A JOKE WITH A STING IN ITS TAIL.
Ham Carter, the Tennessee negro carpetbagger, now of Mississippi, made a furious speech a few days ago to two thousand negroes at Grenada. Ham addressed himself especially, for a time, to a dozen or two white auditors not far away. He said that they could not escape the issue, it was a war of races, and that one or the other must go under. “It happens,” said Ham, “that you, not we, must succumb. You may not like it, but there is no help for you. We have the numbers, and do not propose to yield an inch. You may think this Radical, half negro, half carpetbag, mongrel government, as you call it, insufferable. It will become more and more intolerable to you. You must educate all these colored people. We make you pay now for four months’ schooling for our children; you shall pay for nine months’ per annum. You must stand aside, to, and be satisfied to see us manage all the affairs of the county and State. You don’t like it.” “I see you don’t,” continued Ham, “and if you can’t bear it and can’t get into that new State of beatitude you were fixing up at Jackson, Tennessee, a few days ago, let me advise you, young man, let me urge you affectionately – go wait.” Ham Carter and Ben. Nabers have been alike promised, our special correspondent tells us, the office of lieutenant-governor in the Ames government. Nabers, plainly enough, is undone. His chances are decidedly best with the totally black Alcorn party, designed to give the negroes unmixed mastery of the State, and it is a mistaken notion that Nabers was allied finally with Ames. The scallawags and negroes will now combine against the carpetbaggers, and then, with peace between the races, the piccaninnies will be educated with infinite pleasure by the white people and the sting plucked from the fierce, threatening diatribe of Ham Carter.