Arrayed in our fresh apparel, we soon rejoined our friends in the sitting-room. The new garments fitted the Colonel tolerably well, but, though none too long, they were a world too wide for me, and as my wet hair hung in smooth flat folds down my cheeks, and my limp shirt-collar fell over my linsey coat, I looked for all the world like a cross between a theatrical Aminodab Sleek and Sir John Falstaff, with the stuffing omitted. When our hostess caught sight of me in this new garb, she rubbed her hands together in great glee, and, springing to her feet, gave vent to a perfect storm of laughter—jerking out between the explosions:
"Why—you—you—look jest like—a scare-crow."
There was no mistaking that hearty, hoydenish manner; and seizing both of her hands in mine, I shouted: "I've found you out—you're a "country-woman" of mine—a clear-blooded Yankee!"
"What! you a Yankee!" she exclaimed, still laughing, "and here with this horrid 'secesherner,' as they call him."
"True as preachin', Ma'am," I replied, adopting the drawl—"all the way from Down East, and Union, tu, stiff as buckram."
"Du tell!" she exclaimed, swinging my hands together as she held them in hers. "If I warn't hitched to this 'ere feller, I'd give ye a smack right on the spot. I'm so glad to see ye."
"Do it, Sally—never mind me," cried her husband, joining heartily in the merriment.
Seizing the collar of my coat with both hands, she drew my face down till my lips almost touched hers (I was preparing to blush, and the Colonel shouted, "Come, come, I shall tell his wife"): but then turning quickly on her heel, she threw herself into a chair, exclaiming, "I wouldn't mind, but the old man would be jealous." Addressing the Colonel, she added, "You needn't be troubled, sir, no Yankee girl will kiss you till you change your politics."
"Give me that inducement, and I'll change them on the spot," said the Colonel.
"No, no, Dave, 'twouldn't do," replied the planter; "the conversion wouldn't be genuwine—besides such things arn't proper, except 'mong blood-relations—and all the Yankees, you know are first-cousins."