rear a genius, by which time as near as he could
calculate, he the Theorist would be in his dotage:
and all the better; make a curious contrast, in
favour of young Africa.

Vespasian could not hit a barn door sitting—
with a rifle: it was purely with a view to his moral
improvement, mind you, that Fullalove invited
him into the mizentop to fight the Pirate. The
Patient came gingerly and shivered there with fear.
But five minutes elapsing, and he not killed, that
weakness gave way to a jocund recklessness; and
he kept them all gay with his quaint remarks, of
which I must record but one. When they
crossed the stern of the Pirate, the distance was
so small that the faces of that motley crew were
plainly visible: now, Vespasian was a merciless
critic of coloured skins; "Wal," said he,
turning up his nose sky high, "dis child never
seen such a mixallaneous biling o' darkies as this
yar; why darned ef there ain't every colour in the
rainbow; from the ace of spades down to the
fine dissolving views." This amazing description,
coupled with his look of affront and disgust,
made the white men roar; for men fighting for
their lives have a greater tendency to laugh than
one would think possible. Fullalove was proud
of the critic, and for a while lost sight of the
Pirate in his theory; which also may seem strange.
But your true theorist is a man apart: he can
withdraw into himself under difficulties. "What
said one of the breed two thousand years ago?

Media inter prælia semper
Sideribus, cœlique plagis Superisque vacavi.

Oh the great African heart!" said Fullalove, after
the battle. "By my side he fears no danger. Of
all men negroes are the most capable of
friendship; their affection is a mine: and we have
only worked it with the lash; and that is a
ridicalous mining tool I ratther think."

When Vespasian came out so strong versus
Ramgolam, Fullalove was even more triumphant:
for after all it is not so much the heart, as the
intelligence, of the negro, we albiculi affect to
doubt.

"Oh, the great African intellect!" said Fullalove,
publicly, taking the bull by the horns.

"I know," said Mrs. Beresford, maliciously;
''down in the maps as the great African Desert."

To balance his many excellences Vespasian
had an infirmity. This was, an ungovernable
itch for brushing whites. If he was talking with
one of that always admired, and now beloved,
race, and saw a speck of dirt on him, he would
brush him unobtrusively, but effectually, in full
dialogue: he would steal behind a knot of whites
and brush whoever needed it, however little.
Fullalove remonstrated, but in vain; on this
one point Instinct would not yield to Reason.
He could not keep his hands off a dusty white.
He would have died of the miller of Dee. But
the worst was he did not stop at clothes; he
loathed ill-blacked shoes: woe to all foot-leather
that did not shine; his own skin furnished a
perilous standard of comparison. He was
eternally blacking boots en amateur. Fullalove got
in a rage at this, and insisted on his letting his
fellow-creatures' leather alone. Vespasian pleaded
hard, especially for leave to black Colonel
Kenealy. "The cunnel," said he, pathetically, "is
such a tarnation fine gentleman spoilt for want
of a lilly bit of blacking." Fullalove replied
that the colonel had got a servant whose mission
it was to black his shoes. This simply amused
Vespasian. "A servant?" said he. "Yah! yah!
What is the use of white servants? They are
not biddable. Massa Fullalove, sar! Goramighty
he reared all white men to kick up a dust, white
servants inspecially, and the darkies to brush
'em; and likewise additionally to make their
boots shine, a lilly bit." He concluded with a
dark hint that the colonel's white servant's own
shoes, though better blacked than his master's,
were anything but mirrors, and that this child
had his eye on them.

The black desperado emerged on tiptoe from
Kenealy's cabin, just as Macbeth does from the
murdered Duncan's chamber: only with a pair of
boots in his hand instead of a pair of daggers;
got into the moonlight, and finding himself
uninterrupted, assumed the whistle of innocence,
and polished them to the nine, chuckling audibly.

Fullalove watched him with an eye like a rattlesnake:
but kept quiet. He saw interference
would only demoralise him worse: for it is more
ignoble to black boots clandestinely, than bravely:
men ditto.

He relieved his heart with idioms. "Darn the
critter; he's fixed my flint eternally. Now I
cave. I swan to man I may just hang up my
fiddle: for this darkie's too hard a row to hoe."

It was but a momentary dejection. The
Mixture was (inter alia) a Theorist and an Anglo-Saxon;
two indomitables. He concluded to
temporise with the Brush; and breed it out.

"I'm bound to cross the obsequious cuss with
the catawamptiousest gal in Guinea: and one
that never saw a blacking bottle, not even in a
dream." Majora canamus.

Being now about a hundred miles South of the
Mauritius, in fine weather with a light breeze,
Dodd's marine barometer began to fall steadily:
and by the afternoon the declension had become
so remarkable, that he felt uneasy, and, somewhat
to the surprise of the crew,—for there was now
scarce a breath of air,—furled his slight sails,
treble reefed his topsails, had his top-gallant, and
royal, yards, and gaff topsail, sent on deck, got his
flying jib boom in, &c., and made the ship snug.

Kenealy asked him what was the matter?

"Barometer going down; moon at the full;
and Jonah aboard," was the reply, uttered
doggedly.

Kenealy assured him it was a beautiful evening,
precursor of a fine day. "See how red the
sunset is:

             Evening red and morning grey
             Are the sure signs of a fine day."