Cumberland Oysters Produce Melancholy Forebodings.
The "soft sawder" of the Clockmaker had operated effectually on the
beauty of Amherst, our lovely hostess of Pugwash's inn: indeed, I am
inclined to think, with Mr. Slick, that "the road to a woman's heart
lies through her child," from the effect produced upon her by the
praises bestowed on her infant boy.
I was musing on this feminine susceptibility to flattery, when the
door opened, and Mrs. Pugwash entered, dressed in her sweetest smiles
and her best cap, an auxiliary by no means required by her charms,
which, like an Italian sky, when unclouded, are unrivalled in
splendour. Approaching me, she said, with an irresistible smile,
"Would you like Mr. ---" (Here there was a pause, a hiatus, evidently
intended for me to fill up with my name; but that no person knows,
nor do I intend they shall; at Medley's Hotel, in Halifax, I was
known as the stranger in No. 1. The attention that incognito procured
for me, the importance it gave me in the eyes of the master of the
house, its lodgers and servants, is indescribable. It is only great
people who travel incog. State travelling is inconvenient and slow;
the constant weight of form and etiquette oppresses at once the
strength and the spirits. It is pleasant to travel unobserved, to
stand at ease, or exchange the full suit for the undress coat and
fatigue jacket. Wherever too there is mystery there is importance;
there is no knowing for whom I may be mistaken; but let me once give
my humble cognomen and occupation, and I sink immediately to my own
level, to a plebeian station and a vulgar name; not even my beautiful
hostess, nor my inquisitive friend, the Clockmaker, who calls me
"Squire," shall extract that secret!) "Would you like, Mr. ---"
"Indeed, I would," said I, "Mrs. Pugwash; pray be seated, and tell me
what it is."
"Would you like a dish of superior Shittyacks for supper?"
"Indeed I would," said I, again laughing; "but pray tell me what
it is?"
"Laws me!" said she with a stare, "where have you been all your days,
that you never heerd of our Shittyack oysters? I thought everybody
had heerd of them."
"I beg pardon," said I, "but I understood at Halifax, that the only
oysters in this part of the world were found on the shores of Prince
Edward Island."
"Oh! dear no," said our hostess, "they are found all along the coast
from Shittyack, through Bay of Vartes, away up to Ramshag. The latter
we seldom get, though the best; there is no regular conveyance, and
when they do come, they are generally shelled and in kegs, and never
in good order. I have not had a real good Ramshag in my house these
two years, since Governor Maitland was here; he was amazin' fond of
them, and lawyer Talkemdeaf sent his carriage there on purpose to
procure them fresh for him. Now we can't get them, but we have the
Shittyacks in perfection; say the word, and they shall be served up
immediately."
A good dish and an unexpected dish is most acceptable, and certainly
my American friend and myself did ample justice to the oysters,
which, if they have not so classical a name, have quite as good a
flavour as their far famed brethren of Milton. Mr. Slick ate so
heartily, that when he resumed his conversation, he indulged in the
most melancholy forebodings.
"Did you see that 'ere nigger," said he, "that removed the oyster
shells? well, he's one of our Chesapickers, one of General Cuffy's
slaves. I wish Admiral Cockburn had a taken them all off our hands at
the same time. We made a pretty good sale of them 'ere black cattle,
I guess, to the British; I wish we were well rid of 'em all. The
blacks and the whites in the States show their teeth and snarl, they
are jist ready to fall to. The Protestants and Catholics begin to lay
back their ears, and turn tail for kickin'. The Abolitionists and
Planters are at it like two bulls in a pastur'. Mob-law and Lynch-law
are working like yeast in a barrel, and frothing at the bung hole.
Nullification and Tariff are like a charcoal pit, all covered up,
but burning inside, and sending out smoke at every crack, enough to
stifle a horse. General Government and State Government every now
and then square off and sparr, and the first blow given will bring a
genuine set-to. Surplus Revenue is another bone of contention; like
a shin of beef thrown among a pack of dogs, it will set the whole on
'em by the ears.
"You have heerd tell of cotton rags dipped in turpentine, havn't
you, how they produce combustion? Well, I guess we have the elements
of spontaneous combustion among us in abundance; when it does break
out, if you don't see an eruption of human gore, worse than Etna
lava, then I'm mistaken. There'll be the very devil to pay, that's
a fact. I expect the blacks will butcher the Southern whites, and
the Northerners will have to turn out and butcher them again; and
all this shoot, hang, cut, stab, and burn business will sweeten our
folks' temper, as raw meat does that of a dog--it fairly makes me
sick to think on it. The explosion may clear the air again, and all
be tranquil once more, but it's an even chance if it don't leave us
the three steamboat options: to be blown sky high, to be scalded to
death, or drowned."
"If this sad picture you have drawn be indeed true to nature, how
does your country," said I, "appear so attractive, as to draw to it
so large a portion of our population?"
"It ain't its attraction," said the Clockmaker; "it's nothin' but its
power of suction; it is a great whirlpool--a great vortex--it drags
all the straw and chips, and floatin' sticks, drift-wood and trash
into it. The small crafts are sucked in, and whirl round and round
like a squirrel in a cage--they'll never come out. Bigger ones pass
through at certain times of tide, and can come in and out with good
pilotage, as they do at Hell Gate up the Sound."
"You astonish me," said I, "beyond measure; both your previous
conversations with me, and the concurrent testimony of all my friends
who have visited the States, give a different view of it."
"YOUR FRIENDS!" said the Clockmaker, with such a tone of ineffable
contempt, that I felt a strong inclination to knock him down for
his insolence, "your friends! Ensigns and leftenants, I guess, from
the British marchin' regiments in the Colonies, that run over five
thousand miles of country in five weeks, on leave of absence, and
then return, lookin' as wise as the monkey that had seen the world.
When they get back they are so chock full of knowledge of the
Yankees, that it runs over of itself, like a Hogshead of molasses
rolled about in hot weather--a white froth and scum bubbles out of
the bung; wishy-washy trash they call tours, sketches, travels,
letters, and what not; vapid stuff, jist sweet enough to catch flies,
cockroaches, and half-fledged gals. It puts me in mind of my French.
I larnt French at night school one winter, of our minister, Joshua
Hopewell (he was the most larned man of the age, for he taught
himself e'enamost every language in Europe); well, next spring, when
I went to Boston, I met a Frenchman, and I began to jabber away
French to him: 'Polly woes a french say,' says I. 'I don't understand
Yankee yet,' says he. 'You don't understand!' says I, 'why it's
French. I guess you didn't expect to hear such good French, did you,
away down east here? But we speak it real well, and it's generally
allowed we speak English, too, better than the British.' 'Oh,' says
he, 'you one very droll Yankee, dat very good joke, Sare; you talk
Indian and call it French.' 'But,' says I, 'Mister Mount shear; it is
French, I vow; real merchantable, without wainy edge or shakes--all
clear stuff; it will pass survey in any market--it's ready stuck
and seasoned.' 'Oh, very like,' says he, bowin' as polite as a black
waiter at New OrLEENS, 'very like, only I never heerd it afore; oh,
very good French dat--CLEAR STUFF, no doubt, but I no understand--it's
all my fault, I dare say, Sare.'
"Thinks I to myself, a nod is as good as a wink to a blind horse. I
see how the cat jumps--Minister knows so many languages he hain't
been particular enough to keep 'em in separate parcels and mark 'em
on the back, and they've got mixed, and sure enough I found my French
was so overrun with other sorts, that it was better to lose the whole
crop than to go to weedin', for as fast as I pulled up any strange
seedlin', it would grow right up agin as quick as wink, if there was
the least bit of root in the world left in the ground, so I let it
all rot on the field.
"There is no way so good to larn French as to live among 'em, and if
you WANT TO UNDERSTAND US, YOU MUST LIVE AMONG US, TOO; your Halls,
Hamiltons, and De Rouses, and such critters, what can they know of
us? Can a chap catch a likeness flyin' along a railroad? Can he even
see the feature? Old Admiral Anson once axed one of our folks afore
our glorious Revolution (if the British had a known us a little
grain better at that time, they wouldn't have got whipped like a sack
as they did then), where he came from. 'From the Chesapeeke,' said he.
'Aye, aye,' said the Admiral, 'from the West Indies.' 'I guess,' said
the Southaner, 'you may have been clean round the world, Admiral, but
you have been plaguy little in it, not to know better nor that.'
"I shot a wild goose at River Philip last year, with the rice of
Varginny fresh in his crop; he must have cracked on near about as
fast as them other geese, the British travellers. Which know'd the
most of the country they passed over, do you suppose? I guess it
was much of a muchness--near about six of one and a half dozen of
t'other; two eyes ain't much better than one, if they are both blind.
"No, if you want to know all about us and the Bluenoses (a pretty
considerable share of Yankee blood in them too, I tell you; the old
stock comes from New England, and the breed is tolerable pure yet,
near about one half apple sarce, and t'other half molasses, all
except to the East'ard, where there is a cross of the Scotch), jist
ax me and I'll tell you candidly. I'm not one of them that can't see
no good points in my neighbour's critter, and no bad ones in my own;
I've seen too much of the world for that, I guess. Indeed, in a
general way, I praise other folks' beasts, and keep dark about my
own. Says I, when I meet Bluenose mounted, 'that's a real smart horse
of your'n, put him out, I guess he'll trot like mad.' Well, he lets
him have the spur, and the critter does his best, and then I pass
him like a streak of lightning with mine. The feller looks all taken
aback at that. 'Why,' says he, 'that's a real clipper of your'n, I
vow.' 'Middlin',' says I (quite cool, as if I had heard that 'ere
same thing a thousand times), 'he's good enough for me, jist a fair
trotter, and nothin' to brag of. That goes near about as far agin in
a general way, as a crackin' and a boastin' does. Never TELL folks
you can go a head on 'em, but DO it; it spares a great deal of talk,
and helps them to save their breath to cool their broth.
"No, if you want to know the inns and the outs of the Yankees--I've
wintered them and summered them; I know all their points, shape,
make and breed; I've tried 'em alongside of other folks, and I know
where they fall short, where they mate 'em, and where they have the
advantage, about as well as some who think they know a plaguy sight
more. It ain't them that stare the most, that see the best always, I
guess. Our folks have their faults, and I know them (I warn't born
blind, I reckon), but your friends, the tour writers, are a little
grain too hard on us. Our old nigger wench had several dirty,
ugly-lookin' children, and was proper cross to 'em. Mother used
to say, 'Juno, it's better never to wipe a child's nose at all, I
guess, than to wring it off.'"