' 'No mistake,' says I, 'no mistake, Professor: they were all
prime, first chop; but why did you ax that 'ere question?' 'Why,'
says he, 'that eternal scoundrel, that Captain John Allspice of
Nahant, he used to trade to Charleston, and he carried a cargo once
there of fifty barrels of nutmegs: well, he put half a bushel of
good ones into each eend of the barrel, and the rest he filled up
with wooden ones, so like the real thing, no soul could tell the
difference until HE BIT ONE WITH HIS TEETH, and that he never thought
of doing, until he was first BIT HIMSELF. Well, it's been a standing
joke with them southerners agin us ever since.
"'It was only t'other day at Washington, that everlasting Virginny
duellist, General Cuffy, afore a number of senators, at the
President's house, said to me, "Well Everett," says he, "you know I
was always dead agin your Tariff bill, but I have changed my mind
since your able speech on it; I shall vote for it now." "Give me your
hand," says I, "General Cuffy; the Boston folks will be dreadful glad
when they hear your splendid talents are on our side. I think it will
go now--we'll carry it." "Yes," says he, "your factories down east
beat all natur'; they go ahead on the English a long chalk." You may
depend I was glad to hear the New Englanders spoken of that way; I
felt proud, I tell you.
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