JOHN MARVEL, ASSISTANT
a termagant's tongue, helped to keep him reason-
ably straight, though not uniformly so; for one
afternoon my wife and I came across him when he
showed that degree of delightful pomposity which
was the unmistakable sign of his being "half-shot.
  "Jeams," I said, when I had cut short his
grandiloquence, "what will Eliza say to you when
she finds you this way again"
  Jeams straightened himself and assumed his
most dignified air. "My wife, sir, knows better
than to take me to task. She recognizes me, sir,
as a gentleman."
  "She does You wait and see when you get
home."
  Jeams's manner suddenly changed. He sank
back into his half-drivelling self. "Oh, she ain't
gwine to say nothin' to me, Marse Hen. She
ain't gwine to say no rmore than Miss Nelly there
says to you when you gets this way. W"hat does
she say to you"
  "She doesn't say anything to me. She has no
occasion to do so."
  Jeams twisted his head to one side and burst
into a drunken laugh. "Oh! Yes, she do. I've
done heard her. Eliza, she regalates me, and
Miss Nelly, she regalates you, an' I reckon we
both knows it, and we better know it, too."
                     352