ocess--all the while exhibiting his ivories and
the whites of his eyes in an expression of ill-concealed astonishment,
produced apparently by the presence of my uniform coat--to the "darkey,"
no doubt, an uncommon apparition.

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

THE "JACKSON HOTEL."

I found that I had arrived in the very "nick of time:" for just as I
returned from the stable, and was entering the verandah of the hotel, I
heard the bell calling its guests to supper. There was no ado made
about me: neither landlord or waiter met me with a word; and following
the stream of "boarders" or travellers who had arrived before me, I took
my seat at the common _table-d'hote_.

Had the scene been new to me, I might have found food for reflection, or
observed circumstances to astonish me. But I had been long accustomed
to mix in as motley a throng, as that which now surrounded the table of
the Swampville hotel. A supper-table, encircled by blanket and "jeans"
coats--by buckskin blouses and red-flannel shirts--by men without coats
at all--was nothing strange to me; nor was it strange either to find
these _bizarre_ costumes interspersed among others of fashionable cut
and finest cloth. Black broad-cloth frocks, and satin or velvet vests,
were quite common. Individuals thus attired formed a majority of the
guests--for in young settlements the "hotel" or "tavern" is also a
boarding-house, where the spruce "storekeepers" and better class of
clerks take their meals--usually sleeping in the office or store.

In glancing around the table, I saw many old "types," though not one
face that I had ever seen before. There was one, however, that soon
attracted my attention, and fixed it. It was _not_ a lady's face, as
you may be imagining; though there were present some of that sex--the
landlord's helpmate who presided over the coffee-pot, with some three or
four younger specimens of the backwoods fair--her daughters and nieces.
All, however, were absolutely without attraction of any sort; and I
somewhat bitterly remembered the _mot_ of double meaning, with which my
friend had entertained me at parting.

Venus was certainly not visible at the Swampville _table-d'hote_: for
the presiding divinity was a perfect Hecate; and her attendant damsels
could have found no place in the train of the Cytherean goddess. No--
the face that interested me was neither that of a female, nor in any way
feminine. It was the face of a _man_; and that in the most empha