A Very Big Man

from Harper's New Monthly Magazine's "Editor's Drawer"

We hope to hear often from the Baltimore lawyer who sends these interesting incidents:

            When the present war commenced I was practicing law in the State of Georgia. I was a strong Union man, and concluded to leave the land of secession and return to my native city. I started for Mobile to run the blockade; when I reached Montgomery, Alabama, I found I would have to remain until the next day. That evening, after tea, there was a large crowd in the rotunda of the hotel, and the war was, of course, the general theme of conversation. “War!—war to the death!” was nearly the only expression that could be heard. Every body was volunteering, and the whole city seemed to be in uniform. In the midst of the excitement a little boy, about five years old, came out of one of the parlors dressed in the full uniform of a Confederate Captain. He looked so pretty and smart that I patted him on the head, saying, “You’re a very little man to be a soldier.”

            He turned, measured me with his eye, and replied, “You’re a very big man not to be a soldier!“ The crowd appreciated it, and I paid for the liquor.

"Editor's Drawer", Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 28, Issue 164, January 1864, page 283, New York: Harper and Brother's

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