THE WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD.
We made another attempt at walking on the deck—the moon was trying to
struggle through the fog, which was now of a bright copper colour.
“Doctor,” said I, “have you ever seen a yellow fog before?”
“Yes,” he said, “I have seen a white, black, red, and yellow fog,” and
went off into a disquisition about optics, mediums, reflections,
refractions, and all sorts of scientific terms.
Well, I don’t like hard words; when you crack them, which is plaguy
tough work, you have to pick the kernel out with a cambric needle, and
unless it’s soaked in wine, like the heart of a hickory nut is, it
don’t taste nice, and don’t pay you for the trouble. So to change the
subject, “Doctor,” sais I, “how long is this everlasting mullatto
lookin’ fog a goin’ to last, for it ain’t white, and it ain’t black,
but kind of betwixt and between.”
Sais he, and he stopped and listened a moment, “It will be gone by
twelve o’clock to-night.”
“What makes you think so?” said I.
“Do you hear that?” said he.
“Yes,” sais I, “I do; it’s children a playin’ and a chatterin’ in
French. Now it’s nateral they should talk French, seein’ their parents
do. They call it their mother-tongue, for old wives are like old
hosses, they are all tongue, and when their teeth is gone, that unruly
member grows thicker and bigger, for it has a larger bed to stretch out
in,—not that it ever sleeps much, but it has a larger sphere of
action,—do you take? I don’t know whether you have had this feeling of
surprise, Doctor, but I have, hearing those little imps talk French,
when, to save my soul, I can’t jabber it that way myself. In course of
nature they must talk that lingo, for they are quilted in French—kissed
in French—fed in French—and put to bed in French,—and told to pray to
the Virgin in French, for that’s the language she loves best. She knows
a great many languages, but she can’t speak English since Henry the
Eighth’s time, when she said to him, ‘You be fiddled,’ which meant, the
Scotch should come with their fiddles and rule England.
“Still somehow I feel strange when these little critters address me in
it, or when women use it to me (tho’ I don’t mind that so much, for
there are certain freemason signs the fair sex understand all over the
world), but the men puzzle me like Old Scratch, and I often say to
myself, What a pity it is the critters can’t speak English. I never
pity myself for not being able to jabber French, but I blush for their
ignorance. However, all this is neither here nor there. Now, Doctor,
how can you tell this fog is booked for the twelve o’clock train? Is
there a Bradshaw for weather?”
“Yes,” said he, “there is, do you hear that?”
“I don’t hear nothing,” sais I, “but two Frenchmen ashore a jawing like
mad. One darsen’t, and t’other is afraid to fight, so they are taking
it out in gab—they ain’t worth listening to. How do they tell you the
weather?”
“Oh,” said he, “it ain’t them. Do you hear the falls at my lake? the
west wind brings that to us. When I am there and the rote is on the
beach, it tells me it is the voice of the south wind giving notice of
rain. All nature warns me. The swallow, the pig, the goose, the fire on
the hearth, the soot in the flue, the smoke of the chimney, the rising
and setting sun, the white frost, the stars—all, all tell me.”
“Yes,” sais I, “when I am to home I know all them signs.”
“The spider too is my guide, and the ant also. But the little
pimpernel, the poor man’s weather-glass, and the convolvulus are truer
than any barometer, and a glass of water never lies.”
“Ah, Doctor,” said I, “you and I read and study the same book. I don’t
mean to assert we are, as Sorrow says, nateral children, but we are
both children of nature, and honour our parents. I agree with you about
the fog, but I wanted to see if you could answer signals with me. I am
so glad you have come on board. You want amusement, I want instruction.
I will swap stories with you for bits of your wisdom, and as you won’t
take boot, I shall be a great gainer.”
After a good deal of such conversation, we went below, and in due
season turned in, in a place where true comfort consists in oblivion.
The morning, as the doctor predicted, was clear, the fog was gone, and
the little French village lay before us in all the beauty of ugliness.
The houses were small, unpainted, and uninviting. Fish-flakes were
spread on the beach, and the women were busy in turning the cod upon
them. Boats were leaving the shore for the fishing-ground. Each of
these was manned by two or three or four hands, who made as much noise
as if they were getting a vessel under weigh, and were severally giving
orders to each other with a rapidity of utterance that no people but
Frenchmen are capable of.
“Every nation,” said the doctor, “has its peculiarity, but the French
Acadians excel all others in their adherence to their own ways; and in
this particular, the Chesencookers surpass even their own countrymen.
The men all dress alike, and the women all dress alike, as you will
presently see, and always have done so within the memory of man. A
round, short jacket which scarcely covers the waistcoat, trowsers that
seldom reach below the ankle-joint, and yarn stockings, all four being
blue, and manufactured at home, and apparently dyed in the same tub,
with moccasins for the feet, and a round fur or cloth cap to cover the
head, constitute the uniform and unvaried dress of the men. The attire
of the women is equally simple. The short gown which reaches to the
hip, and the petticoat which serves for a skirt, both made of coarse
domestic cloth, having perpendicular blue and white stripes, constitute
the difference of dress that marks the distinction of the sexes, if we
except a handkerchief thrown over the head, and tied under the chin,
for the blue stockings and the moccasins are common to both, males and
females.
“There has been no innovation for a century in these particulars,
unless it be that a hat has found its way into Chesencook, not that
such a stove-pipe looking thing as that has any beauty in it; but the
boys of Halifax are not to be despised, if a hat is, and even an
ourang-outang, if he ventured to walk about the streets, would have to
submit to wear one. But the case is different with women, especially
modest, discreet, unobtrusive ones, like those of the ‘long-shore
French.’ They are stared at because they dress like those in the world
before the Flood, but it’s an even chance if the antediluvian damsels
were half so handsome; and what pretty girl can find it in her heart to
be very angry at attracting attention? Yes, their simple manners, their
innocence, and their sex are their protection. But no cap, bonnet, or
ribbon, velvet, muslin, or lace, was ever seen at Chesencook. Whether
this neglect of finery (the love of which is so natural to their
countrywomen in Europe) arises from a deep-rooted veneration for the
ways of their predecessors, or from the sage counsel of their spiritual
instructors, who desire to keep them from the contamination of the
heretical world around them, or from the conviction that
‘The adorning thee with so much art
Is but a barbarous skill,
’Tis like the barbing of a dart,
Too apt before to kill,’
I know not. Such however is the fact nevertheless, and you ought to
record it, as an instance in which they have shown their superiority to
this universal weakness. Still, both men and women are decently and
comfortably clad. There is no such thing as a ragged Acadian, and I
never yet saw one begging his bread. Some people are distinguished for
their industry, others for their idleness; some for their ingenuity,
and others for their patience; but the great characteristic of an
Acadian is talk, and his talk is, from its novelty, amusing and
instructive, even in its nonsense.
“These people live close to the banks where cod are found, and but
little time is required in proceeding to the scene of their labour,
therefore there is no necessity for being in a hurry, and there is lots
of time for palaver. Every boat has an oracle in it, who speaks with an
air of authority. He is a great talker, and a great smoker, and he
chats so skilfully, that he enjoys his pipe at the same time, and
manages it so as not to interrupt his jabbering. He can smoke, talk,
and row at once. He don’t smoke fast, for that puts his pipe out by
consuming his tobacco; nor row fast, for it fatigues him.”
“Exactly,” sais I, “but the tongue, I suppose, having, like a clock, a
locomotive power of its own, goes like one of my wooden ones for
twenty-four hours without ceasing, and like one of them also when it’s
e’en amost worn-out and up in years, goes at the rate of one hundred
minutes to the hour, strikes without counting the number, and gives
good measure, banging away often twenty tunes at one o’clock.”
Every boat now steered for the “Black Hawk,” and the oracle stopped
talking French to practise English. “How you do, Sare? how you do your
wife?” said Lewis Le Blanc, addressing me.
“I have no wife.”
“No wife, ton pee? Who turn your fish for you, den?”
“Whereat they all laugh, and all talk French again. And oracle says,
‘He takes his own eggs to market, den.’ He don’t laugh at that, for
wits never laugh at their own jokes; but the rest snicker till they
actilly scream.
“What wind are we going to have, Lewis?”
Oracle stands up, carefully surveys the sky, and notices all the signs,
and then looks wise, and answers in a way that there can be no mistake.
“Now you see, Sare, if de wind blow off de shore, den it will be west
wind; if it blow from de sea, den it will be east wind; and if it blow
down coast,” pointing to each quarter with his hand like a
weather-cock, “den it will sartain be sout; and up de coast, den you
will be sartain it will come from de nort. I never knew dat sign fail.”
And he takes his pipe from his mouth, knocks some ashes out of it, and
spits in the water, as much as to say, Now I am ready to swear to that.
And well he may, for it amounts to this, that the wind will blow from
any quarter it comes from. The other three all regard him with as much
respect as if he was clerk of the weather.
“Interesting people these, Doctor,” said I, “ain’t they? It’s the world
before the Flood. I wonder if they know how to trade? Barter was the
primitive traffick. Corn was given for oil, and fish for honey, and
sheep and goats for oxen and horses, and so on. There is a good deal of
trickery in barter, too, for necessity has no laws. The value of money
we know, and a thing is worth what it will fetch in cash; but swapping
is a different matter. It’s a horse of a different colour.”
“You will find,” said the doctor, “the men (I except the other sex
always) are as acute as you are at a bargain. You are more like to be
bitten than to bite if you try that game with them.”
“Bet you a dollar,” sais I, “I sell that old coon as easy as a clock.
What, a Chesencooker a match for a Yankee! Come, I like that; that is
good. Here goes for a trial, at any rate.
“Mounsheer,” sais I, “have you any wood to sell?”
We didn’t need no wood, but it don’t do to begin to ask for what you
want, or you can’t do nothin’.
“Yes,” said he.
“What’s the price,” said I, “cash down on the nail?” for I knew the
critter would see “the _point_” of coming down with the _blunt._
“It’s ten dollars and a half,” said he, “a cord at Halifax, and it
don’t cost me nothin’ to carry it there, for I have my own shallop—but
I will sell it for ten dollars to oblige you.” That was just seven
dollars more than it was worth.
“Well,” sais I, “that’s not high, only cash is scarce. If you will take
mackarel in pay, at six dollars a barrel (which was two dollars more
than its value), p’raps we might trade. Could you sell me twenty cord?”
“Yes, may be twenty-five.”
“And the mackarel?” said I.
“Oh,” said he, “mackarel is only worth three dollars and a half at
Halifax. I can’t sell mine even at that. I have sixty barrels, number
one, for sale.”
“If you will promise me to let me have all the wood I want, more or
less,” sais I, “even if it is ever so little; or as much as thirty
cords, at ten dollars a cord, real rock maple, and yellow birch, then I
will take all your mackarel at three and a half dollars, money down.”
“Say four,” said he.
“No,” sais I, “you say you can’t git but three and a half at Halifax,
and I won’t beat you down, nor advance one cent myself. But mind, if I
oblige you by buying all your mackarel, you must oblige me by letting
me have all the wood _I want_.”
“Done,” said he; so we warped into the wharf, took the fish on board,
and I paid him the money, and cleared fifteen pounds by the operation.
“Now,” says I, “where is the wood?”
“All this is mine,” said he, pointing to a pile, containing about fifty
cords.
“Can I have it all,” said I, “if I want it?”
He took off his cap and scratched his head; scratching helps a man to
think amazingly. He thought he had better ask a little more than ten
dollars, as I appeared to be so ready to buy at any price. So he said,
“Yes, you may have it all at ten and a half dollars.”
“I thought you said I might have what I wanted at ten.”
“Well, I have changed my mind,” said he, “it is too low.”
“And so have I,” sais I, “I won’t trade with a man that acts that way,”
and I went on board, and the men cast off and began to warp the vessel
again up to her anchor.
Lewis took off his cap and began scratching his head again, he had
over-reached himself. Expecting an immense profit on his wood, he had
sold his fish very low; he saw I was in earnest, and jumped on board.
“Capitaine, you will have him at ten, so much as you want of him.”
“Well, measure me off half a cord.”
“What!” said he, opening both eyes to their full extent.
“Measure me off half a cord.”
“Didn’t you say you wanted twenty or thirty cord?”
“No,” sais I, “I said I must have that much if I wanted it, but I don’t
want it, it is only worth three dollars, and you have had the modesty
to ask ten, and then ten and a half, but I will take half a cord to
please you, so measure it off.”
He stormed, and raved, and swore, and threw his cap down on the deck
and jumped on it, and stretched out his arm as if he was going to
fight, and stretched out his wizzened face, as if it made halloing
easier, and foamed at the mouth like a hoss that has eat lobelia in his
hay.
“Be gar,” he said, “I shall sue you before the common scoundrels
(council) at Halifax, I shall take it before the _sperm_ (supreme)
court, and _try_ it out.”
“How much _ile_ will you get,” sais I, “by _tryin’ me_ out, do you
think?
“Never mind,” said I, in a loud voice, and looking over him at the
mate, and pretending to answer him. “Never mind if he won’t go on
shore, he is welcome to stay, and we will land him on the Isle of
Sable, and catch a wild hoss for him to swim home on.”
The hint was electrical; he picked up his cap and ran aft, and with one
desperate leap reached the wharf in safety, when he turned and danced
as before with rage, and his last audible words were, “Be gar, I shall
go to the _sperm_ court and _try_ it out.”
“In the world before the Flood, you see, Doctor,” said I, “they knew
how to cheat as well as the present race do; the only improvement this
fellow has made on the antediluvian race is, he can take himself in, as
well as others.”
“I have often thought,” said the doctor, “that in our dealings in life,
and particularly in trading, a difficult question must often arise
whether a thing, notwithstanding the world sanctions it, is lawful and
right. Now what is your idea of smuggling?”
“I never smuggled,” said I: “I have sometimes imported goods and didn’t
pay the duties; not that I wanted to smuggle, but because I hadn’t time
to go to the office. It’s a good deal of trouble to go to a
custom-house. When you get there you are sure to be delayed, and half
the time to git sarce. It costs a good deal; no one thanks you, and
nobody defrays cab-hire, and makes up for lost time, temper, and
patience to you—it don’t pay in a general way; sometimes it will; for
instance, when I left the embassy, I made thirty thousand pounds of
your money by one operation. Lead was scarce in our market, and very
high, and the duty was one-third of the prime cost, as a protection to
the na_tive_ article. So what does I do, but go to old Galena, one of
the greatest dealers in the lead trade in Great Britain, and
ascertained the wholesale price.
“Sais I, ‘I want five hundred thousand dollars worth of lead.’
“‘That is an immense order,’ said he, ‘Mr Slick. There is no market in
the world that can absorb so much at once.’
“‘The loss will be mine,’ said I. ‘What deductions will you make if I
take it all from your house?’
“Well, he came down handsome, and did the thing genteel.
“‘Now,’ sais I, ‘will you let one of your people go to my cab, and
bring a mould I have there.’
“Well, it was done.
“‘There,’ said I, ‘is a large bust of Washington. Every citizen of the
United States ought to have one, if he has a dust of patriotism in him.
I must have the lead cast into rough busts like that.’
“‘Hollow,’ said he, ‘of course.’
“‘No, no,’ sais I, ‘by no manner of means, the heavier and solider the
better.’
“‘But,’ said Galena, ‘Mr Slick, excuse me, though it is against my own
interest, I cannot but suggest you might find a cheaper material, and
one more suitable to your very laudable object.’
“‘Not at all,’ said I, ‘lead is the very identical thing. If a man
don’t like the statue and its price, and it’s like as not he wont, he
will like the lead. There is no duty on statuary, but there is more
than thirty per cent. on lead. The duty alone is a fortune of not less
than thirty thousand pounds, after all expenses are paid.’
“‘Well now,’ said he, throwing back his head and laughing, ‘that is the
most ingenious device to evade duties I ever heard of.’
“I immediately gave orders to my agents at Liverpool to send so many
tons to Washington and every port and place on the seaboard of the
United States except New York, but not too many to any one town; and
then I took passage in a steamer, and ordered all my agents to close
the consignment immediately, and let the lead hero change hands. It was
generally allowed to be the handsomest operation ever performed in our
country. Connecticut offered to send me to Congress for it, the folks
felt so proud of me.
“But I don’t call that smugglin’. It is a skilful reading of a revenue
law. My idea of smugglin’ is, there is the duty, and there is the
penalty; pay one and escape the other if you like, if not, run your
chance of the penalty. If the state wants revenue, let it collect its
dues. If I want my debts got in, I attend to drummin’ them up together
myself; let government do the same. There isn’t a bit of harm in
smugglin’. I don’t like a law restraining liberty. Let them that impose
shackles look to the bolts; that’s my idea.”
“That argument won’t hold water, Slick,” said the doctor.
“Why?”
“Because it is as full of holes as a cullender.’
“How?”
“The obligation between a government and a people is reciprocal. To
protect on the one hand, and to support on the other. Taxes are
imposed, first, for the maintenance of the government, and secondly,
for such other objects as are deemed necessary or expedient. The moment
goods are imported, which are subject to such exactions, the amount of
the tax is a debt due to the state, the evasion or denial of which is a
fraud. The penalty is not an alternative at your option; it is a
punishment, and that always presupposes an offence. There is no
difference between defrauding the state or an individual. Corporeality,
or incorporeality, has nothing to do with the matter.”
“Well,” sais I, “Domine Doctor, that doctrine of implicit obedience to
the government won’t hold water neither, otherwise, if you had lived in
Cromwell’s time, you would have to have assisted in cutting the king’s
head off, or fight in an unjust war, or a thousand other wicked but
legal things. I believe every tub must stand on its own bottom; general
rules won’t do. Take each separate, and judge of it by itself.”
“Exactly,” sais the doctor; “try that in law and see how it would work.
No two cases would be decided alike; you’d be adrift at once, and a
drifting ship soon touches bottom. No, that won’t hold water. Stick to
general principles, and if a thing is an exception to the rule, put it
in Schedule A or B, and you know where to look for it. General rules
are fixed principles. But you are only talking for talk sake; I know
you are. Do you think now that merchant did right to aid you in evading
the duty on your leaden Washingtons?”
“What the plague had he to do with our revenue laws? They don’t bind
him,” sais I.
“No,” said the doctor, “but there is a higher law than the statutes of
the States or of England either, and that is the moral law. In aiding
you, he made the greatest sale of lead ever effected at once in
England; the profit on that was his share of the smuggling. But you are
only drawing me out to see what I am made of. You are an awful man for
a bam. There goes old Lewis in his fishing boat,” sais he. “Look at him
shaking his fist at you. Do you hear him jabbering away about _trying_
it out in the ‘_sperm_ court?’”
“I’ll make him draw his fist in, I know,” sais I. So I seized my rifle,
and stepped behind the mast, so that he could not see me; and as a
large grey gull was passing over his boat high up in the air, I fired,
and down it fell on the old coon’s head so heavily and so suddenly, he
thought he was shot; and he and the others set up a yell of fright and
terror that made everybody on board of the little fleet of coasters
that were anchored round us, combine in three of the heartiest,
merriest, and loudest cheers I ever heard.
“_Try_ that out in the _sperm_ court, you old bull-frog,” sais I. “I
guess there is more ile to be found in that fishy gentleman than in me.
Well,” sais I, “Doctor, to get back to what we was a talking of. It’s a
tight squeeze sometimes to scrouge between a lie and a truth in
business, ain’t it? The passage is so narrow, if you don’t take care it
will rip your trowser buttons off in spite of you. Fortunately I am
thin, and can do it like an eel, squirmey fashion; but a stout, awkward
fellow is most sure to be catched.
“I shall never forget a rise I once took out of a set of jockeys at
Albany. I had an everlastin’ fast Naraganset pacer once to Slickville,
one that I purchased in Mandarin’s place. I was considerable proud of
him, I do assure you, for he took the rag off the bush in great style.
Well, our stable-help, Pat Monaghan (him I used to call Mr Monaghan),
would stuff him with fresh clover without me knowing it, and as sure as
rates, I broke his wind in driving him too fast. It gave him the
heaves, that is, it made his flanks heave like a blacksmith’s bellows.
We call it ‘heaves,’ Britishers call it ‘broken wind.’ Well, there is
no cure for it, though some folks tell you a hornet’s nest cut up fine
and put in their meal will do it, and others say sift the oats clean
and give them juniper berries in it, and that will do it, or ground
ginger, or tar, or what not; but these are all quackeries. You can’t
cure it, for it’s a ruption of an air vessel, and you can’t get at it
to sew it up. But you can fix it up by diet and care, and proper usage,
so that you can deceive even an old hand, providin’ you don’t let him
ride or drive the beast too fast.
“Well, I doctored and worked with him so, the most that could be
perceived was a slight cold, nothin’ to mind, much less frighten you.
And when I got him up to the notch, I advertised him for sale, as
belonging to a person going down east, who only parted with him because
he thought him too heav_ey_ for a man who never travelled less than a
mile in two minutes and twenty seconds. Well, he was sold at auction,
and knocked down to Rip Van Dam, the Attorney-General, for five hundred
dollars; and the owner put a saddle and bridle on him, and took a bet
of two hundred dollars with me, he could do a mile in two minutes,
fifty seconds. He didn’t know me from Adam parsonally, at the time, but
he had heard of me, and bought the horse because it was said Sam Slick
owned him.
“Well, he started off, and lost his bet; for when he got near the
winnin’-post the horse choked, fell, and pitched the rider off half-way
to Troy, and nearly died himself. The umpire handed me the money, and I
dug out for the steam-boat intendin’ to pull foot for home. Just as I
reached the wharf, I heard my name called out, but I didn’t let on I
noticed it, and walked a-head. Presently, Van Dam seized me by the
shoulder, quite out of breath, puffin’ and blowin’ like a porpoise.
“‘Mr Slick?’ said he.
“‘Yes,’ sais I, ‘what’s left of me; but good gracious,’ sais I, ‘you
have got the ‘heaves.’ I hope it ain’t catchin’.’
“‘No I haven’t,’ said he, ‘but your cussed hoss has, and nearly broke
my neck. You are like all the Connecticut men I ever see, a nasty,
mean, long-necked, long-legged, narrow-chested, slab-sided,
narrow-souled, lantern-jawed, Yankee cheat.’
“‘Well,’ sais I, ‘that’s a considerable of a long name to write on the
back of a letter, ain’t it? It ain’t good to use such a swad of words,
it’s no wonder you have the heaves; but I’ll cure you; I warn’t brought
up to wranglin’; I hain’t time to fight you, and besides,’ said I, ‘you
are broken-winded; but I’ll chuck you over the wharf into the river to
cool you, boots and all, by gravy.’
“‘Didn’t you advertise,’ said he, ‘that the only reason you had to part
with that horse was, that he was too heavy for a man who never
travelled slower than a mile in two minutes and twenty seconds?’
“‘Never!’ sais I, ‘I never said such a word. What will you bet I did?’
“‘Fifty dollars,’ said he.
“‘Done,’ said I. ‘And, Vanderbelt—(he was just going on board the
steamer at the time)—Vanderbelt,’ sais I, ‘hold these stakes. Friend,’
sais I, ‘I won’t say you lie, but you talk uncommonly like the way I do
when I lie. Now prove it.’
“And he pulled out one of my printed advertisements, and said, ‘Read
that.’
“Well, I read it. ‘It ain’t there,’ said I.
“‘Ain’t it?’ said he. ‘I leave it to Vanderbelt.’
“‘Mr Slick,’ said he, ‘you have lost—it is here.’
“‘Will _you_ bet fifty dollars,’ said I, ‘though you have seen it, that
it’s there?’
“‘Yes,’ said he, ‘I will.’
“‘Done,’ said I. ‘Now how do you spell heavy?’
“‘H-e-a-v-y,’ said he.
“‘Exactly,’ sais I; ‘so do I. But this is spelt _heav-ey._ I did it on
purpose. I scorn to take a man in about a horse, so I published his
defect to all the world. I said he was too _heavey_ for harness, and so
he is. He ain’t worth fifty dollars—I wouldn’t take him as a gift—he
ain’t worth _von dam_?’
“‘Well, I did see that,’ said he, ‘but I thought it was an error of the
press, or that the owner couldn’t spell.’
“‘Oh!’ sais I, ‘don’t take me for one of your Dutch boors, I beg of
you. I can spell, but you can’t read, that’s all. You remind me,’ sais
I, ‘of a feller in Slickville when the six-cent letter stamps came in
fashion. He licked the stamp so hard, he took all the gum off, and it
wouldn’t stay on, no how he could fix it, so what does he do but put a
pin through it, and writes on the letter, “Paid, if the darned thing
will only stick.” Now, if you go and lick the stamp etarnally that way,
folks will put a pin through it, and the story will stick to you for
ever and ever. But come on board, and let’s liquor, and I will stand
treat.’
“I felt sorry for the poor critter, and I told him how to feed the
horse, and advised him to take him to Saratoga, advertise him, and sell
him the same way; and he did, and got rid of him. The rise raised his
character as a lawyer amazing. He was elected governor next year; a
sell like that is the making of a lawyer.
“Now I don’t call the lead Washingtons nor the _heavey_ horse either on
’em a case of cheat; but I do think a man ought to know how to read a
law and how to read an advertisement, don’t you? But come, let us go
ashore, and see how the galls look, for you have raised my curiosity.”
We accordingly had the boat lowered; and taking Sorrow with us to see
if he could do anything in the catering line, the doctor, Cutler, and
myself landed on the beach, and walked round the settlement.
The shore was covered with fish flakes, which sent up an aroma not the
most agreeable in the world except to those who lived there, and they,
I do suppose, snuff up the breeze as if it was loaded with wealth and
smelt of the Gold Coast. But this was nothing (although I don’t think I
can ever eat dum fish again as long as I live) to the effluvia arising
from decomposed heaps of sea-wood, which had been gathered for manure,
and was in the act of removal to the fields. No words can describe
this, and I leave it to your imagination, Squire, to form an idea of a
new perfume in nastiness that has never yet been appreciated but by an
Irishman.
I heard a Paddy once, at Halifax, describe the wreck of a carriage
which had been dashed to pieces. He said there was not “a smell of it
left.” Poor fellow, he must have landed at Chesencook, and removed one
of those oloriferous heaps, as Sorrow called them, and borrowed the
metaphor from it, that there was not “a smell of it left.” On the beach
between the “flakes” and the water, were smaller heaps of the garbage
of the cod-fish and mackarel, on which the grey and white gulls fought,
screamed, and gorged themselves, while on the bar were the remains of
several enormous black fish, half the size of whales, which had been
driven on shore, and hauled up out of the reach of the waves by strong
ox teams. The heads and livers of these huge monsters had been “_tried_
out in the _Sperm_ court” for ile, and the putrid remains of the
carcass were disputed for by pigs and crows. The discordant noises of
these hungry birds and beasts were perfectly deafening.
On the right-hand side of the harbour, boys and girls waded out on the
flats to dig clams, and were assailed on all sides by the screams of
wild fowl who resented the invasion of their territory, and were
replied to in tones no less shrill and unintelligible. On the left was
the wreck of a large ship, which had perished on the coast, and left
its ribs and skeleton to bleach on the shore, as if it had failed in
the vain attempt to reach the forest from which it had sprung, and to
repose in death in its native valley. From one of its masts, a long,
loose, solitary shroud was pendant, having at its end a large double
block attached to it, on which a boy was seated, and swung backward and
forward. He was a little saucy urchin, of about twelve years of age,
dressed in striped homespun, and had on his head a red yarn clackmutch,
that resembled a cap of liberty. He seemed quite happy, and sung a
verse of a French song with an air of conscious pride and defiance as
his mother, stick in hand, stood before him, and at the top of her
voice now threatened him with the rod, his father, and the priest—and
then treacherously coaxed him with a promise to take him to Halifax,
where he should see the great chapel, hear the big bell, and look at
the bishop. A group of little girls stared in amazement at his courage,
but trembled when they heard his mother predict a broken
neck—purgatory—and the devil as his portion. The dog was as excited as
the boy—he didn’t bark, but he whimpered as he gazed upon him, as if he
would like to jump up and be with him, or to assure him he would catch
him if he fell, if he had but the power to do so.
What a picture it was—the huge wreck of that that once “walked the
waters as a thing of life”—the merry boy—the anxious mother—the
trembling sisters—the affectionate dog; what bits of church-yard scenes
were here combined—children playing on the tombs—the young and the
old—the merry and the aching heart—the living among the dead. Far
beyond this were tall figures wading in the water, and seeking their
food in the shallows; cranes, who felt the impunity that the
superstition of the simple _habitans_ had extended to them, and sought
their daily meal in peace.
Above the beach and parallel with it, ran a main road, on the upper
side of which were the houses, and on a swelling mound behind them rose
the spire of the chapel visible far off in the Atlantic, a sacred
signal-post for the guidance of the poor coaster. As soon as you reach
this street or road and look around you, you feel at once you are in a
foreign country and a land of strangers. The people, their dress, and
their language, the houses, their form and appearance, the implements
of husbandry, their shape and construction—all that you hear and see is
unlike anything else. It is neither above, beyond, or behind the age.
It is the world before the Flood. I have sketched it for you, and I
think without bragging I may say I can take things off to the life.
Once I drawed a mutton chop so nateral, my dog broke his teeth in
tearing the panel to pieces to get at it; and at another time I painted
a shingle so like stone, when I threw it into the water, it sunk right
kerlash to the bottom.
“Oh, Mr Slick,” said the doctor, “let me get away from here. I can’t
bear the sight of the sea-coast, and above all, of this offensive
place. Let us get into the woods where we can enjoy ourselves. You have
never witnessed what I have lately, and I trust in God you never will.
I have seen within this month two hundred dead bodies on a beach in
every possible shape of disfiguration and decomposition—mangled,
mutilated, and dismembered corpses; male and female, old and young, the
prey of fishes, birds, beasts, and, what is worse, of human beings. The
wrecker had been there—whether he was of your country or mine I know
not, but I fervently hope he belonged to neither. Oh, I have never
slept sound since. The screams of the birds terrify me, and yet what do
they do but follow the instincts of their nature? They batten on the
dead, and if they do feed on the living, God has given them animated
beings for their sustenance, as, he has the fowls of the air, the
fishes of the sea, and the beasts of the field to us, but they feed not
on each other. Man, man alone is a cannibal. What an awful word that
is!”
“Exactly,” sais I, “for he is then below the canine species—‘dog won’t
eat dog.’1 The wrecker lives not on those who die, but on those whom he
slays. The pirate has courage at least to boast of, he risks his life
to rob the ship, but the other attacks the helpless and unarmed, and
spares neither age nor sex in his thirst for plunder. I don’t mean to
say we are worse on this side of the Atlantic than the other, God
forbid. I believe we are better, for the American people are a kind, a
feeling, and a humane race. But avarice hardens the heart, and
distress, when it comes in a mass, overpowers pity for the individual,
while inability to aid a multitude induces a carelessness to assist
any. A whole community will rush to the rescue of a drowning man, not
because his purse can enrich them all (that is too dark a view of human
nature), but because he is the sole object of interest. When there are
hundreds struggling for life, few of whom can be saved, and when some
wretches are solely bent on booty, the rest, regardless of duty, rush
in for their share also, and the ship and her cargo attract all. When
the wreck is plundered, the transition to rifling the dying and the
dead is not difficult, and cupidity, when once sharpened by success,
brooks no resistance, for the remonstrance of conscience is easily
silenced where supplication is not even heard. Avarice benumbs the
feelings, and when the heart is hardened, man becomes a mere beast of
prey. Oh this scene afflicts me—let us move on. These poor people have
never yet been suspected of such atrocities, and surely they were not
perpetrated _in the world before the Flood_.”
1 This homely adage is far more expressive than the Latin one:—
“Parcit
Cognates maculis, similis fera.”—Juv.