re in the open
street, or a squaw carrying on her back a baby, firmly tied to a piece
of curved bark; a Southern-stater, with a spanking waggon-team, and two
grinning negroes behind, were new and strange elements in the life of a
city. Still, the mere movement, the actual busy stir and occupation of
the inhabitants, attracted me as much as anything else; and the shops
and stalls, where trades were carried on, were a seduction I could not
resist.

The strict puritanism in which I had lately lived taught me to regard
all these things with a certain degree of distrust. They were the
impulses of that gold-seeking passion of which Gottfried had spoken
so frequently; they were the great vice of that civilisation, whose
luxurious tendency he often deplored; and here, now, more than one-half
around me were arts that only ministered to voluptuous tastes. Brilliant
articles of jewellery; gay cloaks, worked with wampum, in Indian taste;
ornamental turning, and costly weapons, inlaid with gold and silver,
succeeded each other, street after street; and the very sight of them,
however pleasurable to the eye, set me a-moralising in a strain that
would have done credit to a son of Geneva. It might have been that, in
my enthusiasm, I uttered half aloud what I intended for soliloquy; or
perhaps some gesture, or peculiarity of manner, had the effect; but so
it was, I found myself an object of notice; and my queer-cut coat and
wide hat, contrasting so strangely with my youthful appearance and
slender make, drew many a criticism on me.

'He ain't a Quaker, that's a fact,' cried one, 'for they don't wear
black.'

'He's a down-easter--a horse-jockey chap, I'll be bound,' cried another.
'They put on all manner of disguises and "masqueroonings." I know 'em!'

'He's a calf preacher--a young bottle-nosed Gospeller,' broke in a
thick, short fellow, like the skipper of a merchant-ship. 'Let's have
him out for a preachment.'

'Ay, you're right,' chimed in another. 'I'll get you a sugar hogshead in
no time'; and away he ran on the mission.

Between twenty and thirty persons had now collected; and I saw myself,
to my unspeakable shame and mortification, the centre of all their looks
and speculations. A little more _aplomb_ or knowledge of life would have
taught me coolness enough in a few words to undeceive them; but such a
task was far above me now, and I saw nothing for it but flight. Could I
only have known which way to take, I need not have