ARMY OF THE POTOMAC ENEMY #7: "PSYCHIC INJURY REB"
"Psychic Injury Reb," shown at right in an action sketch by Harper's illustrator
T. Shealy, is perhaps the most feared Reb in the Confederate army today, with good reason.
His weapon is not his flag-decorated musket with enhanced capability bayonet, but rather a
technique he calls "psychic injury" (hence his name).
The first element in his psychic warfare is his battle cry: the familiar Rebel Yell "Yeeeeee!" loudly shrieked several octaves above the average Reb's, in the sub-audible region of the sound spectrum. Expert Army of the Potomac surgeons have determined that the effect upon the average Yank is more felt than audibly discerned, causing the brain's neurons and synapses to partially collapse, creating a feeling of panic and frenzy in the hapless Federal soldier.
Psychic Injury Reb then plays upon the darkest arachnophobic childhood fears of the average soldier by releasing his infamous "Yummy Vittles," seen at his feet near his expended revolvers. His vittles are masses of spiders, who, roused by Psychic Injury Reb's shrill screaming, climb about his person getting caught and entangled in his great masses of hair (inherited from his father "Cousin Itt Reb"). His victims, their sense of reason already weakened by his verbal assault, are further shocked by the sight of masses of spiders crawling about in his hair, which he whips about in the breeze, casting spiders everywhere. This final gesture, coupled with the fearsome, hawk-like expression Psychic Injury Reb adopts (superbly captured in the sketch), mentally overwhelms his opponents. Many a hapless Yankee soldier in the psychic trauma ward of St. Elizabeth's Hospital in Washington can attest to the effectiveness of Psychic Injury Reb.
The President and his foreign ambassadors have appealed in vain to foreign governments to lobby for the discontinuance of the so-called Confederate State's ghastly new form of warfare. Psychic Injury Reb must be stopped - his atrocities must end! Perhaps armed with the appropriate tranquilizers, earmuffs and suggestive mesmerization the Army of the Potomac marksman may calmly shoot to kill and put an end to him. Not only the Union, but Civilization itself is at stake!
