I' be'n down to the Capital at Washington, D. C., Where Congerss meets and passes on the pensions ort to be Allowed to old one-legged chaps, like me, 'at sence the war Don't wear their pants in pairs at all -- and yit how proud we are!
Old Flukens, from our deestrick, jes' turned in and tuck and made Me stay with him whilse I was there; and longer 'at I stayed The more I kep' a-wantin' jes' to kind o' git away, And yit a-feelin' sociabler with Flukens ever' day.
You see I'd got the idy -- and I guess most folks agrees -- 'At men as rich as him, you know, kin do jes' what they please; A man worth stacks o' money, and a Congerssman and all, And livin' in a buildin' bigger'n Masonic Hall!
Now mind, I'm not a-faultin' Fluke -- he made his money square: We both was Forty-niners, and both bu'sted gittin' there; I weakened and onwindlassed, and he stuck and stayed and made His millions; don't know what _I'm_ worth untel my pension's paid.
But I was goin' to tell you -- er a-ruther goin' to try To tell you how he's livin' now: gas burnin' mighty nigh In ever' room about the house; and ever' night, about, Some blame reception goin' on, and money goin' out.
They's people there from all the world -- jes' ever' kind 'at lives, Injuns and all! and Senators, and Ripresentatives; And girls, you know, jes' dressed in gauze and roses, I declare, And even old men shamblin' round a-waltzin' with 'em there!
And bands a-tootin' circus-tunes, 'way in some other room Jes' chokin' full o' hothouse plants and pinies and perfume; And fountains, squirtin' stiddy all the time; and statutes, made Out o' puore marble, 'peared-like, sneakin' round there in the shade.
And Fluke he coaxed and begged and pled with me to take a hand And sashay in amongst 'em -- crutch and all, you understand; But when I said how tired I was, and made fer open air, He follered, and tel five o'clock we set a-talkin' there.
"My God! " says he -- Fluke says to me, "I'm tireder'n you! Don't putt up yer tobacker tel you give a man a chew. Set back a leetle furder in the shadder -- that'll do; I'm tireder'n you, old man; I'm tireder'n you.
"You see that-air old dome," says he, "humped up ag'inst the sky? It's grand, first time you see it; but it changes, by and by, And then it stays jes' thataway -- jes' anchored high and dry Betwixt the sky up yender and the achin' of yer eye.
"Night's purty; not so purty, though, as what it ust to be When my first wife was livin'. You remember her? " says he. I nodded-like, and Fluke went on, "I wonder now ef she Knows where I am -- and what I am -- and what I ust to be?
"That band in there! -- I ust to think 'at music couldn't wear A feller out the way it does; but that ain't music there -- That's jes' a' _imitation_, and like ever'thing, I swear, I hear, er see, er tetch, er taste, er tackle anywhere!
"It's all jes' _artificial_, this-'ere high-priced life of ours; The theory, it's sweet enough, tel it saps down and sours. They's no _home_ left, ner _ties_ o' home about it. By the powers, The whole thing's artificialer'n artificial flowers!
"And all I want, and could lay down and sob fer, is to know The homely things of homely life; fer instance, jes' to go And set down by the kitchen stove -- Lord! that 'u'd rest me so, -- Jes' set there, like I ust to do, and laugh and joke, you know.
"Jes' set there, like I ust to do," says Fluke, a-startin' in, 'Peared-like, to say the whole thing over to hisse'f ag'in; Then stopped and turned, and kind o' coughed, and stooped
and fumbled fer
Somepin' o' 'nuther in the grass -- I guess his handkercher.
Well, sence I'm back from Washington, where I left Fluke a-still A-leggin' fer me, heart and soul, on that-air pension bill, I've half-way struck the notion, when I think o' wealth and sich, They's nothin' much patheticker'n jes' a-bein' rich!
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