Chapter L: Exit Smith

ENOUGH. I need not tell of our arrival at the steamer; of the trouble the sailors had getting the drunken woman up the gang-ladder; of our meeting Briggs there; of his suggesting, while they were tugging away at the again insensible creature, pulling her up step by step, to “send for the _baggage-master_,” as the proper person to take charge of the immense bundle; of our lying in the harbor five days; of my meeting drunken “Pheel” in Panama, the day after our adventure with his charming bigger half; of his threatening to “punch a hole through” me with a sword-cane, for “running away with” his gentle wife—the proprietor of the _Oregonian Shades_ having told him, on inquiry, that “she went away with that one-legged fellow;”—of our final crossing the Isthmus; of our embarking at last on the crippled _Dakotah_; of our tedious voyage of fourteen days, from Aspinwall to New York; of the various events on the passage; of the death and burial at sea of a bright little boy, who had eaten too much tropical fruit; of our suffering for cold water—there being no ice on board the miserable ship; of our poor food, and but little of it—being restricted to two meals a day; of the machinery giving out off the coast of Cuba, and our danger of not being able to reach any port; of our being towed by a bark, to whom we showed a signal of distress; of a fire on board, which was happily extinguished; of a hard blow off Cape Hatteras; of our final arrival in New York: _et cetera_, and all that.

It is proper, in this chapter, to make some disposition of myself, as writers usually do of their principal characters in the concluding chapter. Therefore, prepare to bid John Smith an everlasting farewell.

To wind up by stating that I got married to a beautiful heiress, after the usual stern opposition, but final consent of her stony-hearted old “parient,” and that I settled down after my rambles, and lived to a green old age, would be a very happy termination; but the events narrated are of too recent occurrence, and would appear like anachronisms. So, I must abandon that idea.

Still, I must make some disposition of myself, for if the reader is allowed to suppose me still perambulating over the world with the inevitable CRUTCH, he will feel that he has not yet read the conclusion of my story, and will look forward to the publication of a supplementary volume of adventures, similar to these—look forward, I heartily assure him, only to be bitterly disappointed. Linger over this volume, gentle reader, for when you have laid it down you will hear of John Smith, the man of the CRUTCH, no more. He is a dead letter.

But now for that disposition. This remarkable character must be got rid of some how. But how? I can think of no end for him so fitting as _death_.

So, dear reader, as I have abandoned the idea of concluding with an account of my marriage; as death is a circumstance of almost as much importance in one’s history; and as I am supported in this course by eminent precedent—Moses having given a graphic account of his own death in Deuteronomy; and as, moreover, this may be read years hence, when the hand that is writing it has indeed grown cold, and the pen fallen from its weary grasp, (and when there will be a vacant crutch to let,) I will conclude by simply stating that I died.

J-o-h-n•S-m-i-t-h.

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Transcriber's Notes

All changes were typographical in nature. Punctuation errors were silently fixed. Inconsistent or older spellings of words were not changed. Differences between chapter titles in the Table of Contents and at the beginning of a chapter were left as printed. The other spelling changes were:

p. 21 athough was replaced with although
p. 26 hurridly was replaced with hurriedly
p. 42 persecucutions was replaced with persecutions
p. 66 eat was replaced with ate
p. 193 nevet was replaced with never
p. 194 strategem was replaced with stratagem
p. 209 scarely was replaced with scarcely
p. 244 Misouri was replaced with Missouri
p. 288 circumtances replaced with circumstances
p. 332 endeaver replaced with endeavor
p. 343 do not not replaced with do not
p. 376 vogage replaced with voyage
p. 368 "to" inserted after "had happened"
p. 370 occuence replaced with occurrence
p. 372 vogage replaced with voyage.