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prank

In the summer of 1867, Harper’s New Monthly Magazine published the following Civil War tale of an attempted prank on an unflappable friend gone wrong:

During “the late unpleasantness” there was a cool, unquenchable sort of a Yankee named Gunn, who ran a stage in Western Virginia over a route much infested with bushwhackers. We frequently told Gunn that he would some day get smashed up and gobbled, and he had better give up his job; but all to no purpose; for he kept on driving stage and pocketing the greenbacks. So three of us concluded one night we would give him a thorough scare that he would accept as a warning. In coming in from his stables late at night he always took a short cut across an old burying-ground. To this point we repaired. One of our number, wrapped in a sheet, lay down “stark and stiff” on one of the newly-made graves, while the others dodged behind some tombstones, and impatiently awaited Gunn’s arrival. Soon he came along, whistling and swinging a pair of heavy bridles, when all at once he confronted the counterfeit spectre. There he stood for a few moments with arms akimbo, and coolly eyed the object from head to foot; then raising his bridles began to give it a tremendous thrashing, bawling out at the same time, “Consarn you old pictur! what you out here for this time o’ night? Get into your hole! get into your hole!” We concluded to let Gunn alone after that.