of the hall opened, a train of serious-faced gentry entered, and as unceremoniously took seats.  Mr. Smooth being put down number one, took a seat beside the missus.  After a blessing had been dispensed, the conversation turned on politics and potatoes.  A potent-looking individual, who sat not far down the table, said the Union was known by its magistracy, which being an established fact, should make it incumbent that no chief of this great and growing nation leave the federal chair unmarked by some bold stroke.  ‘Good!’ says I, ’Smooth always went in for bold strokes—­they are just the things to make outsiders knock under—­’ Here I was just getting up to make a speech on behalf of manifest destiny, when a gent who ought to have been voted into the army as a regular cried out:—­’Keep cool! keep cool!  Mr. Smooth.’

“Scarcely had he ceased speaking, when Uncle Caleb Grandpapa Marcy, Cousin Guth, and good-natured Uncle Dib, and the grindstone-man, Fourney,—­all dressed in bright aprons, and white ghost-like night-caps—­made their appearance, tugging and puffing at a hand-bier, on which lay the much-talked-of flounder.  Jeff, who walked in front with a drawn sword, wheezed, and Grandpapa grunted, and Dib said, ‘Carry a steady hand, boys!’ and Guth said he would bear up his part, which was the tail part.  Staggering along under the load, they brought forth in solemn procession the flounder, and after a good deal of bad diplomacy, laid him, like a stuffed whale, on the table.  The General was not quite certain about the catch of this flounder; but as there was nothing like having a dash at things now-a-days,—­’here’s go into it!’ he exclaimed.  ‘I don’t believe that fish is cooked enough,’ retorted John Littlejohn, a statesman of very elastic capacity, who spoke for Uncle Bull, on t’other side of the big pond.

“Looking as if he were about making a longe into him, hit or miss, the General seizes up the big carving-knife (generally used by Grandpapa Marcy) and asks who will have the first bit?  The pall-bearers, still retaining their bright aprons and white caps, had taken seats at the table, among the guests.  ‘It’s all for me!’ mumbles a sullen voice; no one knew from whence it came.  ‘It’s all for me!—­who are you?’ reiterated Mr. Pierce, kicking under the table:  ’I believe in my soul it’s the black pig, who always pursues unto the death what he considers his!’ True enough, there the savage brute was, lashing everybody’s legs, and threatening destruction with his wicked mouth.  No one knew how he got into the dining-room; but where the good Uncle Sam had anything to eat or give, there he was sure to be, demanding more than his share.  After a hard tussle, Grandpapa and Uncle Caleb succeeded in driving him out of the room; albeit, it was only for a time.  The unsatisfied animal was always keeping Uncle Sam in a fuss, and the folks about the White House in an uproar.  ’That critter is always crying ‘Me first!’ rejoined Uncle Caleb, who, having lost his white cap in the tussle with the black pig, looked funny indeed.