“They do say there ar’ likely to be troublesome times.” he continued, with simple earnestness, after having given the invitation to partake of his homely fare; “and I should like to hear what is going on in the world.  From Whiskey Centre I do not expect to learn much, I will own; but I am mistaken if the Pigeonswing, here, has not a message that will make us all open our ears.”

The Indians ejaculated their assent; but Gershom was a man who could not express anything sententiously.  As the bee-hunter led the way toward his cabin, or shanty, he made his comments with his customary freedom.  Before recording what he communicated, however, we shall digress for one moment in order to say a word ourselves concerning this term “shanty.”  It is now in general use throughout the whole of the United States, meaning a cabin that has been constructed in haste, and for temporary purposes.  By a license of speech, it is occasionally applied to more permanent residences, as men are known to apply familiar epithets to familiar objects.  The derivation of the word has caused some speculation.  The term certainly came from the West-perhaps from the Northwest-and the best explanation we have ever heard of its derivation is to sup-pose “shanty,” as we now spell it, a corruption of “chiente,” which it is thought may have been a word in Canadian French phrase to express a “dog-kennel.”  “Chenil,” we believe, is the true French term for such a thing, and our own word is said to be derived from it—­“meute” meaning “a kennel of dogs,” or “a pack of hounds,” rather than their dwelling.  At any rate, “chiente” is so plausible a solution of the difficulty, that one may hope it is the true one, even though he has no better authority for it than a very vague rumor.  Curious discoveries are sometimes made by these rude analogies, however, though they are generally thought not to be very near akin to learning.  For ourselves, now, we do not entertain a doubt that the sobriquet of “Yankees” which is in every man’s mouth, and of which the derivation appears to puzzle all our philologists, is nothing but a slight corruption of the word “Yengeese,” the term applied to the “English,” by the tribes to whom they first became known.  We have no other authority for this derivation than conjecture, and conjectures that are purely our own; but it is so very plausible as almost to carry conviction of itself. [Footnote:  Since writing the above, the author has met with an allusion that has induced him to think he may not have been the first to suggest this derivation of the word “Yankee.”  With himself, the suggestion is perfectly original, and has long since been published by him; but nothing is more probable than the fact that a solution so very natural, of this long-disputed question in language, may have suggested itself to various minds.]