“ Kissing his companion as he stepped out of the boat, Suggs sought Button, who was tied to a thicket near by, and mounting, pursued his homeward way.
“Never despar,” he said to himself, as he jogged along, “never despar! Honesty, a bright watch-out, a hand o’ cards in your fingers and one in your lap, with a little grain of help from Providence, will always fetch a man through! Never despar! I’ve been hunted and tracked and dogged like a cussed wolf, but the Lord has purvided, and my wust inimy has tuck a tree! Git up, Button, you old, flop-eared Injun!” ”

“ It is a cruel death to die to be merely drowned, and to go through the ordinary common-places of suffocation; but to see your death gradually rising to your eyes, to feel the water rising, inch by inch, upon your shivering sides, and to anticipate the certainly coming, choking struggle for your last breath, when, with the gurgling sound of an overflowing brook taking a new direction, the cold brine pours into mouth, ears, and nostrils, usurping the seat and avenues of health and life, and, with gradual flow, stifling—smothering—suffocating! It were better to die a thousand common deaths. ”

“ I a’n’t never been to Augusty—I couldn’t find the road thar I reckon, ha! ha! Bob—Smi—th! The eternal stink! if he was only to see one o’ them fine gentlemen in Augusty, with his fine broad-cloath and bell-crown hat, and shoe-boots a-shinin’ like silver, he’d take to the woods and kill himself a-runnin’. Bob Smith! that’s whar all your devilment comes from, Simon.”
“Bob Smith’s as good as anybody else, I judge; and a heap smarter than some. He showed me how to cut Jack,” continued Simon, “and that’s more than some people can do if they have been to Augusty.” ”

“ How then could their worthy son, Peleg, be expected to arrive at a conclusion? He never does.
Yet, for one’s general comfort and particular happiness, there does not appear to be any faculty more desirable than the power of “making up the mind.” Right or wrong, it saves a deal of wear and tear; and it prevents an infinite variety of trouble. Commend us to the individual who closes upon propositions like a nutcracker—whose promptness of will has a sledge-hammer way with it, and hits nails continually on the head. Genius may be brilliant—talent commanding ”

“ Winter ruled the hour when Fydget Fyxington was last observed to be in circulation—winter, when men wear their hands in their pockets and seldom straighten their backs—a season however, which, though sharp and biting in its temper, has redeeming traits. There is something peculiarly exhilarating in the sight of new-fallen snow. The storm which brings it is not without a charm. ”

“ He laid Biddy Timpkins on the top of the barrel, released the horse, giving him a vigorous kick, which sent him flying down the street, and strode indignantly away, leaving Carlo, Miss Gadabout’s house, and all other matters in his charge, to the guardianship of chance.
The last time Salix was seen in the busy haunts of men, he looked the very incarnation of gloom and despair. His very coat had gone to relieve his necessities, and he wandered slowly and dejectedly about, relieving the workings of his perturbed spirit by kicking whatever fell in his way. ”

“ But when the clouds, having performed their office, roll away, and the brightness of the morning sun beams upon an expanse of sparkling unsullied whiteness; when all that is common-place, coarse, and unpleasant in aspect, is veiled for the time, and made to wear a fresh and dazzling garb, new animation is felt by the spirit. The young grow riotous with joy, and their merry voices ring like bells through the clear and bracing air ”

“ Every thing is wrong—such a wandering from first principles!—there must be enough in this world for us all, or we wouldn’t be here; but things is fixed so badly that I s’pose some greedy rascal gets my share of suppa’ and other such elegant luxuries. It’s just the way of the world; there’s plenty of shares of everything, but somehow or other there are folks that lay their fingers on two or three shares, and sometimes more, according as they get a chance, and the real owners, like me, may go whistle. ”

“ He giveth up all the sunshine, and hath nothing but chilling shade for himself. He waiteth at the table of the world, serveth the guests, who clear the board, and, for food and pay, give him fine words, which culinary research hath long since ascertained cannot be used with profit, even in the buttering of parsnips. He is, in fact, an appendage, not an individuality; and when worn out, as he soon must be, is thrown aside to make room for another, if another can be had. ”

“ I’m always served the same way, and though I’ve so much to do planning the world’s good, I can’t attend to my own business, it not only won’t support me, but it treats me with despise and unbecoming freedery. Now, I was used sinful about my universal language, which everybody can understand, which makes no noise, and which don’t convolve no wear and tear of the tongue. It’s the patent anti-fatigue-anti-consumption omnibus linguister, to be done by winking and blinking, and cocking your eye, the way the cat-fishes make Fourth of July orations. ”

“ A strange hybrid, indeed, did circumstances beget here, in the New World, upon the old Puritan stock, and the earth never before saw such mystic-practicalism, such niggard-geniality, such calculating-fanaticism, such cast-iron enthusiasm, such unwilling-humour, such close-fisted generosity. This new ‘Græculus esuriens’ will make a living out of anything. He will invent new trades as well as new tools. ”

“ The graceful eddying of the drifts sported with by the wind, and the silent gliding of the feathery flakes, as one by one they settle upon the earth like fairy creatures dropping to repose, have a soothing influence not easily described, though doubtless felt by all. ”

“ That’s the way politicianers serve me, and it’s about all I’d a right to expect. Oh, pshaw! sich a world—sich a people!”
Peter rolled up his “circular recommend” put it in his hat, and slowly sauntered away. As he is not yet provided for, he should receive the earliest attention of parties, or disappointment may induce him to abandon both, take the field “upon his own hook,” and constitute an independent faction under the name of the “Brush party,” the cardinal principle of which will be that peculiarly novel impulse to action, hostility to all “politicianers” who are not on the same side. ”

“ Bushy Creek Ned, standing in the piazza with his fiddle, struck up the old tune of
“We’ll dance all night, ’till broad daylight,
And go home with the gals in the morning.”
Ned’s hint caused a movement towards the dancing room, among the young people, when the captain, as if waking from a revery, exclaimed in a loud voice: “Oh, the devil! what are we all thinking of? why here’s Squire Tompkins, he can perform the ceremony. If a man can’t marry folks, what’s the use of being squire at all?” ”

“ I want to take care of my country, and I want my country to take care of me. Head work is the trade I’m made for—talking—that’s my line—talking in the streets, talking in the bar rooms, talking in the oyster cellars. Talking is the grease for the waggon wheels of the body politic and the body corpulent, and nothing will go on well till I’ve got my say in the matter ”

“ For some miles above the battle-ground, the river is a succession of shallows, broken every mile or two by lovely patches of smooth, still water, generally bedecked with a green islet or two, around which the trout love to play. The banks are generally large, irregular hills, that look as if they were struggling to pitch themselves, with their huge pines, into the stream ”

“ The “best-natured fellow in the world” is merely a convenience; very useful to others, but worse than useless to himself. He is the bridge across the brook, and men walk over him. He is the wandering pony of the Pampas, seeking his own provender, yet ridden by those who contribute not to his support. ”

“ A long time ago, my ma used to put on her specs and say, ‘Peter, my son, put not your trust in princes;’ and from that day to this I haven’t done anything of the kind, because none on ’em ever wanted to borry nothing of me: and I never see a prince or a king, but one or two, and they had been rotated out of office, to borry nothing of them. Princes! pooh! Put not your trust in politicianers—them’s my sentiments. You might jist as well try to hold an eel by the tail. I don’t care which side they’re on, for I’ve tried both, and I know. Put not your trust in politicianers, or you’ll get a hyst. ”

“ At this moment Captain Suggs made no remark orally, but his eye said to Betsy, as plainly as eye could talk, “hit her a lick back, my gal!”
Silently the paddle went into the water, Betsy leaning back, with lips compressed, and in a second the canoe shot ten feet out from the tree, and the Sheriff was left dangling among the vines!
“Stop your senseless jokes!” roared the officer.
“Keep cool, old Tap-my-shoulder! thar’s jist the smallest grain of a joke in this here, that ever you seed. It’s the coldest sort of airnest.” ”

“ The passive grumbletonian is useless to himself and to others: the active grumbletonian is just the reverse. In general, he combines individual advancement with public prosperity; but there are exceptions even in that class—men, who try to take so much care of the world that they forget themselves, and, of course, fail in their intent.
Such a man is Fydget Fyxington, an amelioration-of-the-human-race-by-starting-from-first-principles-philosopher. Fydget’s abstract principle, particularly in matters of government and of morals, is doubtless a sound rule ”

“ I, for my part, have a high opinion of metaphysical studies, and think the science a very useful one, because it teaches people what sheer nobodies they are. The only objection is, they are not disposed to lay this truth sufficiently to heart, but continue to give themselves airs, just as if some folks were really some folks. ”

“ The Eastern and Western, Northern and Southern States, though settled by a population speaking the same language, and enjoying the same institutions, are so distant from each other, and differ so widely in climate, soil, and productions, that they have but few features in common; while the people, from the same causes, as well as from habits, tastes, necessities, the sparseness or density of population, free soil, or slave labour, the intensity, absence, or weakness of religious enthusiasm, and many other peculiarities, are equally dissimilar. ”

“ The process of coinage has been far more rapid and extensive in America than in Europe. That of words predominates in the Western, and that of phrases in the Eastern States. The chief peculiarity in the pronunciation of the Southern and Western people, is the giving of a broader sound than is proper to certain vowels; as whar for where, thar for there, bar for bear. ”

“ Suggs, then, very naturally felt ineffably indignant that an individual who had never seen a collection of human habitations larger than a log-house village—an individual, in short, no other or better than Bob Smith—should venture to express an opinion concerning the manners, customs, or anything else appertaining to, or in any wise connected with, the ultima thule of backwoods Georgians. ”

“ Don’t laugh: it’s a fact; there an’t no doubt. The water, you see, had been round him a smart and long while, whilst he was waiten for the bear, and it’s wonderful cold in them regions, as I was sayen, and you’ll freeze in a minit if you don’t keep moven about smartly. So the captin he strained first one leg, and then he strained tother, but he couldn’t move ’em none. They was both fruz fast into the ice, about an inch and a half deep, from knee to toe, tight as a Jersey oyster perryauger on a mud flat at low water. So he laid down his gun, and looked at the bear, and doubled up his fists. ”

“ FYDGET FYXINGTON. [14] The doctrine, that “all is for the best,” though cherished in the abstract, is but little practised. The world is much more addicted to its opposite. “All’s for the worst” is a very common motto, and under its influence there are thousands who growl when they go to bed, and growl still louder when they get up; they growl at their breakfast, they growl at their dinner, they growl at their supper, and they growl between meals. Discontent is written in every feature of their visage ”

“ To reason well is much, no doubt; but reason loses the race, if it sits in meditation on the fence when competition rushes by.
Under the best of circumstances, something must be left to hazard. There is a chance in all things. No man can so calculate odds in the affairs of life as to insure a certainty. The screws and linchpins necessary to our purpose have not the inflexibility of a fate ”

“ The better sort of people, I think you say! Now, you know North Ca’lina ain’t the best State in the Union, nohow, and Duplin’s the poorest county in the State. Better sort of people, is it? Quality, eh! Who the devil’s better than we are? An’t we honest? An’t we raised our children decent, and learned them how to read, write and cipher? An’t I fou’t under Newnan and Floyd for the country? Why, darn it! we are the very best sort of people. Stuff! nonsense! The wedding shall go on; Polly shall have a husband. ”

“ At this stage of affairs, Floyd (not the general, but the ambassador) rode up, with a mysterious look on his countenance. The dancers left off in the middle of a set, and assembled around the messenger, to hear the news of the parson. The old ladies crowded up, too, and the captain and the squire were eager to hear. But Floyd felt the importance of his situation, and was in no hurry to divest himself of the momentary dignity. ”