of the whites of your eyes as if you was a chokin', and savin' 'No
_Bun-kum_, Mr. Slick.' Cuss that word Bunkum! I am sorry I ever told you
that are story, you will be for everlastinly a throwin' up of that are,
to me now.

"Do you think if I warnted to soft sawder you, I'd take the white-wash
brush to you, and slobber it, on, as a nigger wench does to a board
fence, or a kitchen wall to home, and put your eyes out with the lime?
No, not I; but I could tickel you though, and have done it afore now,
jist for practice, and you warn't a bit the wiser. Lord, I'd take a
camel's-hair brush to you, knowin' how skittish and ticklesome you are,
and do it so it would feel good. I'd make you feel kinder pleasant, I
know, and you'd jist bend your face over to it, and take it as kindly as
a gall does a whisper, when your lips keep jist a brushin' of the cheek
while you are a talkin'. I wouldn't go to shock you by a doin' of it
coarse; you are too quick, and too knowin' for that. You should smell
the otter o' roses, and sniff, sniff it up your nostrils, and say to
yourself, 'How nice that is, ain't it? Come, I like that, how sweet
it stinks!' I wouldn't go for to dash scented water on your face, as a
hired lady does on a winder to wash it, it would make you start back,
take out your pocket-handkercher, and say, "Come, _Mister_ Slick, no
nonsense, if you please." I'd do it delicate, I know my man: I'd use a
light touch, a soft brush, and a smooth oily rouge."

"Pardon me," I said, "you overrate your own powers, and over-estimate
my vanity. You are flattering yourself now, you can't flatter me, for I
detest it."

"Creation, man," said Mr. Slick, "I have done it now afore your face,
these last five minutes, and you didn't know it. Well, if that don't
bang the bush. It's tarnation all over that. Tellin' you, you was so
knowin', so shy if touched on the flanks; how difficult you was to
take-in, bein' a sensible, knowin' man, what's that but soft sawder? You
swallowed it all. You took it off without winkin', and opened your mouth
as wide as a young blind robbin does for another worm, and then down
went the Bunkum about making you a Secretary of State, which was rather
a large bolus to swaller, without a draft; down, down it went, like a
greased-wad through a smooth rifle bore; it did, upon my soul. Heavens!
what a take in! what a splendid sleight-of-hand! I never did nothin'
better in all my born days. I hope I may be shot, if I did. Ha