MAKING POLITICAL CAPITAL, 373 



respect of the &quot;liberty of women,&quot; rather than cause our 

 manners to approach any nearer to theirs. 



Among words, I was rather puzzled on reading a list 

 of articles, drawn up by the Colonisation Society, for 

 the assistance of emigrants to Liberia, to find among 

 other notions &quot; a bale or two of domestics,&quot; set down as 

 desirable portions of a complete outfit. With us the 

 word is usually employed as an abbreviation for &quot; domes 

 tic servants;&quot; but, in this land of helps and niggers, it is 

 a contraction for &quot;domestic manufactures,&quot; and, as the 

 dictionaries say, means u cotton goods of American 

 manufacture.&quot; 



But a negro abbreviation, common on the Potomac, 

 will please etymologists more than this. &quot; Huccum,&quot; 

 says the negro, when you tell him something has hap 

 pened meaning &quot; how did it come ? &quot; &quot; how did it hap 

 pen ?&quot; This is about as good in its way as the &quot; Do 

 tell&quot; of New England mentioned in a preceding 

 chapter. 



Among the singularities of this country, not to be 

 observed in Washington merely, are the methods 

 adopted by party-men and party-organs to keep them 

 selves before their friends and the public to make poli 

 tical capital out of everything. General Cass proposes to 

 discontinue diplomatic relations with Austria, and fifty 

 members of Congress take the occasion to make ferocious 

 Bunkum speeches, which can lead to no possible good for 

 the poor Hungarians. Two petty officials, British and 

 American, have a personal quarrel at Lima, and forth 

 with the latter figures before the whole Union as the 

 defender of national honour in the person of his little 

 insulted wife, and realises an immense political fortune. 

 A squabble occurs on the Mosquito Shore, and forthwith, 

 if the world is not to be set on fire, war must be declared 

 with Great Britain at the very least ! An Englishman 

 is amazed at all this excitability and useless waste of 



