"I believe both animals and
birds have some means of communicating to each other all that is
necessary for them--I don't go further."
"Well, that's reasonable," sais I; "I go that figure, too, but not a
cent higher. Now there is a nigger," sais I; and I would have given
him a wink if I could, and made a jupe of my head towards Cutler, to
show him I was a goin' to get the captain's dander up for fun; but
what's the use of a wink in a fog? In the first place, it ain't easy
to make one; your lids are so everlastin' heavy; and who the plague
can see you if you do? and if he did notice it, he would only think
you were tryin' to protect your peepers, that's all. Well, a wink is
no better nor a nod to a blind horse; so I gave him a nudge instead.
"Now, there is the nigger, Doctor," sais I, "do you think he has a
soul?1 It's a question I always wanted to ask Brother Eldad, for I
never see him a dissectin' of a darky. If I had, I should have known;
for nature has a place for everything, and everything in it's place."
1 This very singular and inconsequential rhodomontade of Mr Slick is
one of those startling pieces of levity that a stranger often hears
from a person of his class in his travels on this side of the water.
The odd mixture of strong religious feeling and repulsive looseness of
conversation on serious subjects, which may here and there be found in
his Diary, naturally results from a free association with persons of
all or no creeds.
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