of a shrewd North-countryman, against
whom, save that he was a runaway bankrupt from Hull in England, there
was nothing to say. Her Coffee Estate was managed by an Irishman that
had married, as he thought, a great Fortune, but found the day after his
wedding that she but a fortune-hunter like himself, and had at least
three husbands living in divers parts of the world. And finally, the
Distillery had for overseer one, an Englishman, that had been a Horse
Couper, and a runner for the Crimps at Wapping, and a supercargo that
was not too honest,--albeit he had to keep his accounts pretty square
with Maum Buckey, than whom there never was a woman who had a keener Eye
for business or a finer Scent for a Rogue.

She made me her Bookkeeper for the Washing Department. 'Twas not a very
dignified Employment for one that had been a young Gentleman, but 'twas
vastly better than the Fate of one who, but for a mere Accident, might
have been a young Slave. So I kept Maum Buckey's Books, teaching myself
how to do so featly from a Ready Reckoner and Accomptant's Assistant
(Mr. Cocker's), which I bought at a Bookstore in Kingston. The work was
pretty hard, and the old Dame of the Tub kept me tightly enough at it;
but when the work was over she was very kind to me, and we had the very
best of living: ducks and geese and turkeys and pork (of which the
Mulotter women are inordinately fond, although I never could reconcile
to myself how their stomachs, in so hot a climate, could endure so
Luscious a Food); fish of the primest from the Harbour of Port Royal,
lobsters and crabs and turtle (which last is as cheap as Tripe with us,
and so plentiful, that the Niggers will sometimes disdain to eat it,
though 'tis excellent served as soup in the creature's own shell, and a
most digestible Viand); to say nothing of bananas, shaddock, mango,
plantains, and the many delicious fruits and vegetables of that Fertile
Colony; where, if the land-breeze in the morning did not half choke you
with harsh dust, and the sea-breeze in the afternoon pierce you to the
marrow with deadly chills, and if one could abstain from surfeits of
fruits and over-drinking of the too abundant ardent spirits of the
country, a man might live a very jovial kind of life. However, I was
young and healthy, and, though never a shirker of my glass in
after-days, prudently moderate in my Potations. During four years that I
passed in the Island of Jamaica (one of the brightest jewels in t