n he had at first
imagined; "why you say dey _no_ murder, and steal and set fire,
when you know dey's Injin! Natur' be natur'; and dat I hear dominie
Woods say t'ree time one Sunday. What 'e dominie say _often_, he
mean, and dere no use in saying dey don't come to do harm."

As Great Smash was an oracle in her own set, there was no gainsaying
her dogmas, and Pliny the elder was obliged to succumb. But the
presence of Mike, one who was understood to have been out, _near_,
if not actually _in_, the enemy's camp, and a great favourite in
the bargain, was a circumstance likely to revive the discourse. In
fact, all the negroes, crowded into the hall, as soon as the Irishman
was seated at table, one or two eager to talk, the rest as eager to
listen.

"How near you been to sabbage, Michael?" demanded Big Smash, her two
large coal-black eyes seeming to open in a degree proportioned to her
interest in the answer.

"I wint as nigh as there was occasion, Smash, and that was nigher than
the likes of yer husband there would be thinking of travelling. Maybe
'twas as far as from my plate here to yon door; maybe not quite so far.
They 're a dhirty set, and I wish to go no nearer."

"What dey look like, in 'e dark?" inquired Little Smash--"Awful as by
daylight?"

"It's not meself that stopped to admire 'em. Nick and I had our
business forenent us, and when a man is hurried, it isn't r'asonable to
suppose he can kape turning his head about to see sights."

"What dey do wid Misser Woods?--What sabbage want wid dominie?"

"Sure enough, little one; and the question is of yer own asking. A
praist, even though he should be only a heretic, can have no great call
for his sarvices, in _sich_ a congregation. And, I don't think the
fellows are blackguards enough to scalp a parson."

Then followed a flood of incoherent questions that were put by all the
blacks in a body, accompanied by divers looks ominous of the most
serious disasters, blended with bursts of laughter that broke out of
their risible natures in a way to render the medley of sensations as
ludicrous as it was strange. Mike soon found answering a task too
difficult to be attempted, and he philosophically came to a
determination to confine his efforts to masticating.

Notwithstanding the terror that actually prevailed among the blacks, it
was not altogether unmixed with a resolution to die with arms in their
hands, in preference to yielding to savage clemency. Hatred, in a
m