This was a forcible simile, but it did not quite content us. “Why didn’t you?” was trembling on the lips of both Tom Harris and myself, but politeness restrained us from uttering what our looks must have plainly said. The Colonel answered our looks thus: “Because, squires, there was this difficulty in the way,—Buck, you know, is our old man.” “I beg your pardon,” said Tom, reddening again; “but I don’t quite catch your meaning. Buck, did you call the gentleman?” “Buck! the old man! White House—deputations—soirees—soft sawder,” explained the Doctor; and then we discovered that President Buchanan was the object of discourse. “Well,” pursued the Colonel, “Buck’s very far gone—notice to quit—time nearly up. His successor is sure to be Abe Lincoln, if the little giant don’t beat him at the election. Nobody else has got a chance. Caucuses all at work! dark as moles. Now, sir, we have plugged the platform.” “You’ve done what?” exclaimed Tom Harris. “We’ve made it all safe, and Lincoln stands to win,” exclaimed the Colonel, condescendingly. “Now we suspect those Southerners mean to ride rusty if they get an anti-slavery man, like old Abe, to be President over them; and though our folks air screamers, and that’s a fact, the South’s an ugly customer, and our line of railway is too close to Missouri State to be safe, if owned by Northerners. But in the smartest row the South can make, you Britishers are sure to be handled as tenderly as a hoosier handles a squirrel’s skin; and so it’s best the property should be in the name of British subjects, not free citizens. Don’t you see?” We did see, and we resolved that on the morrow we would sift the matter thoroughly. “Try the claret, Colonel,” said I; “you have been drinking nothing but sherry, and this is Chateau Margaux that I got at Bilkingham’s sale. Those are pretty good peaches, Doctor, of my own growing.” “Don’t talk of peaches,” said the Doctor, who, I will own, was anything but an agreeable guest; “you must cross the broad Atlantic before you talk of peaches, I reckon. I’ve fed pigs with better than your dukes and earls could show. I’ve bought in the market twenty-nine big peaches for thirty cents, I have. We do crow over you in peaches, as in most, only your national vanity won’t permit you to see it.” The Colonel jumped from his chair. “You be quiet!” said he; “the Doctor is a glowing patriot, Mr Bulkeley; but I know he admires your delightful snuggery, embellished by art and high-flying taste, as much as I do myself. Some day, as a director of the Nauvoo and Nebraska, you may, if you please, build a palace on the site of Magnolia Villa that will take the shine out of the sumptuous halls of your nobility. But enough of business. Gentlemen, if you have liquored sufficiently, we will join the ladies.”