I was going from Baton Rouge to New Orleans on the steamer _Grand
Duke_, one New Year's eve, and had spent a great deal of money at
the bar for wine. The barkeeper was an Italian with a great name,
which was Napoleon. I said to him, "Nap, I hear you have sixty
dozen eggs on board; suppose you treat me to an eggnog." "Oh, no;
me no treat; if you pay, me make some." "If you don't treat me to
an eggnog, I will quit buying wine," I said, and walked out. I
went to Daniel Findlay, the steward, and told him how stingy old
"Nap" was to me. Dan said, "Never mind, George; I'll fix him and
his eggs." He told the cook to fire up, and then get those sixty
dozen eggs and boil them hard as h--l. After they were all hard-
boiled, they put them into cold water, and then put them back into
the box. I went back to the bar, and waited until Dan sent me word
that all was ready; then I said to old Nappy, "I was only in fun;
I wanted to see if you could make a good eggnog." "I make good
eggnoggy as anybody," said Nap. "Well, I tell you what I will do;
if you will make enough to treat all the passengers, I will give
you $10," I said. "All right," says he, and started to the storeroom
to get his sugar, milk, eggs, etc. He soon returned, loaded down
with stock. He got out his large bowl, and then cracked one of
the eggs. It didn't crack to suit him; he looked at it, and then
said to me, "Lookey dat! a chick in the first egg!" He threw that
one out of the window, and then cracked another, which was just
like the first; then he said, "Me boughty the egg for fresh; no
good; all rot." Then he broke another, and another, and finally
he broke one open and found it hard boiled; then he said, "Who
biley the egg? Me give five dollie to know who biley the egg!"
His Italian blood was up to fever heat, and it was some time before
we could get a drink of any kind. He sold the eggs in market when
we got to New Orleans. We did not have our eggnog that New Year's
eve, but we had the best laugh at the expense of old Napoleon that
I ever had in my life.
"SNAP GAMES."
I was coming down from the Memphis races on the _R. W. Hill_.
There were about twenty-five gamblers on the boat, and they were
all crazy for a game of faro. I told them I had a set of tools on
board that I would loan them if they wanted to open. They accepted
the offer, and took turns in opening "snaps." Some opened as high
as $1,000 at a time. I was playing poker, and did not pay much
attention to their game. After supper I told them that I would
open a $1,000 "snap," and they could tap it when they pleased.
When I sat down to deal, I had a matched set of boxes; you could
not tell one from the other. One box was fixed for all the cases
to lose, and this I kept secreted. They knocked me out of $400 on
one deal; on the next deal I shuffled up the same cards and put
them in the box, so they could see that everything was on the
square. As I did so, my partner tipped over a big lot of silver
on the layout, which he had stacked up on purpose to draw their
attention, and I came the change on the boxes and threw my handkerchief
over the box I held in my lap. Everything went on all right. The
first case that showed on the case-keeper they all jumped on to
play it open, as they wanted to break the snap, as then I would
open another; but the case lost, and I was a good big winner over
the last deal. When it came to another case, they played it to
win, and it lost; but they did not think anything was wrong, so
they kept firing away till they were all pretty well crippled in
money matters. They played the deal out, and nearly all were broke.
At the end of the deal I said, "Boys, I will have to quit you, as
it is too much of a seesaw game;" and then they commenced to smell
a rat, and you would have given $100 to have heard them cursing
for not watching me shuffle that deal. The game closed with nearly
all the money won; some of them I had to loan money, to pay their
expenses.