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MR. AND MRS. DOUBLEDAY.

FROM A NEW HOME.

I HAVE been frequently reminded of one of Johnson's humorous sketches. A man returning a broken wheelbarrow to a Quaker, with "Here, I've broke your rotten wheelbarrow, usin' on 't. I wish you'd get it mended right off, 'cause I want to borrow it again this afternoon." The Quaker is made to reply, "Friend, it shall be done;" and I wish I possessed more of his spirit.

But I did not intend to write a chapter on involuntary loans; I have a story to tell.

One of my best neighbours is Mr. Philo Doubleday, a long, awkward, honest, hard-working Maineman, or Mainiote, I suppose one might say; so good-natured, that he might be mistaken for a simpleton; but that must be by those that do not know him. He is quite an old settler, came in four years ago, bringing with him a wife, who is to him as vinegar-bottle to oil-cruet, or as mustard to the sugar, which is used to soften its biting qualities. Mrs. Doubleday has the sharpest eyes, the sharpest nose, the sharpest tongue, the sharpest elbows, and, above all, the sharpest voice, that ever" penetrated the interior" of Michigan. She has a tall, straight, bony figure, in contour somewhat resembling two hard-oak planks fastened together and stood on end; and, strange to say! she was full five-and-thirty when her mature graces attracted the eye and won the affections of the worthy Philo. What eclipse had come over Mr. Doubleday's usual sagacity, when he made choice of his Polly, I am sure I never could guess; but he is certainly the only man in the wide world who could possibly have lived with her; and he makes her a most excellent husband.

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She is possessed with a neat devil; I have known many such cases; her floor is scoured every night, after all are in bed but the unlucky scrubber, Betsey, the maid of all work; and wo to the unfortunate "indiffidle," as neighbour Jenkins says, who first sets dirty boot on it in the morning. If men come in to talk over road business, for Philo is much sought when the public" has any work to do, or school business, for that, being very troublesome, and quite devoid of profit, is often conferred upon Philo, Mrs. Doubleday makes twenty errands into the room, expressing in her visage all the force of Mrs. Raddle's inquiry, "Is them wretches going?" And when, at length, their backs are turned, out comes the bottled vengeance. The sharp eyes, tongue, elbow, and voice, are all in instant requisition.

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Fetch the broom, Betsey! and the scrub-broom, Betsey! and the mop, and that 'ere dish of soap, Betsey! And why on earth didn't you bring some ashes? You didn't expect to clean such a floor as this without ashes, did you?"-"What time are you going to have dinner, my dear?" says the imperturbable Philo, who is getting ready to go out.

"Dinner! I'm sure I don't know! there's no time to cook dinner in this house! nothing but slave, slave, slave, from morning till night, cleaning up after a set of nasty, dirty," &c., &c.

"Phew!" says Mr. Doubleday, looking at his fuming help-mate with a calm smile, “It'ill all rub out when it's dry, if you'll only let it alone."

Yes, yes; and it would be plenty clean enough for you if there had been forty horses in here." Philo, on some such occasion, waited till his Polly had stepped out of the room, and then, with a bit of chalk, wrote, on the broad black walnut mantelpiece,—

"Bolt and bar hold gate of wood,
Gate of iron springs make good,
Bolt nor spring can bind the flame.
Woman's tongue can no man tame,"

and then took his hat and walked off.

This is his favourite mode of vengeance,-"poetical justice," as he calls it; and, as he is never at a loss for a rhyme of his own or other people's, Mrs. Doubleday stands in no small dread of these efforts of genius. Once, when Philo's crony, James Porter, the blacksmith, had left the print of his blackened knuckles on the outside of the oft-scrubbed door, and was the subject of some rather severe remarks from the gentle Polly, Philo, as he left the house with his friend, turned and wrote, over the offended spot,

"Knock not here!

Or dread my dear.-P. D." and the very next person that came was Mrs. Skinner, the merchant's wife, all dressed in her red merino, to make a visit. Mrs. Skinner, who did not possess an unusual share of tact, walked gravely round to the back door, and there was Mrs. Doubleday up to the eyes in soap making. Dire was the mortification, and point blank were the ques tions, as to how the visiter came to go round that way; and when the warning couplet was produced in justification, we must draw a veil over what followed, as the novelists say.

Sometimes these poeticals came in aid of poor Betsey; as once, when on hearing a crash in the little shanty-kitchen, Mrs. Doubleday called, in her shrillest tones, " Betsey! what on earth's the matter?" Poor Betsey, knowing what was coming, answered, in a deprecatory whine, «The cow's kicked over the buckwheat batter!"

When the clear, hilarous voice of Philo, from the yard where he was chopping, instantly completed the triplet ;

"Take up the pieces and throw'm at her!" for once the grim features of his spouse relaxed into a smile, and Betsey escaped her scolding.

Yet Mrs. Doubleday is not without her excellent qualities as a wife, a friend, and a neighbour. She keeps her husband's house and stockings in unexceptionable trim. Her emptins are the envy of the neighbourhood. Her vinegar is,-as how could it fail?—the ne plus ultra of sharpness; and her pickles are greener than the grass of the field. She will watch night after night with the sick, perform the last sad offices for the dead, or take to her home and heart the little ones whose mother is removed for ever from her place at the fire-side. All this she can do cheerfully, and she will not repay herself, as many good people do, by recounting every word of the querulous sick man, or the de

solate mourner, with added hints of tumbled drawers, closets all in heaps, or awful dirty kitchens.

I was sitting one morning with my neighbour, Mrs. Jenkins, who is a sister of Mr. Doubleday, when Betsey, Mrs. Doubleday's "hired girl," came in with one of the shingles of Philo's handiwork in her hand, which bore, in Mr. Doubleday's wellknown chalk marks,

Come quick. Fanny!

And bring the granny; For Mrs. Doubleday's in trouble."

And the next intelligence was of a fine, new pair of lungs, at that hitherto silent mansion. I called very soon after to take a peep at the "latest found;" and if the suppressed delight of the new papa was a treat, how much more was the softened aspect, the womanized tone of the proud and happy mother. I never saw a being so completely transformed. She would almost forget to answer me, in her absorbed watching of the breath of the little sleeper. Even when trying to be polite, and to say what the occasion demanded, her eyes would not be withdrawn from the tiny face. Conversation on any subject but the ever-new theme of "babies," was out of the question. Whatever we began upon, whirled round sooner or later to the one point. The needle may tremble, but it turns not with the less constancy to the pole.

As I pass for an oracle in the matter of paps and possets, I had frequent communication with my now happy neighbour, who had forgotten to scold her husband, learned to let Betsey have time to eat, and omitted the nightly scouring of the floor, lest so much dampness might be bad for the baby. We were in deep consultation, one morning, on some important point touching the well-being of this sole object of Mrs. Doubleday's thoughts and dreams, when the very same little Ianthe Howard, dirty as ever, presented herself. She sat down and stared a while without speaking, à l'ordinaire, and then informed us, that her mother wanted Mrs. Doubleday to let her have her baby for a little while, 'cause Benny's"....-but she had no time to finish the sentence.

"Lend my baby!!!"-and her utterance failed. The new mother's feelings were fortunately too big for speech, and Ianthe wisely disappeared before Mrs. Doubleday found her tongue. Philo, who entered on the instant, burst into one of his electrifying laughs, with

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THE great ones of the earth might learn many a lesson from the little. What has a certain dignity on a comparatively large scale, is so simply laughable when it is seen in miniature, (and, unlike most other things, perhaps, its real features are better distinguished in the small,) that it must be

wholesome to observe how what we love appears in those whom we do not admire. The monkey and the magpie are imitators; and when the one makes a thousand superfluous bows and grimaces, and the other hoards what can be of no possible use to him, we may, even in those, see a far off reflex of certain things prevalent among ourselves. Next in order come little children; and the boy will put a napkin about his neck for a cravat, and the girl supply her ideal of a veil by pinning a pocket handkerchief to her bonnet, while we laugh at the self-deception, and fancy that we value only realities. But what affords us most amusement, is the awkward attempt of the rustic, to copy the airs and graces which have caught his fancy as he saw them exhibited in town; or, still more naturally, those which have been displayed on purpose to dazzle him, during the stay of some "mould of fashion" in the country. How exquisitely funny are his efforts and their failure! How the true hugs himself in full belief that the gulf between himself and the pseudo is impassable! Little dreams he that his own illdirected longings after the distingué in air or in position seem to some more fortunate individual as far from being accomplished as those of the rustic to himself, while both, perhaps, owe more to the tailor and milliner than to any more dignified

source.

The country imitates the town, most sadly; and it is really melancholy, to one who loves his kind, to see how obstinately people will throw away real comforts and advantages in the vain chase of what does not belong to solitude and freedom. The restraints necessary to city life are there compensated by many advantages resulting from close contact with others; while in the country those restraints are simply odious, curtailing the real advantages of the position, yet entirely incapable of substituting those which belong to the city.

Real refinement is as possible in the one case as in the other. Would it were more heartily sought in both!

In the palmy days of alchemy, when the nature and powers of occult and intangible agents were deemed worthy the study of princes, the art of sealing hermetically was an essential one; hence many a precious elixir would necessarily become unmanageable and useless if allowed to wander in the common air. This art seems now to be among the lost, in spite of the anxious efforts of cunning projectors; and at the present time a subtle essence, more volatile than the elixir of life-more valuable than the philosopher's stone-an invisible and imponderable but most real agent, long bottled up for the enjoyment of a privileged few, has burst its bounds and become part of our daily atmosphere. Some mighty sages still contrive to retain within their own keeping important portions of this treasure; but there are regions of the earth where it is open to all, and, in the opinion of the exclusive, sadly desecrated by having become an object of pursuit to the vulgar. Where it is still under a degree of control, the seal of Hermes is variously represented. In Russia, the supreme will of the autocrat regulates the distribution of the "airv

good" in other parts of the Continent, ancient prescription has still the power to keep it within its due reservoirs. In France, its uses and advantages have been publicly denied and repudiated; yet it is said that practically everybody stands open-mouthed where it is known to be floating in the air, hoping to inhale as much as possible without the odium of seeming to grasp at what has been decided to be worthless. In England we are told that the precious fluid is still kept with great solicitude in a dingy receptacle called Almack's, watched ever by certain priestesses, who are selfconsecrated to an attendance inore onerous than that required for maintaining the Vestal fire, and who yet receive neither respect nor gratitude for their pains. Indeed, the fine spirit has become so much diffused in England that it reminds us of the riddle of Mother Goose

A house-full, a hole-full,

But can't catch a bowl-full.

If such efforts in England amuse us, what shall we say of the agonized pursuit every where observable in our own country? We have denounced the fascinating gas as poisonous-we have staked our very existence upon excluding it from the land, yet it is the breath of our nostrils-the soul of our being the one thing needful-for which we are willing to expend mind, body, and estate. We exclaim against its operations in other lands, but it is the purchaser decrying to others the treasure he would appropriate to himself. We take much credit to ourselves for having renounced what all the rest of the world were pursuing, but our practice is like that of the toper who had forsworn drink, yet afterward perceiving the contents of a brother sinner's bottle to be spilt, could not forbear falling on his knees to drink the liquor from the frozen hoof-prints in the road; or that other votary of indulgence, who, having once had the courage to pass a tavern, afterward turned back that he might treat resolution." We have satisfied our consciences by theory; we feel no compunction in making our practice just like that of the rest of the world.

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This is true of the country generally; but it is nowhere so strikingly evident as in these remote regions which the noise of the great world reaches but at the rebound-as it were in faint echoes; and these very echoes changed from their original, as Paddy asserts of those of the Lake of Killarney. It would seem that our elixir vite-a strange anomaly becomes stronger by dilution. Its power of fascination, at least, increases as it recedes from the fountain head. The Russian noble may refuse to let his daughter smile upon a suitor whose breast is not covered with orders; the German dignitary may insist on sixteen quarterings; the well-born Englishman may sigh to be admitted into a coterie not half as respectable or as elegant as the one to which he belongs-all this is consistent enough; but we must laugh when we see the managers of a city ball admit the daughters of wholesale merchants, while they exclude the families of merchants who sell at retail; and still more when we come to the "new country" and observe that Mrs. Pen

niman, who takes in sewing, utterly refuses to associate with her neighbour Mrs. Clapp, because she goes out sewing by the day; and that our friend Mr. Diggins, being raised a step in the world by the last election, signs all his letters of friendship, "D. Diggins, Sheriff."

THE LAND-FEVER.

FROM THE SAME.

[In 1835 and 1836, a fever of speculation in lands took place in the far west. Both the speculators, and the "land-lookers" who helped them in the business of their purchases, were odious to the actual settlers, because, by thus buying up land, they threatened to maintain a wilderness round the clearings for years-a serious disadvantage to these already too solitary men. So much being premised, and with the additional knowledge that the backwoodsmen are generally very hospitable, the reader will apprehend the humour of the following sketch. It was at the height of the fever that Mr. WIL loughby, a respectable-looking middle-aged man, riding a jaded horse, and carrying with him blankets, valise, saddle-bags, and holsters, stopped in front of a rough log-house, and accosted its tall and meagre tenant.]

Turs individual and his dwelling resembled each other in an unusual degree. The house was, as we have said, of the roughest; its ribs scarcely half filled in with clay; its "looped and windowed raggedness" rendered more conspicuous by the tattered cotton sheets which had long done duty as glass, and which now fluttered in every breeze; its roof of oak shingles, warped into every possible curve; and its stick chimney, so like its owner's hat, open at the top, and jammed in at the sides; all shadowed forth the contour and equipments of the exceedingly easy and self-satisfied person who leaned on the fence, and snapped his long cartwhip, while he gave such answers as suited him to the gentleman in the India-rubbers, taking especial care not to invite him to alight.

"Can you tell me, my friend,gan Mr. Willoughby.

"Oh! friend!" interrupted the told you that I was your friend? in these parts."

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civilly be

settler; "who Friends is scuss

"You have at least no reason to be otherwise," replied the traveller, who was blessed with a very patient temper, especially where there was no use in getting angry.

"I don't know that," was the reply. What fetch'd you into these woods?"

"If I should say my horse,' the answer would perhaps be as civil as the question."

"Jist as you like," said the other, turning on his heel, and walking off.

"I wished merely to ask you," resumed Mr. Willoughby, talking after the nonchalant son of the forest, "whether this is Mr. Pepper's land." How do you know it a'n't mine ?"

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"I'm not likely to know at present it seems," said the traveller, whose patience was getting a little frayed. And taking out his memorandumbook, he ran over his minutes: "South half of north-west quarter of section fourteen-Your name is Leander Pepper, is it not?"

"Where did you get so much news? You a'n't the sheriff, be ye?"

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Pop!" screamed a white-headed urchin from the house, "Mam says supper's ready."

"So a'n't I," replied the papa; "I've got all my chores to do yet." And he busied himself at a log pig-stye on the opposite side of the road, half as large as the dwelling-house. Here he was soon surrounded by a squealing multitude, with whom he seemed to hold a regular conversation.

Mr. Willoughby looked at the westering sun, which was not far above the dense wall of trees that shut in the small clearing; then at the heavy clouds which advanced from the north, threatening a stormy night; then at his watch, and then at his note-book; and after all, at his predicament-on the whole, an unpleasant prospect. But at this moment a female face showed itself at the door. Our traveller's memory reverted at once to the testimony of Ledyard and Mungo Park; and he had also some floating and indistinct poetical recollections of woman's being useful when a man was in difficulties, though hard to please at other times. The result of these reminiscences, which occupied a precious second, was, that Mr. Willoughby dismounted, fastened his horse to the fence, and advanced with a brave and determined air, to throw himself upon female kindness and sympathy.

He naturally looked at the lady, as he approached the door, but she did not return the compliment. She looked at the pigs, and talked to the children, and Mr. Willoughby had time to observe that she was the very duplicate of her husband; as tall, as bony, as ragged, and twice as cross-looking.

Malviny Jane !" she exclaimed, in no dulcet treble, be done a-paddlin' in that 'ere water! If I come there, I'll—”

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You'd better look at Sophrony, I guess!" was the reply.

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Why, what's she a-doin'?"

Well, I guess if you look, you'll see!" responded Miss Malvina, coolly, as she passed into the house, leaving at every step a full impression of her foot in the same black mud that covered her sister from head to foot.

The latter was saluted with a hearty cuff, as she emerged from the puddle; and it was just at the propitious moment when her shrill howl aroused the echoes, that Mr. Willoughby, having reached the threshold, was obliged to set about making the agreeable to the mamma. And he called up for the occasion all his politeness.

"I believe I must become an intruder on your hospitality for the night, madam," he began. The dame still looked at the pigs. Mr. Willoughby tried again, in less courtly phrase.

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Will it be convenient for you to lodge me tonight, ma'am? I have been disappointed in my search for a hunting-party, whom I had engaged to meet, and the night threatens a storm."

"I don't know nothin' about it; you must ask the old man," said the lady, now for the first time taking a survey of the new comer; "with my will, we'll lodge nobody."

This was not very encouraging, but it was a poor night for the woods; so our traveller persevered, and making so bold a push for the door that

the lady was obliged to retreat a little, he entered, and said he would await her husband's coming.

And in truth he could scarcely blame the cool reception he had experienced, when he beheld the state of affairs within those muddy precincts. The room was large, but it swarmed with human beings. The huge open fire-place, with its hearth of rough stone, occupied nearly the whole of one end of the apartment; and near it stood a long cradle, containing a pair of twins, who cried-a sort of hopeless cry, as if they knew it would do no good, yet could not help it. The schoolmaster, (it was his week,) sat reading a tattered novel, and rocking the cradle occasionally, when the children cried too loud. An old gray-headed Indian was curiously crouched over a large tub, shelling corn on the edge of a hoe; but he ceased his noisy employment when he saw the stranger, for no Indian will ever willingly be seen at work, though he may be sometimes compelled by the fear of starvation or the longing for whisky, to degrade himself by labour. Near the only window was placed the workbench and entire paraphernalia of the shoemaker, who in these regions travels from house to house, shoeing the family and mending the harness as he goes, with various interludes of songs and jokes, ever new and acceptable. This one, who was a little, bald, twinkling-eyed fellow, made the smoky rafters ring with the burden of that favourite ditty of the west:

"All kinds of game to hunt, my boys, also the buck and doe,

All down by the banks of the river O-hi-o;" and children of all sizes, clattering in all keys, completed the picture and the concert.

The supper-table, which maintained its place in the midst of this living and restless mass, might remind one of the square stone lying bedded in the bustling leaves of the acanthus; but the associations would be any but those of Corinthian elegance. The only object which at that moment diversified its dingy surface was an iron hoop, into which the mistress of the feast proceeded to turn a quantity of smoking hot potatoes, adding afterward a bowl of salt, and another of pork fat, by courtesy denominated gravy: plates and knives dropped in afterward, at the discretion of the company.

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Another call of Pop! pop!" brought in the host from the pig-stye; the heavy rain which had now begun to fall, having, no doubt, expedited the performance of the chores. Mr. Willoughby, who had established himself resolutely, took advantage of a very cloudy assent from the proprietor, to lead his horse to a shed, and to deposit in a corner his cumbrous outer gear; while the company used in turn the iron skillet which served as a wash basin, dipping the water from a large trough outside, overflowing with the abundant drippings of the eaves. Those who had no pocket handkerchiefs, contented themselves with a nondescript article which seemed to stand for the family towel; and when this ceremony was concluded, all seriously addressed them selves to the demolition of the potatoes. The grown people were accommodated with chairs and chests; the children prosecuted a series of flying raids upon

the good cheer, snatching a potato now and then as they could find an opening under the raised arm of one of the family, and then retreating to the chimney corner, tossing the hot prize from hand to hand, and blowing it stoutly the while. The old Indian had disappeared.

To our citizen, though he felt inconveniently hungry, this primitive meal seemed a little meagre ; and he ventured to ask if he could not be accommodated with some tea.

"A'n't my victuals good enough for you?" "Oh!-the potatoes are excellent, but I am very fond of tea."

"So be I, but I can't have every thing I wantcan you?"

This produced a laugh from the shoemaker, who seemed to think his patron very witty, while the schoolmaster, not knowing but the stranger might happen to be one of his examiners next year, produced only a faint giggle, and then reducing his countenance instantly to an awful gravity, helped himself to his seventh potato.

The rain which now poured violently, not only outside but through many a crevice in the roof, naturally kept Mr. Willoughby cool; and finding that dry potatoes gave him the hiccups, he withdrew from the table, and seating himself on the shoemaker's bench, took a survey of his quarters.

Two double beds and the long cradle seemed all the sleeping apparatus; but there was a ladder which doubtless led to a lodging above. The sides of the room were hung with abundance of decent clothing, and the dresser was well stored with the usual articles, among which a tea-pot and canister shone conspicuous; so that the appearance of inhospitality could not arise from poverty, and Mr. Willoughby concluded to set it down to the account of rustic ignorance.

The eating ceased not until the hoop was empty, and then the company rose and stretched themselves, and began to guess it was about time to go to bed. Mr. Willoughby inquired what was to be done with his horse.

"Well! I s'pose he can stay where he is."

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But what can he have to eat?"

"I reckon you won't get nothing for him, without you turn him out on the mash."

"He would get off to a certainty!"

"Tie his legs."

The unfortunate traveller argued in vain. Hay was "scuss," and potatoes were "scusser;" and in short the "mash" was the only resource, and these natural meadows afford but poor picking after the first of October. But to the "mash" was the good steed despatched, ingloriously hampered with the privilege of munching wild grass in the :ain, after his day's journey.

Then came the question of lodging for his master. The lady, who had by this time drawn out a trundle-bed, and packed it full of children, said there was no bed for him, unless he could sleep "up chamber" with the boys.

Mr. Willoughby declared that he should make out very well with a blanket by the fire.

"Well! just as you like," said his host; "but

Solomon sleeps there, and if you like to sleep by Solomon, it is more than I should."

This was the name of the old Indian, and Mr. Willoughby once more cast woful glances toward the ladder.

But now the schoolmaster, who seemed rather disposed to be civil, declared that he could sleep very well in the long cradle, and would relinquish his place beside the shoemaker to the guest, who was obliged to content himself with this arrangement, which was such as was most usual in these times.

The storm continued through the night, and many a crash in the woods attested its power. The sound of a storm in the dense forest is almost precisely similar to that of a heavy surge breaking on a rocky beach; and when our traveller slept, it was only to dream of wreck and disaster at sea, and to wake in horror and affright. The wild rain drove in at every crevice, and wet the poor children in the loft so thoroughly, that they crawled shivering down the ladder, and stretched themselves on the hearth, regardless of Solomon, who had returned after the others were in bed.

But morning came at last; and our friend, who had no desire farther to test the vaunted hospitality of a western settler, was not among the latest astir. The storm had partially subsided; and although the clouds still lowered angrily, and his saddle had enjoyed the benefit of a leak in the roof during the night, Mr. Willoughby resolved to push on as far as the next clearing, at least, hoping for something for breakfast besides potatoes and salt. It took him a weary while to find his horse, and when he saddled him, and strapped on his various accoutrements, he entered the house, and inquired what he was to pay for his entertainment-laying somewhat of a stress on the last word.

His host, nothing daunted, replied that he guessed he would let him off for a dollar.

Mr. Willoughby took out his purse, and as he placed a silver dollar in the leathern palm outspread to receive it, happened to look toward the hearth, and perceiving the preparations for a very substantial breakfast, the long pent-up vexation burst forth.

"I really must say, Mr. Pepper-————-” he began : his tone was certainly that of an angry man, but it only made his host laugh.

"If this is your boasted western hospitality, I can tell you

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"You'd better tell me what the dickens you are peppering me up this fashion for! My name isn't Pepper, no more than yours is! May be that is your name; you seem pretty warm." Your name not Pepper! Pray, what is it then ?"

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"Ah! there's the thing now! You land-hunters ought to know sich things without asking." "Land-hunter! I'm no land-hunter!"

"Well! you're a land-shark, then-swallowin' up poor men's farms. The less I see of such cattle, the better I'm pleased."

"Confound you!" said Mr. Willoughby, who waxed warm, "I tell you I've nothing to do with land. I wouldn't take your whole state for a gift."

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