dictation.

There are many Dutch in St. Louis, and along the levee you perceive
boarding-houses and groceries kept for their accommodation. These men
are generally great drinkers, and think as little of quaffing at a few
draughts half-a-pint of whiskey, as an Englishman would the same
quantity of malt liquor. They consume, also, vast quantities of claret.
I have frequently seen a couple of these men at a cafe, drink five or
bottles without betraying any ill effects. It must, however, be
remembered that claret is not so potent as the heavier wines.

A few days after my arrival, while standing in the vestibule of my
hotel, my attention was drawn to a loud altercation going on at the bar,
and as it was evident, from the manner of the parties, that some public
question was being discussed, I listened, and ascertained that an
obnoxious citizen had been seized for perpetrating a petty act of
revenge on a neighbour by damaging his horse, and was that day to be
publicly tarred, feathered, and escorted out of the city, as they said,
bag and baggage. Having ascertained the spot selected for the scene, I
determined to witness it. Accordingly, at noon, the appointed hour, I
repaired to an open spot of building-land on the Carondelet side of the
city. Here I found assembled a motley assemblage of citizens, negroes,
steamboat-hands, and the general riff-raff of the place. Although the
crowd was not so great, the meeting strongly reminded me of those scenes
of infamy and disgrace in England--public executions; the conduct of the
assembled throng on this occasion being the more decorous of the two.
Precisely at twelve, the mob made a rush towards one corner of the open
space, from which direction I saw the culprit advancing, in charge of
thirty or forty well-dressed people (the committee appointed for the
occasion being among the number). He was a stout man, and described to
me as a great bully; but now he looked completely crest-fallen. As the
party came on, he was hissed by the mob, who, however, kept at a good
distance from his guard. A man, with a large tin can of smoking pitch, a
brush of the kind used in applying the same, and a pillow of feathers
under his arm, followed immediately behind the prisoner, vociferating
loudly. Arrived at the spot, the poor wretch was placed on a stool, and
a citizen, who had taken a very prominent part in front of the
procession, and who, I was told, was the chief cause of this outrage,
stepped in