at Carthage, Ohio, sets down what it calls "the barometrical
register" of the meeting as follows:--"Nine a.m.--Invitations to
drink are freely offered and accepted. Ten a.m.--Sober, but drinking.
Eleven a.m.--Noisy and demonstrative; liquor becoming effective.
Twelve a.m.--Generally 'tight;' pugnacity rising. One p.m.--Rather
drunk; fights freely offered. Two p.m.--Quite drunk; black eyes in
abundance--holders not very firm. Three p.m.--Very drunk; hacks and
furniture-cars in demand. Four p.m.--D--cidedly drunk; too far gone to
fight."
A NICE GIRL.--124.
There is nothing half so sweet in life--half so beautiful, or
delightful, or so loveable--as a "nice girl." Not a pretty, or a
dashing, or an elegant girl, but a _nice_ girl. One of those lovely,
lively, good-tempered, good-hearted, sweet-faced, amiable, neat,
happy, domestic creatures met within the sphere of home, diffusing
around the domestic hearth the influence of her goodness like the
essence of sweet flowers. A nice girl is not the languishing beauty,
dawdling on a sofa, and discussing the last novel or opera; or the
giraffe-like creature sweeping majestically through a drawing-room.
The nice girl may not even dance or play well, and knows nothing
about "using her eyes," or coquetting with a fan. She is not given to
sensation novels--she is too busy. At the opera, she is not in front
showing her bare shoulders, but sits quietly and unobtrusively--at
the back of the box most likely. In fact, it is not often in such
scenes we discover her. Home is her place. Who rises betimes, and
superintends the morning meal? Who makes the toast and the tea, and
buttons the boys' shirts, and waters the flowers, and feeds the
chickens, and brightens up the parlour and sitting-room? Is it the
languisher, or the giraffe, or the _élégante_? Not a bit of it--it's
the nice girl. Her unmade toilet is made in the shortest possible
time; yet how charmingly it is done, and how elegant her neat dress
and plain colour! What kisses she distributes among the family! No
presenting a cheek or a brow, like a "fine girl," but an audible
smack, which says plainly, "I love you ever so much." If I ever
coveted anything, it is one of the nice girl's kisses. Breakfast
over, down in the kitchen to see about dinner; always cheerful and
light-hearted. She never ceases to be active and useful until the day
is done, when she will polka with the boys, and sing old songs, and
play old tunes to her father for hours together. She is a perfect
treasure, is the "nice girl," when illness comes; it is she that
attends with unwearying patience to the sick chamber. There is no
risk, no fatigue that she will not undergo, no sacrifice that she will
not make. She is all love, all devotion. I have often thought it would
be happiness to be ill, to be watched by such loving eyes and tended
by such fair hands. One of the most strongly marked characteristics
of a "nice girl" is tidiness and simplicity of dress. She is ever
associated in my mind with a high frock, plain collar, and the
neatest of neck-ribbons, bound with the most modest little brooch in
the world. I never knew a "nice girl" who displayed a profusion of
rings and bracelets, or who wore low dresses or a splendid bonnet.
I say again, there is nothing in the world half so beautiful, half
so intrinsically good, as a "nice girl." She is the sweetest flower
in the path of life. There are others far more stately, far more
gorgeous, but these we merely admire as we go by. It is where the
daisy grows that we lie down to rest.
A REASON FOR DEAR CREAM.--125.
The _Boston Post_ says that the reason why cream is so dear is, that
milk has risen so high the cream can't reach the top.
ADVICE TO PARENTS.--126.
Rear up your lads like nails, and then they'll not only go through the
world, but you may clench 'em on to the other side.
EXTRAORDINARY CROW.--127.
A native of Kentucky imitates the crowing of a cock so remarkably
well, that the sun, upon several occasions, has risen two hours
earlier by mistake.
LOGS WANTED.--128.
The printer of the _Western Gazette_ lately published the following
notice:--"Dry stove wood wanted immediately at this office, in
exchange for papers. N.B. Don't bring logs that the _Devil_ can't
split."
LOOK ON THIS PICTURE AND ON THIS.--129.
_Matrimony._--Hot buckwheat cake--comfortable slippers--smoking
coffee--buttons--redeemed stockings--boot-jacks--happiness.
_Bachelorhood._--Sheet-iron quilts--blue noses--frosty rooms--ice
in the pitcher--unregenerated linen--heelless stockings--coffee
sweetened with icicles--gutta-percha biscuits--flabby steaks--dull
razors--corns--coughs and colics--rhubarb--aloes--misery.
ABSENCE OF MIND.--130.
A Mr. Jaber J. Jenkinson, of Arkansas, whose sight is such as to
render glasses necessary, put his spectacles on his ear instead of his
eyes, one day last week, and actually walked three miles sideways in a
heavy rain before he discovered his mistake.
DOMESTIC ECONOMY.--131.
The _Boston Herald_ has the following infallible recipe:--"To make
pie: Play at blind man's buff in a printing-office. To have music at
dinner: Tell your wife she is not so handsome as the lady who lives
over the way. To save butter: Make it so salt that nobody can eat it."
TALL RELATIONS.--132.
The wit deservedly won his bet who, in a company when every one was
bragging of his tall relations, wagered that he himself had a brother
twelve feet high. He had, he said, "two half-brothers, each measuring
six feet."
WE WONDER, TOO.--133.
A little boy once said to his aunt, "Aunty, I should think that Satan
must be an awful trouble to God." "He must be troubled enough,
indeed, I should think," she answered. "I don't see how he came to
turn out so, when there _was no devil to put him up to it_."
INFLAMMABLE AND DANGEROUS.--134.
Judge Beeler put a notice over his factory-gate at Lowell: "No cigars
or Irishmen admitted within these walls; for," says he, "the one will
set a flame agoin' among my cotton, and t'other among my gals. I won't
have no such inflammable and dangerous things about me on no account."
A RARE PRINTER.--135.
A western paper contains the following advertisement:--"Wants a
situation, a practical printer, who is competent to take charge of
any department in a printing and publishing house. Would accept a
professorship in any of the academies. Has no objection to teach
ornamental painting and penmanship, geometry, trigonometry, and many
other sciences. Is particularly suited to act as pastor to a small
Evangelical church, or as a local preacher. He would have no objection
to form a small but select class of interesting young ladies, to
instruct in the highest branches. To a dentist or chiropodist he
would be invaluable, as he can do almost anything. Would board with a
family, if decidedly pious."
SOMETHING LIKE A GOOD SHOT.--136.
Two passengers coming down the Mississippi in a steamboat were amusing
themselves with shooting birds on the shore from the deck. Some
sporting conversation ensued; one remarked that he would turn his back
to no man in killing racoons--that he had repeatedly shot fifty a
day. "What o' that?" said a Kentuckian; "I make nothing of killing a
hundred 'coon a day, or'nary luck." "Do you know Captain Scott, of our
State?" asked a Tennessean bystander; "he, now, is something like a
shot. A hundred 'coon! why he never points at one without hitting him.
He never misses, and the 'coons know it. T'other day he levelled at an
old 'un, in a high tree; the varmint looked at him a minute, and then
bawled out, 'Hallo, Cap'n Scott, is that you?' 'Yes,' was the reply.
'Well, pray don't shoot, I'll come down to you--I'll give in--I'm dead
beat.'"
ABSENCE OF MIND.--137.
A highly respectable inhabitant in the city of New York lately died
under very remarkable circumstances. He was subject to fits of extreme
absence of mind from childhood; and one night, upon retiring to rest,
having carefully tucked his pantaloons under the bed-clothes, he threw
himself over the back of a chair, and expired from the severe cold he
experienced during the night. The editor of the _New York Herald_, who
relates this extraordinary fact, assures his readers, as a guarantee
of its truth, that he received his information from the individual in
question.
A REMARKABLE MAN.--138.
There is a man in the West who is described as being so remarkably
tall that he requires a ladder to shave himself! The same individual
never troubles his servant to sit up for him when he is out late at
night, for he can, with the most perfect ease, put his arm down the
chimney and unbolt the street-door.
SPECTACLES AND BIBLE READING.--139.
The will of Elias Boudinot, of New Jersey, has just been proved. It
contains the following clause:--"I give to the president and managers
of the New Jersey Bible Society 200 dollars, to be laid out in the
purchase of spectacles, to be given by them to the poor old people; it
being in vain to give a Bible to those who cannot obtain the means of
reading it."
TO THE POINT.--140.
An officer who was inspecting his company one morning spied one
private whose shirt was sadly begrimed. "Patrick O'Flynn!" called out
the captain. "Here, yer honour!" promptly responded Patrick, with
his hand to his cap. "How long do you wear a shirt?" thundered the
officer. "Twenty-eight inches," was the rejoinder.
EXTRAORDINARY MOTTO.--141.
The _New York Herald_ has the following for its motto:--"Take no
shin-plasters (all damned rogues who issue them), live temperately,
drink moderately, eschew temperance societies, take care of the
sixpences, never hurt a saint, go to bed at ten, rise at six, never
buy on credit, fear God Almighty, love the beautiful girls, vote
against Van Buren, and kick all politicians and parsons to the devil."
EXCESSIVE POLITENESS.--142.
A Californian poet gives the following lesson on politeness to the
youth of the Golden State:--
"Indeed, my friends, far better it would seem,
Were you to choose the opposite extreme;
Like one 'Down East' who an umbrella took,
And from the rain gave shelter to a duck;
Who to a limping dog once lent his arm,
And to a setting hen said, 'Don't rise, ma'am;'
Nor e'er to lifeless things respect did lack--
Said always to a chair, 'Excuse my back;'
'Excuse my curiosity,' he said to books;
And to the looking-glass, 'Excuse my looks.'"
"A SHELL IN DE STOVE."--143.
The _New York Herald's_ Morris Island correspondent relates as follows
an incident of the operations at Charleston:--Quite an uproar was
occasioned in the rear of the _Herald's_ tent here yesterday. General
Terry, whose head-quarters adjoin those of your correspondent, has a
sable cook, who wanted some lead for his fishing-tackle, and undertook
to melt some from the outside of a ten-pound Parrot shell, which he
discovered lying about the camp. Placing the projectile in a stove,
and seating himself where he could catch the molten metal in a shovel
as it fell, he soon had the satisfaction of seeing one of the most
startling views ever brought to his vision. The shell exploded, and
besides blowing the stove and cookhouse to atoms, inflicted serious
wounds upon the darkey. My servant, a contraband from Beaufort, gave
vent to the universal sentiment, while he was surveying the wreck
which the explosion occasioned, and from which we so narrowly escaped,
in the following sage remark:--"De dam ole fool, come clar gown yere
f'm Bos'n an' put a shell in de stove!" If General Terry's niggers
continue to obtain their "sinkers" in this manner, you may expect to
hear that the _Herald's_ head-quarters have been removed.
DIAMOND CUT DIAMOND.--144.
In New York, a quick-witted toper went into a bar-room and called
for something to drink. "We don't sell liquor," said the law-evading
landlord; "we will give you a glass, and then if you want a cracker
(a biscuit) we'll sell it you for three cents." The "good creature"
was handed down, and our hero took a stiff horn; when, turning round
to depart, the unsuspecting landlord handed him the dish of crackers,
with the remark, "You'll buy a cracker?" "Well, no, I guess not;
you sell 'em too dear. I can get lots on 'm five or six for a cent
anywhere else."
EDITORIAL TRIBULATIONS.--145.
The editor of the _American Mechanic_ has encountered trials unknown
to ordinary men. Just hearken unto his wailings:--"Owing to the
fact that our paper-maker disappointed us, the failure of the mails
deprived us of our exchanges, a Dutch pedlar stole our scissors, the
rats ran off with the paste, and the devils went to the circus, while
the editor was at home tending the baby, our paper is unavoidably
postponed beyond the period of its publication."
SAMBO AND CUFFEE.--146.
Varnum S. Mills, of this city, tells a story illustrative of the
simplicity of Virginia niggers. He was visiting a friend in the Old
Dominion, who owns many slaves, among whom were two, named Sambo and
Cuffee, who seemed to be mortal enemies. Sambo was a favourite with
the master, who one day said to him: "Sambo, you have always been a
good nigger, and when you die you shall have a funeral. My family will
all attend, and all the niggers shall be present, and Cuffee shall
be a pall-bearer." The darkey looked his master in the face with the
simplicity of a soft clam when dug out of the mud at low tide, and
indignantly responded: "Massa, if Cuffee comes to de funeril, I won't
go to the grabe." It apparently did not occur to Sambo that he should
be "conveyed" thither.
AN ODE ON GAS.--147.
A country town having been recently lighted with gas, the local editor
electrifies the community with an ode:
"Luminous blaze!
I never seen the like in all my born days!
Tallow candles ain't no mor'n tar
When you're about;
And spirit lamps is no whar,
Bein clean dun out.
"Sparkling lite!
I think I never seen anything half so brite;
Everything is amazing clear;
The hidjus glume
Is defunct; and every cheer
Is apparient in the rume!
"Gloryous halo!
Your skintelashuns make a surprising display;
You don't need no snuffers,
But you are just scrude out;
When you are squenched by puffers,
Ojus fumes aryse.
"Brillyant flame!
The nites was next to darkness when you came;
But candles has vanisht
Before you, and lard oil gone to grass;
Every greasy nuisance has been banisht--
Hurraw for Gass!"
CURIOSITIES OF AMERICAN SPEECH.--148.
In a book on Americanisms, published last year, a Baltimore young
lady is represented as jumping up from her seat, on being asked to
dance, and saying, "Yes, sirree: for I have sot, and sot, and sot,
till I've nigh tuk root!" I cannot say I have heard anything quite
equal to this; but I very well remember that at a party given on
board one of the ships at Esquimault, a young lady declined to dance
a "fancy" dance upon the plea, "I'd rather not, sir. I guess I'm not
_fixed up_ for waltzing;" an expression the peculiar meaning of which
must be left to readers of her own sex to decide. An English young
lady who was staying at one of the houses at Mare Island when we were
there, happened one evening, when we were visiting her friends, to
be confined to her room with a headache. Upon our arrival, the young
daughter of our host--a girl of bout twelve--went up to her to try to
persuade her to come down. "Well," she said, "I'm _real_ sorry you're
so poorly. You'd better come, for there are some almighty swells down
there!" A lady speaking of the same person, said, "Her hair, sir, took
my fancy right away!" Again, several of us were one day talking to a
tall, slight young lady about the then new-fashioned crinoline which
she was wearing. After a little banter, she said, "I guess, captain,
if you were to take my hoops off you might draw me through the eye of
a needle!" Perhaps one of the most whimsical of these curiosities of
expression, combining freedom of manner with that of speech, was made
use of to Captain Richards by a master-caulker. He had been vainly
endeavouring to persuade the captain that the ship required caulking;
and at last he said in disgust, "You may be liberal as a private
citizen, captain, but you're mean to an almighty pump-tack!"--in his
official capacity of course. Again, an American gentleman on board
of one of our mail-packets was trying to recall to the recollection
of the mail-agent a lady who had been fellow-passenger with them on
a former occasion. "She sat opposite you at table all the voyage,"
he said. "Oh, I think I remember her; she ate a great deal, did she
not?" "Eat, sir!" was the reply; "she was a perfect gastronomic
fillibuster!" One more example and I have done with a subject upon
which I might enlarge for pages. The boys at the school at Victoria
were being examined in Scripture, and the question was asked, "In what
way did Hiram assist Solomon in the building of the temple?" It passed
two or three boys, when at last one sharp little fellow triumphantly
exclaimed, "Please, sir, he _donated_ him the lumber."
VERY LIKELY.--149.
"From Camden to Bletchly, a distance of forty miles I travelled along
with Mrs. Greaves. She was a sweet and interesting woman--so sweet
and interesting that, fastidious as I am on the subject, I believe I
would have been willing to have kissed her. I had, however, several
reasons for not perpetrating this act. First, I am such a good husband
I wouldn't even be guilty of the appearance of disloyalty to my sweet
wife. Second, I was afraid our fellow-passengers would see me and tell
Greaves. Third, I do not think Mrs. G. would let me."
CURIOUS EVENT.--150.
A diffident Hartford bachelor went to the sea-shore in August to seek
refuge from the loneliness of his celibacy, and one dark evening,
enjoying the breeze on the piazza of his hotel, happened to take a
seat that had just been vacated by the husband of a loving wife,
with whom the happy man had been chatting. In a few moments the lady
returned, and, mistaking the stranger for her husband, lovingly
encircled his neck and gave him an affectionate kiss, with the remark,
"Come, darling, is it not about time to retire?" He did not faint, but
the shock was very severe.
HOT PIES.--151.
One freezing February morning a negro hawked mutton pies in a basket
around Faneuil Hall Square, roaring out, "Hot mutton pies!" "Hot
mutton pies!" A teamster bought and tried to bite one, but found it
frozen as solid as the curb-stone. "What do you call them hot for, you
black and blue swindler?" yelled the teamster to the shivering pieman.
"Wy, wy, a white man guv 'em to me hot dis mornin'. Dey was hot wen
I got 'em dis mornin'!" "Well, you fool, it didn't take ten minutes
to freeze them in that old basket. Why call them hot now?" "Wy, bless
you, dats de name ob 'em--de name ob 'em! If I didn't holler de right
name nobody would tetch 'em. You want me to holler froze pies, I
suppose! No, sa; you can't fool me dat way!"
A MIGHTY THICK FOG.--152.
A rather loquacious individual was endeavouring to draw an old man
into conversation, but hitherto without much success, the old fellow
having sufficient discernment to see that his object was to make
a little sport for the passengers at his expense. At length says
loquacious individual: "I suppose you consider Down East a right smart
place; but I guess it would puzzle them to get up quite so thick a fog
as we are having here this morning, wouldn't it?" "Well," said the
old man, "I don't know about that. I hired one of your Massachusetts
chaps to work for me last summer, and one rather foggy mornin' I sent
him down to the meadow to lay a few courses of shingle on a new barn
I was finishin' off. At dinner-time the fellow came up, and, sez he,
'That's an almighty long barn of yourn.' Sez I, 'Not very long.'
'Well,' sez he, 'I've been to work all this forenoon, and haven't got
one course laid yet.' 'Well,' sez I, 'you're a lazy fellow, that's all
I've got to say.' And so after dinner I went down to see what he'd
been about, and I'll be thundered ef he hadn't shingled more than a
hundred foot _right out on to the fog_."
WHISKERS AND KISSES.--153.
The editress of the _Lancaster Literary Gazette_ says she would as
soon nestle her nose in a rat's nest of swingle tow as allow a man
with whiskers on to kiss her. We (_Petersburg Express_) don't believe
a word of it. The objections which some ladies pretend to have to
whiskers all arise from envy. They don't have any. They would if they
could; but the fact is, the continual motion of the lower jaw is fatal
to their growth. The ladies--God bless them!--adopt our fashion as
far as they can. Look at the depredations they have committed on our
wardrobes the last few years. They have appropriated our shirt-bosoms,
gold studs and all. They have encircled their soft bewitching necks
in our standing collars and cravats--driving them to flatties and
turn-downs. Their innocent little hearts have been palpitating in the
inside of our waistcoats, instead of thumping against the outside,
as naturally intended. They have thrust their pretty feet and ankles
through our unmentionables, unwhisperables, unthinkaboutables; and
they are skipping along the streets in our high-heeled boots. Do you
hear, gentlemen?--we say boots!
LITTLES.--154.
Everything is beautiful when it is little (except souls!)--little
pigs, little lambs, little birds, little kittens, little children.
Little Martin boxes of houses are generally the most happy and cozy;
little villages are nearer to being atoms of a shattered paradise
than anything we know of. Little fortunes bring the most content, and
little hopes the least disappointment. Little words are the sweetest
to hear, and little charities fly furthest and stay the longest on
the wing. Little lakes are the stillest, little hearts the fullest,
and little farms the best tilled. Little books the most read, and
little songs the best loved. And when Nature would make anything
especially rare and beautiful, she makes it little--little pearls,
little diamonds, little dews. Agar's is a model prayer, but then it
is a little prayer, and the burden of the petition is for little.
The Sermon on the Mount is little, but the last dedication discourse
was two hours. The Roman said, "_Veni, vidi, vici_"--I came, saw,
conquered; but despatches now-a-days are longer than the battles they
tell of. Everybody calls that little which they love best upon earth.
We once heard a good sort of a man speak of his little wife, and we
fancied she must be a perfect _bijou_ of a woman. We saw her; she
weighed two hundred and ten; we were surprised. But then it was no
joke--the man meant it. He could put his wife in his heart, and have
room for other things besides; and what was she but precious, and what
could she be but little? We rather doubt the stories of great argosies
of gold we sometimes hear of, for Nature deals in littles altogether.
Life is made up of littles, death is what remains of them all. Day
is made up of little beams, and night is glorious with little stars.
_Multum in parvo_--much in little--is the great beauty of all that we
love best, hope for most, and remember longest.
SPEAKING HIS DEEP EMOTIONS.--155.
"My dear Ellen," said Mr. Softfellow to a young lady whose smiles
he was seeking, "I have long wished for this sweet opportunity, but
I hardly dare trust myself now to speak the deep emotions of my
palpitating heart; but I declare to you, my dearest Ellen, that I love
you most tenderly; your smiles would shed--would shed----" "Never mind
the wood-shed," said Ellen, "go on with that pretty talk."
SPIRITUALISM EXTRAORDINARY.--156.
An enthusiastic spiritualist, when relating to a sceptic certain
spiritual performances to which he could testify, said that on one
occasion the spirit of his wife, who had been dead several years,
returned to him, and, seating herself on his knee, put her arms around
him and kissed him, much to his gratification, as she used to do when
living. "You do not mean to say," remarked the sceptic, "that the
spirit of your wife really embraced you and kissed you?" "No, not
exactly that," replied the believer; "but her spirit took possession
of the female medium--the future Mrs. B---- that is to be, you
know--and through her embraced and kissed me."
MILWAUKEE ELOQUENCE.--157.