Mr. Slick's Opinion of the British.
What success had you, said I, in the sale of your Clocks
among the Scotch in the eastern part of the Province? do
you find them as gullible as the Blue Noses? Well, said
he, you have heerd tell that a Yankee never answers one
question, without axing another, havent you? Did you ever
see an English Stage Driver make a bow? because if you
hante observed it, I have, and a queer one it is, I swan.
He brings his right arm up, jist across his face, and
passes on, with a knowin nod of his head, as much as to
say, how do you do? but keep clear o' my wheels, or I'll
fetch your horses a lick in the mouth as sure as youre
born; jist as a bear puts up his paw to fend off the blow
of a stick from his nose. Well, that's the way I pass
them are bare breeched Scotchmen. Lord, if they were
located down in these here Cumberland mashes, how the
musquitoes would tickle them up, would'nt they? They'd
set 'em scratching thereabouts, as an Irishman does his
head, when he's in sarch of a lie. Them are fellers cut
their eye teeth afore they ever sot foot in this country,
I expect. When they get a bawbee, they know what to do
with it, that's a fact; they open their pouch and drop
it in, and its got a spring like a fox trap--it holds
fast to all it gets, like grim death to a dead nigger.
They are proper skin flints, you may depend. Oatmeal is
no great shakes at best; it tante even as good for a
horse as real yeller Varginey corn, but I guess I warnt
long in finding out that the grits hardly pay for the
riddlin. No, a Yankee has as little chance among them as
a Jew has in New England; the sooner he clears out, the
better. You can no more put a leake into them, than you
can send a chisel into Teake wood--it turns the edge of
the tool the first drive. If the Blue Noses knew the
value of money as well as they do, they'd have more cash,
and fewer Clocks and tin reflectors, I reckon. Now, its
different with the Irish; they never carry a puss, for
they never have a cent to put in it. They are always in
love or in liquor, or else in a row; they are the merriest
shavers I ever seed. Judge Beeler, I dare say you have
heerd tell of him--he's a funny feller--he put a notice
over his factory gate at Lowell, 'no cigars or Irishmen
admitted within these walls;' for, said he, the one will
set a flame agoin among my cottons, and t'other among my
galls. I wont have no such inflammable and dangerous
things about me on no account. When the British wanted
our folks to join in the treaty to chock the wheels of
the slave trade, I recollect hearin old John Adams say,
we had ought to humor them; for, says he, they supply us
with labor on easier terms, by shippin out the Irish.
Says he, they work better, and they work cheaper, and
they don't live so long. The blacks, when they are past
work hang on for ever, and a proper bill of expence they
be; but hot weather and new rum rub out the poor rates
for tother ones. The English are the boys for tradin
with; they shell out their cash like a sheef of wheat in
frosty weather--it flies all over the thrashin floor;
but then they are a cross grained, ungainly, kicken breed
of cattle, as I een a most ever see'd. Whoever gave them
the name of John Bull, knew what he was about, I tell
you; for they are bull-necked, bull-headed folks, I vow;
sulky, ugly tempered, vicious critters, a pawin and a
roarin the whole time, and plaguy onsafe unless well
watched. They are as headstrong as mules, and as conceited
as peacocks.
The astonishment with which I heard this tirade against
my countrymen, absorbed every feeling of resentment. I
listened with amazement at the perfect composure with
which he uttered it. He treated it as one of those self
evident truths, that need neither proof nor apology, but
as a thing well known and admitted by all mankind. There's
no richer sight that I know of, said he, than to see one
on 'em when he first lands in one of our great cities.
He swells out as big as a balloon, his skin is ready to
bust with wind--a regular walking bag of gas; and he
prances over the pavement like a bear over hot iron--a
great awkward hulk of a feller, (for they aint to be
compared to the French in manners) a smirkin at you, as
much as to say, 'look here, Jonathan, here's an Englishman;
here's a boy that's got blood as pure as a Norman pirate,
and lots of the blunt of both kinds, a pocket full of
one, and a mouthfull of tother; beant he lovely?' and
then he looks as fierce as a tiger, as much as to say,
'say boo TO A GOOSE, if you dare.' No, I believe we may
stump the Univarse; we improve on every thing, and we
have improved on our own species. You'll sarch one while,
I tell you, afore you'll find a man that, take him by
and large, is equal to one of our free and enlightened
citizens. He's the chap that has both speed, wind and
bottom; he's clear grit--ginger to the back bone, you
may depend. Its generally allowed there aint the beat
of them to be found any where. Spry as a fox, supple as
an eel, and cute as a weasel. Though I say it that
should'nt say it, they fairly take the shine off
creation--they are actilly equal to cash.
He looked like a man who felt that he had expressed
himself so aptly and so well, that any thing additional
would only weaken its effect; he therefore changed the
conversation immediately, by pointing to a tree at some
little distance from the house, and remarking that it
was the rock maple or sugar tree. Its a pretty tree, said
he, and a profitable one too to raise. It will bear
tapping for many years, tho' it gets exhausted at last.
This Province is like that are tree, it is tapped till
it begins to die at the top, and if they dont drive in
a spile and stop the everlastin flow of the sap, it will
perish altogether. All the money that's made here, all
the interest that's paid in it, and a pretty considerable
portion of rent too, all goes abroad for investment, and
the rest is sent to us to buy bread. Its drained like
a bog, it has opened and covered trenches all through
it, and then there's others to the foot of the upland to
cut off the springs. Now you may make even a bog too dry;
you may take the moisture out to that degree, that the
very sile becomes dust and blows away. The English funds,
and our banks, rail roads, and canals, are all absorbing
your capital like a spunge, and will lick it up as fast
as you can make it. That very Bridge we heerd of at
Windsor, is owned in New Brunswick, and will pay tole to
that province. The capitalists of Nova Scotia treat it
like a hired house, they wont keep it in repair; they
neither paint it to preserve the boards, nor stop a leak
to keep the frame from rottin; but let it go to wrack
sooner than drive a nail or put in a pane of glass. It
will sarve our turn out they say. There's neither spirit,
enterprise, nor patriotism here; but the whole country
is as inactive as a bear in winter, that does nothin but
scroutch up in his den, a thinkin to himself, "well if
I ant an unfortunate divil, it's a pity; I have a most
splendid warm coat as are a gentleman in these here woods,
let him be who he will; but I got no socks to my feet,
and have to sit for everlastingly a suckin of my paws to
keep 'em warm; if it warn't for that, I guess, I'd make
some o' them chaps that have hoofs to their feet and
horns to their heads, look about them pretty sharp, I
know." It's dismal now, aint it? If I had the framin of
the Governor's message, if I would'nt shew 'em how to
put timber together you may depend, I'd make them scratch
their heads and stare, I know. I went down to Matanzas
in the Fulton Steam Boat once--well, it was the first of
the kind they ever see'd, and proper scared they were to
see a vessel, without sails or oars, goin right straight
ahead, nine knots an hour, in the very wind's eye, and
a great streak of smoke arter her as long as the tail of
a Comet. I believe they thought it was old Nick alive, a
treatin him self to a swim. You could see the niggers a
clippin it away from the shore, for dear life, and the
soldiers a movin about as if they thought that we were
a goin to take the whole country. Presently a little half
starved orange-coloured looking Spanish officer, all
dressed off in his livery, as fine as a fiddle, came off
with two men in a boat to board us. Well, we yawed once
or twice, and motioned to him to keep off for fear he
should get hurt; but be came right on afore the wheel,
and I hope I may be shot if the paddle did'nt strike the
bow of the boat with that force, it knocked up the starn
like a plank tilt, when one of the boys playing on it is
heavier than t'other; and chucked him right atop of the
wheel house--you never see'd a feller in such a dunderment
in your life. He had picked up a little English from
seein our folks there so much, and when he got up, the
first thing he said was,' Damn all sheenery, I say,
where's my boat?' and he looked round as if he thought
it had jumped on board too. Your boat, said the Captain,
why I expect it's gone to the bottom, and your men have
gone down to look arter it, for we never see'd or heerd
tell of one or t'other of them arter the boat was struck.
Yes, I'd make 'em stare like that are Spanish officer,
as if they had see'd out of their eyes for the first
time. Governor Campbell did'nt expect to see such a
country as this, when he came here, I reckon; I know he
did'nt. When I was a little boy, about knee high or so,
and lived down Connecticut river, mother used to say,
Sam, if you don't give over acting so like old Scratch,
I'll send you off to Nova-Scotia as sure as you are born;
I will, I vow. Well, Lord, how that are used to frighten
me; it made my hair stand right up an eend, like a cat's
back when she is wrathy; it made me drop it as quick as
wink--like a tin night cap put on a dipt candle agoin to
bed, it put the fun right out. Neighbour Dearborn's darter
married a gentleman to Yarmouth, that speculates in the
smugglin line; well, when she went on board to sail down
to Nova-Scotia, all her folks took on as if it was a
funeral; they said she was goin to be buried alive like
the nuns in Portengale that get a frolickin, break out
of the pastur, and race off, and get catched and brought
back agin. Says the old Colonel, her father. Deliverance,
my dear, I would sooner foller you to your grave, for
that would be an eend to your troubles, than to see you
go off to that dismal country, that's nothin but an
iceberg aground; and he howled as loud as an Irishman
that tries to wake his wife when she is dead. Awful
accounts we have of the country, that's a fact; but if
the Province is not so bad as they make it out, the folks
are a thousand times worse. You've seen a flock of
partridges of a frosty mornin in the fall, a crowdin out
of the shade to a sunny spot, and huddlin up there in
the warmth--well, the Blue Noses have nothin else to do
half the time but sun themselves. Whose fault is that?
Why it's the fault of the legislature; they don't encourage
internal improvement, nor the investment of capital in
the country: and the result is apathy, inaction and
poverty. They spend three months in Halifax, and what do
they do? Father gave me a dollar once, to go to the fair
at Hartford, and when I came back, says he, Sam, what
have you got to show for it? Now I ax what have they to
show for their three months' setting? They mislead folks;
they make 'em believe all the use of the Assembly is to
bark at Councillors, Judges, Bankers, and such cattle,
to keep 'em from eatin up the crops; and it actilly costs
more to feed them when they are watchin, than all the
others could eat if they did break a fence and get in.
Indeed some folks say they are the most breachy of the
two, and ought to go to pound themselves. If their fences
are good them hungry cattle could'nt break through; and
if they aint, they ought to stake 'em up, and with them
well; but it's no use to make fences unless the land is
cultivated. If I see a farm all gone to wrack, I say
here's bad husbandry and bad management; and if I see a
Province like this, of great capacity, and great natural
resources, poverty-stricken, I say there's bad legislation.
No, said he, (with an air of more seriousness than I had
yet observed,) How much it is to be regretted, that,
laying aside personal attacks and petty jealousies, they
would not unite as one man, and with one mind and one
heart apply themselves sedulously to the internal
improvement and developement of this beautiful Province.
Its value is utterly unknown, either to the general or
local Government, and the only persons who duly appreciate
it, are the Yankees.