've got. I'll thank
you for your long knife, Mister. That'll do. That opens it, cuts in like
rael steel; better it should be into hard word than soft flesh. There
they are, then, and not broken; onhurt, without a spot or a crack. Sing
praises to the Lord! psalms and hymns of rejoicin'--not a phial broke,
nor a box smashed! Praised be the Lord! I say ag'in. Since they are
safe, it don't matter if twenty shoulder-blades and ankle-bones are put
out. Verily the mercy of Heaven shall be made manifest, and that by the
means of a feeble vessel, Jared Bundle by name. Down with ye,
Sambo--down with ye, I say!--Your shoulder and your dingy hide shall be
made whole, and your black bones shall be comforted!"

Not a muscle of the Yankee's face moved; he preserved the grave and
solemn appearance of a man to whom a sacred trust has been confided, and
who is fully penetrated with the importance of his mission. Once or
twice, however, I observed him give a keen but almost imperceptible
glance around him, as if to observe the effect of his eloquence upon his
auditors.

"Down with you, Sambo!" he repeated to the negro, who had got himself
into a sort of sitting posture upon the deck.

"Down, down!" cried the men of Kentucky.

"Down!" those of Missouri and Ohio.

"Be quick about it!" shouted an Illinois sucker.

"Let's see the Yankee's wonderful cure!" exclaimed a hunter from Oregon.

And amidst shouts and exclamations and laughter, poor Sambo was seized
by half a dozen of their bear's fists, and stretched out upon a heap of
coffee-bags like a pig that's going to be killed.

"Boe! Boe!" clamoured the negro at the top of his voice.

"Boohoo as much as you like," cried the Yankee in a shrill tone, that
was heard above all the howlings of the unlucky Sambo. "You'll sing to
another tune when you see and understand and feel what a Conne'ticut man
_can_ do. You say Boe, Boe! like a poor benighted crittur as you are,
but what do you say to that?" cried the pedlar in a triumphant voice, as
he held close to the negro's nose a piece of linen rag on which he had
smeared a green greasy substance bearing a strong resemblance to
paste-blacking in a state of decomposition. Then, taking up the box
which contained this precious compound, he put it in close proximity to
the obtuse snout of the blackamoor, who made a grimace as if his
olfactories were but moderately regaled by the odour emanating from the
miraculous ointment.

"What d'ye think of