"Oh that's a squad of Irishmen; don't you see how the hair's all worn off their heads a carrying brick hods on 'em?" says the Captin.
"You don't say so; now by gracious how they du blather out their words, dont they?" sez I, but I might as well a been talking to a stun fence, for jest that minit the hull on 'em sot up a noise that was enough to make a feller's eye teeth jump out of his head.
Did you ever hear four hundred thousand wild cats, and bears, and wolves, and screech owls, a squalling, and a howling, and a squeaking together? If you haint, there's no use trying to make you have the least idee how that etarnal crowd of critters did hoot and yell. There they were a screaming, and a stamping, and a dancing, and a fiddling, all in a heap, till a feller couldn't hear himself think, and wouldn't a known what he was thinking about if he did hear.
Now says a leetle man by the winder, clear your pipes, feller citizens; let's give 'em a song. I've got one printed off here so that you can all jine in. Them that can't read or don't know the tune can sing Yankee Doodle or Hail Columbia.
With that he flung a hull grist of papers among the crowd and begun tu raise his ebenezer rather strong afore the rest sot in. By-am-by they all got a going, and the way they roared out the song was awful, I can tell you. Some of 'em sung in one tune and some in another—every man went on his own hook. The pussy little feller pulled away on the fiddle like all natur, and the chap with the skewed nose made a plaguey squeaking with a split fife that he had. The feller that hadn't no crown in his hat bellered out Auld Lang Syne, and I see another chap holding his paper upside down, and blowing away at Old Hundred like all natur. When they begun to drop off, for it warn't to be expected that sich a heap of critters could stop all together, the pussy feller with the fiddle yelled out, "Hurra for the song!—Three cheers for singing!" And then they went at it agin, a hooting and tossing up their hats—them that had 'em—as if Old Nick himself had kicked 'em on eend. By gracious! I don't believe such a lot of white Injuns ever got together before, or ever will agin. There was one great feller, as pussy as a bag of bran in harvest time, that roared out his words like a hog that had been larned to talk.
"That's a Yorkshireman," sez Captin Doolittle, "I'll treat if it aint."
"Wal, who on arth is that feller there a talking to that little stuck up chap with the peaked nose? What in the name of natur does he mean by his spracks and his yaws? If I was the little feller, I'd jest thank him not to bark in my face that way; he opens his mouth as if he was a going to swaller the poor critter hull, every time he speaks—du tell, who can he be, Captin?"
"Wal," sez the Captin, "I don't know sartin, but I ruther guess he's one of them Dutch fellers, by his lingo."
"There, now, look a there," sez I, a pinting to a feller that had jest come up to the Dutch chap. He wasn't over clean, anyhow, but he had a great brass handkercher-pin stuck in his bosom, and he strutted so that a common chap couldn't a touched him with a ten foot pole. I poked my elbows into Captin Doolittle's ribs, to try and make him tell me what he was; but he was a looking t'other way, and wouldn't mind me. By-am-by the feller begun to talk to the Dutch chap. He kept a flinging his arms about every which way, and a jabbering over a mess of lingo that was enough to make a man larf in his face. The words all run together like marm's curd when the cheese gets contrary and wont set. The Dutch feller kept a opening his mouth, and once in a while a word would come out full chunk right in t'other's face. Think sez I, if this aint a touch of the dead languages, it ought to be, that's all—for it's enough to make a feller die right off to hear it. He seemed to be ashamed of himself at last, and begun to try to talk genuine American, but he made awful work on't. By-am-by I found out that he was a Frenchman; for a tall laathy feller, that I'd a took my Bible oath cum straight off the Green Mountains, went up to him, sort o' wrathy, and sez he, "Hold your yop, you tarnal Frenchman; if you don't like this country and what we're a doing, you'd better go back hum agin. I haint no doubt but you can git enough frog soup without coming here to run us down."
The French feller turned as red as a turkey's topping, and he began to sputter away as mad as he could be. But t'other chap jest put his hands in his pockets and sez he—"you go to grass." I don't know what else he said, for that minit they all sot up one of their almighty roars and yelled out—"a speech, a speech." Then a feller with spectacles on, got up to make a speech, and arter rolling up his shirt sleeves and spitting on his hands as if he was going to chopping wood, he went at it shovel and tongs.