A few questions on my part served to apprise him of the official character of the person by whom he was addressed, and also to cause his momentary neglect of a young customer for whom he was just then engaged in answering an order for a gallon of molasses. The little damsel who was there upon the saccharine errand, regarded me with open-eyed awe, having probably heard something of the Department in the course of the all-pervading Post-Office controversies of the last few months, and cast as many stolen glances at me as her modesty would allow, thus securing a mental daguerreotype, to be displayed for the benefit of her wondering parents, after her return home with the double load of news and molasses. In his embarrassment at my sudden arrival, the post master forgot the molasses, and in a moment quite a torrent of the thick liquid had overflowed its bounds, and formed a pool upon the floor. "Post master," said I, "you have left your molasses running over." In his eagerness to stop the leak, he went plump into the sweet puddle, with both feet, and any time that day his tracks might have been seen all over the store. "Never mind," said he, "accidents will happen;" at the same time drawing his feet across some waste paper upon the floor. The young customer smiled, but during the running over process, she had said not a word, for by the means she was getting "scripture measure." She handed the post master a bank-note in payment, who, still laboring under considerable excitement, made her the wrong change, doing himself out of at least half the cost of the molasses, which, together with the loss of the surplusage, made it anything but a profitable business transaction for him. But the little girl was honest. She counted and recounted the change that had been given her, and with that peculiar expression that in one like her attends the consciousness of an honest act, she threw it all back upon the counter, remarking, "You have given me too much, sir." The countenance of the post master gave evidence by this time of not a little mortification at the occurrence of two such awkward blunders in the presence of a dignitary all the way from Washington; and in his hurry to turn my attention from them, he forgot even to thank the child for her honest conduct, as he returned her the change "revised and corrected." But I did not. Wishing not to cast an implied censure upon sweet-foot, I passed to the piazza of the store, to throw aside the stump of an Havana, (or a "Suffield," as the case may have been,) and unobserved by him, handed her a quarter, which she acknowledged by a blushing smile, and a low courtesy.