IV.
Breathe the vows she since denies! She hath broken every vow; What she would she would not now— Thou didst hear her perjuries. Whisper, whilst I shut my eyes, Those sweet lies, Echo! Echo!
_Thomas Bailey Aldrich._
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_COLONEL MULBERRY SELLERS._
COLONEL MULBERRY SELLERS was in his “library,” which was his “drawing-room,” and was also his “picture gallery,” and likewise his “workshop.” Sometimes he called it by one of these names, sometimes by another, according to occasion and circumstance. He was constructing what seemed to be some kind of a frail mechanical toy, and was apparently very much interested in his work. He was a white-headed man now, but otherwise he was as young, alert, buoyant, visionary, and enterprising as ever. His loving old wife sat near by, contentedly knitting and thinking, with a cat asleep in her lap. The room was large, light, and had a comfortable look—in fact, a home-like look—though the furniture was of a humble sort, and not over-abundant, and the knick-knacks and things that go to adorn a living-room not plenty and not costly. But there were natural flowers, and there was an abstract and unclassifiable something about the place which betrayed the presence in the house of somebody with a happy taste and an effective touch.
Even the deadly chromos on the walls were somehow without offence; in fact, they seemed to belong there, and to add an attraction to the room—a fascination, anyway; for whoever got his eye on one of them was like to gaze and suffer till he died—you have seen that kind of pictures. Some of these terrors were landscapes, some libelled the sea, some were ostensible portraits, all were crimes. All the portraits were recognisable as dead Americans of distinction, and yet, through labelling, added by a daring hand, they were all doing duty here as “Earls of Rossmore.” The newest one had left the works as Andrew Jackson, but was doing its best now as “Simon Lathers Lord Rossmore, Present Earl.” On one wall was a cheap old railroad map of Warwickshire. This had been newly labelled, “The Rossmore Estates.” On the opposite wall was another map, and this was the most imposing decoration of the establishment, and the first to catch a stranger’s attention, because of its great size. It had once borne simply the title SIBERIA; but now the word “FUTURE” had been written in front of that word. There were other additions, in red ink—many cities, with great populations set down, scattered over the vast country at points where neither cities nor populations exist to-day. One of these cities, with population placed at 1,500,000, bore the name “Libertyorloffskoizalinski,” and there was a still more populous one, centrally located and marked “Capitol,” which bore the name “Freedomslovnaivenovich.”
The mansion—the Colonel’s usual name for the house—was a rickety old two-storey frame of considerable size, which had been painted, some time or other, but had nearly forgotten it. It was away out in the ragged edge of Washington, and had once been somebody’s country place. It had a neglected yard around it, with a paling fence that needed straightening up, in places, and a gate that would stay shut. By the door-post were several modest tin signs. “Col. Mulberry Sellers, Attorney-at-Law and Claim Agent,” was the principal one. One learned from the others that the Colonel was a Materialiser, a Hypnotiser, a Mind-cure dabbler, and so on. For he was a man who could always find things to do.
A white-headed negro man, with spectacles and damaged white cotton gloves, appeared in the presence, made a stately obeisance, and announced—
“Marse Washington Hawkins, suh.”
“Great Scott! Show him in, Dan’l, show him in.”
[Illustration: “A STOUTISH, DISCOURAGED-LOOKING MAN.”]
The Colonel and his wife were on their feet in a moment, and the next moment were joyfully wringing the hands of a stoutish, discouraged-looking man, whose general aspect suggested that he was fifty years old, but whose hair swore to a hundred.
“Well, well, well, Washington, my boy, it _is_ good to look at you again. Sit down, sit down, and make yourself at home. There now—why, you look perfectly natural; ageing a little, just a little, but you’d have known him anywhere, wouldn’t you, Polly?”
“Oh, yes, Berry, he’s _just_ like his pa would have looked if he’d lived. Dear, dear, where have you dropped from? Let me see, how long is it since——”
“I should say it’s all of fifteen years, Mrs. Sellers.”
“Well, well, how time does get away with us. Yes, and oh, the changes that——”
There was a sudden catch of her voice and a trembling of the lip, the men waiting reverently for her to get command of herself and go on; but, after a little struggle, she turned away with her apron to her eyes, and softly disappeared.
“Seeing you made her think of the children, poor thing—dear, dear, they’re all dead but the youngest. But banish care, it’s no time for it now—on with the dance, let joy be unconfided, is my motto—whether there’s any dance to dance or any joy to unconfide, you’ll be the healthier for it every time—every time, Washington—it’s my experience, and I’ve seen a good deal of this world. Come, where have you disappeared to all these years, and are you from there now, or where are you from?”
“I don’t quite think you would ever guess, Colonel. Cherokee Strip.”
“My land!”
“Sure as you live.”
“You can’t mean it. Actually _living_ out there?”
“Well, yes, if a body may call it that; though it’s a pretty strong term for ’dobies and jackass rabbits, boiled beans and slap-jacks, depression, withered hopes, poverty in all its varieties——”
“Louise out there?”
“Yes, and the children.”
“Out there now?”
“Yes, I couldn’t afford to bring them with me.”
“Oh, I see—you had to come—claim against the Government. Make yourself perfectly easy—I’ll take care of that.”
“But it isn’t a claim against the Government.”
“No? Want to be a postmaster? _That’s_ all right. Leave it to me. I’ll fix it.”
“But it isn’t postmaster—you’re all astray yet.”
“Well, good gracious, Washington, why don’t you come out and tell me what it is? What do you want to be so reserved and distrustful with an old friend like me for? Don’t you reckon I can keep a se——”
“There’s no secret about it—you merely don’t give me a chance to——”
“Now, look here, old friend, I know the human race; and I know that when a man comes to Washington, I don’t care if it’s from heaven, let alone Cherokee Strip, it’s because he _wants_ something. And I know that as a rule he’s not going to get it; that he’ll stay and try for another thing and won’t get that; the same luck with the next and the next and the next; and keeps on till he strikes bottom, and is too poor and ashamed to go back, even to Cherokee Strip; and at last his heart breaks and they take up a collection and bury him. There—don’t interrupt me, I know what I’m talking about. Happy and prosperous in the Far West, wasn’t I? _You_ know that. Principal citizen of Hawkeye, looked up to by everybody, kind of an autocrat, actually a kind of an autocrat, Washington. Well, nothing would do but I must go as Minister to St. James’s, the Governor and everybody insisting, you know, and so at last I consented—no getting out of it, _had_ to do it, so here I came. _A day too late_, Washington. Think of that—what little things change the world’s history—yes, sir, the place had been filled. Well, there I was, you see. I offered to compromise and go to Paris. The President was very sorry and all that, but that place, you see, didn’t belong to the West, so there I was again. There was no help for it, so I had to stoop a little—we all reach the day some time or other when we’ve got to do that, Washington, and it’s not a bad thing for us, either, take it by and large all around—I had to stoop a little and offer to take Constantinople, Washington, consider this—for it’s perfectly true—within a month I _asked_ for China; within another month I _begged_ for Japan; one year later I was away down, down, down, supplicating with tears and anguish for the bottom office in the gift of the Government of the United States—Flint-picker in the cellars of the War Department. And by George I didn’t get it.”
“Flint-picker?”
“Yes. Office established in the time of the Revolution, last century. The musket-flints for the military posts were supplied from the capitol. They do it yet; for although the flint-arm has gone out and the forts have tumbled down, the decree hasn’t been repealed—been overlooked and forgotten, you see—and so the vacancies where old Ticonderoga and others used to stand still get their six quarts of gun-flints a year just the same.”
Washington said musingly after a pause:
“How strange it seems—to start for Minister to England at twenty thousand a year and fail for flint-picker at——”
“Three dollars a week. It’s human life, Washington—just an epitome of human ambition, and struggle, and the outcome; you aim for the palace and get drowned in the sewer.”
There was another meditative silence. Then Washington said, with earnest compassion in his voice—
“And so, after coming here, against your inclination, to satisfy your sense of patriotic duty and appease a selfish public clamour, you get absolutely nothing for it.”
“Nothing?” The Colonel had to get up and stand, to get room for his amazement to expand. “_Nothing_, Washington? I ask you this: to be a Perpetual Member and the _only_ Perpetual Member of a Diplomatic Body accredited to the greatest country on earth—do you call that nothing?”
It was Washington’s turn to be amazed. He was stricken dumb; but the wide-eyed wonder, the reverent admiration expressed in his face, were more eloquent than any words could have been. The Colonel’s wounded spirit was healed, and he resumed his seat, pleased and content. He leaned forward and said, impressively—
“What was due to a man who had become for ever conspicuous by an experience without precedent in the history of the world?—a man made permanently and diplomatically sacred, so to speak, by having been connected, temporarily, through solicitation, with every single diplomatic post in the roster of this government, from Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to the Court of St. James all the way down to Consul to a guano rock in the Straits of Sunda—salary payable in guano—which disappeared by volcanic convulsion the day before they got down to my name in the list of applicants. Certainly something august enough to be answerable to the size of this unique and memorable experience was my due, and I got it. By the common voice of this community, by acclamation of the people, that mighty utterance which brushes aside laws and legislation, and from whose decrees there is no appeal, I was named Perpetual Member of the Diplomatic Body, representing the multifarious sovereignties and civilisations of the globe near the republican court of the United States of America. And they brought me home with a torchlight procession.”
“It is wonderful, Colonel—simply wonderful.”
“It’s the loftiest official position in the whole earth.”
“I should think so—and the most commanding.”
“You have named the word. Think of it. I frown, and there is war; I smile, and contending nations lay down their arms.”
“It is awful. The responsibility, I mean.”
“It is nothing. Responsibility is no burden to me; I am used to it; have always been used to it.”
“And the work—the work! Do you have to attend all the sittings?”
“Who, I? Does the Emperor of Russia attend the conclaves of the governors of the provinces? He sits at home and indicates his pleasure.”
Washington was silent a moment, then a deep sigh escaped him.
“How proud I was an hour ago; how paltry seems my little promotion now! Colonel, the reason I came to Washington is—I am Congressional Delegate from Cherokee Strip!”
The Colonel sprang to his feet and broke out with prodigious enthusiasm—
“Give me your hand, my boy—this is immense news! I congratulate you with all my heart. My prophecies stand confirmed. I always said it was in you. I always said you were born for high distinction and would achieve it. You ask Polly if I didn’t.”
Washington was dazed by this most unexpected demonstration.
“Why, Colonel, there’s nothing _to_ it. That little, narrow, desolate, unpeopled, oblong streak of grass and gravel, lost in the remote wastes of the vast continent—why, it’s like representing a billiard table—a discarded one.”
“Tut-tut, it’s a great, it’s a staving preferment, and just opulent with influence here.”
“Shucks, Colonel, I haven’t even a vote.”
“That’s nothing, you can make speeches.”
“No, I can’t. The population only two hundred——”
“That’s all right, that’s all right——”
“And they hadn’t any right to elect me; we’re not even a territory, there’s no Organic Act, the government hasn’t any official knowledge of us whatever.”
“Never mind about that; I’ll fix that. I’ll rush the thing through, I’ll get you organised in no time.”
“_Will_ you, Colonel?—it’s _too_ good of you; but it’s just your old sterling self, the same old, ever-faithful friend,” and the grateful tears welled up in Washington’s eyes.
“It’s just as good as done, my boy, just as good as done. Shake hands. We’ll hitch teams together, you and I, and we’ll make things hum!”
_Samuel L. Clemens_ (“_Mark Twain_”).
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_THE OWL-CRITIC._
A LESSON TO FAULT-FINDERS.
“WHO stuffed that white owl?” No one spoke in the shop: The barber was busy, and he couldn’t stop; The customers, waiting their turns, were all reading The _Daily_, the _Herald_, the _Post_, little heeding. The young man who blurted out such a blunt question; Not one raised a head, or even made a suggestion; And the barber kept on shaving.
“Don’t you see, Mister Brown,” Cried the youth, with a frown, “How wrong the whole thing is, How preposterous each wing is, How flattened the head is, how jammed down the neck is— In short, the whole owl, what an ignorant wreck ’tis? I make no apology; I’ve learned owl-eology. I’ve passed days and nights in a hundred collections, And cannot be blinded to any deflections Arising from unskilful fingers that fail To stuff a bird right, from his beak to his tail. Mister Brown! Mister Brown! Do take that bird down, Or you’ll soon be the laughing-stock all over the town!” And the barber kept on shaving.
“I’ve _studied_ owls, And other night fowls, And I tell you What I know to be true: An owl cannot roost With his limbs so unloosed; No owl in this world Ever had his claws curled, Ever had his legs slanted, Ever had his bill canted, Ever had his neck screwed Into that attitude. He can’t do it, because ’Tis against all bird-laws. Anatomy teaches, Ornithology preaches An owl has a toe That _can’t_ turn out so! I’ve made the white owl my study for years, And to see such a job almost moves me to tears. Mister Brown, I’m amazed You should be so gone crazed As to put up a bird In that posture absurd! To _look_ at that owl really brings on a dizziness; The man who stuffed _him_ don’t half know his business!” And the barber kept on shaving.
“Examine those eyes. I’m filled with surprise Taxidermists should pass Off on you such poor glass; So unnatural they seem They’d make Audubon scream, And John Burroughs laugh To encounter such chaff. Do take that bird down; Have him stuffed again, Brown!” And the barber kept on shaving.
“With some sawdust and bark I would stuff in the dark An owl better than that, I could make an old hat Look more like an owl Than that horrid fowl, Stuck up there so stiff like a side of coarse leather. In fact, about _him_ there’s not one natural feather.”
[Illustration: “THE OWL, VERY GRAVELY, GOT DOWN FROM HIS PERCH.”]
Just then, with a wink and a sly normal lurch, The owl, very gravely, got down from his perch, Walked round, and regarded his fault-finding critic (Who thought he was stuffed) with a glance analytic, And then fairly hooted, as if he should say: “Your learning’s at fault _this_ time, any way; Don’t waste it again on a live bird, I pray. I’m an owl; you’re another. Sir critic, good-day!” And the barber kept on shaving.
_Jas. T. Fields._
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_ANNIHILATES AN OBERLINITE._
[Illustration]
COLUMBUS, O., _June the 21, ’62_.
I WUZ onto my way to Columbus to attend the annooal gatherin uv the fatheful at that city, a dooty I hev religusly performed fer over 30 yeres. Ther wuz but wun seet vakent in the car, and onto that I sot down. Presently a gentleman carryin uv a karpit bag, sot down beside me, and we towunst commenst conversashen. After discussin the crops, the wether, et settry, I askt wher he resided.
“In Oberlin,” sez he.
“Oberlin!” shreekt I. “Oberlin! wher Ablishnism runs rampant—wher a nigger is 100 per cent. better ner a white man—wher a mulatto is a obgik uv pitty on account uv hevin white blood. Oberlin! that stonest the Dimekratik prophets, and woodent be gathered under Vallandygum’s wings as a hen hawk gathereth chickens, at no price—Oberlin, that gives all the profits uv her college to the support uv the underground ralerode——”
“But,” sez he.
“Oberlin,” continyood I, “that reskoos niggers, and sets at defians the benifisent laws fer takin on em back to their kind and hevenly-minded masters—Oberlin——”
“My jentle frend,” sez he, “Oberlin don’t do nuthin uv the kind. Yoo’ve bin misinformed. Oberlin respex the laws, and hez now a body uv her galyent sons in the feeld a fightin to manetane the Constooshn.”
“A fightin to manetane the Constooshn,” retordid I. “My frend” (and I spoke impressively), “no Oberlin man is a doin any sich thing. Oberlin never fit for no Constooshn. Oberlin commenst this war, Oberlin wuz the prime cause uv all the trubble. Wat wuz the beginnin uv it. Our Suthrin brethrin wantid the territories—Oberlin objectid. They wantid Kansas fer ther blessid instooshn—Oberlin agin objecks. They sent colonies with muskits and sich, to hold the terrytory—Oberlin sent 2 thowsand armed with Bibles and Sharp’s rifles—two instooshns Dimocrisy cood never stand afore—and druv em out. They wantid Breckinridge fer President—Oberlin refused and elektid Linkin. Then they seceded, and why is it that they still hold out?”
He made no anser.
“Becoz,” continyood I, transfixin him with my penetratin gaze, “Oberlin won’t submit. We mite 2-day hev peese, ef Oberlin wood say to Linkin, ‘Resine!’ and to Geff Davis, ‘Come up higher!’ When I say Oberlin, understand it ez figgerative fer the entire Ablishn party, uv wich Oberlin is the fountin hed. There’s wher the trubble is. Our Suthern brethren wuz reasonable. So long ez the dimocrisy controld things, and they got all they wanted, they wuz peeceable. Oberlin ariz—the dimocrisy wuz beet down, and they riz up agin it.”
Jest eggsactly 80-six yeres ago, akordin to Jayneses almanac, a work wich I perooz annually with grate delite, the Amerykin Eagle (whose portrate any wun who possessis a 5 cent peece kin behold) wuz born, the Goddis uv Liberty bein its muther, the Spirit uv Freedom its sire, Tomas Gefferson actin ez physician on the occasion. The proud bird growd ez tho it slept on guano—its left wing dipt into the Pasific, its rite into the Atlantic, its beek thretened Kanady, while his magestik tale cast a shadder ore the Gulf. Sich wuz the Eagle up to March, ’61. Wat is his condishn now? His hed hangs, his tale droops, ther’s no strength in his talons. Wat’s the trubble? Oberlin. He hed bin fed on nigger fer yeres, and hed thrived on the diet. Oberlin got the keepin uv him—she withholds his nateral food—and onless Oberlin is whaled this fall, down goes the Eagle.
_Petroleum V. Nasby._
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_AN ECONOMICAL PROJECT._
_To the Authors of the Journal of Paris._
MESSIEURS,—You often entertain us with accounts of new discoveries. Permit me to communicate to the public, through your paper, one that has lately been made by myself, and which I conceive may be of great utility.
I was the other evening in a grand company, where the new lamp of Messrs. Quinquet and Lange was introduced and much admired for its splendour; but a general inquiry was made, whether the oil it consumed was not in proportion to the light it afforded, in which case there would be no saving in the use of it. No one present could satisfy us in that point, which all agreed ought to be known, it being a very desirable thing to lessen, if possible, the expense of lighting our apartments, when every other article of family expense was so much augmented.
I was pleased to see this general concern for economy, for I love economy exceedingly.
I went home, and to bed, three or four hours after midnight, with my head full of the subject. An accidental sudden noise waked me about six in the morning, when I was surprised to find my room filled with light; and I imagined at first that a number of those lamps had been brought into it; but, rubbing my eyes, I perceived the light came in at the windows. I got up and looked out to see what might be the occasion of it, when I saw the sun just rising above the horizon, from whence he poured his rays plentifully into my chamber, my domestic having negligently omitted, the preceding evening, to close the shutters.
I looked at my watch, which goes very well, and found that it was but six o’clock; and still thinking it something extraordinary that the sun should rise so early, I looked into the almanac, where I found it to be the hour given for his rising on that day. I looked forward, too, and found he was to rise still earlier every day till towards the end of June; and that at no time in the year he retarded his rising so long as till eight o’clock. Your readers who, with me, have never seen any signs of sunshine before noon, and seldom regarded the astronomical part of the almanac, will be as much astonished as I was, when they hear of his rising so early, and especially when I assure them, _that he gives light as soon as he rises_. I am convinced of this. I am certain of my fact. One cannot be more certain of any fact. I saw it with my own eyes. And, having repeated this observation the three following mornings, I found always precisely the same result.
[Illustration: “WHEN I SPEAK OF THIS DISCOVERY TO OTHERS.”]
Yet so it happens that when I speak of this discovery to others, I can easily perceive by their countenances, though they forbear expressing it in words, that they do not quite believe me. One, indeed, who is a learned natural philosopher, has assured me that I must certainly be mistaken as to the circumstance of the light coming into my room; for it being well known, as he says, that there could be no light abroad at that hour, it follows that none could enter from without, and that of consequence, my windows being accidentally left open, instead of letting in the light, had only served to let out the darkness; and he used many ingenious arguments to show me how I might, by that means, have been deceived. I owned that he puzzled me a little, but he did not satisfy me; and the subsequent observations I made, as above mentioned, confirmed me in my first opinion.
This event has given rise in my mind to several serious and important reflections. I consider that if I had not been awakened so early in the morning I should have slept six hours longer by the light of the sun, and in exchange have lived six hours the following night by candle-light; and the latter being a much more expensive light than the former, my love of economy induced me to muster up what little arithmetic I was master of, and to make some calculations, which I shall give you, after observing that utility is, in my opinion, the test of value in matters of invention, and that a discovery which can be applied to no use, or is not good for something, is good for nothing.
I took for the basis of my calculation the supposition that there are 100,000 families in Paris, and that these families consume in the night half a pound of _bougies_, or candles, per hour. I think this is a moderate allowance, taking one family with another; for though I believe some consume less, I know that many consume a great deal more. Then estimating seven hours per day, as the medium quantity between the time of the sun’s rising and ours, he rising during the six following months from six to eight hours before noon, and there being seven hours of course per night in which we burn candles, the account will stand thus:—
In the six months between the 20th of March and the 20th of September there are—
Nights 183
Hours of each night in which we burn candles 7
——
Multiplication gives for the total number of hours 1281
These 1281 hours multiplied by 100,000, the number of inhabitants, give 128,100,000
One hundred twenty-eight millions and one hundred thousand hours, spent at Paris by candle-light, which, at half a pound of wax 64,050,000 and tallow per hour, gives the weight of
Sixty-four millions and fifty thousand of pounds, which, estimating the whole at the medium price of thirty sols the pound, makes the sum of ninety-six millions and seventy-five thousand 96,075,000 _livres tournois_
An immense sum! that the city of Paris might save every year, by the economy of using sunshine instead of candles.
If it should be said that people are apt to be obstinately attached to old customs, and that it will be difficult to induce them to rise before noon, consequently my discovery can be of little use; I answer, _Nil desperandum_. I believe all who have common sense, as soon as they have learned from this paper that it is daylight when the sun rises, will contrive to rise with him; and to compel the rest, I would propose the following regulations:—
First. Let a tax be laid of a louis per window on every window that is provided with shutters to keep out the light of the sun.
Second. Let the same salutary operation of police be made use of, to prevent our burning candles, that inclined us last winter to be more economical in burning wood; that is, let guards be placed in the shops of the wax and tallow chandlers, and no family be permitted to be supplied with more than one pound of candles per week.
Third. Let guards also be posted to stop all the coaches, etc., that would pass the street after sunset, except those of physicians, surgeons, and midwives.
Fourth. Every morning, as soon as the sun rises, let all the bells in every church be set ringing; and if that is not sufficient, let cannon be fired in every street, to wake the sluggards effectually, and make them open their eyes to see their true interest.
All the difficulty will be in the first two or three days, after which the reformation will be as natural and easy as the present irregularity, for _ce n’est que le premier pas qui coûte_. Oblige a man to rise at four in the morning, and it is more than probable he will go willingly to bed at eight in the evening; and, having had eight hours sleep, he will rise more willingly at four in the morning following. But this sum of ninety-six millions and seventy-five thousand livres is not the whole of what may be saved by my economical project. You may observe that I have calculated upon only one-half of the year, and much may be saved in the other, though the days are shorter. Besides, the immense stock of wax and tallow left unconsumed during the summer will probably make candles much cheaper for the ensuing winter, and continue them cheaper as long as the proposed reformation shall be supported.
For the great benefit of this discovery, thus freely communicated and bestowed by me on the public, I demand neither place, pension, exclusive privilege, nor any other reward whatever. I expect only to have the honour of it. And yet I know there are little envious minds who will, as usual, deny me this, and say that my invention was known to the ancients, and perhaps they may bring passages out of old books in proof of it. I will not dispute with these people that the ancients knew not the sun would rise at certain hours—they possibly had, as we have, almanacs that predicted it—but it does not follow thence that they knew _he gave light as soon as he rose_. This is what I claim as my discovery. If the ancients knew it, it might have been long since forgotten, for it certainly was unknown to the moderns, at least to the Parisians, which to prove I need use but one plain, simple argument. They are as well instructed, judicious, and prudent a people as exist anywhere in the world, all professing, like myself, to be lovers of economy; and, from the many heavy taxes required from them by the necessities of the state, have surely an abundant reason to be economical. I say it is impossible that so sensible a people, under such circumstances, should have lived so long by the smoky, unwholesome, and enormously expensive light of candles, if they had really known that they might have had as much pure light of the sun for nothing.
_Benjamin Franklin._
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_MISS MEHETABEL’S SON._
A MAN with a passion for _bric-à-brac_ is always stumbling over antique bronzes, intaglios, mosaics, and daggers of the time of Benvenuto Cellini; the bibliophile finds creamy vellum folios and rare Alduses and Elzevirs waiting for him at unsuspected bookstalls; the numismatist has but to stretch forth his palm to have priceless coins drop into it. My own weakness is odd people, and I am constantly encountering them. It was plain I had unearthed a couple of very queer specimens at Bayley’s Four Corners. I saw that a fortnight afforded me too brief an opportunity to develop the richness of both, and I resolved to devote my spare time to Mr. Jaffrey alone, instinctively recognising in him an unfamiliar species.
My professional work in the vicinity of Greenton left my evenings and occasionally an afternoon unoccupied; these intervals I purposed to employ in studying and classifying my fellow-boarder. It was necessary, as a preliminary step, to learn something of his previous history, and to this end I addressed myself to Mr. Sewell that same night.
“I do not want to seem inquisitive,” I said to the landlord, as he was fastening up the bar, which, by the way, was the _salle à manger_ and general sitting-room. “I do not want to seem inquisitive, but your friend Mr. Jaffrey dropped a remark this morning at breakfast which—which was not altogether clear to me.”
“About Mehetabel?” asked Mr. Sewell uneasily.
“Yes.”
“Well, I wish he wouldn’t!”
“He was friendly enough in the course of conversation to hint to me that he had not married the young woman, and seemed to regret it.”
“No, he didn’t marry Mehetabel.”
“May I inquire _why_ he didn’t marry Mehetabel?”
“Never asked her. Might have married the girl forty times. Old Elkin’s daughter over at K——, she’d have had him quick enough. Seven years off and on, he kept company with Mehetabel, and then she died.”
“And he never asked her?”
“He shilly-shallied. Perhaps he didn’t think of it. When she was dead and gone, then Silas was struck all of a heap,—and that’s all about it.”
Obviously Mr. Sewell did not intend to tell me anything more, and obviously there was more to tell. The topic was plainly disagreeable to him for some reason or other, and that unknown reason of course piqued my curiosity.
As I had been absent from dinner and supper that day, I did not meet Mr. Jaffrey again until the following morning at breakfast. He had recovered his bird-like manner, and was full of a mysterious assassination that had just taken place in New York, all the thrilling details of which were at his fingers’ ends. It was at once comical and sad to see this harmless old gentleman, with his naïve, benevolent countenance, and his thin hair flaming up in a semicircle like the foot-lights at a theatre, revelling in the intricacies of the unmentionable deed.
“You come up to my room to-night,” he cried with horrid glee, “and I’ll give you my theory of the murder. I’ll make it as clear as day to you that it was the detective himself who fired the three pistol-shots.”
It was not so much the desire to have this point elucidated as to make a closer study of Mr. Jaffrey that led me to accept his invitation.
Mr. Jaffrey’s bedroom was in an L of the building, and was in no way noticeable except for the numerous files of newspapers neatly arranged against the blank spaces of the walls, and a huge pile of old magazines which stood in one corner, reaching nearly up to the ceiling, and threatening each instant to topple over like the Leaning Tower at Pisa. There were green paper shades at the windows, some faded chintz valances about the bed, and two or three easy-chairs covered with chintz. On a black walnut shelf between the windows lay a choice collection of meerschaum and brierwood pipes.
Filling one of the chocolate-coloured bowls for me, and another for himself, Mr. Jaffrey began prattling; but not about the murder, which appeared to have flown out of his mind. In fact, I do not remember that the topic was even touched upon, either then or afterwards.
“Cosy nest this,” said Mr. Jaffrey, glancing complacently over the apartment. “What is more cheerful, now, in the fall of the year, than an open wood-fire? Do you hear those little chirps and twitters coming out of that piece of apple-wood? Those are the ghosts of the robins and bluebirds that sang upon the bough when it was in blossom last spring. In summer whole flocks of them come fluttering about the fruit trees under the window; so I have singing birds all the year round. I take it very easy here, I can tell you, summer and winter. Not much society. Tobias is not, perhaps, what one would term a great intellectual force, but he means well. He’s a realist, believes in coming down to what he calls ‘the hard pan;’ but his heart is in the right place, and he’s very kind to me. The wisest thing I ever did in my life was to sell out my grain business over at K——, thirteen years ago, and settle down at the Corners. When a man has made a competency, what does he want more? Besides, at that time an event occurred which destroyed any ambition I may have had,—Mehetabel died.”
“The lady you were engaged to?”
“N-o, not precisely engaged. I think it was quite understood between us, though nothing had been said on the subject. Typhoid,” added Mr. Jaffrey, in a low tone.
For several minutes he smoked in silence, a vague, troubled look playing over his countenance. Presently this passed away, and he fixed his grey eyes speculatively upon my face.
“If I had married Mehetabel,” said Mr. Jaffrey, slowly, and then he hesitated.
I blew a ring of smoke into the air, and, resting my pipe on my knee, dropped into an attitude of attention.
“If I had married Mehetabel, you know, we should have had—ahem!—a family.”
“Very likely,” I assented, vastly amused at this unexpected turn.
“A boy!” exclaimed Mr. Jaffrey, explosively.
“By all means, certainly, a son.”
“Great trouble about naming the boy. Mehetabel’s family want him named Elkanah Elkins, after her grandfather; I want him named Andrew Jackson. We compromise by christening him Elkanah Elkins Andrew Jackson Jaffrey. Rather a long name for such a short little fellow,” said Mr. Jaffrey, musingly.
“Andy isn’t a bad nickname,” I suggested.
“Not at all. We call him Andy in the family. Somewhat fractious at first,—colic and things. I suppose it is right, or it wouldn’t be so; but the usefulness of measles, mumps, croup, whooping-cough, scarlatina, and fits is not visible to the naked eye. I wish Andy would be a model infant, and dodge the whole lot.”
This supposititious child, born within the last few minutes, was clearly assuming the proportions of a reality to Mr. Jaffrey. I began to feel a little uncomfortable. I am, as I have said, a civil engineer, and it is not strictly in my line to assist at the births of infants, imaginary or otherwise. I pulled away vigorously at the pipe and said nothing.
“What large blue eyes he has,” resumed Mr. Jaffrey, after a pause; “just like Hetty’s; and the fair hair, too, like hers. How oddly certain distinctive features are handed down in families! sometimes a mouth, sometimes a turn of the eyebrow. Wicked little boys, over at K——, have now and then derisively advised me to follow my nose. It would be an interesting thing to do. I should find my nose flying about the world, turning up unexpectedly here and there, dodging this branch of the family and reappearing in that, now jumping over one great-grandchild to fasten itself upon another, and never losing its individuality. Look at Andy. There’s Elkanah Elkin’s chin to the life. Andy’s chin is probably older than the Pyramids. Poor little thing,” he cried, with a sudden, indescribable tenderness, “to lose his mother so early!”
And Mr. Jaffrey’s head sunk upon his breast, and his shoulders slanted forward, as if he were actually bending over the cradle of the child.
The whole gesture and attitude was so natural that it startled me. The pipe slipped from my fingers and fell to the floor.
“Hush!” whispered Mr. Jaffrey, with a deprecating motion of his hand. “Andy’s asleep!”
He rose softly from the chair, and, walking across the room on tiptoe, drew down the shade at the window through which the moonlight was streaming. Then he returned to his seat, and remained gazing with half-closed eyes into the drooping embers.
I refilled my pipe and smoked in profound silence, wondering what would come next. But nothing came next. Mr. Jaffrey had fallen into so brown a study, that, a quarter of an hour afterwards, when I wished him good-night and withdrew, I do not think he noticed my departure. I am not what is called a man of imagination; it is my habit to exclude most things not capable of mathematical demonstration; but I am not without a certain psychological insight, and I think I understood Mr. Jaffrey’s case.
I could easily understand how a man with an unhealthy, sensitive nature, overwhelmed by sudden calamity, might take refuge in some forlorn place like this old tavern, and dream his life away. To such a man—brooding for ever on what might have been, and dwelling only in the realm of his fancies—the actual world might indeed become as a dream, and nothing seem real but his illusions.
I daresay that thirteen years of Bayley’s Four Corners would have its effect upon me; though instead of conjuring up golden-haired children of the Madonna, I should probably see gnomes and kobolds and goblins engaged in hoisting false signals and misplacing switches for midnight express trains.
“No doubt,” I said to myself that night, as I lay in bed, thinking over the matter, “this once possible but now impossible child is a great comfort to the old gentleman,—a greater comfort, perhaps, than a real son would be. Maybe Andy will vanish with the shades and mists of night, he’s such an unsubstantial infant; but if he doesn’t, and Mr. Jaffrey finds pleasure in talking to me about his son, I shall humour the old fellow. It wouldn’t be a Christian act to knock over his harmless fancy.”
[Illustration: “MR. JAFFREY WHISPERED TO ME.”]
I was very impatient to see if Mr. Jaffrey’s illusion would stand the test of daylight. It did. Elkanah Elkins Andrew Jackson Jaffrey was, so to speak, alive and kicking the next morning. On taking his seat at the breakfast-table, Mr. Jaffrey whispered to me that Andy had had a comfortable night.
“Silas!” said Mr. Sewell, sharply, “what are you whispering about?”
Mr. Sewell was in an ill humour; perhaps he was jealous because I had passed the evening in Mr. Jaffrey’s room; but surely Mr. Sewell could not expect his boarders to go to bed at eight o’clock every night, as he did. From time to time during the meal Mr. Sewell regarded me unkindly out of the corner of his eye, and in helping me to the parsnips he poniarded them with quite a suggestive air. All this, however, did not prevent me from repairing to the door of Mr. Jaffrey’s snuggery when night came.
“Well, Mr. Jaffrey, how’s Andy this evening?”
“Got a tooth!” cried Mr. Jaffrey, vivaciously.
“No!”
“Yes, he has! Just through. Gave the nurse a silver dollar. Standing reward for first tooth.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to express surprise that an infant a day old should cut a tooth, when I suddenly recollected that Richard III. was born with teeth.
Feeling myself to be on unfamiliar ground, I suppressed my criticism. It was well I did so, for in the next breath I was advised that half a year had elapsed since the previous evening.
“Andy’s had a hard six months of it,” said Mr. Jaffrey, with the well-known narrative air of fathers. “We’ve brought him up by hand. His grandfather, by the way, was brought up by the bottle”—and brought down by it, too, I added mentally, recalling Mr. Sewell’s account of the old gentleman’s tragic end.
Mr. Jaffrey then went on to give me a history of Andy’s first six months, omitting no detail however insignificant or irrelevant. This history I would in turn inflict upon the reader, if I were only certain that he is one of those dreadful parents who, under the ægis of friendship, bore you at a street-corner with that remarkable thing which Freddy said the other day, and insist on singing to you at an evening party the Iliad of Tommy’s woes.
But to inflict this _enfantillage_ upon the unmarried reader would be an act of wanton cruelty. So I pass over that part of Andy’s biography, and, for the same reason, make no record of the next four or five interviews I had with Mr. Jaffrey. It will be sufficient to state that Andy glided from extreme infancy to early youth with astonishing celerity,—at the rate of one year per night, if I remember correctly; and—must I confess it?—before the week came to an end, this invisible hobgoblin of a boy was only little less of a reality to me than to Mr. Jaffrey.
At first I had lent myself to the old dreamer’s whim with a keen perception of the humour of the thing; but by-and-by I found I was talking and thinking of Miss Mehetabel’s son as though he were a veritable personage. Mr. Jaffrey spoke of the child with such an air of conviction!—as if Andy were playing among his toys in the next room, or making mud-pies down in the yard. In these conversations, it should be observed, the child was never supposed to be present, except on that single occasion when Mr. Jaffrey leaned over the cradle. After one of our séances I would lie awake until the small hours, thinking of the boy, and then fall asleep only to have indigestible dreams about him. Through the day, and sometimes in the midst of complicated calculations, I would catch myself wondering what Andy was up to now! There was no shaking him off; he became an inseparable nightmare to me; and I felt that if I remained much longer at Bayley’s Four Corners I should turn into just such another bald-headed, mild-eyed visionary as Silas Jaffrey.
Then the tavern was a gruesome old shell anyway, full of unaccountable noises after dark,—rustlings of garments along unfrequented passages, and stealthy footfalls in unoccupied chambers overhead. I never knew of an old house without these mysterious noises.
Next to my bedroom was a musty, dismantled apartment, in one corner of which, leaning against the wainscot, was a crippled mangle, with its iron crank tilted in the air like the elbow of the late Mr. Clem Jaffrey. Sometimes,
“In the dead vast and middle of the night,”
I used to hear sounds as if some one were turning that rusty crank on the sly. This occurred only on particularly cold nights, and I conceived the uncomfortable idea that it was the thin family ghosts, from the neglected graveyard in the cornfield, keeping themselves warm by running each other through the mangle. There was a haunted air about the whole place that made it easy for me to believe in the existence of a phantasm like Miss Mehetabel’s son, who, after all, was less unearthly than Mr. Jaffrey himself, and seemed more properly an inhabitant of this globe than the toothless ogre who kept the inn, not to mention the silent witch of Endor that cooked our meals for us over the bar-room fire.
In spite of the scowls and winks bestowed upon me by Mr. Sewell, who let slip no opportunity to testify his disapprobation of the intimacy, Mr. Jaffrey and I spent all our evenings together—those long autumnal evenings, through the length of which he talked about the boy, laying out his path in life, and hedging the path with roses. He should be sent to the High School at Portsmouth, and then to college; he should be educated like a gentleman, Andy.
“When the old man dies,” said Mr. Jaffrey, rubbing his hands gleefully, as if it were a great joke, “Andy will find that the old man has left him a pretty plum.”
“What do you think of having Andy enter West Point when he’s old enough?” said Mr. Jaffrey, on another occasion. “He needn’t necessarily go into the army when he graduates; he can become a civil engineer.”
This was a stroke of flattery so delicate and indirect, that I could accept it without immodesty.
There had lately sprung up on the corner of Mr. Jaffrey’s bureau a small tin house, Gothic in architecture, and pink in colour, with a slit in the roof, and the word “Bank” painted on one façade. Several times in the course of an evening Mr. Jaffrey would rise from his chair, without interrupting the conversation, and gravely drop a nickel through the scuttle of the bank. It was pleasant to observe the solemnity of his countenance as he approached the edifice, and the air of triumph with which he resumed his seat by the fireplace. One night I missed the tin bank. It had disappeared, deposits and all. Evidently there had been a defalcation on rather a large scale. I strongly suspected that Mr. Sewell was at the bottom of it; but my suspicion was not shared by Mr. Jaffrey, who, remarking my glance at the bureau, became suddenly depressed. “I’m afraid,” he said, “that I have failed to instil into Andrew those principles of integrity—which—which——” And the old gentleman quite broke down.
Andy was now eight or nine years old, and for some time past, if the truth must be told, had given Mr. Jaffrey no inconsiderable trouble. What with his impishness and his illnesses, the boy led the pair of us a lively dance. I shall not soon forget the anxiety of Mr. Jaffrey the night Andy had the scarlet fever,—an anxiety which so affected me that I actually returned to the tavern the following afternoon earlier than usual, dreading to hear the little spectre was dead, and greatly relieved on meeting Mr. Jaffrey on the door-step with his face wreathed in smiles. When I spoke to him of Andy, I was made aware that I was inquiring into a case of scarlet fever that had occurred the year before!
It was at this time, towards the end of my second week at Greenton, that I noticed what was probably not a new trait,—Mr. Jaffrey’s curious sensitiveness to atmospherical changes. He was as sensitive as a barometer. The approach of a storm sent his mercury down instantly. When the weather was fair he was hopeful and sunny, and Andy’s prospects were brilliant. When the weather was overcast and threatening he grew restless and despondent, and was afraid the boy wasn’t going to turn out well.
On the Saturday previous to my departure, which had been fixed for Monday, it had rained heavily all the afternoon, and that night Mr. Jaffrey was in an unusually excitable and unhappy frame of mind. His mercury was very low indeed.
“That boy is going to the dogs just as fast as he can go,” said Mr. Jaffrey, with a woful face. “I can’t do anything with him.”
“He’ll come out all right, Mr. Jaffrey. Boys will be boys. I wouldn’t give a snap for a lad without animal spirits.”
“But animal spirits,” said Mr. Jaffrey, sententiously, “shouldn’t saw off the legs of the piano in Tobias’s best parlour. I don’t know what Tobias will say when he finds it out.”
“What, has Andy sawed off the legs of the old spinet?” I returned, laughing.
“Worse than that.”
“Played upon it, then?”
“No, sir. He has lied to me!”
“I can’t believe that of Andy.”
“Lied to me, sir,” repeated Mr. Jaffrey, severely. “He pledged me his word of honour that he would give over his climbing. The way that boy climbs sends a chill down my spine. This morning, notwithstanding his solemn promise, he shinned up the lightning-rod attached to the extension, and sat astride the ridge-pole. I saw him, and he denied it! When a boy you have caressed and indulged and lavished pocket-money on lies to you, and _will_ climb, then there’s nothing more to be said. He’s a lost child.”
“You take too dark a view of it, Mr. Jaffrey. Training and education are bound to tell in the end, and he has been well brought up.”
“But I didn’t bring him up on a lightning-rod, did I? If he is ever going to know how to behave, he ought to know now. To-morrow he will be eleven years old.”
The reflection came to me that if Andy had not been brought up by the rod, he had certainly been brought up by the lightning. He was eleven years old in two weeks!
I essayed to tranquillise Mr. Jaffrey’s mind, and to give him some practical hints on the management of youth, with that perspicacious wisdom which seems to be the peculiar property of bachelors and elderly maiden ladies.
“Spank him,” I suggested, at length.
“I will!” said the old gentleman.
“And you’d better do it at once!” I added, as it flashed upon me that in six months Andy would be a hundred and forty-three years old!—an age at which parental discipline would have to be relaxed.
The next morning, Sunday, the rain came down as if determined to drive the quicksilver entirely out of my poor friend. Mr. Jaffrey sat bolt upright at the breakfast-table, looking as woe-begone as a bust of Dante, and retired to his chamber the moment the meal was finished. As the day advanced, the wind veered round to the north-east, and settled itself down to work. It was not pleasant to think, and I tried not to think, what Mr. Jaffrey’s condition would be if the weather did not mend its manners by noon; but so far from clearing off at noon, the storm increased in violence, and as night set in the wind whistled in a spiteful falsetto key, and the rain lashed the old tavern as if it were a balky horse that refused to move on. The windows rattled in the worm-eaten frames, and the doors of remote rooms, where nobody ever went, slammed-to in the maddest way. Now and then the tornado, sweeping down the side of Mount Agamenticus, bowled across the open country and struck the ancient hostelry point-blank.
Mr. Jaffrey did not appear at supper. I knew he was expecting me to come to his room as usual, and I turned over in my mind a dozen plans to evade seeing him that night.
[Illustration: “AN ATROCIOUS WINK.”]
The landlord sat at the opposite side of the chimney-place, with his eye upon me. I fancy he was aware of the effect of this storm on his other boarder; for at intervals, as the wind hurled itself against the exposed gable, threatening to burst in the windows, Mr. Sewell tipped me an atrocious wink, and displayed his gums in a way he had not done since the morning after my arrival at Greenton. I wondered if he suspected anything about Andy. There had been odd times during the past week when I felt convinced that the existence of Miss Mehetabel’s son was no secret to Mr. Sewell.
In deference to the gale, the landlord sat up half-an-hour later than was his custom. At half-past eight he went to bed, remarking that he thought the old pile would stand till morning.
He had been absent only a few minutes when I heard a rustling at the door. I looked up and beheld Mr. Jaffrey standing on the threshold, with his dress in disorder, his scant hair flying, and the wildest expression on his face.
“He’s gone!” cried Mr. Jaffrey.
“Who? Sewell! Yes, he just went to bed.”
“No, not Tobias,—the boy!”
“What, run away?”
“No,—he is dead! He has fallen off a step-ladder in the red chamber and broken his neck!”
Mr. Jaffrey threw up his hands with a gesture of despair and disappeared. I followed him through the hall, saw him go into his own apartment, and heard the bolt of the door drawn to. Then I returned to the bar-room and sat for an hour or two in the ruddy glow of the fire, brooding over the strange experience of the last fortnight.
On my way to bed I paused at Mr. Jaffrey’s door, and, in a lull of the storm, the measured respiration within told me that the old gentleman was sleeping peacefully.
Slumber was coy with me that night. I lay listening to the soughing of the wind and thinking of Mr. Jaffrey’s illusion. It had amused me at first with its grotesqueness; but now the poor little phantom was dead. I was conscious that there had been something pathetic in it all along. Shortly after midnight the wind sunk down, coming and going fainter and fainter, floating around the eaves of the tavern with a gentle, murmurous sound, as if it were turning itself into soft wings to bear away the spirit of a little child.
* * * * *
Perhaps nothing that happened during my stay at Bayley’s Four Corners took me so completely by surprise as Mr. Jaffrey’s radiant countenance the next morning. The morning itself was not fresher or sunnier. His round face literally shone with geniality and happiness. His eyes twinkled like diamonds, and the magnetic light of his hair was turned on full. He came into my room while I was packing my valise. He chirped and prattled and carolled, and was sorry I was going away,—but never a word about Andy. However, the boy had probably been dead several years then!
The open waggon that was to carry me to the station stood at the door; Mr. Sewell was placing my case of instruments under the seat, and Mr. Jaffrey had gone up to his room to get me a certain newspaper containing an account of a remarkable shipwreck on the Auckland Islands. I took the opportunity to thank Mr. Sewell for his courtesies to me, and to express my regret at leaving him and Mr. Jaffrey.
“I have become very much attached to Mr. Jaffrey,” I said; “he is a most interesting person; but that hypothetical boy of his, that son of Miss Mehetabel’s——”
“Yes, I know!” interrupted Mr. Sewell, testily, “fell off a step-ladder and broke his dratted neck. Eleven year old, wasn’t he? Always does, jest at that point. Next week Silas will begin the whole thing over again if he can get anybody to listen to him.”
“I see; our amiable friend is a little queer on that subject.”
Mr. Sewell glanced cautiously over his shoulder, and, tapping himself significantly on the forehead, said in a low voice—
“Room to let. Unfurnished!”
_Thomas Bailey Aldrich._
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PECK’S BAD BOY.
[Illustration: “PA TAKING HIS DEGREE.”]
“SAY, are you a Mason, or a Nodfellow, or anything?” asked the bad boy of the grocery man, as he went to the cinnamon bag on the shelf and took out a long stick of cinnamon bark to chew.
“Why, yes, of course I am; but what set you to thinking of that?” asked the grocery man, as he went to the desk and charged the boy’s father with a half-pound of cinnamon.
“Well, do the goats bunt when you nishiate a fresh candidate?”
“No, of course not. The goats are cheap ones, that have no life, and we muzzle them, and put pillows over their heads, so they can’t hurt anybody,” says the grocery man, as he winked at a brother Oddfellow who was seated on a sugar barrel, looking mysterious. “But why do you ask?”
“Oh, nothin’, only I wish me and my chum had muzzled our goat with a pillow. Pa would have enjoyed his becoming a member of our lodge better. You see, Pa had been telling us how much good the Masons and Oddfellers did, and said we ought to try and grow up good so we could jine the lodges when we got big; and I asked Pa if it would do any hurt for us to have a play lodge in my room, and purtend to nishiate, and Pa said it wouldn’t do any hurt. He said it would improve our minds and learn us to be men. So my chum and me borried a goat that lives in a livery stable. Say, did you know they keep a goat in a livery stable so the horses won’t get sick? They get used to the smell of the goat, and after that nothing can make them sick but a glue factory. You see my chum and me had to carry the goat up to my room when Ma and Pa was out riding, and he blatted so we had to tie a handkerchief around his nose, and his feet made such a noise on the floor that we put some baby’s socks on his hoofs.
“Well, my chum and me practised with that goat until he could bunt the picture of a goat every time. We borried a bock beer sign from a saloon man and hung it on the back of a chair, and the goat would hit it every time. That night Pa wanted to know what we were doing up in my room, and I told him we were playing lodge, and improving our minds; and Pa said that was right, there was nothing that did boys of our age half so much good as to imitate men, and store by useful nollidge. Then my chum asked Pa if he didn’t want to come up and take the grand bumper degree, and Pa laffed and said he didn’t care if he did, just to encourage us boys in innocent pastime that was so improving to our intellex. We had shut the goat up in a closet in my room, and he had got over blatting; so we took off the handkerchief, and he was eating some of my paper collars and skate straps. We went upstairs, and told Pa to come up pretty soon and give three distinct raps, and when we asked him who comes there he must say, ‘A pilgrim, who wants to join your ancient order and ride the goat.’ Ma wanted to come up, too, but we told her if she come in it would break up the lodge, cause a woman couldn’t keep a secret, and we didn’t have any side-saddle for the goat. Say, if you never tried it, the next time you nishiate a man in your Mason’s lodge you sprinkle a little kyan pepper on the goat’s beard just afore you turn him loose. You can get three times as much fun to the square inch of goat. You wouldn’t think it was the same goat. Well, we got all fixed and Pa rapped, and we let him in and told him he must be blindfolded, and he got on his knees a laffing, and I tied a towel around his eyes, and then I turned him around and made him get down on his hands also, and then his back was right towards the closet sign, and I put the bock beer sign right against Pa’s clothes. He was a laffing all the time, and said we boys were as full of fun as they made ’em, and we told him it was a solemn occasion, and we wouldn’t permit no levity, and if he didn’t stop laffing we couldn’t give him the grand bumper degree. Then everything was ready, and my chum had his hand on the closet door, and some kyan pepper in his other hand, and I asked Pa in low bass tones if he felt as though he wanted to turn back, or if he had nerve enough to go ahead and take the degree. I warned him that it was full of dangers, as the goat was loaded for bear, and told him he yet had time to retrace his steps if he wanted to. He said he wanted the whole bizness, and we could go ahead with the menagerie. Then I said to Pa that if he had decided to go ahead, and not blame us for the consequences, to repeat after me the following: ‘Bring forth the Royal Bumper and let him Bump.’
“Pa repeated the words, and my chum sprinkled the kyan pepper on the goat’s moustache, and he sneezed once and looked sassy, and then he see the lager beer goat rearing up, and he started for it just like a crow-catcher, and blatted. Pa is real fat, but he knew he got hit, and he grunted and said, ‘What you boys doin’?’ and then the goat gave him another degree, and Pa pulled off the towel and got up and started for the stairs, and so did the goat; and Ma was at the bottom of the stairs listening, and when I looked over the banisters Pa and Ma and the goat were all in a heap, and Pa was yelling murder, and Ma was screaming fire, and the goat was blatting, and sneezing, and bunting, and the hired girl came into the hall and the goat took after her, and she crossed herself just as the goat struck her and said, ‘Howly mother, protect me!’ and went down stairs the way we boys slide down hill, with both hands on herself, and the goat reared up and blatted, and Pa and Ma went into their room and shut the door, and then my chum and me opened the front door and drove the goat out. The minister, who comes to see Ma every three times a week, was just ringing the bell, and the goat thought he wanted to be nishiated too, and gave him one for luck, and then went down the side walk, blatting, and sneezing, and the minister came in the parlour and said he was stabbed, and then Pa came out of his room with his suspenders hanging down, and he didn’t know the minister was there, and he said cuss words, and Ma cried and told Pa he would go to the bad place sure, and Pa said he didn’t care, he would kill that kussid goat afore he went, and I told Pa the minister was in the parlour, and he and Ma went down and said the weather was propitious for a revival, and it seemed as though an outpouring of the spirit was about to be vouchsafed, and none of them sot down but Ma, cause the goat didn’t hit her, and while they were talking relidgin with their mouths, and kussin’ the goat inwardly, my chum and me adjourned the lodge, and I went and stayed with him all night, and I haven’t been home since. But I don’t believe Pa will lick me, ’cause he said he would not hold us responsible for the consequences. He ordered the goat hisself, and we filled the order, don’t you see? Well, I guess I will go and sneak in the back way, and find out from the hired girl how the land lays. She won’t go back on me, ’cause the goat was not loaded for hired girls. She just happened to get in at the wrong time. Good-bye, sir. Remember and give your goat kyan pepper in your lodge.”
_George W. Peck._
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Illustration: THE BRITISH KNOCK]
LONDON, _October 30, 1802_.
I HAVE lately made a most important discovery which has disclosed one of the great secrets of English rank. You, in the United States, knowing nothing of this, will consider the following authentic history of rank a singular curiosity.
They have confined the several species of man within such definite limits, in this country, that the moment they hear a knocking at the doors, they can tell you whether it be a servant, a postman, a milkman, a half or whole gentleman, a very great gentleman, a knight, or a nobleman.
A servant is bound to lift the knocker once; should he usurp a nobleman’s knock he would hazard his situation. A postman knocks twice, very loudly. A milkman knocks once, at the same time sending forth an artificial noise, not unlike the yell of an American Indian. A mere gentleman usually knocks three times, moderately; a terrible fellow feels authorised to knock thrice, very loudly, generally adding to these two or three faint knocks, which seem to run into each other; but there is considerable art in doing this elegantly, therefore it is not always attempted; but it is a valuable accomplishment. A stranger who should venture at an imitation would undoubtedly be taken for an upstart. A knight presumes to give a _double knock_, that is six raps, with a few faint ones at the end. I have not yet ascertained the various peculiarities which distinguish the degrees between the baronet and the nobleman; but this I know too well, that a nobleman, at any time of night, is allowed to knock so long and loud, that the whole neighbourhood is frequently disturbed; and although fifty people may be deprived of their night’s rest, there is no redress at law or at equity. Nor have I learned how long and loud a prince of the blood presumes to knock, though doubtless he might knock an hour or two by way of distinction.
You may hold your sides if you please, but I assure you I am perfectly serious. These people are so tenacious of their prerogative, that a true-blooded Englishman goes near to think it a part of British liberty. Indeed, I am convinced I could place certain Englishmen in a situation, in which, rather than knock at a door but once, they would fight a duel every day in the week. Good heavens, how would a fine gentleman appear if obliged to knock but once at the door of a fashionable lady to whose party he had been invited, while at the same moment a number of his everyday friends, passing by, might observe the circumstance! I cannot conceive of a more distressing occurrence. The moment he entered the room the eyes of the whole company would be turned on him; he would believe himself disgraced for ever, he would feel himself annihilated, for all his imaginary consequence, without which an Englishman feels himself to be nothing, would have forsaken him.
You may imagine it a very easy matter to pass from the simple _rap_ of the servant to that of the nobleman; but let me inform you these little monosyllables stand in the place of Alpine mountains, which neither vinegar nor valour can pass. Hercules and Theseus, those vagabond but respectable bullies, who govern by personal strength instead of a standing army, would have hesitated an enterprise against these raps. They have, by prescription, risen nearly to the dignity of Common Law, of which strangers as well as natives are bound to take notice. I was lately placed in a pleasant position through ignorance of this. Soon after my arrival I received an invitation to dine with a gentleman, and in my economical way, with the greatest simplicity, I gave one reasonable rap; after a considerable time a servant opened the door and asked me _what I wanted_! I told him Mr. ——. He replied “His _master_ has company, but will see if he can be spoken with.” In the meantime I was left in the entry. Presently Mr. —— came, who, a little mortified, began to reprove the servant; but it appeared in the sequel he was perfectly right, for on telling Mr. —— “_I knocked but once_,” he burst into a laugh, and said he would explain that at dinner.
Should an honest fellow, ignorant of the consequences of these raps, come to London in search of a place, and unfortunately knock at a gentleman’s door, after the manner of noblemen, it might prejudice him as much as a prayer-book once prejudiced a certain person in Connecticut. The anecdote is this:—
A young adventurer, educated Church-of-England-wise, on going forth to seek his fortune, very naturally put his prayer-book in his pocket. Wandering within the precincts of Connecticut, he offered his service to a farmer, who, after asking him a thousand questions (a New England custom), gave him employment; but in the evening, the unlucky prayer-book being discovered, he fairly turned the poor wight out of doors to get a lodging where he could.
You know the Connecticut _Blue Laws_ made it death for a priest, meaning a clergyman of the Church of England, to be found within that State. Thank heaven, those days are past. “God, liberty, and toleration,” whether a man prefers a prayer-book to the missal, or the Koran to a prayer-book, or a single rap at a door to the noise of a dozen.
Adieu.
N.B.—You must keep this letter a profound secret, as we have certain gentlemen on our side of the Atlantic who would, in imitation of the noblemen here, disturb their neighbours.
_William Austin._
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_A CAPTIVE MAIDEN._
[Illustration: “WHILE PITMAN SEIZED THE SUFFERER BY ONE ARM, I GRASPED THE OTHER.”]
IT is extremely probable that we shall lose our servant-girl. She was the victim of a very singular catastrophe a night or two since, in consequence of which she has acquired a prejudice against the house of Adeler. We were troubled with dampness in our cellar, and in order to remove the difficulty we got a couple of men to come and dig the earth out to the depth of twelve or fifteen inches, and fill it in with a cement and mortar floor. The material was, of course, very soft, and the workmen laid boards upon the surface, so that access to the furnace and the coal-bin was possible. That night, just after retiring, we heard a woman screaming for help; but after listening at the open window, we concluded that Cooley and his wife were engaged in an altercation, and so we paid no more attention to the noise. Half-an-hour afterwards there was a violent ring at the front door bell, and upon going to the window again I found Pitman standing upon the door-step below. When I spoke to him he said—
“Max,”—the judge is inclined sometimes, especially during periods of excitement, to be unnecessarily familiar,—“there’s somethin’ wrong in your cellar. There’s a woman down there screechin’ and carryin’ on like mad. Sounds ’s if somebody’s a-murderin’ her.”
I dressed and descended; and securing the assistance of Pitman, so that I would be better prepared in the event of burglars being discovered, I lighted a lamp and we went into the cellar.
There we found the maid-servant standing by the refrigerator, knee-deep in the cement, and supporting herself with the handle of a broom, which was also half-submerged. In several places about her were air-holes marking the spot where the milk-jug, the cold veal, the Lima beans, and the silver-plated butter-dish had gone down. We procured some additional boards, and while Pitman seized the sufferer by one arm I grasped the other. It was for some time doubtful if she would come to the surface without the use of more violent means, and I confess that I was half inclined to regard with satisfaction the prospect that we would have to blast her loose with gunpowder. After a desperate struggle, during which the girl declared that she would be torn in pieces, Pitman and I succeeded in getting her safely out, and she went upstairs with half a barrel of cement on each leg, declaring that she would leave the house in the morning.
The cold veal is in there yet. Centuries hence some antiquarian will perhaps grub about the spot whereon my cottage once stood, and will blow that cold veal out in a petrified condition, and then present it to a museum as the fossil remains of some unknown animal. Perhaps, too, he will excavate the milk-jug and the butter-dish, and go about lecturing upon them as utensils employed in bygone ages by a race of savages called “The Adelers.” I should like to be alive at the time to hear that lecture. And I cannot avoid the thought that if our servant had been completely buried in the cement, and thus carefully preserved until the coming of that antiquarian, the lecture would be more interesting, and the girl more useful than she is now. A fossilised domestic servant of the present era would probably astonish the people of the twenty-eighth century.
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_MRS. PARTINGTON IN COURT._
“I TOOK my knitting-work and went up into the gallery,” said Mrs. Partington, the day after visiting one of the city courts; “I went up into the gallery, and, after I had adjusted my specs, I looked down into the room, but I couldn’t see any courting going on. An old gentleman seemed to be asking a good many impertinent questions,—just like some old folks,—and people were sitting around making minuets of the conversation. I don’t see how they made out what was said, for they all told different stories. How much easier it would be to get along if they were all made to tell the same story! What a sight of trouble it would save the lawyers! The case, as they call it, was given to the jury, but I couldn’t see it, and a gentleman with a long pole was made to swear that he’d keep an eye on ’em, and see that they didn’t run away with it. Bimeby in they came agin, and then they said somebody was guilty of something, who had just said he was innocent, and didn’t know nothing about it no more than the little baby that had never subsistence. I come away soon afterwards; but I couldn’t help thinking how trying it must be to sit there all day, shut out from the blessed air!”
_Benjamin Penhallon Shillaber_ _(“Mrs. Partington”)._
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_THE MUSIC-GRINDERS._
[Illustration: “IT’S HARD TO MEET SUCH PRESSING FRIENDS, IN SUCH A LONELY SPOT.”]
THERE are three ways in which men take One’s money from his purse, And very hard it is to tell Which of the three is worse; But all of them are bad enough To make a body curse.
You’re riding out some pleasant day, And counting up your gains; A fellow jumps from out a bush, And takes your horse’s reins, Another hints some words about A bullet in your brains.
It’s hard to meet such pressing friends, In such a lonely spot; It’s very hard to lose your cash, But harder to be shot; And so you take your wallet out, Though you would rather not.
Perhaps you’re going out to dine,— Some odious creature begs You’ll hear about the cannon-ball That carried off his pegs, And says it is a dreadful thing For men to lose their legs.
He tells you of his starving wife, His children to be fed, Poor little lovely innocents, All clamorous for bread,— And so you kindly help to put A bachelor to bed.
You’re sitting on your window-seat, Beneath a cloudless moon; Your hear a sound that seems to wear The semblance of a tune, As if a broken fife should strive To drown a cracked bassoon.
And nearer, nearer still, the tide Of music seems to come; There’s something like a human voice, And something like a drum; You sit in speechless agony, Until your ear is numb.
Poor “Home, sweet home” should seem to be A very dismal place; Your “Auld Acquaintance” all at once Is altered in the face; Their discords sting through Burns and Moore, Like hedgehogs dressed in lace.
You think they are crusaders, sent From some infernal clime, To pluck the eyes of Sentiment, And dock the tail of Rhyme, To crack the voice of Melody, And break the legs of Time.
But hark! the air again is still, The music all is ground, And silence, like a poultice, comes To heal the blows of sound; It cannot be,—it is,—it is,— A hat is going round!
No! pay the dentist when he leaves A fracture in your jaw, And pay the owner of the bear That stunned you with his paw, And buy the lobster that has had Your knuckles in his claw;
But, if you are a portly man, Put on your fiercest frown, And talk about a constable To turn them out of town; Then close your sentence with an oath, And shut the window down!
And, if you are a slender man, Not big enough for that, Or if you cannot make a speech Because you are a flat, Go very quietly and drop A button in the hat!
_Oliver Wendell Holmes._
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_MISS CRUMP’S SONG._
MISS CRUMP was inexorable. She declared that she was entirely out of practice. “She scarcely ever touched the piano;” “Mamma was always scolding her for giving so much of her time to French and Italian, and neglecting her music and painting; but she told mamma the other day that it really was so irksome to her to quit Racine and Dante, and go to thrumming upon the piano, that, but for the obligations of filial obedience, she did not think she should ever touch it again.”
Here Mrs. Crump was kind enough, by the merest accident in the world, to interpose, and to relieve the company from farther anxiety.
“Augusta, my dear,” said she, “go and play a tune or two; the company will excuse your hoarseness.”
Miss Crump rose immediately at her mother’s bidding, and moved to the piano, accompanied by a large group of smiling faces.
“Poor child,” said Mrs. Crump, as she went forward, “she is frightened to death. I wish Augusta could overcome her diffidence.”
Miss Crump was educated in Philadelphia; she had been taught to sing by Madame Piggisqueaki, who was a pupil of Ma’m’selle Crokifroggietta, who had sung with Madame Catalani; and she had taken lessons on the piano from Seignor Buzzifussi, who had played with Paganini.
She seated herself at the piano, rocked to the right, then to the left, leaned forward, then backward, and began. She placed her right hand about midway the keys, and her left about two octaves below it. She now put off to the right in a brisk canter up the treble notes, and the left after it. The left then led the way back, and the right pursued it in like manner. The right turned, and repeated its first movement; but the left outran it this time, hopped over it, and flung it entirely off the track. It came in again, however, behind the left on its return, and passed it in the same style. They now became highly incensed at each other, and met furiously on the middle ground. Here a most awful conflict ensued for about the space of ten seconds, when the right whipped off all of a sudden, as I thought, fairly vanquished. But I was in the error against which Jack Randolph cautions us; “it had only fallen back to a stronger position.” It mounted upon two black keys, and commenced the note of a rattlesnake. This had a wonderful effect upon the left, and placed the doctrine of “snake charming” beyond dispute. The left rushed furiously towards it repeatedly, but seemed invariably panic-struck when it came within six keys of it, and as invariably retired with a tremendous roaring down the bass keys.
It continued its assaults, sometimes by the way of the naturals, sometimes by the way of the sharps, and sometimes by a zigzag through both; but all its attempts to dislodge the right from its stronghold proving ineffectual, it came close up to its adversary, and expired.
Any one, or rather no one, can imagine what kind of noises the piano gave forth during the conflict. Certain it is, no one can describe them, and, therefore, I shall not attempt it. The battle ended, Miss Augusta moved as though she would have arisen, but this was protested against by a number of voices at once.
“One song, my dear Aurelia,” said Miss Small; “you must sing that sweet little French air you used to sing in Philadelphia, and which Madame Piggisqueaki was so fond of.”
Miss Augusta looked pitifully at her mamma, and her mamma looked “sing” at Miss Augusta; accordingly, she squared herself for a song.
[Illustration: “SOME VERY CURIOUS SOUNDS, WHICH APPEARED TO PROCEED FROM THE LIPS OF MISS AUGUSTA.”]
She brought her hands to the campus this time in fine style, and they seemed now to be perfectly reconciled to each other. They commenced a kind of colloquy; the right whispering treble very softly, and the left responding bass very loudly. The conference had been kept up until I began to desire a change of the subject, when my ear caught, indistinctly, some very curious sounds, which appeared to proceed from the lips of Miss Augusta; they seemed to be compounded of a dry cough, a grunt, a hiccough, and a whisper; and they were introduced, it appeared to me, as interpreters between the right and the left.
Things progressed in this way for about the space of fifteen seconds, when I happened to direct my attention to Mr. Jenkins, from Philadelphia. His eyes were closed, his head rolled gracefully from side to side; a beam of heavenly complacency rested upon his countenance; and his whole man gave irresistible demonstration that Miss Crump’s music made him feel good all over. I had just turned from the contemplation of Mr. Jenkins’ transports, to see whether I could extract from the performance anything intelligible, when Miss Crump made a fly-catching grab at half-a-dozen keys in a row and at the same instant she fetched a long, dunghill-cock crow, at the conclusion of which she grabbed as many keys with her left. This came over Jenkins like a warm bath, and over me like a rake of bamboo briers.
My nerves had not recovered from this shock before Miss Augusta repeated the movement, and accompanied it with a squall of a pinched cat. This threw me into an ague fit; but, from respect to the performer, I maintained my position.
She now made a third grasp with the right, boxed the faces of six keys in a row with the left, and at the same time raised one of the most unearthly howls that ever issued from the throat of a human being. This seemed the signal for universal uproar and destruction. She now threw away all her reserve, and charged the piano with her whole force. She boxed it, she clawed it, she raked it, she scraped it. Her neck-vein swelled, her chin flew up, her face flushed, her eye glared, her bosom heaved; she screamed, she howled, she yelled, cackled, and was in the act of dwelling upon the note of a screech-owl, when I took the St. Vitus’s dance, and rushed out of the room. “Good Lord,” said a bystander, “if this be her _singing_, what must her _crying be_!” As I reached the door I heard a voice exclaim, “By heavens! she’s the most enchanting performer I ever heard in my life!” I turned to see who was the author of this ill-timed compliment, and who should it be but Nick Truck, from Lincoln, who seven years before was dancing “Possum up the Gumtree” in the chimney-corner of his father’s kitchen. Nick had entered the counting-room of a merchant in Charleston some five or six years before, had been sent out as supercargo of a vessel to Bordeaux, and while the vessel was delivering one cargo and taking in another, had contracted a wonderful relish for French music.
As for myself, I went home in convulsions; took sixty drops of laudanum, and fell asleep. I dreamed that I was in a beautiful city, the streets of which intersected each other at right angles; that the birds of the air and the beasts of the forest had gathered there for battle, the former led on by a Frenchman, the latter by an Italian; that I was looking on their movements towards each other, when I heard the cry of “Hecate is coming!” I turned my eye to the north-east, and saw a female flying through the air toward the city, and distinctly recognised in her the features of Miss Crump. I took the alarm, and was making my escape, when she gave command for the beasts and birds to fall on me. They did so, and, with all the noises of the animal world, were in the act of tearing me to pieces, when I was waked by the stepping of Hall, my room-mate, into bed.
“Oh, my dear sir,” exclaimed I, “you have waked me from a horrible dream. What o’clock is it?”
“Ten minutes after twelve,” said he.
“And where have you been to this late hour?”
“I have just returned from the party.”
“And what kept you so late?”
“Why, I disliked to retire while Miss Crump was playing.”
“In mercy’s name!” said I, “is she playing yet?”
“Yes,” said he; “I had to leave her playing at last.”
“And where was Jenkins?”
“He was there, still in ecstasies, and urging her to play on.”
“And where was Truck?”
“He was asleep.”
“And what was she playing?”
“An Italian——”
Here I swooned, and heard no more.
_Augustus Baldwin Longstreet._
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_A POLYGLOT BARBER._
[Illustration]
MY first tonsorial experience is in a barber shop of the old town of Prinkipo. Most of the barbers are polyglotically inclined. My particular barber is either a Greek, a Maltese, a Sclav, a Bulgarian, or a Montenegrin. It is impossible at first to tell his native tongue. He has French glibly. He speaks a “leetle Inglis,” and understands less. He is well up in Italian, as many of the families in this vicinage are. He had some knowledge of Spanish, as kindred to the Italian. This extraordinary learning always gives me a shudder, and especially when under his razor or shears. Being a stranger on the island, and having no very pronounced national features, it was equally difficult for him to ascertain my nationality, except by inquisition long and pitiless. All I could do was to arm myself with the affirmatives and negatives of various languages. With these I made myself complaisant, to save my face from bloodshed. My first conversation with this artist confirmed the general reputation as to the gossipy quality of the Barber of Seville. He had all the gossip of the isles, including its languages. The conversation ran somewhat after this style—
Barber: “You have been here long?”
I reply in Bohemian, “_Ne!_”
He easily understood that.
“You are here for your health?”
I reply in Danish, affirmatively and negatively, “_Ja!_” “_Nei, minherre!_” “Yes, sir,” and “No, sir.” This puzzled him.
“An army gentleman, perhaps?”
I reply in German, “_Nein, mein herr_.”
“Oh, then you are a navy officer?”
Having in view my position as admiral of the launch, I reply in Hungarian; because, _lucus a non lucendo_, Hungary is an inland country, and, like our own, without a navy.
“_Igen!_” “Yes.”
“Your vessel is at Constantinople?”
Remembering that there was an Italian emigrant named Christopher Columbus of naval renown, I reply: “_Si, signore_.”
“You will bring your vessel to Prinkipo?”
Ah! here was my opportunity. It is the modern Greek in which I reply: “_Nae vevayos_.”
He is thunderstruck. It is evidently his mother-tongue. Likely he has a Polish father; who knows? When he asks me in French—
“Will your vessel touch at Athens?”
I respond in Polish, “_Tak!_” “No.” And then, with some hesitation, I add the French word, “_peut-être_.” “Perhaps.”
“You will visit Egypt?”
“_Sim, senhor._” This is Portuguese for “Yes, sir.”
The gesture or the manner with which these responses are made encourages him, for he immediately asks whether I have ever been in Alabania. I have no negative or affirmative in any of the languages of the Adriatic. My Dalmatian servitor, Pedro, is absent, and my next best affirmative is in Russian.
“_Do prawda._” Perhaps, being affiliated with the Sclav, he understands this language.
“You have never been in Egypt?”
As the pine and the palm are associated in my mind, and having connected the Polar midnight sun with the Pyramids of the Pharaohs, I respond in Swedish, making it intense—
“_Ja!_” adding a little affirmative in Roumanian, to give intensity to the remark, “_Gie_.”
After a pause in the conversation he resumes. He believes that he has my nationality fixed. He surmises that I am from some Balkan province, and he asks—
“Have you been in Roumelia, Bulgaria, Servia, Montenegro, and Herzegovina?”
Knowing that I could not answer this truthfully, and not being able to answer it partially, I give him back in Roumanian an emphatic negative—
“_Na canna, bucca._”
“You have been quite a traveller!”
This suggests the Chinese as the fitting language for the affirmative, and I say—
“_She!_”
Having no reference to Haggard’s novel, for it was not then out. To make the “_she_” expressive I add another affirmative, which I had carefully studied while boarding with the Chinese Legation in Washington.
“_Ta Jin!_”
“You like the Chinese, Monsieur?”
Having succeeded so well with the Chinese, I answer promptly in the negative—
“_Puh!_”
This monosyllable disgusts him. His subordinates gather around the chair where I was being shaved, interested in this composite conversation. The artist then asks if I had visited Jerusalem. Here was my great breakdown. Notwithstanding I had represented a Hebrew community in New York, with more synagogues than Jerusalem had in the time of Solomon, I was at a loss for a Hebrew affirmative. Happy thought! I respond promptly in the Arabic tongue, with its guttural peculiarity—
“_Na’am._”
It sounded to me after I uttered it like profanity, and I fell back as gracefully as I could, waiting for the next attack, and equipped with a Japanese expletive.
“You like Constantinople?”
I respond in a sweet Japanese accent—
“_Sama, san!_”
“How long have you been in Constantinople?”
I give it to him in English—
“I arrived there in the year 1851—thirty-six years ago.”
“_Mon Dieu!—mon Dieu!—mon Dieu!_” he exclaims, “Have you lived there ever since that time?”
“_Beaucoup, Monsieur!_”
He has not yet learned my nationality. I am afraid every moment that he will strike America. It comes—
“Perhaps you have been in America?”
“Wa’al, yaas, I guess!”
He could not understand this, for he had not been educated at Robert College, nor had he abided in Vermont. I ask him in French which America he means. He says—
“South America. I have a cousin of my wife’s there, and I would like to know how the country looks.”
“_Le nom du cousin de votre femme?_” I ask.
“Pierre Moulka Pari Michipopouli. He is like you, Monsieur—quite a traveller.”
Then began a fusillade of questions and rattling replies.
“You have lived in Paris, Monsieur?”
“_Jamais!_” “Never.” “Been to Genoa?” “_Si, Signore._” “Ah, you are English, are you not?” With the intense Turkish negative I respond, “_Yok!_” “French?” “_Non._” “German?” “_Nein._” “Sclav?” “_Nee._” “Italian?” “_No, Signore._” “Ah! Espagnol? You look like one.”
“Pardon, Monsieur, I am not.”
“Well,” said he, taking breath, “will you tell me, Monsieur, where you do come from?”
“Don’t you remember the only nation in the world where the barber is as good as a king?” I said proudly.
“Oh, Switzerland. _Sapristi! Corpo de Bacco!_”
Understanding that last remark perfectly, I offer him a cigarette, and say, “No, I am not Swiss.”
“Brazeel?” “_Jamais._”
The way that barber rubs the unguent into my hairless scalp and hirsute beard shows that he is a disappointed man.
The next time I visit the shop I receive marked attention. The hands all rise up. They pick up the earth in a Turkish _salaam_. They distribute it in courtesy to the American minister, whom they have meanwhile discovered. As I have been frequently turned away from the doors of our American Congress after twenty-five years’ service, because I did not act or look like a member, so I was unrecognised here, by the “_Oi Barberoi_,” as having no national characterisation. America was the last race or people to which this Greek barber assigned me.
_Samuel S. Cox._
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_AT THE GIANT’S CAUSEWAY._
“YIS, sur. It’s many a wan av yure countrymin Oi’ve taken over the Causeway, sur.”
“How do you know what countryman I am?”
“Thrust me fur knowing the American accent, sur.”
“I haven’t the American accent. You have it. Go to New York if you don’t believe me.”
“There’s many an Oirishman there, I’m tould, sur.”
“More than in Dublin.”
“De ye tell me thot, sur? Well, sur, Oi took Gineral Grant himsilf over the Causeway, and a foine mawn he was. An’ Gineral Sheridan, too, sur. Many’s the great mawn Oi’ve taken over the Causeway, sur.”
“Besides me?”
“Well, sur, ye may be the greatest av thim all, sur; fur, as Oi’ve often noticed, them that’s laste like it is sometimes bether than they look, sur.”
“True. So we won’t pursue _that_ subject any further.”
“Oi took the Duke av Connaught himsilf down this very road, sur, an’ do you know what he says to me, sur? He says, ‘Pat,’ says he, ‘have ye had anything to ate the day?’ ‘Saving yer presence, sur,’ says Oi, ‘except a bite at breakfast’—an’ before the words were out of my mout’, says the Duke to me, says he, ‘Sit down wid us,’ says he; an’ no sooner said than done, and Oi had moy lunch with the Duke av Connaught. De ye moind _thot_, now?”
“That was a great honour—for the Duke.”
“It was—what’s that, sur? It was a great honour fur _me_, sur.”
“Just depends on how a man looks at it. If you think it was a great honour for you, it was.”
“An’ Oi’ve taken great professors over the Causeway, sur—min that knew more in wan minute, sur, than you and Oi wud know in all our loives, sur. An’ they’ve tould me that this was the greatest soight in the whole wurrold.”
“Curious how education develops the power of lying.”
“Loying is it, sur? Don’t you know that there’s nothing in the whole wurrold loike the Goiant’s Causeway, sur?”
“What for? For mud?”
“The road _is_ a troifle muddy at this toime av the year, sur. It’s not many comes to see it in the winther toime, sur; indade, yure the first wan this week. There’s a power av rain in the nort’ av Oireland in the winter toime, sur.”
“How much further away is this Causeway?”
“Is it the Causeway, sur? But a troifle, sur. Ye’ll see it the minute we turn that bit av rock, sur. Sure an’ begorra it’s well worth the walk, for there is no place that is as noted as the Causeway, sur.”
“Yes. They told me about it at Derry. That’s why I came.”
“De ye mane to say, sur, that ye niver heard av the Goiant’s Causeway till ye came to Derry? Well, sur, Oi’ve taken tins av thousands av people over this ground, sur, and yure the first wan that iver tould me he never heard av the Causeway. Where were ye brought up, sur?”
“I’m a Belfast man.”
“De ye mane thot? Troth! Oi don’t think the professors are the biggest loiers, saving yer prisince, sur.”
“Where’s your old Causeway? We’re round that rock now.”
“Where’s the Causeway is it, sur? Where should it be but just before yer two eyes?”
“You don’t mean that foundation, do you?”
“What foundation, sur?”
“Looks like as if a building society had started a big stone tabernacle, and went bankrupt when the foundation was laid.”
“The greatest min in this wurrold, sur, tould me that——”
“Never mind what the greatest men said. _Is_ that the Causeway? That’s what I want settled.”
“It is, sur.”
“Let’s get back.”
“Back, is it, sur? Troth, ye’r not there yet. Divil a fut will Oi go back till ye’ve seen what ye paid for, sur.”
“All right, I’ll go on—under protest—merely to please you, you know.”
“Oi’m afraid ye’r hard to plaze yersilf, sur. It’s wan av the siven wondhers av the wurrold, sur.”
“That people come here? It _is_ a wonder, as you say. I’ll bet they don’t come a second time.”
“Now, beggin’ ye’r pardon, ye’r wrong there, sur. Not the sickond toime, but the twintieth toime have Oi known educated min to come, sur. And the aftener a man av sinse sees it, sur, the more wondherful he thinks it. Now, sur, ye’r fut is on the smaller Causeway, and be careful how you stip, fur it’s moighty slippery undherfut. There are three Causeways, sur, the Great Causeway bein’ in the centhre, and that we’ll come to in a minute, sur.”
“What is it used for?”
“The Causeway, is it?”
“Yes.”
“It’s used for nothin’ at all, sur.”
“Then why did they go to all this expense?”
“What expinse, sur?”
“The building of it.”
“Be all the powers, sur, it’s surely not running through your hid that the Goiant’s Causeway was built by the hand av man, sur!”
“How was it built, then? By contract?”
“Oi see plainly Oi’ll hay to begin at the beginnin’ wid you, sur. It was built by a mighty convulsion av nathure, sur.”
“Oh, yes, I remember reading about it in the papers at the time. It was the beginning of the Irish troubles.”
“It was at the beginning av toime, sur. Professor Gneiss, av Edinburgh, tould me its origin was volcanic, and that——”
“Oh, you can’t believe what a professor says. Was _he_ there?”
“He was not.”
“Well, then!”
“If you, sur, will excuse the liberty Oi’ll take, sur, in recommending you to kape silence fur a few minutes, sur, ye’ll know a good dale more whin ye lave here than ye did whin ye came, sur.”
“All right; go ahead.”
“These columns, sur, are basaltic.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s a term used by Professor Gneiss. Now Oi’ll call ye’r attention to the ind av this column. That we call octagon, meaning eight-sided, as ye can see. And if yer measure the eight sides, sur, yer’ll foind them the same to a hair’s breadth.”
“And yet you say nobody chiselled it?”
“Oi do, sur.”
“You evidently think I’ll believe anything. But no matter. Go on, go on.”
“Now, if ye’ll notice, around this octagon are eight other pillars, forming an octagon group, as we call thim here, sur, all the columns being aqual in size. Now, sur, if ye follow me here, ye will see a septagon column, from the Latin word maning siven, and around that there are siven columns.”
“Is there any sixtogon one?”
“There is not, sur.”
“It’s a sort of seven-by-eight Causeway then?”
“There, sur, Oi tould ye ye would slip down, sur. A man broke his leg there once. Are ye hurt, sur?”
“Not in the least.”
“Thank the powers for that, sur! Oi always notice that the quieter a man kapes, the more attention he can pay to his futin’.”
“And you’re paid to do the talking, too. I hadn’t thought about that.”
“Now, sur, ye see from here the Great Causeway. Isn’t that a grand soight, sur?”
“Well, that depends on what you call a——”
“Oh! tare an’ ’owns, sur, ye’ve kilt yerself entoirely this toime. Don’t attempt to roise, sur, till Oi get down to ye. Dear! dear!! Are ye badly hurt, sur?”
[Illustration: “‘DON’T ATTEMPT TO ROISE, SUR, TILL OI GET DOWN TO YE.’”]
“Groggy, but still in the ring. Say, are my trousers——”
“They _are_ torn a little, sur, Oi regret to say.”
“Why the Old Harry didn’t you tell me this place was so slippery? Do you want to break a man’s neck over this Causeway of yours?”
“Sure, sur, Oi warned ye the very first afgo. Beggin’ your pardon, sur, if ye’d pay as much attintion to ye’r fut as you do to your tongue——”
“Who’s been doing all the talking? Have I opened my mouth since we started? Well, now that we’re down here, what’s there to see?”
“Ye see these columns, sur. They’re the tallest in the Causeway. Ye can see their formation now, sur. They’re all in short lengths of three or four feet, and every joint is a perfect ball and socket wan.”
“What’s the object of the ball and socket?”
“Ah, who can tell that, sur?”
“Hadn’t the professor some pet fiction about it?”
“He _did_ say, sur——”
“I was sure of it.”
“——That it was on account of the uneven cooling of the lava. Now, look at this, sur. This is—_be_ careful, sur. Ye were nearly aff that toime again. This is the Goiant’s Wishin’ Chair. If ye sit down here, ye can have three wishes, sur.”
“I won’t sit down.”
“Have ye nothing to wish, sur?”
“No. All I wanted was to meet the biggest liar in the world, but I don’t need to wish for that now.”
“Then ye’ve met him, sur. Well, Oi suppose ye like company, sur?”
“Anything else to be seen around here?”
“Do ye see those basaltic columns on the face av the cliff, sur? That’s the Goiant’s Organ, sur.”
“Who plays on it?”
“Well, sur, the storms do. When the wind comes dhriving in from the Atlantic, and the waves lash up the Causeway, they do be sayin’ that whin the timpast is at its hoight all the grand tones av an organ can be heard comin’ from thim pipes.”
“Good enough. That’s worth the money. Here you are. I must be going now to catch my train. Good-bye.”
“Here’s a very dacent mon, sur, that sells picturs av the Causeway.”
“I don’t care for any.”
“They’re very chape, sur.”
“I want to forget the Causeway.”
“Then good-bye, sur, an’ thank ye, sur.”
“Good-bye.”
* * * * *
The Guide (to the Picture-seller): “De ye see thot mon sprawlin’ over the Causeway? Well, thot’s the dombdest fule Oi iver tuk over these racks. Oi wouldn’t take that mon over the Causeway agin fur all the money in the North av Oireland. De ye mind _thot_ now?”
_Robert Barr_ (“_Luke Sharp_”).
------------------------------------------------------------------------
_HANS BREITMANN’S BARTY._
HANS BREITMANN gife a barty; Dey had biano-blayin’, I felled in lofe mit a ’Merican frau, Her name vas Madilda Yane. She hat haar as prown ash a pretzel, Her eyes vas himmel-plue, Und vhen dey looket indo mine, Dey shplit mine heart in dwo.
[Illustration: “VENT SHPINNEN’ ROUND UND ROUND.”]
Hans Breitmann gife a barty, I vent dere you’ll pe pound; I valtzet mit Madilda Yane, Und vent shpinnen’ round und round. De pootiest Fraulein in de house, She vayed ’pout dwo hoondred pound, Und every dime she gife a shoomp She make de vindows sound.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty, I dells you it cost him dear; Dey rolled in more ash sefen kecks Of foost-rate lager beer. Und vhenefer dey knocks de shpicket in De Deutschers gifes a cheer; I dinks dat so vine a barty Nefer coom to a het dis year.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty; Dere all vas Souse and Brouse, Vhen de sooper comed in, de gompany Did make demselfs to house; Dey ate das Brot and Gensy broost, De Bratwurst and Braten vine, Und vash der Abendessen down Mit four parrels of Neckarwein.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty; Ve all cot troonk ash bigs. I poot mine mout’ to a parrel of beer, Und emptied it oop mit a schwigs; Und den I gissed Madilda Yane. Und she shlog me on de kop, Und de gompany vighted mit daple-lecks Dill de coonshtable made oos shtop.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty— Vhere ish dot barty now? Vhere ish de lofely golden cloud Dot float on de moundain’s prow? Vhere ish de himmelstrahlende stern— De shtar of de shpirit’s light? All goned afay mit de lager beer— Afay in de Ewigkeit.
_Charles Godfrey Leland._
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_OUR NEW BEDSTEAD._
[Illustration: “WE HAD TO TURN OUT EVERY HOUR.”]
I HAVE bought me a new patent bedstead, to facilitate early rising, called a “wake-up.” It is a good thing to rise early in the country. Even in the winter time it is conducive to health to get out of a warm bed by lamplight; to shiver into your drawers and slippers; to wash your face in a basin of ice-flakes; and to comb out your frigid hair with an uncompromising comb, before a frosty looking-glass. The only difficulty about it lies in the impotence of human will. You will deliberate about it and argue the point. You will indulge in specious pretences, and lie still with only the tip end of your nose outside the blankets; you will pretend to yourself that you _do_ intend to jump out in a few minutes; you will tamper with the good intention, and yet indulge in the delicious luxury. To all this the “wake-up” is inflexibly and triumphantly antagonistic. It is a bedstead with a clock scientifically inserted in the head-board. When you go to bed you wind up the clock, and point the index-hand to that hour on the dial at which you wish to rise in the morning. Then you place yourself in the hands of the invention and shut your eyes.
You are now, as it were, under the guardianship of King Solomon and Doctor Benjamin Franklin. There is no need to recall those beautiful lines of the poet’s—
“Early to bed and early to rise, Will make a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.”
Science has forestalled them. The “wake-up” is a combination of hard wood, hinges, springs, and clock-work, against sleeping late o’ mornings. It is a bedstead with all the beautiful vitality of a flower—it opens with the dawn. If, for instance, you set the hand against six o’clock in the morning, at six the clock at the bed’s head solemnly strikes a demi-twelve on its sonorous bell. If you pay no attention to the monitor, or idly, dreamily endeavour to compass the coherent sequence of sounds, the invention, within the succeeding two minutes, drops its tail-board and lets down your feet upon the floor. While you are pleasantly defeating this attempt upon your privacy by drawing up your legs within the precincts of the blankets, the virtuous head-board and the rest of the bed suddenly rise up in protest; and the next moment, if you do not instantly abdicate, you are launched upon the floor by a blind elbow that connects with the crank of an eccentric, that is turned by a cord that is wound around a drum, that is moved by an endless screw, that revolves within the body of the machinery. So soon as you are turned out, of course, you waive the balance of the nap and proceed to dress.
“Mrs. Sparrowgrass,” said I, contemplatively, after the grimy machinists had departed, “this machine is one of the most remarkable evidences of progress the ingenuity of man has yet developed. In this bedstead we see a host of cardinal virtues made practical by science. To rise early one must possess courage, prudence, self-denial, temperance, and fortitude. The cultivation of these virtues, necessarily attended with a great deal of trouble, may now be dispensed with, as this engine can entirely set aside, and render useless, a vast amount of moral discipline. I have no doubt in a short time we shall see the finest attributes of the human mind superseded by machinery. Nay, more; I have very little doubt that, as a preparatory step in this great progress, we shall have physical monitors of cast-iron and wheel-work to regulate the ordinary routine of duty in every family.”
Mrs. Sparrowgrass said she did not precisely understand what I meant.
“For instance,” said I, in continuation, “we dine every day; as a general thing, I mean. Now sometimes we eat too much, and how easy, how practicable it would be to regulate our appetites by a banquet-dial. The subject, having had the superficial area of his skull and the cubic capacity of his body worked out respectively by a licensed craniologist and by a licensed corporalogist, gets from each a certificate, which certificates are duly registered in the county clerk’s office. From the county clerk he received a permit, marked, we will say, ten.”
“Not ten pounds, I hope,” said Mrs. S.
“No, my dear,” I replied, “ten would be the average of his capacity. We will now suppose the chair, in which the subject is seated at dinner, rests upon a pendulous platform, over a delicate arrangement of levers, connected with an upright rod, that runs through the section of table in front of his plate, and this rod, we will suppose, is toothed into a ratchet-wheel, that moves the index of the banquet-dial. You will see at once that, as he hangs balanced in this scale, any absorption of food would be instantly indicated by the index. All then he is called upon to do is to watch the dial until the hand points to ‘ten,’ and then stop eating.”
“But,” said Mrs. Sparrowgrass, “suppose he shouldn’t be half through?”
“Oh!” said I, “that would not make any difference. When the dial says he has had enough, he must quit.”
“But,” said Mrs. Sparrowgrass, “suppose he _would not_ stop eating?”
“Then,” said I, “the proper way to do would be to inform against him, and have him brought immediately before a justice of the peace, and if he did not at once swear that he had eaten within his limits, fine him, and seize all the victuals on his premises.”
“Oh!” said Mrs. S., “you would have a law to regulate it, then?”
“Of course,” said I, “a statute—a statutory provision, or provisionary act. Then, the principle once being established, you see how easily and beautifully we could be regulated by the simplest motive powers. All the obligations we now owe to society and to ourselves could be dispensed with, or rather transferred to, or vested in, some superior machine, to which we would be accountable by night and day. Nay, more than that, instead of sending representatives to legislate for us, how easy it would be to construct a legislature of bronze and wheel-work—an incorruptible legislature. I would suggest a hydraulic or pneumatic congress as being less liable to explode, and more easily graduated than one propelled by steam simply. All that would be required of us then would be to elect a state engineer annually, and he, with the assistance of a few underlings, could manage the automata as he pleased.”
“I do not see,” replied Mrs. Sparrowgrass, “how that would be an improvement upon the present method, from all I hear.”
This unexpected remark of Mrs. S. surprised me into silence for a moment, but immediately recovering, I answered, that a hydraulic or pneumatic legislature would at least have this advantage—it would construct enactments for the State at, at least, one-fiftieth part of the present expense, and at the same time do the work better and quicker.
“Now, my dear,” said I, as I wound up the ponderous machinery with a huge key, “as you are always an early riser, and as, of course, you will be up before seven o’clock, I will set the indicator at that hour, so that you will not be disturbed by the progress of science. It is getting to be very cold, my dear, but how beautiful the stars are to-night. Look at Orion and the Pleiades! Intensely lustrous in the frosty sky.”
The sensations one experiences in lying down upon a complication of mechanical forces are somewhat peculiar if they are not entirely novel. I once had the pleasure, for one week, of sleeping over the boiler of a high-pressure Mississippi steamboat; and, as I knew in case of a blow up I should be the first to hear of it, I composed my mind as well as I could under the circumstances. But this reposing upon a bed of statics and dynamics, with the constant chirping and crawling of wheel-work at the bed’s head, with a thought now and then of the inexorable iron elbow below, and an uncertainty as to whether the clock itself might not be too fast, or too slow, caused me to be rather reflective and watchful than composed and drowsy.
Nevertheless, I enjoyed the lucent stars in their blue depths, and the midnight moon, now tipping the Palisades with a fringe of silver fire, and was thinking how many centuries that lovely light had played upon those rugged ridges of trap and basalt, and so finally sinking from the reflective to the imaginative, and from the imaginative to the indistinct, at last reached that happy state of half consciousness, between half asleep and asleep, when the clock in the machine woke up, and suddenly struck eight. Of course I knew it was later, but I could not imagine why it should at all, as I presumed the only time of striking was in the morning by way of signal. As Mrs. S. was sound asleep, I concluded not to say anything to her about it; but I could not help thinking what an annoyance it would be if the clock should keep on striking the hours during the night. In a little while the bedclothes seemed to droop at the foot of the bed, to which I did not pay much attention, as I was just then engaged listening to the drum below, that seemed to be steadily engaged in winding up its rope and preparing for action. Then I felt the upper part of the patent bedstead rising up, and then I concluded to jump out, just as the iron elbow began to utter a cry like unto the cry of a steel Katydid, and did jump, but was accidentally preceded by the mattress, one bolster, two pillows, ditto blankets, a brace of threadbare linen sheets, one coverlid, the baby, one cradle (overturned), and Mrs. Sparrowgrass. To gather up these heterogeneous materials of comfort required some little time, and, in the meanwhile, the bedstead subsided. When we retired again, and were once more safely protected from the nipping cold, although pretty well cooled, I could not help speaking of the perfect operation of the bedstead in high terms of praise, although, by some accident, it had fulfilled its object a little earlier than had been desirable. As I am very fond of dilating upon a pleasant theme, the conversation was prolonged until Mrs. Sparrowgrass got sleepy, and the clock struck nine. Then we had to turn out again. We had to turn out every hour during the long watches of the night for that wonderful epitome of the age of progress.
When the morning came we were sleepy enough, and the next evening we concluded to replace the “wake-up” with a common, old-fashioned bedstead. To be sure I had made a small mistake the first night, in not setting the “_indicator_” as well as the _index_ of the dial. But what of that? Who wants his rest, that precious boon, subjected to contingencies? When we go to sleep, and say our prayers, let us wake up according to our natures, and according to our virtues; some require more sleep, some less; we are not mere bits of mechanism after all; who knows what world we may chance to wake up in? For my part, I have determined not to be a humming-top, to be wound up and to run down, just like that very interesting toy one of the young Sparrowgrassii has just now left upon my table, minus a string.
_Frederick Swartout Cozzens._
------------------------------------------------------------------------
_A QUILTING._
I MUST tell you, however, of a quilting which I did not share with Mr. Sibthorpe, though I wished for him many times during the afternoon. It was held at the house of a very tidy neighbour, a Mrs. Boardman, the neatness of whose dwelling and its outworks I have often admired in passing. She invited all the neighbours, and, of course, included my unworthy self, although I had never had any other acquaintance than that which may be supposed to result from John and Sophy’s having boarded with her for some time. The walking being damp, an ox cart was sent round for such of the guests as had no “team” of their own, which is our case as yet. This equipage was packed with hay, over which was disposed, by way of _musnud_, a blue and white coverlet; and by this arrangement half-a-dozen goodly dames, including myself, found reclining room, and were carried at a stately pace to Mrs. Boardman’s. Here we found a collection of women busily occupied in preparing the quilt, which you may be sure was a curiosity to me. They had stretched the lining on a frame, and were now laying fleecy cotton on it with much care; and I understood from several aside remarks, which were not intended for the ear of our hostess, that a due regard for etiquette required that this laying of the cotton should have been performed before the arrival of the company, in order to give them a better chance for finishing the quilt before tea, which is considered a point of honour.
[Illustration: “CARRIED AT A STATELY PACE.”]
However, with so many able hands at work, the preparations were soon accomplished. The “bats” were smoothly disposed, and now consenting hands on either side
Induced a splendid cover, green and blue, Yellow and red,
wherein stars and garters, squares and triangles, figured in every possible relation to each other, and produced, on the whole, a very pretty mathematical piece of work, on which the eyes of Mrs. Boardman rested with no small amount of womanly pride.
Now needles were in requisition, and every available space round the frame was filled by a busy dame.
Several of the company, being left-handed, or rather, ambidextrous (no unusual circumstance here), this peculiarity was made serviceable at the corners, where common seamstresses could only sew in one direction, while these favoured individuals could turn their double power to double account. This beginning of the solid labour was a serious time. Scarcely a word was spoken beyond an occasional request for the thread, or an exclamation at the snapping of a needle. This last seemed of no unfrequent occurrence, as you may well suppose, when you think of the thickness of the materials, and the necessity for making at least tolerably short stitches. I must own that the most I could accomplish for the first hour was the breaking of needles, and the pricking of my fingers in the vain attempt to do as I was bid, and take my stitches “clear through.”
By-and-by it was announced that it was time to roll—and all was bustle and anxiety. The frame had to be taken apart at the corners, and two of the sides rolled several times with much care, and at this diminished surface we began again with renewed spirit. Now all tongues seemed loosened. The evidence of progress had raised everybody’s spirits, and the strife seemed to be who should talk fastest without slackening the industry of her fingers. Some held _tête-à-tête_ communications with a crony in an undertone; others discussed matters of general interest more openly; and some made observations at nobody in particular, but with a view to the amusement of all. Mrs. Vining told the symptoms of each of her five children through an attack of the measles; Mrs. Keteltas gave her opinion as to the party most worthy of blame in a late separation in the village; and Miss Polly Mittles said she hoped the quilt would not be “scant of stitches, like a bachelor’s shirt.”
Tea-time came before the work was completed, and some of the more generous declared they would rather finish it before tea. These offers fell rather coldly, however, for a real tea-drinker does not feel very good-humoured just before tea.
So Mr. Boardman drove four stout nails in the rafters overhead, corresponding in distance with the corners of the quilt, and the frame was raised and fastened to these, so as to be undisturbed, and yet out of the way during the important ceremony that was to succeed.
Is it not well said that “Necessity is the mother of invention”?
A long table was now spread, eked out by boards laid upon carpenters’ “horses,” and this was covered with a variety of table-cloths, all shining clean, however, and carefully disposed. The whole table array was equally various, the contributions, I presume, of several neighbouring log-houses. The feast spread upon it included every variety that ever was put upon a tea-table; from cake and preserves to pickles and raw cabbage cut up in vinegar.
Pies there were, and custards and sliced ham, and cheese, and three or four kinds of bread. I could do little besides look, and try to guess out the dishes. However, everything was very good, and our hostess must have felt complimented by the attention paid to her various delicacies.
The cabbage, I think, was rather the favourite; vinegar being one of the rarities of a settler’s cabin.
I was amused to see the loads of cake and pie that accumulated upon the plates of the guests.
When all had finished, most of the plates seemed full. But I was told afterwards that it was not considered civil to decline any one kind of food, though your hostess may have provided a dozen. You are expected at least to try each variety. But this leads to something which I cannot think very agreeable.
After all had left the table, our hostess began to clear it away, that the quilt might be restored to its place; and, as a preliminary, she went all round to the different plates, selecting such pieces of cake as were but little _bitten_, and paring off the half-demolished edges with a knife, in order to replace them in their original circular position in the dishes. When this was accomplished, she assiduously scraped from the edges of the plates the scraps of butter that had escaped demolition, and wiped them back on the remains of the pat. This was doubtless a season of delectation to the economical soul of Mrs. Boardman; you may imagine its effects upon the nerves of your friend. Such is the influence of habit! The good woman doubtless thought she was performing a praiseworthy action, and one in no wise at variance with her usual neat habits; and if she could have peeped into my heart, and there have read the resolutions I was tacitly making against breaking bread again under the same auspices, she would have pitied or despised such a lamentable degree of pride and extravagance. So goes this strange world.
The quilt was replaced, and several good housewives seated themselves at it, determined to “see it out.” I was reluctantly compelled to excuse myself, my inexperienced fingers being pricked to absolute rawness. But I have since ascertained that the quilt was finished that evening, and placed on Mrs. Boardman’s best bed immediately; where indeed I see it every time I pass the door, as it is not our custom to keep our handsome things in the background. There were some long stitches in it, I know, but they do not show as far as the road; so the quilt is a very great treasure, and will probably be kept as an heirloom.
I have some thoughts of an attempt in the “patchwork” line myself. One of the company at Mrs. Boardman’s remarked that the skirt of the French cambric dress I wore would make a “splendid” quilt. It is a temptation, certainly.
_Sam Slick._
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_A PATENTED CHILD._
[Illustration]
THE town of Sussex, Pennsylvania, has lately been profoundly stirred by an extraordinary and romantic lawsuit. The case was an entirely novel one, and no precedent bearing upon it is to be found in the common or statute law. While it is necessarily a matter of great interest to the legal profession, its romantic side cannot fail to attract the attention of persons of all ages and every kind of sex. In fact, it is destined to be one of the most celebrated cases in the annals of American jurisprudence.
Some time last winter a lady whom we will call Mrs. Smith, who kept a boarding-house in Sussex, took her little girl, aged four, with her to make a call on Mrs. Brown, her near neighbour. Mrs. Brown was busy in the kitchen, where she received her visitor with her usual cordiality. There was a large fire blazing in the stove, and while the ladies were excitedly discussing the new bonnet of the local Methodist minister’s wife, the little girl incautiously sat down on the stove hearth. She was instantly convinced that the hearth was exceedingly hot, and on loudly bewailing the fact, was rescued by her mother and carried home for medical treatment. A few days later Mrs. Smith burst in great excitement into the room of a young law student, who was one of her boarders, and with tears and lamentations disclosed to him the fact that her child was indelibly branded with the legend, “Patented, 1872.” These words in raised letters had happened to occupy just that part of the stove-hearth on which the child had seated herself, and being heated nearly to red heat they had reproduced themselves on the surface of the unfortunate child.
The law student entered into the mother’s sorrow with much sympathy, but after he had in some degree calmed her mind he informed her that a breach of law had been committed. “Your child,” he remarked, “has never been patented, but she is marked ‘Patented, 1872.’ This is an infringement of the statute. You falsely represent by that brand that a child for whom no patent was issued is patented. This false representation is forgery, and subjects you to penalty made and provided for that crime.”
Mrs. Smith was, as may be supposed, greatly alarmed at learning this statement, and her first impulse was to beg the young man to save her from a convict’s cell. With a gravity suited to the occasion, he explained the whole law of patents. He told her that had she desired to patent the child, she should have either constructed a model of it or prepared accurate drawings, with specifications showing distinctly what parts of the child she claimed to have invented. This model or these drawings she should have forwarded to the Patent Office, and she would then have received in due time a patent—provided, of course, the child was really patentable—and would have been authorised to label it “Patented.” “Unfortunately,” he pursued, “it is now too late to take this course, and we must boldly claim that a patent was issued, but that the record was destroyed during the recent fire in the Patent Office.”
This suggestion cheered the spirits of Mrs. Smith, but they were again dashed by the further remarks of the young man. He reminded her that the child might find it very inconvenient to be patented. “If we claim,” he went on to say, “that she has been regularly patented, it follows that the ownership of the patent, including the child herself, belongs to you, and will pass at your death into the possession of your heirs. Holding the patent, they can prevent any husband taking possession of the girl by marriage, and they can sell, assign, transfer, and set over the patent right and the accompanying girl to any purchaser. If she is sold to a speculator or to a joint-stock company, she will find her position a most unpleasant one; and to sum up the case, madam, either your child is patented or she is not. If she is not patented, you are guilty of forgery. If she is patented, she is an object of barter and sale, or in other words a chattel.”
This was certainly a wretched state of things, and Mrs. Smith, to ease her mind, began to abuse Mrs. Brown, whose stove had branded the unfortunate little girl. She loudly insisted that the whole fault rested with Mrs. Brown, and demanded to know if the latter could not be punished. The young man, who was immensely learned in the law, thereupon began a new argument. He told her that where there is a wrong there must, in the nature of things, be a remedy. “Mrs. Brown, by means of her stove, has done you a great wrong. In accordance with the maxim, _Qui facit per alium facit per se_, Mrs. Brown, and not the stove, is the party from whom you must demand redress. She has wickedly and maliciously, and at the instigation of the devil, branded your child, and thus rendered you liable for an infringement of the patent law. It is my opinion, madam, that an action for assault and an action for libel will both lie against Mrs. Brown, and ‘_semble_’ that there is also ground for having her indicted for procurement of forgery.” Finally, after much further argument, the young man advised her to apply to a magistrate and procure the arrest and punishment of Mrs. Brown.
Accordingly, Mrs. Smith applied to the Mayor, who, after vainly trying to comprehend the case, and to find out what was the precise crime alleged against Mrs. Brown, compromised the matter by unofficially asking the lady to appear before him. When both the ladies were in court Mrs. Smith, prompted by the clerk, put her complaint in the shape of a charge that Mrs. Brown had branded the youthful Smith girl. The latter was then marked “Exhibit A,” and formally put in evidence, and both complainant and defendant told their respective stories.
The result was that the court, in a very able and voluminous opinion, decided that nobody was guilty of anything, but that, with a view of avoiding the penalty of infringing the patent law, the mother must apply to Congress for a special act declaring the child regularly and legally patented.
If Congress finds time to attend to this important matter, little Miss Smith will be the first girl ever patented in this country, and the legal profession will watch with unflagging interest the law-suits to which in future any infringement of the patent may lead.
_W. L. Alden._
------------------------------------------------------------------------
_A TALK ABOUT TEA._
[Illustration: “OUR LEARNED FRIEND, DR. BUSHWHACKER.”]
“SIR,” said our learned friend, Dr. Bushwhacker, “we are indebted to China for the four principal blessings we enjoy. Tea came from China, the compass came from China, printing came from China, and gunpowder came from China—thank God! China, sir, is an old country, a very old country. There is one word, sir, we got from China that is oftener in the mouths of American people than any other word in the language. It is _cash_, sir, cash! That we derive from the Chinese. It is the name, sir, of the small brass coin they use, the coin with a square hole in the middle. And then look at our Franklin; he drew the lightning from the skies with his kite; but who invented the kite, sir? The long-tailed Chinaman, sir. Franklin had no invention; he never would have invented a kite or a printing-press. But he could use them, sir, to the best possible advantage, sir; he had no genius, sir, but he had remarkable talent and industry.
“Then, sir, we got our umbrella from China. The first man that carried an umbrella, in London, in Queen Anne’s reign, was followed by a mob. That is only one hundred and fifty years ago. We get the art of making porcelain from China. Our ladies must thank the Celestials for their tea-pots.
“Queen Elizabeth never saw a tea-pot in her life. In 1664 the East India Company brought two pounds two ounces of tea as a present for his Majesty King Charles the Second. In 1667 they imported one hundred pounds of tea.
“Then, sir, rose the reign of scandal. Queen scandal, sir! Then, sir, rose the intolerable race of waspish spinsters who sting reputations and defame humanity over their dyspeptic cups. Then, sir, the astringent principle of the herb was communicated to the heart, and domestic troubles were brewed and fomented over the tea-table. Then, sir, the age of chivalry was over, and women grew acrid and bitter; then, sir, the first temperance society was founded, and high duties were laid upon wines, and in consequence they distilled whisky instead, which made matters a great deal better, of course; and all the abominations, all the difficulties of domestic life, all the curses of living in a country village; the intolerant canvassing of character, reputation, piety; the nasty, mean, prying spirit; the uncharitable, defamatory, gossiping, tale-bearing, whispering, unwomanly, unchristianlike behaviour of those who set themselves up for patterns over their vile decoctions, sir, arose with the introduction of tea. Yes, sir; when the wine-cup gave place to the tea-cup, then the devil, sir, reached his culminating point.
“The curiosity of Eve was bad enough; but, sir, when Eve’s curiosity becomes sharpened by turgid tonics, and scandal is added to inquisitiveness, and innuendo supplies the place of truth, and an imperfect digestion is the pilot instead of charity; then, sir, we must expect to see human nature vilified, and levity condemned, and good fellowship condemned, and all good men, from Washington down, damned by Miss Tittle, and Miss Tattle, and the widow Blackleg, and the whole host of tea-drinking conspirators against social enjoyment.”
Here Dr. Bushwhacker grew purple with eloquence and indignation. We ventured to remark that he had spoken of tea “as a blessing” at first.
“Yes, sir,” responded Dr. Bushwhacker, shaking his bushy head, “that reminds one of Doctor Pangloss. Yes, sir, it is a blessing, but like all other blessings it must be used _temperately_, or else it is a curse! China, sir,” continued the doctor, dropping the oratorical and taking up the historical; “China, sir, knows nothing of perspective, but she is great in pigments. Indian ink, sir, is Chinese, so are vermilion and indigo; the malleable properties of gold, sir, were first discovered by this extraordinary people; we must thank them for our gold leaf. Gold is not a pigment, but roast pig is, and Charles Lamb says the origin of roast pig is Chinese; the beautiful fabric we call silk, sir, came from the Flowery Nation, so did embroidery, so did the game of chess, so did fans. In fact, sir, it is difficult to say what we have not derived from the Chinese. Cotton, sir, is our great staple, but they wove and spun, long staple and short staple, yellow cotton and white cotton, before Columbus sailed out of the port of Palos in the _Santa Maria_.”
_Frederick S. Cozzens._
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[Illustration: _OLD AUNT MARY’S._]
WASN’T it pleasant, O brother mine, In those old days of the lost sunshine Of youth—when the Saturday’s chores were through, And the “Sunday’s wood” in the kitchen, too, And we went visiting, “me and you,” Out to Old Aunt Mary’s? It all comes back so clear to-day! Though I am as bald as you are grey— Out by the barn-lot, and down the lane, We patter along in the dust again, As light as the tips of the drops of the rain, Out to Old Aunt Mary’s!
We cross the pasture, and through the wood Where the old grey snag of the poplar stood, Where the hammering “red-heads” hopped awry, And the buzzard “raised” in the “clearing” sky, And lolled and circled, as we went by Out to Old Aunt Mary’s!
And then in the dust of the road again; And the teams we met, and the countrymen; And the long highway, with sunshine spread As thick as butter on country bread, Our cares behind, and our hearts ahead, Out to Old Aunt Mary’s!
Why, I see her now in the open door, Where the little gourds grew up the sides and o’er The clapboard roof!—and her face—ah, me! Wasn’t it good for a boy to see— And wasn’t it good for a boy to be Out to Old Aunt Mary’s!
And oh, my brother, so far away, This is to tell you she waits to-day To welcome us:—Aunt Mary fell Asleep this morning, whispering, “Tell The boys to come!” And all is well Out to Old Aunt Mary’s!
_James Whitcomb Riley._
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_A PETITION OF THE LEFT HAND._
TO THOSE WHO HAVE THE SUPERINTENDENCY OF EDUCATION.
I ADDRESS myself to all the friends of youth, and conjure them to direct their compassionate regards to my unhappy fate, in order to remove the prejudices of which I am the victim. There are twin sisters of us; and the two eyes of man do not more resemble, nor are capable of being upon better terms with each other, than my sister and myself, were it not for the partiality of our parents, who make the most injurious distinctions between us. From my infancy I have been led to consider my sister as a being of a more elevated rank. I was suffered to grow up without the least instruction, while nothing was spared in her education.
She had masters to teach her writing, drawing, music, and other accomplishments; but if by chance I touched a pencil, a pen, or a needle, I was bitterly rebuked; and more than once I have been beaten for being awkward, and wanting a graceful manner. It is true, my sister associated me with her upon some occasions; but she always made a point of taking the lead, calling upon me only from necessity, or to figure by her side.
But conceive not, sirs, that my complaints are instigated merely by vanity. No; my uneasiness is occasioned by an object much more serious. It is the practice in our family, that the whole business of providing for its subsistence falls upon my sister and myself. If any indisposition should attack my sister,—and I mention it in confidence upon this occasion, that she is subject to the gout, the rheumatism, and cramp, without making mention of other accidents,—what would be the fate of our poor family?
Must not the regret of our parents be excessive, at having placed so great a difference between sisters who are so perfectly equal? Alas! we must perish from distress; for it would not be in my power even to scrawl a suppliant petition for relief, having been obliged to employ the hand of another in transcribing the request which I have now the honour to prefer to you.
Condescend, sirs, to make my parents sensible of the injustice of an exclusive tenderness, and of the necessity of distributing their care and affection among all their children equally. I am, with a profound respect, sirs, your obedient servant,
THE LEFT HAND. _Benjamin Franklin._
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_WOMEN’S FASHIONS._
SHOULD I not keepe promise in speaking a little to Women’s fashions, they would take it unkindly. I was loath to pester better matter with such stuffe; I rather thought it meet to let them stand by themselves, like the _Quæ Genus_ in the Grammar, being Deficients, or Redundants, not to be brought under any Rule: I shall therefore make bold for this once, to borrow a little of their loose-tongued Liberty, and misspend a word or two upon their long-wasted, but short-skirted patience; a little use of my stirrup will doe no harme.
_Ridentem dicere verum, quid prohibet?
Gray Gravity itselfe can well beteam, That Language be adapted to the Theme. He that to Parrots speaks, must parrotize; He that instructs a foole, may act th’ unwise._
It is known more then enough, that I am neither Nigard, nor Cinick, to the due bravery of the true Gentry: if any man mislikes a bully ’mong drossock more than I, let him take her for his labour! I honour the woman that can honour her selfe with her attire: a good Text alwayes deserves a fair Margent: I am not much offended if I see a trimme, far trimmer than she that wears it: in a word, whatever Christianity or Civility will allow, I can afford with _London_ measure: but when I heare a nugiperous Gentledame inquire what dresse the Queen is in this week: what the nudiustertian fashion of the court; I meane the very newest: with egge to be in it in all haste, what ever it be; I look at her as the very gizzard of a trifle, the product of a quarter of a cypher, the epitome of nothing, fitter to be kickt, if shee were of a kickable substance, than either honour’d or humour’d.
To speak moderately, I truly confesse, it is beyond the ken of my understanding to conceive, how those women should have any true grace, or valuable vertue, that have so little wit, as to disfigure themselves with such exotick garbes, as not only dismantles their native lovely lustre, but trans-clouts them into gant bar-geese, ill-shapen-shotten-shell-fish, Egyptian hyeroglyphicks, or at the best into French flurts of the pastery, which a proper English-woman should scorne with her heels; it is no marvell they weare drailes on the hinder part of their heads, having nothing as it seems in the fore part, but a few Squirril’s brains to help them frisk from one ill-favor’d fashion to another.
_These whimm-Crown’d shees, these fashion-fansying wits, Are empty thin-brained shells, and fiddling Kits._
The very troublers and impoverishers of mankind, I can hardly forbear to commend to the world a saying of a Lady living sometime with the Queen of _Bohemia_. I know not where shee found it, but it is a pitty it should be lost.
_The World is full of care, much like unto a bubble; Women and care, and care and women, and women and care and trouble._
The Verses are even enough for such odde pegma’s. I can make myselfe sicke at any time, with comparing the dazling splender wherewith our Gentlewomen were embellished in some former habits, with the goosdom wherewith they are now surcingled and debauched. Wee have about five or six of them in our Colony; if I see any of them accidentally, I cannot cleanse my phansie of them for a moneth after. I have been a solitary widdower almost twelve yeares, purposed lately to make a step over to my Native Country for a yoke fellow; but when I consider how women there have tripe-wifed themselves with their cladments, I have no heart to the voyage, least their nauseous shapes and the Sea, should work too sorely upon my stomach. I speak sadly; me thinkes it should breake the hearts of Englishmen to see so many goodly Englishwomen imprisoned in French Cages, peering out of their hood-holes for some men of mercy to help them with a little wit, and no body relieves them.
It is a more common than convenient saying, that nine Taylors make a man; it were well if nineteene could make a woman to her minde; if Taylors were men indeed, well furnished, but with meer morall principles, they would disdain to be led about like Apes, by such mymick Marmosets. It is a most unworthy thing, for men that have bones in them, to spend their lives in making fidle-cases for futilous women’s phansies; which are the very pettitoes of infirmity, the gyblets of perquisquilian toyes. I am so charitable to think, that most of that mystery would worke the cheerfuller while they live, if they might bee well discharged of the tyring slavery of mis-trying women; it is no little labour to be continually putting up English-women into Out-landish caskes; who if they be not shifted anew, once in a few moneths, grow too sowre for their Husbands. What this Trade will answer for themselves when God shall take measure of Taylors’ consciences is beyond my skill to imagine. There was a time when
_The joyning of the Red-Rose with the White, Did set our State into a Damask plight._
But now our Roses are turned to _Flore de lices_, our Carnations to Tulips, our Gilliflowers to Dayzes, our City Dames, to indenominable Quæmalry of overturcas’d things. Hee that makes Coates for the Moone had need take measure every noone; and he that makes for women, as often, to keepe them from Lunacy.
I have often heard divers Ladies vent loud feminine complaints of the wearisome varieties and chargeable changes of fashions! I marvell themselves preferre not a Bill of redresse. I would _Essex_ Ladies would lead the Chore, for the honour of their County and persons; or rather the thrice honourable Ladies of the Court, whom it best beseemes; who may wel presume of a _Le Roy le Veult_ from our sober King, a _Les Seigneurs ont Assentus_ from our prudent Peers, and the like _Assentus_ from our considerate, I dare not say wife-worne Commons! who I believe had much rather passe one such Bill, than pay so many Taylors’ Bills as they are forced to doe.
Most deare and unparallel’d Ladies, be pleased to attempt it; as you have the precellency of the women of the world for beauty and feature; so assume the honour to give, and not take Law from any, in matter of attire; if ye can transact so faire a motion among yourselves unanimously I dare say, they that most renite, will least repent. What greater honour can your Honours desire, than to build a Promontory president to all foraigne Ladies, to deserve so eminently at the hands of all the English Gentry present and to come; and to confute the opinion of all the wise men in the world; who never thought it possible for women to doe so good a work?
If any man think I have spoken rather merrily than seriously, he is much mistaken. I have written what I write with all the indignation I can, and no more than I ought. I confesse I veer’d my tongue to this kinde of Language _de industria_ though unwillingly, supposing those I speak to are uncapable of grave and rationall arguments.
I desire all Ladies and Gentlewomen to understand that all this while I intend not such as through necessary modesty to avoyd morose singularity, follow fashions slowly, a flight shot or two off, showing by their moderation that they rather draw countermont with their hearts, than put on by their examples.
I point my pen only against the light-heel’d beagles that lead the chase so fast, that they run all civility out of breath, against these Ape-headed pullets, which invent Antique foole-fangles, meerly for fashion and novelty sake.
_Nathaniel Ward._
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_THE NEWSBOY._
[Illustration: “I WISH YOU, SIR, TO CONTROL YOUR NEWSBOYS.”]
“IS this the office of the _National Pop-gun and Universal Valve Trumpet_?” inquired Sapid in sepulchral tones.
“Hey—what? Oh!—yes,” gruffly replied the clerk, as he scrutinised the applicant.
“It is, is it?” was the response.
“H—umpse;” heaving a porcine affirmative, much in use in the city of brotherly love.
“I am here to see the editor, on business of importance,” slowly and solemnly articulated Sapid. There must have been something professionally alarming in this announcement, if an opinion may be formed from the effect it produced.
“Editor’s not come down yet, is he, Spry?” inquired the clerk, with a cautionary wink at the paste-boy.
“Guess he ain’t more nor up yet,” said Spry; “the mails was late last night.”
“I’ll take a seat till he does come,” observed Sapid, gloomily.
Spry and the clerk laid their heads together in the most distant corner of the little office.
“Has he got a stick?” whispered one.
“No, and he isn’t remarkable big, nuther.”
“Any bit of paper in his hand—does he look like State House and a libel suit? It’s a’most time—not had a new suit for a week.”
“Not much; and, as we didn’t have any scrouger in the _Gun_ yesterday, perhaps he wants to have somebody tickled up himself. Send him in.”
St. Sebastian Sockdolager, Esq., the editor of _The National Pop-gun and Universal Valve Trumpet_, sat at a green table, elucidating an idea by the aid of a steel pen and whity-brown paper, and therefore St. Sebastian Sockdolager did not look up when Mr. Sapid entered the sanctum. The abstraction may, perhaps, have been a sample of literary stage effect; but it is certain that the pen pursued the idea with the speed and directness of a steeple-chase, straight across the paper, and direful was the scratching thereof. The luckless idea being at last fairly run down and its brush cut off, Mr. Sockdolager threw himself back into his chair with a smile of triumph.
“Tickletoby,” said he, rumpling his hair into heroic expansiveness.
“What?” exclaimed Sapid, rather nervously.
“My dear sir, I didn’t see you—a thousand pardons! Pray what can be done for you in our line?”
“Sir, there is a nuisance——”
“Glad of it, sir; _The Gun_ is death on a nuisance. We circulate ten thousand deaths to any sort of a nuisance every day, besides the weekly and the country edition. We are a regular smash-pipes in that line—surgical, surgical to this community—we are at once the knife and the sarsaparilla to human ills, whether financial, political, or social.”
“Sir, the nuisance I complain of lies in the circulation—in its mode and manner.”
“Bless me,” said Sockdolager, with a look of suspicion, “you are too literal in your interpretations. If your circulation is deranged, you had better try Brandreth, or the Fluid Extract of Quizembob.”
“It is not my circulation, but yours, that makes all the trouble. I never circulate—I can’t without being insulted.”
“Really, mister, I can’t say that this is clearly comprehensible to perception. Not circulate! Are you below par in the money article; or in what particular do you find yourself in the condition of ‘no go’? Excuse my facetiæ and be brief, for thought comes tumbling, bumping, booming——” and Sockdolager dipped his pen in the ink.
Mr. Sappington Sapid unravelled the web of his miseries. “I wish you, sir, to control your newsboys—to dismiss the saucy, and to write an article which shall make ’em ashamed of themselves. I shall call on every editor in the city, sir, and ask the same—a combined expression for the suppression of iniquity. We must be emancipated from this new and growing evil, or our liberties become a farce, and we are squashed and crushed in a way worse than fifty tea-taxes.”
“Pardon me, Mr. Whatcheecallem; it can’t be done—it would be suicidal, with the sharpest kind of a knife. Whatcheecallem, you don’t understand the grand movement of the nineteenth century—you are not up to snuff as to the vital principle of human progression—the propulsive force has not yet been demonstrated to your benighted optics. The sun is up, sir; the hill-tops of intellect glow with its brightness, and even the level plain of the world’s collective mediocrity is gilded by its beams; but you, sir, are yet in the foggy valley of exploded prejudice, poking along with a tuppenny-ha’penny candle—a mere dip. Suppress sauciness! why, my dear bungletonian, sauciness is the discovery of the age—the secret of advancement! We are saucy now, sir, not by the accident of constitution—temperament has nothing to do with it. We are saucy by calculation, by intention, by design. It is cultivated, like our whiskers, as a superadded energy to our other gifts. Without sauciness, what is a newsboy? what is an editor? what are revolutions? what are people? Sauce is power. Sauce is spirit, independence, victory, everything. It is, in fact,—this sauce, or ‘sass,’ as the vulgar have it,—steam to the great locomotive of affairs. Suppress, indeed! No, sir; you should regard it as part of your duty as a philanthropist and as a patriot to encourage this essence of superiority in all your countrymen; and I’ve a great mind to write you an article on that subject instead of the other, for this conversation has warmed up my ideas so completely that justice will not be done to the community till they, like you, are enlightened on this important point.”
St. Sebastian Sockdolager, now having a leading article for _The National Pop-gun and Universal Valve Trumpet_ clearly in his mind, was not a creature to be trifled with. An editor in this paroxysm, however gentle in his less inspired moments, cannot safely be crossed, or even spoken to. It is not wise to call him to dinner, except through the keyhole; and to ask for “more copy,” in general a privileged demand, is a risk too fearful to be encountered. St. Sebastian’s eye became fixed, his brow corrugated, his mouth intellectually ajar.
“But, sir, the nuisance,” said Sappington.
“Don’t bother!” was the impatient reply, and the brow of St. Sebastian Sockdolager grew black as his own ink.
“The boys, sir, the boys!—am I to be worried out of my life and soul?”
The right hand of St. Sebastian Sockdolager fell heavily upon the huge pewter inkstand—the concatenation of his ideas had been broken—he half raised himself from his chair and glanced significantly from his visitor to the door. “Mizzle!” said he, in a hoarse, suppressed whisper.
The language itself was unintelligible—the word might have been Chaldaic, for all that Sapid knew to the contrary; but there are situations in which an interpreter is not needed, and this appeared to be one of them. Sapid never before made a movement so swiftly extemporaneous.
He intends shortly to try whether the Grand Jury is a convert to the new doctrine of sauciness.
_Joseph C. Neal._
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_THE BOYS AROUND THE HOUSE._
SURELY you must have seen a boy of eight or ten years of age get ready for bed? His shoe-strings are in a hard knot, and after a few vain efforts to unlace them he rushes after a case-knife and saws each string in two. One shoe is thrown under the table, the other behind the stove, his jacket behind the door, and his stockings are distributed over as many chairs as they will reach.
The boy doesn’t slip his pants off; he struggles out of them, holding a leg down with his foot and drawing his limbs out after many stupendous efforts. While doing this his hands are clutched into the bedclothes, and by the time he is ready to get into bed the quilts and sheets are awry and the bed is full of humps and lumps. His brother has gone through the same motions, and both finally crawl into bed. They are good boys, and they love each other, but they are hardly settled on their backs when one cries out—
“Hitch along!”
“I won’t!” bluntly replies the other.
“Ma, Bill’s got more’n half the bed!” cries the first.
“Hain’t either, ma!” replies Bill.
There is a moment of silence, and then the first exclaims—
“Get yer feet off’n me!”
“They hain’t touching you!” is the answer.
“Yes they be, and you’re on my pillar, too!”
“Oh! my stars, what a whopper! You’ll never go to heaven!”
The mother looks into the bedroom and kindly says—
“Come, children, be good, and don’t make your mother any trouble.”
“Well,” replies the youngest, “if Bill ’ll tell me a bear story ’ll go to sleep.”
The mother withdraws, and Bill starts out—
“Well, you know, there was an old bear who lived in a cave. He was a big black bear. He had eyes like coals of fire, you know, and when he looked at a feller he——”
“Ma, Bill’s scaring me!” yells Henry, sitting on end.
“Oh, ma! that’s the awfullest story you ever heard!” replies Bill.
“Hitch along, I say!” exclaims Henry.
“I am along!” replies Bill.
“Get yer knee out’n my back!”
“Hain’t anywhere near ye!”
“Gimme some cloze!”
“You’ve got more’n half now!”
“Come, children, do be good and go to sleep,” says the mother, entering the room and arranging the clothes.
They doze off after a few muttered words, to preserve the peace until morning, and it is popularly supposed that an angel sits on each bed-post to sentinel either curly head during the long, dark hours.
“Ho-hum!” yawns Bill.
“Ho-hum!” yawns Henry.
It is morning, and they crawl out of bed. After four or five efforts they get into their pants, and then reach out for stockings.
“I know I put mine right down here by this bed!” exclaims Bill.
“And I put mine right there by the end of the bureau!” adds Henry.
They wander around, growling and jawing, and the mother finally finds the stockings. Then comes the jackets. They are positive that they hung them on the hooks, and boldly charge that some maliciously wicked person removed them. And so it goes until each one is finally dressed, washed, and ready for breakfast, and the mother feels such a burden off her mind that she can endure what follows their leaving the table—a good half-hour’s hunt after their hats, which they “positively hung up,” but which are at last found under some bed, or stowed away behind the woodbox.
_C. B. Lewis (“M Quad”)._
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_MR. DOTY MAD._
MR. HENRY K. DOTY, one of the most prominent citizens, and the leading hide and pelt dealer in the North-West, has just returned from a European tour. He has been absent about four months; and in that time he has made a visit to every European country, and has become thoroughly acquainted with the customs, manners, and languages of the different people. He spent about seventy-five thousand dollars on the trip; but this could not be called an extravagant sum when one takes into consideration the superb paintings, statuary, and other works of virtue that he brought back with him. In Paris, upon the Roo de Rivoly alone, he purchased fifteen thousand dollars’ worth of pictures; and in Brussels he bought several thousand dollars’ worth of those elegant carpets from which that city derives its name. Mr. Doty says that he was well treated everywhere except in England. He is specially bitter against Mr. Phelps, our representative at the court of St. James.
“This man Phelps,” says he, “is a little, dried-up, snobbish Vermont lawyer, with a soul no bigger than a huckleberry. I dyed my moustache, and put on my dress-suit and my twenty-thousand-dollar diamond bosom-pin, and called to see him. A fine specimen he is to represent our wealth and culture! I don’t believe his clothes cost more than twenty dollars a suit.
“‘I suppose I ought to call on the queen,’ says I.
“He didn’t say anything; and I continued, ‘Would you mind introducing me?’
“‘Really, Mr. Doty,’ says he, ‘I do not feel like presenting an entire stranger to her Majesty.’
“‘Oh! you needn’t be scared,’ says I, ‘for I carry as big a letter of credit as any American in London; and when it comes to culture, and that sort of thing, I can knock the socks off any of your lords and marqueezies.’
“Well, will you believe it? he had the impudence to shove a printed list of questions at me.
“‘You will have to answer these on oath before I can tell you whether I can present you to her Majesty,’ says he.
“I was as mad as a Texas steer. Here are some of the questions: ‘Did you ever have a grandfather? and if so, what was his vocation?’ ‘Have you contracted the toothbrush habit?’ ‘Are you addicted to the use of the double negative?’ ‘Spell phthisis, strychnine, pneumonia?’ Fine questions these to put to a gentleman worth a cool million! I told him to go to —— with his queen; and I’m going to have my private secretary write a letter to the President, complaining of Phelps, and demanding that he be discharged.”
_Eugene Field._
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_OUR TWO OPINIONS._
US two wuz boys when we fell out,— Nigh to the age uv my youngest now; Don’t rec’lect what ’t wuz about, Some small deeff’rence, I’ll allow. Lived next neighbours twenty years, A-hatin’ each other, me ’nd Jim,— _He_ havin’ _his_ opinyin uv _me_, ’nd _I_ havin’ _my_ opinyin uv _him_.
Grew up together ’nd wouldn’t speak, Courted sisters, ’nd marr’d ’em, too; ’tended same meetin’-house oncet a week, A-hatin’ each other through ’nd through! But when Abe Linkern asked the West F’r soldiers, we answered,—me ’nd Jim,— _He_ havin’ _his_ opinyin uv _me_, ’nd _I_ havin’ _my_ opinyin uv _him_.
But down in Tennessee one night Ther wuz sound uv firin’ fur away, ’nd the sergeant allowed ther’d be a fight With the Johnnie Rebs some time nex’ day; ’nd as I wuz thinkin’ uv Lizzie ’nd home Jim stood afore me, long ’nd slim,— _He_ havin’ _his_ opinyin uv _me_, ’nd _I_ havin’ _my_ opinyin uv _him_.
[Illustration: “US TWO SHUCK HANDS.”]
Seemed like we knew ther wuz goin’ to be Serious trouble f’r me ’nd him; Us two shuck hands, did Jim ’nd me, But never a word from me or Jim! He went _his_ way ’nd _I_ went _mine_, ’nd into the battle’s roar went we,— _I_ havin’ _my_ opinyin uv Jim, ’nd _he_ havin’ _his_ opinyin uv _me._
Jim never come back from the war again, But I hain’t forgot that last, last night When, waitin’ f’r orders, us two men Made up ’nd shuck hands, afore the fight. ’nd after it all, it’s soothin’ to know That here _I_ be ’nd yonder’s Jim,— _He_ havin’ _his_ opinyin uv _me_, ’nd _I_ havin’ _my_ opinyin uv _him_.
_Eugene Field._
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_ONE OF MR. WARD’S BUSINESS LETTERS._
To the Editor of the ——.
SIR—I’m movin along—slowly along—down tords your place. I want you should rite me a letter, sayin how is the show bizniss in your place. My show at present consists of three moral Bares, a Kangaroo (a amoozin little Raskal—’twould make you larf yerself to deth to see the little cuss jump up and squeal) wax figgers of G. Washington Gen. Tayler, John Bunyan Capt. Kidd and Dr. Webster in the act of killin Dr. Parkman, besides several miscellanyus moral wax statoots of celebrated piruts & murderers, &c., ekalled by few & exceld by none. Now Mr. Editor, scratch orf a few lines sayin how is the show bizness down to your place. I shall hav my hanbills dun at your offiss. Depend upon it. I want you should git my hanbills up in flamin stile. Also git up a tremenjus excitemunt in yr. paper ’bowt my onparaleld Show. We must fetch the public sumhow. We must wurk on their feelins. Cum the moral on ’em strong. If its a temprance community tell ’em I sined the pledge fifteen minits arter Ise born, but on the contery ef your peple take their tods, say Mister Ward is as Jenial a feller as we ever met, full of conwiviality, & the life an sole of the Soshul Bored. Take, don’t you? If you say anythin abowt my show say my snaiks is as harmliss as the new-born Babe. What a interestin study it is to see a zewological animal like a snaik under perfeck subjecshun! My kangaroo is the most larfable little cuss I ever saw. All for 15 cents. I am anxyus to skewer your infloounce. I repeet in regard to them hanbills that I shall git ’em struck orf up to your printin offiss. My perlitercal sentiments agree with yourn exackly. I know thay do, becawz I never saw a man whoos didn’t.
Respectively yures,
A. WARD.
P.S.—You scratch my back & Ile scratch your back.
_Artemus Ward._
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_THE SHOWMAN’S COURTSHIP._
THARE was many affectin ties which made me hanker arter Betsy Jane. Her father’s farm jined our’n; their cows and our’n squencht their thurst at the same spring; our old mares both had stars in their forrerds; the measles broke out in both famerlies at nearly the same period; our parients (Betsy’s and mine) slept reglarly every Sunday in the same meetin house, and the nabers used to obsarve, “How thick the Wards and Peasleys air!” It was a surblime site, in the Spring of the year, to see our sevral mothers (Betsy’s and mine) with their gowns pin’d up so thay couldn’t sile ’em, affecshunitly Bilin sope together & aboozin the nabers.
Altho I hankerd intensly arter the objeck of my affecshuns, I darsunt tell her of the fires which was rajin in my manly Buzzom. I’d try to do it but my tung would kerwollup up agin the roof of my mowth & stick thar, like deth to a deseast Afrikan, or a country postmaster to his offiss, while my hart whanged agin my ribs like a old-fashioned wheat Flale agin a barn door.
’Twas a carm still nite in Joon. All nater was husht and nary zeffer disturbed the sereen silens. I sot with Betsy Jane on the fense of her farther’s pastur. We’d bin rompin threw the woods, kullin flours & drivin the woodchuck from his Native Lair (so to speak) with long sticks. Wall we sot thar on the fense, a swingin our feet two and fro, blushin as red as the Baldinsville skool house when it was fust painted, and lookin very simple, I make no doubt. My left arm was ockepied in ballunsin myself on the fense, while my rite was woundid luvinly round her waste.
[Illustration: “I CLEARED MY THROAT AND TREMBLINLY SED, ‘BETSY, YOU’RE A GAZELLE.’”]
I cleared my throat and tremblinly sed, “Betsy, you’re a Gazelle.”
I thought that air was putty fine. I waitid to see what effeck it would hav upon her. It evidently didn’t fetch her, for she up and sed—
“You’re a sheep!”
Sez I, “Betsy, I think very muchly of you.”
“I don’t b’leeve a word you say—so there now cum!” with which obsarvashun she hitched away from me.
“I wish thar was winders to my Sole,” said I, “so that you could see some of my feelins. There’s fire enuff in here,” said I, strikin my buzzum with my fist, “to bile all the corn beef and turnips in the naberhood. Versoovius and the Critter ain’t a circumstans!”
She bowd her hed down and commenst chawin the strings to her sun bonnet.
“Ar could you know the sleeplis nites I worry threw with on your account, how vittles has seized to be attractiv to me, & how my lims has shrunk up, you wouldn’t dowt me. Gase on this wastin form and these ’ere sunken cheeks——”
I should have continnered on in this strane probly for sum time, but unfortnitly I lost my ballunse and fell over into the pastur kersmash, tearin my close and seveerly damagin myself ginerally.
Betsy Jane sprung to my assistance in dubble quick time and dragged me 4th. Then drawin herself up to her full hite, she said:
“I won’t listen to your noncents no longer. Jes say rite strate out what you’re drivin at. If you mean gettin hitched, I’M IN!”
I considered that air enuff for all practical purpusses, and we proceeded immejitly to the parson’s, and was made 1 that very nite.
(Notiss to the Printer. Put some stars here.)
* * * * *
I’ve parst threw many tryin ordeels sins then, but Betsy Jane has bin troo as steel. By attendin strickly to bizniss I’ve amarsed a handsum Pittance. No man on this footstool can rise & git up & say I ever knowinly injered no man or wimmin folks, while all agree that my Show is ekalled by few and exceld by none, embracin as it does a wonderful colleckshun of livin wild Beests of Pray, snaix in grate profushun, a endliss variety of life-size wax figgers, & the only traned kangaroo in Ameriky—the most amoozin little cuss ever introjuced to a discriminatin public.
_Artemus Ward._
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_YE PEDAGOGUE._
A BALLAD
[Illustration: “AND STRAP YE URCHINS WELLE.”]
RIGHTE learnéd is ye Pedagogue, Fulle apt to reade and spelle, And eke to teache ye parts of speeche, And strap ye urchins welle.
For as ’tis meete to soake ye feete, Ye ailinge heade to mende; Ye younker’s pate to stimulate, He beats ye other ende!
Righte lordlie is ye Pedagogue, As any turbaned Turke; For welle to rule ye District Schoole, It is no idle worke.
For oft Rebellion lurketh there, In breaste of secrete foes, Of malice fulle, in waite to pulle Ye Pedagogue his nose!
Sometimes he heares with trembling feares Of ye ungodlie rogue On mischiefe bent, with felle intent To licke ye Pedagogue!
And if ye Pedagogue be smalle, When to ye battell led, In such a plighte, God sende him mighte To break ye rogue his heade!
Daye after daye, for little paye, He teacheth what he can, And bears ye yoke, to please ye folke, And ye committee-man.
Ah! many crosses hath he borne, And many trials founde, Ye while he trudged ye district through, And boarded rounde and rounde!
Ah! many a steake hath he devoured, That, by ye taste and sighte, Was in disdaine, ’twas very plaine, Of Daye his patent righte!
Fulle solemn is ye Pedagogue, Amonge ye noisy churls, Yet other while he hath a smile To give ye handsome girls;