"And indeed, ma'am," said William, "I does
feel very bad in my conscience, and I believes
my wife says right. If missus will please take
me back again, I'll do my best."

Somehow the negotiation ended in his
resuming his post, with the little increase I had
spoken of, and again life flowed on smoothly.

But there came a second episode in the
sojourn of William. It was necessary to adjourn
from town to country. On arriving there,
the quality of the cookery was entirely changed.
From being excellent, it became execrable.
Remarks, suggestions, were alike unavailing.
The artistic spirit seemed to have departed with
the change of abode, and finally I gave William
warning: whereat he was surprised, wounded,
and scandalised.

What was the mystery?

A friend of William's had been living in the
house, and had done all the cookery which
William was quite incapable of doing himself;
the friend had been comfortably boarded in the
kitchen, as remuneration; but when we all
migrated, the friend could not be conveyed with
the rest of the establishment, unless some one
paid his travelling expenses, or without inquiry
being made. I leave it to my readers to determine
whether the anecdote about "de Ke-aptin of
de steamar," and the religious wife, was true,
merely adding (without comment) that it came
to my knowledge that this pious father of a
family had no child.

Another faithful old servant, and who lived
with us upwards of four years, was John. He
was honest and industrious, spent most of his
wages in the schooling of his youngest child,
and told me that he regarded master as his fader,
and missus as his moder. He had the occasional
weakness of "getting sick," which meant being
extremely unwell in consequence of a few days'
indulgence in strong liquors; but we found it
best to wink at this. While John was with us
a certain Francis was hired in the house as cook,
between whom and John a deadly enmity sprung
up. One night Francis sallied forth into the
streets, armed with a bludgeon, and thirsting for
revenge. He knew that John would pass by a
certain road; it was dark and moonless; Francis
lay in ambush, and when John was close upon
him, raised his club, and knocked down John.
Francis was a taller man, John was older and
smaller, but vigorous and determined; he was
up in a minute, and, pursuing his assailant, who
fled in an ignominious manner, pulled him down,
and seized one of his fingers between his teeth,
holding on like a bulldog until it was bitten
through. It subsequently had to be amputated.
After which he (John) was heard to ejaculate
piously, "I tank de Lord who give me de
victory over my enemy!"

After the butchery at Morant Bay, is it not
recorded that the assassins met together in
a Baptist chapel and sang songs of praise for
their victory?

John punished his children in the following
manner: A man of few words, he wasted none
on the offender, but arming himself with a
long thick leather strap, he applied it vigorously
to his back or hers—for I saw him thus
punish his daughter, a child of nine years old.
It is said that his wife underwent the same
wholesome discipline when John deemed it needful.
Spite of this, Mrs. John stood up for her
lord and master with a wife's devotion; for,
on the occasion of John's dismissal from our
service, his fellow-servants expressing certain
sentiments of a not complimentary nature to his
character, Mrs. John rushed furiously to the
garden, and tore up the shrubs which John had
planted, by the roots, in order "dat him enemies
should not reap de benefit of him industry."

Never deeming these little ebullitions
inconsistent with the practice of religion, Mrs. John
might be seen every Sunday a regular attendant
at the usual service, and at the communion
also; she knelt meekly on the floor, her eyes
upturned, her hands clasped, the personification
of our converted sister, as the little tracts say.
She was an attentive listener, too, for on
Mondays (when she came for the washing) she
would repeat as much of "minster's sarmon"
as her hearers had patience to listen to.

One day, a thimble was brought me by Mrs.
John's little girl. "Mother bid me say she found
dat timble in your pocket, missus, when she
wash your dress; and me was to tell you she
poor, but proud."

Joe, the son of John, a clever little fellow and
valuable as a servant (if he could have been
induced to regard honesty as the best policy, which
he couldn't), was put in prison one day by his
master, for purloining. An eye-witness
describes the following tableau vivant on the
occasion: The victim sat on the floor, with conscious
innocence written on his face; his mother read
the Psalms aloud. A friend of Mrs. John's,
much noted for the respectability of her
character and the amiability of her disposition,
paced to and fro, muttering imprecations against
"dem stinken white people," as a sort of obligato
accompaniment to the Song of David.

My English servant, on our paying a visit to
a certain house, where she dined with the
coloured folk, said, "Oh, ma'am, the niggers
stand round the table, and are thrown bits like
dogs." And so I found it afterwards, in my
own kitchen. If you engage a certain number
of servants, be sure they are nearly doubled. A
groom keeps his assistant—some wretch too idle
to work hard, or who is trying how long he
can subsist without wages, on the scraps that
fall to him; the cook ditto; the odd-job man
ditto; besides these, are friends who "have de
custom of de house," and come in for scraps
too, nowise abashed. On the entrance of the
mistress, an introduction takes place, and the
friend makes a personal remark on the lady,
usually complimentary: "Dis is Miss Mary
Anne, ma'am; Miss Mary Anne, dis my missus."
"And a nice buckra lady, too," says Miss Mary
Anne, quietly eating my substance.

Prince among the ne'er-do-wells came Mr.
Joseph: a man young, strong, intelligent, and
highly educated for his class. Among his various