The negro boys there are the most cunning imps I have ever had to do with. I recollect on my last voyage to Jamaica, while my vessel was lying in St. Anne's bay, I had to go to Port Maria to look for some cargo; and on my way thither, near Ora Cabeça, I came to one of the numerous small rivers that empty themselves into the little bays along the coast--I think it was the Salt Gut. When at some distance, I had observed a negro boy belabouring a mule most heartily; but before I got up he had left off his thumping and dismounted, and now appeared in earnest talk with his beast, which, with fore-legs stretched out firm, and ears laid down, seemed proof against all arguments to induce him to enter the water. Quashie was all animation, and his eyes flashed like fire-flies. "Who--o! you no go ober? Berry well--me bet you fippenny me make you go--No? Why for you no bet?--why for you no go ober?" Here the mule shook his ears to drive off the flies, which almost devour the poor animals in that climate. "Oh! you do bet--berry well--den me try." The young rascal (he was not more than ten years old) disappeared in the bush, and returned in a few seconds with some strips of fan-weed, a few small pebbles, and a branch of the cactus plant. To put three or four pebbles in each of the mule's ears, and tie them up with the fan-weed, was but the work of a minute. He then jumped on the animal's back, turned round, put the plant to his tail, and off they went, as a negro himself would say, "like mad, massa." Into the water they plunged--the little fellow grinning and showing his teeth in perfect ecstasy. Out they got on the other side--head and ears down--tail and heels up--and the boy's arms flying about as if they did not belong to him; and I lost sight of him as he went over the rocky steep at full gallop, where one false step would have precipitated them into the sea beneath, from whence there would have been but small chance of escape. No, no, a butcher's boy is nothing to a negro boy--the one may ride like the deuce, but the other is the very deuce himself riding. "Did you see any more of him, sir?" inquired a young lady opposite. "Yes, madam, about two hours afterwards I reached Port Maria, and in an open space near the stores, there sat, or rather lay, young Quashie eating cakes; and there also stood the mule, eating guinea grass, and looking much more cheerful than when I first saw him at the Salt Gut. 'Well, Quashie,' I said, 'you have got here I see, but which of you won?'--'Quashie win, massa--Quashie never lose.'--'But will he pay?' I inquired.--'Quashie pay himself, massa. You see, Massa Buccra, massa gib Quashie tenpenny-bit for grass for mule. Quashie bet fippenny him make him go ober de Gut--Quashie win--Quashie hab fippenny for cake, mule hab fippenny for grass.'"