“All sorts, sir. Some good, and some good for nothing—everything sells, ’owever. I never was in Leaplow, but we says over ’ere, that the Leaplowers eat, and drink, and sleep on our opinions. Lord, sir, it would really do your heart good to see the stuff, in these harticles, that they does take from us without higgling!”
“I presume, brigadier, that you use them as an amusement—as a means to pass a pleasant hour, of an evening—a sort of moral segar?”
“No, sir,” put in the broker, “they doesn’t smoke ’em, my word on’t, or they wouldn’t buy ’em in such lots!”
I now thought enough had been laid in on my own account, and I turned to see what the captain was about. He was higgling for a bale marked “Opinions on the Lost Condition of the Monikin Soul.” A little curious to know why he had made this selection, I led him aside, and frankly put the question.
“Why, to own the truth, Sir John,” he said, “religion is an article that sells in every market, in some shape or other. Now, we are all in the dark about the Leaplow tastes and usages, for I always suspect a native of the country to which I am bound, on such a p’int; and if the things shouldn’t sell there, they’ll at least do at Stunnin’tun. Miss Poke alone would use up what there is in that there bale, in a twelvemonth. To give the woman her due, she’s a desperate consumer of snuff and religion.”
We had now pretty effectually cleared the shelves, and the cook, who had come ashore to dispose of his slush, had not yet been able to get anything.
“Here is a small bale as come FROM Leaplow, and a pinched little thing it is,” said the broker, laughing; “it don’t take at all, here, and it might do to go ’ome again—at any rate, you will get the drawback. It is filled with ‘Distinctive Opinions of the Republic of Leaplow.’” The cook looked at the brigadier, who appeared to think the speculation doubtful. Still it was Hobson’s choice; and, after a good deal of grumbling, the doctor, as Noah always called his cook, consented to take the “harticle,” at half the prime cost.
Judge People’s Friend now came trotting down to the port, thoroughly en republican, when we immediately embarked, and in half an hour, Bob was kicked to Noah’s heart’s content, and the Walrus was fairly under way for Leaplow.
CHAPTER XXIII.
POLITICAL BOUNDARIES—POLITICAL RIGHTS—POLITICAL SELECTIONS, AND POLITICAL DISQUISITIONS; WITH POLITICAL RESULTS.
The aquatic mile-stones of the monikin seas have been already mentioned; but I believe I omitted to say, that there was a line of demarcation drawn in the water, by means of a similar invention, to point out the limits of the jurisdiction of each state. Thus, all within these water-marks was under the laws of Leaphigh; all between them and those of some other country, was the high seas; and all within those of the other country, Leaplow for instance, was under the exclusive jurisdiction of that other country.