“I ain't sure of that, sir; they live too much together, like our people down South, and that's not the way to get rid of prejudices. They 've none of that rough-and-tumble with the world as makes men broad-minded and marciful and forgiving; and they come at last to that wickedest creed of all, to think themselves the superfine salt of the earth. Now, there ain't no superfine salt peculiar to any rank or class. Human natur' is good and bad everywhere,—ay, sir, I 'll go further, I 've seen good in a Nigger!”
“I'm glad to hear you say so,” said the Englishman, repressing, but not without difficulty, a tendency to smile.
“Yes, sir, there 's good amongst all men,—even the Irish.”
“I feel sorry that you should make them an extreme case.”
“Well, sir,” said he, drawing a long breath, “they're main ugly,—main ugly, that's a fact. Not that they can do us any mischief. Our constitution is a mill where there's never too much water,—the more power, the more we grind; and even if the stream do come down somewhat stocked with snags and other rubbish upon it, the machine is an almighty smasher, and don't leave one fragment sticking to the other when it gets a stroke at 'em. Have you never been in the States, stranger?”
“Never. I have often planned such a ramble, but circumstances have somehow or other always interfered with the accomplishment.”
“Well, sir, you 're bound to go there, if only to correct the wrong impressions of your literary people, who do nothing but slander and belie us.”
“Not latterly, surely. You have nothing to complain of on the part of our late travellers.”
“I won't say that. They don't make such a fuss about chewing and whittling, and the like, as the first fellows; but they go on a-sneering about political dishonesty, Yankee sharpness, and trade rogueries, that ain't noways pleasing,—and, what's more, it ain't fair. But as I say, sir, go and see for yourself, or, if you can't do that, send your son. Is n't that young man there your son?”
The young Englishman turned and acknowledged the allusion to himself by the coldest imaginable bow, and that peculiarly unspeculative stare so distinctive in his class and station.