s being open, a passer-by heard her
objurgation. It seems the family had assembled at the dinner-table, and
her oldest son began by making premature demonstrations toward the
provisions, when his mother emphatically addressed him: "You Bob Barker,
if you stick your fork into that meat before I've asked a blessing, I'll
be the death of ye!"

There was a worthy shipmaster, also, who used to trade to Hayti, when
that stalwart colored person, Christophe, was the Emperor, who used to
say, "Put a bag of coffee in the mouth of h----, and a Yankee will be
sure to go after it." On one occasion, so the story ran, Captain H----
complained of some insult from one of Christophe's ragged soldiery. The
fact reached the ears of that potentate, who desired to stand well with
Americans, and our townsman was summoned before him. He found in the
presence of the monarch the whole body of the scanty force on duty in
the town. "Can you pick out the man who insulted you?" asked the sable
autocrat. Captain H---- pointed him out; but beginning to fear the
infliction of some punishment too severe, attempted to extenuate the
offence. "Stop!" cried Christophe, and called the soldier near him. "Do
you say this was the man of whom you have told me?" "Yes, sir, it is,"
replied the alarmed captain; "but"--In an instant Christophe had drawn
his sword, and with one blow struck off the head of the unlucky culprit.
The terror of the accusing party, at such a sudden and bloody
consummation, may be partly imagined. He procured his clearance as soon
as possible, and I believe made his future voyages to waters under a less
summarily sanguinary domination.

We had also a _soi-disant_ nobleman, of really the humblest extraction,
and ignorant to a singular degree, but known by his eccentricities far
and wide, who, on the score of a little money accidentally amassed,
proclaimed himself, by an inscription beneath a wooden statue of himself,
in front of his residence,--"LORD OF THE EAST, LORD OF THE WEST, AND THE
GREATEST PHILOSOPHER IN THE WESTERN WORLD." He decorated his court-yard
with an extraordinary amount of lumber of this sort, in the shape of
human beings, and dumb creatures of many sorts, each statue standing upon
its separate pillar, to the intense admiration of the gaping rustics who
visited the town to inspect it; and he fairly beat the Scottish Earl of
Buchan, who was infected with a similar mania. Upon an arch directly
opposite his front door, he had