one is glad to be able
to employ the weary hours with literature.

This is the greatest country for false rumors that I ever was in.
Communication is very uncertain, nothing but special messengers to
bring us news from the outside world. An occasional visit to Mr.
Soule[53] or to Beaufort enlivens the long weeks, and we welcome the
gathering at church on Sunday, with the gossip and the mail and the
queer collection of black beings in gay toggery, as the great event of
our lives. If it were not for the newspapers, I might forget the time
of year. It is very amusing to be appealed to by a negro to know how
soon the 1st of August is; to tell them it is the 20th of July gives
them very little idea.

I should like to look in upon you and bring you some of the delicacies
of the tropical clime, waterm[=e]lions, as the "inhabitants" call
them, rich and red; huge, mellow figs, seedy but succulent; plump
quails, sweet curlew, delicate squirrels, fat rabbits, tender
chickens. We fare well here. If the wretched country only had more
rocks and less sand, better horses, more tolerable staff officers,[54]
and just a little more frequent communication with New England, I
should perhaps be content to make quite a long stay, if I were wanted.

I will only remark at present that I find the nigs rather more
agreeable, on the whole, than I expected; that they are much to be
preferred to the Irish; that their blackness is soon forgotten, and as
it disappears their expression grows upon one, so that, after a week
or so of intercourse with a plantation, the people are as easily
distinguished and as individual as white people; I have even noticed
resemblances in some of them to white people I have seen. They are
about as offensively servile as I expected. The continual "sur,"
"maussa," with which their remarks are besprinkled is trying, but soon
ceases to be noticed. "Bauss" is the most singular appellation, used
by a few only.

"M's Hayyet's brudder" passed through the Pine Grove "nigger-house"
one day and retired, after a distinguished ovation, incubating, like a
hen, upon a sulky-box full of eggs. Promises to show Miss Harriet's
picture, not yet fulfilled, were received with the greatest
satisfaction.

We have been making out our pay-rolls for May and June; the blanks,
delayed in the printing, have just arrived. Red Tape. The money has
been ready a long time. We ought to pay for July at the same time.
This, understand, is only a parti