Notes from the Editor's Desk -- 1/8/23

The Revolutionary

As the smoke clears on the field of battle, revealing in the dissipation of its uniformity the skirmish that the din already suggested, although its horror only now becomes clear, one soldier crawls about in search of his musket. Contests of mortal result are won or lost above, or even at his level, its losers falling to join him, lifelessly, felled by shot, stab, or bludgeon, or remaining where they were last concerned in physical contest. Every rank from general to lieutenant has impressed upon the private the importance of the musket.  Whereas faces contorted into the most awful, hate fueled, and loathing of all possible contortions make clear the irreconcilable differences between the two sides, the opposition’s generals and their lieutenants no doubt placed a similar emphasis on the musket’s importance. Their many differences of thought and action are bridged by the importance of an operable musket.

“Musket,” the soldier crawling about keys saying as he crawls about, lifting up the corpses in the mud to see if his recently misplaced musket can be found beneath them. “Musket, musket, musket.” The mud is such that no more inspection of the field will do, but a rooting about must also be undertaken, which brings up truncheons, tankards, and various personal effects, but no musket in its thick depths. Two soldiers topple over him, unexpectedly, if the holler coincident with their fall is to be believed, locked in mortal combat, and only one stands up from this tangle, evidently coming away the better for the Revolutionary’s intercession in the bout. The other’s face turns to see no more our solider; such is the effect of the stag horn dagger centered in the chest. Our horrified soldier recoils and says, “This gets worse and worse by the minute. The mud thickens, and I went and lost my musket like the biggest klutz the Revolution has on offer.”

What is that? Up ahead is a stock of wood in a location that one could reasonably assume our soldier had occupied at such a time as he might have lost his musket.  He had been part of his side’s formation when the sides came near enough for the skirmish to begin, and therefore it would not be unreasonable to think that he occupied the space near to where the stock is observed. Our revolutionary inches in its direction. Although all about is pell-mell and frenzied, and even though his adrenaline is coursing through his system to an unsustainable degree, recent experience suggests that the whole war could be passed harmlessly at ground level, should he not make too much of his presence, and he is vaguely aware that he travels eastward, the direction of his home. Home, before the revolution, had always seemed like an incredible well-spring of invaluable support, a place where the stew was always bubbling in the familiar kettle suspended above a fire in the hearth, and where a fire was constantly burning. Our great leaders gradually made it clear to us that much of our comfort was borne of a mistaken view of the world. Much was amiss that could only be corrected in the way of a musket and a fearsome grimace. A musket did seem to be missing above the mantle, where the wood was faintly discolored, or I should say where the wood was less discolored, as it seemed smoke had long curled around a musket in the very place, a musket that had gone missing. “My God, now I am without stew and without musket. Once, though, I reach those stocks, and they are not so distant now, I will only want for stew.”