“‘Do you give it up?’
“‘Yes.’
“‘There the gipsy girls steal poultry; and here they steal hearts,’ and he puts his left hand by mistake on his breast, not knowing that the pulsation there indicates that his lungs, and not his gizzard is affected, and that he is broken-winded, and not broken-hearted.
“‘Very good,’ every one sais; but still every one hasn’t heard it, so it has to be repeated; and what is worse, as the habits of the gipsies are not known to all, the point has to be explained.
“Target sais, ‘He will send it to the paper, and put Trigger’s name to it,’ and Pistol says, ‘That is capital, for if he calls you out, he can’t hit you,’ and there is a joyous laugh. Oh dear, but a day in the woods is a pleasant thing. For my own part, I must say I quite agree with the hosier, who, when he first went to New Orleens, and saw such a swad of people there, said, he ‘didn’t onderstand how on earth it was that folks liked to live in a heap that way, altogether, where there was no corn to plant, and no bears to kill.’
“‘My, oh my!’ sais Miss Letitia, or Letkissyou, as Pistol used to call her. People ought to be careful what names they give their children, so as folks can’t fasten nicknames on ’em. Before others the girls called her Letty, and that’s well enough; but sometimes they would call her Let, which is the devil. If a man can’t give a pretty fortune to his child, he can give it a pretty name at any rate.
“There was a very large family of Cards wunst to Slickville. They were mostly in the stage-coach and livery-stable line, and careless, reckless sort of people. So one day, Squire Zenas Card had a christenin’ at his house.
“‘Sais the Minister, ‘what shall I call the child?’
“‘Pontius Pilate,’ said he.
“‘I can’t,’ said the Minister, ‘and I won’t. No soul ever heerd of such a name for a Christian since baptism came in fashion.’