"Why, this don't amount to anything, this is only an old book cover.
It hasn't anything in the world to do with the horses."

He only replied:

"Put dat right back dah!"

I tried another appeal:

"Now, you woolly-headed son of thunder, haven't you got sense enough to
know that the officer who posted you didn't mean such a thing as this!
He only meant that we should not be allowed to take any of the horses'
bedding or equipments; don't you see?"

I might as well have reasoned with a cigar store Indian. He set his
teeth, his eyes showed a dangerous amount of white, and foreshortening
his musket for a lunge, he hissed out again "Put dat right back dah, I
tell you!"

I looked at the bayonet; it was very long, very bright, and very sharp.
It gleamed cold and chilly like, as if it had not run through a man for a
long time, and yearned for another opportunity. Nothing but the whites
of the darky's eyes could now be seen. I did not want to perish there in
the fresh bloom of my youth and loveliness; it seemed to me as if it was
my duty to reserve myself for fields of future usefulness, so I walked
back and laid the book cover precisely on the spot whence I had obtained
it, while the thousand boys in the house set up a yell of sarcastic
laughter.

We staid in Wilmington a few days, days of almost purely animal