"A large man," he said, "came to New York from the mountains of Pennsylvania and offered to bet $50.00 that he could carry a feather-bed tick full of buckshot across Broadway on his head. Well, boys, we loaded the tick, which took nearly all the shot in the city, and he started. He won the bet, I saw him do it, but you see that stone pavement on Broadway, do you? Well, boys, when he crossed the street the load was so heavy that he mired into that stone pavement clear up to his knees, but he won the $50.00." Then we told him that we were liars ourselves, and trudged on, actually having beat the gamblers out of thirty cents. After another oyster stew dinner we strolled into the Bowery Theatre, where minstrels were playing, which amused us, as it was the first we had ever seen, and supposed they were genuine darkies. They sat in a half circle and after singing and playing, the two end men would ask questions, and one dialogue ran this way: "Rastus, I heard you was out last night." "Yes, Sah, I was out prominading on Broadway." "Did you have your best girl along?" "Zartenly." "Did you take her home?" "Zartenly." "Did she invite you in?" "Not zackly. We stood inside the gate." "Did she exhibit great affection?" "Great what?" "Great affection." "I suppose so." "What did she and you do?" "Dat am a pointed question, sah." "Well, but you said she showed great affection." "Showed what?" "Great affection, Rastus. Did she love you?" "Yes, sah, she squozed my hand and then I squoze her with my arm." "Squoze, Rastus? Why, there is no such word as squoze." "Yes, there is, for she said she had never been squoze by a regular man before." "Where do you get that word?" "Noah Webster, sah. Shall I instruct you?" "Certainly." "Is not rise, rose, risen, proper?" "Certainly." "Then why not squize, squoze, squizzen?" Then they all sang again. One incident that I yet remember was that all had on light-colored vests, and while crossing Broadway, dodging here and there among the omnibusses, trucks, and other vehicles, such as we had never seen before, I slipped on the wet stone pavement and fell flat on my stomach, but it soon dried off and I was at the front again, and at the appointed time we appeared at the book store and gave the man his dollar, who again cautioned us not to let the police see it. It was papered up nicely and I can now see how nervously Newell jammed it into his inside pocket, which was not quite large enough, and then we boarded the steamer, all the while looking out of the corners of our eyes that no one suspicioned us. After the steamer had cleared the dock and Lute Aborn said we were on the high seas, we slipped around behind the wheel pit, for it was a side-wheeled steamer, and as Newell was nervously untying the string, he said: "Now we will all look at the pictures first and then you, Lute, who is the best reader, will read it aloud"--when, behold, it was nothing but a New Testament worth ten cents.