e out of the water for the hoss, and
he couldn't drink for the hoss, and he was almost choked to death, and
as black in the face as your hat. And the Prince and the officers larfed
so, they couldn't help him, if they was to die for it.

"Sais I to myself, 'A joke is a joke, if it tante carried too far,
but this critter win be strangled, as sure as a gun, if he lays here
splutterin' this way much longer.' So I jist gives the hoss a dab in
the mouth, and made him git up; and then sais I, 'Prince,' sais I, for I
know'd him by his beard, he had one exactly like one of the old
saint's heads in an Eyetalian pictur, all dressed to a pint, so sais I,
'Prince,' and a plaguy handsum man he is too, and as full of fun as a
kitten, so sais I, 'Prince,' and what's better, all his officers seemed
plaguy proud and fond of him too; so sais I, 'Prince, voila le condition
of one colonist, which,' sais I, 'Prince, means in English, that
leftenant is jist like a colonist.'

"'Commong,' sais he, 'how is dat?'

"'Why' sais I, 'Prince, whenever a colonist goes for to drink at a
spring of the good things in this world, (and plaguy small springs we
have here too,) and fairly lays down to it, jist as he gets his lips
cleverly to it, for a swig, there is some cussed neck or another, of
some confounded Britisher, pops right over him, and pins him there. He
can't get up, he can't back out, and he can't drink, and he is blacked
and blued in the face, and most choked with the weight.'

"'What country was you man of?' said he, for he spoke very good for a
Frenchman.

"With that I straightened myself up, and looked dignified, for I know'd
I had a right to be proud, and no mistake; sais I, 'Prince, I am an
American citizen.' How them two words altered him. P'raps there beant no
two words to ditto 'em. He looked for all the world like a different man
when he seed I wasn't a mean uncircumcised colonist.

"'Very glad to see you, Mr. Yankee,' said he, 'very glad indeed. Shall I
have de honour to ride with you a little way in your carriage?'

"'As for the matter of that,' sais I, 'Mountsheer Prince, the honour is
all the other way,' for I can be as civil as any man, if he sets out to
act pretty and do the thing genteel.

"With that he jumped right in, and then he said somethin' in French
to the officers; some order or another, I suppose, about comin on and
fetchin' his hoss with them. I have hearn in my time, a good many men
speak French, but I never