e as to refuse to serve his majesty, he must suffer for his
folly. We have been particular in this anecdote; and we request our
readers to bear it in mind, when we shall come to contrast this prompt
answer of the royal Duke to the letter of a negro, with the conduct of
Mr. Beasley, our agent for prisoners. The prisoners themselves noticed
it; and envied the negro, while they execrated the haughty, unfeeling
agent, who seldom, or ever answered their letters, or took any notice
of their applications.

The poor negro consoled himself for his disappointment by turning
Christian; and being a pretty clever fellow, and having formerly
belonged to the royal family, it was considered an act of kindness and
magnanimity, to raise him to the rank of _deacon_ in Simon's church.
_Deacon John_ generally acts as a privy counsellor to the king; and
is sometimes a judge in criminal cases, when his majesty allows of
one, which is not very often; for he most commonly acts in as despotic
and summary a manner as the _Dey_ of Algiers himself.

King Dick keeps a boxing-school, where the white men are sometimes
admitted. No. 4 is noted, also, for fencing, dancing and music; and,
however extraordinary it may appear, they teach these accomplishments
to the white men. A person, entering the cock-loft of No. 4, would be
highly amused with the droll scenery which it exhibited; and if his
sense of smelling be not too refined, may relish, for a little while,
this strange assemblage of antics. Here he may see boxing, fencing,
dancing, raffling, and other modes of gambling; and to this, we may
add, drawing with chalk and charcoal; and tricks of slight-of-hand;
and all this to gratify the eye; and for the sense of hearing, he may
be regaled with the sound of clarionets, flutes, violins, flagelets,
fifes, tambarines, together with the whooping and singing of the
negroes. On Sundays this den of thieves is transformed into a temple
of worship, when _Simon_, the _priest_, mounted on a little stool,
behind a table covered with green cloth, proclaims the wonders of
creation, and salvation to the souls of true believers; and hell fire
and brimstone, and weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth, to the
hardened and impenitent sinner, and obstinate rebel of proffered
mercy. As he approaches the end of his discourse, he grows warmer and
warmer, and, foaming at the mouth, denounces all the terrors of the
law against every heaven-daring, God-provoking sinner. I