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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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took to Orleans-it was as good as a meetin’ now, really, to hear that critter pray; and he was quite gentle and quiet like. He fetched me a good sum, too, for I bought him cheap of a man that was ‘bliged to sell out; so I realized six hundred on him. Yes, I consider religion a valeyable thing in a nigger, when it’s the genu- ine article, and no mistake.” “Well, Tom’s got the real article, if ever a fellow had,” rejoined the other. “Why, last fall, I let him go to Cincinnati alone, to do business for me, and bring home five hundred dollars. ‘Tom,’ says I to him, ‘I trust you, because I think you’re a Christian-I know you wouldn’t cheat.’ Tom comes back, sure enough; I knew he would. Some low fellows, they say, said to him-‘Tom, why don’t you make tracks for Canada?’ ‘Ah, master trusted me, and I couldn’t,’- they told me about it. I am sorry to part with Tom, I must say. You ought to let him cover the whole balance of the debt; and you would, Haley, if you had any conscience.” “Well, I’ve got just as much conscience as any man in business can afford to keep,- just a little, you know, to swear by, as ‘twere,” said the trader, jocularly; “and, then, I’m ready to do anything in reason to ‘blige friends: but this yer, you see, is a leetle too hard on a fellow-a leetle too hard.” The trader sighed contem- platively, and poured out some more brandy. “Well, then, Haley, how will you trade?” said Mr. Shelby, after an uneasy in- terval of silence. “Well, haven’t you a boy or gal that you could throw in with Tom?” |
