“He worse than ebber now,” cried the discontented African. “A t’ink colored man like a sheep! I nebber see sich a lip, Harvey; he most as big as a sausage!”
Great pains had been taken in forming the different articles used in the disguise of Captain Wharton, and when arranged, under the skillful superintendence of the peddler, they formed together a transformation that would easily escape detection, from any but an extraordinary observer.
The mask was stuffed and shaped in such a manner as to preserve the peculiarities, as well as the color, of the African visage; and the wig was so artfully formed of black and white wool, as to imitate the pepper-and-salt color of Caesar’s own head, and to exact plaudits from the black himself, who thought it an excellent counterfeit in everything but quality.
“There is but one man in the American army who could detect you, Captain Wharton,” said the peddler, surveying his work with satisfaction, “and he is just now out of our way.”
“And who is he?”
“The man who made you prisoner. He would see your white skin through a plank. But strip, both of you; your clothes must be exchanged from head to foot.”
Caesar, who had received minute instructions from the peddler in their morning interview, immediately commenced throwing aside his coarse garments, which the youth took up and prepared to invest himself with; unable, however, to repress a few signs of loathing.
In the manner of the peddler there was an odd mixture of care and humor; the former was the result of a perfect knowledge of their danger, and the means necessary to be used in avoiding it; and the latter proceeded from the unavoidably ludicrous circumstances before him, acting on an indifference which sprang from habit, and long familiarity with such scenes as the present.
“Here, captain,” he said, taking up some loose wool, and beginning to stuff the stockings of Caesar, which were already on the leg of the prisoner; “some judgment is necessary in shaping this limb. You will have to display it on horseback; and the Southern dragoons are so used to the brittle-shins, that should they notice your well-turned calf, they’d know at once it never belonged to a black.”
“Golly!” said Caesar, with a chuckle, that exhibited a mouth open from ear to ear, “Massa Harry breeches fit.”