"Yes sir; about nine o'clock in the morning the sea being smooth and the ship running, as I should think, about seven knots-you came up into the maintop, where I belong, and was pleased to ask my opinion about the best way to set a top gallant stu'n'-sail."

"He's mad! He's mad!" said the officer, with delirious conclusiveness. "Take him away, take him away-put him somewhere, master-at-arms. Stay, one test more. What mess do you belong to?"

"Number 12, sir."

"No, sir; never saw him before this morning."

"What are those men's names?" he demanded of Israel.

"Well, sir, I am so intimate with all of them," looking upon them with a kindly glance, "I never call them by their real names, but by nick-names. So, never using their real names, I have forgotten them. The nick-names that I know them by, are Towser, Bowser, Rowser, Snowser."

"Enough. Mad as a March hare. Take him away. Hold," again added the officer, whom some strange fascination still bound to the bootless investigation. "What's my name, sir?"

"Why, sir, one of my messmates here called you Lieutenant Williamson, just now, and I never heard you called by any other name."

"There's method in his madness," thought the officer to himself. "What's the captain's name?"

Why, sir, when we spoke the enemy, last night, I heard him say, through his trumpet, that he was Captain Parker; and very likely he knows his own name." That ain't the

"I have you now. captain's real name."

"He's the best judge himself, sir, of what his name is, I should think."

"Were it not," said the officer, now turning gravely upon his juniors, were it not, that such a supposition were on other grounds absurd, I should certainly conclude that this man, in some unknown way, got on board here from the enemy last night."

"How could he, sir?" asked the sailingmaster.

"Heaven knows. But our spanker

boom geared the other ship, you know, in manoeuvering to get headway."

"But supposing he could have got here that fashion, which is quite impossible under all the circumstances-what motive could have induced him voluntarily to jump among enemies?"

"Let him answer for himself," said the officer, turning suddenly upon Israel, with the view of taking him off his guard, by the matter of course assumption of the very point at issue.

"Answer, sir. Why did you jump on board here, last night, from the enemy?"

"Jump on board, sir, from the enemy? Why, sir, my station at general quarters is at gun No. 3, of the lower deck, here."

"He's cracked-or else I am turned -or all the world is;-take him away?"

"But where am I to take him, sir!" said the master-at-arms. "He don't seem to belong anywhere, sir. Wherewhere am I to take him?"

"Take him out of sight," said the officer, now incensed with his own perplexity. "Take him out of sight, I say."

"Come along, then, my ghost," said the master-at-arms. And, collaring the phantom, he led it hither and thither, not knowing exactly what to do with it.

Some fifteen minutes passed, when the captain coming from his cabin, and observing the master-at-arms leading Israel about in this indefinite style, demanded the reason of that procedure, adding that it was against his express orders for any new and degrading punishments to be invented for his men,

"Come here, master-at-arms. To what end do you lead that man about?"

"To no end in the world, sir. I keep leading him about because he has no final destination."

"Mr. officer of the deck, what does this mean? Who is this strange man? I don't know that I remember him. Who is he? And what is signified by his being led about?"

Hereupon, the officer of the deck, throwing himself into a tragical posture, set forth the entire mystery; much to the captain's astonishment, who at once indignantly turned upon the phantom.

"You rascal-don't try to deceive me. Who are you? and where did you come from last?"

"Sir, my name is Peter Perkins, and I last came from the forecastle, where the master-at-arms last led me, before coming here."

"No joking, sir, no joking."

"What was the next port, sir?"

"Why, sir, I was saying Boston was the first port, I believe; wasn't it?and"

"The second port, sir, is what I want." Well-New York."

"Right again," whispered the midshipman.

"And what port are we bound to, now ?"

"Let me see-homeward-bound-Falmouth, sir."

What sort of a place is Boston ?" Pretty considerable of a place, sir." "Very straight streets, ain't they?" "Yes, sir; cow-paths, cut by sheepwalks, and intersected with hen-tracks."

When did we fire the first gun?" Well, sir, just as we were leaving Falmonth, ten months ago-signal-gun, sir."

Where did we fire the first shotted gun, sir?—and what was the name of the privateer we took upon that occasion ?"

Pears to me, sir, at that time I was on the sick list. Yes, sir, that must

have been the time; I had the brain fever, and lost my mind for a while." "Master-at-arms, take this man away." "Where shall I take him, sir?" touching his cap.

66

Go, and air him on the forecastle." So they resumed their devious wanderings. At last, they descended to the berth-deck. It being now breakfasttime, the master-at-arms, a good-humored man, very kindly introduced our hero to his mess, and presented him with breakfast; during which he in vain endeavored, by all sorts of subtle blandishments, to worm out his secret.

At length Israel was set at liberty; and whenever there was any important duty to be done, volunteered to it with such cheerful alacrity, and approved himself so docile and excellent a seaman, that he conciliated the approbation of all the officers, as well as the captain; while his general sociability served in the end, to turn in his favor the suspicious hearts of the mariners. Perceiv ing his good qualities, both as a sailor and man, the captain of the main-top applied for his admission into that section of the ship; where, still improving upon his former reputation, our hero did duty for the residue of the voyage.

One pleasant afternoon, the last of the passage, when the ship was nearing the Lizard, within a few hours' sail of her port, the officer of the deck, happering to glance upwards towards the main-top, descried Israel there, leaning very leisurely over the rail, looking mildly down where the officer stood.

"Well, Peter Perkins, you seem to belong to the main-top, after all."

"I always told you so, sir," smiled Israel, benevolently down upon him, "though, at first, you remember, sir, you would not believe it."

IT

is now some eighteen or twenty years since an enterprising Yankee, actuated, it is but charitable to suppose, by the purest love of musical art, by the enthusiasm of a discoverer, or by a proper and praiseworthy desire for posthumous fame, produced upon the boards of one of our metropolitan theatres, a musical sketch entitled "Jim Crow." Beyond the simple fact of its production by the estimable gentleman above referred to, the origin of this ancient and peculiar melody is beyond the reach of modern antiquarian lore. Whether it was first sung upon the banks of the Alatamaha, the Alabama, or the Mississippi; or, whether it is pre-American, and a relic of heathen rites in Congo, or in that mysterious heart of Africa, which foot of civilized man has never trod, is a problem whose solution must be left to the zeal and research of some future Ethiopian Oldbuck. It is sufficient for the present disquisition to know that it appeared in the manner above stated. To those (if there can be any such) who are unacquainted with its character and general scope, it may be proper to remark that "Jim Crow" is what may be called a dramatic song, depending for its success, perhaps more than any play ever written for the stage, upon the action and mimetic powers of the performer. Its success was immediate and marked. It touched a chord in the American heart which had never before vibrated, but which now responded to the skilful fingers of its first expounder, like the music of the Bermoothes to the magic wand of Prospero. The schoolboy whistled the melody on his unwilling way to his daily tasks. The ploughman checked his oxen in mid-furrow, as he reached its chorus, that the poetic exhortation to "do just so," might have the action suited to the word. Merchants and staid professional men, to whom a joke was a sin, were sometimes seen by the eyes of prying curiosity in private to unbend their dignity to that weird and wonderful posture, now, alas! seldom seen but in historic pictures, or upon the sign of a tobacconist; and of the thoroughly impressive and extraordinary sights which the writer of this article has in his lifetime beheld, the most memorable and noteworthy was that of a young lady in a sort of inspired

rapture, throwing her weight alternately upon the tendon Achillis of the one, and the toes of the other foot, her left hand resting upon her hip, her right, like that of some prophetic sybil, extended aloft, gyrating as the exigencies of the song required, and singing Jim Crow at the top of her voice. Popularity like this laughs at anathemas from the pulpit, or sneers from the press. The song which is sung in the parlor, hummed in the kitchen, and whistled in the stable, may defy oblivion. But such signal and triumphant success can produce but one result. Close upon the heels of Jim Crow, came treading, one after the other, "Zip Coon," ""Long-tailed Blue,” “Ole Virginny neber tire," "Settin' on a Rail," and a host of others, all of superior merit, though unequal alike in their intrinsic value, and in their participation in public approval. The golden age of negro literature had commenced. Thenceforward for several years the appearance of a new melody was an event whose importance can hardly be appreciated by the coming generation. It flew from mouth to mouth, and from hamlet to hamlet, with a rapidity which seemed miraculous. The stage-driver dropped a stave or two of it during a change of the mails at some out of the way tavern; it was treasured up and remembered, and added to from day to day, till the whole became familiar as household words. Yankee Doodle went to town with a load of garden vegetables. If upon his ears there fell the echo of a new plantation song, barter and sight-seeing were secondary objects till he had mastered both its words and music. Thereafter, and until supplanted by some equally enthusiastic and enterprising neighbor, Yankee Doodle was the hero of his native vale, of Todd Hollow. Like the troubadours and minstrels of ancient days, he found open doors and warm hearts wherever he went. Cider, pumpkin pie, and the smiles of the fair were bestowed upon him with an unsparing hand. His song was for the time to him the wand of Fortunatus.

The prevailing characteristics of the melodies which this period produced are their perfect and continual lightness, spirit, and good humor; but the true secret of their favor with the world is to be found in the fact that they

are genuine and real. They are no senseless and ridiculous imitations forged in the dull brain of some northern self-styled minstrel, but the veritable tunes and words which have lightened the labor of some weary negro in the cotton felds, amused his moonlight hours as he fished, or waked the spirits of the woods as he followed in the track of the wary racoon. It is as impossible to counterfeit, or successfully imitate, one of these songs, as it would be for a modern poet to produce a border ballad like Chevy Chase or Lord Jamie Doulas. It is not alone the patient and laborious student of negro minstrelsy that can detect the ring of the false metal. The shameless imitations carry their imposture upon their face. Walpole, with all his credulity, would never have been deceived, had Chatterton tarned his attention to manufacturing plantation songs.

The allusion to ancient English and Scottish ballads cannot fail to bring to the mind of the poetical scholar, the striking similarity that exists between many of the "specimens" of Percy, Ritson and others, and the most approved poetry of the African school. In the terseness and fitness of the language, the oft repeated idiomatic expressions, the occasional looseness and nerligence in respect to rhyme, the carelessness and license in the metre, and, above all, in the incoherence of the constantly recurring refrain; the lover of negro minstrelsy is continually reminded of the old, plain songs which Shakespeare loved, and "the spinsters and the knitters in the sun did use to chant. I quote almost at random from Motherwell.

**Oh! I never saw my love before

With a hey lilelu and a how lo lan; Till I saw her through an auger bore,

further illustration of this subject I cannot forbear quoting a portion of a banjo song from a volume now lying before me. Its genuineness, no one at all fami liar with negro literature will presume to question, while its intrinsic worth and excellence will be perceived by the most indifferent or prejudiced observer. It is hardly possible to peruse it without thinking of Gil Maurice or Syr Charles Bawdin. Not inferior to the former in its simplicity and truthfulness it is far above the feeble imitation of Chatterton in dramatic effect and artistic construction.

"Oh, my boys I'm bound to tell you; Oh! Oh!

Listen awhile, and I will tell you;
Oh! Oh!

I'll tell you little 'bout Uncle Gabriel;
Oh, boys, I've just begun.
Hard times in old Virginny.

"Oh, don't you know old Uncle Gabriel? Oh! Oh!

Oh, he was a darkey General,
Oh! Oh!
He was the chief of the insurgents,
Way down in Southampton.

Hard times in old Virginny.

"It was a little boy betrayed him,
Oh! Oh!

A little boy by the name of Daniel
Oh! Oh!
Betrayed him at the Norfolk landing;
Oh, boys I'm getting done.
Hard Times in old Virginny.

"Says he, How d'ye do, my Uncle Gabriel? Oh! Oh!

I am not your Uncle Gabriel,
Oh! Oh!

My name it is Jim McCullen;
Some they calls me Archy Mullin.
Hard times in old Virginny.

And the birk and the brume blooms bonnie.

And she gave to me a gay gold ring,

With a hey lilelu and a how lo lan; With three shining diamonds set therein, And the birk and the brume blooms bonnie."

Let the words peculiarly Scottish in Hynd Horn, the ballad from which the above is taken, or in almost any other ancient ballad, be literally translated into the African dialect, and we have at once a plantation song. The birk and the bruine may be more alliterative, but they are certainly not more poetic trees than the gum and the persimmon. In

"They took him down to the gallows,

Oh! Oh!

They drove him down with four grey horses,

Oh! Oh!

Brice's Ben, he drove the wagon,

Oh, boys, I am most done.

Hard times in old Virginny.

"And there they hung him and they swung him, Oh! Oh!

And they swung him and they hung him,

Oh! Oh!

And that was the last of the darkey General;

Oh, boys I'm just done.

Hard times in old Virginny."

Those of us who have for so many years been looking anxiously forward to