“But suppose you die too suddenly to repent?”
“Boss, I alluz keeps myseff ready for ’pentance.”
The road down is lined with public houses, little quaint inns in which nobody sleeps, but which are devoted exclusively to the selling of beer and spirits. At each of these half the vehicles stopped, and the scenes about them were curious, if not altogether enjoyable. The only business done inside was the drawing and drinking of beer, and outside—heaven help an American—negro minstrelsy. Imagine three cockneys burnt corked, and dressed in trowsers striped in imitation of the American flag, with long blue striped coats and red vests, one playing the banjo, another the concertina, and the third doing the silver sand clog, with that peculiar soul-depressing, spirit-quenching expression that all clog dancers wear habitually.
ENGLISH NEGRO MINSTRELSY.
THE ROADSIDE REPAST.