in this vulgar society. I withdrew into the thickets of the adjoining
wood and there for a time abandoned myself to melancholy reminiscences.

Presently I heard footsteps. I turned and saw a black approaching,
bearing the homely viand known as corn-dodger. He offered it. I accepted
it as a tribute from the inferior race to the superior.

I recognized him as one whose fustigation had so revived my crapulous
spirits in the morning. He seemed to bear no malice. Malignity is
perhaps a mark of more highly developed character. I, for example,
possess it to a considerable degree.

The black led me to a lair in the wood. He took my half-eagles from my
tar. He scraped and cleansed me by simple methods of which he had the
secret. He clothed me in rude garments. Gunny-bag was, I think, the
material. He gave me his own shoes. The heels were elongated; but this
we remedied by a stuffing of leaves. He conducted me toward the banks of
Bayou La Farouche.

On our way, we were compelled to pass not far from the Mellasys mansion.
There was a sound of revelry. It was night. I crept cautiously up and
peered into the window.

There stood the Reverend Onesimus Butterfut, since a prominent candidate
for the archbishopric of the Southern Confederacy. Saccharissa, more
over-dressed than usual, and her cousin Mellasys Plickaman, somewhat
unsteady with inebriation, stood before him. He was pronouncing them man
and wife,--why not ogre and hag?

How fortunate was my escape!