he is Dead.
At this distance of time, though I have many comforts around
me,--Worldly Goods, a Reputable name, my Child, and her Husband,--I
still look back on my old life in Jamaica, and confess that Providence
dealt very mercifully with me in those bygone days. For I had enough to
eat and to drink, and a Mistress who, although Passionate and
Quarrelsome enough by times, was not unkind. If she would swear, she
would also tender gentle Language upon occasion; and if she would throw
things, she was not backward in giving one a dollar to heal one's pate.
An odd life it was, truly. There was very little of that magnificence
about the town of Port Royal in my days which I have heard the Creoles
to boast about. It may have been handsome enough in the Spaniard's
Reign, or in King Charles the Second's; but I have heard that its most
comely parts had been swallowed up by an Earthquake, and, when I
remember it, the Main thoroughfare was like nothing half so much as the
Fag End of Kent Street in the Borough, where the Broom-men live. As for
public scavengers--humane at least--there were none; for that salutary
practice of putting rebellious Blacks into chain-gangs, and making them
sweep the streets,--which might be well done in London with Pickpockets
and the like trash, to their souls' health and the benefit of the Body
politic,--did not then obtain. The only way of clearing the offal was by
the obscene birds that flew down from the hills; Messieurs the
landcrabs, who were assuredly the best scavengers of all, not stirring
beyond the Palisadoes. Some things were very cheap, but others
inordinately dear. Veal was at a prodigious price; and 'twas a common
saying, that you could buy Four children in England cheaper than you
could one calf in Jamaica. But for the products and dishes of the
colony, which I have elsewhere hinted at, all was as low-priced as it
was abundant. What droll names did they give, too, unto their fish and
flesh and fowl! How often have you in England heard of Crampos,
Bonettas, Ringrays, Albacoras, and Sea-adders, among fish; of Noddies
and Boobies and Pitternells and Sheerwaters among birds? And Calialou
Soup, and Pepperpot to break your Fast withal in the morning, and make
you feel, ere you get accustomed to that Fiery victual, like a
Salamander for some hours afterwards!

Now and then also, with some other young white folks with whom I had
stricken up acquaintance,--clerks, storekeepers, and the like,--woul