racious or
affable. Even old Peterkin, when he came into notice, was treated with a
consideration which put that worthy man at ease, and set his tongue
again in motion. At first he had felt a little overawed by Arthur's
elegant appearance, and had whispered to his neighbor:

'That's a swell, and no mistake. I s'pose that's what you call foreign
get up. Well, me and ma is goin' to Europe some time, and hang me if I
don't put on style when I come home. I'd kind of like to speak to the
feller. I wonder if he remember that I was runnin' a boat when he went
away?'

If Arthur did remember it he showed no sign when Peterkin at last
pressed up to him, claiming his attention, as Captain Peterkin, of the
_'Liza Ann_, the fastest boat on the canal, and by George, the
all-tiredest meanest, too, I guess, he said: 'but them days is past, and
the old captain is past with them. I dabbled a little in ile, and if I
do say it, I could about buy up the whole canal if I wanted to; but I
ain't an atom proud, and I don't forget the old boatin' days, and I've
got the old '_Liza Ann_ hauled up inter my back yard as a relict. The
children use it for a play-house, but to me it is a--a--what do you call
it? a--gol darn it, what is it?'

'Souvenir,' suggested Arthur, vastly amused at this tirade, which had
assumed the form of a speech, and drawn a crowd around him.

'Wall, yes; I s'pose that's it, though 'taint exactly what I was trying
to think of,' he said. It's a reminder, and keeps down my pride, for
when I get to feelin' pretty big, after hearin' myself pointed out as
Peterkin the millionaire, I go out to that old boat in the back yard,
and says I, '_'Liza Ann_,' says I, 'you and me has took many a trip up
and down the canal, with about the wust crew, and the wust hosses, and
the wust boys that was ever created, and though you've got a new coat of
paint onto you, and can set still all day and do nothing while I can
wear the finest broadcloth and set still, too, it won't do for us to
forget the pit from which we was dug, and I don't forget it neither, no
more than I forgit favors shown when I was not fust cut. You, sir, rode
on the _'Liza Ann_ with that crony of yours--Hastings was his name--and
you paid me han'some, though I didn't ask nothin'; and ther's your
brother--Frank, I call him. I don't forgit that he used to speak to me
civil when I was nobody, and now, though I'm a Dimocrat, as everybody
knows me knows, and everybody most does k