“Signed,
“No. 8,020 office-color.”
I was told that all we had to do now was to mark ourselves with paint or tar, as we might choose, the latter being recommended for the crew; taking no further trouble than to number ourselves; and when we went ashore, if any of the gens-d’armes inquired why we had not the legal impression on our persons, which quite possibly would be the case, as the law was absolute in its requisitions, all we had to do was to show the certificate; but if the certificate was not sufficient, we were men of the world, and understood the nature of things so well, that we did not require to be taught so simple a proposition in philosophy, as that which says, “like causes produce like effects”; and he presumed I could not have so far overrated his merits, as to have sent the whole of my nuts into his boat. I avow that I was not very sorry to hear the officer throw out these hints, for they convinced me that my journey through Leaphigh would be accompanied with less embarrassment than I had anticipated, since I now plainly perceived that monikins act on principles that are not very essentially different from those of the human race in general.
The complaisant register and the keeper of the privy seal took their departure together, when we forthwith proceeded to number ourselves in compliance with his advice. As the principle was already settled, we had no difficulty with its application, Noah, Bob, myself, and the largest of the seamen being all Nos. 1, and the rest ranking in order. By this time it was night. The guard-boats began to appear on the water, and we deferred disembarking until morning.
All hands were early afoot. It had been arranged that Captain Poke and myself, attended by Bob, as a domestic, were to land, in order to make a journey through the island, while the Walrus was to be left in charge of the mates and the crew; the latter having permission to go ashore, from time to time, as is the practice with all seamen in port. There was a great deal of preliminary scrubbing and shaving, before the whole party could appear on deck, properly attired for the occasion. Mr. Poke wore a thin dress of linen, admirably designed to make him look like a sea-lion; a conceit that he said was not only agreeable to his feelings and habits, but which had a cool and pleasant character that was altogether suited to a steam-climate. For my own part, I agreed with the worthy sealer, seeing but little difference between his going in this garb, and his going quite naked. My dress was made, on a design of my own, after the social-stake system; or, in other words, it was so arranged as to take an interest in half of the animals of Exeter Change, to which MENAGERIE the artist by whom it had been painted was sent expressly, in order to consult nature. Bob wore the effigy, as his master called it, of a turnspit.
The monikins were by far too polished to crowd about us when we landed, with an impertinent and troublesome curiosity. So far from this, we were permitted to approach the capital itself without let or hindrance. As it is less my intention to describe physical things than to dwell upon the philosophy and the other moral aspects of the Leaphigh world, little more will be said of their houses, domestic economy, and other improvements in the arts, than may be gathered incidentally, as the narrative shall proceed. Let it suffice to say on these heads, that the Leaphigh monikins, like men, consult, or think they consult—which, so long as they know no better, amounts to pretty much the same thing—their own convenience in all things, the pocket alone excepted; and that they continue very laudably to do as their fathers did before them, seldom making changes, unless they may happen to possess the recommendation of being exotics; when, indeed, they are sometimes adopted, probably on account of their possessing the merit of having been proved suitable to another state of things.
Among the first persons we met, on entering the great square of Aggregation, as the capital of Leaphigh is called when rendered into English, was my Lord Chatterino. He was gayly promenading with a company of young nobles, who all seemed to be enjoying their youth, health, rank, and privileges with infinite gusto. We met this party in a way to render an escape from mutual recognition impossible. At first I thought, from his averted eye, that it was the intention of our late shipmate to consider our knowledge of each other as one of those accidental acquaintances which, it is known, we all form at watering-places, on journeys, or in the country, and which it is ill-mannered to press upon others in town; or, as Captain Poke afterwards expressed it, like the intimacy between an Englishman and a Yankee, that has been formed in the house of the latter, on better wine than is met with anywhere else, and which was never yet known to withstand the influence of a British fog. “Why, Sir John,” the sealer added, “I once tuck (he meant to say TOOK, not TUCKED) a countryman of yours under my wing, at Stunin’tun, during the last war. He was a prisoner, as we make prisoners; that is, he went and did pretty much as he pleased; and the fellow had the best of everything—molasses that a spoon would stand up in, pork that would do to slush down a topmast, and New England rum, that a king might set down to, but could not get up from—well, what was the end on’t? Why, as sure as we are among these monkeys, the fellow BOOKED me. Had I BOOKED but the half of what he guzzled, the amount, I do believe, would have taken the transaction out of any justice’s court in the state. He said my molasses was meagre, the pork lean, and the liquor infernal. There were truth and gratitude for you! He gave the whul account, too, as a specimen of what he called American living!”
Hereupon I reminded my companion, that an Englishman did not like to receive even favors on compulsion; that when he meets a stranger in his own country, and is master of his own actions, no man understands better what true hospitality is, as I hoped one day to show him, at Householder Hall; as to his first remark, he ought to remember that an Englishman considered America as no more than the country, and that it would be ill-mannered to press an acquaintance made there.
Noah, like most other men, was very reasonable on all subjects that did not interfere with his prejudices or his opinions; and he very readily admitted the general justice of my reply.
“It’s pretty much as you say, Sir John,” he continued; “in England you may press men, but it won’t do to press hospitality. Get a volunteer in this way, and he is as good a fellow as heart can wish. I shouldn’t have cared so much about the chap’s book, if he had said nothin’ ag’in the rum. Why, Sir John, when the English bombarded Stunin’tun with eighteen pounders, I proposed to load our old twelve with a gallon out of the very same cask, for I do think it would have huv’ the shot the best part of a mile!”