Yankee Eating and Horse Feeding.
"Did you ever hear tell of Abernethy, a British doctor?" said the
Clockmaker.
"Frequently," said I; "he was an eminent man, and had a most
extensive practice."
"Well, I reckon he was a vulgar critter that," he replied, "he
treated the hon'ble Alden Gobble, secretary to our legation at
London, dreadful bad once; and I guess if it had been me he had used
that way, I'd a fixed his flint for him, so that he'd think twice
afore he'd fire such another shot as that 'ere agin. I'd a made him
make tracks, I guess, as quick as a dog does a hog from a potato
field. He'd a found his way out of the hole in the fence a plaguy
sight quicker than he came in, I reckon."
"His manner," said I, "was certainly rather unceremonious at times,
but he was so honest and so straightforward, that no person was,
I believe, ever seriously offended at him. IT WAS HIS WAY."
"Then his way was so plaguy rough," continued the Clockmaker, "that
he'd been the better, if it had been hammered and mauled down
smoother. I'd a levelled him as flat as a flounder."
"Pray what was his offence?" said I.
"Bad enough you may depend. The hon'ble Alden Gobble was dyspeptic,
and he suffered great on easiness arter eatin', so he gees to
Abemethy for advice. 'What's the matter with you?' said the
Doctor--jist that way, without even passing the time o' day with
him--'what's the matter with you?' said he. 'Why,' says Alden, 'I
presume I have the Dyspepsy.' 'Ah!' said he, 'I see; a Yankee
swallowed more dollars and cents than he can digest.' 'I am an
American citizen,' says Alden, with great dignity; 'I am Secretary to
our Legation at the Court of St. James.' 'The devil you are,' said
Abernethy; "then you'll soon get rid of your dyspepsy.' 'I don't see
that 'ere inference,' said Alden, 'it don't follow from what you
predicate at all; it ain't a natural consequence, I guess, that a man
should cease to be ill because he is called by the voice of a free
and enlightened people to fill an important office.' (The truth is,
you could no more trap Alden than you could an Indian. He could see
other folks' trail, and made none himself; he was a real diplomatist,
and I believe our diplomatists are allowed to be the best in the
world.) 'But I tell you it does follow,' said the Doctor; 'for in the
company you'll have to keep, you'll have to eat like a Christian.'
"It was an everlasting pity Alden contradicted him, for he broke out
like one ravin' distracted mad. 'I'll be damned,' said he, 'if ever I
saw a Yankee that didn't bolt his food whole like a boa constrictor.
How the devil can you expect to digest food, that you neither take
the trouble to dissect, nor time to masticate? It's no wonder you
lose your teeth, for you never use them; nor your digestion, for
you overload it; nor your saliva, for you expend it on the carpets,
instead of your food. It's disgusting, it's beastly. You Yankees load
your stomachs as a Devonshire man does his cart, as full as it can
hold, and as fast as he can pitch it with a dung-fork, and drive off;
and then you complain that such a load of compost is too heavy for
you. Dyspepsy, eh! infernal guzzling, you mean. I'll tell you what,
Mr. Secretary of Legation, take half the time to eat that you do to
drawl out your words, chew your food half as much as you do your
filthy tobacco, and you'll be well in a month.'
"'I don't understand such language,' said Alden. (For he was fairly
riled, and got his dander up, and when he shows clear grit, he looks
wicked ugly, I tell you.) 'I don't understand such language, sir;
I came here to consult you professionally, and not to be--' 'Don't
understand!' said the Doctor, 'why it's plain English; but here, read
my book!' and he shoved a book into his hands and left him in an
instant, standing alone in the middle of the room.
"If the hon'ble Alden Gobble had gone right away and demanded his
passport, and returned home with the Legation, in one of our first
class frigates (I guess the English would as soon see p'ison as one
o' them 'ere Serpents), to Washington, the President and the people
would have sustained him in it, I guess, until an apology was offered
for the insult to the nation. I guess if it had been me," said Mr.
Slick, "I'd a headed him afore he slipped out o' the door, and pinned
him up agin the wall, and made him bolt his words again, as quick as
he throw'd 'em up, for I never seed an Englishman that didn't cut his
words as short as he does his horse's tail, close up to the stump."
"It certainly was very coarse and vulgar language, and I think," said
I, "that your Secretary had just cause to be offended at such an
ungentlemanlike attack, although he showed his good sense in treating
it with the contempt it deserved."
"It was plaguy lucky for the doctor, I tell you, that he cut his
stick as he did, and made himself scarce, for Alden was an ugly
customer; he'd a gi'n him a proper scalding; he'd a taken the
bristles off his hide, as clean as the skin of a spring shote of
a pig killed at Christmas."
The Clockmaker was evidently excited by his own story, and to
indemnify himself for these remarks on his countrymen, he indulged
for some time in ridiculing the Nova Scotians.
"Do you see that 'ere flock of colts," said he, as we passed one of
those beautiful prairies that render the valleys of Nova Scotia so
verdant and so fertile. "Well, I guess they keep too much of that
'ere stock. I heerd an Indian one day ax a tavern-keeper for some
rum. 'Why, Joe Spawdeeck,' said he, 'I reckon you have got too much
already.' 'Too much of anything,' said Joe, 'is not good; but too
much rum is jist enough.' I guess these Bluenoses think so about
their horses; they are fairly eat up by them, out of house and home,
and they are no good neither. They bean't good saddle horses, and
they bean't good draft beasts; they are jist neither one thing nor
t'other. They are like the drink of our Connecticut folks. At mowing
time they use molasses and water--nasty stuff, only fit to catch
flies; it spiles good water and makes bad beer. No wonder the folks
are poor. Look at them 'ere great dykes; well, they all go to feed
horses; and look at their grain fields on the upland; well, they are
all sowed with oats to feed horses, and they buy their bread from
us: so we feed the asses, and they feed the horses. If I had them
critters on that 'ere marsh, on a location of mine, I'd jist
take my rifle and shoot every one on 'em--the nasty yo-necked,
cat-hammed, heavy-headed, flat-eared, crooked-shanked, long-legged,
narrow-chested, good-for-nothin' brutes; they ain't worth their
keep one winter. I vow, I wish one of these Bluenoses, with his
go-to-meetin' clothes on, coat-tails pinned up behind like a leather
blind of a Shay, an old spur on one heel, and a pipe stuck through
his hat-band, mounted on one of these limber-timbered critters, that
moves its hind legs like a hen scratchin' gravel, was sot down in
Broadway, in New York, for a sight. Lord! I think I hear the West
Point cadets a-larfin' at him. 'Who brought that 'ere scare-crow out
of standin' corn and stuck him here?' 'I guess that 'ere citizen came
from away down east out of the Notch of the White Mountains.' 'Here
comes the Cholera doctor, from Canada--not from Canada, I guess,
neither, for he don't look as if he had ever been among the rapids.'
If they wouldn't poke fun at him it's a pity.
"If they'd keep less horses, and more sheep, they'd have food and
clothing, too, instead of buyin' both. I vow I've larfed afore now
till I have fairly wet myself a-cryin', to see one of these folks
catch a horse: may be he has to go two or three miles of an arrand.
Well, down he goes on the dyke with a bridle in one hand, and an old
tin pan in another, full of oats, to catch his beast. First he goes
to one flock of horses, and then to another, to see if he can find
his own critter. At last he gets sight on him, and goes softly up to
him, shakin' of his oats, and a-coaxin' him, and jist as he goes to
put his hand upon him, away he starts all head and tail, and the rest
with him: that starts another flock, and they set a third off, and
at last every troop on 'em goes, as if Old Nick was arter them, till
they amount to two or three hundred in a drove. Well, he chases them
clear across the Tantramer marsh, seven miles good, over ditches,
creeks, mire holes, and flag ponds, and then they turn and take a
fair chase for it back again, seven miles more. By this time, I
presume, they are all pretty considerably well tired, and Bluenose,
he goes and gets up all the men folks in the neighbourhood, and
catches his beast, as they do a moose arter he is fairly run down;
so he runs fourteen miles, to ride two, because he is in a tarnation
hurry. It's e'enamost equal to eatin' soup with a fork, when you are
short of time. It puts me in mind of catching birds by sprinklin'
salt on their tails; it's only one horse a man can ride out of half
a dozen, arter all. One has no shoes, t'other has a colt, one ain't
broke, another has a sore back, while a fifth is so etarnal cunnin',
all Cumberland couldn't catch him, till winter drives him up to the
barn for food.
"Most of them 'ere dyke marshes have what they call 'honey pots' in
'em; that is a deep hole all full of squash, where you can't find no
bottom. Well, every now and then, when a feller goes to look for his
horse, he sees his tail a-stickin' right out an eend, from one of
these honey pots, and wavin' like a head of broom corn; and sometimes
you see two or three trapped there, e'enamost smothered, everlastin'
tired, half swimmin' half wadin', like rats in a molasses cask. When
they find 'em in that 'ere pickle, they go and get ropes, and tie
'em tight round their necks, and half hang 'em to make 'em float,
and then haul 'em out. Awful lookin' critters they be, you may
depend, when they do come out; for all the world like half-drowned
kittens--all slinkey slimey, with their great long tails glued up
like a swab of oakum dipped in tar. If they don't look foolish it's
a pity! Well, they have to nurse these critters all winter, with hot
mashes, warm covering, and what not, and when spring comes, they
mostly die, and if they don't they are never no good arter. I wish
with all my heart half the horses in the country were barrelled up in
these here 'honey pots,' and then there'd be near about one half too
many left for profit. Jist look at one of these barn yards in the
spring--half a dozen half-starved colts, with their hair lookin' a
thousand ways for Sunday, and their coats hangin' in tatters, and
half a dozen good-for-nothin' old horses, a-crowdin' out the cows
and sheep.
"Can you wonder that people who keep such an unprofitable stock, come
out of the small eend of the horn in the long run?"