"SIR,--I propose to receive the surrender of the well-known
Southern Confederacy on the following terms:

"Fresh rolls for all the officers and men to be made at once, and
the boots of the Southern Confederacy to be blacked by officers
duly appointed by the United States of America. All the officers to
give their individual pay rolls, that they may be cashed by the
United States. Such public and private property as has been stolen
by the well-known Southern Confederacy to be turned over to the
police-officers appointed to take charge of it.

"Each officer will be permitted to retain both of his arms, and,
together with the men, is expected to return calmly to his family,
and not commit assault upon the United States of America without
due provocation.

"THE GENERAL OF THE MACKEREL BRIGADE.

("Green Seal.")

It is related in tradition, that when the knightly Munchausen received
this epistle, he laughed horribly for the space of at least half an
hour, as though greatly rejoiced at a bit of unparalleled waggishness.
After which he delivered himself of four sinister winks at nothing,
simultaneously exclaiming:

"By Chivalry! here's magnanimity."

After which he wrote thus:

"GEN. MACK. BRIG.:

"SIRRAH,--I have received your scrawl of this date, containing what
may be denominated terms of first-class board for the celebrated
Southern Confederacy. Inasmuch as said terms give me rather more
advantage than half a dozen strategical victories over your vandals
could possibly have procured for us, I hereby permit you to capture
us at once, in order to avoid further carnage in your ranks.

"MUNCHAUSEN X his mark."

Other letters incidental to this business passed between the two
paladins, my boy; but as the letters of all great men are proverbial
for their great dignity and heaviness, and are immensely calculated to
incline readers to untimely repose, I have spared you the infliction.
Suffice it to say, that when Captain Villiam Brown read the Mackerel
terms of surrender, he spasmodically applied his lips to a canteen,
with the air of one who takes poison because the butcher's daughter has
refused to be won by his manly shape.

"Ah!" says Villiam, "such magnanimity!"

Captain Bob Shorty was playing Old Sledge with three members of the
Sanitary Commission when the document arrived.

"By all that's Federal!" says Captain Bob