120 ON THE FRONTIER. 



fidential mood, he told me that at school he had been 

 taught the world was round and went round the sun, which 

 might be all very well to teach town fellows, but was 

 " derned bosh " to tell him, who they knew meant to travel 

 and was sure to find out they were lying. Joe had also 

 strong convictions about slavery. His old father, who was 

 a hard-fisted working farmer in a very small way, once 

 owned a nigger, and Joe considered he belonged by birth 

 and position to the slaveocracy. This question was the 

 great point of difference between our two "hands," who, 

 when they had nothing to do or talk about, held long and 

 extraordinary arguments on the subject. 



Our other man " went to bed with the name " of La- 

 fayette, which of course had been shortened to Laughfy, 

 and by that sobriquet he was always called, which, 

 considering he was of a grave and sedate aspect, was 

 sufficiently absurd. Laughfy was a "Yank," from Maine, 

 as tall as Joe but not so burly, and as sallow of complexion 

 as the former was ruddy ; an equally expert axeman, very 

 nearly as good a shot and teamster, he yet held proficiency 

 in such things in contempt. He was great on "isms/* 

 a spiritualist, a Swedenborgian, a propounder of the 

 " higher law," a (in theory) negro-equalist ; but had actually 

 little, if any, more education than Joe, and certainly not 

 the clearest of ideas on any of those difficult subjects. 

 Both were ardent patriots in a restricted way. Joe was 

 firmly persuaded that " Old Missouri " was the finest 

 country in the world. To hear him talk, you would come 

 to the conclusion he had no use for any other country 

 except to furnish places to be disparagingly compared 



