I was more discouraged than I need to have been; for, after all, the resemblances in human beings are more than their differences.  The differences are superficial,—­the resemblances radical.  Everywhere men like, in a Christian minister, the same things,—­sincerity, earnestness, and living Christianity.  Mere words may please, but not long.  Men differ in taste about the form of the cup out of which they drink this wine of Divine Truth, but they agree in their thirst for the same wine.

But to my story.

I was sitting, therefore, meditating somewhat sadly, when a knock came at the door.  On opening it, a negro boy, with grinning face, presented himself, holding a note.  The great fund of good-humor which God has bestowed on the African race often makes them laugh when we see no occasion for laughter.  Any event, no matter what it is, seems to them amusing.  So this boy laughed merely because he had brought me a note, and not because there was anything peculiarly amusing in the message which the note contained.  It is true that you sometimes meet a melancholy negro.  But such, I fancy, have some foreign blood in them,—­they are not Africans pur sang.  The race is so essentially joyful, that centuries of oppression and hardship cannot depress its good spirits.  It is cheerful in spite of slavery, and in spite of cruel prejudice.

The note the boy brought me did not seem adapted to furnish much provocation for laughter.  It was as follows:—­

“United States Hotel, Jan. 4th, 1834.

“SIR,—­I hope you will excuse the liberty of a stranger addressing you on a subject he feels great interest in.  It is to require a place of interment for his friend[s] in the church-yard, and also the expense attendant on the purchase of such place of temporary repose.

“Your communication on this matter will greatly oblige,

“Sir,

“Your respectful and

“Obedient Servant,

“J.B.  BOOTH.”

It will be observed that after the word “friend” an [s] follows in brackets.  In the original the word was followed by a small mark which might or might not give it the plural form.  It could be read either “friend” or “friends”; but as we do not usually find ourselves called upon to bury more than one friend at a time, the hasty reader would not notice the mark, but would read it “friend.”  So did I; and only afterward, in consequence of the denouement, did I notice that it might be read in the other way.

Taking my hat, I stepped into the street.  Gas in those days was not; an occasional lantern, swung on a wire across the intersection of the streets, reminded us that the city was once French, and suggested the French Revolution and the cry, “A la lanterne!” First I went to my neighbor, the mayor of the city, in pursuit of the desired information.  A jolly mayor was he,—­a Yankee melted down into a Western man, thoroughly Westernized by a rough-and-tumble