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As I was walking up Beacon-street, the
other day, I met a little republican corps,
which greatly amused me. The band consisted
of four boys, from six to ten years of
age, accoutred in childish fashion, with pasteboard
caps and tin swords. The troop was
merely large enough to furnish captain, lieutenant,
ensign, and trumpeter—a fair epitome
of some of our military establishments. Being
all of them in office, I very naturally
concluded they were satisfied and happy;
but my eye had not followed the young soldiers
far, when I perceived the lieutenant (a
sturdy urchin, about six years old,) make a
decided halt. “What is the matter, Jack?”
called out the captain. “I tell you what,
Andrew, you've been captain long enough,”
was the reply;—“I'm going to be captain
now.”

Some altercation followed; and the

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refractory lieutenant vociferated still more
loudly, “You've been captain long enough—
it is my turn now.” A compromise was
at length effected; and the ambitious little
rebel agreed to budge a few yards further,
satisfied with the promise of rotation in office
at the end of the street.

I could not refrain from laughing, as the
little pageant moved out of sight. “This,”
said I, “is an abridgement of human society—
here is the genuine spirit of man.”

That little troop recurs to my memory as
frequently as Franklin thought of his dearbought
whistle.

When I hear selfish politicians keeping up
an angry clamour about “reform,” I say to
myself, “Ha! your troop would be all officers;
and even then the most contemptible
among ye would soon prove insubordinate,
and exclaim, “I tell you what, Andrew, it is
my turn to be captain now.”

When I see a lover all devotion, or a young
husband all indulgence, I wonder how long
it will be before he will say, “You've been
captain long enough. It is my turn now.”

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When a blooming young girl asks, “Don't
you think Isabel begins to fade?” I imagine
her ambitious little heart is whispering, “She
has been captain long enough.”

When I hear a belle congratulate a rival
upon her marriage, it sounds to my ear
very much like, “It is my turn to be captain
now.”

When I hear writers declare, in a most
oracular tone, that Miss Sedgwick will never
rival her early productions, I am half
tempted to answer, “Nay, my friend, she
has not been captain long enough. We must
content ourselves with being lieutenants.”

I might mention a hundred things, which
bring the discontented little officer to my
mind; but I forbear, lest my readers should
impatiently exclaim, “I tell you what,—
you've been captain long enough!”

p045-078

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