My husband thus describes the proceedings in his part of the vessel:
“The fore cabin was furnished with a bar, where ardent spirits and tobacco were supplied to those of the passengers that were destitute of such blessings; and the regularity with which the glass circulated, might very well illustrate perpetual motion. The gentlemen were associated together in small groups, and were conversing on various subjects, but chiefly on that theme of which the Americans never seem to tire--the revolutionary war; the presence of an Englishman is almost certain to produce a note from this string. A number were amusing themselves by rallying a squire, as a justice of the twenty-five dollar court is here termed, and a little dark man, who figured as the deacon of a church. It appeared that the deacon was a farmer, and his neighbour the squire, kept a store for the sale of almost every thing, and for the convenience of barter, or ‘trading,’ as they call it. One cold morning during the last winter, the deacon took six bushels of wheat to the store of the squire, to be exchanged for as much salt as could be mutually agreed upon. After some time and many words were spent in manœuvering, they consented to barter measure for measure. The deacon proceeded to mete out his grain, while the squire complaining of the coldness of the morning amused himself by stamping upon his elastic floor. The deacon, of course, could not object to his neighbour warming his toes in what manner he pleased, in his own store, he therefore said nothing, although he discovered that this stamping had consolidated his six bushels of wheat into the compass of five and a half. The squire then commenced his part of the contract--to measure out the salt; and a chillness conveniently seized the toes of the deacon, which he endeavoured to counteract by stamping, after the example of the squire. ‘Stop, stop,’ said the squire, ‘what are you stamping for?’ ‘To warm my toes,’ was the answer. ‘But do you not see how you shake down the salt?’ ‘Not more than you shook down the wheat,’ was the reply. And so, as they acknowledged, ‘they got a fair trade between them.’”
There was a youth on board whom I regarded with curiosity; he bore so striking a resemblance to Brom Bones, the hero of Sleepy Hollow, that nothing was wanting but the fox’s tail in his hat to complete the similitude. I felt an unconquerable inclination to learn something of this ‘roystering blade,’ and for this purpose, I stepped up to a young man, with whom he had just been conversing, and was very soon fully gratified. From this informant I learned a few circumstances concerning the hero in question;--that, like his model, he was fond of a spirited horse; and that he had lately figured conspicuously in a race--not with a goblin for a gallon of cider, but with a more substantial personage in the form of a deacon. I quite forget his name, for the image of Brom Bones was so correctly delineated in my mind, that it entirely obliterated his proper name from my memory.