I found this a very nice article, light in color, clear and thick, not unlike honey. I bought it eagerly, and gave my friend to understand I would like to have more. In less than ten minutes he had brought me more than a dozen, which I purchased at sight of the shells, and carried below. I discovered the next day when too late, that only the first one was worth eating, the rest appearing to be about equally compounded of very black molasses and sea-water.
I made my out-door agent understand that I wanted to collect shells, showing him one as a specimen. He rushed to the side, shouting to his comrade in the canoe, "Teroot!" and returned with a few which were not worth much. My "wants" having been thus advertised, I was beset with cries of "Teroot!" for the next half-hour; for every barbarian pedler who had a beech-worn shell or fragment of a shell to dispose of, pushed it into my face with the same war-cry. I selected a few, which I thought worthy to be added to my collection. But I was by no means rid of the rest, after so doing; for I was pursued from post to pillar, and the same specimens, transferred to different hands, loomed before my eyes dozens of times, with the savage cry "Teroot! Tabahky!"
"I'm sayin', ould chap, what's the matter wid y'er leg?" said the voice of Farrell near me.
I turned and saw an elderly, grave looking man climbing in over the rail. As he landed on deck, he presented a singular phenomenon; having one well-proportioned leg of the natural size, while the other one at the calf would have filled a deck-bucket.
"Say, ould chap, what ails y'er leg?" repeated the Irishman.
"Ididee tikee-nut!" shouted the old man, holding up over his head a bunch of nuts, knotted together by strips of the husk.
"Ah! the divil take your tikeenuts, it's your leg I'm looking at. Who ever saw the likes?"
"Tabahky!" roared the venerable savage, keeping an eye to business.
"What made y'er leg swell that big?" pursued Farrell.
"Tikee moee moee!" was the answer, in a voice of thunder.