“They are considerable large print are the Bull family,” said he; “you can read them by moonlight. Indeed, their faces ain’t onlike the moon in a gineral way; only one has got a man in it, and the other hain’t always. It tante a bright face; you can look into it without winkin’. It’s a cloudy one here too, especially in November; and most all the time makes you rather sad and solemncoly. Yes, John is a moony man, that’s a fact, and at the full a little queer sometimes.
“England is a stupid country compared to our’n. There it no variety where there it no natur. You have class variety here, but no individiality. They are insipid, and call it perlite. The men dress alike, talk alike, and look as much alike as Providence will let ‘em. The club-houses and the tailors have done a good deal towards this, and so has whiggism and dissent; for they have destroyed distinctions.
“But this is too deep for me. Ask Minister, he will tell you the cause; I only tell you the fact.
“Dinin’ out here, is both heavy work, and light feedin’. It’s monstrous stupid. One dinner like one rainy day (it’s rained ever since I been here a’most), is like another; one drawin’-room like another drawin’-room; one peer’s entertainment, in a general way, is like another peer’s. The same powdered, liveried, lazy, idle, good-for-nothin’, do-little, stand-in-the-way-of-each-other, useless sarvants. Same picturs, same plate, same fixin’s, same don’t-know-what-to-do-with-your-self-kinder-o’-lookin’-master. Great folks are like great folks, marchants like marchants, and so on. It’s a pictur, it looks like life, but’ it tante. The animal is tamed here; he is fatter than the wild one, but he hante the spirit.
“You have seen-Old Clay in a pastur, a racin’ about, free from harness, head and tail up, snortin’, cavortin’, attitudinisin’ of himself. Mane flowin’ in the wind, eye-ball startin’ out, nostrils inside out a’most, ears pricked up. A nateral hoss; put him in a waggon, with a rael spic and span harness, all covered over with brass buckles and brass knobs, and ribbons in his bridle, rael jam. Curb him up, talk Yankee to him, and get his ginger up. Well, he looks well; but he is ‘a broke hoss.’ He reminds you of Sam Slick; cause when you see a hoss, you think of his master: but he don’t remind you of the rael ‘Old Clay,’ that’s a fact.
“Take a day here, now in town; and they are so identical the same, that one day sartificates for another. You can’t get out a bed afore twelve, in winter, the days is so short, and the fires ain’t made, or the room dusted, or the breakfast can’t be got, or sunthin’ or another. And if you did, what’s the use? There is no one to talk to, and books only weaken your understandin’, as water does brandy. They make you let others guess for you, instead of guessin’ for yourself. Sarvants spile your habits here, and books spite your mind. I wouldn’t swap ideas with any man. I make my own opinions, as I used to do my own clocks; and I find they are truer than other men’s. The Turks are so cussed heavy, they have people to dance for ‘em; the English are wus, for they hire people to think for ‘em. Never read a book, Squire, always think for yourself.
“Well, arter breakfast, it’s on hat and coat, ombrella in hand, (don’t never forget that, for the rumatiz, like the perlice, is always on the look out here, to grab hold of a feller,) and go somewhere where there is somebody, or another, and smoke, and then wash it down with a sherry-cobbler; (the drinks ain’t good here; they hante no variety in them nother; no white-nose, apple-jack, stone-wall, chain-lightning, rail-road, hail-storm, ginsling-talabogus, switchel-flip, gum-ticklers, phlem-cutters, juleps, skate-iron, cast-steel, cock-tail, or nothin’, but that heavy stupid black fat porter;) then down to the coffee-house, see what vessels have arrived, how markets is, whether there is a chance of doin’ any thin’ in cotton or tobacco, whose broke to home, and so on. Then go to the park, and see what’s a goin’ on there; whether those pretty critturs, the rads are a holdin’ a prime minister ‘parsonally responsible,’ by shootin’ at him; or whether there is a levee, or the Queen is ridin’ out, or what not; take a look at the world, make a visit or two to kill time, when all at once it’s dark. Home then, smoke a cigar, dress for dinner, and arrive at a quarter past seven.
“Folks are up to the notch here when dinner is in question, that’s a fact, fat, gouty, broken-winded, and foundered as they be. It’s rap, rap, rap, for twenty minutes at the door, and in they come, one arter the other, as fast as the sarvants can carry up their names. Cuss them sarvants! it takes seven or eight of ‘em to carry a man’s name up stairs, they are so awful lazy, and so shockin’ full of porter. If a feller was so lame he had to be carried up himself, I don’t believe on my soul, the whole gang of them, from the Butler that dresses in the same clothes as his master, to Boots that ain’t dressed at all, could make out to bowse him up stairs, upon my soul I don’t.
“Well, you go in along with your name, walk up to old aunty, and make a scrape, and the same to old uncle, and then fall back. This is done as solemn, as if a feller’s name was called out to take his place in a funeral; that and the mistakes is the fun of it. There is a sarvant at a house I visit at, that I suspicion is a bit of a bam, and the critter shows both his wit and sense. He never does it to a ‘somebody,’ ‘cause that would cost him his place, but when a ‘nobody’ has a droll name, he jist gives an accent, or a sly twist to it, that folks can’t help a larfin’, no more than Mr. Nobody can feelin’ like a fool. He’s a droll boy, that; I should like to know him.
“Well, arter ‘nouncin’ is done, then comes two questions—do I know anybody here? and if I do, does he look like talk or not? Well, seein’ that you have no handle to your name, and a stranger, it’s most likely you can’t answer these questions right; so you stand and use your eyes, and put your tongue up in its case till it’s wanted. Company are all come, and now they have to be marshalled two and two, lock and lock, and go into the dinin’-room to feed.