Scene-Schoolroom-Class in Military Affairs stand up.
Question. What is the first duty of a Brigadier General?
Answer. To swear by note.
Q.What is the second duty?
A.To drink every day a large quantity of bad whiskey.
Q.What is the third duty?
A.To be constantly astonished that these and other feats do not
bring him a Major General's commission.
Q.What is the first duty of a Colonel?
A.To put three stars on his collar.
Q.What is the second duty?
A.To see that his regiment is never put to such useless work
as drilling in the School of the Battalion.
Q.What is the third duty?
A.To imitate the Brigadier Generals in a small way, especially
in the fine arts of swearing and drinking.
Q.What is the first duty of a Captain?
A.To forget all the promises he made to the boys when he was elected,
and put on dignified airs in the presence of his old associates.
Q.What is the second duty?
A.To get a finer uniform than his Colonel.
Q.What the third duty?
A.To become the best pokerplayer in the army.
Q.-What is the first duty of an Adjutant General?
A.-To become so huffish that everyone will dislike to do business
with him.
Q.-What is the second duty?
A.-To fill his office with young squirts, as clerks and assistants,
to look fiercely at visitors.
Q.-What is the third duty?
A.-To perpetually intrigue for a higher position in the line,
provided it is not attended with personal danger.
Q.-What is the duty of a regular aide?
A.-To make himself important.
Q.-What is the second duty?
A.-To make himself very important.
Q.-What is the third duty?
A.-To look upon those gentlemen who, through patriotic motives,
or admiration of his chief, volunteer to serve the country without
compensation, in the capacity of an aide, as a sort of interloper
that interferes with his importance.
Q.-What is the first duty of a Quartermaster?
A.-A great Captain has laid down the three great duties of this
officer. He says the first duty is to make himself comfortable.
Q.-What does he say is the second duty?
A.-To make himself damned comfortable.
Q.-What does he lay down as his third duty?
A.-To make everybody else damned uncomfortable.
Q.-What is the first duty of a Commissary?
A.-To take all the delicacies provided in the army for his own use.
Q.-What is the second duty?
A.-To share sparingly said delicacies with his friends, and never
let them go into such vulgar places as the mouths of sick soldiers
Q.What is the third duty?
A.To be very particular to see that the requisitions for rations
are in proper form-all the t's crossed and i's dotted when presented
by soldiers who are sick or who have had nothing to eat for three
or four days.
Q.What is the first duty of a Medical Director?
A.To permit the sick and wounded to take care of themselves.
Q.What is the second duty?
A.To learn the sick and wounded to be of little trouble to the
medical department, and to this end to constantly ship those mortally
wounded, or in extremis, to distant points, without attendants,
and without anything to eat or drink.
Q.What is the third duty?
A.To employ a good part of his time in cursing the physician,
in charge of those distant hospitals, for letting so many of the
sick and wounded die.
Q.What is the first duty of a surgeon?
A.Under the names of drugs and medicines, to purchase a full supply
of good liquors.
Q.What is the second duty?
A.To cause all private cellars to be searched, and all the good
brandies found there to be confiscated, lest the owners should
smuggle them to the soldiers, give them away and make the whole
army drunk.
Q.What is the third duty
A.To see that he and his assistants drink up all of said liquors.
Q.What is the fourth duty?
A.To wear the largest amount of gold lace, and be always absent
from the post of danger and of duty.
Q.What is the first duty of a Chaplain?
A.-Never to mention the subject of religion to the soldiers.
Q.-What is the second duty?
A.-To preach to the regiment only once a year, and not that unless
specially requested by the Colonel.
Q.-What is the third duty?
A.-To grumble all the time about the smallness of his pay.
Q.-What is the first duty of pickets?
A.-To go to sleep on their posts.
Q.-What is the second duty?
A.-To wake up when the enemy's pickets invite them to come over
and take a drink.
Q.-What is the third duty?
A.-To be "driven in" upon the explosion of the first
shell.
Q.-What is the first duty of an army?
A.-To destroy as much private property as possible, particularly
that belonging to its friends.
Q.-What is the second duty?
A.-To parole all prisoners taken from the enemy who are known
to have burned houses, stolen Negroes, or murdered women.
Q.-What is the third duty?
A.-Always to act on the defensive and never to invade the enemy's
territory however good may be the opportunity, although he may
be ravaging yours all the time.
Q.-What is the first duty of the Government?
A.-To fill all its important posts with Yankees and foreigners.
Q.-What is the second duty?
A.-To deliver its chief cities without striking a blow.
Q.-What is the third duty?
A-Never to learn from experience.
Q.-What is the first duty of the Southern people?
A.-To keep out of the army.
Q.-What is the second duty?
A.-To make all the money they can out of the Government and the
soldiers, as wars come seldom.
Q.-What is the third duty?
A.-To surrender the entire trade in shoes and clothing - on which
trade the army is dependent - to that patriotic class of men, who
are too conscientious to charge the government or the army a profit
exceeding two thousand percent.
Q.-What is the fourth duty?
A.-To let success cause a relaxation of their exertions, and see
in every little reverse the ruin of our cause.
That will do-take your seats.
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