Transcription
Letter from JIMMY-THE-GUM to his Big Brother
BARNEY-THE-SMASHER. To be had at the Poet's Box, 182 Overgate, Dundee. ROYAL HORSE DISTILLERY,
Eliventeenth of Cawnpore, Dear Barney,- -I am writing these few lines on the top of an old Indian
drum, with neather top, bottom nor sides to it. We landed here when we got on
shore. Our first battle was at Never-sa-dhi. There was many thousands killed,
but I am happy to state there were no lives lost, I myself killed twenty-nine
out of a eleventeen who attacked me with loaded bayonets, in the midst of whi-
ch one of the natives rushed upon me with a double-barrelled bootjack, but I
managed to blow his brains out with a pair of scissors. 1 slept three nignts in a
dry ditch full of water. The last time I saw Mick Johnston he was quite well.
and the next time I spoke to him he was dead. If he had liyed till to-morrow he
would have been dead a mounth. He leaves a child and l6 small wives in a
high state of low fever. Send me the newspaper when you write, I have nothing to read but the
History of England, I was reading it the other day. and I find that when Ki-
ng Nebuchadnezzar attacked the Indians on Law Hill, Alexander the Great and
Sir William Wallace took Constantinople prisoner, whilst Julias Cæsar and Lord
Nelson fought the Hottentots at Auchtermochty. it was somewhere about this
that MaeGonegall the Great, Fizzie Gow. Blin' Houghi, and Blue Jock won the
The Battle of Waterloo ! Give my love to Bridget O'Flannagan, and tell her I will write when I get
killed, and 1ot her know how I get on. Answer this, and direct to me at the sing
of " The pig with the Keys in his Pocket. "-From your other tother brother,
JIMMY-THK-GUM. P.S.?If this letter should not reach you, you must let me know by return
of post. You need not wait for another till you get impatient, but write imm-
ediately and let me know how you are coming on, and I will bring you home a
peice of the Nort Pole for a walking-stick. Having altered my mind, I am determined not to send this letter at all, so
you can answer it or not just as you please. When yome come to the end don't
read any more. I had almost forgotten to mention that I have been very all
The Doctor said It was consumptive, but I declined. But I am still verry bad
with the " Tweasles, [ ] and I am daily expecting each evening that every munite
will be my next. If I am as bad to day as I was to-morrow, I go to the Infir-
mary yesterday,?Yours till death, if not before it, JIMMY. 2:th Royal Besom Mop-Squirting Brigade,
Pipeclay Dusting Depo, 375 miles
On the othe side of the world.
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