the rest of the day but
practise in what might be called Experimental Cookery: broiling and
grilling, and deviling slices of meat, and subjecting them to all
sorts of igneous operations. It was the first fresh beef that either
of us had tasted in more than a year.

"Oh, ye'll pick up arter a while, Peter," observed Zeke toward night,
as Long Ghost was turning a great rib over the coals--"what d'ye
think, Paul?"

"He'll get along, I dare say," replied I; "he only wants to get those
cheeks of his tanned." To tell the truth, I was not a little pleased
to see the doctor's reputation as an invalid fading away so fast;
especially as, on the strength of his being one, he had promised to
have such easy times of it, and very likely, too, at my expense.

CHAPTER LIX.

THE MURPHIES

DOZING in our canoe the next morning about daybreak, we were awakened
by Zeke's hailing us loudly from the beach.

Upon paddling up, he told us that a canoe had arrived overnight, from
Papeetee, with an order from a ship lying there for a supply of his
potatoes; and as they must be on board the vessel by noon, he wanted
us to assist in bringing them down to his sail-boat.

My long comrade was one of those who, from always thrusting forth the
wrong foot foremost when they rise, or committing some other
indiscretion of the limbs, are more or less crabbed or sullen before
breakfast. It was in vain, therefore, that the Yankee deplored the
urgency of the case which obliged him to call us up thus early:--the
doctor only looked the more glum, and said nothing in reply.

At last, by way of getting up a little enthusiasm for the occasion,
the Yankee exclaimed quite spiritedly, "What d'ye say, then, b'ys,
shall we get at it?"

"Yes, in the devil's name!" replied the doctor, like a snapping
turtle; and we moved on to the house. Notwithstanding his ungracious
answer, he probably thought that, after the gastronomic performance
of the day previous, it would hardly do to hang back. At the house,
we found Shorty ready with the hoes; and we at once repaired to the
farther side of the inclosure, where the potatoes had yet to be taken
out of the ground.

The rich, tawny soil seemed specially adapted to the crop; the great
yellow murphies rolling out of the hills like eggs from a nest.

My comrade really surprised me by the zeal with which he applied
himself to his hoe. For my own part, exhilarated by the cool breath
of the morning, I worked away like