the
colonies. The focus to see right, as I said afore, is three thousand
miles off.'

"'Well,' sais he, 'that's a capital illustration, Mr. Slick. There is
more in that than meets the ear. Don't tell me you don't know nothin'
about the colonies; few men know so much as you do. I wish to heavens
you was a colonist,' sais he; 'if you were, I would offer you a
government.'

"'I don't doubt it,' sais I; 'seein' that your department have advanced
or rewarded so many colonists already.' But I don't think he heard that
shot, and I warn't sorry for it; for it's not right to be a pokin' it
into a perlite man, is it?

"'I must tell the Queen that story of _the Gander Pulling_,' sais he; 'I
like it amazingly. It's a capital caricature. I'll send the idea to H.
B. Pray name some day when you are disengaged; I hope you will give me
the pleasure of dining with me. Will this day fortnight suit you?'

"'Thank you,' sais I, 'I shall have great pleasure.'

"He railly was a gentlemany man that. He was so good natured, and took
the joke so well, I was kinder sorry I played it off on him. I hante
see'd no man to England I affection so much as Mr. Tact, I swear! I
begin to think, arter all, it was the right of _sarchin' vessels_ he
wanted to talk to me about, instead of _sarchin' me_, as I suspicioned.
It don't do always _to look for motives, men often act without any_. The
next time, if he axes me, I'll talk plain, and jist tell him what I
_do_ think; but still, if he reads that riddle right, he may larn a good
deal, too, from the story of "the Gander Pulling," mayn't he?"

CHAPTER V. THE BLACK STOLE.

The foregoing sketch exhibits a personal trait in Mr. Slick's character,
the present a national one. In the interview, whether real or fanciful,
that he alleges to have had with one of the Secretaries of State, he was
not disposed to give a direct reply, because his habitual caution led
him to suspect that an attempt was made to draw him out on a particular
topic without his being made aware of the object. On the present
occasion, he exhibits that irritability, which is so common among all
his countrymen, at the absurd accounts that travellers give of the
United States in general, and the gross exaggerations they publish of
the state of slavery in particular.

That there is a party in this country, whose morbid sensibility is
pandered to on the subject of negro emancipation there can be no doubt,
as is proved by the experiment