I,,








THE
LIFE AND ADVENTURES,
5011p%), terAceo) ftRB,$Vtrctt
OF
PRIVATE  MILEES  9REILLY.
(4?th Regiment, New York Volunteers.)
"The Post of Honor is the Private's Station."
With Comnic Illustrations by Mvulliaen
FROMI TIIE AUTHENTIC IRECORDS OF THE NEW YORK HERALD.
NEW YORK:
CARLETON, PUBLISHER, 413 BROADWAY.
MDCCCLXIVo




Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1S64, by
GEO. W. CARLETON,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern
District of New York.
R. CRAIGIIEAD,
Printer, Stereotyper, and lEtectrotyper,
Caxton 13 itilbiing,
81, 83, and 85 Centre Street,




To
OUR NAVY AND OUR ARMY;
ALL GOOD  CITIZENS  OF MANHATTAN  ISLAND
AND
THE GREAT STATE OF NEW  YORK;
AND TO
PATRIOTS OF EVERY CLASS AND NATIONALITY THROUGHOUT
THE UNITED STATES,
lbtz'Flumt to 31eupaattuttll  3lnuxi Bte








CONTENTS.
CHAPTER                                               PAGE
I.-THE IRON-CLADS AT CHARLESTON,                     11
IL —THE ARREST OF MILES O'REILLY,    O   O.  25
III.-HIS PETITION,...  40
IV.-THIE PARDON,.                                      52
V.-RECEPTION OF MILES O'REILLY IN NEW YORK,  59
VI.-THE BANQUET.....        73
VII.T-MILES GOING INTO CITY POLITICS,   O   O   o 114
VIII.-THE MILES O'REILLY CAUCUS,                       117
X. —MILES O'REILLY AT THE WHITE HOUSE,   o  154
X.-MILES O'REILLY IN RICHMOND,..                198
X:I.-MAILES O'REILLY AT FORTRESS MONROE,    o   O 221




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
PACoS
MILE S O'REILLY LAID B3Y THE HIEELS,- o   o'onlispieee.
O'REILLY IN ONE OF  IS.FLIGHTS-.. Title.
PRIVATE MILES UNDER ARREST,                            25
PRIVATE MILES CONCOCTING HIS DEFENCE,                  40
PRIVATE [MILES RELEASED,.                           52
SIGNS-MANUAL,    o    O.  59
PRIVATE MILES STAR-GAZING,.        73
THE SECRETARY'S ~VISION,                               83
THE B]ANQUET~,                       o  o  87
PRIVATE MILES GOING INTO CITY POLITICS,    o          114
"OUR REPORTER,"                                       117
THE CAUCUS, O                                       120
O'[REILLY IN THE PRESENCE-C(HAMBER.....              174




THE Editor of this collection of the writings iln which
Private Miiles O'REeilly, 47th Regiment New York Volunteers, has figured more or less extensively, had hoped,
in preparing this volume for the press, to have had the
gay and luminous assistance of the young soldiers, humble in position, but distinguished by his talents, who
forms the central figure and inspiration of every scene,
and whose droll merits have been so generously recognized by all classes and parties of the American public.
This hope has been suddenly disappointed by the return
of Private  filles to his regiment in the Department of
the South, where, it is conjectured, he may be employed
by Government as the bearer of flags of truce to the
Rebel lines. Indeed, there are rumors that his present
mission is of a very high diplomatic nature, far surpassing in importance the charge recently conferred on Dr.
Zacharie, the famous chiropodist and international negotiator, who has twice visited Richmond as the mutual
friend and foot-physician of the United States and Rebel
Cabinets. The rumors in this connexion further add
that O'Reilly's mission will be reciprocated by the sending
of Ex-Generals Gustavus W. Smith and Mansfield Lovell,
on behalf of the Richmond Government, to meet our
6" Irish Ambassador " at Savannah, or Port Royal Ferry,
whichever place may be agreed upon. The intrinsic probabilities of this affair are increased by the fact that Private
O'Reilly was for several years employed in the Street
Department, of New York City, under the Ex-Generals




Viii                  PREFACE.
in question5 as Inspector, at three dollars  ei' diemn, of
somle contract work which never had any existence, —
thus making him  their friend for life.  The Editor,
therefore, hopes the very best issue from the negotiations now about to be inaugurated under such happy
auspices; and, in the absence of Private Miles, can only
refer such readers as may desire to have a personal picture and history of that soldier to the chapter in which
is narrated the interview between President Lincoln, his
Cabinet, the Foreign Diplomatic Corps and Private
I. O'Reilly, towards the conclusion of this volume.
For the rest, a work of this kind needs little preface.
Truth, by arraying itself in the garb of humor, may often
attract the attention which has been denied to her most
serious appeals. The very wide celebrity achieved by the
writings of Private Miles O'Reilly is in itself an evidence
of the anxious and revolutionary condition of the public
mind,  Old landmarks are swept away, and men are casting about for new issues and a purer system of public life.
In the discussion of the  iron-clad  question, forming the earlier portion of this volume, the arguments
advanced and the conclusions arrived at, are those
of sincerity and deep conviction. Justice is sought to be
done to Admiral Du Pont and his gallant s-ubordinates,
but certainly not at the expense of the Admnlral and
officers now in Commiand of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron. On the contrary, in the whole discussion, properly reviewed, the firiends of the officers
now commanding will find an ample explanation of the
reasons which have operated for the disappointment of
public expectation in regard to the attack upon Charleston. The fault is herein traced to its true source, and is
found to rest in the inherent defects of the 3Monitors,
and not in any incapacity on the part of their present
commanders.
That portion of the volume relating to city and state
pOlitics, had for its object to promote the election of
national and upright men, irrespective of person or




PREFACE.                     ix
party, to fill the chief offices of both City and State.
Since the original appearance of these papers in the
]Herald, two elections have been held; and somne friends
of Private Miles are partial enough to believe that his
songs may have had some little influence on the public
opinion which shaped their results. The true explanation of the political revolution is too obvious, however,
to leave any ground for vanity of this kind. The recent
elections, not only through all the loyal States, but ill
all the States of the Confederacy, have shown certain
distinctive  characteristics:-a determination  of the
people to put down extremists of all colors: an utter
distrust on the popular part of all old leaders, who fall
under the title of "' professional politicians;" and a popular resolve to place new men of good personal character
in the seats of those who have held office heretofore without establishing any claim to other than official respect.
In the last part of the volume —that treating of presidential politics, the national vote and the army vote to
be cast next year-Private O'Reilly has aspired in his
songs to little more than a voicing forth of one strong
current of opinion which he seems to have observed
throughout the army. He is the claqueur of no candidate, and would, apparently, as soon vote-so far as personal grounds are concerned-for any one as for any
other of the high officers or statesmen who are named
by him as possible recipients of the army suffrage. It
appears his aim in this matter to fix public attention on
the necessity, or at least the expediency, of consulting
the preferences and loyal instincts of our soldiers in the
field, before determining upon whom shall be placed the
mantle of nomination for the chief magistracy of the
Union.  Camps, in their own queer way, are places of
very thorough national instruction.  Regiments of men
from all quarters of the loyal states are aggregated and
mixed together in the larger organizations of our armies.
They march, fight, and sleep under the same banner.
No matter what their inrmer habits or station in lifet




x                      PREFACEo
the same food is served out to all, Equal promotion
awaits their merit; and if struck down by weapons or
disease, they lie side by side in one general hospital,
their attendance the same, and their nursing as affec=
tionateo. Falling  on the battle-field they have common
graves, and living'they will have a common destiny.
They are not hackneyed in the ways, nor corrupted by
the habits of the "professional politician."   National
fromn the  ery necessities of their position, and eager
beyond all others to secure a just and honorable Peace,
-which will. renmit them  to their homes and happy firesides in a restored and vindicated'cl  nion-the wishes of
the army in the approaching Presidential contest are
most certainly entitled to some deference.   No claim is
advanced in behalf of this volume to an exclusive or
perfect mirroring in its pages of the army -mind.  In
every army there are difelrent currents of opinion, but
all with their tides in one general direction; and this
hasty volume is but a chronicle of the currents Jwhich
have flowed, and the general drift'they have taken,
under the view of one very hunable soldier,
TuE[ E DITOR..NaEJWI YOx:.ecem.ber 1t0', 18630




PR IVATE MILES 0'REILLY.
CIHAPTER  Io
THE IRONXCLADSo D5 U iPONT S ATTACK ON SUMITERo
11 CAMS, FOLLT ISLAND, S. C., April 25, 18638
Y DEAn  l7' Our friend, Major Wrighl;, showed
me one paragraph of your letter to him, in
which you referred, apparently with surprise, to the
fact that the attack on Charleston by the iron-clads
should have been discontinued'" when so few casualties had occurred.:"  This is so obvious a reflection,




1.2           THE ADVENTURES OF
on the first hasty view of the affair, and one so radix
cally unjust when we look calmly at the facts, that,
in Major Wright's absence (he has gone down the
posts along the Florida coast on a tour of inspection)
I will venture to occupy your time a few moments
on the subjecte
In ordinary warfare the amount of casualties will
give a fair idea of the strength of the resistance and
the power and persistency of the attack.  With
wooden vessels, your remark, as previously quotedand I know it to be an all but universal one-would
apply with truth;  and it is because we have all
become so accustomed to measure battles on land or
sea by the amount of slaughter and maiming in
flicted, that we are apt to err in judging an utterly
uncommon and unprecedented battle by the ordinary
or common standard. Let me also add that this
standard is both a vulgar and false one. ~McClellan9s
victory at Yorktown was a bloodless one, but, nevere
theless, a triumph of the highest importance in its
results. Of Halleck's siege and capture of Corinth,
the same may be said-that victory, although a bloodless one, having thrown open the doors of the entire
South-West to the conquering advance of our armies.
And now, let me submit to you, more in detail,




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         13
some few hasty reflections on the subject of the
recent operations for the capture of Charleston:1. It is to be borne in mind that this (so far as the
navy was concerned) was purely an experiment as to
the possibility of taking a city by machinery. The
Monitors might be called blood-saving instruments,
with this penalty attached to them: that whenever
the loss of life should begin, it would involve the almost certain destruction of every man on board.
The number of men in the whole iron-clad squadron
was less than a regiment; and these few hundred
men, rushing against thirty or forty thousand behind
powerful fortifications, were to have no other part in
the fight than to supply the necessary power for working the machines. If Charleston were to fall, it was
by machinery; and the moment the experiment was
tested to the point of proving that the machines were
inadequate to their work, it was wisdom to withdraw
them, and would have been dangerous foolhardiness
to have held them longer exposed.
2. The experiment was fully prosecuted up to this
point, with a magnificence of gallantry before which
every generous and j ust spectator, not directly involved in the attack, must have bowed in reverence.
The machines were untried, and the conflict was the




14            THE ADVENTURES OF
first practical test we have ever had of the power of
the new kinds of ordnance and ordnance material
employed against them. I refer to the Blakely and
Whitworth English guns, firing bolts and steel-pointed
shot. The warfare was almost as new to Admiral
Du Pont and his Captains as it would have been to
you or myself-new kinds of projectiles raining on
them from above; vast torpedoes known to be underneath their keels, and every channel of entrance
blocked up with triple rows of torpedo-armed obstructions.
3. After less than an hour's conflict, five out of the
eight Monitors were disabled-the Keokuk sinking.
Behind the forts, calmly waiting their opportunity,
lay three of the enemy's iron-clads in plain view:
vessels not able in fair fight to live an hour before
one of our Monitors; but held in readiness to cruise
out and capture any Monitor disabled by the artillery practice of the forts and batteries. This
should not be let out of sight.
4. With two or three of our vessels of this kind
disabled, captured, repaired, and in the enemy's service, what force would it require to maintain the
blockade of Charleston? Wooden vessels-our gunboats and steam-sloops-would be useless; and our




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          15
iron vessels could not live outside of Charleston bar
in rough weather. Nor, even if they could, unless
we had enough of them to cross-fire over every inch
of the mouth of the harbor permanently, could a
blockade be maintained against the fast clipper
steamers built as blockade-runners in English shipyards. In a word, the enemy, with a single AMonitor
of ours, could drive every wooden boat from the
blockade: and the blockade would thus practically
be raised.
5. Could we afford to have Charleston a free
port-the greatest free port in the world, when
viewed as the only outlet and inlet for the commerce
of eight millions of people; with arms and all other
requisites pouring into it unmolested, and cotton,
tobacco, naval stores, and. so forth, pouring out?
WVould not such an event of necessity-a moral and
political necessity — compel France, and perhaps
other wavering foreign Powers, to acknowledge the
Confederacy?  Are we in a position lightly to
hazard these consequences 8
6. Bear in mind that the weakness of the Monitorturrets was increasing in geometrical ratio under the
force of each concussion. Each bolt started, each
plate cracked, each stancheon bent by the first ball,




16            THE ADVENTURES OF
left weaker protection against the second; and the
second transmitted this deterioration, increased by its
own impact, to the third. Thus onward —the element
of the calculation being that three hundred guns,
worked with every advantage of space and fixity,
were arrayed against thirty-two guns cramped up in
delicate machines, and requiring to be fired just at
the exact right moment of turretal rotation.'7. Fort Sumter itself, we should not forget, was
but the fire-focus of two long, converging lines of
forts and batteries; and while, for aggressive purposes, and from its position, its armament was more
to be dreaded than that of any other work,-the fort
itself, being built of masonry, fully exposed to fire,
was the most pregnable point in the harbor. Nor
would its fall have terminated the contest, nor given
any further ease to the iron-clads, than the withdrawal of so many guns from against them. Their
work would still lie before them, in silencing the
other forts and removing the triple line of powerful
and cunningly devised obstructions.
The foregoing, my dear N -, are only a few of
the most prominent suggestions to be used in form



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         17
ing a right estimate of the struggle. Busy and overworked as I am, this explanation has appeared necessary to my conscience as a point of duty: insomuch
that I could not rest until my very utmost was done
to let you see this affair from the standpoint of a
deeply interested spectator, who had given some
thought and observation to the problem, and who
certainly has no other interest in this matter than to
see that no injustice is done to brave, true patriots
whom he honors-honors with his whole heart and
soul.
How I should have felt if in the Weehawken,
commanded by John Rodgers, who had the post of
honor in the van, I do not know; but suppose that
pride and the busy sense of duty and responsibility
would have held me firm to my work. Only a spectator, however, with no immediate cares to distract my
attention, I am not ashamed to say that I trembled
like a leaf for the gallant souls on board the Weehawken, when she first steamed into the hell-madevisible fronting and around Fort Sumter.
The chief officers, as you know, who took part in
this fight were Admiral Du Pont, Commodore Turner,
Fleet Captain Ramon Rodgers, Dupont's chief of
staff; and Commanders John Rodgers, Drayton of




18           THE ADVENTURES OF
South Carolina, brother to General Drayton of the
Confederate army; George W. Rodgers, Daniel
Ammen, Downs, Fairfax, Worden, who commanded
the original Monitor in her fight with the Merrimac
in Hampton Roads; and Rhind who, with rash galgantry, ran his vessel, the Keokuk, right under the
walls of Fort Sumter, in which position she was so
badly riddled and ripped up with bolts and percussion
shells, that she sank next morning, despite all efforts
to keep her afloat and send her down for repairs to
Port Royal. I record these names because it gives
me pleasure to write them. It is with names such
as these that the future crown of the Republic will
be most brightly jewelled.
And here let me give you a few verses, on the
subject of the iron-clads, which are said to have been
picked up in a bottle on the shore of Seabrooke Island
by a soldier named Miles O'Reilly-a youthful warrior of Italian extraction-belonging to the 47th Nlew
York, but now detached as an orderly at the Headquarters of Brigadier-General Thos. G. Stevenson,
Commanding United States troops around Edisto
Inlet. As several of the Monitors are lying in the
Edisto, some think, from intrinsic evidence, that the
verses must have been written on board one of them




PRIVATE MILES 0 REILLY.          19
by some officer acquainted with their demerits; but
who, fearing the wrath of the higher powers, could not
publish them in regular form, and was therefore
obliged to launch his only edition in a sealed bottle
over the side of his ship.
Our friend Commander George W. Rodgers is
strong in this belief; and his suspicions as to the
authorship are almost equally divided between Commanders Beaumont, Ammen and Downs, with the
heaviest balance of suspicion against the first named
of these officers. Others, who are not in the Navy,
think that the lines are the work of Private M.
O'Reilly's own brain, the stanzas being revised and
put into good English by a certain Chaplain Hudson
of the Volunteer Engineers, who has a taste for
literature, and is known to be "in cohoot" with
O'Reilly, who has become quite famous in a small way
throughout the Department for comic songs and impromptu verses about the incidents of the day. This
latter class are of opinion that there " never was no
bottle at all,"-much as the ungrateful Betsy once
insulted Mrs. Sairey Gamp by saying, that "s there
never was no such a person as Mrs. Harris!"9 Be these
things as they may, the lines, if containing little
poetry, are as full of sense as an egg is full of meat;




20              THE ADVENTURES OF
and whether written by Beaumont, Ammen, Downs,
Hudson  or Private  O'Reilly, they reveal certain
truths which the authorities at Washington should
by no means overlook.
AN IDYL OF THE IRON-CLADS.
CONSIDERABLY AFTER MR. EMERSON S 4 BRAHMA."
[Lines picked up in a bottle by Private Mitles O'Reilly.]
iF the torpedoer's torpedes
Knock the torpedoed high in air,
Won't Uncle Gideon, as he reads,
Look solemn through his silvery hair I
Vague or forgot the navy seems
To Gideon slumbrous in the dark,
Stroking his beard in happy dreams,
Or studying plans from Noah's ark.
Vainly we labor hard and long
To paint the errors of the ships,
Entranced by Stimers' syren song,
His judgment lieth in eclipse.
Rifles and smooth-bores are the same,
He cares not for a turret jammed;
Prompt from himself to turn all blame,
He muttereth mildly " That be —— rammed I"




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.                21
The strong men of the navy pine,
But pines not that forsaken crew
Of those who, in the contract line,
Proclaim "d what Monitors can do."
We hoist our bottoms from the sea
To show why slow and wild we steered,
Coated with polyps dull as he
And grasses lengthy as his beard;But this in him no terror breeds
Who muttereth —" Spite of all the shocks
Of storms, and battles, and torpedes
I must be guided by my Fox I
"Though foul their bottoms as the heart
Of Toucey or Fernando Wood,
Though plates are cracked and stancheons start
And every pilot-house runs blood;
"Although the pendent grasses drop
On rocks a dozen fathoms down,
Though on their sides the oyster crop
Be large enough to feed a town;
"Though turrets jam and won't revolve,
Though guns kick off the track within,
It still is Gideon's grim resolve,
On Ericsson his faith to pin.




22             THE ADVENTURES OF
"And woe to him who on his cuff
Weareth gold lace, or round his cap,
If, by expostulations rough,
He waketh Gideon from his nap I"
Thus Gideon muttered, half awake,
Thinking the iron-clads a bore,
Then turning, a fresh snooze to take,
Fox entering heard the great man snore.
Before concluding this letter-hastily written, but
containing points, it seems to me, which you might
do the country a service by bringing to the notice of
_Mr. Lincoln-let me call attention to the manifest
impolicy of further increasing our fleet of Monitor
built iron-clads. These vessels, admirable perhaps
for attacking fortified places along our coasts-although they have been badly repulsed at Forts McAlister and Sumter-are manifestly unfit to cross the
ocean, except when a guaranty-deed of " dead calm"
shall have been obtained from the Clerk of the Weather; and are just as manifestly unfit for human
beings to live in for any length of time.  Besides, it
is clear, that, with the reduction of Charleston and
Mobile, all the work for which this class of vessels is
peculiarly fitted will have been accomplished.
I know it is said that they could be used as float



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.           23
ing batteries with which to defend our harbors; but
ask the men best competent to judge of their capacities as against vessels like the Warrior, Guerriere,
La Gloire, etc., and this illusion will be dissipated.
In the judgment of men who have commanded these
little, low-lying, two-gun, slow sailing, floating batteries, one of the vast iron-clad frigates of France
or England could receive the fire of any two of
them-eight or ten guns at most-and then run
right over them, the vast ploughs which such frigates carry in front, beneath the water, ripping
the whole lower skin of the Monitor-hulls to pieces,
and their tall prows moving on undisturbed over the
little circular towers and pilot-houses, which would
go down in eddying whirlpools beneath their irre.
sistible weight and impetus.
Believe me, my dear N —, that we need ironclad frigates; and fast vessels to fight fast vessels.
There is not one of our grass-grown Monitors to-day
that can make, to save her life, even in tideless water,
over five miles an hour, if so much; while the mailed
frigates of France and England make from seven to
eleven and -a half. In this respect also, the Roanoke
is a failure, only making six knots per hour; and our
only safeguard against invasion, and our only means




24            THE ADVENTURES OF
of aggression in case of a foreign war, must be looked
for in such vessels as Mr. Webb, of New York, is
now constructing.
Cannot the Navy Department be made to realize
these ob vious facts?  Cannot Mr. Assistant Secretary
Fox-whose abilities and zeal are highly spoken of by
many who are in the best position to judge-cannot
he be brought to comprehend that all vessels-of-war
must be in their nature a compromise between the
best shape and construction for the immediate purposes of battle-occurring, mayhap, once in several
years; and. the necessity for having such accommodations, ventilation, comforts, etc., as will preserve
the health of the men and officers forming the
respective crews? These questions are asked by
every unprejudiced naval officer at this station; and
it is important that the matter should receive the
prompt attention of all who are interested in
city property along the Atlantic and Pacific seaboards.




CHAPTER IL.
THE ARREST OF PRIVATE MILES.
MORRIS ISLAND, S. C., August29, 1868.
Y DEAR HUDsom: A most ridiculous incident has
occurred here, which nevertheless threatened,
but for the prompt measures adopted by LieutenantColonel J. F. Hall, Provost Marshal General, to have
resulted, perhaps, in a weakening of the strong regard which has heretofore subsisted between our land
and naval forces. The facts are as follows:2




26            TtHE ADVENTURES OF
There is in one of the New York regiments an odd
character named Miles O'Reilly, who has frequently
relieved the monotony of camp life by scribbling
songs on all sorts of subjects, and writing librettos for
the various "minstrel companies," got up in imitation of George Christy's, at different posts of the
Department during periods of repose.
His last effort was a song, advising Admiral Dahlgren to go home, and warmly espousing the interests
of Admiral Du Pont and the former commanders of
the iron-clads, in whose behalf his affections seem
warmly enlisted, he having served for some months
as a volunteer marine on board the Pawnee, Wabash,
Ironsides, Paul Jones, and other vessels of the South
Atlantic Blockading Squadron.
These verses he managed in some mysterious manner to have printed in regular street ballad form,
either on the press of -Mr. J. H. Sears, at Hilton
Head; or, more probably, in the office of General
Saxton's Free Soouth, at Beaufort. At any rate he got
them printed, and they soon were in the hands of
nearly every soldier —the men singing them with intense and uproarious relish to an old Irish air, slightly altered - the Shan Van Voght, which Private
O'Reilly taught them.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.             27
At last the song attracted the attention of some naval officers who were ashore on a visit to Col. J. W.
Turner, "a corn-fed boy from Illinoy," and Col. J. J.
Elwell, Chief Quartermaster of the Department; and
they, having mentioned the matter to some army
associates, Col. J. F. Hall was very quickly on the
track of the author, and had no difficulty in tracing
the squib to O'Reilly, who was at once placed in
confinement, with a sixty-four pound shot at each
heel, to aid, perhaps, in preventing any further
Pegasinian or Olympian flights. Ile takes his punishment good-humoredly; compares himself to Galileo,
"'an ould cock that was tortured for telling the
thruth;" and is at present busily writing an appeal
in verse to Secretary Stanton. In order that you
may be able to judge of the enormity of the breach
of discipline of which O'Reilly has been guilty, I
transmit herewith a printed copy of his song:THE ARMY TO THE IRON-CLADS.
( With an accompaniment of bombshells, Greekfire, and two hundred
rounder rified shots.)
Och I Admiral Dahlgreen,
It is aisy to be seen
That ashore so long you've been
You can never toe the mark;




28              THE ADVENTURES OF
Of your ships you seem as chary
As my little black-eyed Mary
Of her silver-winged canary
Or her crockery Noah's ark.'Tis no harm, you seem to think,
That upon desthruction's brink —
He is not the boy to shrinkOur gallant Gillmore stands;
Houlding hard his threatened lines,
Pushin' far his saps and mines,
While you-knowin' his designssIdly sit with folded hands.
Give us back our own Du Pont I
Ramon Rodgers, too, we want,
Send the say-dogs to the front
Who have fought the fight before;
John Rodgers, Dhrayton, Rhind,
Ammen-grim, but always kindAye, and Worden, though half blind,
Let us have their lead once more I
Woe's me I George Rodgers lies,
Wid dimmed and dhreamless eyes,
He has airly won the prize
Of the sthriped and starry shroud; —
While some fought shy away
He pushed far into the fray,
As if ayger thus to say,'" All the lads have not been cowed I"




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.               29
Staunch Fairfax and thrue Downs,
Born layguerers of towns I
" No chance here of laurel crowns,"
Thus it seems I hear you sighin';
"'Twas not always so," you say,
" When Du Pont in every fray
Led the line and cleared the way,
Wid his broad blue pennon flyin'."
Och I Gideon, King of men I
Take Dahlgreen home again,
And let Fulton's glowin' pen
All his high achavements blazonFor Fulton, Gideon mine 
Can paint pictures, line by line,
All of that precise design
You and Fox delight to gaze on.
Dear Uncle Gideon, ohI
Let Dahlgreen homeward go I
HEe's a shmart man, as we know,
And the guns he makes are sthriking;
Keep him always on the make,
Do, Gid, for pity's sake;
But the warrior lead to take,
Let us have Dui Pont, the Viking!
What disposition will eventually be make of private Miles O'Reilly, who has twice risen to sergeant




30            THE ADVENTURES OF
and twice been " sot back " for eccentric breaches of
discipline, it would be hard to guess. Lieutenant
Colonel E. W. Smith, General Gillmore's Assistant
Adjutant General, is at a loss to know under what
article of war the crime of song-writing can be punished. Officers of a naturally severe cast of countenance will also be required to avoid unseemly
laughter during the sessions of the court. Besides,
there is a strong feeling, I regret to say, among all
the men and many of the subordinate'officers in
O'Reilly's favor: and while many, wearing the
double rows of buttons, declare lie should be severely dealt with, very nearly all the single-breasted
coats, with or without shoulder-straps, think it would
do no injury to postpone his trial until after an article of war against song writing shall have been
added to those now in force by the next Congress.
It is rumored that copies of the song in question
have permeated the navy, and that nearly all the
wardroom messes have under discussion the propriety
of signing a petition for O'Reilly's release. Meantime it is difficult, even for Colonel Hall, to enforce
that rigorous treatment of the prisoner which he is
thought to deserve, as the soldiers, to a man, believe
he is unfairly punished; and the provost guard have




PRIVATE MILES 09REILLY.          31
twice been found smuggling in dainties to him-his
prescribed and proper daily diet being eighteen
ounces of bread with two quarts of cold water.
General A. H. Terry, we hear, offers to release the
prisoner if he will disclose the name of the printer
of his incendiary song. This offer O'Reilly indignantly spurns, saying he "never sould the pass in
his life, nor never will;" and winds up by asking
do they take him for a "soup kitchen convert," or
one of " Lord Clarendon's Jimmy O'Briens." These
phrases are all Greek to us down here, even in this
region of Greek fire; but mayhap "Irish Tom,"
opposite the Custom House, may be able to translate
them into English.
Before quitting this subject, let me say that the
attempts made in certain quarters to exalt the present achievements of the South Atlantic Blockading
Squadron, at the expense of its late commander,
Admiral Du Pont, will have an effect rather the
reverse of that intended by those who are engaged
in this paltry business. No one whose authority in
such matters is of any weight, thinks of blaming
Admiral Dahlgren for the extreme caution he has
thus far displayed in exposing his iron-clads to tire.
He ranks second to no officer in the navy as a comman



32           THE ADVENTURES OF
der of gallantry and nerve. But the tools in his
hands are utterly inadequate to the work they are
expected to accomplish; and, in taking him out of
the Ordnance Bureau of the Navy, in which his services have been invaluable for the last fifteen or
twenty years, and placing him suddenly, and with
but little actual sea-experience, in command of so
vast an undertaking as this of Charleston, —it is felt
that Secretary Welles has committed his favorite
error of placing the right man in the wrong place,
and imposing upon Dahlgren a task under which he
must most certainly break down.
It is well understood by all here that, with the
destruction of Fort Sumter and the capture of Forts
Wagner and Gregg, the main business of the land
forces under General Gillmore will have been accomplished. Indeed, this is all General Gillmore bargained to do when making those representations
which resulted in his appointment to the command.
Nothing will then remain for him but to shell
Charleston, at long range, from Cumming's Point;
and here, en parenthese, let me remark that the accident to the three hundred pounder Parrott gun does
not, as was at first supposed, at all disable that gun.
The injury was received from the untimely bursting




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          33
of a shell, just as it was passing out of the bore.
This accident blew off the muzzleband; but the
remainder of the piece is uninjured, and in as good
condition as ever for practical work.
And now to return to the iron-clad matter, of
which I set out to speak. It is not generally known,
but is nevertheless true, that Admiral Dahlgreu is,and
has been for the last ten days, confined to his bed by
sickness, or has only been able to crawl on deck or
into the pilot-house on critical occasions. The
abominable atmosphere of the iron-clads has taken
hold of his system, and nothing but his high resolution, and the necessity he is under of vindicating the
action of the Navy Department, which placed him
in command, can long sustain him under his present
debility. So fixed is his determination to go through
with his work, however, that he has not in any of his
dispatches to the Department even referred to his illhealth; and it is only by private letters from sympathizing friends that the North can hear of his condi tion.
He doubtless feels that, under the peculiar circumstances attending Du Pont's removal, a more than
common anxiety must be felt by thee Navy Department for the exertions to the uttermost of the
officer who has succeeded thile victor of Port
2*




34            THE ADVENTURES OF
Royal, and the thrice gallant first assailer of Fort
Sumter.
In Du Pont's attack, it must be remembered, all the iron-clads ran up to within eight hundred
yards of the then uninjured fort,-Captain Rhind,
in the ill-fated iKeokuk, running in to within four
hundred yards, and fighting desperately for thirty
minutes at that distance, only withdrawing under
orders, and at a moment when his vessel was a sinking ruin;-while in the present operations, assisted
by Gillmore's powerful land batteries, Admiral Dahlgren, reserving his vessels for work farther up the
roadstead, has wisely held them not closer than two
thousand yards to Fort Sumter, while that work was
still in a condition to reply effectively to his firetwo thousand yards being very nearly the extreme
effective range of his fifteen-inch smooth bores;.
Under these circumstances, Du Pont may possibly be condemned for rashness, or Dahlgren commended for prudence; but it is obviously worse than
absurd to indulge in any sneers or indirect innuendoes or cavils against Du Pont's attack as if it had
lacked in gallantry. The Old Viking of the South,
Atlantic blockading squadron is the last man in the
world among his peers-men personally acquainted




PRIVATE MILES 0'REILLY.         35
with him and professionally competent to judge hin
-to whom such a charge will stick. No braver or
more intelligent officers ever lived than his subordinate iron-clad commanders-John Rodgers, Rhind,
Drayton, Fairfax, Ammen, Downs, Worden, Turner,
and the lamented George W. Rodgers, who lost his
life, as you are aware, while running his vessel in
to within one hundred and fifty yards of Fort
Wagner.
There is one point, however, in Admiral Dahlgren's
course which excites a good deal of laughing commentary among our army officers. It is this:-On
the 23d inst. Colonel John W. Turner, the'" corn fed
boy from Illinoy," who is General Gillmore's chief
of staff and of artillery, ceases fire against Fort Sumter, on the ground that it is an inoffensive ruill,
which could be still more completely made a pile of
broken brick and powdered mortar by further fire;
but which could not, by any amount of fire, be rendered more completely harmless as against the ironclads than in its then condition. The day after this,
on the 24th inst., the iron-clads, idle or only firing at
long range during the previous ten days against this
particular fort, announced their intention of making
"an attack in force on the work," and our army




36            THE ADVENTURES OF
friends are jocosely anticipating that the New
York papers will some day tell you of the "' Surrender of Fort Sumter to the iron-clads" in startling
capitals,-the announcement adding that on such a
day so many hundred marines and seamen " landed
on the ruined ramparts, and, gallantly climbing
over the shattered arches and parades, hoisted the
Stars and Stripes and took possession of the work in
the name of the navy-another glorious victory to
the-marines "  The western officers in particular
are strong in this belief. They say they saw the
same thing done at Island No. Ten; and on, this
point, but in connexion with the siege of Vicksburg,
they tell a story which is rather hard upon the "' bummers," or mortar schooners and gunboats, employed
in the reduction of that place.
They say that Lieutenant-General Pemberton once
askled Grant for a truce to bury his dead outside the
works. This was while Grant was attacking from the
land circumvallation, while the naval forces were
throwing shells high up in the air to fall down over
the bluffs into the devoted city. Grant answered
that he had no objection, but would require some
hours to consult with Admiral Porter, in order to
have tile navy cease firing as well as the land forces.




PRIVATE MIILES O'REILLY.         37
" O, if that be your only cause for wishing delay,
never mind it," was the prompt answer of the rebel
negotiator.  "If your land batteries on a level with
us will only stop, the bummers and gunboats may
keep firing at the moon until the day of Judgment."
The same Western officers further allege that the
same principle which would justify the navy in claimir'g Fort Sumter as their prize, was amply illustrated
in the flamiing bulletins which announced the capture
of the Haines Bluff batteries, after they had been evacuated under the stress put upon them through General Sherman's corps, by the Mississippi flotilla.
These remarks, I am fully aware, are extremely illnatured, and may even appear frivolous to men who
cannot understand that honor is the highest prize for
which our soldiers and sailors are contending. But
beyond doubt there cannot be so much smoke without
fire; and it is for the best interests of both branches
of the service that each should know the alleged
points of grievance between them. The navy has
such an abundance of laurels, that none of its true
friends-and I claim to be one of its truest-could
wish to deprive the army of a single twig or leaf that
is justly due to it.
As for other matters, the wisest here think that




98            THE ADVENTURES OF
Admiral Dahlgren's caution in the opening of'tile
Charleston conflict will be abundantly justified when
the nature of the work yet to be accomplished is
understood by the public. Fort Sumter-weakest
for defence, most powerful for the offensive-is now
happily eliminated from the problem which the ironclads have yet to solve. But Forts Moultrie and
Johnson, Battery Bee, Battery Beauregard, Castle
Pinckney and Fort Ripley, still remain to be settled
with; and in the attack upon these General Gillmore
can give but little assistance. Against Fort Moultrie, the strongest defensive work in the harbor, he
can do almost nothing. Fort Johnson is on the
extreme left of Beauregard's line of defences, stretching across James Island from the harbor line to Secessionville. To attack this line in general would require a force more than treble that now at Gen. Gillmore's disposal; and his only means of advancing
under cover against the fort, would be to start
trenches, zigzags and parallels from where the Swamp
Angel Battery is now located, along the narrow strip
of hard sand-shore which lies between the swamps
and the harbor-line. This strip of hard sand would
offer very nearly the same obstacle to trenching that
would be offered by the pavements and sub-soil of




PRIVATE MIILES O'REILLY.         39
Broadway; and, exhausted as his men are by the
labors they have already performed, and the malarial cachexia which has reduced their systems, it is
doubtful if his whole force, applied to the spade and
pick for the next three months, would suffice to advance a mine under the walls of Fort Johnson. Most
probably-indeed almost certainly-Gen. Gillmore,
on obtaining possession of Cummings' Point, will
open at long range with his three, two, and one hundred pounder Parrots against Charleston city, keeping his troops in a state of tranquil amusement, while
watching the effects of Greek fire amongst the buildings of Meeting and King streets; and generously
admniring the splendid exertions of courage, labor, and
science by which his confreres of the navy propose
to remove the various lines of torpedo-armed obstractions now blocking up Charleston harbor.




O REILLY~S PETITION TO MR. STANTON.
IN CAMP, MORRIS ISLAND, S. C., Aug. 20, 1868.
REGRET to have to inform you that the publication in your columns of the song written by
Private Miles O'Reilly of the 47th regiment New
York Volunteers, has only led to the still severer
treatment of that imprisoned bard. Had I foreseen,
when sending you the song for your private amuse



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          4t
ment, that it could by any possibility have occurred
to you to put it on record in the E. Y. fleracd, my
sincere sympathy for the prisoner would have led
me to caution you against the adoption of such a
course. Now that the thing has become matter of
public notoriety, General A. H. Terry, commanding
the Post, has nothing for it but to let O'Reilly suffer
tlo penalty of his offence; nor could General Gillmore, with propriety or delicacy, interpose the prerogative of his clemency in regard to a crime of
which the particulars have been so widely bruited.
The balls, therefore, must remain on poor Miles for
some time, and all the rigors of his confinement have
been, if anything, increased. He is now attended by
Chaplain Hudson, of the New York Volunteer Engineers, formerly well known in your city as a minister
of the Gospel, and lecturer on the beauties of Shakspeare. Between Miles and the chaplain a very tender sentiment of esteem is said to have been developed; and it was upon Mr. Hudson's intercession that
General Gillmore finally consented to forward O'Reilly's petition (of which I spoke in my last) to the
Secretary of War. The first song having been unfortunately published, it can do no further injury to let
the petitioner's defence of himself, see the light.




42               THE ADVENTURES OF
What disposition will be made of it by Mr. Stanton, all down here are at a loss to imagine.   Some
think that, if the President's attention could be
called to the case, his own proclivity to a joke might
make him look with leniency on the luckless rhymer
of Morris Island. The petition reads as follows, but
to appreciate its true pathos and humor one should
hear O'Reilly sing it himself.   His recitative of the
parts in parenthesis has never been surpassed:MEMORIAL OF PRIVATE MILES O REILLY, NOW AN ONLUOKY PRISONER
IN THE GUARDHOUSE.
To His Excellency the Right Hon. EDWIN M. STANTON, Esq., and all others
whom it may concerns:AIR-" The Fine Ould English Gentleman."
I'll sing to you a navy song
Made by a soldier's pate,
Of a galliant, grim ould Admiral,
Whom iron jobbers hateBecause he couldn't, or didn't, or wouldn't
Some fibs in their favor state:
For which he has several big black marks
(Wid no end of notes of disadmiration, an' great big, ugly
criss crasses forninst his name),
On Uncle Gideon's slateThis galliant, grim ould Admiral,
Wan of the oulden time I




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY                43'Twas he who, whin our skies wor dark,
Nigh twinty months ago,
Let rifts of daylight through the clouds
In glorious lusthre flow;
"The fight is done I Port Royal won 1"
Och, didn't the counthry crow,
An' didn't ould Uncle Gideon
(Aye, and all the administhration organs, big and little, from
Colonel Forney's "Philadelphia Fibber" down to Horace Greeley's very weakly "Thribune")
Of the mighty vic'thry blow,
An' praise the grim ould Admiral,
As " wan of the rale ould time?"
An''twas him that tuk the iron-clads
Last spring aginst Fort Sumther;
And'twas him that, at seven or eight hundhred yards,
Wid his fifteen-inchers bumped her;
And'twas Rhind, wid his two big rifled guns
That at half the distance thumped herWhile the present Admiral stands off
(At the convaynient perspective distance of two thousand
yards or thereabouts, until even the poor forsook ruin of a place
seems to grow weary of waitin' for him),
An' don't, by a long shot, come t' her
So near as the grim ould Admiral,
Who is wan of the oulden time I




44              THE ADVENTURES OF
But now this great ould Admiral
Is laid upon the shelf,
Like a broken chaney taypot
Or a useless piece of delf,
Because he couldn't, or didn't, or wouldn't,
(An' for this, more power to himself l)
Chime in wid them iron-clad jobbers
(Who are down on their bare knees, every mother's son of
them, night, noon and mornin', prayin' Heaven or the other
place for long life and success to Du Pont's inimies)
In their schaimes for acquirin' pelfThis honest an' thrue ould Admiral,
This type of the bygone time I
An' because on the side of this Admiral,
I used both me tongue an' me pen,
I am now chained up like a un-u-i-corn
In the Provost-Marshal's den,
Wid nothin' but hard tack an' watherIf it worn't for the Provost's men
Who shmuggle me in, God bless the boys 
(On the sly, do you see, an' just by way of keepin' me
sperrits up, an' purventin' me leg-ornamints from takin' the skin
off my ankles too much),
Some whiskey, now an' agen,
Which I dhrink to the great ould Admiral,
Whom I knew in the bygone time.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.               45
Och I Stanton, our great God of War,
My condition in pity see,
An' if you have got any bowels to melt
Let your bowels be melted for me;For I come of the daycintest people
In the beautiful town of Thralee,
Where praties an' whishkey is plenty,
(An' divil resayve the provost marshal we have there, at all
at all, though we have the " peelers"-bad'cess to'em-who
is worse, if such a thing wor possible)And they bow both heart an' knee
To men like the grim ould AdmiralA type of the oulden time I
God be good to you, Misther Stanton,
An' look kindly on me case;
An' to the man wid Methusaleh's beard
An' the pathriarchal face
(I mane ould Uncle GideonWelles),
Just ax him to show me grace,
For which I will, as in duty bound,
If he gets me out of this placeDo for him an' for you all that ever I can
(Votin' airly and votin' often for yez both, or for aither ot
you, if yez ever chance to be candydates in any dishtrick or
county where I can get widin ten rods of the ballot box,
An' now my name I thraceMiles O'Reilly, who wrote of the Admiral,
An' is havin' a hard ould time I




46            THE ADVENTURES OF
Of course such a document as the foregoing can
hardly hope to receive grave or serious attention at
the War Department, nor is it at all likely that Mr.
Stanton will order O'Reilly's irons to be taken off in
consequence of this rhythmical prayer. The commanding officer of the Forty-seventh regiment is
now absent on leave, and is believed to be stayingat
his home in your city. The greatest anxiety to have
him return, so that he may be present at the trial, is
manifested by the prisoner, who relies largely upon
his evidence as to his (O'Reilly's) general good
conduct as a soldier.
Dr. Marsh, the Chief Inspector of the Sanitary
Commission, visits the guard-house frequently, and
does all that he can for the unhappy culprit, in whom
so much interest is felt. It is due also to Surgeon J.
J. Craven, Medical Purveyor, to say that he has
been unremitting in his attentions; as has also been
Surgeon Dibble, of the Sixth Connecticut Volunteers, who declares it to be his opinion, after close
examination, that this is what Mr. James T. Brady,
of your city, would call a case of "6 moral insanity;"
and that the prisoner having a monomania for writing verses, should not be held responsible before a
military tribunal. This plea, however, is -not accept



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          47
ed; and, as things look now, the balls and chains will
not be taken off O'Reilly until farther orders. Lieut.Colonel J. F. Hall, Provost Marshal General, is now
at the North, and it is believed that he will take Secretary Stanton's orders in the case before returning.
And now a word to the correspondent of a paper
published in Baltimore, who is well known to write
under the immediate inspiration of the iron-clad
interest, and who has of late been laboring to
prove that my former letters in reference to the 3Monitor question, have been a tissue of blunders and
errors of statement written by one having no practical knowledge of his subject-matter —the strong
inference from his ownletter being (though modesty
does not allow him  to state the matter in open
words), that he alone is the repository of all ironclad information,-thus ignoring not only the present
writer, a very small matter; but also Mr. Osbun,
the chief iron-clad reporter of the Iierald, who has
sailed and served in the Monitors for inany months,
and who is painfully familiar with the sensations
caused to men inside the pilot-house and turret by
the concussions of shot striking and shell exploding
against the exterior walls and on the deck.
For my inexperience in matters naval and mili



48            THE ADVENTURES OF
tary, I tender apologies to this correspondent. In
newspaper controversies he will find me a mere neophyte; and, never having been in any position of
command, my style unavoidably lacks that authoritative, not to say dogmatic and dictatorial tone so
pleasantly conspicuous in all he writes.
His intimacy with all the iron-clad inventors and
contractors, gives him an advantage over me in estimating the value of that class of ships; and if, as he
seems to think, the object of such vessels be to
secure the safety from hostile missiles of the three
occupants of each pilot house, and the sixteen men
forming the practical gun-crew in each turret, it may
at once be admitted, that, as nearly as any human
machinery can, they approximate perfection; and
this more especially when at an average distance
of two thousand yards from the enemy's ordnance.
But when Rhind took the Keokuk* within four
hundred yards of Sumter, his ship was riddled and
sunk; and when George W. Rodgers ran within one
hundred and fifty yards of Wagner,t the penalty of
his rash gallantry was paid with his life. The only
unfortunate point in regard to the two thousand
* Not a " Monitor" exactly. f In the Catskill, a regular Monitor.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          49
yards safety theory is this:-that the distance named
converts the contest on both sides into very much
of a sham battle, a sort of child's bargain-" You
don't hurt me, and I won't hurt you."
When Worden first steamed up to Fort lMcAllister, on the Ogeechee, the men and officers thronged
out on the ramparts of that small earthwork to see
what an iron-clad was like. Worden himself directed one of his guns and burst a shell immediately
over their heads, thereby killing Miiajor Barstow,
second in command under Colonel Anderson, and
wounding several of the men. After this he opened
a steady bombardment of the work, in which he was
joined by three other Monitors, and the bombardment lasted several days and nights-with what result? Not another man of the garrison was killed.
Not a gun was dismounted, and when the ironclads, discomfited, steamed away, the fort was just as
strong and substantially as uninjured as when the
attack commenced;!
Citing the case of the Atlanta-an ordinary commercial steamer, awkwardly and rapidly converted,
with old railroad iron, into some semblance of a
mail-clad war vessel-can furnish no parallel to the
vast and fast iron-clad frigates and line-of-battle3




50            THE ADVENTURES OF
ships now being built by the governments of France
and England, and upon which all the ingenuity and
resources of those two great countries are being lavished. —The Atlanta was caught in a corner, where
her superior speed could give her no advantage,
except for retreat. Her commander was a rash fool,
who hazarded everything, and lost his vessel, rather
than endure the mortification of turning tail in presence of certain distinguished ladies on board a river
steamer-ladies, by the way, who had come down in
no expectation of seeing one or more of our Monitors,
but to see the Atlanta capture or destroy one small
wooden gunboat which lay in Wassaw Sound.
How the Weehawken and her consort happened to
arrive so opportunely, is a point not yet explained in
any navy dispatches that have been published.*
Accustomed to look for, and, when found, highly to
appreciate, every grain of comfort in the bushels of
official chaff almost daily poured out upon us in these
disastrous times, I thank the correspondent in question for his assurance that " the Navy Department is
not insensible to the fact, that iron-plated frigates are
needed to meet and fight the same class of vessels
on the high seas."  With this point conceded, the
controversy may well close,-its main object having
* Since explained in a letter from Admiral Du Pont, dated January
8th, 1864.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         51
been to impre'ss upon the country, that our M1onitors are not all that we need, nor even any great part
of what we need in the way of a National Navy.
The second object has also been accomplished-not
by these letters, indeed, but by the sure developments of time. The reputation of Admiral Du Pont,
and of his gallant subordinate commanders, has
been thoroughly rescued from the obloquy or suspicion, with w-hich, in certain quarters, there appeared a disposition to cloud it. As for the reputation of General Hunter, also assailed, that too
will take care of itself in the proper time and manner. Suffice it for the present that in all the mailitary operations General Hunter undertook, or is blamed for having failed to undertake, he was governed
by clear and peremptory orders; and that, many
months before the first attack upon Fort Sumter, he
in conjunction with Admiral Du Pont, submitted to
those in higher authority precisely and identically
the same plan of action, which has since to a qualified extent —all the extent he prophesied-proved
successful under the magnificent engineering skill of
General Gillmore, and the cooperation of the ironclads under their present Admiral.




CIHAPTER  IV.
MILES O'REILLY PARDONED.
WASHINGTON DISPATCH, N. Y. Herald, Oct. 1863.
WE are gratified to be able to announce that the
President, always attentive to the cry of suffering and deserving soldiers, has granted a free pardon to Private Miles O'Reilly, Forty-seventh regiment New  York Volunteers, now a prisoner on
Morris Island, South Carolina. The President takes




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.           3
the view that O'Reilly's original offence was but
" an innocent joke " in his own eyes, however contrary to the letter or spirit of the Revised Regulations for the Army. O'Reilly has been ordered
North, and is expected here by the next steamer.
Mr. Lincoln, in giving instructions to Colonel E. D.
Townsend, Assistant Adjutant-General, for issuing
the order of pardon, referred to the old proverb
about " making the ballads of a nation, and allowing
any one else to make the laws." It is believed that
Miles will be confidentially employed at the White
House in rendering into popular verse the stories
and traditions of the great Northwest; and no doubt
such a volume-the materials and anecdotes furnished by Mr. Lincoln, and the vers'es by the Bard
of Green Erin —will be quite equal to anything in
the same line since the days of ~Esop's Fables, translated by the poet Gay.
It is said that the immediate impelling cause of
this step on the part of the President-a very strong
one in view of the stand taken with regard to Private
O'Reilly by certain high authorities in the Navy
Department-was a song brought to the notice of
His Excellency by Captain Arthur M. Kinzie, of the
Illinois Cavalry, a very deserving young officer, who,




54           THE ADVENTURES OF
in the "halcyon days long ago," collected, drilled,
and disciplined the first regiment of Colored Troops
that had been raised in the United States since the
days of General Andrew Jackson, who was of opinion
-concurring therein with General George Washington —that colored men could stop a ball or fill a pit
as well as better; and that the exclusive privilege
of being killed or maimed in battle, or worked to
death in the trenches, was not that kind of privilege
for the exclusive right of which any great number
of earnest and sensible white men could long contend.  Capt. Kinzie, in the letter transmitting the
following verses to the President, declared that they
had been of the utmost value in reconciling the
minds of the soldiery of the old 10th Army Corps
to the experiment of the Ist South Carolina Volunteers. The verses were as follows; and although the
author never declared himself, they were universally
attributed through the Department of the South to
Private Miles O'Reilly:



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.               5
SAMBO S RIGHT TO BE KILT.
AIR —" The Low-backed Car."
Some tell us'tis a burnin' shame
To make the naygers fight;
And that the thrade of bein' kilt
Belongs but to the white:
But as for me, upon my sowl I
So liberal are we here,
I'll let Sambo be murthered instead of myself,
On every day in the year.
On every day in the year, boys,
And in every hour of the day;
The right to be kilt I'll divide wid him,
And divil a word I'll say.
In battle's wild commotion
I shouldn't at all object
If Sambo's body should stop a ball
That was comin' for me direct;
And the prod of a Southern bagnet,
So ginerous are we here,
I'll resign, and let Sambo take it
On every day in the year.
On every day in the year, boys,
And wid none o' your nasty pride,
All my right in a Southern bagnet prod,
Wid Sambo I'll divide I




56              THE ADVENTURES OF
The men who object to Sambo
Should take his place and fight;
And it's betther to have a nayger's hue
Than a liver that's wake and white.
Though Sambo's black as the ace of spades,
His finger a thrigger can pull,
And his eye runs sthraight on the barrel-sights
From undher its thatch of wool.
So hear me all, boys darlin',
Don't think I'm tippin' you charff
The right to be kilt we'll divide wid him,
And give him the largest half!
Whatever may be thought of the spirit animating this ditty-which certainly is extremely devoid
of any philanthropic or humanitarian cant-the practical results of its popular diffusion redounded undoubtedly to the best interests of the service, "with
a view to soup." The white soldiers of the Department began singing it round their camp-fires at
night, and humming it to themselves on their sentry-beats. It made them regard the enlistment of
the despised sons of Ham  as rather a good joke at
first; and next, as a joke containing some advantages to themselves.  Very quickly they became
reconciled to the experiment; and it was not long
before they commenced to take in the movements




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.           57
and doings of their humble colored allies, that sort
of half-ludicrous, half-pathetic interest which a jollyhearted, full-grown elder brother takes in the first
awkward attempts at manly usefulness that are
made by " little Bub," who is some score of years
his junior. This was General Hunter's object in all
his orders and other measures relative to the organization of colored regiments. He urged the matter
forward purely as a military measure, and without
one syllable or thought of any " humanitarian proletarianism."  Every black regiment in garrison
would relieve a white regiment for service in the
field. Every ball stopped by a black man would
save the life of a white soldier. Besides, if the
blacks are to have liberty, the strictness of military
discipline is the best school in which their elevation
to the plane of freedom can be conducted. It was
Hunter's chief misfortune, and the greatest curse of
his Department, that this purely military experiment was interfered with by a swarm of blackcoated, white-chokered, cotton-speculating, long-faced,
philanthropy-preaching fanatics-the grand hierarch
of whom appeared of opinion that "a white man,
by severe moral restraint and constant attendance
upon his (the grand hierarch's) preaching, might in
3*




THE ADYENTURES OF
time elevate himself to something very like an
equality with an average buck-nigger just fresh
from the plantations." For the presence of: these
civilians in the Department, General HIunter was
not responsible; nor for the evil effects of their
mischievous, and only mischievous, interference
should he be blamed.
"'That song," said the President, on hearing it
read by Colonel Hay, " reminds me of what Deacon
Stoddard, away down in Menard County, said one
day, when a woman that was of suspected repute
dropped a half eagle into the collection plate, after
one of his charity sermons:'I don't know where
she gets it, nor how she earns it; but the money's
good, and will do good. I wish she had some better way of getting it than she is thought to have;
and that those who do get their money better, could
be persuaded to make half as good a use of it.' I
have no doubt, Hay, that O'Reilly, in whom you
seem to take such an interest, might be a great deal
better man than he is. But that song of his is both
good and will do good. Let McManus step over to
Colonel Townsend, and say that I want to see him."
It was under these circumstances that Private Miles
O'Reilly obtained his pardon.




CHAPTER V.
RETURN OF PRIVATE MILES 0 REILLY.-HIS RECEPTION
IN NEW YORK.
[Y.. Herald, Oct., 1868.
RIVATE Miles O'Reilly, Forty-seventh regiment
New York Volunteers, having been pardoned
by the President for his breach of decorum in publishing songs relative to the joint naval and military
operations against Charleston, came to this city in
the Arago last week, having been given a thirty days'




60           THE ADVENTURES OF
furlough by General Gillmore, at the end of which
time he will proceed to VWashington, and report to
the President for special duty. Private O'Reilly
was received by a large party of distinguished friends
off Sandy Hook, on board the steam yacht of our
excellent Port Surveyor, Mr. Rufus F. Andrews,
who seems always ready to give both his vessel and
his time t6 such festivities. Excellent speeches were
made by General Daniel E. Sickles, Mr. James T.
Brady, John Van Buren, Winm. E. Robinson, Commodore Joseph Hoxie, Judge. Charles P. Daly,
Daniel Devlin, and others; while Dr. Carmichael, Mr.
John Savage, Mr. Stephen C. Massett, Mr. Barney
Williams, and several celebrated songsters, amateur
and professional, favored the company with patriotic
and expressive melodies as the good vessel steamed
up the Hudson on a brief pleasure trip.
Private O'Reilly is now staying at the residence
of his cousin, Mr. James O'Reilly, quite a prominent
democratic politician in the Sixteenth ward, who is
at present employed in the City Inspector's Department. The military minstrel's health seems to have
suffered somewhat from the rigors of his late confinement on Morris Island; but his spirits remain as
high as ever, and his letter of versified thanks to




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.                61
Mr. Lincoln is one of the most truly  humorous
things we have seen for many days.  Of this production we can only give two verses-rthe first and
second-O'Reilly saying that the balance (which
treats liberally of the Cabinet difficulties and the
" succession"), cannot appear until the President
gives his consent to its publication,-Private Miles
declaring that he has had his full share of punishment
-or publishing rhymes without authority, and that he
is resolved never knowingly to be caught in the same
bad scrape again. His letter to the President begins:Long life to you, Misther Lincoln I
May you die both late an' aisy;
An' whin you lie wid the top of aich toe
Turned up to the roots of a daisy,
May this be your epitaph, nately writ"T' hough thraitors abused him vilely,
He was honest an' kindly, he loved a joke,
An' he pardoned Miles O'Reilly I"
And for this same act while I've breath in me lungs
Or a heart in me body beatin',
It's "long life to you, misther Lincoln I"
That meself will keep repeatin' -
If you ain't the handsomest man in the world
You've done handsome by me, an' highly;
And your name to poshterity will go down
Arm in arm wid Miles O'Reilly I




62            THE ADVENTURES OF
The balance of this ditty we shall hope to present
to our readers at an early day, it being extremely
improbable that Mr. Lincoln will make himself a
party to the desire of the Navy Department to have
O'Reilly's light hid under a bushel. In the meantime the " bard of Morris Island," having dabbled a
little in city politics before his enlistment, and having corresponded constantly, all the time he was
away, with his cousin James, who is deep in all the
mysteries of the Tammany and Mozart "machines,"
has got off the following " inside and partic'lar"
view of the present condition of our local democratic
wranglings, which may be read with amusement,
and possibly with some instruction, by our fellow
citizens of every stripe and hue. The'"talk" in
some of its paragraphs, like all other " oracular talk,"
may be dark to the outside heathen-the mere barbarians who have no other connexion with politics
than to vote for the "machine candidates" and pay
their taxes. But to the initiated, we are assured,
every line and almost every syllable will convey a
world of hard-headed and hard-hitting meaning.
Private Miles says this last effusion of his genius is
the " War Song of the ionist Dimmycrats of New'York City Aginst the Chates;" and is anxious to




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.                  63
have it sung before next election day either by Mr.
Barney Williams or Mr. and Mrs. Florence, at the
Academy of Music.  He calls itTIE BUST UP OF THE MACHINES.
AIR —The Groves of Blarney.
I.
Och, the coalition,
For a fair divishikn
Of the city spoils, that was lately made;
It now proves a shwindle,
Which but sarves to kindle
Into fiercer fury min of every shade.
All the lads delightin',
In "payce" are fightin'
Like the divil himself aginst their new allies;
While aich "city rail-roadher"
Has around him an odher'Which even min wid noses the laste. sinsitive do in their very
haeart of hearts most etarnally dispise I
II.
Yes; I tell you fairly,
Things looks mighty quarely
In the dimmycratic party of this daycint town;
The machines is busted
And all them that thrusted
In the reg'lar nominhins —Och, their tails is down




644             THE ADVENTURES OF
It is fine insthruction
Just to see. the ruction
That is made by Jim Brady an' McKeon too;
While there's Oliver Charlick,
Who is perfeck garlick
To Mister Pether B. Sweeny, Owny Brennan, iughey Smith,
Jake Sharp, James B. Taylor, and to all that crew I
III.
There's the bould Fernandy,
Who was wanst our dandyHe is now a mimber of the great " has beens" I
While fat Daycon Anson*
For revinge is prancin',
And is knockin' all the crockery into smithereens.
Here's the thrue John Kelly
Come to join the melee,
An' big Michael Connolly, stout as Brine O'Lynn;
Jump in and sthrip, boysl
To be whipped or whip, boys!'Tis an ould-fashioned Donnybrook free fight, in which the best
men win.
IV.
Here is War Horse Purdy,
Late so shpry an' sturdy,
Now so badly "Sweenied" that his teeth won't pass;
Take off his bridle,
Turn him out to idle,
You may cure his sthring halt wid a year of grasas
* Hco, Axson, Herrick, M. C:




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.                6.3
An' here's Edward Cooper,
A red-bearded throoper,
Wid his partner Hewitt-min of iron both,
An' here's Charles O'Conor,
That grim sowl of honor,
Who to thry his hand in a little free fight divarsion was niver in
the laste bit lothe.
V.
Och, here's Watherberry,
Who's sore-headed-very,
Thryin' hard to bolsther up Governor Saymour's shpine;
An' there's Harry Hilton,
Who just now was kilt on
That political Jug-ornate-the Broadway line I
Here's the bould Smith Ely
For whose grieviance feel I —
Mat* thrated him badly, and there's no mistake;
An' here's Cornell (Charley),
Arm in arm wid Farley;
They are two party pilliars whom the little hayro of the Twintieth will find it hard to shake!
VI.
Here is Aldherman Froment,
Who a sturdy blow lent
To "min who take offices they don't dare to fill;"
An' the gay Dan Delavan,
Who don't fear to tell a man
What he thinks of the " grist" made in the Sixth Ward " mill;"
* M. T. Brennan, Comptroller, N. Y. City.




66              THE ADVENTURES OF
Here's the bully Boole, too,
Won't be made a fool, too,
So he tells the managirs they may go to-Cork;
While the gay Bill Tweedie
Owns that things looks seedy,
An' not only seedy, but most particularly dusty for the reg'lar
machine candydates in our gay New York!
VII.
Och, Jim Kerrigan's howling
For the scalp of Dowling,
An' I guess he'll get it wid Billy Walsh's aid;
While grim Fifth ward Savage
Shwears to slay and ravage
If his frind Bob McIntyre ain't a Police Justice made.
Here is Billy Miner —
There's no metal finer
Than there is in Billy for a stand up fight;
An' young Aldherman Hardy,
Who is never tardy
To uphold aginst all comers-no matthe# how fortyfied in
"conthrol" they may think themselves-the people's right.
VII.
Och, here's John McCool, too,
Who sthrikes hands wid Boole, too,
Aginst dictation, come from whence it may;
While the staunch Gid. Tucker,
Yet may bring us succor
Whin he gets his sharp pen into its full play;




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.            67
Och, our great Conthroller
Needs a new consolerJohnny Andherson's " solace" cannot charm New York;
The machines is busted,
An' all them that thrusted
In the reg'lar nominashins (to quote the very powerful an'
iligant words of my cousin Jim's boss, City Inspecther
Boole), they may go to Cork I
This song, which Private O'Reilly gave with great
unction on board tlz steam pleasure yacht which
iUacle Sam is generous enough to keep for the benefit
of Mr. Surveyor Andrews, appeared lo create so much
hilarity and was so well received, that, on its being
encored, he said, with the leave of the honorable
company, he'd much prefer, instead of repeating himself, to give them a song about state politics, which
had been composed by his cousin, Mr. Patrick D.
O'Reilly, of the 19th Ward,-" a man that needn't
turn his back upon any politicianer that ever was
born for downright cuteness and knowledgability."
He had heard said that this song was written by
Judge Waterbury, but there wasn't a word of truth
in the rumor. In the first place, it wasn't the judge's
sentiments. In the second, the judge had never
been partial to the " Little Giant" while he was alive;




68           THE ADVENTURES OF
nor now was he over and above partial to General
Dix, though not so " coppery"' by any means as some
people thought him. The last reason why the song
was not Judge Waterbury's was, that it happened to
be Patsy O'Reilly's; and if anybody thought it wasn't
Patsy's, and would only say it wasn't Patsy's to Patsy's
face any fine night, he (Private Miles) "would be
happy to see the argyment," which he prophesied
would be a knock down one. Patsy, his cousin, they
must know had been bred for, a priest, but didn't
take kindly, God pity him! to the notion of single
blessedness and fasting. He was too robustious a
man for the church; but he had made his mark in
city politics, and had to-day more contracts with the
Street Department than any other one man in the
city. ilaving got off these remarks, Private O'Reilly
than sang to the air of Bonnie Duendee, the following verses:




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.                 69
SONG OF THE NATIONAL DEMOCRACY.
To the Albany chiefs the War Democrats spoke,
Ere you play the old game, there are slates to be broke;
Your words are all right, if they only were true,
But beneath the war flag you've a copperhead crew.
So fill up the cup, be it lager or bier,
Resurrect the war hatchet and sharpen the spear,
In November we'll have an almighty big row,
And to Copperhead doctrines be - well, if we bow I
Dean Richmond his stomach may pat and may pinch
His jolly red nose till it lengthens an inch;
But he can't make us think his professions are true
While he sails his war ship with a Copperhead crew.
So fill up the cup, whiskey, claret, or bier,
Resurrect the war hatchet and sharpen the spear,
There are braves on the war path prepared for a row,
And to Breckenridge doctrines be - well, if we bow I
The bold Pete de Cagger, with mystery big,
May adjust each stray hair in his amber-hued wig,
But his arts, though potential, are well understood,
If his platform be honest, why runs he with Wood?
So fill up the cup, things look certainly queer,
Resurrect the war hatchet and sharpen the spear,
With the lords of the " Central"* we're in for a row,
And to Richmond and Cagger be - well, if we bow I
* N. Y. Central Railroad.




70              THE ADVENTURES OF
To the tenets of Douglas we tenderly cling,
Warm hearts to the cause of our country we bring,
To the flag we are pledged-all its foes we abhor;
And we ain't for the nigger, but are for the war I
So fill up the cup, pleasant tipple is bier,
Resurrect the war hatchet and sharpen the spear;
With the Albany chiefs we are in for a row,
And their sceptre we'll break or their heads they shall bow.
It may suit the subservient Old War Horse* to say,
He is "willing to follow where Pete leads the way;"
That, with gaiety, he as blank paper will yield
Himself to the power which the Regency wield;Oh, so great doth your gaiety, Purdy, appear,
That we drink your good health in a bumper of bier;
And after November's slate smashing grand'row,
We'll, with gaiety, make you our very best bow.
Such things do for some folks, but don't do for us,
Who for Pruyn, Cagger, Cassidy, don't care a cuss;
To'the flag we are pledged, all its foes we abhor;
And first, last, all the time, we are in for the war I!
So fill up the cup-healthy drinking is bier,
Resurrect the great war-axe and sharpen the spear;
In the Wigwam, next April, all factions we'll hush,
And for new men to lead, we'll go in with a rush I
The platform of Logan, Grant, Gillmore, and Dix,
Is better than any that managers fix:
-" Our flag in its glory I our'Union restored,
And till treason cries Quarter, no sheath to the sword I"
* Supervisor Elijah F. Purdy.




PRIVATE MIMES O'REILLY.          71
So fill up the cup with much better than bier,
The Big Spring is bubbling, its waters are clear,
Democracy's fountain, and thus at its brink
"To the memory of Douglas" with bowed heads we drink I
We learn that Private O Reilly has been waited
upon by numerous delegations from the various Irish
benevolent and patriotic societies, anxious to know
upon what day it will be convenient to him to receive
a public demonstration of their kindliness and sympathy. To this he has very modestly replied, placing the whole matter in the hands of a committee,
consisting of Judge Michael Connoly, Thomas Whelan, Esq., Mr. Andrew Carrigan, of the Emigrants'
Industrial Savings Bank, Captain Patrick M. Haverty, late Quartermaster of the Irish Brigade, Mr.
R. J. Lalor, and Patrick Meehan, Esq., of the Irish
American newspaper. We learn also that arrangements are now being made for an immense and magnificent complimentary dinner to be given to Private
IMiles at an early day-Messrs. Charles O'Conor,
James T. Brady, Richard O'Gorman, John KcKeon,
Hon. Gideon Welles, Geneitals Sickles and Meagher,
Admiral Du Pont, Peter Cooper, A. T. Stewart, Capt.
C. R. P. Rodgers, A. V. Stout, Daniel Devlin, J. J.
Bradley, Wm. C. Barrett, Governor Seymour, Hon.




72           THE ADVENTURES OF
Ben. Wood, President Lincoln, Hon. John Clancy,
Daniel E. Delavan, Phineas T. Barnumr, Hon. Edwin
M. Stanton, Captain Fox, Captain Ericsson, Oliver
Charlick, John Y. Savage, Hon. Thomas A. Ledwith, Alderman Billy Walsh, Mr. Thurlow Weed,
and others too numerous to mention, being among
the invited guests. We have given public dinners
to all sorts of military heroes, except those of the
humbler order. It now only remains for us to show,
as can be done in O'Reilly's case, that even the humblest bearer of the musket is not allowed to'" bloom
unseen," by the keen eyes of a generous and enlightened public. Tickets for the entertainment can be had
of Mr. Nathaniel Jarvis, Jr., City Hall, Judge Bartholomew O'Connor, Ann street, and Mr. A.V. Stout,
at the " Shoe and Leather Bank." Dodworth's band
will be in attendance, and the dinner is to be the
ne plus ultra of Delmonico's very highest style of
art. It takes place next Thursday evening; and, as
there will be seats for but three hundred guests, and
as the English, Russian and French Admirals, with
their chiefs of staff, have been invited, all who desire
to be present at this "feast of reason and flow of
soul" should not lose a moment in making application for their tickets.




CHAPTER VI.
THE MILES O REILLY BANQUJET.
[From the N. Y. Y.HeraZd, Oct. 23, 1863.
ITN contrast with the magnificent banquet given to
Private Miles O'Reilly, Forty-seventh regiment
New York Volunteers, last evening, at Delmonico's,
all previous festive entertainments of a public character given in our city must pale their ineffectual
4




74           THE ADVENTURES OF
fires. The arrangements were of the most faultless
kind, and the company embraced many of the very
foremost representative men of Manhattan Island.
The Japanese ball will hereafter be remembered as
a poor affair; the Prince of Wales break-down at
the Academy of Music will pass into oblivion; and
even the recent civic dinner to the Muscovite Admiral and his officers, at the Astor House, will be dismissed with -a contemptuous shrug when contrasted
with the superb and gorgeous banquet given at
Delmonico's, over which the most cultivated taste
presided, and at which the ablest and most brilliant
minds of the day poured out their views and aspirations with a frankness never before equalled.
TIE BANQUET HALL AND BANQUET.
Delmonico, as was said of the famous bayonet
charge which General Hancock did not make at
Williamsburg-IDelmonico "outdid himself."  The
tables, sparkling with massive gold and glittering silver, bore aloft, in vases of crystal and in the
hands of sculptured nymphs and graces, all the most
luscious fiuits of the tropic and temperate zones, all




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.           75
the flowers of richest hue and odor. Everything
that taste and liberality combined could achieve
towards making the banquet worthy.of those who
gave it was accomplished. The dining hall was of
itself a picture, so well had- the artistic effects of
colors in glasses, gold and silver ware, dazzling
exotics, quivering jelly palaces, and crusted battlements of charlotte russe-been studied. Where the
walls were not flashing mirrors, they were covered
with banners of every nationality and hue —great
interest being excited by the shot and shell torn
banner of the Sixty-ninth New York Volunteers,
which Colonel Robert Nugent, who was present,
kindly volunteered for the occasion. In the window
recesses were placed fanciful bowers of evergreens,
liberally sprinkled with flowers, and made cool by
little sparkling fountains, which sprang out of crystal
basins, in which innumerable gold and silver fish
were "C playing at backgammon."  The ornamental
confectionery showed many beautiful designs, those
most prominent being an exact model of Fort
Sumter as it appeared before making the acquaintance of General Gillmnore's rifled guns; and an Irish
harper, with an Irish wolfhound at his feet and an
Irish harp in his hand —for the archeological correct



76            THE ADVENTURES OF
ness of which Judge Charles P. Daly offered to give
his erudite and incontrovertible certificate. The bill
of fare we omit in deference to the feelings of those
who were not present. Suffice it to say that Delmonico " saw" the recent Astor House Russian
programme, and "went fifty better."  The delicious
juices of meats, the delicate flavors of fishes, the
wild sweetness of game, the ravishing tenderness of
fruits, the quivering sensibilities of jelly, and the sharp
titillations of ice, were all present on the board in
prodigal profusion and perfection.
THE CARD OF INVITATION.
The invitations issued by the committee were
worded as follows;" SIR: —We take pleasure in inviting you to be
present as a guest, on the occasion of a banquet for
which we have found an excellent excuse in the
person of Private Miles O'Reilly, Forty-seventh
regiment New York Volunteers, late a prisoner on
Morris Island, South Carolina, but released from
durance vile by order of our benevolent and truly
amiable President.  All guests must bring with
them  an unlimited supply of good appetite and




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         77
humor. The napkins, wines and things will be provided by our accomplished caterer.
DANIEL P. INGRAHAM,
Judge of Supreme Court.
ANTHONY L. ROBERTSON0
Ju dge of Su~perior Court.
JoHN R. BRADY,
IHENRY HILTON,
Juddges of Court of Common Pleas.
And seventy others, COMMITTEE OF ARRANGEMENTS
for the Miles O'Reilly Banquet."
THE DISTINGUISHIED GUESTS.
At half-past six precisely the guests assembled,
the army being represented by Generals Truman
Seymour, U.S.A.; Thomas F. Meagher, of the Irish
Brigade; Alfred H. Terry, of the Tenth army corps;
Lieutenant-Colonel E. W. Smith, of the Department
of the South; Col. D. T. Van Buren, Captains S. W.
Stockton, Horace Porter, and F. E. Howe; LieutenantColonel J. H. Wilson and others; the navy by certain very distinguished officers, whose names, for
reasons connected with the KNavy Department, are
specially omitted; the bench by Judges Bosworth,




78           THE ADVENTURES OF
Hilton and McCarthy; the bar by James T. Brady,
Samuel J. Tilden, John Van Buren, Surrogate
Tucker, Wm. M. Evarts, Daniel Lord, James W.
Gerard, Richard O'Gorman, C. Bainbridge Smith,
ex-Judge O'Connor, Malcolm Campbell, and many
other brilliant lights, too numerous to mention; the
press by Messrs. Greeley, Raymond, Hudson, Godwin, Gay, Nordhoff, Swinton, Clapp, Willis, Guernsey,
and others; our business men by A. T. Stewart,
Edward Cooper, Oliver Charlick, A. V. Stout, Wm.
F. Havemeyer, E. H. Miller, Royal Phelps and
company; the Church by the Rev. Dr. Bellows, and
Chaplain Hudson, of the New York Volunteer
Engineers; Congress by Messrs. Benjamin Wood,
Winthrop Chanler, Anson Herrick, and Mr. Brooks
of the Express; the heads of the city departments
by Messrs. Cornell, Boole, and Devlin; the Board
of Supervisors by MIessrs. Ely, Purdy, Tweed, and
Blunt; the Board of Aldermen by Messrs. Farley,
Hardy, Chipp, Long, and Walsh; and the public
generally by Professor E. Meriam, of Brooklyn
Heights; David Dudley Field, Judge Edmonds,
Mr. Wm. Jewett, of Colorado, and several hundred
others.- It was remarked, however, at this time that,
owing to an oversight by the Committee of Arrange



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.           79
ments, no sub-committee had been appointed to
escort Private O'Reilly to the banquet-an oversight
which was at once remedied and the Sub-cormmittee
appointed.
The following letters were received by the Committee of Arrangements and Invitations:TELEGRAM FROM THE PRESIDENT.
WASHINGTON, October 21, 1868.
Have to remain here watching my Cabinet. There
might be a row in the family if I went away. Telegraphing not a good medium for stories; but have
an anecdote appropriate to O'Reilly's case, which I
send in letter by this day's mail.
LFTTER FROM A DISTINGUISHED NAVAL OFFICER.
[Name omitted for reasons stated elsewhere.]
WASMINGTON, October 21, 1863.
GENTLEMEN,-I regret that a sentiment and surroundings which you can appreciate will not allow
me to join your festive assembly. The Navy is not
forgetful of the tribute paid by Private O'Reilly to
the merit of many of its most deserving officers. In




80           THE ADVENTURES OF
the manly pathos of his reference to the late Fleet
Captain George We. Rodgers, in that song for which
he suffered imprisonment, he struck strings of the
human heart which must vibrate so long as courage
can enkindle respect, or the death of a hero and
martyr claim the tribute of a tear.
Admirali Dahlgren has had little sea experience,
but no braver man lives. Few of firmer purpose or
more resolute to succeed. His place, however, was
in tke Navy Ordnance Yard at Washington, into the
habits of which he had grown; and his failure is
only another exemplification of the evils which follow
placing the right man in the wrong place. Thus
much in justice to an old friend and valued brother
officer. I think that Private O'Reilly, nevertheless,
has given us honest and manly songs-songs of, the
kind we much need; and in the acknowledgment
you propose making to him you have my earnest
sympathy. With sincere respect
TELEGRAM FROM GENERAL GRINT.
CHaTTANOOGA, October 21, 1868.
Your invitation reaches me just as I am preparing
to move upon the enemy's works. Be assured my
sympathies are with every movement which aims to




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          81l
acknowledge our indebtedness, as individuals and as
a nation, to the private soldiers-the  countless,
nameless, unrewarded, often disregarded heroes of
the musket and bayonet-to whose true patriotism,
patient endurance, and courage in the day of danger
we, who are generals, owe victory, and the country
will yet owe its salvation.
LETTER FROM IIONE. FERNANDO WOOD.
FrmTr AvENwU, NEw YoBx, October 22, 1863.
GENTLEMEN,-A recent chill blast from  Ohio,
coupled with a cold shiver recently caught in
Pennsylvania,* have laid me up with an indisposition
which confines me to that home in which I am both
prized and appreciated. I look upon your banquet
with a single eye to the public good; and am far
from convinced that it may not soon be even a better
investment to take stock in the national fortunes, than
to embark with my friend Lamar in that blockaderunning enterprise about which some of my foolish
enemies have lately been making a fuss. Just now
I am so doubled up with rheumatic twinges that my
walk is slantendicular; and I make it my rule never
to appear in public when in this attitude. Yery
candidly and sincerely yours,
*The Ohio and Pennsylvania electiona




82            THE ADVENTURES OF
NOTE FROM MR. WEED.
ASTOR HOUSE, 6 o'clock P.M., Oct. 22, 1863.
DEAR DEVELIN-Am just polishing off and finishing
up Mayor Opdyke.  Will be with you in a moment
when I get through.
T. W.
LETTER FROM THE COUNT GUROWSKI.
WASHINGTON, Oct. 21, 1868.
GENTLEEN —-Your invitation is received, but me
it does not suit to be of your guests invited. I, who
have bearded a Russian Emperor, am not to bow in
homage abject to any of the great asses who are in
this country heroes made. The President (I have
proved it) is a mountebank; Secretary Seward is a
faineant and traitor; General McClellan is a traitor
and ass. Chase is an ass. I have no doubt Gillmore
is an. assish asinine ass; as indeed are all the men
whose names we in the newspapers see, or in men's
mouths hear, there being only one exception, who is
with highest consideration, yours,
A. GuRowsxI.




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PRIVATE MIILES O'REILLY.         83
TELEGRAPH FROM GOVERNOR SEYMOUTR.
ALBANY, Oct. 22, 1868.
AM worried to death about the New York Police
Commissioners.  Sometimes think I will remove
them; sometimes think that I won't. If I can make
up my mind either one way or other, will be with
you. If not, will stay here, and do nothing else but
try.
FROM MR. GIDEON WELLES.
NAVY DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, Oct. 19, 1863.
GENTLEMEN-I regret that the severe studies and
labors in which I am now engaged will not permit
me to be present at your very interesting demonstration.  Having commenced my investigations of
naval science by a close analysis of that most famous
vessel of antiquity in which,the second great progenitor of our race avoided destruction-and of which,
let me add, the so-called models placed in the hands
of our children are even ludicrously erroneous when
examined by the light of antiquarian science-I
have now reached, in my descending studies, the
type of vessels used in the great Spanish armada;
and it is my hope, ere the termination of an exist



84            THIE ADVENTURES OF
ence already bountifully protracted, to have brought
down my researches to that amazing new starting
point in naval history —the discoveries and successful
experiments of the immortal Fulton! With the
introduction of steam as a motor of vessels, a great
change, all will admit, has been effected in the conditions of maritime warfare. That change it is my
hope, and shall be my unceasing endeavor to grasp
and appreciate, if not while in official existence, then
in that bright and tranquil period of repose which a
grateful country will not fail to afford to the declining years of a conscientious and faithful old public
servant.
Very respectfully, gentlemen.
LETTER FROM GENERAL SANDFORD.
NTEW YoRx, Oct. 22, 1868.
GENTLEnMEN-AS yOU have had the good taste to
invite the members of my staff and the most prominent officers of my command, as well as myself, I
thank you in their name and in my own. The managers of the late IRussian banquet did differently; but
those managers were members of the Common Council, which explains, if it does not palliate their offence.  Their neglect in this respect extended to




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          85
the Governor of the State, only one member of whose
military family was asked; and to General Dix, who
was invited to appear, so far as I can learn, altogether unattended, to meet foreign officers, some of
equal, many of inferior, rank-but all attended by
their proper retinue. I thank you again in behalf
of my staff and the senior officers of the First Division, as also for myself; and beg to assure you that
such of us as feel like it, will, with pleasure, avail
ourselves of your very kind and hospitable invitation.
Respectfully and obediently, your servant.
Tickets were issued for only three hundred persons, but it was reported that over six hundred had
squeezed themselves into the room. Mr. A. V. Stout
presided admirably, and grace was said by Dr.
Bellows.
After the cloth was removed, Mr. STOUT introduced the intellectual part of the proceedings with
some remarks, as follows:PRESIDENT A. V. STOUT'S SPEECH.
He said that while awaiting the return of the Subcommittee with the Guest of the Evening, he would
remark that he had once before been selected to pre



86            THE ADVENTURES OF
side at a somewhat similar meeting. It was when a
stand of colors was presented to the old Sixty-ninth
State Militia, and a sword of honor to its Colonel, as
a testimonial of our sympathy with a sentiment
which made him refuse to parade an Irish regiment
in honor of the Prince of Wales. (Cheers.) He was
selected to preside on that occasion, probably, from
the same motive which had led to his selection in the
present case. It was an Irish demonstration for an
Irish object and to illustrate an Irish sentiment.
They therefore took an American to preside on that
occasion as a token of the sympathy that exists between the American and Irish people. (Loud cheers.)
That ceremony took place in peacefulf times, months
-though not many-before the war blast startled the
North from its false dream of security. Since then
the festal flag which he had an humble share in presenting had cast its flashing radiance over many
a battle-field, had been lost in desperate charges of
the enemy, and regained by such sacrifices of life
and limb as could only fitly be described by his
friend, General Thomas Francis IMleagher, whose
words are not less trenchant than his sword, whose
genius to describe can only be surpassed by the
heroism of action which has become a part of our








THE BAQUE.-Page 87.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         87
proudest history. (Loud and long continued cheering.) To this pleasant side of his recollections of that
last Irish festivity, however, there was a side which
was unpleasant enough at the time, though it might
appear ludicrous when mentioned now. On the
very day after that demonstration, the English depositors at his bank bustled up to the counter, in one
long continued current, and withdrew every dollar
of theirs that was in his keeping, to the amount of
many hundred thousand dollars. (Uproarious laughter, and cries-of " Good, good.") He could assure
them it was no laughing matter at the time, either
to him or his fellow directors. MIr. Stout would now
apologize for having detained them, and would introduce, during the temporary absence of Private
O'Reilly, who would be present in a very few moments, the first regular toast of the evening, to which
Mr. James T. Brady would respond:The President of the United States.
MR. JAMES T. BRADY'S SPEECH.
Mr. Brady commenced by remarking that it was
a peculiarity of the race from which he came, and
with which all the~ dearest recollections of his childhood were associated, to be diffident of their own




88            TIHE ADVENTURES OF
powers and to shun all occasions of publicity, whether festive or professional. They had met that night
to do honor to an humble hero-to vindicate a sentiment; and, amidst glowing fruits and the melody
of ringing glasses, to renew their allegiance to the
banner of the old National Democratic Faith. (Loud
cheers.)  Of Private O'Reilly-after whom  the
members of the Sub-committee were now scouring
the city in carriages-it was not his part just at; present to speak. He was called upon to respond to the
toast of " The President of the United States;" and
to that duty he would confine himself. He regretted
that, by another oversight of the Committee of Arrangements-almost as bad as that by which the
Guest of the Evening had not been sent for in proper
form-no ladies had been invited to brighten by
their smiles and inspire by their beauty such forlorn
bachelors as himself. Rich as were the bouquets on
the board, dazzling as were the gold and silver chasings of the plate, refreshing to the eye as were the
flower-gemmed bowers of evergreens with which art
had so lavishly filled the background of this brilliant
picture, it needed only, but it needed still, to complete his happiness, the presence of some few representatives of that gentler sex to whom we owe our




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          89
highest inspirations, our noblest virtues, and all of our
purest raptures. But he was not responding to the
toast of Woman-that divinity whom in childhood
we adore as mother, or draw to our hearts with the
sweet name of sister. He was to respond to the toast
of the President of the United States, Commanderin-chief of all the land and naval forces of the Union,
and to that task he would steadily address himself.
(Cheers.) We need a country-we must have a
country. As well might a forest try to preserve its
freshness and vitality if torn up by the roots and cast
on some granite spur of the Rocky Mountains, as for
a race of men-free, intelligent, self-governing, and
progressive —to exist without a nationality in whose
soil should be interwoven all the roots and fibres of
their being. (Loud cheers.) For himself, he had no
ambition to try the experiment of supporting life
without that feeling of nationality which is life's most
precious stimulus. He came of a race which had
long centuries ago been taught by wrongs and degradation in their native land, the full value of emigration. If the worst should come to the worst-if the
twenty millions of Northern white men could not
vindicate their equality, man for man, with the eight
millions of the South, their numbers giving them the




90           THE ADVENTURES OF
victory over men as brave and high-spirited as themselves-then it would be time to inquire the price of
passage to New Zealand or Australia, to Otaheite or
to Borneo-some land where, amidst savage solitudes
or herding with savage men, we might cease to be
reproached with the memories of that heritage from
which our crimes, our follies, and our lack of manly
qualities had driven us. (Loud applause and cheers.)
There are some who lay claim to patriotism and profess themselves anxious to prosecute the war for the
Union with vigor, while, in the same breath, they
denounce the constitutional head of the government
and all his acts with a bitterness never shown when
they speak of those conspiratorial miscreants who
have brought all this wretchedness and mourning on
our once happy land. (Cheers and hisses.) Indeed,
he had not forgotten that it was by prominent representatives of this facing-both-ways type of democracy
that he had been solemnly read out of the party not
many months ago, for having visited Connecticut and
there performed his duty as a National Democratone of full growth and stature in the party, when
these mushrooms of to-day were still in the rank soil
out of which they have since ominously cropped-by
opposing the election of Colonel Thomas H. Sey



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         91
mour, once his valued friend, as were these mushrooms once his very obsequious good servants. [Loud
applause, and cheers, amidst which a bustle took
place at the door, caused by the return of a member
of the Sub-committee, who reported that he had
heard from his associates, and that they had found
Private O'Reilly, who would be with them in a very
few moments.  This announcement was received
with cheers.]
Mr. Brady, when the hubbub had subsided, said
that he stood where stand all the clear-headed
and independent men of the country-on the platform of unfaltering and unchangeable devotion to the
Union. (Loud cheers.) He cared not to discuss at
present such details as the emancipation proclamation, the confiscation bill, the draft and the suspension of the habeas corpus in loyal States. MIen
might differ in judgment on these matters and still
be the truest of true patriots. There were many
measures of the administration which, in the words
of General Dix, "he certainly should not have advised;" and two or three of the measures referred to
might have had, if it were the time, his disapproval.
But all minor issues faded out of view when we raised
our eyes to the grand banner of our country, and saw




92            THE ADVENTURES OF
its stars appealing to us for that protection in this
hour of trial which heretofore they had shed upon us
in every land and under all vicissitudes of fortune.
(Loud and ringing cheers.) It was no idle boast ten
years ago when President Franklin Pierce-(hisses,
mingled with cheers and applause)-from the white
steps of the Capitol spoke of that flag as " the inviolable panoply of the American citizen," no matter in
what remote corner of the earth his Yankee love of
adventure might have led him. (Laughter and loud
cheers.) Those days would come back to us. They
must. It is the vow of all the manhood of our people. In the homely words of a poet whose name, if
he ever had any, had escaped the speaker's memory:"To the flag we are pledged, all its foes we abhor,
And we ain't for the nigger, but are for the war."
(Loud cheering, and cries of "Good," "That's
the talk," "So say we all of us," &c.)
Our duties, if he had read their order rightly,
were first to our God, next to our common country,
whether ours by birth or adoption. The first of
these duties he would not speak of in public. It
was for the solitude of the closet, the attitude of




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.           93
the bent knee, and the eloquence of silent invocation. But to do our duty to our country, in its
grandest and widest significance, we must, as with
charity, begin at home. We must interest ourselves, however distasteful the task, in regenerating
the dismal swamp of local politics. We must drain
the fetid marsh now swarming with unclean things,
refence the ancient boundaries of popular rights,
and perform for the toads, reptiles, and' other vermin which coil and swelter in those hot-beds of corruption -bur local party organizations- another
miracle of like character with that for which St.
Patrick claims the gratitude of Ireland.  (Loud
laughter and cheers, continued for several minutes.)
We must, he said, break up and destroy that coalition between Republicans of easy virtue and Democrats of no virtue at all, which has been the primary
cause of the present degradation of politics —a degradation so utter, that to be now called a politician
is almost equivalent to being called a rogue. (Cheers
and laughter.)  We must, above all things, and as
the first step in a right direction, teach these vamnpires one lesson of respect for the independence of
the Judiciary.  From the table at which Justice sits
down to measure out the priceless treasures of her




94            THE ADVENTURES OF
uncorrupted store, their Harpy hands must be remote. They must be driven so far from the Bench,
that not even in imagination can they clutch the
sacred ermine, or whisper one word of entreaty,
still less a threat, into the ear of those ministers
upon whose purity and independence the whole
fabric of a free government has its broadest and
securest base. (Vociferous cheers, and loud cries
of " Hilton," " Bosworth," " McCarthy," "No meddling with the Judges," &c.) Mr. Brady spoke more
in sorrow than in anger-from an impulse of imperative duty. All other evils could be endured, if not
cured; but let the ermine once pass under the dominion of politicians, and all assurances of personal
freedom and property would be at the mercy of the
basest and most unscrupulous class of the commnunity. He spoke, it might be said, with feeling-with
interest —and he was not ashamed to own it. FIe
did feel outraged by the attempt now being made
against the official life of his friend, the upright
man, the honest jurist, Henry Hilton. (Cheers.)
His friend, the upright man, the honest jurist, Mr.
Bosworth. (Renewed cheering.) His friend, the
upright, kindly, and whole-souled Judge Florence
McCarthy. (Vociferous shouts of " They shan't do




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.           95
it," "They can't," &c.) Of one of the candidates
put up against one of the gentlemen he had named,
he felt it but justice to speak in terms of personal commendation.* Under other circumstances, it
would have given hinm pleasure to support one of
the adverse nominees for the Superior Court, assured of his integrity, his talents and his capacity.
(IHear, hear.)  But situated as these matters now
were, it had become the first duty of every good
citizen to trample down all considerations of personal liking or disliking, and to lend his every effort
to the task of preserving unimpaired and in all the
fresh lustre of its purity the independence of those
officers who are entrusted, in last resort, with the
maintenance of all the rights which are dearest to
us as free citizens of a great and civilized republic.
(Applause.)
SOME ANXIOUS INQUIRIES.
At this point the bustle at the door was renewed,
and loud cries announced the return of another
member of the Sub-Committee, of whom eager inquiries were made as to the whereabouts of Private
O'Reilly, the Bard of Morris Island. The Sub-Committee man explained that he had heard that PriJudge Lemuel B. Garvin.




96           THE ADVENTURES OF
vate O'Reilly had been overtaken some half hour
before by the associate who had previously returned, and that he had come there expecting to find
the Guest of the Evening in the seat of honor. The
matter was annoying enough, but there could be no
doubt but that the other members of the Sub-Committee would soon be back and bring the Guest of
the Evening with them. This assurance satisfied the
audience, more especially when it became known
that one of the Sub-Committee had gone to the residence of Mr. James O'Reilly, in the Sixteenth
Ward, where Private Miles was awaiting the carriage.
Order being once more restored, the Chairman
said that, in the absence of the gallant soldier
whom they had all mnet to honor, he would propose
the next regular toast of the evening —" Our Army
and our Navy."
SPEECH OF MR. LUE CLARKe, OF MORRIS ISLAND.
On this the hubbub was renewed with increasing
clangor, various cries being raised for "Meagher,"
" Terry," " Sickles," " Graham," " Let us have Halleck himself," " Little Mac's the boy," &c. While the
confusion was at its height, a sturdy Irishman named




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         97
Luke Clark of the 5th Ward, lifted himself on one of
the chairs and demanded to know-What had the
Sub-committee done with Private Miles O'Reilly?
Some were beginning to say that the committee had
sold him for a substitute-perhaps to go in place of
Mr. Theodore Tilton, of the Independent, or of Mayor
Oydyke's son, both of whom were drafted. He had
known Miles down on Morris Island, and knew he
was too decent a boy and too good a judge of a good
dinner to stay away from such a feast of his own
accord. He (the speaker) had thrown up as many
shovels full of dirt with his own two good looking
hands on Morris Island as the next man; and he
appealed to General Terry and Lieutenant Colonel
Smith, who were both present, to see justice done to
him. (Cheers and renewed demonstrations.)
DR. CAM7rCiAELIs SONG.
In order to restore harmony, Dr. Carmichael was
here introduced, and sang with excellent spirit and
voice the following song, composed by "a gentleman of this city," whose name, unfortunately,
our reporter was not able to catch. The Doctor has
a delicious voice, brilliantly cultivated; and gave
the following words to the air of " When the twilight
5




98              THE ADVENTURES OF
bat is flitting," with an earnestness, pathos, and tenderness which could not have been surpassed:
THE CAPTAIN'S DAUGHTER.'Twas a bright expanse of water,
Where the Captain's gentle daughter
Every summer morning sought he.
Bath of beauty, light and grace;
Quite a fleet of drifted lilies
Danced above the mimic billows,
And a screen of drooping willows
Curtained close the bathing place.
In my skiff at random floating,
Rod and line but little notingAh I! what subtle charm had boating
Since the bathing place was known!
"Happy waves that may enfold her I"
And my fancy growing bolder
Changed each lily to a shoulder
White and dimpled as her own I
"Ah I how clear 1" I muttered, eyeing,
Many a colored pebble lying
Far below, and vainly trying
On some book to fix my thought;
"Now some good breeze, hither winging,
Set youn silver curtain swingingCoolness to the bather bringing I"
But the good breeze answered not.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.            99
Homeward o'er the meadows tripping,
All the lovelier for her dipping,
Soon I saw the maiden skipping,
Who said gravely when we met:
"' Friend, thou hast grown fond of boating" —
And my weak heart quailed on noting
The malicious laughter floating
In the eyes of my coquette.
This song was received, as any song by Dr. Carmichael is sure to be, with vehement applause; on
the subsidence of which the Chairman said that he
was now about to propose, " The Health of Miles
O'Reilly," on which subject, before they drank it,
his friend Judge Charles P. Daly would make a few
remarks, so well timed that they should only cease
on the appearance of their absent guest. (Laughter
and cheers.)
SPEECH OF JUDGE DALY.
Judge Daly regretted that, having been absent in
the bridal party of General Michael Corcoran, he had
not time to prepare as he could have wished for this
occasion. All were aware that he traced his origin
to that "Green Isle" in which their absent guest
first knew the blessings of a mother's smile and the




100          THE ADVENTURES OF
wholesome nourishment of potatoes (Loud laughter.)
The practice of receiving, without regard to rank,
those who have faithfully served their country in the
field, is of remote antiquity. HIe had found in the
course of his artistic, antiquarian and archaeological
researches that a similar compliment had once been
paid to a non-commissioned officer in the army of
Wallenstein, during the Thirty Years' War, as mentioned by the learned historian, Von Schneidermark.
In the early histories and traditions of the Scandihavians also, such instances were not uncommon. Count
Ptosotoff, the earliest historian of Runssian Tartary,
mentions no less than three cases of a similar character, and of all these the famous Gen. Kiitsoff speaks
in terms of commendation. He trusted that these
citations from high authority would completely satisfy
everybody 
AN INTERRUPTION.
Mr. Clark again raised himself upon a chair,
declaring that he was ready to admit, for argument
sake, that the old lords and gentlemen Judge Daly
had just named might be very respectable people in
their way; but nothing could " completely satisfy"
him-nothing that Mr. Wallenstein, or Mr. Putusoff,




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLYo.       101
or Mr. Cutusoff could do or say, until the Subcommittee could be made to account for what they
had done with his friend and countryman. (Loud
applause, and cries of "That's the talk, Lulke;"
"They've sold him as a substitute.")
SPEECH OF LIEUTENANT-COLONEL E. W. SMITH.
As Mr. Clark had referred to General Terry and
to himself, Colonel Smith had a few words to say.
As an officer of the Department of the South he had
known Private nMiles O'Reilly, and had, in fact,
signed the very furlough on which Private O'Reilly
was now in their midst. (Loud cries and laughter.
".He ain't in our midst;"  "That's what's the
matter," &c.) As an officer of the regular army, it
was somewhat against his sense of discipline to sit at
a banquet where a private soldier was present as a
guest. (Here again broke out cries —" He ain't
present;" " Wish he were."  " It's all Putusoff and
Cutusoff with the Sub-committee.") Colonel Smith
would be compelled to resume his seat if these interruptions were continued. He knew Private O'Reilly,
and he also had known Mr. Luke Clark while that
patriot was working in the trenches. Luke, if he
remembered rightly, had been in the employ of a




102            THE ADVENTURES OF
sutler, and was condemned to spadework in the
parallels for having given more whiskey to some
soldiers than was good for them. (Roars of laughter,
and cries of " Good boy, Luke.") As to the labors
performed by the army under General Gillmore in
the Department of the South, he felt that words were
inadequate to describe their vastness. (Loud cheers.)
No description, however, could be more perfect than
that given in one stanza of the now famous song, for
which Private O'Reilly had first fallen under the
Provost M]arshal's censure. He referred to the stanza
commencing:'Tis no harm, you seem to think,
That upon destruction's brinkHe is not the boy to shrinkOur gallant Gillmore stands;
Holding hard his threatened lines,
Pushing far his saps and mines.
That was just it. If ever lines were "held hard,"
Gillmore's had been when they first captured Morris Island. For months one half the army was up
all night in the trenches, with spade and pick, while
the other half stood guard against the enemy with
the bayonet.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.       103
A VYoIcE.-What might the third half be doing 
(Laughter.)
GENERAL GILLMORE FOR NEXT PRESIDENT.
Colonel Smith then paid a high tribute to the qualities of Generals Sherman and Hunter, the former
commanders of the Department of which he had
now the honor to be an humble officer; and before
resuming his seat would only propose the health of
General Q. A. Gillmore, the hero of Pulaski and
Sumter; and might the country never have a worse
fate than to have such a man for its next President.
(Uproarious applause.)
TRIUMPHANT RETURN OF THE SUB-COMMITTEE.
Just at this moment volleys of cheers and joyful
shouts from the staircase announced that the long
expected Sub-committee were at length approaching. " Have yez Miles O'Reilly wid you?" shouted
a burly Hibernian, elbowing his way through the
crowd, and leaning over the staircase. "We have
James O'Reilly, his cousin," was the answer, "and
Miles, he says, is amongst you, only that he is in
plain clothes, so that you don't know him."




104;THE ADVENTURES OF
GREAT QUESTION OF THE DAY —- ARE YOU MILES
O'REILLY a"
The confusion following this announcement was
perfectly indescribable. Every man turned round
to his neighbor, seized his elbow, looked square into
his eyes, and asked eagerly-" Are you Private
Miles? "  Everybody asked the question of every
other person, and every person said " No" to everybody.
Mr. Luke Clark said he had been all round the
tables, and couldn't see Miles anywhere. He asked
that the Sub-committee should be seized, and never
let go until they gave him up. (Hear, hear.) The
more he thought of it the surer he felt that they had
sold the Guest of the Evening for a substitute to
either Tilton or Opdyke. The Sub-committee were
a collection of Judases, and he was individually in
favor of at once holding them personally responsible
for the production of their missing friend. (Immense applause, followed by the immediate institution of threatening demonstrations against the committee.)




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        105
SPEECH OF HON. BEN WOOD.
Mr. B. Wood rose as the friend of " Peace."  He
was for "Peace," under all circumstances, and for
submission as the means of attaining it. To say
that his views, if carried out, would degrade the
North, was folly, which no sensible man, who knew
the worth of "' Peace," could believe. All he wished
on behalf of the South-with one of whose " peculiar institutions" his own fortunes were largely connected-all he wished was, that we should withdraw
our armies from every square foot of soil south of
Mason and Dixon's line, divide our navy into two,
giving the South half, accept the Montgomery constitution, and confer on  Mr. Jeff. Davis the Loyal
Union League nomination for the next Presidency.
[Groans, hisses and hootings. Loud cries of "Put
him out," " Scotch the copperhead," and so forth.
~Mr. Ben Wood kept on gesticulating, and shoutingthe only words we could catch being 1" four, eleven,
forty-four or fight."]
A PRESIDENTIAL SONG.
Mr. John E. Develin at last made himself heard
above the tumult. He wished to introduce to the




106             THE ADVENTURES OF
meeting ex-Coroner Frank O'Keefe, who would now
give them a song in the chorus of which all present
he knew would gladly join-his friends General Terry
and Colonel Smith not least.  Thus introduced, Mr.
O'Keefe sang the following stanzas to the well-known
West Point and old army air of " Benny Havens,"
which is the American edition of " Irish Mlolly."
Come fill your glasses, fellows,
The night is wearing low;
A health to Quincy Gillmore
Let us drink before we go.
He's the victor of Pulaski,
And he it was, we know,
Who knocked Fort Sumter into a
Triangular chapeau.
So fill your glasses, fellows,
The night is wearing low;
A health to Quincy Gillmore
Let us drink before we go.
Oh, a bumper to Ulysses Grant,
A chief whose worth we know;
Our banner in his stalwart hands,
What reck we of the foe?
He's the Mississippi river horseResistless as its flow,
And all its length of waters
With his victories are aglow.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         107
So a bumper to Ulysses Grant,
A chief whose worth we know;
Our banner in his stalwart hands,
What reck we of the foe?
The applause which followed these verses was
flattering not only to Mr. O'IKeefe, but to the generals thus mentioned. By unanimous consent the
song was encored, and the applause was, if any
thing, louder, and the chorus heartier, when sung
the second time.
CHIEF ENGINEER DECKER S SPEECIL
Mr. Decker said he had been to a good many fires
and had helped to put out a good many. But there
was one fire he would nevertry to extinguish-that
of patriotism. (Enthusiastic cheers.) He had run
with a good many "macfines;" but the shakiest
machine he ever had run with was that joint-stockconsolidated engine company, called the TammanyMozart " Little Six." It was pretty well played out.
(Loud cries of " Hi, hi!" and groans for the TammanyMozart managers.)
SPEECH OF MR. OLIVER CHARLICK.
Mr. Charlick desired to be allowed the floor, if
only for one moment, in order to reply to the




108           THE ADVENTURES OF
denationalized, the undemocratic sentiments in which
Mr. Benjamin Wood had recently indulged. He
could not but attribute the present false attitude of a
great portion of the Democratic party in this City
and State to the miserable kind of material that was
now in control of the regular IDemocratic machineorganizations of Manhattan Island. The council
fires of Tammany may be lighted, but where are
the great braves and warriors who once sat there,
toasting their shins in the good days gone by?
Where now  are such men as Charles O'Conor,
George Douglas, John J. Cisco, Edwin Croswell,
Churchill C. Cambreling, Samuel J. Tilden, Greene
C. Bronson, Wm. F. Havemeyer, John Targee, C.
W. Lawrence, De Witt Clinton, Gulian C. Yerplanck,
John A. Dix, Azariah Flagg, Daniel D. Tompkins,
and all that glorious old galaxy who once sat in the
Conventions of our party, and ruled its destinies with
the solemnity and conscientiousness of the Council
of Elders in the best days of the Venetian republic?
iHave we any successors to these men. Contrast the
names recited with those which are prominent in
politics to-day. Every great man in our city Israel
is excluded merely because he is a great man-too
great to be cramped to the pattern of spoil coalitions




PRIVATE ]MILES O'REILLY.       109
-too pure to be allowed inside the charnel-house in
which lie mouldering the sad remains of democratic
principle. Charles O'Conor is outside the organization to-day; James T. Brady has been read out of the
party by the managing leaders, and so has Gen. Dix;
Henry Hilton and Florence McCarthy are to be
slaughtered; Bosworth is a phcenix expiring amidst
the flames of petty wrath and jealousy. (Cheers.)
But, gentlemen, to birds of this description there is a
certain resurrection, and from its ashes we shall yet
see arising a fresh and revivified democracy. Gentlemen, I am of the opinion that "freedom's battle
once begun" will require a great deal of good
management to make it stop.
ANOTHER INTERRUPTION-FIERCE CRIES FOR O REILLY.
Whatever more Mr. Charlick might have intended
to say was here lost amidst the yellings, cries,
stamping, and other noises, which the friends of
Private Miles, and those anxious to see him, now
raised. Mingled with these were the criminations and
recriminations of the various members of the SubCommittee of Arrangements, each saying that it was
the duty of the other to have invited the Guest of the
Evening, and to have called for him in a carriage at




110          THE ADVENTURES OF
the proper time. Mr. James O'Reilly gave it as his
opinion that his cousin Miles had never received any
official invitation, it being everybody's business to
invite him, and, therefore, nobody doing it. There
was never one of the Reillys who wanted to thrust
his company anywhere. He thought that Miles had
the family pride, and had stayed away to show that,
though only a private soldier, he had still in his veins
the thrue O'Reilly blood.
COLORADO JEWETT'S BEMARKS.
Mr. Jewett, of Colorado, here produced a large
manuscript, and said that, with the permission of the
company, he would now proceed to read for them an
exposition of the exact state of his peace and -gold
negotiations with the various crowned heads of
Europe, with all of whom he was on termns of personal
intimacy. This announcement was followed by loud
cries of " Oh, shut up," "Print it in the Tribune,"
&c., amidst which Mir. Jewett indignantly withdrew.
MR. FRANK O'DONNELL S SONG.
In order to amuse the company while they were
waiting, Mr. Frank O'Donnell kindly volunteered to
give them a song, the authorship of which is ascribed




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.              111
to ex-Judge Bartholomew O'Connor. Mr. O'Donnell
sings delightfully, and his lyric, of which we append
a copy, is calledTHE SPRIG Or TAMMANIA.
AmR-The Sprig of Shillelah.
Oh, self is the soul of a politic manHe loves a neat office and gets what he can,
The young sprig of Tammania, the Tammany prig I
He goes up to Albany, eager for spoil,
Comes down, holds a caucus to " make the pot boil;"
Then believes he has got full control of the town,
And he hopes on his " gridiron " to do us all brown,
The young sprig of Tammania, the Tammany prig I
Who had ever the luck to see Tammany Hall
When the true men who sat there were patriots all,
Old sachems of Tammany-Tammany braves I
They spoke to a party of principle thenTo a party not ruled by unprincipled men:
They knew not of "spoil coalitions" with those
Who in public they'd make us believe to be foes,
Those old sachems of Tammany-Tammany braves I
There's a truth, mighty leaders, we'd have you to know,
We've been waiting to see just how far you would go,
You sprigs of Tammania, you very bad prigs 
And now, when the country is sore and distressed,




112            THE ADVENTURES OF
Its brave soldiers fighting, its martyrs at rest,
Be sure that the people, so quick to descry,
Will give you, ere you know it, a very black eye,
You bad sprigs of Tammania, you very bad prigs I.GRAND BURST UP OF THE BANQUET.
How  much longer Mr. O'Donnell might have
continued singing, nobody can tell, as he appeared
fresh and had any number of additional verses in his
head. But the excitement about the continued nonappearance of the Guest of the Evening now rose
alnost to the point of frenzy, and threatened to
assume some violent shape.  Loud  objurgations
were heaped on the Sub-Committee of Arrangements for their gross neglect in not inviting and
properly escorting Private Miles O'Reilly to the
banquet. It was in vain that Surveyor Andrews
offered the use of his government steam yacht to
scour the bay, go up to Albany, or cross over to
Ireland, in pursuit of the absent guest. He was
received with much the same cries as had greeted
Mr. Colorado  Jewett; but peace was partially
restored when Mr. Gideon J. Tucker proposed that
all present should resolve themselves into a Committee of the Whole for the purpose of hunting up




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         113
the missing hero. Several more songs were sung
before our reporters left, but the noise was too great
for them to catch the words, the fun growing too fast
and furious for weak heads. The steadier portion of
the audience left by the back exit as rapidly as they
could just about this time; and we deem it just as
well, if not a little better, to here drop the curtain.
The play of "Hamlet,"' with the part of the Prince
left out, will not again be repeated.




CHAPTER  VII.
MILES GOING INTO CITY POLITICS.
E learn, said the Heracld, one day, —just as the
November election in New York City and State
was being cleared off, and the municipal campaign for
December opening,-We learn that Private Miles
O'Reilly, Forty-seventh regiment New York Volunteers7 is about to devote himself to a reconsolidation




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          115
of all the political interests in this city, on the
simple basis of the " spoils." HIe thinks, by throwing
aside all clap-trap of principle or patriotism, and
uniting all the now warring elements of the political
family  in an immense Joint-Stock-ConsolidatedGrand-Junction-Lobby-League, that the managers on
all sides will be enabled to fill their pockets much
more readily and with much less trouble to themselves. His idea is to take the total assessed value
of all property, real and personal, on Manhattan
Island, as his " base of operations;" and to make
arrangements for its absorption at the rate of twentyfive per cent. per annum  by his new political company. Shares will be issued to all existing political
interests, on the same strict system that was observed in providing for the stockholders of the " Consolidated Stage Company" in the city railroad legislation at Albany during the last half dozen years.
We learn further that Private O'Reilly, in order
to carry out these views, has issued a caucus circular
calling together all the parties in interest, for the
purpose of arranging the details and settling the apportionmlent of stock which is to be given to each.
This caucus meets at the St. Nicholas to-morrow
evening, and its proceedings will doubtless prove of




116.          THE ADVENTURES OF
the highest interest. The only objection of any
weight that we have heard urged against Private
O'Reilly's plan is, that his organization cannot be
permanent, as, in four years, at twenty-five per cent.
per annum, it will have absorbed all the property,
real and personal, of the city, and there will be
" nothing left to steal." To this Private O'Reilly answers that, when all the taxpayers have been turned
out into the streets, full means of activity will still
be left to the organization in plots and efforts to
cheat each other.  i' Inside rings" will then have to
be formed, having for their object a further "consolidation" of plunder. He is also sanguine that,
with the triumph of the scheme in this city, politicians all over the State and country may take it up,
until finally it shall be placed in a position to dictate
one of its own members or agents for the next Presidency. The proceedings of the caucus will be
looked for with interest.




" OUR REPORTER."
CHAPTER VIII.
THE MILES O0REILLY CAUCUS. AN INTRODUCTION AER
THIE MANNER OF THE;WORLD.
F on the proper day of the proper month, several
hundred years before the commencement of the
Christian era, the chief editor of the Athens Herald
had sent out one of his reporters of an afternoon,
with orders to bring back an exact account of the
lEleusinian Mysteries-to reveal any of which to the




118       T HE  ADVENTURES OF
uninitiated incurred the penalty of death-the feelings of that reporter might not have been of the
most festive character. We fancy him securing his
stylus and tablets next to his manly breast, taking
an affectionate farewell of the wife who weeps and
the children who cling to him; then, wrapping
around him his reportorial toga and drawing tighter
the strings of his sandals, so that he may be prepared, if need be, to make the best time ever witnessed in the Olympic games. Finally we see him
drop on one knee, raise his eyes to the white porch
of his home, breathe a hasty invocation to the Gods
of the Acropolis, then pull down his ivy wreath
over his eyes, and dash off madly towards the scene
of the mystic and sacred ceremonials.
Row OIUR REPORTER ENTERED THE CAUCUS ROOM.
Human nature, even in the reportorial form, is
much the same now as it was three thousand years
ago; and as the Athenian reporter, in toga and
sandals, would have felt while endeavoring to gain
admission as a "dead-head" to the Eleusinian rites,
so felt your reporter, in stove-pipe hat and Wellingtons, while attempting to gain entrance to the initial
caucus of the new political organization, known as




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         119
the "Joint Stock Consolidated Grand Junction Lobby League," with which the name of Private Miles
O'Reilly, Forty-seventh Regiment, New York Volunteers, has been recently connected. What would
have been his fate if compelled to remain outside in
the immense and indescribable jam  of humanity
which awaited the regular opening of the doors, it is
not for him to say.  Ribs have only a certain
strength, and the crushing in of the breast-bone
upon the spine is not good treatment for consumptive patients.  Fortunately, however, he found a
"'next friend " (such things are useful and plentiful
in politics), who took him round to a private entrance in rear of the caucus room, where Messrs.
Dick Connolly and Sal. Skinner were on duty as
janitors.  These gentlemen he at once recognized
by their regalia as promising knights of the " Most
illustrious D. B. Order;" and on giving them the
pass-word and grip of an "arch-past" he was at
once allowed to enter the mystic chamber, fifteen or
twenty minutes in advance of its being thrown open
to the rush of the regular caucus representatives.




120           THE ADVENTURES OF
THE CORPUS DELICTI IN COURT-MODEL OF TEE CITY
OF NEW YORK.
The room selected for the caucus, in the St. Nicholas Hotel, was one of great size, oblong in form,
— its rear windows very appropriately commanding a fine view of Mercer street. Towards this end
there was a large stage, about three feet high, and
covered with green baize, which ran across the
room; and on this stage there was an exact model
of the city of New York-all its streets laid out, all
its church spires visible; every house, store and
shanty having its counterpart in miniature, and
many of its public parks and squares still showing
traces of having been used as encampments. Tbhousands of beautiful models of sailing vessels and
steamers lay moored around the piers. On this gentle slope stands Murray Hill. There is the City
Hall. The Park, with all its winding roads, woody
ravines, glassy lakelets, magnificent bridges, breezy
hills and odorous garden patches, lies exposed to
view.  Here, at Fort Washington, the primeval
rock pushes up one shoulder through the trimly
shaven grass in rear of James Gordon Bennettis
house.  This is the highest point of Manhattan




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~i  ~ :,,\;=-i\ —a---~-~\ \ \Plfl%[lYI[IIEJ(lflUllllll]tZt
II,;           h
U'i o s s7
THE CATJ3U8. —-Pabe a20~








PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          121
Island. There are palaces all along the North river.
Very splendid, too, is that portion of the city north
of Fourteenth street, and west of Third avenue.
That black open space on Fifth avenue is where the
Colored Orphan Asylum  lately stood.  You see
similar black spaces in Third avenue and elsewhere.
These are the vestigia nigra of our late anti-draft,
anti-negro riot.  But of all the pretty things in the
model, Broadway is the prettiest and most picturesque. Its architecture so various, its idiosyncrasies
so peculiar! Here the new style is for ever jostling
out or dwarfing into insignificance the old. There
are banners on every roof. This, verily, is a great
city, and great should be the men who rule it. This
city is certainly worth subjugation and spoliation.
Are there not "' patriots" enough in it to successfully
essay the task?
POLITICAL' ASPECTS OF THE MODEL, SHOWING WHERE
THE POWER LIES.
In looking at this model, so exact in all its details,
an irregularity of proportion becomes apparent, and
in this irregularity is its political significance. The
shanties in Mackerelville are as large or larger than
many fine mansions in the best avenues. Small
6




122           THE ADVENTURES OF
groggeries, in this model, are two or three times the
size of vast public institutions —such as school-houses
or churches, in whose shade they nestle. The City
Hall towers up on high, as though its cupola were in
the clouds, while its base spreads out to a bulk
which threatens soon to reach from river to river,
and to absorb half the island. Such political buildings as Tammany Hall, Mozart Hall, the Police
Headquarters, the Republican Headquarters, the
" Pewter Mug," the "' Ivy Green," the Comptroller's
office and other municipal offices, and all the tenement houses throughout the city, are built in harimony with the proportions of the exaggerated City
Hall, and out of all harmony with their actual neighbors. On looking closer it may be seen that a complete network of powerful threads and wires connects together in bonds of telegraphic sympathy and
accord all buildings modelled in this larger proportion. The nearer it is examined the stronger and
more complex will appear the system of wire-work
which radiates from the City Hall in all directions.
There are wires, powerful and numerous, and
each dripping with corrupt gold, leading to the
site of every contract famous in municipal history. There are wires to the Battery enlargement;




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          123
wires to every one of the city railroads now being
built; wires to every ferry franchise; wires to every
pier and dock; wires to the Russian and all other
banquets; hundreds of wires to Washington market,
and hundreds upon hundreds yet quivering with
electric life and connecting the Fort Gansevoort
market-site with the sources of authority. From
every street and engine-house, from every road and
avenue, from every grant and privilege, from every
police precinct and from certain of the courts and
other offices, a network of tributary wires runs back
to the City Hall, and is from thence re-distributed
to the Tammany, Mozart, and Republican Headquarters. A cable, very fine in itself, but made of
four thicker and seventeen thinner strands, connects
this whole complex mechanism with the State Capitol at Albany-an exact and striking model of which
was placed upon a pedestal some few feet behind
the model of the City, just as the Capitol itself looks
down from its lofty eminence when viewed from the
foot of State street. This cable thus forms, as it
were, the rein or guiding strap with which the master charioteers at Albany disport themselves while
driving the "' city team." The clock in the cupola of
the City Hall, we should add, had a musical box




124           THE ADVENTURES OF
attached to its machinery, which, as time slipped on,
poured forth such popular airs as "' That's the way
the money goes," and "Come, brothers, join the
mystic ring," in one continuous melody.
ONE OF THE MODEL-MAKERS ADMIRES HIS OWN WORK.
While your reporter was examining this model, a
deep, gruff voice said, just close to him;'" Curious,
isn't it?" and turning sharply round he found himself face to face with a great burly figure of the live
oak type, clad in solemn black. HIe was an elderly
man, of rough and shaggy appearance, with masses
of bushy grey hair, heavy and shaggy grey eyebrows; dark, piercing grey eyes, a heavy and curling beard running around his lower jaw; brown
complexion, a short, thick, aggressive nose, and
cheeks rather inclined to look dropsical. In the
lines of his strong, coarse mouth there lurked infinite
force and cunning, and his face, as a whole, could be
extremely expressive, or as stolid and meaningless as
though cut in timber. " Very curious, isn't it?" he
repeated, with that tender interest which a workman
of high order feels in examining some masterpiece of
ingenuity which has had his own best efforts. " I
quite pride myself on that model," he added.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        125
"Three-fourths of its present machinery I invented
and put up with my own hands."
GRAND ENTRANCE OF THE DELEGATIONS-BLUE LIGHTS
BURNING.
Just at this moment the main doors leading into
the hall were thrown open, and in poured such a
tide of humanity as is seldom witnessed in one
assemblage. First came a select delegation from
Tammany Hall, headed by several illustrious corporators in the Broadway and other city railroads,
while its rear was brought up by Messrs. Peter
Griese, Martin J. Kopp, J. Joseph Donelly, John IH.
Doty, E. S. Williams, and other well known public
characters of that order. Next came a select Mozart
delegation-very select, indeed-consisting of the
Duke of Bloomingdale, the whole Tobacco Family,
three judicial candidates, seventeen candidates for
the Assembly, four candidates for the Senate, eight
candidates for Aldermen and twenty-four candidates for the Board of Councilmen. After these
came the Republican delegation, led by the burly
and graceful fornls of the West Washington market,
Fort Gansevoort, Ferry franchise and Marine transportation Operators, the rear being brought up and




126           THE ADVENTURES OF
kept in order by the batons of three prominent gentlemen from Police Headquarters. These were the
only bodies that entered the caucus room with any
show of organization; but behind them poured in
any imaginable quantity of "roughs"' and expectants, fellows with gun contracts and fellows without;
Belgian and Russ pavement contractors, jobbers and
lobbyists, and numerous representatives of that semilegal class who only use.the bar as an excuse for corruption. There were emigrant runners, policy-shop
keepers and their backers, baggage smashers, pocketbook droppers, and all the other classes powerful in
politics; while mixed up with all these were some
few dozen of our very best citizens, who evidently
came there prompted by a public-spirited curiosity
to have one good look at the kind of rulers under
whose control this fair City has passed. Just as this
assemblage was pouring in, several large blue lights
which had been placed all round the model of the
devoted city were set on fire, and as they illuminated the faces of the entering crowd with their
ghastly glare, the effect was equal to any thing in the
best "bandit pictures " of Salvator Rosa.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        12 7
LAW AND ORDER VICTORIOUS —THE CHAIR IS FILLED.
While everything was still in confusion, the leading men of the three regular delegations made obeisance to the rough and shaggy old man who claimed
to have made three-fourths of the model. They
hailed him as "King of the Lobby," and moved
that, as a matter of right and to protect his own and
their interests, lie should take the chair. They assured him they had " all the sinew" necessary to put
through a " Fifth of August," or any other scheme
they saw fit. To this the shaggy man grunted a
hoarse assent, shuffled into a large arm chair, which
was placed just between the models of the Albany
State House and the city of New York, then seized
his mallet and commenced rapping vigorously while
calling " Order, order," in stentorian tones. To this
the assemblage, now pretty well seated, replied by
cries of "Law and order forever," "We have Law
and the profits on our side," etc.
SPEECH OF THE CHAIRMAN-THE PROGRAMME STATED.
The Chairman was a man of business —a strictly
commercial man-and would go to business at once.
lie announced that the first caucus of the " Miles




128          THE ADVENTURES OF
O'Reilly Joint Stock Consolidated Grand Junction
Lobby League" was now in session, its object being
to form a political company which, "taking as its
base of operations all property, real and personal, on
Manhattan Island, should make arrangements for its
absorption at the rate of twenty-five per cent. per
annum amongst the members of said Lobby League."
There were other clauses providing for the formation
of " inside rings," to cheat each other, whenever the
main design against all present property-holders
should have been thoroughly carried out. (Loud
applause.) The Chairman had now to call their
attention to a grave matter. All knew that Governor
Seymour had vetoed a bill last winter. (Painful
groans.) For that offence against the interests of
certain leaders he should never be forgiven. (Loud
cheers.)  The day of vengeance was almost within
their grasp; and he had now to denounce Horatio
Seymour as a traitor to the principles and candidates
of the democratic party. (Loud applause.) He had
documents to prove that Governor Seymour had subscribed no less than sixteen thousand dollars to the
funds of the Republican party this very year. (Loud
cheers.) The Governor had retained in power the
Police Commissioners, and they had just levied an




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         129
assessment of sixteen thousand dollars upon the men
and officers of their force, with which to defeat the
democratic party. (Here there were some symptoms
of a row.) The Chairman cared little, personally,
which party succeeded. IHe had belonged to all
parties-and had made money out of all. But as
they owed Governor Seymour a grudge, bitter and
lasting, for his veto of the Broadway Railroad Bill,
he thought all the Governor's " fiiends" should circIlate this story as widely as they could. (Applause,
and cries of " We will, we will," etc.)
SPEECH OF HIS SERENE HIGHNESS THE DUKE OF BLOOMINGDALE.
The Duke of Bloomingdale here rose, and in his
most Hlenry Clayish manner, pulled forward the
peaks of his shirt-collar, then stuck his right hand
into the breast of his buttoned surtout, and, extend?
ing his left hand oratorically, thus commenced: —He announced to the assembled wisdom that he and
his associates, Mr. Peter Griese of Tammany, one
of the grantees of the Broadway Railroad, and the
Republican representative from West Washington
market, had held an election in their own minds,
taken the votes of all present on all the questions
G*




130          THE ADVENTURES OF
that would arise during the evening, and were prepared, in conjunction with their worthy Chairman,
to carry out all the details of the meeting on the
basis of popular representation thus secured. (Loud
cries of " Hi, hi,"" Bully for you," etc.) He would
advert for a moment to the declaration of their
worthy Chairman that this was a business meeting,
and should be conducted on strictly commercial
principles. ("Hear, hear.") The preponderance of
stock in the 1" Joint Stock Consolidated Grand Junction Lobby League" had already passed into the
hands of the Chairman, the two friends he had just
named-representing the Tammany and Republican
"maehines"-and into his own, representing the
Mozart interest.  (Dead silence and blank faces
among the audience.) He must ask his " friends,",
as Governor Seymour would say, to have confidence
in him. Confidence was one of the softest, tenderest, and most useful sentiments of the human heart.
(" Hear, hear.") Without confidence between man
and wife there would be jealousy and wretchedness.
Without confidence between partners there would be
all kinds of trouble. (" Hear, hear," and laughter.)
Without confidence, said Puanc], there could be no
enjoyment of sausages. ITe needed confidence, and




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        131
asked all his friends to place their interests in his
hands. Indeed, by the arrangeinents already perfected, they were so placed already, and any who
did not like it could do otherwise. (Blanker and
blanker faces amongst the crowd.) He would say,
however, on commercial principles, that some nominations for December were yet in his hands. (" HIear,
hear.") And about these he would be happy to see
any gentlemen who were aspirants at his private
office. (Faces growing blank again.) He would
now introduce to them his friend, Mr. Peter Griese,'who would explain to their satisfaction so much of
the scheme of the new "Joint Stock Consolidated
Grand Junction Lobby League" as he might think
it fit for theim to know. (Loud cheers.)
SPEECH OF THE HON. PETER GRIESE, BROADWAY CORPORATOR.
Mr. Griese was of opinion that men have their
affinities as well as metals. He had once been separated from his friend, the last speaker. That friend
once had power, and he had none. There was,
therefore, between them no basis for a fair and
equitable division of interests. Finally the speaker
obtained some power, no matter how.  (" Hear,




132           THE ADVENTURES OF
hear.") A division of interests was then agreed
upon, and the moment this was accomplished, they
rushed into each other's arms like long-lost brothers.
(Loud applause.) They felt that they were truly
congenial souls. (Deep sensation, during which the
noble Duke used his pocket-handkerchief quite
freely, either to wipe his eyes or hide his laughter.)
Mr. Griese said that all had heard of the'"Tammany machine," the "Mozart machine," and the
6I Republican machine."  But they had now before
them, in that beautiful model of their city-all its
political interests bound together by the ligatures of
a common interest, and all its "' placers" and "d pockets" so brilliantly and appropriately illumined by
the mellow radiance of a blue light-in this model,
he said, they had the true secret, the cabalistic mystery, the philosopher's stone, so to speak, of all the
i"machines" put together! This was the magic
machine which turned everything that it touched
into gold. This it was which had power to seize
even the judiciary by the throat and squeeze gold
out of its decisions. Nothing was good but gold;
power was the key to gold, and had no other value.
The model before t~hem was one to which he had
contributed many wires, and the full worth of its




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        133
every wire he knew. With the kind aid of the
Police  Commissioners, the  present leaders, he
thought, could hold their grip. (Loud applause.)
All knew how far it was from his nature to seek
personal aggrandizement in politics. (" Hear, hear.")
All knew, or should know —and he was prepared to
expel any man who did not-the thoroughly unselfish and generous structure of his heart. (Loud
cheers.) But while he could not, would not, and
never did, wish anything for himself, he had
"friends," in whose behalf he was ready to demand
that everybody else should make every sacrifice.
Men, he continued, like those friends of his youth
whose names, like his own, were inserted in the
Broadway Railroad Bill. Men, it is true, unknown
to fame, unknown even to the Directory; but none
the less near and dear to him. Men who might be
" myths," and mere swindling ghosts or siqnzulctcra
of Corporators to those vagabond Hessians of the
press who were arrayed against all the little generosities of legislation by which millions of the public treasure were annually given away; but who were
precious to him as the apple of his own eye, and for
whom he was ready, he again repeated, to demand
that everything else should be sacrificed.  (Loud




134          THE ADVENTURES OF
applause.) He wished them all to know that the
opposition to their schemes amounted to nothing.
The insurrectionary, national, or loyal men of the
city Democracy had no organization, no "machine"
that was worth anything. For the people he cared
nothing. In his lexicon, " the masses " were always
written "them  asses."  (Laughter and applause.)
As to the pretence made that certain Democrats
were opposed to corruption, to lobby intrigues, to
shares in fraudulent contracts, and so forth, this
was all "' poppycock." He judged men by himself.
That was the only standard of measure they had to
go by; and he knew, after much self-study, that no
men living were actuated by pure, patriotic, or disinterested motives. These terms were words, mere
words and nothing more. He himself had once
joined in raising the cry: "Honest men against
cheats." By this he had convinced the cheats that
it would be cheaper to "let him in" than to keep
him out-and that was all he wanted. His own experience told him that there were no honest men in
public life-no honest motives. These things he
knew, and would believe nothing to the contrary.
(Loud applause.)




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        135
AN INTERRUPTION AND A KICK OUT.
-Mr. James O'Reilly, of the Sixteenth Ward, had
heard with delight, as he always did, the words of
the last speaker. But in one particular he thought
that gentleman wrong. The national Democracy,
led by such men as John McKeon, John Kelly,
Brady,Van Buren, and Richard O'Gorman, could
neither be sneered nor pooh-poohed out of existence. The impression that their organization was
not a strong one, he regretted to be obliged to say,
was wrong. They had the bone and sinew of the
party, as well as nearly all its respectability and
talent. Men like Red-Headed Tom Ferris, one of
the gamest boys that lived; Ben Ray, Sheriff
Lynch, MSat Gooderson, Isaiah Rynders, and James
Irving, were not to be despised. He was sureMr. Jake Sharp hereupon rose, and furiously demanded the instant expulsion of Mr. James O'Reilly,
which had been already carried unanimously-the
Duke of Bloomingdale, the senior representative of
West Washington market, and Mr. P. Griese voting
in the affirmative, and the chairman thereupon declaring it to be the ascertained will of the whole
meeting. (Loud applause.) The Chairman would




136           THE ADVENTURES OF
add that if any one could say that he had seen any
other man look approbation while Mr. J. O'Reilly was
speaking, the person who had dared so to look should
also be expelled. (Dead silence.)
JIMMY NESBITT'  SONG.
Mr. Nesbitt here j umped up on one of the benches,
and said he had a song so pat to James O'Reilly's
case, that with the permission of the chair and those
present, he'd be glad to give it to them. This proposal was hailed with deafening shouts-for Jimmy
Nesbitt is a good fellow and a popular favorite; and,
when quiet was restored, thus Jimmy sang, and with
immense effect, the following verses, which the chair.
man announced to be by Private Mtiles O'Reilly,
Forty-seventh regiment New York Volunteers, who
only remained away in deference to the fact that,
belonging as yet to the army-his discharge not
having arrived, though hourly expected-he could
not take part in a political meeting:
Arrah! tare and'ages,
How the haythen rages;
An' how the people do think foolish things I
They grip an' shake us,
In the hope to make us
Give up our big " bones " in the lobby " rings,"




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.               137'Tis because they're jealousAll them outside fellows;
But, faix! we know betther, an' we'll hould our own;
Och, about the " moral"
Let the docthors quarrel;
But there's not one of us-no, not for St. Pathrick wid
Father Matthew to back him-that will give up our "bone."
Faix, from every steeple
You may call the people,
WVid both bell an' thrumpet, for to put us down;
But you'll only rue it,
For you'll fail to do it;
Och, our three machines, boys, they conthrols the town!
Don't breed a riot,
Just submit ill quiet;
The more you sthruggle you'll be licked the worse;
An' the min you fought for,
That you worked and thought for,
When you're down in the gutther-haxin' been run over by the
machines you thried to stop —they won't care a curse.
Some people wondher,
Whin they see the plundher
That is goin' on daily in full public view,
That the town don't rise up,
Fix a hundhred ties up,
An' do some lynchin' on the godless crew?




138             THE ADVENTURES OF
But we say, to the divil
Wid all such dhrivel,
The machines is mighty, an' they can't be beat;
So let's all "go in," boys;'Tis the way to win, boys;
And let every mother's son o' you own a railroad, or two or
three, if that will suit him any betther, in his private sthreet.
In the " market" line, boys,
There are pickin's fine, boys,
If you're only started on the inside thrack;
There are sinecure places,
An' there's ferry lases
That can make you nabobs in a single crack I
Or commince to litiGate aginst the city:
There's no road to fortune that's so quick an' "Sharp"Faix, I've seen it thried, boys;
An' don't seek to hide, boys,
That the money comes in that way just as aisy, if not a little
aisier, than playin' at "head an' harp."
A REPUBLICAN MACHINE-VIEW  OF THE MACHINE.
The  senior Republican  representative of West
Washington market now wished to call the attention
of the Chair and of all present to the very beautiful
and accurate model of the city of New York, which
had been thoughtfully laid before them, just as coro



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         139
ners expose a dead body to the jury before proceeding with their inquest. The model on the stage was
a political model of the great city in which they
lived and were prospering.  ("Hear, hear.") An
examination of its proportions would show them
why and how they prospered, and the importance of
keeping all the existing machines in control. In
this model, the shanties of Miackerelville, they would
observe, were as large as the finest mansions between
HIighbridge and the Battery. This was because they
held as many votes. A single tenement house in the
" Dead Rabbit" district of the Sixth ward counted
more votes than one whole side of Madison square.
(Loud cheers.) The humbler classes, he was happy
to say, had never been taught their own interests in
public matters. They cared nothing about taxation,
believing that their landlords had to pay it. The
rich cared little either, knowing that all they paid
would come out of the pockets of their tenants, and
with interest. Tax Mlr. Win. B. Astor an extra ten
thousand dollars a year, and he will only add it to
his rents. All taxation is paid in the last resort by
the very poorest. Overtax the merchant, and he
meets it by dismissing some of his clerks and making
the others work hlarder and later. Overtax the man



140           THE ADVENTURES OF
ufacturer, and he reduces the wages of his operatives. Everywhere the burden is shifted from
shoulder to shoulder until you come down at last to
the very humblest strata, and on them perforce it
rests. (Loud cheers.) And this, fortunately for the
politicians, has never been explained to the poor.
When their rents are raised, they curse their landlords; when their wages are reduced, they curse
their employers: and it never seems to occur to
them-and here he thought was the richest part of
the joke —that their own votes last year, and the
year before, and the year before that again, were at
the bottom of all their sufferings. (Loud laughter,
mingled with applause.)
ANOTHER INTERRUPTION -MR. XERRIGAN  WISHES TO
44OPEN A LITTLE GAME."
Here there was a slight interruption, caused by a
proposal from the Hon. J. 0. Kerrigan that they
should now " open a little game" for the judgeships,
civil and police, which were to be disposed of in December. Mr. IKerrigan would either toss coppers,
draw straws or play poker with any gentleman present for any one of the offices in question. As there
were many candidates for these offices in the room,




PRIVATE AMILES O'REILLY.       141
he thought that quite a handsome "pool" could be
made up, if they were all ready and would check in.
The Chair called Mr. Kerrigan to order. The representative from West Washington market had the
floor at present, and until he vacated it the proposition of the gentleman from the Sixth could not be
entertained.  When his Gansevoort friend  was
through, Mr. Kerrigan's proposition should receive
all the attention to which it was entitled; but he believed that the Duke of Bloomingdale intended to
dispose of such nominations as fell to him on behalf
of Mozart Hall in a more business-like manner, and
on more strictly commercial principles. So far as
the Tammany nominations went, a raffle or game of
poker might be in order.
FOUR SENATORS AND SEVENTEEN ASSEMBLYMEN WANTED.
The member from West Washington and Fort
Gansevort then resumed:-In such company it was
not necessary to dwell upon the very complex system
of " strings" and "6 wires" by which the whole city
was dominated from the City Hall. (Hear, hear.)
They all understood it. They were all growing rich
by it, and would yet grow richer. (Loud applause.)
He would call their attention, however, to the master



142          THE ADVENTURES OF
stroke of the whole machine. The cable of four
thicker and seventeen thinner strands, connecting
the network of the City Government with Albany,
was typical of the part played in the construction
and management of this mechanism by the majority
of Senatorial and Assembly representatives who had
been sent from Manhattan Island to Albany during
the last half dozen years. (Cheers.) He would not
name them, but would let " expressive silence muse
their praise." (Cheers and laughter.) He hoped this
year that they might be enabled to send up the river
-he did not mean to Sing Sing, but to Albany-four
Senators and seventeen Assemblymen of the best
possible stripe. It only needed the election of the
Lobby League Candidates for Senate and Assembly
to fully enable them to carry out the proposition of
the distinguished soldier, Private Miles O'Reilly. on
whose call they were assembled. He thought that
these candidates were only next in importance to
Judges of the right stripe, and on these they were
determined.
A BUSH WITH A BIRD IN IT TALKED ABOUTo
Here a rumor reached the hall that Private Miles
O'Reilly was downi stairs, and would be up in a few




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          143
minutes, carrying a holly bush in his hand, and in
the bush a mocking bird from South Carolina. This
announcement created wild and uproarious applause,
with cries of 1" Let Miles speak next," " Let the boy
te'l his own story," " Three cheers for the' Bird in
the Bush,' "* and so forth.
CONTROLLING VIEWS PUT FORTH.
Mr. John H. Doty believed he had some control
in this concern, and he would like to see any one dare
to interrupt him. He had the power, and would use
it. He was no sentimentalist, but had a heart. All
knew the sacrifices he had made for certain " next
friends" who should be nameless. They were men
who were-like the corporators in the Broadway
Railroad-unknown to fame, unknown even to the
Directory. But he was their "friend," and was always
ready to do his utmost in their favor. Thanks to
special legislation by former Republican Legislatures
in behalf of one of their own pets, he held control
over the machines of all parties, and would hold it
f6r several years. All the boasted wire arrangements of the model were very fine; but did they not
see that every wire out of the many thousands traversing the city and running to its " placers," had in the
* This was the signature to certain letters on local Democratic
Politics published in the N. Y. Times six years ago.




144           THE ADVENTURES OF
final stage before fruition to pass under his control?
He did not care to expose at once how absolute was
the power which special legislation had placed in
his hands. As the occasion rose, he would use the
power; and before another year every public man
and every newspaper* in the city should either bow
to his dictation or be crushed. He was not a refined
man and he never minced matters. It was important to him that Judges of the right stripe, four Senators of the right stripe, two Supervisors of the right
stripe, seventeen Assemblymen of the right stripe, a
Mayor of the right stripe, eight Aldermen of the
right stripe, twenty-four Councilmen of the right
stripe, and all the Police and Civil Justices of the
right stripe should be elected, and he was decidedly
in favor of the "Joint Stock Consolidated Lobby
League."  (Loud  Cheers.)  He thought Private
O'Reilly's proposition for an absorption by the politicians of all the property of the city, real and personal, in four years, a most excellent one; but it was
not original, as he could prove. He and some few
friends had been working on the same idea for fifteen
or twenty years. He favored the proposal made by
the bard of Morris Island, that the stockholders in
the political company should at the right moment
* An allusion, doubtless, to his large advertising patronage.




PRIVATE MILES 09REILLY.        145
commence cheating each other; and finally he would
propose, and was ready to expel every one who objected, that certain "next friends" whom he would
name at the right time, should be made the recipients of the final " consolidation of interests" which
was embraced in Private O'Reilly's very statesmanlike and equitable plan.
MI'KEON'IS DEMOCRACY ON THE WAR PATH —CHILLED GLASS
AND IHOT WATER — KXICKED CURS AND BITING MASTIFFS.
-Mr. John Kelly, who was one of the few dozen
respectables who had come in to look at this curious
gathering, had a few words to say. He knew he had
friends enough in the crowd to protect him. The
last speaker, he confessed, talked too dictatorially to
suit his democratic nerves. That the position which
Mr. Doty held was a goblet of immense dimensions
he would not deny. It had been enlarged and
enlarged by special legation, until there was no
knowing how much it did or could contain. Probably, however, it held more power than any one man
could quaff without danger of losing his balance.
Such goblets fortunately were of chilled glass. Ten
drops of scalding truth would shiver them into
7




146          THE ADVENTURES OF
atoms. Men who kept cur dogs at their heels used
their feet freely. Some day they would kick a mastiff, and then be taught the difference. He was
happy to say that some friends of his, who were large
stockholders in the " Consolidated Stage Company,"
had at length got a majority of the stock of that concern, and were about to sue for the turning over to
the company of all shares in City Railroad Bills
granted by former legislatures to individuals who
represented themselves to be the agents and attorneys of that company. (Suppressed cheers.) Powerftul as Mr. Doty and his friends might eventually
become when they had all their own Judges on the
bench, stronger combinations had been broken, and
would be again. (Suppressed but increasing applause.) They did not yet own all the judiciary;
and there was still upon the bench   [The remainder of the speech was drowned in hisses, cheers, and
much confusion.]
PETER IN A PECK OF TROUBLE —HE BECOMES RUM3UNCTIOUS.
- Mr. Griese was filled with disgust and loathing as
he contemplated the speckled and miserable vulture
who had just been addressing them. Such atro



PRIVATE MILES 0I7REILLY.       147
cious sentiments were insurrectionary. He moved
that all present who were not adherents of the dominant dynasty, and who could either read or write,
should be expelled. (Loud cheers.) It should be
his peculiar privilege, he claimed, to do all the
reading and writing of the whole concern. He
insisted that both the dividends voted by the Company, to which the last speaker had the impudence to
refer, were legitimately expended; and that all he had
received from the Legislature was no more than fair
compensation for his time and labor. The widows
and orphans who held stock in that Company should
have looked out for themselves, as he had done.
IHe had been their agent just up to the passage of
the different bills; but his agency ceased immediately preceding the passage, and his name or that of
his dummy, in each bill, represented only his private
interest.
MR. SHARP DOES NOT DESPISE THE DAY OF SMALL TmNGS.
Mr. Sharp was in favor of having peace in the
family, almost at any price. If they quarrelled
among themselves their enemies, the proverb said,
might come by their own. He thought they need
not grasp everything at once. If they could gain




148          THE ADVENTURES OF
one Judge a year, it would not be doing badly.
Some Judges could not make the decisions they
might want, but would be willing to acquiesce
made by their bolder associates.  This suited him
well enough, and he thought should suit others. He
had been in the business more than twenty years,
and. never saw things, with good management, looking so prosperous as now. His friends should not
urge matters too far. They should be reasonable in
their demands, and divide fair. One Judge a year
would do him. [Applause, and cries of " Be sure
you get it."]
REFORM MOVEMENTS "ALL A FARCE."t
Mr. Alderman Farley was not afraid of public opinion. They had seen "reform movements" before,
and knew how they resulted. Always heretofore,
they had put men better suited to their purposes into
power. "Reform movements" drew to them two
classes amongst politicians-the men turned out of
existing "machines" as not worth their pay and
rations. This was one class. The other class was
that of well-meaning but imbecile noodles, who
meant to do strictly right, but knew not enough to
prevent their being dragged this way and that by




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         149
adroit schemers.-If a'" reform movement" should
fall into the hands of men upright, experienced and
active — then, indeed, there would be danger. But
this, he believed, could never happen. The men
they might really fear were too noble to engage in
the business.
MR. GEO. WILKES TALKS OF A. IGILANCE COMMITTEE.
Mr. Wilkes wished the Alderman not to be too
sure of that. The so-called "reform  movements,"
which had resulted in impotence, were bogus reform
movements, in which the people took no interest.
They were the mere result of intrigues or caucusings amongst " soreheads" of the class which the
Alderman had so well described. But he (Mr. Geo.
Wilkes) had been present at one popular "reform
movement" in which the people were interested, and
he could assure them it was a terribly earnest thing.
IHe referred to the grand reform association, known
as the San Francisco Vigilance Committee. (Deep
sensation, and much uneasiness, many moving towards the door.) He saw they had heard of it. It
was an association, which had violated all law, in
order to obtain substantial justice, after every other
means had failed. (Sensation increasing.) Should




150           THE ADVENTURES OF
such a " reform movement" as that ever break out
or be organized in the city of New York, he would
advise nine-tenths of the present assemblage to be
out of town while the reformers were on the war
path.
CLOSING SPEECH BY THE CHAIR.
The sensation made by this speech can more easily
be imagined than described. Cheers, hootings, applause, yells and screams broke out in one mingled
uproar. The representatives of the three " regular
machines" whispered eagerly with the Chairman for
a few moments, and then disappeared. The Chairman himself declared hurriedly that the caucus
stood adjourned until further notice. Its proceedings had been satisfactory and harmonious to a degree never before witnessed. As he understood
matters, all present had agreed to place their interests in the hands of the three regular Tammany,
Mozart and Republican representatives, who had
just departed with their immediate friends; while,
as for himself, he would take care -of himself,
and hoped they might all be as successful. The' blue lights," he would remind them, were burning low, and he called upon such members of




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        loi
the police as might be present to see that the very
valuable and curious model of their new "machine,"
containing in its proportions, and the net-work of its
wires and strings, all the secrets of the "Joint Stock
Consolidated Grand Junction Lobby League," should
suffer no injury. He would now say good night.
CONCLUSION OF THE MILES O REILLY CAUCUS.
No sooner had the burly figure of the Chairman
quitted the stage than scores of profane feet leaped
upon it, and hundreds of curious eyes examined for
the first time that " machine," upon which only the
most deeply initiated should ever be permitted to
gaze. Among the crowd of amazed spectators, who
had attended the caucus as " outsiders" and fromn a
desire to see the "' ruling classes of the city in council assembled," your reporter noticed scores of our
really great and prominent men, whose names are
familiar as household words in connexion with every
enterprise which has lent grandeur, wealth, or dignity to the Empire City. They now gazed for the
first time upon " the machine;" first saw exposed
the system of trickery and fraud by which the treasury is depleted and the chevaliers of politics enriched. It was a sight to move deep thought in the




152           THiE ADVENTURES OF
breast of every reflective and intelligent man, whose
destinies are cast in with the fortunes of Manhattan
Island. Is that machine to dominate for ever? Shall
the programme of the managing leaders be carried
out? Is there no way by which, in one united effort,
the sceptre of this political Moloch can be broken?
Evidently the cable linking the city mechanism to
Albany should be sundered at any cost. Evidently
the Judges most obnoxious to the managing leaders
of the " machine" are those who should be elected.
But to do all this will require some sacrifices. It may
take time. The machine, as depicted in the model,
is the work of many years. It may take a year, it
may take more, to break it. Are there enough good
_men and true in the city of New York to make
one effort to this end? If there be not, then let the
machines run on until all the purposes of the leading
spirits of this caucus have been fully and triumph~
antly accomplished! Men, who will do nothing to
save themselves, are not worth saving. Many who
sat down to read this expected a farce, and they have
found a sermon. The subject is too serious to be
trifled with; for



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.               153
Vain is irony; unmeet
Its polished words for deeds which start
In fiery and indignant beat
The pulses of the heart.
7*




CHAPTER IX.
~IsLES O9REILLY AT THE WHITE OITUSE.
[From the N, Y. Herald.]
WASHINGTON, Nov. 26, 1863.
LET to-day be chronicled as a great day for Ireland,
and let it live as the greatest of Thanksgiving Days
in American history I This afternoon took place the
interesting ceremonial of presenting Private Miles
O'Reilly, Forty-seventh Regiment New York Volunteers, to his Excellency the President of the United
States, by whom, in turn, the young Milesian warrior
and bard of the Tenth army corps was presented to
several members of the Cabinet and foreign diplomatic cwor, who were paying a Thanksgiving Day
call to the President when the cards of General
T. F. Meagher and Father Murphy were handed in
by Colonel Hay-these gentlemen having kindly
consented to act as the chaperoms, or social godfathers
and godmothers of Private O'Reilly, who was accompanied by Major Kavanagh and Captain Breslin, of




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        155
the old Sixty-ninth New York, and by Mr. Luke
Clark, of the Fifth Ward of your City, as his own
" special friends." The details of this interview will
hereafter form an instructive episode in the grand
drama of our national history. It was in a manner
the apotheosis of democratic principles —an acknowledgment of our indebtedness to the men who carry
muskets in our armies. It had its political significance, also, and may prove another link between our
soldiers in the field and the present lengthy occupant
of the White House, who is understood to be not
averse to the prospect of a lengthier lease of that
" desirable country residence," which has none of the
modern improvements.
PICTURE OF PRIVATE OREILLY.
Private O'Reilly is a brawny, large-boned, rather
good-looking young Milesian, with curly reddish
hair, grey eyes, one of which has a blemish upon it,
high cheek bones, a cocked nose, square lower jaws,
and the usual strong type of Irish forehead-the
perceptive bumps, immediately above the eyes, being
extremely prominent. A more good-humored or
radiantly expressive face it is impossible to conceive.
The whole countenance beams with a candor and




156            THE ADVENTURES OF
unreserve equal to that of a mealy potato which has
burst its skin or jacket by too rapid boiling.  He
stands about six feet three inches, is broad-chested,
barrel-bodied, firm  on his pins, and with sinewy,
knotted fists of a hardness and heaviness seldom
equalled.  On the whole, he reminds one very much
of Ensign O'Doherty's ideal picture of the iMilesian
hero:One of his eyes was bottle green,
And the other eye was out, my dear;
And the calves of his wicked looking legs
WVere more than two feet about, my dear I
0, the lump of an Irishman,
The nasty, ugly Irishman,
The great he-rogue, with his wonderful brogue,
The leathering swash of an Irishman.
WHAT HE AND HIS COUSINS THINIK ABOUT ENGLAND.
Private 0 Reilly says that he was born at a place
they call Ouldcastle; that he picked up what little
of the humanities and rudiments he possesses under
one Father Thomas Maguire, of Cavan-" him  that
was O'Connell's frind, rest their sowls;" and he is
emphatic in declaring that he and seventeen of his
O'Reilly cousins, sixty-four Murphy cousins, thirtyseven Kelly cousins, twenty-three Lanigan cousins,




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         157
together with a small army of Raffertys, Caffertys,
Fogartys, Flanigans, IRyans, O'Rourkes, Dooligans, Oulahans, Quinns, Flynns, Kellys,  Mlurphys, O'Connors, O'Connells, O'Driscolls, O'Mearas,
O'Tooles, McCartys, McConkeys, and McConnellsall his own blood relations, many of them now in
the service, and all decent boys-would be both
proud and happy to enlist or re-enlist for twenty
years or the war, if his Reverence's Excellency the
President would only oblige them " the laste mite in
life" by declaring war against England. He is of
opinion that no excuse is ever needed for going to
war; but adds that if any were, it might be found
in the recent Canadian-rebel conspiracy to release
the prisoners in camp on Johnson's Island.
" If we let this pass," he says, " divil resayve the
so illigant an excuse the dirty spalpeens may ever
give us again! They gripped us whin we wor wake,
an' mled us give up them two rapparees, Shlidell and
Mason. We've now got five iron-clads to their one,
boys dear; and Mr. Lincoln," he adds, " won't be
the jockey he bought him for, if he don't give John
Bull his bellyful of'neuthrality' before he gets
through his term."  Mr. Luke Clark, of the Fifth
ward, is understood to be very strong in the same
view.




158          THE ADVENTURES OF
ARRIVAL AT THE WHITE HOUSE —SCENES AT THE DOOR.
On the arrival of the party at the White House
there was a great scene of handshaking at the door
between Private O'Reilly and Edward McManus, the
chatty old greyhaired gentleman from Italy-where
O'Reilly knew him-who has kept watch at the gate
through five administrations; and who is now
assisted by Mr. Thomas Burns, also from Italy, who
has outlived the storms of two reigns. It was'" God
bless you, Miles," and "God bless you kindly,
Edward," for as many as ten minutes, the handshaking being fast and furious all the time.
GENERAL MEAGHER'S SPEECH.
General Meagher, in presenting Private O'Reilly
to the President, made some remarks to the effect
that he was happy to have the honor of introducing
to one who was regarded as the Father of the Army
this enfant.perdu, or lost boy of the Irish race. I1is
friend, Colonel John Hay, the President's Secretary,
who had served as a volunteer in the Department of
the South, was acquainted with O'Reilly's character
in his regiment, and knew that it was good, though
chequered with certain amiable indiscretions, having




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         159
their origin in the fount of Castaly, or some other
fountain-of which he had forgotten the particulars.
(Laughter.) IHe wished to assure Mr. Lincoln that
the bone and sinew of the army —his own countrymen in it not least-had eyes to see, and hearts to
feel, and memories to treasure up the many acts
of hearty, homely, honest kindliness, by which the
Chief Magistrate of the nation had evinced his interest in their welfare. In the golden hours of sunrise, under the silver watches of the stars, through
many a damp, dark night on picket duty, or in the
red flame and heady fury of the battle, the thought
that lay next the heart of the Irish soldier-only
dividing its glow with that of the revered relic
from the altar, which piety and affection had annexed,
as an amulet against harm, around his neck-was the
thought that he was thus earning a title, which hereafter no foul tongue or niggard heart would dare dispute, to the full equality and fraternity of an American citizen. ("Hear, hear," from the President.)
Ugly and venomous as was the toad of civil strife, it
yet carried in its head for the Irish race in America
this precious, this inestimable jewel. By adoption of
the banner, and by the communion of bloody gravetrenches on every field, from Bull Ran to where the




160           THE ADVENTURES OF
Chickamauga rolls down its waters of death, the
race that were heretofore only exiles, receiving generous hospitality in the land, are now proud peers
of the proudest and brave brothers of the best.
(Deep emotion, Secretary Seward tapping the table
with his fingers, and Mr. Chase gravely bowing his
head in approval.) On behalf of Private O'Reilly,
he desired to thank Mir. Lincoln for the clemency
which had failed to see crimne in an innocent song.
Although the verses of Private O'Reilly had become
conspicuous, they were far from being the only or
the best efforts of the lyric muse to which the fast
frolic and effervescing life of camps had given birth.
Whenever Clio shall aspire to write the history of this
war, that sagest sister of the sacred Nine will be
obliged to draw largely on the rough, but always
heartfelt, often droll, still oftener tenderly pathetic
verses, with which Euterpe will be found to have inspired the rough writers and fighters of the rank and
file. (" Hear, hear," from the President, the Baron
Gerolte and General Cullum.) Seeing that Lord
Lyons was present, General Meagher would not now
refer to the Fenian Brotherhood, of which the Chevalier John O'Mahony was the Head Centre. Ile
thanked the President, Mr. Seward, Mr. Chase, Mr.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        161
Stanton, General ilalleck, the Baron Stoeckl, the Baron
Gerolte, the Count Mercier, Colonels Townsend and
Kelton, Assistant Secretary of the Navy Fox, and
the others who were present, for their interest in
this interview, of which accident had made them
witnesses. Had he had the slightest inkling how
his Excellency had been engaged, he should most
certainly have postponed the visit-a wish for which
had been conveyed to him through Secretary Stanton.
He would now briefly introduce to the President
Private Miles O'Reilly, the bard of Morris Island,
whose self and family-snug farmers and very decent
people-he had well known many years ago in the
Green Isle, which was their common birthplace.
MR. LINCOLN' S SPEE1CH-IIS STORY ABOUT Cc THE WIDOW
ZOLLICOFFER IS DARKEY.' 
MIr. Lincoln replied that he was happy to see
Private O'Reilly, but did not care to make a set
speech. In his position it was not wise to talk foolishly, and he would, therefore, but rarely talk at all.
As to the "war for the succession," about which
the Herald and Mr. Wendell Phillips appeared
crazy, he would say some few words. Men oftenest
betray and defeat themselves by over-anxiety to




162           THE ADVENTURES OF
secure their object, just as the widow Zollicoffer's
nigger did, away down in Bourbon county, when
he had been eating her cranberry jam. (Laughter.)
The widow, while making her jam, was called away
to a neighbor who was about increasing the population. (Loud laughter.) 6' Sam, you rascal," she said,
" you'll be eating my jam when I'm away."  Sam
protested he'd die first; but the whites of his eyes
rolled hungrily towards the bubbling crimson.
"See here, Sam," said the widow, taking up a piece
of chalk, "I'll chalk your lips, and then on my
return I'll know if you've eaten any." So saying,
she passed her forefinger heavily over the thick lips
of her darkey, holding the chalk in the palm of her
hand, and not letting it touch him. Well, when she
came back, Sam's lips were chalked a quarter of an
inch thick, and she needed against him no other
evidence. (Laughter.) Now, it is much the same
about the Presidency. (Renewed mirth.) A good
friend of mine declares that he wouldn't take it
at any price; but his lips were thickly chalked when
he came back from Ohio. (Great merriment, in
which Mr. Chase joined heartily.) So were General
Fremont's, out in Missouri, when he issued his " einancipatio:, order;" and General Butler's were not only




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        163
chalked, but had the jam on and had it thick. Secretary Seward once chalked very badly, but had given
it up as of no use since his quarrel with Mr. Weed,
machine proprietor of his own State. (Loud laughter.) Mingled chalk and jamr might be seen on the
lips of General Banks; while the same compound
formed quite a paste around the orifice through
which his good friend Governor Seymour supplied
the wants of nature. (Roars of laughter.) He had
never seen any chalk on the lips of Secretary Stantoin or General HIenry W. Halleck: but, with these
exceptions, there was scarcely a man connected with
the army who did not chalk his lips. (Continued
mirth, the foreign diplomatic corps joining heartily.)
He believed many of the generals would compromise for a brigadier's commission in the regular
army; but these were matters too grave to be joked
about. He would now introduce to all present Private
Miles O'Reilly, of the Tenth army corps-an army
corps which had done well under General Gillmore,
having been magnificently disciplined by General
Hunter —perhaps the very strictest field officer in
the service. Mr. Lincoln conclude by bidding
the bard of Morris Island welcome to the WVhite
House, at the same time extending his hand for a
friendly shake.




164           THE ADVENTURES OF
HOW PRIVATE O'REILLY SHAKES HANDS.
All this time Private Miles O'Reilly, Forty-seventh
regiment New York Volunteers, had been standing
in the first position of a soldier-heels in, toes out,
body rigid and perpendicular as a ramrod, and the
little fingers of his open hands resting behind the
side seams of his sky-blue inexpressibles. He had a
twenty-five cent bouquet in the breast of his blue
coat, and in his eyes that stolid expression or
total want of expression which is imparted by the
order-" eyes front."  No sooner, however, did, the
President extend his hand than the sinews relaxed,
and his countenance brightened up as if some crazy
millionaire had suddenly offered to give him its face
in gold for a twenty dollar greenback. Instantly lihe
made the sound of spitting into the palm of his right
hand, then raised the arm to its full height, and
brought down his open palm against the Presidential
palm with a report that rang through the council
chamber as if one of the "6 torpedo devils" of Chief
Engineer Stimers had been exploded by the concussion. He no doubt intended to say something
extremely eloquent; but laboring, like Charles Lamb,
under a bad stammer, his words came slowly and




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         165
with pain, though of their earnestness the very
difficulty with which they were uttered gave proof.
MR. LUKE CLARK AS A DOCTOR.
Mr. Luke Clark suggested that it was timorous the
boy was; that his heart was too full, and the words
bubbled up so quick to his tongue that they choked
and killed each other-like an audience crowding
out through the narrow doors of a theatre in which
the cry of " fire" has been raised. If his Reverence's
Excellency the President would only order up a jug
of water, with no more whiskey in it than President
Pierce took at the opening of the Crystal Palace"just enough to kill the animalcule"-Mr. Clark was
of opinion that Miles would rapidly recover.
The order was given. Private Miles retired for a
few moments into Mr. Nicolay's room, just outside
the council chamber, from whence he soon returned,
wiping his mouth with the cuff of his coat, gasping
a little for breath, and with his whole face so much
brighter and livelier that it was like a transfiguration.
"Your Riverence's Excellency," he said, scraping
his left foot backwards, bowing forward his body, and
giving one of his red forelocks a jerk between the




166           THE ADVENTURES OF
finger and thumb of his right hand: " Your Riverence's Excellency, though I'm  wipin' my lips, it's
nayther chalk nor cranberries I had on them last."
(Loud laughter.)
LORD LYONS ASKS FOR A SONG-THE CABINET Cc POKING
FUN."' Suppose, Mr. Seward, you ask your young friend
to give us a song," said Lord Lyons, who had been
looking rather superciliously at all parts of the ceremonial. "They say the fellow can sing; and I suppose it is because he can sing, he is here."
Mr. Seward referred the matter by a bow to the
President, who glanced sharply at Lord Lyons. For
one moment a cloud passed over Mr. Lincoln's kindly face, but disappeared as he turned and let his eyes
rest on the beaming countenance of Private Miles.
" What say you, Private O'Reilly?  Will you
sing 2"
"I will that, your Riverencess Excellency," was
the response, with just one flash of a scowl towards
Lord Lyons. " It's my prayer for your Excellency
that you may never die until the skin of a gooseberry
makes a nightcap for you; and may you have the
vigor'of Lord Palmershin-that's your boss, Lord




PRIVATE MIILES O'REILLY.       16T
Lyons-till the day you're a hundhred an' fifty!" (Uproarious laughter, in which all joined except Father
Murphy —Lord Lyons laughing the loudest.) "Now,
what shall I sing?"' continued Private Miles. "If his,
Riverence, Father Pathrick Murphy, worn't to the
fore, it's a song in honor of my counthryman, the
same Lord Palmershin, that I'd give you.'Tisn't
that I ever loved him or any other anti-Irish Irishman, who takes blood money for the life of his counthry. (Sensation.) But it's because I'm sick of the
humbug that is in them English journals that say
the ould man ought to be ashamed of himself.
(Laughter.) Faix, at his age, I can't see any shame
about it. (Loud laughter.)
"Au contraire," suggested Count Mercier, with a
smile and shrug: "' a son age, devrait an moins en
etre fier.'
(Roars of laughter, amidst which Father Murphy
retired in company with Mr. Nicolay, Colonel Hay's
colleague, on the plea that the room was growing
too hot for him.)
" How old do you say he is, my Lord?" said Secretary Seward, removing the cigar from his mouth.
"Old enough to be your father," was the reply;
"he will be eighty next June." (Renewed laughter.)




168           THE ADVENTURES OF
THE DECANTERS AND THINGS ORDERED IN —-COU~NCL
TABLE CLEARED FOR A JOLLIFICATION-(I GRANT'S
PARTICULAR.'
General Halleck here arose to suggest that now,
while Father Murphy was absent, was the proper
time, if ever, for the improper song.
"Col. Hay, please touch the bell," said Mr. Lincoln, "and let Burgdorf, my messenger, send us up
the decanters and things. I have some French wines,
sent me from Paris by Secretary of Legation Pennington, whose tongue is so completely occupied in
the business of tasting vintages that he has never
had time to teach it French, though a resident in
Paris many years. If you prefer whiskey, I have
some that can be relied upon-a present from Mr.
Leslie Combs. I call it'Grant's Particular,' and
HIalleck is about issuing an order that all his generals shall drink it."
"With the news we have to-day from Chattanooga," said Gen. Halleck, gaily, " I think the country
will endorse the order to which BMr. Lincoln has referred. For my own part I'll take some of that
whiskey-just enough to drown a mosquito, Kelton
-and, with the President's permission, our first toast




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         169
will be, the health of Ulysses Grant, the river-horse
of the Mississippi!"
Secretary Stanton seconded the toast in a neat and
spirited address, Mr. Lincoln frequently applauding.
The health was received with all the honors, every
one present standing up while the liquor went down,
and the company giving three cheers for General
Grant, and then three more, and then three after
that to top off with.
Some drank it in wine, others whiskey. The council table was hastily cleared of books, papers, and
maps. All took seats except Private O'Reilly, who
continued to have spasms of rigidity and the " first
position of a soldier" whenever his eyes happened to
rest for a moment on General Halleck's buttons in
bunches of three, or General Cullum's twin-button
brigadier arrangement.
"Excuse me, gentlemen; this is my only beverage," said the President, filling out a glass of
water.  "Help yourselves. Seward, the diplomatic body is under your care. Baron Gerolte's glass
is empty.  General Meagher, will you be kind
enough to see what the friends of Private O'Reilly
will take?  Now, Miles, clear your throat with a
glass of wine-not too much for him, Colonel
8




170             THE ADVENTURES OF
Hay-and let us hear your song in honor of Lord
Palmerston."
Private O'Reilly tossed off a demitasse, and then
gave, with irresistible drollery and a really fine baritone voice, the following words, to the well known
air, once so popular in the mouth of John Brougham
-" Ould Ireland You're 3My Darling."
LORD PALMERSTON AND MRS. O'KANE.
Of all the min wid swoord or pin
Who live in song or story,'Till time lets pass his empty glass,
Lord Pam,'tis you're my glory;
And this shall be the song for me,
As years are o'er me flowin'Time take all else, but lave my pulse
Like Pam's as warmly glowin' I
Chorus-Of all the min wid swoord or pin
Who live in Irish story,
Till time lets pass his empty glass,
Lord Pam-[ye ould sinner, wid your wicked
arts, your white head and your everlastin' physique]
Lord Pam,'tis you're my glory I
To Mrs. O'Kane a glass we dhrain,
In silks we will attire her;
And Cromwell's curse, or somethin' worse
On the dunce that don't admire her!




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.                 171
Fresh, fair, and young, Pam's winnin' tongue
Gev argyment so weighty,
That Parson O'Kane she quitted wid pain
For a lover hard on to eighty.
Chorus —Och I of all the pearls of precious girls
That live in song or story,
Wid Vaynus' art to fire the heart,
[Mrs. O'Kane, my jewel-Mrs. O'Kane, acushlac-Mrs. O'Kane,
mavourneen dheelish, asthore macree]'Tis you,'tis you're my glory I
Lord Pam is great, a shpaker nate,
Britannia's frisky ruler;
In high debate on pints of shtate
No head than his is cooler;
But undhernathe the silvery wratheOuld Time's white frost or ashesLike Etna's fire, his heart's desire
Breaks out in tindher flashes.
Chorus-Of all the min wid swoord or pin,
Who live in British story,
Till time lets pass his empty glass,
Lord Pam-[Avic!-ye ould deludherer, that
ought to know betther, and that does know betther, but can't
help yourself, aroon]Lord Pam,'tis you're my glory I
There's somethin' quare in Irish air
And a diet of pitaties,
That makes us all so prone to fall




172              THE ADVENTURES OF
To whishkey and the ladies;
Wid these galore, what want we more,
Our heads are wildly turnin';
While in our flood of dancin' blood
Delight is fairly barnin'.
Chorus-But of all the min wid swoord or pin,
Who live in the wide world's story,
Till time lets pass his empty glass,
Lord Pam-[An' bad'cess to me if you can't
have half my rations, half my tent, and half my canteen any
day in the year]
Lord Pam,'tis you're my glory I
So pledge the toast, Britannia's boast,
His sthrongest wakeness pardon;
And let no thrick, my royal Vic,
Your heart aginst him harden I
The warmest vein has clearest brain,
The proofs are sthrong and weighty;
So to Mrs. O'Kane a glass we'll dhrain;
And to Pam, her lover of eighty I
Chorus-Och, of all the pearls of precious girls,
An' of all the lovers hoary,
Till time lets pass his empty glass,
Lord Pam —[And you, Mrs. O'Kane, dear,
that's able to illecthrify a telegraph post wid one wink of your
rollickin' eye, acushia]
Yez both, dears, are my glory I




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         173
IEOW THE SONG WAS RECEIVED.
To describe the roars of laughter with which this
lyric was received, would be impossible, his Reverence's Excellency the President alone preserving
an immovable countenance. Seward was in convulsions. Chase lost much of that dignified deportment, showing elevation of character as well as of
position, for which he has been remarked. Stanton,was purple, and pressed his left hand on his side to
check the pain of excessive merriment. The diplomatic body, in various stages of exhaustion, begged
Mr. Lincoln to stop the song, or it would be the
death of them. Halleck shook a strong rosewood
arm-chair, in which he sat, nearly to bits, the tears
rolling down his swarthy cheeks, and his black eyes
glittering with an intensity of humorous relief. Secretary Welles, when it was over, first carefully picked up several of his waistcoat buttons from the floor,
and then put on his spectacles to examine with due
deliberation what manner of man Private. Miles
might be; after which he declared that the song
was " one of the most interesting he had heard for
many years!"




174           THE ADVENTURES OF
MR. LTCOLN OPENS THE BALL-HE  THINKS MRS.
O'KANE A VERY SERIOUS MATTER.
His Excellency the President, who had been sitting, curled up in an arm-chair, with his legs loosely
crossed one over the other, now began to rise, slowing untwisting the kinks of his back, and towering
up like one of the genii, or afrites, released from the
jar, or jug, in which they had been bottled up for
centuries under the seal of Solomon.
"Aisy!" exclaimed Mr. Luke Clark, with unaffected dismay. "It's dashin' your brains out agin
the ceilin' you'll be, or tanglin' your shouldhers in
the top notches of the shandyleer!"
At length, M3r. Lincoln reached his full height, and
said, that he had not quite caught thie drift of the
song; but from what little of it he did catch, it was
just as well that he had caught no more.
" Hear, hear," from Father Murphy, who had reentered the room during the singing of the last four
lines.
Being on friendly terms with Great Britain, Mr.
Lincoln continued, he trusted that the song would
go no further.
"Hear, hear," from Lord Lyons, who was trying




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PRIVATE SMILES 9'REILLY.        175
hard to smother some refluent waves of laughter.
"There are themes," continued Mr. Lincoln —
"and Mrs. O'IKane is one of them-much too serious
to be joked about." With this admonition, made as
gentle as he could, he would now ask Private O'Reilly's opinion as to how the next Presidency was going?
PRIVATE O'REILLY ON THE SUCCESSION.
Private O'Reilly's stammer immediately became
very bad again, insomuch that Colonel Hay, remembering the successful treatment previously recommended, had to administer, but only as a medicine,
another small dose of some amber-hued beverage.
" I think," said Private M1iles, when he had recovered his breath, and again wiped his lips with his'
coat cuff: "I think that the politicianers is all wrong
about it, your Riverence's Excellency; and there's
not the humblest gossoon in the army to-day, that
couldn't tell them more than they know on that subject, wid all their caucussings and convintions."
"a Well, explain," said Mr. Chase, rather anxiously, but still preserving all his allomb of manner and
gracious courtesy of smile.




176          THE ADVENTURES OF
"They could tell them," said Private Miles, "that
there's but one man who wears a Black Coat in the
United States this blessed and holy day, that can be
elected to that office. Mind, I'm  not sayin'-for
I'm no flattherer, and I'm no seventh son-that he
will be.  All I do say is, that there's only one
Black Coat in the Union, that can be a successful
candydate for that office."
HOW THE SOLDIERS WILL VOTE.
"You think blue, with brass buttons, the healthiest color for Presidential aspirants to appear in,"
queried Mr. Seward, casting a sly glance as he spoke
from under his shaggy gray eyebrows in the direction of Secretary Chase.
" Faix, sir, you might sing that same, if you knew
any tune that would fit it," was Private O'Reilly's
answer. "Every Presidential candidate should appear in blue an' goold, the way Ticknor and Fields
publishes their pocket editions of the poicks. There's
half a million of us that can vote, though Governor
Saymour won't let any of us New York boys vote
by proxy; and it's for no black coat in the Union,
except one, that the army vote will be given. Everything depinds now on how the war goes. It may be




PRIVATE MILES 0'REILLY.         177
Grant, and it will be Grant, if his gallant victhories
continue; or it may be Dix, who is very sthrong wid
all classes; or it may be Banks, who will have the
New England States solid; or it may be Rosy, whose
devotions have touched the thrue Church; or, last
of all, if the war goes well as a whole, Gineral Halleck will be an almighty hard man to defeat before a
dimmycratic convintion. The very fact that he has
held back, and hasn't been curryin' favor anywhere,
will be the strongest card in his hand. Of Gineral
McClellan I say nothin', for the proper time hasn't
come yet-except that those who think he's played
out, may find themselves mistaken some fine mornin'.  There'll be milithary candydates as plenty
as thorns on a brier bush, or black feathers on a
crow.  Aginst the canvass of votes in your big
cities, will be the votes of our canvass towns. The
boys who for the last two years and more have been
carryin' their butchery, bakery, and grocery in a
haversack over one hip, and their tavern in a canteen over the other, will all vote just as they have
been taught to fight-facin' the same way, and touchin' the elbow. I hear people sayin' that this gineral
is shtrong wid the Germans, and that some other
gineral is shtrong with the Irish; but I tell you that
8*




178            THE ADVENTURES OF
there's nayther Irish nor Germans amongst the min
who have been atin', marchin', shleepin' an' fightin'
side by side since the summer that was two years
ago. If it would be agreeable to this noble company, who are the very hoigth of quality, there was
a song that was wrote to illusthrate this subjeck,
which he'd as soon sing as not. It was wrote by
Gineral Isaac I. Stevens-God rest his sowl!-who
was killed near Centhreville-more's the pity-his
son dhroppin' badly wounded from his horse just as
a rifle ball whistled through the father's forehead."
Private O'Reilly's voice grew rather husky towards
the close of this address, and his eyes were suffused
with an unusual moisture.  Clearing his throat at
length by an effort which was half a cough, half sob,
he sang the following words amidst deep silence on
the part of his audience, to the air of "Jamie's on the
Stormy Sea:'
SONG OF THE SOLDIERS.
Comrades known in marches many,
Comrades tried in dangers many,
Comrades bound by memories many,
Brothers ever let us be I
Wounds or sickness may divide us,
Marching orders may divide us,
But, whatever fate betide us,
Brothers of the heart are we.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.             179
Comrades known by faith the clearest,
Tried when death was near and nearest,
Bound we are by ties the dearest,
Brothers ever more to be:
And, if spared and growing older,
Shoulder still in line with shoulder,
And with hearts no thrill the colder,
Brothers ever we shall be.
]By communion of.the banner —
Battle-scarred but victor banner,
By the baptism of the banner,
Brothers of one church are we!
Creed nor faction can divide us,
Race nor language can divide us,
Still, whatever fate betide us,
Children of the flag are we I
The deep and dead silence which followed this
song was fully as flattering to Private O'Reilly's
vocal powers as had been the tumultuous laughter
which  hailed  his  Lord Palmerston ditty.  This'" Song of the Soldiers " he gave with the greatest
energy and enthusiasm, his chest swelling, his feet
taking firmer stand on the floor, and his gray eyes
kindling up with flashes of electric vivacity. None
could doubt who heard and saw him, that in songs
of this kind, and in the spirit which animates them,




180          THE ADVENTURES OF
and amongst the men who feel them and are their
subject, the future government of the United States
is centred.
WHAT SAY THE PEOPLE?
"That's a gallant song," said the President, first
breaking silence, and sighing as he spoke. "If I
had heard it, and had known Ike Stevens wrote it,
he should have had two stars on each shoulder before
he died. But haven't you anything livelier, Miles?
Mind, I don't mean liveliness of your Lord Palmerston type. Tell us, if you can, what the people say
of us; what they say of Chase; what of Seward?
You needn't be afraid, Miles: we ain't a thin-skinned
family, and we know before asking that you have an
awkward knack of telling the truth."
Private O'Reilly said he had no song to give thena
on this subject just now; but would be happy if they
would hear a song from his friend Mr. Luke Clark,
who had an excellent voice.
-Mr. Clark said the song he was about to sing was
one which he had picked up at a "' free and easy,"
in a place they called the Ivy Green, which is a sort.of chapel of ease to the Pewter Mug, and which is
kept, he said, by Jim McGowan and Johnny Lord



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.            181
"two as square men as ever drew ale from  tap, or
whirled the mixer round in a temperance cocktail."
Luke had been introduced there by his friend, Alderman Billy Walsh, of whose brother, the " King of
the Dead Rabbits," Mr. Lincoln must have heard.
The song he was about to give them had been sung
there frequently by Senator Chris. Woodruff, a lucky
boy, and had never failed to bring down the house.
He hoped it would give offence to nobody.
MR. LUKE CLARKES SONG.
With these brief prefatory remarks, Mr. Clark
now cleared his throat, and sang, with a voice of
stentorian power, the following ditty, to the wellknown and lively air of "Nora Creina:A CABINET PHOTOGRAPH,
Stanton's beard is thick and long,
And rough and tough his portly figure;
But his heart is brave and strong
With fierce vitality and vigor.
Work that might a dozen men
Tire to death, he knocks off gaily,
And, blundering badly now and then,
Does true and noble service daily.




182             THE ADVENTURES OF
Oh, my Edwin, dread and dear,
Dispensing fount of pay and rations,
Private Miles upon you smiles,
" Conformably to Regulations."
Seward loves to smoke and dream,
Fit chief for theoretic faction;
Great to talk on every theme,
But failure flat in every action.
Aiming Abe to mould and bend,
On each associate's rights in ringing,
Lukewarm to the Czar-our friendAnd to John Bull most humbly cringing.
Oh, my Seward, since you changed
Your faith in Weed, your fate is dismal;
He and Greeley now estranged,
Before you yawns a pit abysmal.
Angular and lank and bare,
His whiskers, like his habits, foxy,
Forward steps Montgomery Blair,
Who throws his family vote by proxy.
Mistress Bates is next in line,
With poodle, bundles and umbrella;
Good old soul I whose gooseberry wine
Is, like her spirit, sweet and mellow.
Dear old lady-bless your heart,
Our love and reverence we accord you;'Tis you that took Ike Fowler's partAnd for the act may Heaven reward you I




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.               183
Then there's Uncle Gid, whose cast
Of face inspires each artist's noddle;
When this cruel war is past
They'll hire him as a " patriarch model."
Next is Usher, like a bat,
Who aid to either winner offers —
Now a pigeon, now a ratTwixt Chase and Blair he doubtful hovers.
Oh, my Usher, hard to catch,
As sinewy, slippery as a boaWhile Gid, through Mrs. Cora Hatch,
Is taught by Heaven's own Admiral, Noah!
Salmon hath a paper mill,
Which night and day pursues its journey;
Soon with greenbacks he will fill
The land from Maine to Califurny.
Oh, the vanished days of gold I
The vanished, halcyon days of specie I
Bullion's dead, and cpin has fled
On paper winglets to Hel —vetia.
Oh, my Chase, my Salmon dear
My greenly gleaming, gorgeous Salmon,
Down paper's tide serene you glideA tide that hasn't got a dam on I
Grand and grim is Salmon's face
While on financial themes he ponders;
Clear his eye, his bearing high,
As in his greenback dreams he wanders.




184            THE ADVENTURES OF
Oh, could he but give us back
The days ere paper did affright us,
Never should our Salmon lack
Aquarial lodgings in the White House.
Oh, my Chase, my Salmon dear,
The country well may mourn in sables —
[Bullion's dead and coin has fledOur cash consists of claret labels I
TERRIBLE EFFECTS OF Cc FREE SONG" —-UNIVERSAL EXECRATION OF MR. CLARK.
The sudden dropping into the room of one of
Gillmore's Greek fire three-hundred-pounders could
not have produced greater consternation than the
singing  of this ditty-Private  O'Reilly making
several ineffectual motions to stop his blundering
friend, who —sublimely unconscious of any impropriety-kept on singing with a force which recalled
the historical roaring of the thousand bulls of Bashan. Every one felt as if a wet blanket or douche
bath had been suddenly applied down his spineMr. Chase alone preserving all his stately urbanity,
and beating time with his fingers on the elbow of his
arm chair to the unfortunate melody. On the conclusion of the song, dead silence followed-some
slight chucklings of Lord Lyons and the Count Mer



PRIVATE MIILES O'REILLY.       185
cier alone excepted. At this silence Mr. Luke Clark
appeared deeply hurt, having apparently expected
the same applause he had so often received for the
same performance in less elevated latitudes. It was
only when he saw General Meagher, with the greater
part of his handkerchief stuffed down his throat,
and Private O'Reilly, his face white with rage, shaking his fist at him in a highly belligerent manner,
that Mr. Clark began to suspect it might be possible
that he had been committing a fauxm pas-"' puttin'
his fat into it"-in his own vernacular.
" I have to apologize for my misfortunate frind,"
said Private Miles, stammering very badly. "It's
little I thought the kind of song the divil would put
it into his head to sing whin I axed him."
"Oh, all right," said the President, reassuringly.
" We asked you to tell us what the people said of us,
and your friend Clark has only been doing it with a
vengeance."9
AUTHORS AND CIRCULATORS OF THE SONG DENOUNCED.
General Meagher said that Irishmen were proverbial for blunders of all sorts, and this meeting
would perhaps have been incomplete, but for the
recent ludicrous incident. Nothing that the malice




186          THE ADVENTURES OF
of enemies could put in verse, or that the ignorance
of such men as Mr. Clark could be used to propagate, would injure that well earned and substantial
fame which Mr. Chase's administration of the finan
ces of the country had acquired. To the other
injured members of the Cabinet he made similar
soothing complimentary allusions.
Mr. Chase begged General Meagher to give himself no uneasiness about an incident which they would
long remember as one of the most amusing of their
official lives. He would only add that he had heard
that song before, and that his friend Mr. George
Wilkes reported it to have been written by Mr.
Samuel L. M. Barlow, and put into circulation by a
secret society for the diffusion of copperhead information, of which Mr. Hiram Cranston and C. Godfrey Gunther were the presiding officers. He felt
that he need say no more.
In order to smoothe over the trifling interruption of
good feeling which had taken place, MIr. Seward
would suggest that Private O'Reilly should leave off
his gestures and black looks against his friend, Mr.
Clark, and give them another lyric-if he had one,
another army song.
Private Miles declared himself so mortified by the




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.           187
blunders of that omadhawn-nodding in the direction of Mr. Clark-that he had scarce any heart left
to sing anything. The best he could do, however,
he would; so he'd give them a song that was composed by his soggartk, Father Murphy, who had
been chaplain, and a good one, God bless him! to the
poor boys of the Irish Brigade, in the days of its
hardest fights under General Meagher, who ought to
have two stars on each shoulder, or there could be
no such thing as justice to Ireland. He picked out
this song, as it was about the army and the Presidency, two matters most likely to be of interest to
the hearer to whomr he owed gratitude for his pardon, and was most anxious to please. He then sang,
with rising spirit, as his mind recovered slowly
from the effects of Luke Clark's wet blanket, the
following lyric, to the air of " The Minstrel
Boy." —
THE BLUE CAP AND BUTTON.
The boys of the host that has suffered the most,
The Army of the PotomacWho have dyed with their blood Virginia's fields
To the color of the sumac;
There are some, you know, for McClellan will goThe " old braves," who still admire him;




188             TILE ADVENTURES OF
While others for Meade will vote or bleed,
As the chances may require them.
CHORus-The boys of the host, &c.
The lads in the West, whose luck is the bestAnd gallantly still they carry itAre pledged to " Old Brains," who first gave them the
reins
Of the victory winning chariot I
Twixt Halleck and Grant half doubting they pant;
And Rosy has friends, I augur,
Despite the mishap which put crape on his cap
By the banks of the Chickamauga.
CHoRus-The lads of the West, &c.
There is Dix and there's Banks who have friends in all
ranks,
They are sons of the blue cap and button:
And with either, you see, any rival would be
Just as dead as a quarther of mutton 1
But in West and in East there's one " black coat" at
least,
Around whom the army might gather"' Uncle Abe," it is you, honest, kindly and trueTo us boys you have been as a father I
CHoRvs —There is Dix and there's Banks, &c.
1HOW  ARE TEINGS IN NEW  YORK 
Mr. Seward was anxious to know how things were
going in New York.  He had been gratified to see




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        189
that in the November contest the Tammany and
Mozart majority of over thirty thousand last year,
had been so badly pulled down that one of their
judicial candidates-Fernando Wood's brother-inlaw-had been defeated; and that Judge McCunn,
who was another, only claimed some fifty majority,
while the impression was universal that his rival,
Bosworth, had been defrauded out of a large legitimate majority by cheating in the Sixth ward.
Private O'Reilly answered that the Milesian settlement in question was "doin' as well as could be
expected," as the gossips said when a lady was so
ill that she could never be better until after she'd
been worse. The few natives that were in the upper
and western reserves of the island were kindly
and humanely treated, "purvided only that they
voted -the reg'lar dimmycratic ticket and never
axed for any places of official thrust." The same
generous treatment had heretofore been extended to
the Germans; but since they had set up a candidate
of their own, in the person of Mr. C. Godfrey
Gunther, they would hereafter be strictly confined, by order of the Common -Council, to making
bologna sausages, pretzel bunns, lager bier and rag
picking.  The managers of the Tammany-Mozart




190           THE ADVENTURES OF
machines had brought things down to such a fine
point that all nominations were now settled by a
sociable game of," spoilt five" or " beggar-me-neighbor"-and faix! it was beggarin' the citizens, they
was, at a two-forty rate, wid their tails over the
dasher! "They tossed coppers for judgeships, dhrew
sthraws for the State Legislature, and declared political death aginst anybody that wouldn't' go straight'
for their swindles. In ordher to give his misfortunate
frind Luke Clark-as good a fellow at bottom, Misther
Chase, as ever shuk toe at a wake or exercised his
shillelagh and the privilege of a citizen at a primary
election-he would now ask this honorable company
to hear from Mr. Clark a song composed by Thomas
Whelan, Esq., better known as'Irish Tom,' who
kept a whiskey coffee-house just opposite Collector
Barney's Asylum for incurable imbeciles-it-was, of
course, the Custom House he meant."  (Laughter
and applause.)
MR. LUKE CLARK'S SECOND SONG.
Mr. Luke Clark thanked the company in general,
and Misther Chase in particular, for the ginerosity and
kindliness with which he was thrated. It would be
well for Misther Sam Barlow to keep out of the way




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        191
of his shillelagh when he got back to New York. It
was down on the knees of his heart, he was axin'
their pardon for his error; and now he'd like to tell
them who Tom Whelan was before he gev them his
song.  Tom  was a mimber of the Ancient and
Honorable Society of St. Tammany. He had been
a brave, with scalps at his girdle, whin the present
Grand Sachems, Wiskinkies and Sagamores were no
more than little papooses, swung in baskets over the
backs of their mother-squaws. Tom had dhrunk as
often from  the Big Spring as ayther War Horse
Purdy or Colonel Dan Delavan, that used to be City
Inspecther. He had smoked the calumet in the best
days of the party, and had hunted in their " Happy
Huntin' Grounds."  This song was a lament for the
Tammany Society, addressed to Tom's great friend,
Frank Boole, who is a good fellow at bottom, and a
sound war dirmmycrat, and who is supposed to be no
more in love wid the "Raffle Managers" than Tom
himself.  Mr. Clark then cleared his throat and
commenced roaring to the air of "' The Widdy
ZMcGinness's Raffle:"



192              THE ADVENTURES OF
THE LAMENT OF ST. TAMMANY.
Och, the times they are changed since as brothers we ranged,
Through our huntin' grounds happy and glorious;
When around the Big Spring every man was a king,
And the fun it was fast and uproarious;
Och, it's then we wor " braves," but it's now we are slaves,
Rough ridden at that wid a snaffle;
But our riders we'll taich, ere the goal they can raich,
We know tricks just worth two of their " raffle."
So sing this chorious, in pure Greek, gintlemin:
Sing Fal lal de ral al, &c.
God be wid the ould times, may they long live in rhymes,
Whin within the Ould Wigwam assembled,
Round the Council Fire set as full ayquils we met,
And before no Conthroller we thrembled I
0, them times will come back, or the thraces will crack,
And the coach be upset in the gravel;
For come good or come ill, curse the wan of us will
Submit any more to the " raffle I"
So sing, gintlemin, this chorious in choice Italian:
Fal de lal de ral al, &c.
0, we all lost a friend wid Bill Kennedy's end,
Thrue, honest, clear-headed, and hearty;
Little cared he for pelf; he was not for himself,
But was first and was last for the party I




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.              193
0, soft on yer breast may the green verdure rest,
Poor Bill I though aginst you they cavilThese dogs, without soul, who now seek to conthrol
Our party by mayns of their " raffle."
So sing, tindherly and slowly, boys dear, this German chorious:
Fal de lal de ral, &c.
Take hands all around, let the melody sound,'We are thrue to the flag and the nation;
Now let aich lift in air his good right hand, and swear
Never more to submit to dictation I
To the divil we fling all the men of the "ring,"
WIho the party would bridle and snaffle;
And, if worst comes to worst, the " machines" will be burstAind'tis we, boys, will hold the next raffle!
And, honeys, that sintimint is so thruly American, that we'll
join in this native American chorious:
Fal de lal ral de lal, &c.
Loud applause and laughter greeted this song, Mr.
Chase sending his regards to Irish Tom and hoping
that Father Murphy could give absolution to Mir.
Clark for his many sins, as easily as he ([r. Chase)
gave him absolution for his greenback ditty.(Laughter.)
Mr. Lincoln.-If Father Murphy could include
Private  O'Reilly in the same absolution, having
special reference to the Lord Palmerston and Mrs.
9




194           TIE ADVENTURES OF
O'Kane song, it should not be forgotten. (Loud
Laughter.)
THE COUNT MERCIER'S SPEECH-A WAR CLOUD WITH
GREAT BRITAIN.
The Count Mercier now pulled out his watch, and
declared that the supreme, the ineffable, the inevitable moment had arrived! Standing here in the
midst of the centuries-all the traditional splendors
of the past pressing in upon his mental vision, and
with all the possible glories of a French future for
Mexico crowding with supernal presences and diaphoretic radiances in the foreground of his unutterable thoughts; thus standing, but not insensible to
the material necessities on which French valor and
French glory have their most enduring base, it became his duty to tell them that the supreme moment
of dinner had arrived; and, as Madame the Comtesse
had promised bully beef, fricaseed frogs and an oyster
stew, he could by no means refuse to assist at the
celebration domestigupe. Among the treasured memories of his future life should be the inconspicuous
but not undelighted part which in this meeting he
had borne. He would transmit to the XJemoire -Dip2lomatique his little joke about Lord Palmerston.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        195
To his Imperial Majesty the Emperor, he would
transmit Private O'Reilly's views about the succession; and it was his trust that the good fellowship of
this interview would obviate any difficulties between
the government which he had the honor to represent, and that of which, by many inches, Mr. Lincoln
was the highest coronal. He would shake Private
O'Reilly's hand! France thus embraced Hibernia!
The Gauls and the Celts should be brothers; for they
had a common faith, a common enemy. (Here he
glanced towards Lord Lyons.) In this league of the
Latin peoples, would not America join?  It would
be a point to rivet the eye of all history if Mr. Lincoln would condescend to take hands all round with
Private O'Reilly and the speaker, as typical of the
trinal unity and reconsolidated solidarity of the Latin
race! If in this position they could dance the cancan
together, singing as they circled round mourir pour
Za patrie, and auxo armes, auk armed, mres braves, he
thought the gigantic illustration of a mighty inter
national thought would be complete. (Deep emotion,
Lord Lyons very red, and making furious notes of the
Count Mercier's words for transmission to his gov
ernment.)  Count Mercier saw what Lord Lyons
was doing, and hurled against the implied threat of




i96          THE ADVENTURES OF
English wrath that embalmed sublimity-that titanic
but unspeakable word which, on the authority of
Victor Hugo, in his book " Les Miserables," Colonel
Cambronne, at the head of the last square of the old
Imperial Guard at Waterloo, hurled against the English general who asked him to surrender.
aM. LINCOLN INTERFERES.
Mr. Lincoln begged the Count would not utter the
word in question. As to dancing, he never danced.
As to his being a candidate for re-election, that reminded him of what old Jesse Dubois once said to
an itinerant preacher. Jesse, as State Auditor of
Illinois, had charge of the State House at Springfield. The preacher asked the use of it for a lecture.
"On what subject a" asked Jesse. "On the Millerite
second coming of our Saviour," answered the longfaced man.'" O,bosh," retorted Uncle Jesse, testily;
"I guess if our Saviour had ever been to Springfield,
and had got away with his life, he'd be too everlasting smart to think of coming here again."' This was
very much his case about the succession. As he saw
they were buttoning up to go away, he would not
seek to detain them-more especially as Louis Burg



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        197
dorf had been making secret signs to him through
the half open door, for the last half hour, that Mrs.
Lincoln and the children would have cold turkey for
their Thanklsgiving dinner if he didn't cross over to
the other side of the building. Good day, gentlemen [to the diplomatic corps and mnenmbers of his
Cabinet]. General Meagher, you, Private O'Reilly
and Father lMurphy will dine with me. O'Reilly's
suggestion about the double stars shall not be forgotten."




198           THE ADVENTURES OF
CHAPTER X.
MILES O'REILLY IN RICHMOND.
REBEL VIEWS OF HIS RECEPTION BY PRESIDENT DAVIS.
From the Richmond Examiner (Pro-Beauregard anti-Davis organ),
January 9th, 1863.
3ISTORY will witness for us, though the personal
adherents of the President seem unable to appreciate, how much we have borne and forborne
during the last three years in deference to the high
and difficult office of which, to the misfortune of the
Confederacy, Mr. Jefferson Davis is the incumbent.
No imagination can over-estimate the pecks of adverse opinion and the bushels of contempt we have
swallowed in silence, rather than furnish any handle
to the tools and pimps of the administration, for their
oft-repeated and as often refuted slander, that our
course is designed to embarrass the Government,
and furnish aid and comfort to the enemy by a
betrayal of domestic dissensions. It is high time,
indeed, that this cry about " embarrassing the Gov



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         1.99
ernment" should cease. It is, as Edmund Burke
once said,'an attempt to convert the very confession
of imbecility into a buckler against investigation,
and thereby to secure a permanent continuance of
the evil." Such pleas may avail the Yankee tyranny at Washington, but are wholly out of place
amongst the people of this free and enlightened Confederacy. They may do for the organs, journalistic
and Congressional, of the imperial and imperious
despot who rules, reigns and riots over the destinies
of the brutish and degraded North; but we tell Mr.
Davis and his organs that the proud, brilliant, and
chivalrous chieftains of the South despise and defy
all such agencies for the suppression of their honest
convictions.
In silence we have witnessed for over two years
the efforts of our Government to break down and
drive out of our service the General dearest to our
people, and the most trusted champion of their
cause. All know that General Beauregard has been
under the ban of official jealousy ever since the first
great victory of Bull Run. He was sent to coLnmand at Charleston as the readiest means of getting
him out of the way-the calculation being, that if
wooden vessels had forced, with so little loss, the




200           THE ADVENTURES OF
more powerful defences guarding the approaches to
New  Orleans, how little could Beauregard do at
Charleston against the vast flotilla of iron-clads
which Mr. Davis knew, through our friends and
emissaries in the North, to be then preparing for an
attack upon the hated " cradle of Secession."  Over
all these calculations of his enemies, however, the
genius of General Beauregard has triumphed; and
this although the Tredegar foundries, under orders
from our Secretary of War, refused to have cast for
him the larger ordnance his requisitions certified to
be necessary; and even went so far as to delay sending him the ordinary guns already cast until the full
requisitions from every other commander in the field
had been satisfied. Beauregard could not get a
gun until the Davis pet, Pennsylvania Pemberton,
had been supplied with all he needed, to hand over
to the enemy at Yicksburgh. The Davis pet, Braxton Bragg, had also to be supplied with all the heavy
artillery requisite to furnish abundant trophies to the
Yankee Vandals in their entrance upon the various
fortified positions which he successively abandoned.
The defence of New Orleans was intrusted to another Davis pet —'a [New York scavenger named
Mansfield Lovell "-to quote the words of General




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         201
Pemberton - and with what result the country
knows only too sadly!
But history, we say, will witness how patiently we
have thus far kept silence on all the army blunders
which have notoriously either caused our defeats, or
rendered the most splendid achievements of our
valor as fruitless as Lee's victory in the battle of the
Wilderness, called by the Yankees "Chancellorsville;" or Bragg's partial successes-rather an opportunity for a victory than a victory itself-on the
banks of the well-named Chickamauga.
We have seen the Confederacy cut in twain by
the loss of the Mississippi river-the "Scavenger
from New York" surrendering New Orleans without
a blow; a Philadelphia incapable or traitor allowing
himself, with one of our finest armies, to be cooped
up within fortified lines at Vicksburgh, and starved
into surrender by an army in the field, not much, if
at all, superior to his own in numbers. We have
seen Missouri and Arkansas lost by the fatal tendency
of Mr. Davis to allow none but his own creatures to
hold command. Sterling Price, the gallant and
invincible, was superseded by General Heath, of
Virginia; and Heath by Hindman; and Hindman
by half a score of nameless others, who have since
9*




202          THE ADVENTURES OF
drunk themselves to death in bumpers to the health
of Mr. Davis. The thrice chivalrous John Magruder
has been exiled to Texas, with orders to " raise his
own army if he wants one," because he threatened
to break his sword when Yorktown was abandoned
to McClellan without a blow; and because he could
not see Bragg's policy of " falling back without a
fight," whenever the enemy made any demonstration
towards a flanking movement. A fellow called
Finnegan, who talks Connemara Irish and doesn't
know his horse's tail from his sabre, has been left in
command of Florida for the last two years, and
during that whole period has never organized one
single attack upon the enemy, though with a force
outnumbering theirs more than five to one. What
true son of the Sunny South but blushes at our long
record of unvaried disgrace and disaster in North
Carolina?  And now to sum up:Kentucky lost, Missouri lost, Arkansas lost, lNew
Mexico and the Indian Territories lost, Mississippi
lost, Tennessee lost, Alabama threatened and helpless; Georgia, with the foe in overwhelming force
holding possession of her gates; Finnegan drinking whiskey slings with, his staff and playing " oldsledge" on the top of an empty butter-firkin in the




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        203
great Okeefinokee Swamp; North Carolina lying
abject and unresisting before the Yankee raiders;
Mlaagruder without an army to meet Banks in Texas;
Louisiana a prey to bogus conventions in which
4" colored Americans of African descent" are induced
to vote for original signers of the Secession Ordinance; Georgia threatened in rear and neutralized
on her coast-line by the enemy's possession of Fort
Pulaski and the islands commanding the Wassaw
and Ossibaw inlets; Western Virginia created a
new State, and sending anti-slavery representatives
to bow the supple hinges of the knee where thrift
mnay follow fawning; while over all, upon a throne
of Southern skulls-his long limbs swathed in robes
of blood-dyed velvet, and holding the thigh-bone of
Albert Sidney Johnson as a sceptre in his horrid
hands-sits grimly the hideous Fetish who is the
Yankee emperor!
And as if all this were not enough, to all these
natural evils of war, evils of another kind are now
being added, which seem to argue that the intellect
of Mr. Davis is beginning to suffer under the neuralgic attacks which have of late grown so intense that
he is often, his friends say, unable to sleep for as many
as five days and nights in succession I We refer, of




204           THE ADVENTURES OF
course, to the quasi-negotiatiotns which he has allowed
Mr. Ould, our commissioner, to hold with that Federal commander who has earned for himself the bad
eminence of recognition  by the title of' Beast:Butler;"9 and to the still more flagrant folly and disgrace of his having granted a safe conduct -fiolm
Savannah to Richmond, and from  Richmond perhaps outside the Confederate lines, to a vulgar and
insolent Irish Yahoo, who is ostensibly serving as a
private soldier in the Yankee cohorts under General
Gillmore, but to whom, nevertheless, President Davis
has seen fit to accord the honors of an ambassadorial
reception. We refer-and bhlsh as we refer-to
the reception granted by President Davis on last
Sunday evening to private Miles O'Reilly, 47t1
Regiment New York Volunteers, now a part of the
Yankee army of occupation on Morris and Folly
Islands; and to the disgraceful scenes of riot and
open treason, of which that visit was made the occasion, and of which a full report will be found elsewhere in our columns.
And who, we ask, after reading that report, can
blame the "basin cats," the "Screamersville" vagabonds, the low Irish and Germans, and other cancaile
of Butchertown and Rockets, for their unseemly anld




PRIVATE MILES 0 REILLY.         205
scandalous proceedings? Who can wonder when it
was noised abroad that this ridiculous and insulting
envoy had arrived in town and was about to be
received by President Davis, that all the " Union
rats"' should have come out of their holes and hailed
with shouts and cheers, the hope of peace-even on
the basis of " submission"-of which the reception of
such an envoy appeared the certain augury?  To
Major Ben. Humphreys, the late Gen. John B.
Floyd's worthy nephew, for his dignified rebuke to
the self-abasement of Mr. Davis, we are indebted for
the only redeeming feature in this disgraceful episode
of our history. It is the old, old story:- -"Le Roi
s'aamuse.' IHector has lost his wits under wine and
the Trojans suffer.
As to what passed between Mr. Davis and the
envoy of the lWashington tyrant, we, of course, are
not in a position to give particulars if we would, nor
would we if we could. The interview was held in
the family residence of Mr. Davis, and not in the
official chambers of the President of the Confederacy.
Even for this slight favor we are thankful; for it will
argue ill for the South whenever any individual in
the uniform of the abhorred Union is allowed to
stand, except as a manacled prisoner under sentence of




206           THE ADVENTURES OF
death, in the Presidential presence upon Capitol
Hill. As to the premature and indiscreet remarks
indulged in by Colonel L. M. Keitt, Gov. John J.
IlMcRae, Lucius Q. C. Lamar, and Ex-Brigadier, now
Private Pryor, in the bar-room of the Spottiswoode
House —for which, as we learn, they were immediately confined in Castle Thunder —relative to the
passage of an Act declaring Mr. Davis incompetent
by reason of illness, thanking him for his services,
allowing him a handsome pension to reside inEurope,
and appointing Gen. Beauregard to fill the vacancy,
pro tem., we trust that nothing further will be done
-at least at present. If, after full consideration, it be
the judgment of our people that Mr. Davis has
broken down under the burdens of his most onerous
and harassing position, every thing that can be
done should be done, to soften and make graceful
his retirement; and until the people shall have
declared otherwise by vote,Vice President Alexander
Stephens must, to the grief of every true Confederate, be his successor I We speak of "i the people"
in this matter, not of Congress: for it is only too
widely known that a mnajority of that body, either
from weariness of the war, or devotion to the personal fortunes of Mr. Davis, are in favor of submit



PRIVATE ]MILES O'REILLY.       207
ting proposals for Peace and re-Union to the Washington despotism whenever Mr. Jefferson Davis may
either die or be removed.
In conclusion, before quitting this ridiculous and
yet painful subject, let us hope that the advisers of
Mr. Davis will have sense enough in themselves and
weight enough with him, to prevent the return of
this scandalous negotiator to the Federal lines. That
he came under a flag of truce to Savannah, and was
there received by Captain Gordon as a guest in the
headquarters of General Mercer, is deplorably true:
that, under a safe-conduct from President Davis, and
in company with ex-General Gustavus W. Smith
(whom we are surprised to find mixed up in such a
business), he came from Savannah to this city, is also
an unfortunate circumstance that cannot be denied.
But in the inflammatory and diabolical speech which
he made from the stoop of the Exchange Hotel to
the " basin cats" and other vagabonds from Screamersville, Butchertown, and Rockets, who came to
hear and cheer him; and still more in the diabolical
songs with which he favored his congenial admirers
upon that occasion, calling upon our gallant soldiery
to mutiny, kill their officers, hang Congress, lay
down their arms, and then pass quietly under the




208           THE ADVENTURES OF
yoke-the Caudine forks;-by these acts we claim,
and the law of nations will support us in it (see Puffendorf, iTone lI. Cap. 7, Section 25; Vattel, Vol.
5, pages 227-39; and Grotius, De Legibus Belli,
Vol. VI. Cap. 22, Section 3), that he has forfeited
the protection of his ambassadorial character and
safe-conduct; and we agree, at least thus far, with
the gentlemen who have been imprisoned in Castle
Thunder, that this last and worst insult of the tyrant
Lincoln should be resented by the hanging of his
congenial "envoy" on the highest gallows that can
be erected on Capitol HIill; and that, as was done in
the cases of the three Scotch lords-Kilhnarnock,
Cromartie and Balmerino-in the Pretender's IRebellion of 1746, his entrails and heart be then taken out
and burned;-with the difference that, while theirs
were wholly consumed in the fire and their ashes
then scattered to the winds, the intestines and lights
of this miscreant should only be cooked sufficiently
to form a banquet for " Beast Butler," to whom, for
his savory deglutition, they should then be transmitted under flag of truce.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.            209
ANOTHER VIEW OF MILES O REILLY S RECEPTION.
(From the Richmond Enquirer, official organ of Jeft. -Davis.)
JANUARY 10th, 1864.
Our friends of the Examinaer, perhaps thinking it
don't pay to keep cool this cold weather, have worked themselves up into the delirious condition of
brain fever over an incident which has furnished to
minds of better balance the most amusing and exhilarating topic of this carnival week. They see treason, stratagem and bloody spoils in the reception by
President Davis of the latest edition of that magnificent farce-" Our Irish Ambassador."
To the proposition of the Examivner that the " intestines and lights" of Private Miles O'Reilly shall
be cut out, roasted ac la maitre d'hotel, and transmitted to Genelal Butler "for his savory deglutition,"
we are perfectly willing to accede, whenever the
proprietors of the paper in question, and that "' gentleman fromr Ireland" who is their chief writer, will
agree to present the dish in person to Gen. B. F. B.,
as did Herodias the head of John the Baptist to her
mother!
It is an old saying, though we believe only true
of the worst classes of our Mlilesian friends, that




210           THE ADVENTURES OF
Cc you can never put one Irishman on a spit without
finding half a dozen of his fellow-countrymen not
only ready but eager to roast him;" and of this proverb, in its exceptional application, the Examiner's
article upon this ridiculus mus affords a shining
example. All its statements in the case are grossly
erroneous, as we shall show hereafter-the naked facts
that a person named Miles O'Reilly was received
under flag of truce by Gen. Mercer at Savannah,
accompanied to this city by ex-General Gustavus W.
Smith, and that he has here been granted an interview with President Davis alone excepted.
And now let us ask the -Examiner why did it not
protest against the two audiences heretofore granted
by President Davis to Dr. Zacharie, the celebrated
corn-cutter and international negotiator, who has
twice visited the South, ostensibly to see " his poor,
dear old father, who lies (permanently) dying in
Savannah;" but really as a semi-official agent of
the Federal Government?  Rulmor says that Dr.
Zacharie, during his first visit, was a guest on one
occasion at the table of the Examiner people, adding
that he was twice afterwards invited, but would not
go, for the reason that a pickled pig's-head at the
top of the table, pickled pig's feet at the foot, and




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.          211
four thin slices of broiled bacon as the entremets, did
not by any means form a pretty feast to set before a
gentleman of his character.
Again, without going into a discussion of the
obsolete theories laid down by Puffendorf, Grotius,
and the other authorities recited by the Examiner,
can we not admit-the United States being at least
our equal-that President Davis can afford to receive any individual, no matter who or what, that
President Lincoln can afford to send? Sir Walter
Scott was no bad authority upon true chivalry, and
in the mouth of Lord Marmion he has put a quotation completely decisive of this point:" And first I tell thee, haughty peer I
He who does England's message here,
Were he the meanest in her state,
May well, proud Angus! be thy mate."
As for ourselves, between Dr. Zacharie and Private
O'Reilly, we are clearly in favor of the latter. If
we were in the Washington government's place, perhaps neither might be sent; but chacun d son gountas the old woman said when she kissed her cow.
In the Exait;iner's charges that Private O'Reilly
made a speech of the most inflammatory character
to the " basin-cats" and other canaille from Butcher



212           THE ADVENTURES OF
town and Screamersville, "who had assembled to
hear and cheer him;" and that he sang to the same
crowd from the stoop of the Exchange Hotel, songs
advising our gallant soldiers to mutiny, kill their
officers and then submit quietly to the jugurthan
yoke-there is, need we say, not one syllable of
truth? His speech was purely humorous in character, and-as we have heard from  some who were
present-in very excellent taste for the occasion, all
subjects of difference-being avoided as much as possible. He spoke with true Irish pathos of former
happy days in the South, through which, it appears,
he roamed pretty extensively, some ten years ago,
as " deputy aide-de-camp " to a Yankee pedlar of
cheap jewelry, gold pens and other " notions."
The song about Northern and Southern soldiers
was given on the invitation of Messrs. Boteler, Brokenborough, De Jarnette and other gentlemen of
equally high character, who had collected on the
Exchange stoop to hear and be amused; and if he
did wrong in singing it, he erred on the invitation
of gentlemen whose loyalty to the Confederate flag
is, to say the very least, as unimpeachable as that of
the Examiner. The main part of his audience, we
may here say, were neither " basin-cats," nor ca



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        213
naille, but out-door hospital-patients and veterans
fromr Lee's army home on furlough. Will our citi.
zens believe that to such an audience any song of
the kind described by the Examiner could be sung
with impunity?
So far was this lyric from containing anything improper for Southrons to hear from  a Northern
soldier, that we gladly print it, as a refutation of
the ETxaminer's slander, from a copy in the hands of
Gen. Winder, who has charge of Private O'Reilly
at the Exchange Hotel. To our way of thinking, it
shows a kindlier feeling on the part of our Northern
foemen to the soldiers of the South, than we were
prepared to expect; and if such be-as Private
O'Reilly claims-a fair example of the sentiments
of the great mass of the Federal " blue-bellies," it
evinces, we think, a disposition towards a restoration
of Peace and Brotherhood, on terms not only honorable and just to both sides, but also presenting a
dream of " Universal Dominion," which we know
to have long lain close to the hearts of the whole
American people before the commencement of this
unhappy civil war.
Of this lyric Private Miles denies tile authorship,
saying that it was written by " a great scholar all




214            THE ADVENTURES OF
out,"' named Corporal Tracy, who is now, or was
when Miles last heard from  him, senior orderly at
Gen. John A. Logan's head-quarters. Tracy, it appears, was badly wounded at Gettysburgh, and had
to lie for some weeks in a field-hospital, wherein
Confederate and Union soldiers were mixed np indiscriminately. It was there and thus that Tracy
wrote; and as his verses were sung by Private
O'Reilly to the air of "Jamie's on the Stormy Sea,"
there were many kindling eyes and heaving hearts
amongst the veterans in his audience. It was entirely pathetic, and yet entirely manly. The vieux
moustaches, familiar with the sounds of battle, caught
the echoes of old fights in all its swelling lines and
sinking cadences; and the suggestion in the last
stanza that North and South should reunite to wipe
out our " common wrongs" with France and England, was rapturously applauded.
He called it:
TEHE BLUE-BELLIES TO THE GREY-BACKS.
A DREAM OF UNIVERSAL DOMINION.
Men who have, in many a battle,
Made the hail round either rattle,
Keeling over men and cattle,
Souls and bullets on the wing;



PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.                215
Must this war, its woes expanding,
Still be pushed, fresh lives demanding,
We like gladiators standing
Elbow-bloodied in the ring?
Grape-shot rustling, bullets singing,
Round shot humming, orders ringing,
And our torn, loved flags a-swinging,
Forward in the fiery gales;Bugles fiercely, sharply sounding,
Sheets of flame the sight confounding,
And, o'er all, the heavy pounding
Of the red artillery flails I
Brethren, thus we stand confronted,
Every bayonet forward slanted,
Tired and bloody but undauntedShall the work again begin?
Shall the cry again be slaughter,
Your blood, our blood shed like waterPitiless and useless slaughter,
In a fight ye cannot win?
Curse the symbols that divide us,
Folly and fraud alone divide us,
Brethren, join us-stand beside usBoth have wrongs to wipe away;
All our feuds forgotten, ended,
Let our flag, with forces blended,
O'er the world, serene and splendid,
Henceforth bear imperial sway I




216           THE ADVENTURES OF
As to the "premature and indiscreet remarks"
made by Messrs. [Keitt, Lamar, Curry, McRae, and
Private Roger A. Pryor in the bar-room of the
Spottiswoode House, relative to deposing President
Jeff. Davis and elevating General Beauregard to his
place, we have little to say at present-except to
express our sincere joy that this scheme, so long
festering in the minds of that little clique represented by the Examiner, has thus been brought to a
head that can be seen and punctured. For Col. Keitt
we are sorry.  As commander of Fort WVagner, he
fought bravely and held out with conspicuous resolve. McRae and Curry have of late so broken
down their constitutions, that whiskey takes effect
on them after the second quart-a thing it never did
before. Lamar is a hot-headed and shallow dreamer,
whose appointment as Professor of Philosophy by
the Mississippi University, was one of the most
magnificent satires ever devised against the miserable muddle and trash of ethical and metaphysical
acquirements. As to Pryor, formerly a Brigadier,
but reduced for sufficient cause to the ranks, he is a
born and bred conspirator-a natural Marat, to whom
no mercy should be shown; and in his case we
respectfully urge that President Davis owes it to




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        217
the country to apply the advice given gratis by the
Examiner in regard to the hanging of Private
O'Reilly, and the burning by the common hangman
of his lights and bowels. When executions of this
just character begin, we caution all the rest of the
Anti-Davis people not to be found too near the
gallows 1
Of the only other song given by Private Miles
O'Reilly, from the stoop of the Exchange Hotel, we
have just received a copy from Mayor Mayo, who
was also one of the 1" basin-cat " audience described
by the Examiner. This song is said to be the work
of a Yankee officer attached to the Ordnance Corps,
named Horace Porter, whose Teutonic version of
" King Dickey de tree times "-Shakespeare's Richard the Third,-as given in a Dutch district of
Pennsylvania-will long be remembered by all our
young West Pointers who were Cadets at the same
time with Captain Porter. Private Miles sang the
words with great spirit and tenderness to the air of
"Napoleon's March," the soldiers in his audience
appearing much pleased with it, and giving it an enthusiastic encore. He called it:
10




218              THE ADVENTURES OF
THE REVIEW.
A PICTURE OF OUR VETERANS.
"Morituri te salutant,"
Say the soldiers as they pass;
Not in uttered words they say it,
But we feel it as they pass;
"We, that are about to perish,
We salute you as we pass I"
Gallant chiefs their swords presenting,
Trail them proudly as they pass;
Battle banners, torn and glorious,
Dip, saluting, as they pass:
Brazen clangors shake the welkin
As the marching columns pass.
Naught of golden pomp, or glitter,
Marks the veterans as they pass;
Travel-stained, but bronzed and sinewy,
Firmly, proudly on they pass;
And we hear them-" Morituri
Te salutant," as they pass.
On his pawing steed the General
Scans the waves of men that pass;
And his eyes at times are misty,
Then are blazing as they pass;
And his breast with pride is heaving
As the stalwart veterans pass.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY,             219*    *   *    *   *   *    *   *   a   *
Oh, our comrades I gone before us
In the last review to pass,
Never more to earthly chieftain
Dipping colors as you pass; —
Heaven accord you gentle judgment
When before its Throne you pass I
To the souls of all our perished
We, who still saluting, pass,
Dip the flag and trail the sabre
As with wasted ranks we pass; —
And we murmur, " Morituri
Vos salutant," as we pass I
To whatever of "high treason against the Confederacy" the Examinzer can find in this last quaint
and uncouth, but touching and soldierly song, we
bid it welcome. Already it is on the lips and in the
hearts of many of our veterans; and we believe
they will fight none the worse for it when Lee's or
Johnson's bugles again arouse them to strike tents,
pack ten days' rations, and march northward or
westward to repel the foul Yankee invader.
In the mission of Private O'Reilly we see the
rays, and the only rays yet vouchsafed to our straining sight, of a peaceful dawn. When the Yankee




220           THE ADVENTURES OF
Government sends us an. Envoy of this kind, it is
proof that it must be thinking of making, of its own
motion, some concessions of one sort or the other,
while officially demanding of us absolute submission.
In a word, Mr. Lincoln appears ready, if we can
judge from the tone of his only accredited minister,
Private Miles O'Reilly, to " build a bridge of gold"
for our leaders to retreat over. He will at least give
them a canoe to go ashore on, before asking them
to scuttle their own ship and let her sink, without
further effort, into the darkness and oblivion which
are the ineed of all unsuccessful great national
struggles.




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.         221
CHAPTER XI.
MILES  O'REILLY AT FORTRESS MONROE.
(Suppressed Dispatch to the N;. Y Herald.)
FORTRESS MONROE, January 18, 1864.
Y the flag of truce boat " New York," from City
Point, this morning arrived  Private Miles
O'Reilly, 47th Regiment New York Volunteers, en
route from Richmond to Washington'with important
dispatches. Private O'Reilly appears in good health
and remarkably good appetite-the latter probably
a result of his brief sojourn within the Confederate
lines. He says himself that he "6 was treated as well
as they knew how, and could afford, poor craythurs;" and that his heart bled for many of them
whom he had known in better and more peaceful
times. Of their condition, or what he thinks of the
treatment of our prisoners, he will give no picture,
indignantly spurning all questions, on the ground
that his appointment as the successor of Dr. Zacharie
has placed him in a confidential position between




222           THE ADVENTURES OF.Mr. Jefferson Davis and His Excellency the President of the United States; and that what he has
seen and heard " is the business of them two, and of
no one else whatsumdever."
Immediately on the arrival of Private O'Reilly
he was surrounded by a vast crowd of soldiers,
citizens and sailors, who cheered him vociferously,
calling —some for a speech, others for a song; but to
none of these requests would he accede. Shaking
hands with all, but elbowing his way vigorously
through them, and towards the sally-port of the
Fortress, he was at length released by the interposition of Colonel J. Wilson Shaffer, Chief of Staff to
General Butler, who took him in charge, and ordered
the assemblage to fall back-a mandate enforced by a
sergeant and squad of men sent down to compel order.
Private O'Reilly was introduced to General But-i
ler by Colonel Shaffer, who said that he had known
Miles for years, having formerly had him under his
command in Missouri, Kansas and the Indian Territories-under Fremont in the former Department;
and, in the latter, about the time that Colonel (now
General) Canby made his gallant fight, and suffered
so severely, at the battle of Fort Craig.
General Butler said he was glad to see Private




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        223
Miles, and immediately ordered Colonel Shaffer to
prepare a special dispatch steamer to carry the new
" Envoy Extraordinary"-General Butler said " extraordinary envoy"-to Baltimore, where a special
train for Washington would be in waiting. " No
one can tell, Shaffer," said General Butler, "what's
going to be the upshot of this Miles O'Reilly business!  He is worth a dozen Zacharies; and the
rebels may have' acknowledged the corn' to him
which they concealed from the corn-cutter."  With
these words General Butler withdrew O'Reilly into
his private office, from which they did not again
emerge until Colonel Shaffer tapped at the door and
reported the dispatch-boat nearly ready.
By this time the whole garrison had assembled in
front of the General's headquarters; and the appearance on the stoop of Private Miles in company with
General Butler, was the signal for a burst of cheering that made the welkin ring. " Order him to
speak, General-order him to sing," were the prevailing cries, mingled with cheers for "Butler,"
"Honest Old Abe," "General Grant," "Little
Mac," "Sal. Chase," "Admiral Du Pont," and other
eminent characters who live in the hearts of the
soldiery and people.




224           THE ADVENTURES OF
General Butler, introducing }Miles, desired them to
know that he had seen Private O'Reilly before. It
was at the Charleston Convention, where Miles had
been "going his millions better with nary a pair 
on the lamented Stephen A. Douglas; while he (Gen.
Butler), in company with the late Isaac I. Stevens,
then delegate from Oregon, was working like a beaver
for Breckinridge (groans), or whomsoever else the
"black squadron of the Gulf States" would agree
upon as their candidate. (Dead silence.) His friend
Gen. Stevens had since been paid with a bullet
through his brain for that attempted service to the
cause of the South. He was shot while carrying the
colors of the 79th New York Ilighlanders-his old
regiment —in an attempt to retrieve Gen. Pope's
disasters in front of Washington. (Loud cheers.)
As for himself (Gen. Butler), he had seen the error
of his ways and claimed that he had brought forth
fruits meet for repentance.: (Loud laughter and
cheers.) It was now his chief regret that his old
friend and co-operator, Caleb Cushing, still remained
in a condition of Egyptian darkness-at least, had
returned to that condition ever since Mr. Lincoln had
refused his repeated applications for a Brigadier's
commission; and ever since he had realized how




PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.        225
much money could be made by prosecuting claims
against Uncle Sam in the interest of the shoddy contractors and copperheads.  (Laughter and cheers
renewed.)
General Butler would only further remark, before
introducing to his audience Private O'Reilly, that
he had often been struck by recognising amongst the
names of the anti-Douglas leaders in the Charleston
Convention, nearly all those arch-villains upon whom
the hand of Heaven and an outraged country now
presses with heaviest terrors. (Loud cheers.) Some
of them lie in bloody and nameless graves-and
these are the happiest. Some are exiles in Europe,
penniless, despised, and without hope-Uncle Sam's
soldiers in possession of their palaces and plantations; themselves the laughing-stock of diplomacy.
Some have drunk, and others are drinking themselves
to death-seeking in oblivion, at any cost, an escape
from tile haunting spectres of the human hecatombs
that have been sacrificed to their ambition. (Sensation and applause.) Upon the brows of all, the
brands of the wrath of God and man are visibly
imprinted. Famished, ragged, hollow-eyed, foot-sore,
and fainting, the few survivors of the original conspiracy at Charleston now drag themselves round
their desolated country at the head of diminishing




226        PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.
legions-cursed everywhere in the hearts of their
less guilty, because more ignorant dupes; and terrified by the vision in a near future of that Divine
Retribution which gave up to the guillotine in Paris,
and by the very hands of the Jacobin-mob who had
been their frenzied idolators and instruments-the
authors of the worst infamies of the Reign of Terror.
(Sensation and cheering.) General Butler would
now introduce Private Miles O'Reilly, 47th Regiment
New York Volunteers, who could only address them
very briefly, the steamer being nearly if not quite
ready; and O'Reilly's business with the President
(loud cheers) being of a kind that could not be
delayed. (Cheers, and a voice: "Nine times nine
for our next President.")
Private Miles, on stepping forward, thanked General Butler and Col. Shaffer for their kindness,
which he regarded as wholly undeserved by any
thing he had done or could do. [Loud cries of
"You're too modest, Miles," and laughter.] Of
how he had come to be within the Rebel lines,
and how hle had got out of them, the bundle of
Southern papers he had brought would give theln
particulars, if they would only read "Extracts fronm
the Southern press," in the next day's Herald. But




THE ADVENTURES OF            227
on his way that morning in the flag-of-truce boat
from City Point, he had picked up an old New York
paper containing a debate in the Senate of the
United States that " made a fool of all the other debates " he had ever seen. " To the rare-open ordher
-march," shouted he in stentorian accents. " Prepare for review! It isn't a review of yourselves,
boys, I mane, so don't be pullin' your white cottons
out of your pockets; but it's a review of that illusthrious Conschrip Father, who is opposed to axin' any
questions of Uncle Gid., as to how be spinds the nate
little sum of nearly two hundhred millions a year, for
a navy that can't catch the'Alabama;' while at the
same time, this same Conschrip Father-an' I wish
he was conschripted wid all my heart-is in favor of
again cuttin' down the pay of our oficers,-and this
although they are now paid in a currency that isn't as
good by a long sight as its face!" In honor of this
conscript Father, he would give them  a song,
written by Captain De Lancy Rochford, of the Invalid Corps, formerly of the Irish Brigade,-only
premising for the benefit of such misfortunates as
hadn't had the privilege of being born in Ireland,
that the words of the chorus, "L2a bouchCal dlhas
cruithlin amoe," meant " My pretty boy milking his




228         PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.
cow," as "Ma colleen dhas," in the original, meant
the other gender. He begged all present to join him
in the chorus, which should be accompanied by the
gesture of' milking," and which must be pronounced as if spelled: "6 3a boohal tha crooveen acmoe."
[Uproarious laughter and cries of "We will that,
Miles."]  "Just to think of it," continued Private
O'Reilly, waxing indignant, " just to think that while
the financial stump-tail only yields us a swill-milk
currency, not only is the army to suffer from  the
natural wakeness of the demoralized liquid, but even
the small quantity honestly due us is to be cut down!'
[Loud cries of "6 Grimes shan't do it, Miles," &c.]
"So now, boys," resumed Miles, "get your right
hands ready for milkin', and when I give the signal
for the chorious, rattle down the fluid lively into your
tin pails. I tell yez all, that no candydate need
hereafther apply for the Irish vote, or the army or
navy vote, who can't sing this song and give the pure
Greek chorious its thrue Athaynian accintuation."
A HEALTH TO THE MAN FROM I-OW-A.
AIR:-ShYe Pretty Boy Milking his Cow.
Here's a health to the man from I-ow-a,
The popular saver o' dimesl




THE ADVENTURES OF                   229
On the thrumpet o' fame let us blow a
Loud paean in honor o' Grimes!
Wid his hand on the navy's full uddher,
He can make the crame goldenly flow,
Of Gid's ark he's the pilot an' ruddher,
Ma bouchal dhas cruithin amoe I
Chorus (all milking as if for dear life),
Wid his hand on the Navy's full uddher
He can make the crame goldenly flow,
Of Gid's ark he's the pilot an' ruddher,
Ma bouchal dhas cruithin amoe I
His frindship for Gid is amazin',
The navy's defects must be hid,
For he shwears'tis misprishin o' thrayson
To ax any questions o' Gid:But he'll pinch from the Captains an' Kurnils,
Some quarthers an' dimes, as we know,
An' be puffed by " intilligent journals,"
Ma bouchal dhas cruithin amoe I
Chorus (milking hard and rattling the fluid
down into their tin pails as directed),
But he'll pinch, from the Captains an' Kurnils,
Some quarthers an' dimes, as we know,
An' be puffed by " intilligent journals,"
Ma bouchal dhas cruithin amoe I
Poor divils who wear sash an' sabre,
Prepare to be docked o' your dimes —




230          PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.
What is all your hard fightin' and labor,
Compared wid the value o' Grimes?
Republics we know are desaytefulThe story was told long agoBut Gid is both mighty an' grateful,
Ma bouchal dhas cruithin amoe I
Chorus (milking as if resolved to pull the
teats off the imaginary stump tail),
Republics we know are desaytefulThe story was told long agoBut Gid is both mighty an' grateful,
Ma bouchal dhas cruithin amoe.
Never was song a greater success than this, despite the very execrable and Fort Lafayetty "tang"
that was in some of what Ben. Shillaber, as "Mrs.
Partington" would call-" its seditionary sediments."
The audience "milked" and roared until the very
sentinels caught the infection and shook all over as
they presented arms to passing double-rows of buttons. Gen. Butler had a cough so violent that it
compelled him to cover his face with his handkerchief. Col. Shaffer took refuge behind a pillar, and
internally determined that Miles should some day or
other be his guest " at Freeport, Illinoy"-of which
rising, but not yet quite risen town, he was mayor,
sheriff, county clerk, register, and both boards of the




THE ADVENTURES OF            231
common council at last advices. It is even said that
an orderly sergeant of the regular army-that stateliest and most solemn of created beings-was observed to bite very hard on a bullet which he carries round in his pocket to guard against the rare
temptation of a smile: but even the bullet couldn't
save him. He firstsmiled, then grinned; and finally
the infection of the universal " milking" so carried
him away, that he was actually seen to pull the imaginary teat of the Treasury stump-tail no less than
thrice during the third chorus 
Emerging at last from behind the pillar, Col. Shaffer was understood to observe-running his fingers
wildly through his hair as he spoke-that the song
was improper, and should not have been sung. It
was a thing to be deplored. [Here the Colonel
choked, coughed, and blew his nose.] He had no
time, however, to call their attention at present to
that portion of the "Revised Army Regulations"
applying to the case. The steamboat was waiting;
the President was waiting; the Country was waiting; and Private Miles had no time to lose. On
behalf of General Butler, who had retired, he thanked the crowd for their conduct-with the exception
of their having laughed at a chorus (here the Colonel




232        PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.
"milked") which should rather have moved their
tears. [Loud laughter, the crowd recommencing to
"milk" and again shouting "Ma bouchal dhas cruithin amoe!"] All present would now retire, while
he and Private O'Reilly made their way to the boat.
UIpon this Colonel R. M. Hough, of Chicago, stepped
forward and shook Private O'Reilly by the hand.
"Miles," said he-with many expletives omitted —
"Miles, I love you. You've a heart bigger, Miles,
than any steer I ever slaughtered. I've killed and
packed more steers in my time, and I've had more
bullets fired at me at one moment, than any other
man this side of-no matter where! But amongst
all the steers, Miles, and I've weighed their hearts,
there never was a bigger heart than yours I" [Applause from the crowd, Colonel Hough being now at
the Fortress filling a beef contract.]  "Before he
goes, Shaffer, I've one favor to ask: that you'll give
him time for a song that I hear he once wrote about
some celebrated steers in South Carolina. If you'll
only do this, old fellow, I'll stand two baskets 1"
Colonel Shaffer consented-the more readily, as the
dispatch-boat had not yet completed her coaling.
"Now fire away, Miles," urged the impatient Hough.
"I've had onee to run Shaffer and a saw-mill, Gen.




THE ADVENTURES OF             2o3
Benham and a coal-yard, all four together; I've had
a horse fall under me with sixteen bullets in his body,
twenty-two bullets through my clothes, and only a
scratch on my sitting-machine. I've charged on
horseback into the sea to fight an iron-clad; but" —
and here the Colonel became very energetic in his
assurances-" a song from you about a live steer,
or a dead steer for the matter of that, would more
than repay me for all I have been, and done, and
suffered in the suppression of this most foul and
unnatural rebellion."
Private O'Reilly, whose face brightened up at the
hint about "two baskets," briefly explained that the
South Carolina " steer" happened to be a 6" bull;"
and the only bull, on the authority of a celebrated
elderly and philanthropic lady, to be found in all
the Sea-Islands of the Southern coast at the time of
his lamented decease. Certain straggling soldiers
had crossed over from St. Helena to Lady's Island one
day, and in sport had made beef of the bull. [Laughter.] Not such "' prime mess," to be sure, as Col.
Hough was in the habit of slaughtering, but ordinary
army beef-or beef without much bleeding, by the
process of bullets. It was to lay before General
Hunter this disaster to the cows under her charge, that




234          PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.
the eminent philanthropic lady, already referred to,
next morning wrote and sent to Head Quarters of
the Department the subjoined elegy, which (as alleged) she offered to appear and sing, if so desired,
to the air that " The Old Cow died of." It was called,:
THE BUTCHERED BULL.
A BALLAD OF LADY'S ISLAND.
Dear General H., my heart is full
Lamenting for my butchered bull;
The only bull our islands had,
And all my widowed cows are sad.
With briny tears and drooping tails,
And loud boo-hoos and bovine wails,
My kine lament with wifely zeal
Their perished hopes of future veal.
Sad is the wail of human wife
To see her partner snatched from life;
But he, the husband of a score,
For him the grief is more and more I
Henceforth no hope of golden creamEven milk in tea becomes a dream;
Whey, bonnyclabber, cheese and curds,
Are now, ah, me I mere idle words.




THE ADVENTURES OF                  235
The cruel soldiers, fierce and full
Of reckless wrath, have shot my bull;
The stateliest bull-let scoffers laughThat e'er was " Father" called by calf.
A bull as noble, firm and fair
As that which aided Jove to bear
Europa from the flowery glade
Where she, amidst her maidens, played.
So, General dear, accept my vows,
And oh I take pity on my cows,
With whom, bereft of wifely ties,
All tender hearts must sympathize.
Quick to the North your order send
(By Smith's congenial spirit penned),
And order them, in language full,
At once to send me down a bull:If possible, a youthful beast,
With warm affections yet unplaced,
Who to my widowed cows may prove
A husband of undying love.
The recitation  of this elegy concluded, Private
O'Reilly, preceded by Colonels Shaffer and Hlough,
made his way to the steamboat pier, and was soon
en route for Washington, charged with information
for the President, and carrying with him  renewed




236        PRIVATE MILES O'REILLY.
pleasant recollections of " life at old Point Comfort."
To the President and Congress we now commit himl
and the important "'Proposals for Peace," about
which Mr. Fernando Wood is continually raving in
Congress, and of which, we assure him, Miles
O'Reilly is the only authorized bearer.
What these " Peace" proposals are, it is for Mr.
Lincoln to explain, whenever such explanation can
be given "consistently with the public interests."
In 3Mr. Lincoln's hands we are well assured, that,
whenever the negotiation ripens to a consistency
that will give us back "Peace with the Union,"
all minor points of difference or difficulty will be
ignored. The cocoa-nut will be laid, in its layers of
native packing, upon the Speaker's desk. Messrs.
Anson Herrick, of New York, better known as "the
Deacon;" and S. S. Cox, of Ohio, better known
as " Sun-Set," will be appointed a Committee of two
to piece one of the eyes of the fruit, and let not
only Fernando, but all the country, taste its milk!
Private O'Reilly will then appear as "C ma bouchal
dhas cruithin" his cocoanut-there being no word
in Holy Irish for this heathen fruit; and, with both
houses of Congress singing, sipping, and "milkings"
Brother Ben will lie down with Owen Lovejoy; Mr.




PRIVATE MILES 09REILLY.        23T
Holman, of Indiana, take Thad. Stevens of Pennsylvania as the partner of his couch; while Sunset
Cox will get astride of war-horse Gurley, and allow
that mild but mettled animal to snuff " Peace
anear" with the same keen nostrils that were once
distended in the task of snuffing battles-at a distance! The golden age will return, and Mr. Chase
will re-employ Jay Cooke & Co. in buying up greenbacks all over the country, giving twenty-three dollars and fifty cents in gold for every ten dollars'
worth of the verdant paper that has on it the quaint
signature of General Spinner. For this agency the
patriotic financiers named will charge nothing; after
which, it will only remain to proclaim that the  Millennium which was to have arroven, has arriv; and
that Private Miles O'Reilly, 47th Regiment New
York Volunteers, has been its prcesidizum et dulce
decus-at once its poet and its prophet I
THE END.








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