“There you have me again. What a name!”
“It is an Indian name, my lord,” said Mrs. Adams.
“Oh ho! Indian. They told me I should find the people lived like the savages. Succotash! what is it?”
“Succotash, my lord, is a mixture of beans and Indian corn.”
“Beans! beans! Do you eat beans over here?” his lordship asked.
“We do, my lord,” Mrs. Adams replied, “and we think them very nutritious and palatable, notwithstanding the maxim, ‘Abstincto a fabis.’ Possibly you may be a disciple of Pythagoras, and believe that the souls of the dead are encased in beans, and so think it almost sacrilegious for us to use them as food.”
Lord Upperton looked up in astonishment. Was it possible that ladies in the Colonies were acquainted with the classics?
“In England we feed our sheep on beans,” his lordship replied; “and may I ask what is Indian corn?”
“Possibly you may call it maize in England. When our fathers came to this country they found the Indians used it for food, and so ever since it has been known as Indian corn.”
“Beans for sheep; corn for savages. Pardon me, madam, but I am not a sheep, nor yet quite a savage with a tomahawk. Thank you, but I don’t care for any succotash.”