We had several negroes amongst the Moonbeams, one of whom, a sail-maker, was occupied close to where I lay, with his palm and needle, following his vocation, and mending a sail on deck--another black diamond, a sort of half-inch carpenter, was busy with some job abaft of him. I had often noticed before, the peculiar mode in which negroes quarrel. I would say that they did so very classically, after the model of Homer's heroes, for instance, as they generally prelude their combats with long speeches--or perhaps it would be more correct to call their method the Socratic mode of fighting---as they commence and carry on with a series of questions, growing more and more stinging as they proceed, until a fight becomes the necessary consequence, indeed, unavoidable; as in the present case. The origin of the dispute was rather complex. There was an Indian boy on board, of whom more anon; and this lad, Lennox, with a spice of his original calling, had been in the habit of teaching to read, and to learn a variety of infantile lessons, which he in turn took delight in retailing to the negroes; and there he is working away at this moment, reversing the order of things--the young teaching the old. Palmneedle appears a very dull scholar, while Chip, I can perceive, is sharp enough, and takes delight in piquing Palmy. Chip says his lesson glibly. "Ah, daddy Chip, you shall make one parson by and by--quite cleber dis morning--so now, Palmneedle, come along;" and Palmy also acquitted himself tolerably for some time. "What you call hanimal hab four legs?" said Indio, in continuation of the lesson, and holding up four fingers. Here I thought of my cousin Sally. "One cow," promptly rejoined Palmneedle, working away at the sail he was mending. "Yes--to be sure! certainly one cow hab four legs; but what is de cow call?" "Oh, some time Nancy; some time Juba." "Stupid--I mean what you call ebery cow." "How de debil should I sabe, Indio?" "Becaase," said Indio, "I tell you dis morning already, one, tre, five time; but stop, I sall find one way to make you remember. How much feets you hab yourself--surely you can tell me dat?" "Two--I hab two feets--dere." "Den, what is you call?" "One quadruped. You tink I don't know dat?" "One quadruped! ho, ho--I know you would say so--you say so yesterday--really you wery mosh blockhead indeed--_dat_ is what de cow is call, man. You!--why you is call one omnivorous biped widout fedder--dat is what you is call; and de reason, Massa Lennox tell me, is, because you nyam as mosh as ever you can get, and don't wear no fedder like one fowl--mind dat--you is one omnivorous biped." Here Chip began, I saw, to quiz Palmy also.