"'By this time down comes the slave-catchers, an' says they, hearin' on it, "That 'ere tarnation nigger's gone off with 'em, we'll know 'un by them marks well enough," says they, an' off they goes across river. "Hullo!" I sings out to the folks, "I'm a-gettin' cold here, so I guess I'll come ashore again, slick off!" I twangs out. "Guess ye can't, straunger!" they hails; "not till we gets ye some kiverin's!--we 're considerable proper here, we are!" "Ain't this a free country, then?" I says, givin' a divvle of a splash; an' with that they begs an' axes me for to hould on, an' they'd fix me, as they calls it, in no time. "Well, mate, what does they do but one an' another brings me somethin' as like what I 'scribed as could be, hands 'em along on a pole, an' I puts 'em on then an' there. Arter that, the ladies o' the place bein' blessed modest, an' all of a fright leest I'd a comed out an' gone through the town--why, out o' grannytude, as they says, they gets up a supperscription on a hundred dollars to make up my loss--has a public meetin' logged down for the evenin', when I'm for to indress the citizens, as they says, all about freedom an' top-gallantry, an' sich-like. Hows'ever, I jist sticks my tongue in my cheek, eats a blessed good dinner in a hot-ell, watches my chance, an' off by a track-boat at sundown to New Orleans, where I shipped aboard a English barque, an' gets safe out to sea wonst more. "'Lord love ye, Harry!' exclaimed Jack hereupon, 'the likes o' that now! But I've heerd say, them fittish-men you talks on has wonderful knowledge--why, mayhap it's them as keeps all the niggers black, now?' 'Well, bo',' said Harry, 'I don't doubt but if them 'Merricain slaves jist knowed o' that 'ere red mushroom, why they'd show the Yankees more stripes nor stars! D' ye see, if a Yankee knowed as his own father were a-hoein' his sugar-canes, blowed if he wouldn't make him work up his liberty in dollars! All the stripes, d' ye see, mate, is for the blacks, an' all the stars is for the whites, in them Yankee colours as they brags so much about! But what I says is, it's cussed hard to get through this 'ere world, shipmate, if ye doesn't keep well to the wind'ard of it!'