"Lawk a'-mercy! I'm going wrong! and got to walk all that way back
again."
A pedestrian may get robbed of his money on the highway, but a cross-road
frequently robs him of time and patience; for when haply he considers
himself at his journey's end, an impertinent finger-post, offering him
the tardy and unpleasant information that he has wandered from his track,
makes him turn about and wheel about, like Jim Crow, in anything but a
pleasant humor.
It were well if every wayfarer were like the sailor, who when offered a
quid from the 'bacoo box of a smoker, said, 'I never chews the
short-cut!' and in the same spirit, we strongly advise him, before he
takes the short-cut to think of the returns!
Should the weather prove rainy, the hungry traveller may certainly get a
wet on the road, although he starves before he reaches the wished-for
inn.
As there is likewise no more chance of meeting a good tempered guide on a
cross-road, than of finding eggs and bacon, in an edible state, at least
on a common--and as he can no more pull in the summer-rains than he can
the reins of a runaway stallion; the result is, the inexperienced youth
ludicrously represents so many pounds of 'dripping,' and although he may
be thirsty, he will have no cause to complain that he is--dry! The best
mode for an honest man to go round the country, is to take a
straight-forward course, especially when the surcharged clouds do rule
the horizon with sloping lines of rain! Besides, it is by no means a
pleasant thing for a man with a scanty wardrobe, to find his clothes
running away at a most unpleasant rate, while he can scarcely drag one
clay-encumbered leg after the other.
It is a difficult trial, too, of a man's philosophy, after trudging over
a long field, to be encountered by the mockery of a 'ha! ha!'--fence! He
utters a few bitter expletives, perhaps, but nought avails his railing
against such a fence as that!
The shower which makes all nature smile, only causes him to laugh--on the
wrong side of his mouth, for he regards it as a temperance man does a
regular soaker!
Reader! never attempt a bye-way on a wet day, with a stick and bundle at
your back--(if you have a waterproof trunk, you may indeed weather
it)--but go a-head on the turnpike road--the way of all mails--leaving
long and short commons to the goose and donkey--and the probability is,
that you may not only I make a sign before you die, but get a feed--and a
shelter.