“It’s likely you know as well as I do, when I’m looking right at the letter, and you are staring at the rum barrels. I’ll thank you to hold your tongue.” “Send to Washington—have him put out—can’t read writen—dunce—fool—blunderhead—how long must we wait?” burst out in paroxysms of wrath from the expectants. “Gentlemen have a little patience, will ye; you see what spider’s tracks this writen is. It wants optics like those of a microscope to decipher it,” responds the poor postmaster, perspiring in his dread at the awful threats of the expectants. “Now have a l-e-e-t-l-e patience and you’ll all get your letters.” “Mrs. Soapdish!” “Soapdish, you wretch!” shrieks a female voice in the crowd. “Soapdish, you mean puppy! Soapdish! you low fellow!” “Yes, Soapdish!” asseverated the postmaster, who seeing it is only a woman begins to take courage. “Have you any objection to Soapdish? If you have leave the letter, that’s all. Leave the letter for the dead office at Washington, only _don’t interrupt_ me in my official duties, my good woman! Soapdish is a very good name, the name your husband gave you, no doubt, Mrs. Soapdish! Does she want her letter, after paying me five cents for it!” “You mean Mrs. Soper, Mr. Skinner,” modestly observes some one from the crowd. “No I don’t. I mean Mrs. Soapdish. Miss-es—Misses—Soap-dish—Soapdish! Stop though! what a confounded crabbed hand!” squinting over it, then glancing askance at it, and then fairly turning it upside down, after endeavoring to squint inside, as if to find the name there. “On the whole, I shouldn’t be surprised if it were ‘Soper.’ Here, take it, my good woman, and look at it yourself. If it isn’t Soapdish, it’s Soper, and one name is as good as another in Tahoo, for that’s the language the fellow has written in I verily believe,” continues he, grumbling and fumbling over his other letters. “James Shipoker, Esq.!” “James Shipoker, Esq.,” ejaculates the judge of the county court. “Oh, what an _incorrigible ass_! James Shipman you fool! Well, I can’t stand this. I’ll write to my friend, the Postmaster-General, and have you kicked out, neck and crop, you dunce you!” “Just come and help yourselves, gentlemen! I see how it is. You wish to interrupt me to avoid paying the postage. I can see through a grindstone as well as the best of ye, especially when there’s a hole in it big enough to put John P.’s dog in. Here, boy, you come and call over the letters. See if you have any better luck!” The store-lad fortunately could “read writen,” and after a while each one got his letter or his paper and left the post-office. And thus endeth the second lesson. In other words, it is dinner time. * * * * * Dinner is dispatched.