I was not more than six weeks in Jamaica when I felt it myself.

Now, it was a very dangerous symptom, if you had it strong in you, for this reason.

Our colonel, the most cross-grained old crabstick that ever breathed, happened himself to be taken in when young, and resolving, like the fox who lost his tail and said it was not the fashion to wear one, to pretend he did the thing for fun, determined to make every fellow marry upon the slightest provocation.
Begad, you might as well enter a powder magazine with a branch of candles in your hand, as go into society in the island with a leaning towards the fair sex.

Very hard this was for me particularly; for like poor Sparks there, my weakness was ever for the petticoats.

I had, besides, no petty, contemptible prejudices as to nation, habits, language, color, or complexion; black, brown, or fair, from the Muscovite to the Malabar, from the voluptuous _embonpoint_ of the adjutant's widow,--don't be angry old boy,--to the fairy form of Isabella herself, I loved them all round.