rsuasive manner of addressing the members had the desired effect.
They were convinced by the gentle logic of their dignified superior
officer, and they could not have the heart to oppose him had they felt
so inclined.

Messrs. Wagstaff, Overdale, and Dennis, who were thus so summarily
promoted, were solemnly sworn in on a boiled ham, after which all hands
joined in singing, "We won't go home till morning." It may be proper to
add, in respect to this last musical asseveration, and as a deserved
tribute to the veracity of the persons concerned, that when they said
they wouldn't go home till morning, _they didn't_.

THE COLORED CAMP-MEETING.

There is a divinity that shapes our ends,
Rough----

SHAKSPEARE.

[Illustration]

An evening or two after the facts related in the last chapter of this
veritable and never-to--be-believed history, the members of the club
were seated in silent deliberation round their table, each man smoking a
short pipe by a special order of the council; an unusual commotion was
noticed at the end of the table where John Spout was supposed to be
anchored. First the smoke, which had settled, in a thick, hazy layer,
upon everything, and concealed the members from each other, as if they
had mutually pulled the wool over each other's eyes until all were for
a time invisible, was observed to wave to and fro, as if agitated by
some powerfully moving cause, concealed from the observers by the
fragrant tobacco fog which had been raised by the joint exertions of the
assembled multitude. A few minutes more disclosed the arm of John Spout,
working like an insane windmill, backwards and forwards, to open a clear
space, and make himself visible to the naked eye.

After the lapse of some little time, and the expenditure of no small
amount of muscular power in this interesting exercise, the ruddy
beef-face of the Higholdboy beamed forth from the encircling mist, like
a good-natured light-house, which had been on a spree the night before,
and got up with a red nose, in consequence of the nocturnal dissipation.
As soon as he had cleared a space about him large enough for him to
speak without danger of suffocation, he announced that he had a
proposition to lay before the honorable body, and proceeded to state
that he had observed in a morning paper an advertisement of a
camp-meeting, to be held at a distance from the city easily accessible,
by a 2'40" team, in a couple of hours. He, moreover, wen