"Ye-a-a-s; wall, I went eout West last fall, stopped at Cincinnatty--teu weeks. Dreadful nice place; by gravy, they do deu business there; beats Salvation haow they go it on steamboats--bust ten a day and build six!" "Is it possible?" says the old gent; "but the hogs----" "Deu beat all. I went up to the Pork-haouses;--fus thing you meet is a string--'bout a mile long, of big and little critters, greasy and sassy as sin; buckets and bags full of scraps, tails, ears, snaouts and ribs of hogs. Foller up this line and yeou come to the Pork-haouses, and yeou go in, if they let yeou, and they did me, so in I went, teu an almighty large haouse--big as all aout doors, and a feller steps up to me and says he:-- "'Yeou're a stranger, I s'pose?' "'Yeou deu?' says I. "'Ye-a-a-s,' says he, 'I s'pose so,' and I up and said I was. "'Wall,' says he, 'ef you want to go over the haouse, we'll send a feller with you!' "So I went with the feller, and he took me way back, daown stairs--aout in a lot; a-a-a-nd everlastin' sin! yeou should jist seen the hogs--couldn't caount 'em in three weeks!" "Good gracious!" exclaims the old gent. "Fact, by gravy! Sech squealin', kickin' and goin' on; sech cussin' and hollerin', by the fellers pokin' 'em in at one eend of the lot and punchin' on 'em aout at t'other! Sech a smell of hogs and fat, _brissels_ and hot water, I swan _teu_ pucker, I never did cal'late on, afore! "Wall, as fast as they driv' 'em in by droves, the fellers kept a craowdin' 'em daown towards the Pork-haouse; there two fellers kept a shootin' on 'em daown, and a hull gang of the all-firedest dirty, greasy-looking fellers _aout_--stuck 'em, hauled 'em daown, and afore yeou could say Sam Patch! them hogs were yanked aout of the lot--killed--scalded and scraped." "Mighty quick work, I guess," says the old gent. "Quick work? Yeou ought to see 'em. Haow many hogs deu yeou cal'late them fellers killed and scraped a day?" "Couldn't possibly say--hundreds, I expect." "Hundreds! Grea-a-at King! Why, I see 'em kill thirteen hundred in teu hours;--did, by golly!" "Yeou don't say so?" "Yes, _sir_. And a feller with grease enough abaout him to make a barrel of saft soap, said that when they hurried 'em up some they killed, scalded and scraped ten thousand hogs in a day; and when they put on the steam, twenty thousand porkers were killed off and cut up in a single day!" "I want to know!" "Yes, sir. Wall, we went into the haouse, where they scalded the critters fast as they brought 'em in. By gravy, it was amazin' how the _brissels_ flew! Afore a hog knew what it was all abaout, he was bare as a punkin--a hook and tackle in his _snaout_, and up they snaked him on to the next floor. I vow they kept a slidin' and snakin' 'em in and up through the scuttles--jest in one stream! "'Let's go up and see 'em cut the hogs,' says the feller.