first roof that she could ever strictly call her own.

Mrs. Willoughby took a survey of the offices last. Here she found,
already established, the two Plinies, with Mari', the sister of the
elder Pliny, Bess, the wife of the younger, and Mony--alias Desdemona--
a collateral of the race, by ties and affinities that garter-king-at-
arms could not have traced genealogically; since he would have been
puzzled to say whether the woman was the cousin, or aunt, or step-
daughter of Mari', or all three. All the women were hard at work, Bess
singing in a voice that reached the adjoining forest. Mari'--this name
was pronounced with a strong emphasis on the last syllable, or like
Maria, without the final vowel--Mari' was the head of the kitchen, even
Pliny the elder standing in salutary dread of her authority; and her
orders to her brother and nephew were pouring forth, in an English that
was divided into three categories; the Anglo-Saxon, the Low Dutch, and
the Guinea dialect; a medley that rendered her discourse a droll
assemblage of the vulgar and the classical.

"Here, niggers," she cried, "why you don't jump about like Paus dance?
Ebbery t'ing want a hand, and some want a foot. Plate to wash, crockery
to open, water to b'ile, dem knife to clean, and not'ing missed. Lord,
here's a madam, and 'e whole kitchen in a diffusion."

"Well, Mari'," exclaimed the captain, good-naturedly, "here you are,
scolding away as if you had been in the place these six months, and
knew all its faults and weaknesses."

"Can't help a scold, master, in sich a time as dis--come away from dem
plates, _you_ Great Smash, and let a proper hand take hold on
'em."