_George._ Bless his dear old handwriting, it's all I ever saw of him. For ten years his letters came every quarter-day, with a remittance and a word of advice in his formal cavalier style; and then a joke in the postscript, that upset the dignity of the foregoing. Aunt, when he died, two years ago, I read over those letters of his, and if I didn't cry like a baby-- _Mrs. P._ No, George; say you wept like a man. And so you really kept those foolish letters? _George._ Yes; I kept the letters, and squandered the money. _Mrs. P._ [_Embracing him._] Ah! why were you not my son--you are so like my dear husband. _Enter_ Salem Scudder, R. _Scud._ Ain't he! Yes--when I saw him and Miss Zoe galloping through the green sugar crop, and doing ten dollars' worth of damage at every stride, says I, how like his old uncle he do make the dirt fly. _George._ O, aunt! what a bright, gay creature she is! _Scud._ What, Zoe! Guess that you didn't leave anything female in Europe that can lift an eyelash beside that gal. When she goes along, she just leaves a streak of love behind her. It's a good drink to see her come into the cotton fields--the niggers get fresh on the sight of her. If she ain't worth her weight in sunshine you may take one of my fingers off, and choose which you like. _Mrs. P._ She need not keep us waiting breakfast, though. Pete, tell Miss Zoe that we are waiting. _Pete._ Yes, missus. Why, Minnie, why don't you run when you hear, you lazy crittur? [Minnie _runs off._] Dat's de laziest nigger on dis yere property. [_Sits down._] Don't do nuffin. _Mrs. P._ My dear George, you are left in your uncle's will heir to this estate. _George._ Subject to your life interest and an annuity to Zoe, is it not so? _Mrs. P._ I fear that the property is so involved that the strictest economy will scarcely recover it. My dear husband never kept any accounts, and we scarcely know in what condition the estate really is. _Scad._ Yes, we do, ma'am; it's in a darned bad condition. Ten years ago the judge took as overseer a bit of Connecticut hardware called M'Closky. The judge didn't understand accounts--the overseer did. For a year or two all went fine. The judge drew money like Bourbon whiskey from a barrel, and never turned off the tap. But out it flew, free for everybody or anybody to beg, borrow, or steal. So it went, till one day the judge found the tap wouldn't run. He looked in to see what stopped it, and pulled out a big mortgage. "Sign that," says the overseer; "it's only a formality." "All right," says the judge, and away went a thousand acres; so at the end of eight years, Jacob M'Closky, Esquire, finds himself proprietor of the richest half of Terrebonne-- _George._ But the other half is free. _Scud._ No, it ain't; because, just then, what does the judge do, but hire another overseer--a Yankee--a Yankee named Salem Scudder. _Mrs. P._ O, no, it was--