越境运毒者 | |
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54
capers
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| n.开玩笑( caper的名词复数 )；刺山柑v.跳跃，雀跃( caper的第三人称单数 ) | |
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55
cavalry
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| n.骑兵；轻装甲部队 | |
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56
pounce
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| n.猛扑；v.猛扑，突然袭击，欣然同意 | |
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57
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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58
picket
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| n.纠察队；警戒哨；v.设置纠察线；布置警卫 | |
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59
buddy
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| n.（美口）密友，伙伴 | |
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60
plumb
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| adv.精确地，完全地；v.了解意义，测水深 | |
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61
truce
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| n.休战，(争执，烦恼等的)缓和；v.以停战结束 | |
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62
odious
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| adj.可憎的，讨厌的 | |
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63
narrative
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| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
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64
pricked
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| 刺，扎，戳( prick的过去式和过去分词 )； 刺伤； 刺痛； 使剧痛 | |
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