artin up.

"Nothin," sed he: "only, now that Jane's face is in range with the
Deekin's, wat a wonderful resemblance! She hez the Pogram nose and
ginral outline uv face; not Mrs. P.'s angularity, but the Deekin all
over. My deer sir," sed he, addressin the Deekin, "ef she wuzn't a
quadroon, I shood say she looks enough like yoo to be yoor daughter, by
a first wife, I shood say, for she hez not, ez I remarked, Mrs. P.'s
angularity and gineral boneinis; but uv course, she bein a part nigger,
the resemblance may be sat down ez-a-very-remarkable-coincidence!"

The Deekin turned ez white ez a sheet, and Mrs. Pogram turned ez red ez
a biled lobster, from wich I inferred that there wuz trooth in a rumor I
had heerd about the Deekin and his wife hevin a misunderstandin about a
nigger woman and her baby, about 18 years ago, wich resulted in his bein
made bald-headed in less than a minute, and the baby's mother being sold
South. The Illinoy store-keeper, uv the name uv Pollock, resoomed,--

"I wuz about askin wat them niggers is ez is nearly white?"

"Why, they'r octoroons, or seven-eighths white," sed Mrs. Pogram.

"And no Kentuckian ever marries a nigger?" inquired the store-keeper,
who I saw wuz pursooin his investigations altogether too fur.

"Never!" sed Mrs. Pogram; "we leave that to Ablishnists."

"Well, then," sed this Pollock, who, I spect, wuzn't half so innsent ez
he let on, "I see that yoo hev no objection to mixin with the nigger,
providin yoo don't do it legally; that amalgamashen don't hurt nothin,
pervidin yoo temper it with adultery. Is that the idee, Mrs. Pogram?"

Mrs. P. wuz mad, and made no reply, and Pollock persood the subjick.

"Jane there, is, I take it, about one-eighth nigger. She got her white
blood from whites, uv course; and ez there coodent be no marryin in the
biznis, there is proof positive in her face that the 8th commandment hez
bin violated about four times somewhere in this vicinity, or wherever
her maternal ancestors, on her mother's side, may hev resided. What do
yoo think about it, Deekin? Ez a Christian, woodent it be better to
marry em than to add a violation uv the commandment to the sin uv
amalgamashen? It wood redoose yoor load jest a half."

The Deekin wuz too indignant to reply, and ez it involved a pint
altogether too hefty for his limited intelleck, I took it up.

"My dear sir," I remarked, "yoo don't make the proper distinction, or,
rather, yoo don't appreciate the subjic