er," that I cannot make up my mind to write it. I know
there is an ingenious substitute, as the following little dialogue will
show, but my early education under the astronomer and the delicate
minded Adrienne, has rendered me averse to false taste, and I find the
substitute as disagreeable as the original. The conversation to which I
allude, occurred between me and a very respectable looking shirt, that
I happened to be hanging next to on a line, a few days after my
arrival; the colonel having judged it prudent to get me washed and
properly ironed, before he carried me into the "market."

"Who is your BOSS, pocket-handkerchief?" demanded the shirt, a perfect
stranger to me, by the way, for I had never seen him before the
accidents of the wash-tub brought us in collision; "who is your boss,
pocket-handkerchief, I say?--you are so very fine, I should like to
know something of your history."

From all I had heard and read, I was satisfied my neighbor was a Yankee
shirt, both from his curiosity and from his abrupt manner of asking
questions; still I was at a loss to know the meaning of the word BOSS,
my clairvoyance being totally at fault. It belongs to no language known
to the savans or academicians.

{savans = scholars}

"I am not certain, sir," I answered, "that I understand your meaning.
What is a BOSS?"

{boss = Cooper was annoyed by American euphemisms, such as using the
Dutch word "boss" in place of "master"--a custom he blamed largely on
New England "Yankees"}

"Oh! that's only a republican word for 'master.' Now, Judge Latitat is
MY boss, and a very good one he is, with the exception of his sitting
so late at night at his infernal circuits, by the light of miserable
tallow candles. But all the judges are alike for that, keeping a poor
shirt up sometimes until midnight, listening to cursed dull lawyers,
and prosy, caviling witnesses."

{circuits = American "circuit judges" travelled from town to town,
holding court in each and sleeping at local inns and taverns}

"I beg you to recollect, sir, that I am a female pocket-handkerchief,
and persons of your sex are bound to use temperate and proper language
in the presence of ladies.

"Yes, I see you are feminine, by your ornaments--still, you might tell
a fellow who is your boss?"

"I belong, at present, to Colonel Silky, if that is what you mean; but
I presume some fair lady will soon do me the honor of transferring me
to her own wardrobe. No doubt my fut