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therefore prudently accepted, and the last account I heard of her stated that she was then enjoying all the luxuries of eastern magnificence.[1]
About a month after the arrival of the Isaac Tod a circumstance occurred which, as it caused a considerable sensation for some time, I shall fully relate.
About two miles at the rear of the fort, on the
- ↑ Miss Barnes was fond of quotations; but she was no Blue. One of the clerks was one day defending the native and half-bred women, whose characters she had violently attacked, and he recriminated in no very measured language on the conduct of the white ladies: "O Mr. Mac!" said she, "I suppose you agree with Shakspeare that "every woman is at heart a rake?"—"Pope, ma'am, if you please." "Pope! Pope!" replied Jane. "Bless me, sir! you must be wrong; rake is certainly the word.—I never heard of but one female Pope." Then, in order to terminate the argument, she pretended to read an old newspaper which she held in her hand. He quickly discovered by her keeping the wrong end uppermost that she did not know a syllable of its contents. He quitted her abruptly; and as he was coming out I met him at the door, a wicked and malicious grin ruffling his sun-burnt features. "Well, Mac," said I, "what's the matter? You seem annoyed."—"What do you think," he replied, "I have just had a conversation with that fine-looking damsel there, who looks down with such contempt on our women, and may I be d—d if the b—h understands B from a buffalo!" Her supposed education was the only excuse in his opinion to justify her usurpation of superiority;—that gone, he judged her "poor indeed."
