his command of the Rapparoarer Tigers.
These redoubtable volunteers were (of course)
the ægis of the Union, and the terror of
Buffum County. On fourth of July day they
fired off so many rounds of musketry that
their eventually blowing themselves up with
gunpowder was thought to be by no means a
matter of extreme improbability. The
Rapparoarer Screamer newspaper teemed with
cards headed "Rapparoarer Tigers, attention!"
and commanding the attendance of the corps at
reviews, burials or weddings of members, or
political meetings. Colonel Quagg, in his
Tiger uniform, at the head of his corps, vowing
vengeance against the Punkington National
Guards, the Lower Whittle Fire Corps; the
Squashborough Invincibles; the Bunkum
Defenders; the East Halleluia Hussars.
Between which last-named volunteers and the
Tigers there had occurred a deadly fray at
the corners of Seventh Street and Slog
Avenue, Punkington: the Hussars being at
last obliged to take refuge in a liquor-store in
the next block, and two eyes and unnumbered
double teeth being left on the field. Colonel
Quagg brandishing his sabre and threatening
gouging, cowhiding, and etarnal chawing up to
creation in general and rival militia and tire
corps in particular, was a great and glorious
sight to see once, perhaps twice, but not
oftener; for the sun at noon-day dazzles, and
distance lends enchantment to the voice of a
powder magazine, or Vesuvius, or a mad
dog.

Colonel Quagg had neither wife nor
relations, chick nor child. He lived behind the
smithy, in a grim cabin; where, for aught
anybody knew he slept on the bones of his
enemies, or kept bears and wolves, or burned
brimstone and Bengal lights in his fire-place.
Where he was raised was not certain. What
he did on Sundays (for he never went to
church or meeting, and could not, in deference
to our citizens, work in his smithy on the
Sabbath) was not known. There were but
two things about him on which arguments
could be, with tolerable certainty, held. That
he liked rum—raw—which he drank in vast
quantities without ever winking, or being
intoxicated; and that he hated the
Grace-Walking Brethren.

What these, or any other brethren had
ever done to incur his dislike was not stated;
but it was clear and certain that he hated them
fiercely and implacably. He declaimed against
them in drinking bars; he called them
opprobrious names in the street; and, what was
particularly disagreeable to the brethren
themselves, he made a point of giving every
minister who passed his smithy—on horse or
on foot, on business or pleasure—a sound
and particularly humiliating beating.

Colonel Quagg's method was this. 'Zeek,
the long, lanky assistant would, as he blew
the bellows, keep a sharp look out through
a little round hole in the smithy wall. When,
on the crest of the little hill in the valley
beneath which the smithy lay (the bridge
over the Danube, leading to Punkington, was
in the other direction), there appeared the
devoted figure of a Grace-Walking clergyman,
Zeek' would call out, "one o' them, Colonel!"
Whereupon the blacksmith would lay down
his hammer, and say grimly, " 'Zeek,
' ile.'"

The "ile," or oil, being brought, the Colonel
would therewith anoint a tremendous leather
strap, in size and appearance between the
trace for a cart-horse and the movement-
band for a steam-engine. Then would he
sally forth, tug the luckless preacher by one
leg off his horse—if he happened to be riding—
or grapple him by the collar of his coat if he
were a-foot, and thrash him with the strap—
not till he howled for mercy; for the
victim always did that at the very first
stroke of the awful strap; but till his own
brawny arm could no longer hold the mighty
weapon. All this was accompanied by a
flood of abuse on the part of the Colonel:
the minister, his congregation, sect, person,
and presumed character, were all animadverted
upon; and, after having been treated
with brutality, he was dismissed with scorn,
with a sardonic recommendation to send as
many more of his brethren that way as he
could, to be served in the same way. Then,
execution being done, and the miserable
victim of his ferocity being gone on his
bruised way towards Punkington, the Colonel
would stride into Silas B. Powkey's tavern
over the hill, hot, perspiring, and fatigued;
and, throwing his terrible strap on the bar,
and seating himself on a puncheon, would
throw his legs aloft, half in weariness half in
triumph, even till they reached the altitude
of the mantel-piece, would there rest them,
and, ejecting a mighty stream of tobacco
juice, cry:

"Squire, strapped another Grace-Walker:
Rum."

Now this, as in the celebrated Frog and
Boy case (vide spelling-book reports), albeit
excellent sport to one party concerned, was
death to the other. Martyrdom had not
exactly been contracted for when the Grace-
Walking Brethren entered the ministry; and
without martyrdom there was no riding the
Punkington circuit. There was no avoiding
the colonel and his awful strap. There was
no going round another way. There was no
mollifying, persuading, or infusing soft pity
into the colonel's breast. "I licks ye," he
was wont to reply when interceded with,
"because I kin, and because I like, and
because ye'se critters that licks is good for.
Skins ye have on and skins I'll have off; hard
or soft, wet or dry, spring or fall. Walk in
grace if ye like till pumpkins is peaches; but
licked ye must be till your toe-nails drop off
and your noses bleed blue ink." And licked
they were accordingly.

What was to be done with such a man—a
man with this dreadful fixed idea of strapping