The Richmond Dispatch often looked at different countries and different eras for examples to fire up its readership in the South’s struggle for independence. Here the editors looked across the Atlantic for commentary on who would be selected as the “Black Republican” nominee for U.S. president and what Southerners would endure before they submitted to Big Yankee.
From the Richmond Daily Dispatch March 2, 1864:
Wednesday morning…March 2, 1864
…
Capital Mode of election.
Some philosopher having disputed the fact that everything has its use, and given as an example that unclean parasite which sometime makes its abode upon the “dome of thought, the temple of the soul,” it was replied by a controversialist on the other side that at Hardenburg, in Sweden, the pediculus held a position of some importance. When a Burgomaster had to be chosen, the eligible candidates sat with their beards upon the table, in the centre of which was placed one of those insects whose only use would seem to be the invention of fine-tooth combs, and the one in whose beard he took cover was the Magistrate for the ensuing year.
Who shall deny, after this, that everything has its uses? It is true we are not informed whether the electoral body always selected the best man, but that is a pitch of perfection which is not uniformly attained even by universal suffrage. The present Chief Magistrate of the United States, for example, might have been just as well selected after the fashion of Hardenburg as by the votes of his actual constituency. We recommend the Black Republicans to settle the claims of their various aspirants for the next Presidency by sitting with their beards upon a table and giving the virtuous and intelligent parasite a fair chance. As he generally selects the dirtiest specimen of humanity, it would be amusing to witness his perplexity between Lincoln, Fremont, and Banks. But, on the whole, we are inclined to think the choice would fall on the same head that the United States people have chosen, and which has furnished bed and board to political parasites for the last four years. …
Eating grass.
A French officer who, on one occasion, accompanied a raid against an Arab tribe in Algeria, gives an instance of the spirit of defiance which animated those haughty sons of the desert. The French commander had assembled the Arab Chiefs, and, telling them that his soldiers had filled up their wells, carried off their cattle, and burned their
dwellings, exhorted them to submission, asking them what they would do further against a country so powerful as France.–“The Arabs, as if impelled simultaneously, stooped to the earth, plucked some scant blades of grass there growing, and began chewing the same in angry silence. This was all their reply, and by it they intimated that they would eat what the earth gave, like the beasts that are upon it, rather than surrender.”
Eating grass is not very agreeable, but it is better than eating dirt. The Southern people, if subjected to such an alternative, will not show less spirit than the Arabs.
Speaking of eating grass, the same article offered a deal to Virginia farmers: send food to Richmond to feed the destitute families of soldiers in the field and you’ll get paid by the people of Richmond:
Shipments made to Wm. P. Munford, Esq., President Young Men’s Christian Association, or to J. R. Chamberlayne, Secretary to the Overseers of the Poor of the city, will be properly attended to, and settled for promptly as shippers may direct. We urge upon the citizens of the country to do what they can. Their assistance is greatly needed.
