Numbers of men, women, and children, white, yellow, and
black, were collected on the river bank; most of them clad in old-fashioned
French garments, and their heads decorated with colored handkerchiefs, or
white nightcaps. The moment the steamboat came within sight and hearing,
there was a waving of handkerchiefs, and a screaming and bawling of
salutations, and felicitations, that baffle all description.
The old gentleman of fifty thousand dollars was received by a train of
relatives, and friends, and children, and grandchildren, whom he kissed on
each cheek, and who formed a procession in his rear, with a legion of
domestics, of all ages, following him to a large, old-fashioned French
house, that domineered over the village.
His black valet de chambre, in white jacket and trousers, and gold
earrings, was met on the shore by a boon, though rustic companion, a tall
negro fellow, with a long good-humored face, and the profile of a horse,
which stood out from beneath a narrow-rimmed straw hat, stuck on the back
of his head.
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