A VIOLATION OF THE TREATY.

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A VIOLATION OF THE TREATY.

AMONG the appellants for justice at the Recorder's office yesterday, was Damon Dunfield, an old Ethiopian, whose woodsaw was hung on his shoulder like the guitar of a troubadour, ere the days of chivalry had gone by. Damon looked about as wise as an owl in daylight; he appeared to have borrowed for the occasion, the dilapidated hat of Jacques Strop, and the remainder of his wardrobe seemed made to match. His hair was a grizzly gray, and his face wrinkled and puckery, like a postillion's boot.

"I wants to hab dis 'ere business settled, massa 'Corder, dagreeable to de constirtushun."

"What business is that?" said the Recorder. "Whoy, you sees, massa 'Corder, dis 'ere nigga has wiorlated de treaty affer de boundary line was 'greed to 'tween us." "Dis 'ere nigga," to which Damon alluded, was a big, burly black, with teeth enough to form the stock in trade of a dentist, and a pair of eyes that curvetted about in their sockets like the revolving lamp of a light-house.

"And pray," said the Recorder, "what has this negro to do with the violation of the treaty or the tracing of the boundary

יי? line

"I aint got nuffin at all," said the fellow with the mouthful of bones.

"But I says you hab," said Damon," and I'll just 'splain de whole ting to massa Judge, in less time dan I'd be sharpenin' my saw."

"Well, then, let us hear you," said the Recorder.

"Wal, it's jus' dis, massa," said Damon, "you sees dis chil' is an old squatter and no mistake. I's had what you may call de pre-emption right to de cuttin' ob all de wood 'tween Canal and Customhouse streets and de Lebee and Dauphin streets, I doesn't know how long; wal, dis 'ere nigga comes and he cuts into my cus'omers wood, and cuts me out, for he interferes wid my wested rights. Wal, massa, you sees I speak to him like a book, or jus' as massa Webster did to Lord Ass-bur'on, and I conwinces him right up and down dat he aint no right to 'trude on my bound'ry."

"Guess, ol' fella, I knows de science ob wood sawin' well as you do," said the big negro, "dere aint notin' in the constirtushun to perwent me, neider."

"Silence, sir," said the Recorder; and silence having prevailed, Damon continued

"Wal, as I was sayin', massa Judge, when I showed him my exclusib pribileges, he tho't to come de diplermatics ober me, but he couldn't shine, no how, so finerly he 'grees not to cut no wood widin my limerts--no way, no somedevor."

"I didn't sign no documents," said the big negro.

"You pledged de word ob a wood-sawyer and a darkey dat you wouldn't," said Damon, "and now I cotches you at it ebery day."

"Did he commit any assault and battery on you?" said the Recorder.

"He didn't," said Damon, "but you sees, massa Judge, he's a strange nigga, and I calls on you to purtect home industry. I wants you to go in for what massa Clay calls de'Merican system."

The Recorder assured Damon that he would do all in his power to protect home industry, and to support the American system, but that he could not interfere with his rival in business, or prevent his sawing wood within the imaginary boundary lines to which he (the plaintiff) seemed to set up a prescriptive right.

The case was dismissed. Damon shouldered his saw, and pledged himself to bring the case before a higher court.

ALLWELL, NOT ALL RIGHT.

THE proceedings of the police office were yesterday varied by the rehearsal of what would be called in the playbills "a drama of domestic interest." The principal charactersthose whose names would be underlined, if the subject had been dramatized-were Dudley Dobbs, and what out of courtesy we shall call his better half. Oliver Allwell, too, had a part assigned to him in the piece; but as it was not a main one, we shall for the present pass him over.

Dobbs has passed the summer of life, though his appearance as yet gives but little evidence of the sear leaf of autumn. He is a pursy little man, with a round, red face, and evidently of a bilious, nervous temperament. Before his case was called

ALLWELL, NOT ALL WELL.

185

up he paced the court-room backward and forward, sometimes suddenly striking the boards with his cane; at other times striking his forehead, which was bald, with the palm of his hand, and exclaiming in a semi-suppressed voice-"I'm a miserable man!—False, fickle Fanny! envious Allwell."

"Mrs. Dobbs' "human face divine" was concealed beneath the folds of a green veil. What her personal charms were, at that stage of the proceedings, it was impossible to discover. She kept up a pendulum kind of movement with her body, as if she were practising experiments on perpetual motion.

In the course of human events-or, more strictly speaking, when the names that preceded those of Dobbs and Allwell on the watch report had been called over and disposed of, then did the clerk call out-" All well versus Dobbs-witness, Mrs. Dobbs."

"I call on the court to dismiss this case at once," said Mr. Dobbs. "It was a prostitution of judicial power to have ever brought me here, and I protest against any investigation, as an unnecessary and illegal exposure of domestic privacy.'

"The court knows its duty, Mr. Dobbs," said the Recorder, "and will perform it. You have been subpoenaed here to answer to an assault, and not to instruct the court in its duty. It is vested with a power to shield itself from insult, or at least with a power to punish for any insult offered. Beware sir, how you address it."

"Dobbs, dear, be calm," interposed Mrs. Dobbs, partially raising her green veil and looking entreaty; "don't offend his honour."

"I will," Dobbs; "that is, I will not suffer myself to be brought before a public court by that scoundrel Allwell, whose very name is a misnomer, without protesting against it!”

During these preliminary remarks Mr. Oliver Allwell sat with his chair poised back against the wall, the hind feet of it only touching the boards, and his feet resting on the front rung. He was paring his nails, and we could hear him humming, solo voce

"Dance, the boatman dance."

Being the complainant, however, he was called on to state his charge. He did so briefly, and in a manner which showed that he feared not Mr. Dobbs, either in or out of a passion. "May it please your honour, sir," said Allwell, "I recently arrived in the city, and accidentally met with Mrs. Dobbs, who

was an old acquaintance of mine-in fact, I was her beau, as we say."

Here Dobbs looked daggers at Mrs. Dobbs, and bowieknives at Allwell.

All well continued-" In short, your honour, she invited me to tea on Friday evening, when every thing passed off well. Again, on invitation, I took tea with her and her husband on Monday evening. Mrs. D. and I talked of old times, and dwelt upon by-gone reminiscences, when Dobbs, without any previous intimation of his design, actually pushed me out of his house! I could, but I would not, inflict upon him personal chastisement, preferring to have him punished by the strong arm of the law."

"Now I shall hear you, Mrs. Dobbs," said the Recorder. "Dobby, my duck," said Mrs. Dobbs, "ask Mr. Allwell's pardon; do, my dear, he is such a nice gentleman."

-but I'm

"Yes, Mrs. Dobbs," said Mr. Dobbs, "and I thought you were a nice gentlewoman-a discreet woman--adeceived in you, Mrs. D. You

"What have you to say to this charge, Mr. Dobbs ?" asked the Recorder.

"This, your honour," said Mr. Dobbs :-"On Thursday last my wife was out shopping, and when she came in she said to me, 'Dobby, my dear,' says she, (she always calls me Dobby, and I call her Fan, for short-her Christian name is Fanny) Dobby, my dear,' says she. What is it, Fan, my love,' says I. I just met my cousin Allwell, from New York, and I invited him to tea to-morrow evening,' says she. 'I s'pose it's all right, my love,' says I. It is Dobby, dear,' says she, he's such a nice man.' 'Well, your honour, he did tea it with us on Friday evening, and between them they engrossed the whole conversation; I seemed to be nobody with them, and I certainly did not feel like myself. They talked of nothing but pic-nics at Hoboken, drives to Harlem, boating parties to Staten Island, and society balls in all parts of the city. I bore it, your honour-bore it like a man; but, would you believe it, when I came home, on Monday evening,

"Oh! Dobby dear, d" interrupted Mrs. Dobbs.

"Never Dobby' or 'dear' me again, madam!" exclaimed Mr. Dobbs: "I detest deception, ma'am."-[Here Mrs. D. insinuated her white handkerchief to the corner of her eye.]— Dobbs continued:-"Yes, your honour,-when I came home

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on Monday evening, I actually found him with his arm round her neck, and he reading 'The Mysteries of Paris' to her! 'Dobby,' says she. 'Mrs. D.,' says I. Love!' says she. "Fiddlesticks!' says I. That scoundrel,' says I-' your coz, as you call him—quits this house instantly. You'll drive me mad, Dobbs,' says she. You have driven me crazy, madam,' says I; but, at all events, out he goes,'-and so out I put him."

Mrs. Dobbs was called on by both plaintiff and defendant to give testimony in their favour; but she preferred to remain neutral, except so far as her entreaties to both Allwell and "Dobby" went, to settle the affair amicably.

As there was no "battery" proven, the Recorder simply bound Dobbs over to keep the peace; but he advised Mrs. Dobbs never to invite even a cousin to tea, unless her husband approved of the invitation.

LOVE AND LETTER WRITING.

YESTERDAY a most romantic looking young gentleman made his appearance at the police office. An unsealed note, which came "greeting" from the Recorder, politely commanding him to "be and appear" there at ten o'clock and answer to the complaint of Mrs. Martha Williamson, and which ended by a hint to "fail not at his peril," bringing visions of the calaboose before his excitable imagination—was the immediate cause of his presence in that particular temple of justice. His face was overhung by a profusion of coal-black hair, which he wore in ringlets-he called them hyperion curls-and his face was as pale and pensive as if he were preparing to act the ghost in a melo-drama. He gazed through his eye-glass with an air of supercilious scorn, and seemed even to regard the Recorder as some fel-low beneath his dignity. He looked like one who breakfasted on love-sonnets, who dined on sentiment, supped on serenades, and slept on romance. He seemed, in a word

When Mrs. Martha Williamson was called, a woman enter