“Yes,” interposed Peterkin; “so you see, Mak, when you agree with a trader to get him an elephant-tusk, that’s a cumprumoise, according to Johnson.”
“No, no, Mak,” said I quickly; “Peterkin is talking nonsense. It is not a bargain of that kind; it’s a—a—You know every question has two sides?”
“Yis, massa.”
“Well, suppose you took one side.”
“Yis.”
“And suppose I took the other side.”
“Then suppose we were to agree to forsake our respective sides and meet, as it were, half-way, and thus hold the same middle course—”
“Ay, down the middle and up again; that’s it, Mak,” again interrupted Peterkin—“that’s a cumprumoise. In short, to put it in another and a clearer light, suppose that I were to resolve to hit you an awful whack on one side of your head, and suppose that Ralph were to determine to hit you a frightful bang on the other side, then suppose that we were to agree to give up those amiable intentions, and instead thereof to give you, unitedly, one tremendous smash on the place where, if you had one, the bridge of your nose would be—that would be a cumprumoise.”
“Ho! ha! ha! hi!” shouted our guide, rolling over on the grass and splitting himself with laughter; for Makarooroo, like the most of his race, was excessively fond of a joke, no matter how bad, and was always ready on the shortest notice to go off into fits of laughter, if he had only the remotest idea of what the jest meant. He had become so accustomed at last to expect something jocular from Peterkin, that he almost invariably opened his mouth to be ready whenever he observed our friend make any demonstration that gave indication of his being about to speak.
From the mere force of sympathy Mbango began to laugh also, and I know not how long the two would have gone on, had not Jack checked them by saying—