Later — Night

We hear that Lord Dunmore has purposed to inoculate such of our Regiment as have not yet suffered the smallpox — a welcome measure, though come late — and that he sought this isle as a place of refuge where this delicate operation may be carried out without disturbance or annoy.

This plague hath ravaged us; three or four die of it each day. Slant continues his vigilant practices against its depredations; but other contagions have settled upon us in its wake. Were our ranks not swelled every day by men crawling through the reeds, families arrived in boats, and victorious runaways bleeding in their shirts, we had been decimated.

Of late, sensible of disease and impending battle, Dr. Trefusis hath convinced Bono to aid him in the concoction of final words. This gravediggers’ game they pursue whenever they meet, protesting that a body can never be too forward in such preparations; the one recommending the Style Sentimental-Heroical (Weep not for me), the other the Masculine-Stoical (I weep not for myself); Miss Nsia scolding them both for their fatal wit.

Miss Nsia and Dr. Trefusis are not with us now, being confined to their own ship; I while the slow hours with my own friends, delighted that, after years of solitude, I may call others by that agreeable name. When we are together in company — Slant, Pomp, Olakunde, my own self, even unspeaking Will — we no longer seem broken, as we did; we no longer seem children, but comrades. They did not laugh when I spoke today of the Argive host and the fall of Rome. Slant added that he hath known a cat named Agamemnon. Olakunde told us of my mother’s gods; he told us of Eshu, the very spirit of time, deception, and change, an ancient boy who standeth at a crossroads, to which sly potentate Olakunde prays for victory over obdurate fate. And Pomp, hearing of change, mentioned his experiments in the fluctuation of swamp-water in ditches, which he hath conducted in his idleness, but which speculations would do honor to one of our academicans. Olakunde and I quizzed him on the predations of the alligator. And together, we make a fine company.

I envision the future day when this campaign is finished, and we grown older and commenced men of means — with wives of our own, and children, and farms, perhaps, laid about with barns. Olakunde shall be the Ovid of far Oyo, writing the tales of Africk metamorphoses; and Pomp recording his ghost stories for a winter night. I shall write sonatas en trio; and Slant perhaps shall be proprietor of his own plantation.

Grant us, Lord, a Thanksgiving feast together in that distant day; and we shall tell our children — Eat goose? There was a time when we ate tallow candles with a stomach and thought slush and horse-junk well-tasting. And we shall unfold our old shirts, which tatters shall be darkened with the smoke of Norfolk, and tell them tales of vanquished rebels and Dunmore until the spirit-hours, when they must be lifted and taken to their beds.

Pork-junk again for supper. We hope for better rations soon.