A Conscript's Epistle To Jeff Davis

The followíng quaint epistle has beeq furnished for publication by a member of the Mounted Rifles, who picked t up in. a desertad, rebel camp on the Chowan River, about thirty miles irom Winton, while out od a scouting expedition last spring. The letter was addreesed in thia wise: " Read, if you want to, you thieving 'Scalp Hunter,' whoevèr you are, and forward, postpaid, to the High Cbancellor oí the Davil's Exehequer.(?) on earth, "Jeff. Davis, " Richmond, Va." HeADQUARTEBS " ScALP HUNTE9," Camp Chowan, N. C, Jan. 11. J Ezcelleney Davis : It is with feelings of undevelopea pleasure that an öectionate conscript entrusts this sheet of confiscated paper, to the tender mercies of a Confedérate States mail carrier, addresed, as it shall be to yourself. O Jeff. Red Jacket ol the Gnli, and Chief of tho Six Naüons - more or Itss. He writes on the stump oí a shivered monarch of the foreRt, with tho "pine trees wailing around him." and " Eudymion's planet risiug on theair." To yon, O Czar of all Chivalry and Khan of all Cotton Turtury, he appeala lor the privilege of seekiiig, on his own hook a land less free - a home among the hyenasofthe North. Will you not balt your "brave colums," and stay your gorgeous career for a thin space - and while an idminng world takes a brief gaze at your glorious and Godforsaken cause, pen for the happy conscript a furlougti without end? Do so and mail it if you please, to that city the windy, wandering Wigfall didft't winter in, called, for short, Philadelphia. The Etesian winds sweeping down the defiles of the Old Dominion, and over the swamps of Suffolk, come moaning through the pines of the Old State iaden with mufic, and sigh themselves away into sweet sounds of silence to the i'ar off South. Your happy con-, script would go to tho far away North whence the wind comes, and leave you to reap the whirlwind, with no one but your father, the Devil, to rake and bind after you. And he's goinpr. It is with intense and muhifarious proud satisfaction that he gazes lor the last time upan onr holy flag - that syrrtbol and sign of an r.dored trinitv. cotton. ïrggers and chivilry. He still sees it in the little camp on tho Chowan, tied to the peak ofits Pulmetto pole, and flfwtting over our boundless Confecleracy, the revived relie of ages gone, banner of our king of few days and full of trouble. And that pole, in ts tapering uprightness testifying some of the grandest beauties of our nationalily: its peak pointing hopefully toward the tropical s'ans, ind its biggesl end run into the ■ round. Relie and pole good bye. 'Tis best the conscript goes ; his claim to chivalry has gono before him. Behind he leaves the legilimate chivalry of this unbounded na tion centored in the illegiüinate son of a, Kentucky horse-thief. But a few more words, illustnous President, and ho is done - donegone, Elevated by their suffenugs and sufimges to the highest office in the gift of a great and exceeding free people, you hare held your position without ehange of base, or purpose of any sort,' through Wftary months of war, and want and oe; and though every conscript would unite with the thousands of loyal and true men ol the South ia a grand old grief at your downiall, se, too, will they sink under the calamity of an exquisite joy when you shall have reached the eminent meridian whence all progress is perpendicular. And now, bastard President pf a pofitieal abortion, farewell. "Scalp hunter," relio, pole and chivalrous confederates in crime, good bye. Escept'it be in the army of the Union, vou will not ag;,in see the conecript.