University of Virginia Library

LETTER V.

To Mr. Thompson:—Dear Sir—I left off my last
letter to you only a few minits before the omnibus cum
to take me from the Hotel to the steambote. Well, I
was a little behind the administration in gettin my trunks
packed agin, and cum monstrous nigh gettin left. But
Patrick got me down to the wharf jest as the last ring
was dyin out of the bell, and in a few minits I was
afloat on salt water for the fust time in my life. You
must know I fell in a mill-pond once when I was a boy,
and was pulled out by old nigger Ned, jest when I had
'bout tuck my last swaller, and I spose it's that what's
always made me have sich a mortal dred of water whar
I can't tetch bottom ever sense. I felt monstrous jubus
'bout gwine aboard, and if ther was any possible way
of gettin round it I wouldn't a run no sich risks you
may depend.

It was a butiful afternoon, and the passengers was all
as lively as crickets, talkin and laughin and lookin at
the city as the steambote went spankin along with her
flags a flyin, and her wheels turnin the sea into soapsuds,
and leavin a white track in the water behind us. Ther
was a heap of ships and steambotes all about—sum
standin still, sum gwine out and sum cumin in; and
little boats not bigger than a feedin-trough was dodgin
all about, with ther white sails a shinin in the sun like
sand-hill cranes in a rice-field. The city kep gettin
smaller and smaller, til bimeby Fort Moultry, whar you
know the Carolina boys licked the British so in the revolution,
didn't look no bigger than a fodder-stack. I
looked around for the shore, but the sky seemed to cum

down to the water on every side, til it looked jest like
the crystal of my watch, 'thout a spot of yeath to put
one's foot on as far as my eyes could see. I begun to
feel monstrous skary, and I don't blieve I ever did draw
sich long breths before in all my born days. I do blieve
I thought of all the ship-racks I ever red of in my life,
and I would a gin ten per-cent, of all I had in the world
to had my life insured. I held on to the side of the
boat with both hands, and kep as fur off from the biler
as I could. But the ladys and the little children didn't
seem to mind it a bit, and after we was out of sight of
land about a ower I got a little over my skeer.

Bimeby a nigger feller commenced ringin a bell as
hard as he could ring, and hollerin out—“Gentlemen
what hain't paid ther passage will please to walk up to
the captin's office and settle!” As soon as I could git
a chance I paid for my tickets, and pretty soon after that
the bell rung agin for supper. We had a fust rate supper,
but sumhow it didn't seem natural to be swimmin
and rockin about in the sea, and eatin at the same time,
and I didn't eat much. Besides, ther was a sort of
sickish feelin cum over me in the supper room, and I
went up on the roof agin as quick as I could to smoke
a segar, thinkin it mought make me feel better.

By this time it was night, but the moon and stars was
shinin above and below—the only difference in the sea
and the heavens bein that the stars and moon in the
water was dancin and caperin about like they was out
of ther senses, while them in the sky was winkin and
twinklin in ther old places as quietly and sober as ever.
I got a light for my segar and was jest beginnin to smoke
when a nigger feller cum up to me, and ses he:

“Massa, no smokin lowed aft the machinery.”

“The mischief ther ain't!” ses I, and I went away
back to the hind eend of the boat and tuck a seat, and
commenced a right good smoke to myself. But I hadn't
been thar more'n a minit before here cum the nigger
feller agin.

“You musen't smoke aft the machinery,” ses he.

“Well,” ses I, “I ain't near yer machinery.”

“No; but,” ses he, “you is aft.”

“Aft what?” ses I.

“The place for gentlemen to smoke is forard,”
ses he.

“Well,” ses I, “my buck, I don't understand your
gibrish, but if you'll jest show me whar I can smoke
'thout any danger to your machinery, I'll go thar.”

With that the bominable fool begun to snicker, til he
seed my cane was takin the measure of his hed for a
nock down, when he straitened up the pucker of his
face and sed—

“Cum this way, sir; this is the forard deck, massa.”

I follered him over to the fore eend of the boat, whar
sum more gentlemen was smokin. I hadn't tetched a
drap of licker in a coon's age, but I was never so put to
to walk strait in my life. Sumhow I couldn't make no
sort of calkelation for the floor—one minit it was up to
my knee, and the next step I couldn't hardly reach it—
and my legs kep gittin mixed up and tangled so I didn't
know one from tother. All the passengers seemed like
they was tite—sum of 'em looked monstrous serious,
and one or two was caskadin over the side of the boat
into the sea with all ther might. I felt a little sort o'
swimmy in the hed myself, and I begun to spicion I was
gettin sea-sick, so I tuck a seat by the side of the boat
and smoked my segar to settle my stummick.

Well, thar I sot and smoked til all the passengers went
down into the bed-room to sleep. It was a butiful night,
and the scene was jest the kind to set a man's brains a
thinkin. The sea is a roomy place and ther's nothin
thar to prevent one's givin free scope to his imagination
—it's a mighty thing, the sea is, and if a man don't feel
some sublime emotions in its presence, it's because his
hed works is on a monstrous small scale. Thar it was, the
great, the everlastin ocean, dressed out in its star-bespangled
night-gown, dancin to the soft music of the sighin

winds, and the liquid cadence of its ever-splashin
waves; while down deep in its coral caverns the whales
and porpoises was spoutin ther love ditties to ther
sweetharts, and the maremaids was puttin ther hair in
curl to break the harts of the young sea-hoses. It was
monstrous still—the monotonous splashin of the wheels,
the gruntin and groanin of the ingine, the rushin of the
foam, and the rumblin and squeakin of the timbers of
the boat, all keepin time together, made a sort of noisy
silence that fell negatively on the ear. I leaned over
the side and looked at the fiery foam, as it rolled sparklin
away from the bow: but it faded from the face of
the sea while I looked at it, and a few yards behind
us ther remained no track of our passage. I felt alone on
the vast ocean, and a feelin of isolation cum over me,
which, fore I got rid of it, made the boat seem no bigger
than a teapot, and myself about the size of a young
seed-tick. I could preached a sermon on the sublimity
of creation, and the insignificance of man and his works,
but I had no congregation then, and it's too late now.
I don't know what made me think of home—but sumhow
I felt like I'd gin a heap to be thar. I thought of
the butiful bright eyes that was closed in sleep on my
pillar, and the dear little cub that was nestled in my
place. Bless ther dear souls—perhaps they was dreamin
of me that very minit—perhaps I was never to see 'em
in this world again. These thoughts made me feel monstrous
bad, and the more I reflected about it, the worse
I felt, til I blieve I would gin all I had in the world jest
to be sure I wouldn't die before I got back.

Bimeby, I thought, I'd try to go to sleep, so I went
down into the bed-room, and tried it. But it was no
go. I got into one of the little boxes, what they call
berths, but I couldn't stay born no way I could fix it.
In the first place I couldn't git stowed away no how,
and in the next place, whenever I shut my eyes, it
seemed like the boat was whirlin round and round like
a tread-wheel. I got up agin, and went up stairs, and

smoked another segar, til I got pretty tired, and then I
went in the gentlemen's parlor, and stretched myself on
one of the seats. I fell asleep thar sumtime between
that and daylight, and never waked up til most breckfust
time the next mornin, when they sed we was in
Cape Fear, gwine right up to Wilmington.

Cape Fear is a very fine river, and ther's some fine
plantations and houses on the banks when you git near
to Wilmington. Pretty soon after breckfust we got in
sight of the city, and a few minits afterwards we was
long side the wharf, and the niggers was cartin our
baggage up the hill to the railrode. Wilmington presents
'bout as curious a aspect from the river, as any
other town in my knowins. The fust thing you see is
everlastin piles of turpentine barrels, piled up on the
wharf in evry direction, and on the vessels in the river.
That's the front rank. The next is a plattoon of wind-mills,
enuff to lick all the Don Quicksots in Spain. In
them they bile the spirits of turpentine out of the gum.
The rare rank—and that's scattered all over the hill—is
made up of houses, and old brick walls and chimneys
of houses what's been burnt down, with here and thar
a few more barrels of turpentine. They've had two or
three fires here lately, what's burnt up the best part of
the town; but I don't wonder at it, for I would as soon
think of puttin out a powder-house as a place what's so
perfectly soaked with turpentine. All I wonder at is,
that the river don't ketch a fire too.

We waited about a ower in Wilmington, which
afforded us a opportunity of lookin about a little. After
travellin over it, and lookin at sum very handsum bildins,
among which was the new Piscopal Church, a monstrous
pretty bildin, we went back to the cars. When
we got thar, I ax'd a nigger fellar whar I could git sum
segars, and he told me to go into a house what stood
rite over a branch, on stilts 'bout twenty feet high, whar
he sed Lucy Ann would sell 'em to me. Well I went
into the house, and ses I, “Is Lucy Ann here?”

“Dat's my name,” sed a little outlandish person with
a coat and britches on.

“I want to see Lucy Ann,” ses I.

“Dat's me,” ses he. “What shall I have the plaisure
to sell you to day, ha?”

I looked up at the old feller's whity-brown sort of a
face, and ses I, “I don't spose it makes any difference,
but they told me Lucy Ann kep this store.”

“Well, sare, my name be Lucy Ann; I keep dis
store, and sell you sum vary fine orange, banana, soda-water,
and so forth.”

I bought sum segars and sum oranges and went out,
but I couldn't help thinkin ther was sum mistake about
it. If Lucy Ann was a woman, her pearance and dress
wasn't very flatterin to the North Carolina galls.

Bimeby the bell rung, and the passengers was all
aboard agin in the cars. The lokymotive man pulled
the wire what sot the steam agwine, and away we went,
licky-teklink, rite among the tar and turpentine what
was strung all along the road, evry here and thar, for
most a hundred miles. Like all the southern rodes this
railrode don't run through the most interestin part of the
country, so it wouldn't be fair to judge of the old North
State by what one sees on the railrode. The country
ain't much else but one everlastin turpentine plantation;
and all one can see for miles, is millions upon millions
of pine trees with the bark half off, and the white turpentine
runnin down ther sides, and lookin like so many
tall ghosts standin in the dark shade, with ther windinsheets
on. The rode runs through a very level country,
and is the straitest in the world—having a single stretch
of upwards of seventy miles without a single bend in it.
The cars ain't quite so stylish as them on the Georgia
Railrode, but the conducters is very obligin, attentive,
clever men, and git along with as few accidents as any
other conducters in the world, only they don't low no
smokin in the cars.

We got to Weldon a little after dark, and thar we

tuck a very good supper. Here we bought tickets agin,
and ther was a big fat feller thar what seemed termined
to make us all go the Bay route, as he called it, whether
we would or no. He banged all the fellers to talk I
ever heard in all my born days. He got ahed of evrybody
else, passengers and all; and when I told him I'd
be very glad to commodate him, only I wanted to go
by Washington; he sed, he'd be dad fetched if he
didn't have the seat of government moved down on the
Bay, jest for the commodation of the public what travels
on his line. He's a monstrous good agent, and ought
to be well paid for his trouble.

I didn't git much good sleep the night before, in the
steambote, and by the time we got to Petersburg, I was
pretty well done over, and I never was so glad in my
life to go to bed. I remember sumthing 'bout gettin
up the next mornin fore daylight, and gettin in a omnibus,
and then gettin in sum more cars, and whizzin
along through Virginy like a streak of ligthnin. Towns
and bridges, and rivers, and mountings went whirlin
past us so rapid that I hadn't no time to ax any thing
about 'em. Like Cassio when he got sober, “I remember
a heap of things, but nothin very pertickelerly,”
from the time I went to bed in Petersburg, til I found
myself in the steambote on the Potomac gwine to
Washington.

These railrodes play the mischief with a man's observations.
One mought as well try to count the fethers
in a pigeon's tail when he's on the wing, as to look at
the country he's travellin through in the railrode cars.
He gits a kind of flying panorama of trees and houses,
and towns and rivers, and fenses and bridges, all mixed
up together—one runnin into tother, and another beginnin
before the last one's left off—so he can't make hed
nor tail to 'em. And when he does stop a minit he's
so pestered with hack-drivers and porters, that he hain't
hardly got time to buy his ticket or eat his breckfust, let
alone doin any thing else. I was anxious to have a

good look at the Old Dominion, for a good many reasons—I
wanted to see the state whar my father and
mother was born, and what had given birth to the great
Washington. But I had sich a bominable pore chance,
I don't blieve I'd know any more about Virginy when I
see it agin, than Captain Marryat did about America
when he went home to write his everlastin book of lies.

The Potomac is a noble river; and as ther was no
waves to set the bote a rollin, I had a fust rate chance
to look at the scenery on its banks. I never shall forgit
my feelins when the bell rung to let us know we was
near Washington's grave, at Mt. Vernon. I felt that it
was a grate privilege to be allowed to look at that
sacred spot, where the ashes of the father of his country
was reposin—to look at the mound of yeath that had
taken to itself the noble form in which had centred so
much virtue, so much patriotism, so much valor, so
much wisdom, so much of evry thing that ennobles
human nater. I remembered how on the bosom of the
very stream on which I was, a British fleet once floated,
and that when they passed the grave of our country's
sainted hero, they lowered ther proud banner, in token
of respect to the illustrious ded—and when I thought
of that, it made me half forgive 'em for destroyin the
city that bore his name. Fort Washington stands high
up on the bank, and looks down monstrous sassy; and
I reckon if the John Bull's was to try that game agin,
they'd find the Potomac sumwhat rougher navigashun
now than it was then.

In a few minits more we was in sight of Washington
city, with the great umbrella top of the Capitol loomin
up into the heavens, grand, gloomy, and peculiar. We
wasn't long gettin to the wharf, and after a terrible
encounter with 'bout five hundred cab-men and porters,
I made out to git my baggage into a hack and druv to
Gadsby's hotel, whar I got a good supper and soon
went to bed.

I dreamed all night of cog-wheels and steam-ingines

—sumtimes my bed was a car, then it was a steambote,
and then it was a omnibus, but it was gwine all the
time, at the rate of twenty-five miles a ower. My
brains hain't got more'n 'bout half settled yet, so you
must excuse this monstrous pore letter. I hope to git
regelated in a day or two, and then I will tell you sumthing
'bout Washington City and its lyons. No more
from