NEGIiO SILLINESS. 187 



in Frencli-Spaiiisli-Africau Creole patois, a language whicli 

 is becomiiif]^ fixed, with its own orammar and declensions, &c. 

 A curious book on it has lately been published in Trinidad 

 by Mr. Thomas, a coloured gentleman, who seems to be at 

 once no mean philologer and no mean humorist. The 

 substance of the Negro's answer was, " AMiy, sir, you sent 

 me to the town to buy a packet of sugar and a packet of 

 salt; and coming back it rained so hard, the packets burst, 

 and the salt was all washed into the su2;ar. And so I am 

 washiuo- it out a^'ain." .... 



This worthy was to have been brought to me, that I might 

 discover, if possible, by what processes of " that whicli he 

 was pleased to call his mind " he had arrived at the conclu- 

 sion that such a thing could be done. Clearly, he could not 

 plead unavoidable ignorance of the subject-matter, as might 



the old cook at San Josef, wdio, the first time her master 





 brought home ^Yenham Lake ice from Port of Spain, was 



scandalized at the dirtiness of the "American water;" washed 



off the sawdust, and dried the ice in the sun. His was a case of 



Handy- Andy-ism, as that intellectual disease may be named, 



after Mr. Lever's hero ; like that of the Obeah-woman, when 



she tried to bribe the white o-entleman with half-a-dozen of 



o 



bottled beer ; a case of muddle-headed craft and elaborate 

 silliness, whicli keeps no proportion between the means and 

 the end; so common in insane persons; frequent, too, among 



