424

LIFE ON TEE MISSISSIPPI.

improved. He asked me if I was able to imagine a person named
' Eschol Sellers.' Of course I said I could not, without stimulants.
He said that away out West, once, he had met, and contemplated, and
actually shaken hands with a man bearing that impossible name—
^6 Eschol Sellers.' He added—

WE READ ALOUD.
* It was twenty years ago; his name has probably carried him off
before this; and if it hasn't, he will never see the book anyhow*
We will confiscate his name. The name you are using is common,
and therefore dangerous; there are probably a thousand Selierses
beating it, and the whole horde will come after us; but Eschol
Sellers is a safe name—it is a rock.'