Shortly after the inauguration of President Lincoln, and during the period in which the throng of office-seekers was greatest, an applicant for a clerkship in one of the departments received notification to appear before the ‘examining committee’ for examination as to qualifications.  In due time he appeared, and announced himself ‘ready.’  The aforesaid ‘committee,’ supposing that they had before them a decidedly ‘soft one,’ determined to enjoy a little ‘sport’ at the poor fellow’s expense.  After having put a great many questions to him, none of which in the least applied to the duties he would be expected to perform, he was asked how he would ascertain the number of square feet occupied by the Patent Office building.  This question aroused in him suspicions that ‘all was not right,’ and, with a promptness and emphasis that effectually dampened the hopes of his questioners, he replied, ’Well, gentlemen, I should employ an experienced surveyor.’

The same correspondent tells us that—­

    In one of the rural towns of Illinois lived, a few years agone, a
    very eccentric individual known as ‘DICKEY BULARD,’ whose original
    sayings afforded no little amusement to his neighbors.

DICKEY had his troubles, the saddest of which was the loss of his only son.  Shortly after this event, in speaking of it to some friends, he broke out in the following pathetic expression of feeling: 

    ‘I’d rather a’ lost the best cow I have, and ten dollars besides,
    than that boy.  If it had been a gal, it wouldn’t a’ made so much
    difference; but it was the only boy I had.’

    On another occasion, in referring to the death of his grandmother,
    who had been fatally injured by a butt from a pet ram, DICKEY gave
    vent to his feelings as follows: 

    ’I never felt so bad in all my life as I did when grandmother
    died.  She had got so old, and we had kept her so long, we wanted
    to see how long we could keep her.

* * * * *

It is the ‘turn of the tune’ which gives point to the far-famed legend of ’The Arkansaw Traveler,’—­which legend, in brief, is to the effect that a certain fiddling ‘Rackensackian,’ who could never learn more than the first half of a certain tune, once bluntly refused all manner of hospitality to a weary wayfarer, avowing with many an oath that his house boasted neither meat nor whisky, bed nor hay.  But being taught by the stranger the ‘balance’ of the tune,—­’the turn,’ as he called it,—­he at once overwhelmed his musical guest with all manner of dainties and kindnesses.  And it is the ‘turn of the tune,’ in the following lyric, from the soft tinkle of the guitar to the harsh notes of the ‘beaten parchment,’ which gives it a peculiar charm.

  THE GUITAR AND THE DRUM.

  BY R. WOLCOTT, CO.  B., TENTH ILLINOIS