“‘Ay—that day on the Pillar o’ Cloud.’
“‘Oh!’ says he. ‘You mean about she. Well, it didn’t come t’ nothin’, Tumm. The women folk wasn’t able t’ find me, an’ they didn’t know which I wanted sove, the mother or the child; so, somehow or other, both went an’ died afore I got there. But that isn’t got nothin’ t’ do with this.’
“He was drifted a few fathoms past. Just then a big sea fell atop of un. He ducked real skilful, an’ come out of it smilin’, if sputterin’.
“‘Now, Tumm,’ says he, ‘if we was t’ the s’uth’ard, where they says ’tis warm an’ different, an’ lives isn’t lived the same, maybe you’d be on the pan o’ ice, an’ I’d be aboard the berg; maybe you’d be like t’ starve, an’ I’d get so much as forty cents a day the year round. They’s a great waste in life,’ says he; ‘I don’t know why, but there ’tis. An’ I ’low I’m gone t’ waste on this here coast. I been born out o’ place, that’s all. But they’s a place somewheres for such as me—somewheres for the likes o’ me. T’ the s’uth’ard, now, maybe, they’d be a place; t’ the s’uth’ard, maybe, the folk would want t’ know about the things I thinks out—ay, maybe they’d even pay for the labor I’m put to! But here, you lives, an’ I dies. Don’t you see, Tumm? ’Tis the law! ’Tis why a Newf’un’lander ain’t a nigger. More’n that, ’tis why a dog’s a dog on land an’ a swile in the water; ’tis why a dog haves legs an’ a swile haves flippers. Don’t you see? ’Tis the law!’
“‘I don’t quite find you,’ says I.
“Poor Botch shook his head. ‘They isn’t enough words in langwitch,’ says he, ‘t’ ’splain things. Men ought t’ get t’ work an’ make more.’
“‘But tell me,’ says I.
“Then, by Botch’s regular ill luck, under he went, an’ it took un quite a spell t’ cough his voice into workin’ order.
“‘Excuse me,’ says he. ‘I’m sorry. It come too suddent t’ be ducked.’
“‘Sure!’ says I. ‘I don’t mind.’