Chương Chương 14 · 第14章

By-and-by, when we got up, we turned over the truck the gang had stole

off of the wreck, and found boots, and blankets, and clothes, and all

sorts of other things, and a lot of books, and a spyglass, and three

boxes of seegars. We hadn’t ever been this rich before in neither of

our lives. The seegars was prime. We laid off all the afternoon in the

woods talking, and me reading the books, and having a general good

time. I told Jim all about what happened inside the wreck and at the

ferry-boat, and I said these kinds of things was adventures; but he said

he didn’t want no more adventures. He said that when I went in the

texas and he crawled back to get on the raft and found her gone, he

nearly died; because he judged it was all up with _him_, anyway it could

be fixed; for if he didn’t get saved he would get drownded; and if he

did get saved, whoever saved him would send him back home so as to get

the reward, and then Miss Watson would sell him South, sure. Well, he

was right; he was most always right; he had an uncommon level head, for

a nigger.

I read considerable to Jim about kings and dukes and earls and such,

and how gaudy they dressed, and how much style they put on, and called

each other your majesty, and your grace, and your lordship, and so on,

’stead of mister; and Jim’s eyes bugged out, and he was interested. He

says:

“I didn’ know dey was so many un um. I hain’t hearn ’bout none un um,

skasely, but ole King Sollermun, onless you counts dem kings dat’s in a

pack er k’yards. How much do a king git?”

“Get?” I says; “why, they get a thousand dollars a month if they want

it; they can have just as much as they want; everything belongs to

them.”

“_Ain’_ dat gay? En what dey got to do, Huck?”

“_They_ don’t do nothing! Why, how you talk! They just set around.”

“No; is dat so?”

“Of course it is. They just set around—except, maybe, when there’s a

war; then they go to the war. But other times they just lazy around; or

go hawking—just hawking and sp— Sh!—d’ you hear a noise?”

We skipped out and looked; but it warn’t nothing but the flutter of a

steamboat’s wheel away down, coming around the point; so we come back.

“Yes,” says I, “and other times, when things is dull, they fuss with

the parlyment; and if everybody don’t go just so he whacks their heads

off. But mostly they hang round the harem.”

“Roun’ de which?”

“Harem.”

“What’s de harem?”

“The place where he keeps his wives. Don’t you know about the harem?

Solomon had one; he had about a million wives.”

“Why, yes, dat’s so; I—I’d done forgot it. A harem’s a bo’d’n-house, I

reck’n. Mos’ likely dey has rackety times in de nussery. En I reck’n de

wives quarrels considable; en dat ’crease de racket. Yit dey say

Sollermun de wises’ man dat ever live’. I doan’ take no stock in dat.

Bekase why: would a wise man want to live in de mids’ er sich a

blim-blammin’ all de time? No—’deed he wouldn’t. A wise man ’ud take en

buil’ a biler-factry; en den he could shet _down_ de biler-factry when

he want to res’.”

“Well, but he _was_ the wisest man, anyway; because the widow she told

me so, her own self.”

“I doan k’yer what de widder say, he _warn’t_ no wise man nuther. He

had some er de dad-fetchedes’ ways I ever see. Does you know ’bout dat

chile dat he ’uz gwyne to chop in two?”

“Yes, the widow told me all about it.”

“_Well_, den! Warn’ dat de beatenes’ notion in de worl’? You jes’ take

en look at it a minute. Dah’s de stump, dah—dat’s one er de women;

heah’s you—dat’s de yuther one; I’s Sollermun; en dish yer dollar

bill’s de chile. Bofe un you claims it. What does I do? Does I shin

aroun’ mongs’ de neighbors en fine out which un you de bill _do_ b’long

to, en han’ it over to de right one, all safe en soun’, de way dat

anybody dat had any gumption would? No; I take en whack de bill in

_two_, en give half un it to you, en de yuther half to de yuther woman.

Dat’s de way Sollermun was gwyne to do wid de chile. Now I want to ast

you: what’s de use er dat half a bill?—can’t buy noth’n wid it. En what

use is a half a chile? I wouldn’ give a dern for a million un um.”

“But hang it, Jim, you’ve clean missed the point—blame it, you’ve

missed it a thousand mile.”

“Who? Me? Go ’long. Doan’ talk to _me_ ’bout yo’ pints. I reck’n I

knows sense when I sees it; en dey ain’ no sense in sich doin’s as dat.

De ’spute warn’t ’bout a half a chile, de ’spute was ’bout a whole

chile; en de man dat think he kin settle a ’spute ’bout a whole chile

wid a half a chile doan’ know enough to come in out’n de rain. Doan’

talk to me ’bout Sollermun, Huck, I knows him by de back.”

“But I tell you you don’t get the point.”

“Blame de point! I reck’n I knows what I knows. En mine you, de _real_

pint is down furder—it’s down deeper. It lays in de way Sollermun was

raised. You take a man dat’s got on’y one or two chillen; is dat man

gwyne to be waseful o’ chillen? No, he ain’t; he can’t ’ford it. _He_

know how to value ’em. But you take a man dat’s got ’bout five million

chillen runnin’ roun’ de house, en it’s diffunt. _He_ as soon chop a

chile in two as a cat. Dey’s plenty mo’. A chile er two, mo’ er less,

warn’t no consekens to Sollermun, dad fatch him!”

I never see such a nigger. If he got a notion in his head once, there

warn’t no getting it out again. He was the most down on Solomon of any

nigger I ever see. So I went to talking about other kings, and let

Solomon slide. I told about Louis Sixteenth that got his head cut off

in France long time ago; and about his little boy the dolphin, that

would a been a king, but they took and shut him up in jail, and some

say he died there.

“Po’ little chap.”

“But some says he got out and got away, and come to America.”

“Dat’s good! But he’ll be pooty lonesome—dey ain’ no kings here, is

dey, Huck?”

“No.”

“Den he cain’t git no situation. What he gwyne to do?”

“Well, I don’t know. Some of them gets on the police, and some of them

learns people how to talk French.”

“Why, Huck, doan’ de French people talk de same way we does?”

“_No_, Jim; you couldn’t understand a word they said—not a single

word.”

“Well, now, I be ding-busted! How do dat come?”

“_I_ don’t know; but it’s so. I got some of their jabber out of a book.

S’pose a man was to come to you and say _Polly-voo-franzy_—what would

you think?”

“I wouldn’ think nuff’n; I’d take en bust him over de head—dat is, if

he warn’t white. I wouldn’t ’low no nigger to call me dat.”

“Shucks, it ain’t calling you anything. It’s only saying, do you know

how to talk French?”

“Well, den, why couldn’t he _say_ it?”

“Why, he _is_ a-saying it. That’s a Frenchman’s _way_ of saying it.”

“Well, it’s a blame ridicklous way, en I doan’ want to hear no mo’

’bout it. Dey ain’ no sense in it.”

“Looky here, Jim; does a cat talk like we do?”

“No, a cat don’t.”

“Well, does a cow?”

“No, a cow don’t, nuther.”

“Does a cat talk like a cow, or a cow talk like a cat?”

“No, dey don’t.”

“It’s natural and right for ’em to talk different from each other,

ain’t it?”

“’Course.”

“And ain’t it natural and right for a cat and a cow to talk different

from _us?_”

“Why, mos’ sholy it is.”

“Well, then, why ain’t it natural and right for a _Frenchman_ to talk

different from us? You answer me that.”

“Is a cat a man, Huck?”

“No.”

“Well, den, dey ain’t no sense in a cat talkin’ like a man. Is a cow a

man?—er is a cow a cat?”

“No, she ain’t either of them.”

“Well, den, she ain’t got no business to talk like either one er the

yuther of ’em. Is a Frenchman a man?”

“Yes.”

“_Well_, den! Dad blame it, why doan’ he _talk_ like a man? You answer

me _dat!_”

I see it warn’t no use wasting words—you can’t learn a nigger to argue.

So I quit.