54:2 AMERICAN ANGLER'S BOOK. 



Now I call that hexameter in the rough, and taking it all 

 through,, it is pretty good legendary poetry, to- boot. 



Nbs. Your taste in such matters, my dear boy, betrays your 

 "bringing up;" but it seems to me, that a man who spends 

 much of his time on lake or river, and allows the " particular 

 metre," as you call it, and the repetitions in " Hiawatha" to 

 prejudice him against the book, comes short of a full 

 appreciation of camping out, or cooking his dinner on the 

 stream. 



Nor. Now you are a beautiful specimen of a star-struck 

 fisherman, with your hair poking through the crown of 

 that old hat, and that terrible rent in your trousers ; how 

 you would captivate your wife, and the ladies in general. 

 But let me give you the concluding lines of the drama, as 

 well as I can recollect them, and then if you can see 

 no similarity between the "Song of Hiawatha," and the 

 " Song of the Nigger Gin'ral," I'll consent to a truce between 

 Longfellow and Dick Cooper. See now, how harmoniously 

 the descriptive blends with the dramatic. 



" Thursday week come on his trial, 



Ho my boys you most done. 



[But I forgot, I did not mean to put in the chorus.) 



" Dey sont an called all de county, 

 To come and see de Nigger Gin'ral ; 

 Some dey called him Archy Mullin, — 

 Right name was John de Cullin. 

 I'm here to-day and gone to-morrow, 

 I didn't come to stay forever. 



" Dey drove him down ta de gallus. 

 Drove him down wid fo' gray hosses ; 

 Diggs's Ben he druv de wagpn. 

 Dar dey hung him and dey swung him, 

 An dat's de end of de Nigger Gin'ral. 



