are satisfied
to talk forever of the same things in the same terms.

The incidents of our journey were few and uninteresting. At Montreal I
received a very civil note from Mrs. Davis, accompanying my trunk and my
purse. In the few lines I had written to her from the packet-office, I
said that my performance of a servant's character in her establishment
had been undertaken for a wager, which I had just won; that I begged of
her, in consequence, to devote the wages owing to me to any charitable
office she should think fit, and kindly to forward my effects to
Montreal, together with a certificate, under her hand, that my real rank
and station had never been detected during my stay in her house: this
document being necessary to convince my friend Captain Pike that I had
fulfilled the conditions of our bet.

Mrs. Davis's reply was a gem. "She had heard or read of Conacre, but
didn't suspect we were the Cregans of that place. She did not know how
she could ever forgive herself for having subjected me to menial duties.
She had indeed been struck--as who had not?--with certain traits of my
manner and address." In fact, poor Mrs. D., what with the material
for gossip suggested by the story, the surprise, and the saving of the
wages--for I suspect that, like the Duke in Junius, her charity ended
where it is proverbially said to begin, at home,--was in a perfect
paroxysm of delight with me, herself, and the whole human race.

To me, this was a precious document; it was a patent of gentility at
once. It was a passport which, if not issued by authority, had at least
the "visa" of one witness to my rank, and I was not the stuff to require
many credentials.

Before we had decided on what day we should leave Montreal, a kind of
small mutiny began to show itself among our party. The old man, grown
sick of travelling, and seeing the America of his hopes as far off as
ever, became restive, and refused to move farther. The sons had made
acquaintances on board the steamer, who assured them that "about the
lakes "--a very vague geography--land was to be had for asking. Peggy
and Susan had picked up sweethearts, and wanted to journey westward;
and poor Joe, pulled in these various directions, gave himself up to a
little interregnum of drink, hoping that rum might decide what reason
failed in.

As for me, I saw that my own influence would depend upon my making
myself a partisan; and, too proud for this, I determined to leave them.
I poss