Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year
1870, by the PUNCHINELLO PUBLISHING COMPANY,
in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States, for
the Southern District of New York.
MAN AND WIVES.A TRAVESTY. By MOSE SKINNER. CHAPTER FIFTH. QUEER DOINGS AT THE HALF-WAY HOUSE.  “Tell the
minister,” said ANN to TEDDY, “to come in. If I don’t get a husband out
of this somehow, I ain’t smart. I’ll just marry the man I’ve
got here.”
ARCHIBALD sank down on the sofa, bathed in a cold perspiration. “Oh, don’t” he groaned; “you mustn’t. ‘Twasn’t my
fault; JEFF sent me.” Her eyes flashed on him angrily. “Yes, you helped JEFF set a trap for me,” said she,
“and you’ve fell into it yourself. Come, here’s the minister.” But ARCHIBALD didn’t come, he only turned white, and made a
gurgling noise. “There should be somebody here competent to give away the
bridegroom,” said the minister, with an air of annoyance. “Sure, and it’s meself as’ll do that same,” said TEDDY,
obeying a nod from ANN. “Away now with sich modeshty, youngster. Bear up and be a man.
It’ll soon be over. And if ye make a fuss,” he added in a whisper,
“I’ll knock the head off ye. Do ye mind that?” Then, as if relating his
experience to a large and sympathetic audience: “‘Twas just that way I
felt meself like, when the knot was tied. Wake in the knees sim’larly,
and a faylin’ like I was a cold dish-cloth wrung out. But Lord, he’ll
hold up his head agin, I’ll warrant ye.” “Oh, why can’t you let me go?” begged ARCHIBALD, “I ain’t done
nothin’.” TEDDY smiled. ‘Twas such a smile as a dentist gives, just
before he swoops upon his prey. “Did you iver now?” said he, appealing to the minister. “What
a man it is. As bashful as a young gyrl, without a mammy to smooth it
over. Steady now. There you are, as nice as a cotton hat,” he
continued, as he put ARCHIBALD’S arm within ANN’S. “Lean aginst me as
hard as iver ye like, man. I well knows as I’ll nivir git me reward in this
world, for all the young cooples as I’ve startid in life, but, thank
Hevins, there’s another.” The ceremony commenced. What can one coy youth do, single-handed, against a woman who
is determined to marry him? Like the beautiful young lady in the
endless love-stories, who faints at the altar with her hard-hearted
father, the Duke, on one side, and the relentless bridegroom, the
Count, on the other, ARCHIBALD BLINKSOP was hemmed in by destiny. There
was alas! no steel-clad knight with his visor down, to rush in, and
shout in trumpet tones: “Hold! I forbid the bans—— To be
continued in our next. Back numbers sent to any address.” No.
Steel-clad knights are, unfortunately, somewhat scarce in Indiana, and
so the ceremony continued. TEDDY was first bridesman. He not only supported ARCHIBALD,
but he held his head and jerked it forward occasionally, thus assisting
in the responses. The ceremony concluded. At its close ARCHIBALD BLINKSOP, according to the Law of
Indiana, was a Man and One Wife. At its close ANN BRUMMET, according to the same Law, was a
Woman and One Husband. The world is large. To a woman of her immense strategical
resources this was but a fair beginning. Blest with a good constitution
and rare matrimonial attainments, why should she falter in the good
work thus begun? They picked the new-made husband up, limp as a rag, and laid
him tenderly on the sofa. TEDDY and the minister withdrew, and the
Honeymoon commenced. ARCHIBALD began to recover. “Where am I?” he moaned faintly. “You’re married,” said ANN. He groaned, and wiped the perspiration from his pallid brow. “Can I go home?” he inquired feebly. “Yes,” replied ANN. “Go, and when I want you I’ll come for
you. Tell your dear BELINDA that ANN BRUMMET, the poor
relation, has got ahead of her on this heat. She didn’t think,
did she, when she was courting you, that she was only just getting you
ready for me?” But before she was through, ARCHIBALD, moaning in broken
accents that he wished he was dead, had rushed frantically from the
house. ANN was congratulating herself on her success, when there came
another rap from TEDDY. “Sure and it’s your lawyer this time. Will I sind him away?” “No,” said ANN, “I want to see him. And bring in some oysters
and sherry. I’m getting hungry.” “Well,” said the lawyer, entering and taking a chair
familiarly, where’s your man?” “Gone,” said ANN. “What! without the divorce? Whew! that’s too bad. How
did it happen?” “JEFF didn’t come,” replied ANN. “He sent a substitute. But I
wasn’t going to be fooled that way, so I just drafted him
instead.” “What! married him?” queried the lawyer, incredulously. “Yes, why not? DIGBY was here, you see, and I could not find
it in my heart to cheat the poor man out of a job, with a large family
on his hands, too.” And she laughed. “Well, that is a joke,” was the lawyer’s reply. And he
rubbed his hands appreciatively. “Who is the fellow? What’s his name?” “BLINKSOP,” said ANN, “ARCHIBALD. Oh, won’t there be a row,”
she chuckled. “He’s engaged to my cousin BELINDA, you see.” At this juncture TEDDY entered with the oysters and sherry. “Come,” said ANN to the lawyer, “sit up here and have
something to eat, and I’ll tell you all about it. TEDDY,” she continued
facetiously, “will you ask a blessing?” TEDDY closed his eyes reverentially. “For what I’m going to resayve out of this,” said he, “may I
be truly thankful, and, oh Lord! I wish ’twas more.” And he went out
with a solemn air. “Did I understand you to say,” inquired the lawyer, after he
had animated his diaphragm with two glasses of sherry, “that this
BLINKSOP is engaged to your cousin?” “Yes,” replied ANN, struggling with a very large oyster. “I
call her cousin, but there’s no blood-relation.” “When did the engagement take place?” he inquired, hoisting
another glass of sherry. “Only yesterday; but it’s pretty well known that she’s been
soft on him for a good while.” “Has the engagement been formally announced?” said he, holding
the now empty bottle upside down, and squeezing it vigorously. “Let me
fill your glass,” he continued, holding the bottle to the light and
examining it critically, with one eye closed. “No, I thank you, I’ve got enough. Yes,” she went on, “the
engagement was known far and wide in less than two hours. There was a
croquet party at the house yesterday, and BELINDA told ’em all. Why?” “Because,” replied the lawyer, setting his glass upside down,
and rolling the empty bottle along the floor, with a dejected air,
“because it may affect this marriage of yours.” “What, my marriage with BLINKSOP?” “Yes.” “In what way?” “It may test its legality,” was the answer. “Mind, I don’t say
your marriage is not valid; but, in this State, if a couple solemnly
engage themselves, they are, to all intents and purposes, legally
married. In New England it is even more rigid. There, I understand, if
a young man goes home with a young lady on a Sunday evening, it is
considered as good as an engagement; and if, on the next Sunday
evening, he goes home with another young lady, he is looked upon as a
fickle-minded miscreant, capable of ruining a whole town. Little
children avoid him, and even dogs go round the corner at his approach.
Now, if this BLINKSOP chooses to contest this, marriage, I
think—mind you, I only think—that with this
previous engagement to back his unwillingness to marry you, this
marriage will go for nothing.” Having delivered this legal opinion with an air of profound
wisdom, and the most acute penetration, he leaned back in his chair,
crossed his legs, and regarded his empty glass as with the air of a man
whose fondest hopes in that direction had been ruthlessly crushed. And
ANN was walking the floor thoroughly excited. “It’s just my confounded luck,” said she, angrily, “just as I
was counting on galling BELINDA, too. I don’t believe,” she added after
a pause, “that BLINKSOP’S got spunk enough to contest it.” “Perhaps not; but if he should——” “Well, what shall I do?” she interrupted, impatiently. The lawyer reached deliberately over the table, and drank the
few drops of wine that remained in ANN’S glass. “Do,” said he, slowly, “just what you were going to do, in the
first place.” “What! Marry JEFFRY MAULBOY?” The lawyer nodded. “But it’s too late now. He wouldn’t come.” “Try it,” was the lawyer’s answer. “Urge him,” he
added, significantly. The woman who hesitates is lost. ANN hesitated, but she wasn’t
lost. No; she rather thought she was found. “I’ll do it, old boy,” she finally said, “if I can find him,
high or low. See here, if you don’t hear from me, come here day after
to-morrow—will you—and bring DIGBY with you?” The lawyer promised, and took his departure. ANN immediately wrote a letter, sealed and directed it to
JEFFRY MAULBOY, and rung for TEDDY. “Do you know of a man named JEFFRY MAULBOY?” said she. TEDDY opened his eyes very wide. “What, the Prize-Fighter?” said he. “It’s a jokin’ ye are; fur
how could ye ask that same, afther I see him giv’ TIM MCGONIGLE sich an
illegant knock-down with me own eyes, at the torchlight procession in
the fall of the winter? And JIM, with a shlit in his ear as was
bewtifool to look at, jumps up, and says he——” He paused, for tears stood in ANN’S eyes. The reminiscence was
too much for her overcharged soul. “Yes,” she murmured. “He was always just such a lovely brick,
was JEFF.” Then she added, with an effort: “I want you to take this
letter to him the first thing in the morning. Go to Mrs. LADLE’S first,
and if he ain’t there—Do you know where his folks live?” “I do that. It’s a lawyer his father is, and lives at Western
Bend. I’ll find him, mum, sure.” “Do it,” said ANN, “and I’ll find you for a month.” TEDDY took the letter and retired to his room. “To JIFFRY MAULBOY the Prize-Fighter,” said he, patting it
lovingly. “Well-a-day! Who’d a thought it now? Here’s somethin
to be proud of. Here’s somethin to boast of like, a settin’ at
the fireside, mebbe, with me little ansisters upon me knees. ‘And it’s
meself, me little ducks,’ I’d say, ‘as carried a letther, with me own
hands, to the great JIFFRY MAULBOY, as wiped out PATSY MCFADDEN in
a fair shtand-up fight, and giv’ TIM MCGONIGLE a private mark as he
carried to his grave.’ I wonder what’s in it?” he continued, holding it
up to the light. “Divil a word now can I see. That’s illaygil, and
shows there’s mischief brewin’. Now what would an unconvarted haythen
do as hadn’t the moril welfare of the community a layin’ close to his
heart like? Carry the letther, and ax no questions. But what would an
airnest Christian do, who’s a bloomin’ all over with religion, and
looks upon the piety of the public as the apple of his eye? He’d take
his pinknife, jist so, and shlip the blade under the saylin’-wax, jist
so, and pacify his conscience like by raydin’ the letther.” Having convinced himself that the operation, viewed in a
purely religious light, was strictly mercantile, TEDDY snuffed the
candle with his thumb and forefinger, and spread the letter on the
table. It ran thus:— “HALF-WAY HOUSE, June 30th—Evening. “JEFFRY MAULBOY:—You have gone back on your word,
and made a desperate woman of me. I’ll do all I threatened, and more. I
have just written to Mrs. CUPID, and kept back nothing. If you
ain’t here by day after to-morrow, ready to marry me, as you agreed
to, I’ll send the letter, and go to her besides. Do as you please.
I don’t care for my future, if you don’t for yours.
Trust the bearer. “ANN BRUMMET.” TEDDY read it twice. Then he held up his hands, lost in
admiration. “Married to one man, and a goin’ for another afore the
ceremony is cold! What talints! What nupchility! Oh, what an illegant
Mormyn is bein’ wastid in this very house! If ye could grow a daughter
like that, TEDDY me boy, she’d sit ye up for life.” He shook
his head, sighed heavily, and gazed wistfully at the letter. “I couldn’t look poshterity in the face,” he continued, with a
self-accusing air, “without a copy of that letther.” He went and got writing materials with evident reluctance, and
after three or four trials, succeeded in producing a very good
duplicate of ANN’S letter, bearing himself, throughout, like a man who
sees his duty plainly before him, and does it without flinching. He put the duplicate in the envelope, sealed it carefully, put
the original in his pocket, and in ten minutes was abed and asleep. (To be continued.)
PUNCHINELLO’S PLAN FOR THE PREVENTION AND DETECTION OF
CRIME. In view of the amount of crime which the detective police is
apparently unable to trace to its authors, and the number of criminals
who constantly elude arrest, Mr. PUNCHINELLO begs to submit an entirely
new and original plan for the prevention and detection of crime, which
he hopes will receive the favorable consideration of the powers that be. In the first place, he would recommend that all Jail Birds be
immediately transported to the Canary Islands. Second. The entire population of the City of New York
should be organized into a Vigilance Committee. This force should be
employed night and day in watching the remaining inhabitants and
outsiders. Any member found asleep on his (lamp) post should be drawn
(by our special artist) and quartered (in a station-house for the
night). Third. All residents should be compelled, on pain of
being instantly garroted, to surrender their valuables, and even their
invaluables, to the Property Clerk, Comic Headquarters, PUNCHINELLO
Office, who should be held strictly irresponsible and be well paid for
it. Fourth. Everybody should be instantly arrested and held
to bail, as a precaution against the escape of wrong-doers. It should
be made the duty of proprietors of liquor saloons to Bale out their
customers when “too full.” Fifth. Any person found with a ‘Dog’ in his possession
should be compelled to give a strict account of himself; the ‘Dog’
should be Collared, sent to the Pound, closely interrogated, and his
evidence carefully Weighed. In cases of ‘Barking up the Wrong Tree’ the
person unjustly arrested should be indemnified. Sixth. The City Government should immediately offer an
immense reward for the invention of a telescope of sufficient power to
detect crime whenever and wherever committed within the city limits.
This instrument should be placed on the summit of the dome of the New
County Court House, and a competent scientific person appointed to be
continually on the look-out, and his observations noted down by a
Stenographer. Seventh. There should be frequent balloon ascensions in
various parts of the city, under the direction of distinguished
aeronauts, for the purpose of watching the behavior of evil disposed
persons. In order that these aerial movements may excite no suspicion
in the minds of persons under surveillance, the balloons should ascend
high enough to be out of sight. They will then be out of mind. Eighth. A Sub-Committee should be chosen, the members
of which shall hang about the various haunts of vice in back slums, and
learn as much as possible of the nefarious projects of the desperate
characters who frequent such dens. Each member should report daily, and
if he is not familiar with the ‘flash’ dialect in which thieves
converse (which is very improbable, if chosen as suggested), should
take care to provide himself with a copy of GROSE’S Slang Dictionary or
Vocabulary of Gross Language, which will the better enable him to
understand it. Ninth. A strict blockade of the port should be
maintained, to prevent the ingress of bad characters from abroad, and
especially from the now Radical State of New Jersey, with which
ferry-boat communication should be immediately cut off. Tenth. A Reformatory School in which the Dangerous
Classes might (except during recitations) be kept under restraint would
be a great public benefit. The study of metaphysics should be
prohibited at such an institution. Burglars especially should not be
allowed to Open Locke on the Human Understanding.
The Worst Kind of “Paris Green.” It is stated by observant flâneurs that much absinthe
is consumed by ladies who frequent fashionable up-town restaurants. One
lovely blonde has grown so absinthe-minded from the habit, that
she regularly leaves the restaurant without paying for her luncheon.
Quarrelsome in their Cups. Should the European Powers get into a fight over the Sublime
Porte, what a strong argument it would be in favor of temperance!
 ABOUT A FOOT. Mr. Bunyan (whose corns have just been subjected to severe
pressure). “YOU OLD BEGGAR, YOU!” Mr. Lightfoot (who is a little hard of hearing). “NO
APOLOGY NECESSARY, I ASSURE YOU, SIR; MATTER OF NO CONSEQUENCE
WHATEVER; PRAY DON’T MENTION IT.”
MR. BEZZLE’S DREAM. MR. BEZZLE was the editor and proprietor of a large and
influential newspaper that sold two for a cent, and had special
correspondents in every corner of the office. By honest industry and a
generous disregard of what went into the newspaper, so that it paid, he
had raised himself to the highest rung of fortune’s ladder, and we all
know what tall ringing that is. He used to say that to accept
one kind of advertisement and to reject another, was an injustice to
the public and an outrage upon society, and that strict integrity
required that he should accept, at as much as he could get a line,
every advertisement sent for insertion. It would have done you good to
have witnessed Mr. BEZZLE’S integrity in this respect, and the noble
spirit of self-sacrifice with which he resolved that none of the public
should be slighted. He used to laugh to scorn the transcendental notion
about the editorial columns not being purchased, “If my opinions are
worth anything,” he used to exclaim, “they are worth being paid for;
and if I unsay to-morrow what I said yesterday, the contradiction is
only apparent, and is in accordance with the great spirit of progress
and the breaking up of old institutions.” The sequel to this
magnanimous career may be imagined. The enterprise paid so well that
old BEZZLE found it to his interest to employ a man at fifteen dollars
a week to do nothing else but write notes from “Old Subscribers,”
informing BEZZLE that they had taken his “valuable paper” for over
twenty years, that no family should be without it, and that they would
rather, any morning, go without their breakfast than go without reading
the Hifalutin’ Harbinger. One day, when BEZZLE had been an
editor for forty years, he fell asleep and had a dreadful dream. He
thought that he rose early one morning, dressed himself in his best
suit of broadcloth, which he had taken for a bad debt, walked up to the
ticket office of a theatre where he was well known, and asked for a
couple of seats. The gentlemanly treasurer (was there ever a treasurer
that wasn’t gentlemanly in a newspaper notice?) handed him two of the
best seats in the house—end seats, middle aisle, six rows
from the stage. Mr. BEZZLE slapped down a five-dollar bill with that
air of virtue which had become a second nature to him. (Second nature,
by the by, is no more like nature at first hand than second childhood
is like real childhood.) “Why, Mr. BEZZLE!” exclaimed the treasurer, “have you taken
leave of your senses, sir? Put that back in your pocket;” and he
pointed to the recumbent bank-note. “Who ever heard of an editor paying
for two seats at the theatre since the world began? What have we ever
done to offend you, Mr. BEZZLE, that you should behave thus?” “Sir,” said Mr. BEZZLE, “I once was young, but now am old. I
see the error of my editorial ways, and have resolved to mend ’em. My
columns are not to be bought, sir. My dramatic critic is not to
be suborned. I am determined to tear down the flaunting lie with which
THESPIS has so long concealed her blushless face, and to show the
deluded public the cothurnus bespattered, and the sock and buskin
draggled in the mire. Perish my theatrical advertising columns when I
cease to tell the truth! There is the sum twice told: I pays my money
and I takes my choice. Never mind the change.” And with these words Mr.
BEZZLE stalked off, his face crimson with a rush of aesthetics to the
head. From the theatre Mr. BEZZLE went to the house of a celebrated
publisher, who received him with open arms, and conducted him to a
counter where all the newest and most expensive books were displayed.
“We are just settled in our new quarters,” explained the publisher,
“and any little thing you might say about us in your valuable paper
would be—I don’t ask it, you know—but it
would be—upon my word it would. See here, Mr. BEZZLE, I want
you to pick out from this counter just what you want, and—” “Sir!” exclaimed Mr. BEZZLE, leaping at the publisher with
eyes that fairly blazed with the radiance of rectitude, “who do you
take me for?” If Mr. BEZZLE had been less violent he would probably
have said, “Whom do you take me for,” and so have spared himself
the ignominy of sinking to the ungrammatical level of the Common Herd.
But the fact is, his proud spirit was chafed and fretted at the
spectacle of sordid self-seeking that everywhere met his gaze, and
excess of sentiment made him forgetful of syntax. “Mark me, my friend,
I am not to be bought,” he continued in unconscious blank verse. “I shall
take my pick, sir, and you will take this check.” And he handed
the amazed publisher a check for five hundred dollars. “I sicken, sir,”
he continued, “of this qualmish air of half-truth that I have breathed
so long. I am going to read these books, and say what I think of ’em,
and five hundred dollars is dirt cheap for the privilege. I had sooner
that every ‘New Publications’ ad. should die out of my newspaper than
that my literary columns should be contaminated with a Lie! Never mind
the change, sir. If anything is left over, send it to the proprietor of
the new penny paper that is struggling to keep its head above water.
Don’t say that it came from me. Say that it came from a converted
roper-in.” And Mr. BEZZLE stalked out of the office in such a tempest
of morality that the publisher felt as though a tidal wave of virtue
had swept over him. After this, Mr. BEZZLE’S dream became a trifle confused; but
he thought that this noble course of conduct was greatly approved by
the public, that its eminent practicability commended it to all classes
of people, and that theatres, publishers, and others quadrupled their
advertisements. “Ah!” sighed Mr. BEZZLE, rubbing his hands, but still
asleep, “what a sweet thing virtue is! Honesty is the best
policy after all!” At this moment his elbow was nudged, and opening his eyes he
beheld one of the office boys, whom he had sent up to the theatre half
an hour ago, to ask for six reserved seats near the stage. “Mr. PUPPET says he’s very sorry, sir,” said the boy, “but the
seats is all taken for to-night, and so he can’t send any.” “Can’t send any, can’t he?” exclaimed BEZZLE, wide awake. “All
right. Just go to Mr. SNAPPETY, the dramatic editor, for me, and tell
him not to say one word about that theatre in his criticism to-morrow,
I’ll teach Mr. PUPPET,” etc., etc., etc. SPIFFKINS.
TURKEYS—A FANTASY.  e hear a great
deal from scientific men about the influence of climate, atmosphere,
and even the proximity of certain mineral substances, upon the life and
welfare of man; but there is yet another vein to be worked in this
region of human knowledge. Taking a chance train of ideas—an
excursion-train, we may say—which came in our way on last
Thanksgiving, we were brought to some interesting conclusions in regard
to the influence exercised by the turkey upon human affairs. The annual
happiness of how many thousands at the return of Thanksgiving
Day—the unfed woes of how many thousands more—does
this estimable fowl revolve within his urbane crop! Every kernel of
grain which he picks from the barn-floor may represent an instant of
masticatory joy held in store for some as yet unconscious maxillary; we
may weigh the bird by the amount of happiness he will afford. When we
go to market, to barter for our Thanksgiving turkey, we inquire
substantially of the spruce vender, glistening in his white apron: “How
much gustatory delight does yonder cock contain?” And he, gross slave
of matter, doth respond, giving the estimate in dollars and parts of
dollars!
But how inadequate is any material representative of his value
to us. Indeed, it is next to impossible to conceive of the niceties
involved in this question of how much we owe the turkey. For him the
country air has been sweetened; the rain has fallen that he might
thrive; the wheat and barley sprouted that he might be fed. A shade
more of leanness in the legs, one jot less of rotundity in the
breast—what misery might not these seemingly trivial
incidents have created? A failure in the supply of
turkeys?—it would have been a national calamity! What were
life, indeed, without the turkey? As for Thanksgiving, the turkey he is it. Paris, c’est la
France! Remove the turkey, and you undermine Thanksgiving. How
could a conscientious man go to church on Thanksgiving morning, knowing
within himself that he shall return to beef, or mutton, or veal for his
dinner, as on work-days? I tell you, religion would disappear with the
turkey. Toward the close of Thanksgiving, how manifest becomes the
influence of this feathered sovereign. Observe yonder jaundiced youth
pacing the street moodily, his lips set in a cynic sneer. His turkey
was lean. I know it. He cannot hide that turkey. The gaunt fowl
obtrudes himself from every part. On the other hand, none but the
primest of prime turkeys could have set in motion this brisk old
gentleman with the ruddy check and hale, clear eye, whom we next pass.
A most stanch and royal turkey lurks behind that portly
front—a sound and fresh animal, with plenty of cranberries to
boot.—What are these soldiers? Carpet-knights who have united
their thanks over a grand regimental banquet. What frisky gobblers they
have shared in, to be sure! They prance and amble over the pavements as
if they had absorbed the very soul of Chanticleer, and fancied
themselves once more princes of the barnyard. The most singular and
freakish of the turkey’s manifestations this, by far! Indeed, on a review of these suggestive facts, we cannot but
feel a marvellous reverence for the potent cock, established as patron
of this feast. This sentiment is wide-spread among our people, and
perhaps it is not too fanciful to predict that it will some day expand
itself to a cultus like that of the Egyptian APIS, or, more
properly, the Stork of Japan. The advanced civilization of the Chinese,
indeed, has already made the Chicken an object of religious veneration.
In the slow march of ages we shall perhaps develop our as yet crude and
imperfect religions into an exalted worship of the Turkey. Then shall
the symbolic bird, trussed as for Thanksgiving, be enshrined in all our
temples, and the multitudes making pilgrimage from afar to such
sanctuaries shall be greeted by an inscription over the temple-gate of
BRILLAT SAVARIN’S axiom:— “Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are.”
BOOTS. MR. PUNCHINELLO:—Breaking in a young span of boots
is ecstasy, or would be, if fitting bootmakers could be found; but
there’s the pinch, though they do give you fits sometimes. Getting tailored to suit me, the next thing was to get booted,
I succeeded. It cost me nineteen dollars. I’d willingly return the compliment for nothing. At last my boots were finished, and I went into them right and
left; at least, I tried so to do. With every nerve flashing lightning, I pulled and tugged most
thrillingly, but in vain. “There’s no putting my foot in it,” says I. “Give one more try,” says he. Although almost tried out, I generously gave one more. I
placed the bootmaker’s awl in one strap, and his last-hook in the
other, and with “two roses” mantling my cheeks, postured for the
contest. I tried the heeling process, and earnestly endeavored to toe
the mark; but to successfully start the thing on foot was a bootless
effort. Then I slumberously gravitated, and dreamed thus:— Old “LEATHERBRAINS” in SATAN’S livery, producing a hammer from
a carpet-bag (he was a carpet-bagger), proceeded to shape my feet, and
fill them with shoe-pegs. My nap was ruffled, and not to be continued under those
circumstances, so I wisely concluded it. “They’re on!” says the bootmaker. And a tight on it was, excruciatingly so. I suspected at the time that I had been put to sleep by
chloroform, but I afterward remembered that a feeble youth was reading
aloud from the Special Cable Dispatches of the Tribune. My feelings centred in those boots, tears filled my eyes, and
I was dumb with emotion, but quickly reviving, I slaked the cordwainer
with a flood of rabid eloquence. The cowering wretch suggested that they would stretch. He
lied, the villain, he lied, they shrank. However, “in verdure clad,” I was persuaded into wearing them,
and stiffly sidled off, a badgered biped, my head swinging round the
circle, and my voice hanging on the verge of profanity all the way. As fit boots they were a most successful failure. I gave them
to the office boy; but the crutches I afterward bought him cost me
twenty-seven dollars. Henceforth I shall take my cue from JOHN CHINAMAN, and encase
my understanding in wood. Yours calmly, VICTOR KING.
Recognized at Last. A recent telegram from London says:— “The Prussian hussars rode down and out to pieces a regiment
of marine infantry.” Hooray! Cheer, boys, cheer! The mythical Horse-Marines are
thus at last recognized as an accomplished fact.
“As I was going to St. Ives.” At St. Ives, Huntingdonshire, England, Lord ROBERT MONTAGU,
M.P., was lately burned in effigy by some intelligent boors, because he
had joined the Roman Catholic faith. That tells badly for the burners,
who should not have cared an f i g about the matter.
“Walker.” MCETTRICK, the pedestrian, was arrested at Boston, a few days
since, for giving an exhibition without a license. He gave bail.
Probably leg-bail.
On the Bench When is a judge like the structures that are to support the
Brooklyn Suspension-Bridge? When he’s called a caisson.
AN OFFICER WHO MUST ALWAYS BE OUT OF GUN-SHOT RANGE. General FARRE.
THE PLAYS AND SHOWS.  y this time
everybody has seen Rip Van Winkle, and everybody has expressed
the same unbounded admiration of Mr. JEFFERSON’S matchless genius. But
the world never has been, and doubtless never will be, without the
pestiferous presence of Reformers, Men of Progress, Earnest Men, who
insist upon improving everything after their own fashion, and who are
unhappy because they did not have the opportunity of making the solar
year consist of an even number of days, and because they were not
present at the building of the Ark, in order to urge upon NOAH the
propriety of attaching a screw propeller to that primitive Great
Eastern. These horribly energetic nuisances never find anything that
precisely suits them, and are always insisting that everything stands
in need of the improvements which they gratuitously suggest. Latterly
they have ventured to attack Rip Van Winkle,—not the
actor, but the play,—and to insist that the closing scene
should be so modified as to make the play a temperance lecture of the
most unmistakable character.
If you recollect—as of course you do—the
last scene in that exquisite drama, you can still hear “RIP’S”
tremulous voice as he says, “I will take my pipe and my glass, and will
tell my strange story to all my friends. And I will drink your
good health, and your family’s, and may you live long and prosper.” And
now come the Progressive Nuisances, and ask Mr. JEFFERSON to change
this ending so that it will read as follows:— GRETCHEN.—”Here is your glass, RIP.” RIP.—”But I swore off.” GRETCHEN.—”Bless you, my husband. Promise me never
more to touch the intoxicating beer-mug.” RIP.—”I promise. Hereafter I will take my TUPPER’S
Proverbial Philosophy and my glass of water, and I will daily address
all my friends on the subject of total abstinence from everything that
cheers, whether it inebriates or not. And I will now close this
evening’s lecture by an appeal to the audience now present, to take
warning by me, and never drink a drop of lager-beer. Think, my friends,
what would be the feelings of your respective wives, should you return
home, after a drunken sleep of twenty or thirty years, and find them
all married to richer husbands! Think how they would revile the
weakness of the beer which could not keep you asleep forever. Think how
you would complicate the real estate business, when you came to turn
out the mistaken people who had occupied, improved, and sold your
property during your brief absence. Think of the difficulties that
would arise from the increase in the size of your families, which would
probably have taken place while you were sleeping out in the open air,
and for which you would have to provide, although you had not been
consulted in the matter. Think, too, of the extent to which you would
be interviewed by the reporters of the Sun, and the atrocious
libels concerning yourselves and your families which that unclean sheet
would publish. Think of all these things, my friends, and then step
into the box-office on your way out and sign the total abstinence
pledge. The ushers will now make a collection for the support of the
temperance cause. Mr. MOLLENHAUER will please lead the audience in
singing that beautiful temperance anthem—” “‘Cold water is the only thing
Worth loving here below;
The man who won’t its praises
sing,
Will straight to Hades go.'” Now, for one, I don’t like this improved version of “RIP.” Of
course, the Temperance Reformers will construe this expression of
opinion into an admission that every man, woman, or advocate of female
suffrage, who has ever written a line for PUNCHINELLO is a confirmed
drunkard. In spite of this probability, I still have the courage to
maintain that so long as Mr. JEFFERSON is an artist, and not a
temperance lecturer, he need not mix up the drama with the Temperance
Reform, or any other hobby. If he is to be compelled to deliver a
temperance address every time he plays Rip Van Winkle, let us
compel Mr. GREELEY to play “RIP” every time he gives a temperance
lecture. If the latter catastrophe were to happen, the punishment of
the Reforming Nuisances would be complete. There are, however, plays which could be changed so as to
terminate much more naturally and effectively than they now do. For
example, there is Enoch Arden. At present ENOCH, when he looks
through the window and sees his wife enjoying herself with PHILIP in
the dining-room, immediately lies down on the grass-plat in the
back-yard, and groans in a most harrowing style,—after which
he picks himself up, and, going back to his hotel, dies without so much
as recognizing his old friends and congratulating them upon their
prosperity. Now the way in which the play should have ended, had the
dramatist wished to convince us that “ENOCH” was a reasonable being,
would have been somewhat as follows:— ENOCH (looking through the window).—”Well, here’s a
go. My wife has actually married PHILIP. They look pretty comfortable,
too. PHILIP is evidently rich. Here’s luck for me at last. I’ve got him
where I can strike him pretty heavily.” [He enters the house,] PHILIP AND HIS WIFE.—”ENOCH! Can it be possible?
Why, we thought you were entirely dead, and so we married. Well! well!
This is a healthy state of things.” ENOCH (sternly).—”Mr. PHILIP RAY. You have had the
impertinence to marry my wife. Sir! I consider that you have taken an
unjustifiable liberty. Have you anything to say for yourself before I
proceed to shoot you? I might mention that I once had a third cousin
whose aunt by marriage was slightly insane, so you see that I can kill
you with a calm certainty that the jury will acquit me, on the ground
of my hereditary insanity.” PHILIP.—”Take a drink, old boy. We’ll be reasonable
about this matter. Don’t attempt murder,—it’s no longer
respectable since MCFARLAND went into the business. Why can’t we
compromise this affair?” ENOCH.—”It will cost you something. There are my
lacerated feelings, which can’t be repaired without a good deal of
expense. Still I will do the fair thing by you. Give me fifty thousand
dollars and I’ll leave the country and say nothing more about it. You
can keep my wife, if you want her. I’m sure I don’t.” PHILIP.—”But I’ve been to a good deal of expense
about her. Her clothes have cost me no end of money, and there are all
our new children besides. Children, let me tell you, are a great deal
more expensive now than they were in your day. Now, I’ll give you
twenty thousand dollars, and your wife, and we’ll call it square.” ENOCH.—”No, sir. I don’t want the wife, and I insist
on more than twenty thousand dollars. I’ve got you entirely in my
power, and you know it. I’ll come down to forty thousand dollars, but
not a cent less. Draw a check on the bank, or I’ll draw a revolver on
you. Be quick about it, too, for my hereditary insanity may develop
itself at any moment.” PHILIP.—”Well, if I must, I must. Here is your
money. How did you leave things at—well, at the place you
came from? Everybody well, I hope?” ENOCH.—”There were no people, and consequently
nothing to drink there. Don’t speak of the wretched place. Thanks for
the check. Hope you’ll find your wife satisfactory. Let this be a
warning to you, not to marry a widow another time, unless you have a
sure thing. Don’t believe her when she says her husband is dead, unless
you have him dug up, and personally inspect his bones. Thank you! I will
take another drink since you insist upon it. Here’s luck! You’ll agree
with me that this is the best day’s work I have ever done. Good-by. I’m
off to Chicago.” Now, would not that be the way in which “ENOCH” would have
acted had he been a practical business man? You see the play thus
altered is eminently probable, not to say realistic. I have several
more improved catastrophes, which, if substituted for the present
ending of some of our more recent popular plays, would render them
quite perfect. Hamlet especially needs changing in this
respect. Some of these days I will show the readers of PUNCHINELLO how
SHAKSPEARE should have ended that drama. I rather think they will agree
with me, that SHAKSPEARE, clever as he doubtless was in certain
respects, knew very little about writing plays that should be at once
effective and probable. MATADOR.
ON THE ROAD TO ROUEN. The Prussians.
 JOHN BULL DETECTS A BEAR-FACED INTRUDER UPON THE PRIVACY OF
THE BLACK SEA.
“AB” I.
Absinthe’s a cunning word
Dram-drinkers to entice,
It comes from a Greek root which
means
The opposite of nice.
II. The wormwood shrub its gall
Essentially doth give
To “ab” by which so many die.
For which so many live.
III. Its color is sea-green.
And should you enter where
The blissful stimulant is sold.
You’ll see green people there.
IV. King DEATH no longer drenches
With “coal-black wine” his
throttle.
But slakes the drouth of his
awful mouth
With pulls at the absinthe
bottle.
V. And why should we repine
At the poison that’s in his cup,
Since the fools we can spare are
everywhere
And “ab” will use them up? VI. Then heigh! for the wormwood
shrub.
And ho! for the sea-green liquor
That softens the brain to sillybub
And turns the blood to ichor!
GRAIN ELEVATORS. Rye cocktails.
ODD REQUEST. Bishop Potter having forbidden the celebration of the Holy
Communion privately at St. Sacrament Mission, when a priest is the only
communicant, it seems that Father BEADLEY “has asked for the formation
of thirty persons, one of whom shall commune with him each day.” When Father B.’s thirty communing persons are fully “formed,”
we should like to take a look at them. We should expect to find that a
new race is started at last. This would be disagreeable news to
Professor DARWIN, but there are plenty of other and rival Professors
who would be delighted at the phenomenon. Twenty-nine at least of the
newly-formed “persons” will always be “on view,” as but one of the
thirty can be engaged at a time. Doubtless they will be able to
converse in the American language, and it will be so
interesting to hear them talk! To tell how they feel, and what they
think of things! We should look for original and piquant views of everything
and everybody. If they should appeal to Nature’s Standard, and
pronounce Mr. PUNCHINELLO the handsomest man in New York, who could
wonder? They would simply confirm the opinions of connoisseurs. We hope they will give us a call as soon as “formed.” Give us
but the opportunity, and we promise to make something of these
unsophisticated “persons.” If we can but succeed in impressing on their
plastic young minds the principles which have hitherto guided us in our
own glorious path, we shall have no idle fears of their future. They
will be all right from the start. Just as the twig is bent, or rather
straightened, the high old tree has got to shoot up. We look with interest for news of this unique formation.
Rebottling his Wrath. BOTTLED BUTLER talks fierce
against poor JOHN BULL,
All the British he’d kill at one
slap,
With their bones Bully BEN a
canal would fill full—
The one that he dug at Dutch Gap.
Con by a Switch-tender. Why is a railway accident like a dandy? Because it’s death on
the Ties.
 BONED TURKEY. John Bull. “WELL, NOW, THIS IS TOO BAD!—HERE’S THIS
ROOSHAN FELLER BEEN AND GOBBLED UP ALL THE TURKEY!”
HIRAM GREEN’S FASHION REPORT. The only Strictly Reliable Report on the Market. A full-dressed girl of the Period, as she sails out for an
afternoon airin, looks like somethin as I imagine the north pole would,
with a 1/2 dozen rainbows rapt about it. She is a sorter of a
flag-staff, from whose perpendicularity the ensines of all nations
blows and flaps, and any man base enuff to haul down one solitary flag
will be shot on the spot. A far dixy. Tellin the thing jest as
it is, there’s more flummy-diddles and mushroon attachments to a
woman’s toggery nowadays than there is honest men in Wall street. Durin the past season, overskirts and p-an-ears have been
looped up, makin the fair secks look as if she was gettin her garments
in trim to leep over some frog-pond. The only change in overskirts now, is that they have been let
down a few pegs, giving the fair wearer an appearance of havin landed
safe on tother side of the Pollywog Asilum, which she has been all
summer waitin to jump over. LONG TRAILLIN DRESSES are agin comin into fashin, to the great
detriment of the legitimate okerpashon of street-sweepin. I understand that MARK TWAIN endorses long traillin skirts,
and compels his new infant to wear ’em. How schockin! JET TRIMMINS are agin to have a run. The United States Sennit
will probably Read in a few black orniments this winter. SHAWL SOOTS are a pooty gay harniss, nowadays, to sling on. To
make one, get an old shawl, ram your head through the middle of it,
then draw it snug about the waist, with a cast-off nitecap string. Yaller and red are becoming cullers for a broonet, says Harper’s
bazar. The 15th amendment ladies will please take notiss and
cultivate yaller hair and red noses in the futer. RED GLOVES are much worn, makin the fashinable bell’s hands
look like a washer-woman’s thumb on a frosty mornin. Some pooty desines have appeared in EAR RINGS, but the
desines of a sertin strong-minded click of femails to ring
the ears of their lords and masters hain’t endorsed in this ere
report. HAIR-DRESSIN. The more frizzled and stirred up a ladey’s hair appears
nowadays, the hire she stands in the eyes of the Bon tung. A
waterfall which will go into a store door without the wearer stoopin
over, hain’t considered of suffishent altitood for a fashinable got-up femme
de sham to tug around. Thrashin masheens are now used to get just the rite angle on
the hair. The head is inserted in the masheen, which proceeds to give
the copiliary attraction a wuss shampoonin than can be got in a
Rale Rode smash up. Where thrashin masheens hain’t to be had, young gals sprinkle
the hair with corn-meel, and then let the chickens scratch it out. This
gets up a snarl which a Filadephy lawyer can’t ontangle. Chauced bolony sassiges are fashinable danglin from a
ladey’s back hair. These are often worn dubble barrelled, remindin us of a yoke
of oxen—takin a waggin view of it. MEN’S HARNISS. Trowsers are very narrer contracted about the walkin pins. The only way a feller can get his calves into his
bifurkates, is to fill his butes with milk and coax ’em through. N.B.—The readers of this report musen’t
misunderstand me, and undertake to crawl head first through their
garments, for I assure him or her, that I refer to the calves
of their perambulaters. Cotes are worn short waisted, short in the skirts, and short
in the sleeves. I have known them short in the pocket, when the
taler sent in his bill. Neckties are worn large, what would usually be alowed for a
silk dress is required now for a fashenable scarf. With the 2 long ends, which hangs danglin down over a feller’s
buzzum, it doesent make a bit of difference if he wears a ragged shirt,
dirty shirt, or no shirt at all. Charity covers a multitood of sins, I’m told, and so does the
new stile of scarfs cover a heep of dirt and old rags. The new stile of silk hats, worn by a femail heart destroyer,
is big enuff to hitch up dubble, with the shoo, in which the old lady
and her children “hung out.” Altho the wimmen fokes have got off the steel trimmims,
I notiss the Internal Revenoo Offisers are continerly gettin in stealin
trim. This strictly reliable report will be isshood as often as the
undersined gets any new cloze. Any person wishin to know how to dress, can obtain the
required informashen by sendin a ten cent shinny to PUNCHINELLO Pub. Co. A well-drest man is the noblest work of his taler, likewise is
a full-rigged woman the noblest work of her taleress. Which is the opinion of the compiler of this work. Stilishly Ewers, HIRAM GREEN, ESQ., Lait Gustise of the Peece.
THE DREAM OF A DINER-OUT. But yesterday night I dreamed a
dream—
I forget what I’d dined on,
really,—
‘Twas something heavy, and then
I’d read
“What I Know of Farming,” by
GREELEY. Many and strange were the sights
I saw
As I turned on my restless pillow,
BISMARCK and BLUCHER pitching
cents
For beer, ‘neath a weeping willow. JULIUS CAESAR was turning up
trumps
In a nice little game at euchre,
With a Chinese coolie, GEORGE
FRANCIS TRAIN,
SATAN, and old JOE HOOKER. EARL RUSSELL the small, to make
himself tall,
Close by on his dignity stood,
While LITTLE JOHN sang the “Song
of the Shirt”
‘Till I thought he was ROBBIN’
HOOD! BRUTUS was taking a “whiskey
straight,”
Which I didn’t think orthodox;
While GRANT, with his usual zeal
for sport,
Seemed busy with fighting Cox! But I woke at last with a
boisterous laugh
From a dream that was simply
ridiculous,
For I knew (so did you) it
couldn’t be true
That France had succumbed to St.
NICHOLAS.
 RAILWAY TALK. Old Lady. “SONNY, BE THEM EGGS FRESH OR STALE?” Boy. “FRESH, ‘M. I buys MY EGGS, I DOESN’T
STALE ‘EM!”
 EGGS-ACTLY! Mr. Benedick. “BY JOVE! WHAT AN AWFUL SMELL OF
ASAFOETIDA THIS EGG HAS!” Mrs. B. “O, HOW SHOCKING! NOW THAT I THINK OF IT, I DID
THROW AWAY SOME ASAFOETIDA PILLS, AND I SUPPOSE THE HENS HAVE BEEN
EATING THEM!”
POEMS OF THE CRADLE. CANTO XIV. By by, baby bunting,
Daddy’s gone a-hunting,
To get a little rabbit skin
To wrap the baby bunting in. At last there came a day when the husband was of no
consequence in his own house. When numerous female visitors frowned
upon and snubbed him. When his mother-in-law glared at him and
entreated him despitefully if he ventured into her august and fearful
presence; and even that wonderful and mysterious person, the hired
nurse, unfeelingly ordered him out of the house, and bade him “begone
about his business.” The miserable and conscience-stricken wretch
wandered disconsolately from room to room, only to meet with fresh
humiliation and contumely, and at last, in sheer despair, betook
himself off to a lonely and gloomsome spot in the dark wood, and there,
in penitent humility, bewailed his misfortune in being that miserably
and insignificant nonentity—a man. Sorrowfully resting his head upon his hands, his eyes fixed
upon the ground, his whole soul absorbed in self-reproach, he passes
the long hours in gloomy abstraction, wishing, he hardly knew what,
only that he was not, what he unfortunately happened to be at that
moment, a man despised of women and hated by his mother-in-law. His
sorrowful musings were broken in upon by his one faithful friend, the
gentle companion of many a quiet hour, his affectionate and devoted
pet, his beloved cat. Gently rubbing her head against his penitent
knee, she awakens the absorbed poet to a realization of her presence,
and to a feeling of pleasure that he is not deserted by all, but has
one heart left that beats for him alone. Fondly taking his feline friend in his arms, he softly strokes
her back, and gazes lovingly into the soft green eyes that look
responsively into his, and rebukes her not when, in impulsive love, she
rubs her cold nose against his burning cheek, and wipes her eyes upon
his frail moustache. Night draws on apace. The dew begins to fall; the pangs of
hunger to manifest themselves; and hesitatingly and timidly he and his
cat turn their footsteps homeward. Loiter as he will, each moment
brings him nearer to that abode where once he thought himself master;
but to his astonishment he now finds himself an outcast and a reproach. Slowly and quietly he creeps around to the back kitchen door,
his cat held tightly in his arms, stealthily enters, and meekly drops
into a chair, the image of a self-convicted burglar. Presently he hears a sound of smothered laughter, a quick,
light step, and mother-in-law and nurse enter, full of importance, and
unnaturally friendly with each other. The unhappy man silently tries to
shrink into nothingness, and thus escape being again driven out of
doors; but the Argus eyes peer into the dark corner, and his intentions
are frustrated. Tremblingly he steps forth, into the light, prepared to meekly
obey the harsh command, when, to his great surprise, his fearful
mother-in-law smiles benignly upon him, and with a knowing look and
gracious beckoning with the forefinger, bids him follow. He follows, dizzy with the unlooked-for reception, and, in a
bewildered state, is ushered into that sanctum of privacy from which he
has been ignominiously debarred all day—his wife’s room. The revulsion of feeling was too much for the poor man. His
head began to whirl, and his eyes were blinded. He had a faint
perception of his wife speaking to him, and of his being shown
something, he didn’t know what; of being told to do something, he
didn’t know what; and standing dazed and helpless until forcibly led
from the room, and bidden to “go get his supper and not act like a
fool.” The familiar expression and natural manner completely restored
his wavering consciousness, and he knowingly made his way to the
kitchen and vigorously attacked a largo pork-pie, which he gloriously
conquered and felt all the pride of a hero. The next day, having regained in a measure his usual
self-control, he was allowed once more, in consideration of the
position he held in the family, to enter that sanctum sanctorum,
and gaze upon its inmates. His acute mother-in-law, having extracted a
promise of absence for the day, on condition of being allowed to look
at his own child a moment, carefully deposits in his trembling hands a
small woollen bundle with a tiny speck of a face peering therefrom. Indescribable emotions rushed through his frame at the first
touch of that soft warm roll of flannel, and a torrent of tumultuous
joy bubbled up in his heart when he had so far mastered his emotions as
to be able to touch with one nervous finger the little soft red cheek,
lying so peacefully in his arms. The tiny hands doubled up, so brave
looking yet so helpless now, giving promise of the future, brought
tears of joy and pride to his eyes, and stooping over the wondrous
future man, he pressed a kiss upon its unconscious face. That kiss awoke the sleeping muse within him. Blissful visions
of the future, and ambitious feelings for the present, started into
being. His first thought was to do something to please the potent
little fellow; but happening to glance at his “everlasting terror,” he
remembered his promise. A brilliant idea striking him at that moment,
he apostrophized the infant in the touching words:— By by, baby bunting,
Daddy’s gone a-hunting,
To get a little rabbit skin
To wrap the baby bunting in. One more kiss, and with a little sigh he lays the precious
burden down, and departs to spend the day in the woods, according to
promise, so as not to be bothering around under foot, and getting in
everybody’s way when he ain’t wanted. As he cannot entirely control circumstances, he is determined
to make the best of them, and he mentally blesses the happy thought, or
rather inspiration, that suggested the soft rabbit skin as a bed for
the baby, and resolves that it alone shall be the object of his day’s
search.
POLISHING THE POLICE.  oubtless there
is much room for improvement in the deportment and speech of our very
efficient Municipal Police. Citizens have frequently to apply to them
for information, and it sometimes happens that the answer is couched in
language that may be Polish, so far as the querist knows, though, in
fact, there is no polish about it. It is more likely to be COPTIC, as
the policeman of the period likes to call himself a “COP.” If there is
a street sensation in progress, and you ask a contemplative policeman
the cause of it, matters are not made perfectly clear to you when he
replies that it is “only a put-up job to screen a fence” or words to
that affect. If you ask him to explain things more fully he will
probably say, “Shoo! fly,” or “you know how it is yourself,” or
recommend you to “scratch gravel.” Such expressions as these are very
embarrassing to strangers, and even to citizens whose pathways have not
led them through the brambly tracts of police philology.
In view of these facts, the public have reason to be thankful
to Justice DOWLING for the reproof administered by him, a few days
since, to a policeman who made use of slang in addressing the bench.
The reprehended officer of the law spoke about a prisoner being “turned
over,” when he should have said “discharged.” This gave Mr. DOWLING
occasion to pass some severe remarks with regard to the use of slang
terms generally, by policemen, and to caution them against addressing
persons in any such jargon. The lesson was a timely one, and we hope
that it may prove effective, since we frequently hear perplexed
inquirers complaining that their education has been neglected so far as
slang is concerned, and lamenting that, when young, they had not
devoted themselves rather to the study of the Thieves’ Dictionary than
to that of the polite but comparatively useless treatises on their
native tongue.
THREE LETTERS. I was persuaded to send my son to Dr. STUFFEM’S
boarding-school, in “the salubrious village of Whelpville” (I quote
from the Doctor’s circular), “where the moral training of the pupils is
under the parental supervision of the Principal.” Since the arrival of
Master THEOPHILUS, I have just received weekly reports of his progress
on printed forms, and I presume it is satisfactory, although I do not
precisely understand these weekly missives, which are only a complex
arrangement of figures. To-day, however, I am favored with three
letters which came in a bulky envelope, and I append them, in the order
of their perusal by myself. The first seems to be written by a
schoolmate of my son’s, and was probably placed in the envelope
inadvertently by THEOPHILUS. I do not venture to make any alteration in
the orthography of the first and second epistles, as I do not know what
dictionary may be authoritative in Whelpville. “Deer Thee its rainin like blaises and I cant get out since
I came heer Ive had bully times and I hope Ill keep sik a good wile our
doctur lets me eat donuts but sez I musnt play out in the rain wen its
rainin farther told me Id beter rite to sum of my scholmaids and giv me
this hole sheet of paper maibe Id get a leter rote before dinner but I
cant tell you mutch wile its rainin Thee git sik and you can come heer
to git wel our doctur is bully I havent took no stuf but sitrate of
magneeshia and I don’t mind that litel Billy Sims wot lives down by the
postofis has got meesils and you can ketch them from him if he arnt ded
and then old Stuffy can rite to your farther to let you come here and
tel him weve got a bully doctor Thee if Billy Sims is ded or got wel
you mite ketch somthin ells and its prime heer farthers got a gun and I
no where the pouder is bring some pecushin caps with you Thee or well
hav to tuch her off with a cole if old Beeswax wont let you come you
mite send me some caps in a leter don’t mash em Thee doctur sais I wil
be wel in about a munth if I don’t ketch cold but I can easy fall in
the pond before the munth is out Thee its hoopincof time and you can
easy ketch that you only hav to hold yur breth til you most bust our
doctur is bully for hoopincof. “Thee weve got a barn and theres lots of ha on 2 high
plaises were we can clime up there arnt no steps nor lader and we hav
to clime up poles its bully Thee theres four cats heer and one lets me
nuss her the others is all wild and run under the barn we can hunt them
wild ones Ive got 2 long poles to poke under the barn but I wont hunt
the cats till you come. I get lots of aigs up on the ha when it arnt
rainin I got four yesterda and sukt 2 and took 2 to mother the 2 I sukt
was elegant but one of mothers had a litel chiking in it. “Thee you hav to come heer on the ralerode farther brot me
but yore farther needent bring you there arnt no plais for him to sleep
but you can sleep with me theres a boy sels candy in the cars and
theres penuts on a stand in the deepoe 5 sents gits a pocketful the
candy is nasty but its in purty boxes its ten sents theres a old wommen
keeps the penut stand but shes got a litel gurl and the gurl gives you
most for 5 sents don’t let the old wommen wate on you but just ask the
prise and then sa sis give us 5 sents worth shes awful spry wen you git
the penuts just come out of the big dore of the deepoe and keep strait
down the rode til you come to our house you can tel it by the 4 cats if
they arnt under the barn but you can ask somebody ware farther lives
his name is Mister Gillander but these fools that lives about hear cal
him Mr. Glander. “Thee do come dinners reddy “Yores afectionate DICK GILLANDER”
My son’s letter, or rather the first draft of it, is not much
more artistic in appearance than the foregoing. He is evidently in the
same class in orthography with his friend, Master Gillander, and I do
not doubt that, under careful culture, he may emulate the various
virtues of his friend, and become, in time, an accomplished “aig”
sucker. Here is his letter in the original:— “DEER FARTHER:—As this is the da fur composition
doctur STUFFEM sed I mite rite you a leter for my composition and I
rite these fu lines to let you no that I am wel, but one of the boys is
my roomait and is gone home sick but he is beter and has got a good
doctur and be wants me to come down to his howse pleas sir send me a
dolar it is on a ralerode and the fair is fourty 5 sents. I can go
Satterda and come back Mundy and there is a meetin house clost by dicks
howse and they go to meetin in a carrige and dick drives “Yores respectful “THEOPHILUS”
The third epistle was written on a clean sheet, the date being
in the middle of the first page, and the entire production bearing the
marks of herculean effort. I infer that this final letter was a
“corrected, proof,” and had to pass a severe examination. Probably,
this was the only one intended for my eye, and I cannot account for the
arrival of the three documents, except upon the hypothesis that my boy
heedlessly and hurriedly thrust them in one enclosure, and forgot to
remove the phonetic specimens before mail time. It ran thus:— “MY DEAR FATHER: In lieu of the usual essay required of
pupils on this day, my preceptor allows me to write a letter to you,
which he hopes may serve to evince my progress in the art of
composition, the improvement in my penmanship (to which he devotes
special attention), and to inform you of my continued health. Indeed,
in this delightful locality, nothing else could be expected, as
Whelpville, being 796 feet above tide-water, is entirely free from
those miasmatic influences which unfortunately affect the sanitary
condition of those institutions of learning that are less favorably
situated. The only case of sickness that has occurred since my arrival,
and for a long time previously, was that of my room-mate and friend,
Richard Gillander, whose father has recently purchased an estate in our
neighborhood, principally on account of the salubrity of our climate.
But Richard had doubtless contracted the disease, which was of an
intermittent character, at his former school, which was the Riverbank
Classical Academy, at Swamptown. Our kind preceptor allowed Richard to
return to his father’s house until his health should be entirely
restored. He is now decidedly convalescent, and has written me an
urgent invitation to visit him on Saturday next. As this invitation is
corroborated by a letter from Mr. Gillander to our preceptor, I should
be much pleased to accept it, with your approval. If you have no
objection to this arrangement, therefore, I will thank you to enclose
me one dollar by mail, as the railway fare to Richard’s home amounts to
nearly this sum. “Hoping for a favorable reply, and promising myself the
pleasure of writing you a full account of this visit one week hence, “I remain, My dear parent, Your dutiful Son, THEOPHILUS.”
This letter breathed such an air of lofty morality that I was
quite overcome. I enclosed the required dollar, of course, and wrote a
line to Doctor STUFFEM complimenting him upon the manifest improvement
in his pupil. I am looking with some anxiety for the promised letter
recounting the incidents of the projected visit, and have some
misgivings induced by Master DICK’S hints concerning the gun,
powderhorn, and percussion-caps. I infer, however, from the last
letter, that such a change has been wrought upon THEOPHILUS, that he
will probably spend his holiday in reciting moral apothegms to his
friend and “room-mait.”
 SEVERE. Irascible old Gent (to garrulous barber). “SHOO!
SHOO!—WHY DON’T YOU TREAT YOUR TALK
AS YOU DO YOUR HAIR—CUT IT SHORT?”
SARSFIELD YOUNG’S PANORAMA. PART III. THE GEYSERS. A fascinating, achromatic sketch of the Geysers of Iceland,
those wonderful hydraulic volcanoes, which would readily he considered
objects of the greatest natural grandeur, if the hotels in the
neighborhood were only a little better kept and more judiciously
advertised. Before these stupendous hot-water works the spectator
stands aghast, and boils his egg in fourteen seconds, by a stop-watch. It would seem as though the poet’s invocation, “Come, gentle spring! ethereal
mildness, come,” were somewhat rudely answered, for the spring comes with a
noise like thunder, bringing with it “ethereal mildness” at the rate of
ten thousand gallons a minute. It has been calculated that there is
thrown out annually water enough to supply all the hot whiskey punches
that are required during that time in the State of Maine alone. Old
sailors say it reminds them of a whale fastened alongside their
ship—it is a Seething Tide. These vast wreaths, which the painter’s art has so beautifully
revealed to us at the top of the canvas, are steam. It runs no
machinery, bursts no boilers, does nothing, in fact, that is useful,
but only hangs round. Yet these volcanoes are full of instruction to
those who live by them, impressing upon each and every one the
mournful, yet scientific truth, that his life is but a vapor. A VIEW OF MELROSE, MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASS. It has been well said, “If you would view fair Melrose, do it
by moonlight.” Our artist found that the suburban trains had not been
arranged with an eye to this effect, and he was reluctantly obliged to
give us his impressions of this charming spot by daylight. This, however, has its advantages. The elegant private residences, neatly trimmed lawns, graceful
shade trees, beautifully dressed women and children, driving or
promenading, are all more distinctly brought out. The male population, for the most part, are brought out a few
hours later, by steam and horse cars. Everything here betokens ease and refinement. Here they refine
sugar, in this large brick building. The school-houses, churches, and town-hall are easily
distinguished from each other, being of brick, with a brown belfry. On
the extreme left is the town-farm for paupers. We haven’t time, so we
won’t dwell upon this. THE PYRAMIDS OF EGYPT. These highly interesting old buildings are presented with
extraordinary fidelity. They were taken on the spot. They are three in
number, you will observe. I presume you cannot tell me what this is? We
paid for it as the Sphinx, and it is pronounced by competent judges an
exceedingly flattering portrait. The Pyramids are centuries old. It is
understood that Miss Sphinx, out of respect to her sex, is about thirty
summers—permanently. I will not deceive you. These structures are immense tombs
full of mummies; all the rooms are taken. From careful observation, it
is concluded that, like the Federal Union, they “must be preserved.”
Here they stay in rapt solitude. A glance at the superintendent’s
register, as you go in, shows that the “PHARAOH family” furnish the
largest number of inmates. Look at this caravan about to cross the Desert. The camels are
going instead of coming. They are the ships of the
desert—hardships. The leading camel has a bell appended to
his neck, which at this moment is ringing for Sahara. We wish them good
luck on their journey. This gentleman on the rear camel (which you notice carries a
red flag to prevent collision), who is jauntily attired in nankeen
trousers and a blue cotton umbrella, is a physician from New Jersey,
whose sands of life have nearly run out. He will get plenty more by
to-morrow. A STORM OFF HATTERAS. A terrific sight! You can’t sec anything, it is so thick. The sea runs mountain
high. The gallant ship, with creaking masts, drives before the gale and
plunges over the crests of the foaming billows. That is what she was
built for. The thunder peals crash after crash, and occasionally crash
before crash. The lightning’s lurid glare illumines, ever and anon, the
scene. The stoutest hold their breath, and if they can’t do that,
they hold to a belaying-pin, while the awe-stricken crew in vain
attempt to pump out the hold. All is darkness, except in the binnacle. We leave the noble vessel to her fate, with the cheering
conviction that she is fully insured. THE COLISEUM AT ROME. Who has not yet heard of the Coliseum at Rome, that great
masterpiece of Architecture, wherein Rome held her gladiatorial
combats, her peace jubilees, and other solemnities! What classic
associations cluster around it; what tender recollections of Latin
Grammar and of ROMULUS and REMUS, CATILINE, and other friends of our
youth, crowd upon us! Here is where the poet saw the lying gladiator die; and where
Mr. FORREST beheld the arena swim around him. You perceive from the
outline of this immense building that there was ample room for this
purpose. A look at this recalls past ages; the palmy days of Rome. I
need not remind my young friends that Rome is not so palmy as she was.
And yet there is no reason in the world why she couldn’t be made a
great railroad centre. Look at Troy! Strangers repair to this venerable pile from every part of the
earth, though it is somewhat out of repair just at present. This view, I need hardly explain, is intended to be by
moonlight. The student, the philosopher, the lover of the classics,
will gaze upon this ruin with emotions of mingled joy and sadness. Other lovers will gaze at this object, which, without my
assistance, they will recognize as the silver-orbed moon. Mark its
pensive rays. The silver moon will now roll on—to the next
subject.
|
CHURCH BELLES.