The Clockmaker — or, the Sayings and Doings of Samuel Slick, of Slickville. Thomas Chandler Haliburton
door, and afore I see'd any body a coming, I let go, and I vow if I did'nt let a chap have it all over his white waistcoat. Well, he makes a grab at me, and I shuts the door right to on his wrist, and hooks the door chain taught and leaves him there, and into Marm Lecain's bed room like a shot, and hides behind the curtain. Well, he roared like a bull, till black Lucretia, one of the house helps, let him go, and they looked into all the gentlemen's rooms and found nobody—so I got out of that are scrape. So, what with Marm Lecain's carpets in the house, and other folks' waistcoats in the street, its too nice a location for me, I guess, so I shall up killoch and off to morrow to the TREE-mont.
Now, says the Professor, the St. John's folks are jist like Billings, fifty cents would have bought him a spit box, and saved him all them are journeys to the street door—and a canal at Bay Varte would save the St. John's folks a voyage all round Nova-Scotia. Why, they can't get at their own backside settlements, without a voyage most as long as one to Europe. If we had that are neck of land in Cumberland, we'd have a ship canal there, and a town at each end of it as big as Portland. You may talk of Solomon, said the Professor, but if Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like a lily of the field, neither was he in all his wisdom, equal in knowledge to a reel free American citizen. Well, said I, Professor, we are a most enlightened people, that's sartain, but somehow I don't like to hear you run down King Solomon neither; perhaps he warnt quite so wise as Uncle Sam, but then, said I, (drawing close to the Professor, and whispering in his ear, for fear any folks in the bar room might hear me,) but then, said I, may be he was every bit and grain as honest. Says he, Mr. Slick, there are some folks who think a good deal and say but little, and they are wise folks; and there are others agin, who blart right out whatever comes uppermost, and I guess they are pretty considerable superfine darned fools. And with that he turned right round, and sat down to his map and never said another word, lookin' as mad as a hatter the whole blessed time.
No. IX
Yankee Eating and Horse Feeding.
Did you ever heer tell of Abernethy, a British doctor? said the Clockmaker. Frequently, said I, he was an eminent man, and had a most extensive practice. Well, I reckon he was a vulgar critter that, he replied, he treated the honble. Aiden Gobble, secretary to our legation at London, dreadful bad once; and I guess if it had been me he had used that way, I'd a fixed his flint for him, so that he'd think twice afore he'd fire such another shot as that are again. I'd a made him make tracks, I guess, as quick as a dog does a hog from a potatoe field. He'd a found his way out of the hole in the fence a plaguy sight quicker than he came in, I reckon. Hits manner, said I, was certainly rather unceremonious at times, but he was so honest, and so straightforward, that no person was, I believe, ever seriously offended at him. IT WAS HIS WAY. Then his way was so plague rough, continued the Clockmaker, that he'd been the better, if it had been hammered and mauled down smoother. I'd a levelled him as flat as a flounder. Pray what was his offence? said I. Bad enough you may depend. The honble. Alden Gobble was dyspeptic, and he suffered great on easiness arter eatin, so he gees to Abemethy for advice. What's the matter with you, said the Doctor? jist that way, without even passing the time o' day with him—What's the matter with you? said he. Why, says Alden, I presume I have the Dyspepsy. Ah! said he, I see; a Yankee swallowed more dollars and cents than he can digest I am an American citizen, says Alden, with great dignity, I am Secretary to our Legation at the Court of St. James. The devil you are, said Abernethy, then you'll soon get rid of your dyspepsy. I don't see that are inference, said Alden, it don't follow from what you predicate at all—it ant a natural consequence, I guess, that a man should cease to be ill, because he is called by the voice of a free and enlightened people to fill an important office. (The truth is, you could no more trap Alden than you could an Indian. He could see other folks' trail, and made none himself; he was a real diplomatist, and I believe our diplomatists are allowed to be the best in the world.) But I tell you it does follow, said the Doctor; for in the company you'll have to keep, you'll have to eat like a Christian. It was an everlasting pity Alden contradicted him, for he broke out like one ravin distracted mad. I'll be d—d, said he, if ever I saw a Yankee that did'nt bolt his food whole like a Boa Constrictor. How the devil can you expect to digest food, that you neither take the trouble to dissect, nor time to masticate? It's no wonder you lose your teeth, for you never use them; nor your digestion, for you overload it; nor your saliva, for you expend it on the carpets, instead of your food. Its disgusting, its beastly. You Yankees load your stomachs as a Devonshire man does his cart, as full as it can hold, and as fast as he can pitch it with a dung fork, and drive off; and then you complain that such a load of compost is too heavy for you. Dyspepsy, eh! infernal guzzling, you mean. I'll tell you what, Mr. Secretary of Legation, take half the time to eat, that you do to drawl out your words, chew your food half as much as you do your filthy tobacco, and you'll be well in a month. I don't understand such language, said Alden. (for he was fairly ryled, and got his dander up, and when he shows clear grit, he looks wicked ugly, I tell you.) I don't understand such language. Sir: I came here to consult you professionally, and not to be—. Don't understand! said the Doctor, why its plain English: but here, read my book—and he shoved a book into his hands and left him in an instant, standing alone in the middle of the room. If the honble. Alden Gobble had gone right away and demanded his passports, and returned home with the Legation, in one of our first class frigates, (I guess the English would as soon see pyson as one o' them are Serpents) to Washington, the President and the people would have sustained him in it, I guess, until an apology was offered for the insult to the nation. I guess if it had been me, said Mr. Slick, I'd a headed him afore he slipt out o' the door, and pinned him up agin the wall, and made him bolt his words again, as quick as he throw'd 'em up, for I never see'd an Englishman that didn't cut his words as short as he does his horse's tail, close up to the stump. It certainly was very coarse and vulgar language, and I think, said I, that your Secretary had just cause to be offended at such an ungentlemanlike attack, although he showed his good sense in treating it with the contempt it deserved, It was plaguy lucky for the doctor, I tell you, that he cut stick as he did, and made himself scarce, for Alden was an ugly customer; he'd a gin him a proper scalding—he'd a taken the bristles off his hide, as clean as the skin of a spring shote of a pig killed at Christmas. The Clockmaker was evidently excited by his own story, and to indemnify himself for these remarks on his countrymen, he indulged for some time in ridiculing the Nova Scotians.
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