urn
mother monarchy out of doors, and the in-door partner was making sad
use of the stock in trade (which consisted of a very large supply of
letter-writing material, only to be used for disseminating republican
principles), the junior of the house, taking advantage of the
opportune moment, thought it quite in keeping with the spirit of the
times to make a spec on his own account; and to that end the said
junior partner (not the least sagacious of the three), with a bill of
sale of Cuba in his pocket, had just stepped over to Washington to
consummate the purchase, and revel awhile in the damask of the White
House. Borland, finding no more congressional faces to smash in
Washington--from which city it was considered General Pierce had
removed an intolerable perplexity by sending him to foreign parts--had
been recompensed by the smashing of his own, in Central America, where
he had raised a tolerable sort of a breeze. He, too, must be thrown
in. Seymour, the blue-stocking governor, of whom so much was expected,
and whose mission to the god of all the Rushas, American statesmen
looked upon with great anxiety, it was currently reported had burrowed
in a snow-bank somewhere in the interior of the amiable Czar's vast
dominions, not one word having been heard of him for the last nine
months. That he had not lent material aid to the fighting Cossack, was
a source of grievous dissatisfaction to Young America.

"Smooth spread all these things out before the Gineral, just as clear
as water. To get Cuba--which was not just ready to hook on--and
St. Domingo, that it would take some nice diplomacy to make consider
the annexation question, and a few slices more of Mexico, ready to
make fast any moment; the Sandwich Islands, yearning to get in;
Central America, hardly worth taking in, but nevertheless acceptable,
on the ground of carrying out the universal plan, and Canada only
requiring a little more coaxing, Smooth thought the cost could be
reckoned down to a close figure. But there was Uncle Johnny, and his
newly-coined friend Louis Napoleon, to be kept shy while all this was
going on; and just there the plague and expense of the thing hung.
However, Smooth scratched his head, and made up his mind to enter into
a bargain to do the licking at a fair showing, cash down. As to the
brush between Nicholas and his neighbor--unhappy wretches; one always
wanting to steal the bits of stray territory--Smooth found it painful
to keep his fing