"And so you are a buckskin, sir," said he, rather cavalierly.
"Yes sir," replied Ben, "I am a buckskin."
"Well sir, I am afraid you'll not make your fortune by that here in London," said Palmer.
"No sir," answered Ben, "I find it is thought a misfortune here, to have been born in America. But I hope it was the will of heaven, and therefore must be right."
"Aye!" replied Palmer, a little tauntingly; "and so you have preaching there too!! But do the buckskins generally stir so early as this?"
Ben replied, that the Pennsylvanians were getting to find out that it was cheap burning sun-light. Here Palmer and his cockneys stared at him, as country buckskins are wont to do at a monkey, or parrot, or any such creature that pretends to mimic man.
"You talk of sun-light, sir," said the foreman to Ben: "can you tell the cause of that wide difference between the light of the sun in England and America?"
Ben replied that he had never discovered that difference.
"What! not that the sun shines brighter in London than in America—the sky clearer—the air purer—and the light a thousand times more vivid—and luminous—and cheering—and all that?"
Ben said that he could not understand how that could be, seeing it was the same sun that gave light to both.