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[Illustration: Vol. I No. 11.]
PUNCHINELLO
SATURDAY, JUNE 11, 1870.
PUBLISHED BY THE
PUNCHINELLO PUBLISHING COMPANY,
83 NASSAU STREET, NEW YORK.
* * * * *
THE MYSTERY OF MR. E. DROOD,
By ORPHEUS C. KERR,
In this Number and will be continued Weekly
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* * * * *
THE MYSTERY OF MR. E. DROOD.
AN ADAPTATION.
BY ORPHEUS C. KERR.
[The American Press's Young Gentlemen, when taking their shady literary
walks among the Columns of Interesting Matter, have been known to
remark--with a glibness and grace, by Jove, greatly in excess of their
salaries--that the reason why we don't produce great works of
imagination in this country, as they do in other countries, is because
we haven't the genius, you know. They think--do they?--that the
bran-new localities, post-office addresses, and official titles,
characteristic of the United States of America, are rife with all the
grand old traditional suggestions so useful in helping along the
romantic interest of fiction. They think--do they?--that if an American
writer could write a Novel in the exact style of COLLINS, or TROLLOPE,
or DICKENS: only laying its scenes and having its characters in this
country; the work would be as romantically effective as one by COLLINS,
or TROLLOPE, or DICKENS; and that the possibly necessary incidental
mention of such native places as Schermerhorn Street, Dobb's Ferry, or
Chicago, _wouldn't_ disturb the nicest dramatic illusion of the
imaginative tale. Very well, then! All right! Just look here!--O A.P's
Young Gentlemen, just look here--]
CHAPTER I.
DAWNATION.
A modern American Ritualistic Spire! How can the modern American
Ritualistic Spire be here! The well-known tapering brown Spire, like a
closed umbrella on end? How can that be here? There is no rusty rim of a
shocking bad hat between the eye and that Spire in the real prospect.
What is the rusty rim that now intervenes, and confuses the vision of at
least one eye? It must be an intoxicated hat that wants to see, too. It
is so, for ritualistic choirs strike up, acolytes swing censers
dispensing the heavy odor of punch, and the ritualistic rector and his
gaudily robed assistants in alb, chasuble, maniple and tunicle, intone a
_Nux Vomica_ in gorgeous procession. Then come twenty young clergymen in
stoles and birettas, running after twenty marriageable young ladies of
the congregation who have sent them worked slippers. Then follow ten
thousand black monkies swarming all over everybody and up and down
everything, chattering like fiends. Still the Ritualistic Spire keeps
turning up in impossible places, and still the intervening rusty rim of
a hat inexplicably clouds one eye. There dawns a sensation as of
writhing grim figures of snakes in one's boots, and the intervening
rusty rim of the hat that was not in the original prospect takes a
snake-like--But stay! Is this the rim of my own hat tumbled all awry? I'
mushbe! A few reflective moments, not unrelieved by hiccups, mush be
d'voted to co'shider-ERATION of th' posh'bil'ty.
Nodding excessively to himself with unspeakable gravity, the gentleman
whose diluted mind has thus played the Dickens with him, slowly arises
to an upright position by a series of complicated manoeuvres with both
hands and feet; and, having carefully balanced himself on one leg, and
shaking his aggressive old hat still farther down over his left eye,
proceeds to take a cloudy view of his surroundings. He is in a room
going on one side to a bar, and on the other side to a pair of glass
doors and a window, through the broken panes of which various musty
cloth substitutes for glass ejaculate toward the outer Mulberry Street.
Tilted back in chairs against the wall, in various attitudes of
dislocation of the spine and compound fracture of the neck, are an
Alderman of the ward, an Assistant-Assessor, and the lady who keeps the
hotel. The first two are shapeless with a slumber defying every law of
comfortable anatomy; the last is dreamily attempting to light a stumpy
pipe with the wrong end of a match, and shedding tears, in the dim
morning ghastliness, at her repeated failures.
"Thry another," says this woman, rather thickly, to the gentleman
balanced on one leg, who is gazing at her and winking very much. "Have
another, wid some bitters."
He straightens himself extremely, to an imminent peril of falling over
backward, sways slightly to and fro, and becomes as severe in expression
of countenance as his one uncovered eye will allow.
The woman falls back in her chair again asleep, and he, walking with one
shoulder depressed, and a species of sidewise, running gait, approaches
and poises himself over her.
"What vision can _she_ have?" the man muses, with his hat now fully upon
the bridge of his nose. He smiles unexpectedly; as suddenly frowns with
great intensity; and involuntarily walks backward against the sleeping
Alderman. Him he abstractedly sits down upon, and then listens intently
for any casual remark he may make. But one word comes--
"Wairzernat'chal'zationc'tif'kits."
"Unintelligent!" mutters the man, weariedly; and, rising dejectedly from
the Alderman, lurches, with a crash, upon the Assistant-Assessor. Him he
shakes fiercely for being so bony to fall on, and then hearkens for a
suitable apology.
"Warzwaz-yourwifesincome-lash'--lash'-year?"
A thoughtful pause, partaking of a doze.
"Unintelligent!"
Complicatedly arising from the Assessor, with his hat now almost hanging
by an ear, the gentleman, after various futile but ingenious efforts to
face towards the door by turning his head alone that way, finally
succeeds by walking in a circle until the door is before him. Then, with
his whole countenance charged with almost scowling intensity of purpose,
though finding it difficult to keep his eyes very far open, he balances
himself with the utmost care, throws his shoulders back, steps out
daringly, and goes off at an acute slant toward the Alderman again.
Recovering himself by a tremendous effort of will and a few wild
backward movements, he steps out jauntily once more, and can not stop
himself until he has gone twice around a chair on his extreme left and
reached almost exactly the point from which he started the first time.
He pauses, panting, but with the scowl of determination still more
intense, and concentrated chiefly in his right eye. Very cautiously
extending his dexter hand, that he may not destroy the nicety of his
perpendicular balance, he points with a finger at the knob of the door,
and suffers his stronger eye to fasten firmly upon the same object. A
moment's balancing, to make sure, and then, in three irresistible,
rushing strides, he goes through the glass doors with a burst, without
stopping to turn the latch, strikes an ash-box on the edge of the
sidewalk, rebounds to a lamp-post, and then, with the irresistible rush
still on him, describes a hasty wavy line, marked by irregular
heel-strokes, up the street.
That same afternoon, the modern American Ritualistic Spire rises in
duplicate illusion before the multiplying vision of a traveller recently
off the ferry-boat, who, as though not satisfied with the length of his
journey, makes frequent and unexpected trials of its width. The bells
are ringing for vesper service; and, having fairly made the right door
at last, after repeatedly shooting past and falling short of it, he
reaches his place in the choir and performs voluntaries and
involuntaries upon the organ, in a manner not distinguishable from
almost any fashionable church-music of the period.
CHAPTER II.
A DEAN, AND A CHAP OR TWO ALSO.
Whosoever has noticed a party of those sedate and Germanesquely
philosophical animals, the pigs, scrambling precipitately under a gate
from out a cabbage-patch toward nightfall, may, perhaps, have observed,
that, immediately upon emerging from the sacred vegetable preserve, a
couple of the more elderly and designing of them assumed a sudden air of
abstracted musing, and reduced their progress to a most dignified and
leisurely walk, as though to convince the human beholder that their
recent proximity to the cabbages had been but the trivial accident of a
meditative stroll.
Similarly, service in the church being over, and divers persons of
piggish solemnity of aspect dispersing, two of the latter detach
themselves from the rest and try an easy lounge around toward a side
door of the building, as though willing to be taken by the outer world
for a couple of unimpeachable low-church gentlemen who merely happened
to be in that neighborhood at that hour for an airing.
The day and year are waning, and the setting sun casts a ruddy but not
warming light upon two figures under the arch of the side door; while
one of these figures locks the door, the other, who seems to have a
music book under his arm, comes out, with a strange, screwy motion, as
though through an opening much too narrow for him, and, having poised a
moment to nervously pull some imaginary object from his right boot and
hurl it madly from him, goes unexpectedly off with the precipitancy and
equilibriously concentric manner of a gentleman in his first private
essay on a tight-rope.
"Was that Mr. BUMSTEAD, SMYTHE?"
"It wasn't anybody else, your Reverence."
"Say 'his identity with the person mentioned scarcely comes within the
legitimate domain of doubt,' SMYTHE--to Father Dean, the younger of the
piggish persons softly interposes,
"Is Mr. BUMSTEAD unwell, SMYTHE?"
"He's got 'em bad to-night."
"Say 'incipient cerebral effusion marks him especially for its prey at
this vesper hour.' SMYTHE--to Father DEAN," again softly interposes Mr.
SIMPSON, the Gospeler.
"Mr. SIMPSON," pursues Father DEAN, whose name has been modified, by
various theological stages, from its original form of Paudean, to Pere
DEAN--Father DEAN, "I regret to hear that Mr. BUMSTEAD is so delicate in
health; you may stop at his boarding-house on your way home, and ask him
how he is, with my compliments." _Pax vobiscum_.
Shining so with a sense of his own benignity that the retiring sun gives
up all rivalry at once and instantly sets in despair, Father DEAN
departs to his dinner, and Mr. SIMPSON, the Gospeler, betakes himself
cheerily to the second-floor-back where Mr. BUMSTEAD lives. Mr. BUMSTEAD
is a shady-looking man of about six and twenty, with black hair and
whiskers of the window-brush school, and a face reminding you of the
BOURBONS. As, although lighting his lamp, he has, abstractedly, almost
covered it with his hat, his room is but imperfectly illuminated, and
you can just detect the accordeon on the window-sill, and, above the
mantel, an unfinished sketch of a school-girl. (There is no artistic
merit in this picture; in which, indeed, a simple triangle on end
represents the waist, another and slightly larger triangle the skirts,
and straight-lines with rake-like terminations the arms and hands.)
"Called to ask how you are, and offer Father DEAN'S compliments," says
the Gospeler.
"I'm allright, shir!" says Mr. BUMSTEAD, rising from the rug where he
has been temporarily reposing, and dropping his umbrella. He speaks
almost with ferocity.
"You are awaiting your nephew, EDWIN DROOD?"
"Yeshir." As he answers, Mr. BUMSTEAD leans languidly far across the
table, and seems vaguely amazed at the aspect of the lamp with his hat
upon it.
Mr. SIMPSON retires softly, stops to greet some one at the foot of the
stairs, and, in another moment, a young man fourteen years old enters
the room with his carpet-bag.
"My dear boys! My dear EDWINS!"
Thus speaking, Mr. BUMSTEAD sidles eagerly at the new comer, with open
arms, and, in falling upon his neck, does so too heavily, and bears him
with a crash to the ground.
"Oh, see here! this is played out, you know," ejaculates the nephew,
almost suffocated with travelling-shawl and BUMSTEAD.
Mr. BUMSTEAD rises from him slowly and with dignity.
"Excuse me, dear EDWIN, I thought there were two of you."
EDWIN DROOD regains his feet with alacrity and casts aside his shawl.
"Whatever you thought, uncle, I am still a single man, although your way
of coming down on a chap was enough to make me beside myself. Any grub,
JACK?"
With a check upon his enthusiasm and a sudden gloom of expression
amounting almost to a squint, Mr. BUMSTEAD motions with his whole right
side toward an adjacent room in which a table is spread, and leads the
way thither in a half-circle.
"Ah, this is prime!" cries the young fellow, rubbing his hands; the
while he realizes that Mr. BUMSTEAD'S squint is an attempt to include
both himself and the picture over the mantel in the next room in one
incredibly complicated look.
Not much is said during dinner, as the strength of the boarding-house
butter requires all the nephew's energies for single combat with it, and
the uncle is so absorbed in a dreamy effort to make a salad with his
hash and all the contents of the castor, that he can attend to nothing
else. At length the cloth is drawn, EDWIN produces some peanuts from his
pocket and passes some to Mr. BUMSTEAD, and the latter, with a wet towel
pinned about his head, drinks a great deal of water.
"This is Sissy's birthday, you know, JACK," says the nephew, with a
squint through the door and around the corner of the adjoining apartment
toward the crude picture over the mantel, "and, if our respective
respected parents hadn't bound us by will to marry, I'd be mad after
her."
Crack. On EDWIN DROOD'S part.
Hic. On Mr. BUMSTEAD'S part.
"Nobody's dictated a marriage for you, JACK. _You_ can choose for
yourself. Life for _you_ is still fraught with freedom's intoxicating--"
Mr. BUMSTEAD has suddenly become very pale, and perspires heavily on the
forehead.
"Good Heavens, JACK! I haven't hurt your feelings?"
Mr. BUMSTEAD makes a feeble pass at him with the water-decanter, and
smiles in a very ghastly manner.
"Lem me be a mis'able warning to you, EDWIN," says Mr. BUMSTEAD,
shedding tears.
The scared face of the younger recalls him to himself, and he adds:
"Don't mind me, my dear boys. It's cloves; you may notice them on my
breath. I take them for nerv'shness." Here he rises in a series of
trembles to his feet, and balances, still very pale, on one leg.
"You want cheering up," says EDWIN DROOD, kindly.
"Yesh--cheering up. Let's go and walk in the graveyard," says Mr.
BUMSTEAD.
"By all means. You won't mind my slipping out for half a minute to the
Alms House to leave a few gum-drops for Sissy? Rather spoony, JACK."
Mr. BUMSTEAD almost loses his balance in an imprudent attempt to wink
archly, and says, "Norring-half-sh'-shweet-'n-life." He is very thick
with EDWIN DROOD, for he loves him.
"Well, let's skedaddle, then."
Mr. BUMSTEAD very carefully poises himself on both feet, puts on his hat
over the wet towel, gives a sudden horrified glance downward toward one
of his boots, and leaps frantically over an object.
"Why, that was only my cane," says EDWIN.
Mr. BUMSTEAD breathes hard, and leans heavily on his nephew as they go
out together.
(_To be Continued._)
* * * * *
~JUMBLES~
PUNCHINELLO has heard, of course, of the good time coming. It has not
come yet. It won't come till the stars sing together in the morning,
after going home, like festive young men, early. It won't come till
Chicago has got its growth in population, morals and ministers. It won't
come till the women are all angels, and men are all honest and wise; not
until politicians and retailers learn to tell the truth. You may think
the Millennium a long way off. Perhaps so. But mighty revolutions are
sometimes wrought in a mighty fast time. Many a fast man has been known
to turn over a new leaf in a single night, and forever afterwards be
slow. Such a thing is dreadful to contemplate, but it has been. Many a
vain woman has seen the folly of her ways at a glance, and at once gone
back on them. This is _not_ dreadful to contemplate, since to go back on
folly is to go onward in wisdom. The female sex is not often guilty of
this eccentricity, but instances have been known. It is that which fills
the proud bosom of man with hope and consolation, and makes him feel
really that woman is coming; which is all the more evident since she
began her "movement." The good time coming is nowhere definitely named
in the almanacs. The goings and comings of the heavenly bodies, from the
humble star to the huge planet, are calculated with the facility of the
cut of the newest fashion; and the revolutions of dynasties can be fixed
upon with tolerable certainty; but the period of the good time coming is
lost in the mists of doubt and the vapors of uncertainty. It is very
sure in expectancy, like the making of matrimonial matches. Everybody is
looking for it, but nobody sees it. The sharpest of eyes only discern
the bluest and gloomiest objects. But PUNCHINELLO may reasonably expect
to see, feel and know, this good time. The coming will yet be to it the
time come. Perhaps it will be when it visits two hundred thousand
readers weekly, when mothers sigh, children cry, and fathers well-nigh
die for it. At all events, somewhen or other--it may be the former
period, but possibly the latter--the good time _will_ come. And great
will be the coming thereof, with no discount to the biggest or richest
man out.
What a luxury is Hope! It springs eternal in the human breast. Rather an
awkward place for a spring, but as poets know more than other people, no
doubt it is all right. Hope is an institution. What is the White House,
or the Capitol at Washington, to Hope? What is the Central Park, or
Boston Common, or the Big Organ, to Hope? Not much--not anything, like
the man's religion, to speak of. Hope bears up many a man, though it
pays no bills to the grocer, milliner, tailor, or market man. It is the
vertebra which steadies him plumb up to a positive perpendicular. A
hopeless man or woman--how fearful! They very soon become
round-shouldered, limp and weak, and drink little but unsizable sighs,
and feed on all manner of dark and unhealthy things. It is TODD'S
deliberate opinion that if a cent can't be laid up, Hope should. Hope
with empty pockets is rich compared to wealth with "nary a" hope. Hope
is a good thing to have about the house. It always comes handy, and is
acceptable even to company. So believes, and he acts on the faith, does
TIMOTHY TODD.
* * * * *
~Capitol Punishment.~
Abolition of the franking privilege.
* * * * *
~SKETCH OF ORPHEUS C. KERR.~
[Illustration: RESIDENCE OF THE ADAPTER: BEGAD'S HILL, TICKNOR'S FIELDS,
NEW JERSEY.]
It is now nearly a twelfth of a century since the veracious Historian of
the imperishable Mackerel Brigade first manoeuvred that incomparably
strategical military organization in public, and caused it to illustrate
the fine art of waging heroic war upon a life-insurance principle.
Equally renowned in arms for its feats and legs, and for being always on
hand when any peculiarly daring retrograde movement was on foot, this
limber martial body continually fell back upon victory throughout the
war, and has been coming forward with hand-organs ever since. Its
complete History, by the same gentleman who is now adapting the literary
struggles of MR. E. DROOD to American minds and matters, was
subsequently issued from the press of CARLETON, in more or less volumes,
and at once attracted profound attention from the author's creditors.
One great American journal said of it: "We find the paper upon which
this production is printed of a most amusing quality." Another observed:
"The binding of this tedious military work is the most humorous we ever
saw." A third added: "In typographical details, the volumes now under
consideration are facetious beyond compare."
[Illustration: THE ADAPTER AS HE APPEARS EVERY SATURDAY.]
The present residence of the successful Historian is Begad's Hill, New
Jersey, and, if not existing in SHAKSPEARE'S time, it certainly looks
old enough to have been built at about that period. Its architecture is
of the no-capital Corinthian order; there are mortgages both front and
back, and hot and cold water at the nearest hotel. From the central
front window, which belongs to the author's library, in which he keeps
his Patent Office Reports, there is a fine view of the top of the porch;
while from the rear casements you get a glimpse of blind-shutters which
won't open. It is reported of this fine old place, that the present
proprietor wished to own it even when a child; never dreaming the
mortgaged halls would yet be his without a hope of re-selling.
Although fully thirty years of age, the owner of Begad's Hill Place
still writes with a pen; and, perhaps, with a finer thoughtfulness as to
not suffusing his fingers with ink than in his more youthful moments of
composition. He is sound and kind in both single and double harness;
would undoubtedly be good to the Pole if he could get there; and,
although living many miles from the city, walks into his breakfast every
morning in the year. Let us, however,
"No longer seek his virtues to disclose,
Nor draw his frailties from their dread abode."
but advise PUNCHINELLO'S readers to peruse the "Mystery of Mr. E.
DROOD," for further glimpses of Mr. ORPHEUS C. KERR.
* * * * *
~The Fall of Man at the Falls~.
It is a very lamentable fact that the married people of Niagara have not
attained even the dignity and comfort of insanity. A paragraph informs
us that "The Niagara hotels have already forty-seven men trying to look
as if married for years, and who only succeed in resembling imbeciles."
To a Niagara tourist this must be an Eye-aggravating spectacle. But,
fortunately, none of this class of the Double-Blest will shoot anybody.
They don't look as if they had been married long! They are imbecile, not
insane!
* * * * *
~Green and Red~.
The _Southern Cell_ proposes that the Fenians shall make a new Ireland
of Winnipeg. Except on the principle of Hibernating, PUNCHINELLO cannot
discover why his Irish fellow-citizens are ambitious to winter in the
Red River country. Wouldn't Greenland do as well, and wear better?
* * * * *
~TAKE CARE OF THE WOUNDED~
Though but one of the Fenian leaders was killed in the late Frontier
Fizzle, yet many of them are reported as being badly wounded--as to
their feelings. General O'NEIL'S feelings are dreadfully hurt by the
ignominy of a constable and a cell, which was a bad Cell for a Celt. The
feelings of General GLEASON (and they must be multitudinous, since he is
nearly seven feet high,) were so badly wounded by circumstances over
which he didn't seem to have any control, that he retired from the field
"in disgust." Mental afflictions, in fact, are so numerous among the
Fenians since their Fizzle, as to suggest the advisability of their
Head-Centre founding a Hospital for Wounded Feelings with the surplus of
the funds wrung by him from simple, hard-working BRIDGET.
* * * * *
~Interesting to Bathers~
Persons who are drowned while bathing in the surf are said to experience
but little pain. In fact, their Sufferings are short.
* * * * *
~Fenian Tactics~.
The first movement of the Fenians on reaching Canadian soil was to
"throw out their skirmishers into a hop field," where the Hops gathered
by them were of the precipitate and retrogressive kind sometimes traced
to Spanish origin.
* * * * *
~THE HOLY GRAIL AND OTHER POEMS.~
(This is one of the other Poems.)
BY A HALF-RED DENIZEN OF THE WEST.
SIR PELLEAS, lord of many a barren isle,
On his front stoop at eventide, awhile,
Sat solemn. His mother, on a stuel,
At the crannied hearth prepared his gruel.
"Mother!" he cried, "I love!" Said she, "Ah, who?"
"I know not, mother dear," he said, "Do you?
I only know I love all maidens fair;
My special maid, I have not seen, I swear.
Perhaps she's fair as Arthur's queenly saint;
And pure as she--and then, perhaps she ain't."
Turned then his mother from the hearth-stone hot;
Dropped the black lid upon the gruel-pot.
"I know'd a Qua-aker feller, as often as tow'd me this:
'Doan't thou marry for munny, but goa wheer munny is!'
She's a beauty, thou thinks--wot'a a beauty? the flower as blaws,
But proputty, proputty sticks, and proputty, proputty graws."
Then said her son, "If I may make so bold,
You quote the new-style poem, not the old.
The Northern Farmer whom you think so sage
Is not born yet. This is the Middle Age."
He said no more, and on the next bright day
To Arthur's court he proudly rode away.
And on the way a maiden did he meet,
And laid his heart and fortunes at her feet.
Smiling on him--ETTARRE was her name--
"Brave knight," she said, "your love I cannot blame.
Your hands are strong. I see you have no brains,
You're just the man for tournaments. Your pains,
In case for me a battle you shall win,
Shall be rewarded," and she smiled like sin.
PELLEAS glistened with a wild delight;
And good King Arthur soon got up a fight
And on the flat field, by the shore of Usk,
SIR PELLEAS smashed the knights from dawn till dusk.
Then from his spear--at least he thought he did--
He shook each mangled corpse, and softly glid,
And crowned ETTARRE Queen of Love and Truth.
She wore the crown and then bescorned the youth.
Now to her castle home would she repair;
And PELLEAS craved that he might see her there.
"Oh, young man from the country!" then said she,
"Shoo fly! poor fool, and don't you bother me!"
She banged her gate behind her, crying "Sold!"
The noble youth was left out in the cold.
He shoo-ed the fly from the flower-pots,
From blackest moss, he shoo-ed them all.
Shoo-ed them from rusted nails and knots,
That held the peach to the garden-wall;
And broken sheds, all sad and strange.
He shoo-ed them from the clinking latch,
And from the weeded, ancient thatch,
Upon the lonely moated grange.
He only said, "This thing is dreary.
She cometh not!" he said.
He said, "I am aweary, aweary,
I wish these flies were dead."
So PELLEAS made his moan. And every day,
Or moist or dry, he shoo-ed the flies away.
"These be the ways of ladies," PELLEAS saith,
"To those who love them; trials of our faith."
But ceaseless shoo-ing made the lady mad,
And she called out the best three knights she had,
And charged them, "Charge him! Drive him from the wall!
If he keeps on, we'll have no flies at all!"
And out they came. Each did his level best;
SIR PELLEAS soon killed one and slew the rest.
A bush of wild marsh-marigold,
That shines in hollows gray,
He cut, and smiling to his love,
He shoo-ed more flies away.
He clasped his neck with crooked hands;
In the hot sun in lonely lands,
For several days he steady stands.
The wrinkled fly beneath him crawls,
He watches by the castle walls--
Like thunder then his bush it falls.
(_To be Continued._)
* * * * *
~ASTRONOMICAL CONVERSATIONS.~
[BY A FATHER AND DAUGHTER RESIDING ON THE PLANET VENUS.]
No. IV.
_D._ Oh, Pa, if we only had a Moon! What is life without one?
_F._ Well, my child, we've w'iggled along, so far. It is true, our
Telluric friends may be said to have the advantage of us; but then,
there's no lunacy here! Everything is on the square on this planet!
_D._ I don't care; I want a Moon, square or no square! There's no excuse
for being sentimental here. Who is ever imaginative, right after supper?
And yet Twilight is all the time we have.
_F._ But still, HELENE, I think our young folks are not really deficient
in sentiment. What they would be, with six or seven moons, like those of
SATURN or URANUS, is frightful to think of! Heavens! what poetry would
spring up, like asparagus, in the genial spring-time! We should see
Raptures, I warrant you! And oh, the frensies, the homicidal energies,
the child-roastings! Yes, Moonshine would make it livelier here, no
doubt. A fine time, truly, for Ogres, with their discriminating
scent!--And what a moony sky! How odd, if one had a parlor with six
windows.
_D._ Seven would be odder.
_F._ Well, seven, and a moon looking into each one of 'em! An artist
would perhaps object to the cross-lights, but he needn't paint by them.
_D._ What kind of "lights" were you speaking of?
_F._ Satellites.
_D._ Oh, pshaw! don't tantalize me!
_F._ Well, cross-lights.
_D._ Now, pray, what may a cross-light be? An unamiable and inhospitable
light, like that which gleams from the eyes of an astronomer when he is
interrupted in the midst of a calculation?
_F._ No, nor yet the sarcastic sparkle in the eyes of a witty but
selfish and unfilial young lady! Cross-lights are lights whose rays,
coming from opposite quarters, cross each other.
_D._ (Then yours and mine are cross-lights, I guess!) If two American
twenty-five cent pieces were to be placed at a distance from each other,
and you stood between them----
_F._ My child, I could never come between friends who would gladly see
each other after so long an absence!
_D._ I was only trying to realize your idea of "light from opposite
quarters."
_F._ The most of 'em must be far too rusty to reflect light.
_D._ Oh, I dare say their reflections are heavy enough.
_F._ And so will mine be, soon, if you go on in that style.
_D._ Well, pa, I do drivel--that's a fact! Let us turn to something of
more importance.
_F._ Suppose we now attend the Celestial Bull Fight always going on over
there in the sky. On one side you perceive that gamey _matador,_ ORION
(not the "Gold Beater,") with his club and his lion's skin, _a la
Hercules_. You observe how "unreservedly and unconditionally" he pitches
into the Bull, and how superb is the attitude and ardor of his opponent.
It is a splendid set-to, full of alarming possibilities. Every moment
you expect to see those enormous horns engaged with the bowels of ORION,
or, in default of this, to behold that truculent Club come down, Whack!
on that curly pate!
_D._ And yet, they don't!
_F._ True enough,--they don't. It reminds me of one JOHN BULL, and his
familiar _vis-a-vis,_ O'RYAN the Fenian. As the celestial parties have
maintained their portentous attitudes for ages, and nothing has come of
it, so we may look placidly for a similar suspension in the earthly
copy.
_D._ But their very attitudes are startling! Wasn't ORION something of a
boaster?
_F._ Oh, yes; he was in the habit of declaring that there wasn't an
animal on earth that he couldn't whip. He got come up with, however. By
the way, ORION was the original Homoeopathist. His proposed
father-in-law, DON OEROPION, having unfortunately put out his eyes, in a
little operation for misplaced affection, he hit on the now famous
principle, which, if fit for HAHNE-MAN, was fit for ORION. He went to
gazing at the sun. What would have destroyed his vision if he had had
any, now restored it when he didn't have any, and his sight became so
keen that he was able to see through OEROPION--though, I believe, he
reinforced his powers of ocular penetration with a pod-auger.
_D._ (Drivelling again! More Bitters, I guess!) Father, why were the
Pleiades placed in the Head of TAURUS?
_F._ Well, my child, there are various explanations. On the Earth, they
pretend to say it was meant to signify that the English women are the
finest in the universe--the most sensible, the most charming, the most
virtuous. No wonder, if this is so, we find their sign up there! What
said MAGNUS APOLLO to young IULUS,--"Proceed, youngster, you'll get
there eventually!" And MAG. was right.
_D._ Pa, why do they say, "the _Seven_ Pleiades," when there are only
six?
_F._ Well, dear, [_kissing her,_] perhaps there's a vacancy for _you!_ I
expect the Universe will be called in, one of these nights, to admire a
new winking, blinking, and saucy little violet star--the neatest thing
going! But not, I hope, just yet.
_D._ Boo--hoo--hoo--hoo!
_F._ Well, hang the Pleiades! Boo--hoo--hoo--too!
* * * * *
~Good for Something Better.~
We like enthusiasm. We are ourselves quite given to the admiration of
great people, as they, in their turn, we have reason to believe, are
given to admiration of their dear PUNCHINELLO. But when an English
adorer says that he considers "MR. CHARLES SUMNER fit for a throne," we
are tempted to inquire what throne there is fit for _him_? The fact is,
thrones have come to be rather more disreputable than three-legged
stools. "Every inch a king" may mean six feet of mad-man, or five feet
of mad-woman. We sincerely hope that there is no intention in England of
making MR. SUMNER the King of Spain--we mean of abducting him for the
purpose; for of course, he would never voluntarily assume the purple.
* * * * *
~The Difference.~
Fenian General O'NEILL bore down upon Canada with a martial charge, but
he was sent back in a Marshal's charge.
[Illustration: AWFUL SCARE OF THE BRITISH LION AT THE ADVANCE OF THE
FENIAN HEAD CENTREPEDE.]
* * * * *
~Woman's Right to Ballot and Bullet.~
In a speech which sounds like a six-shooter, that deadly woman, Mrs.
F.H.M. BROWN, of San Francisco, gives notice that "when she goes to cast
her ballot, if any man insults her, she will shoot him!" Who will now
dare to question woman's ability to exercise both the franchise and the
franchised? PUNCHINELLO sadly foresees that Shooters for the hands of
women will take the place of Suitors. Nevertheless, he guarantees that
the Constitutional right of women to bear arms shall not be infringed,
and that they shall enjoy the inestimable privilege to shoot and be shot
at. Every woman shall be at perfect liberty to cast her bullet for the
man of her choice!
* * * * *
~How to Make Ends Meet.~
Miss BRITTAIN delivers a lecture on the High-caste women of India. She
should supplement it with one on the High-strung women of Indiana, and
thus illustrate the extremes of marriage and divorce.
* * * * *
~From the Vermont Border.~
_Voice._ "Has anything been gained by General O'NEIL?"
_Echo._ O Nihil!
* * * * *
[Illustration: A CABINET ORNAMENT. THE FISH REPRESENTED IS ONE OF THE
UPPER CRUST-ACEA]
* * * * *
~The Dominion of King Whiskey.~
The London _Illustrated News_ calls the new Province of the Dominion,
Manetoda, instead of Manitobah. Perhaps the mistake originated from the
rumor of the Many Tods by which certain members of the Canadian Cabinet
are said to be habitually inspired.
* * * * *
~A Blue-grass Reflection.~
Hard, indeed, is the life of the poor trapper of the Plains. Driven by
stress of hunger, he is often obliged to eat rattle-snake; but, as he
cannot eat the head of the reptile, though the tail is good at a pinch,
he fails, you perceive, to make both ends ~Meat.~
* * * * *
~A Bright Idea.~
The Hon. JOHN BRIGHT is said to while away the time, in his retirement,
by knitting garters. It seems very strange that such a usurpation of
Woman's Rights should be carried into effect by one of the stoutest
advocates of them.
* * * * *
~The Green above the Red, at last.~
One of the narrators of the late Fenian fizzle on the Canadian border
describes General O'NEIL as having invaded the Dominion, "mounted on a
small Red horse."
* * * * *
~OUR PORTFOLIO.~
An exchange, after praising our recent Cartoon representing the
"Barnacles on American Commerce," moves to refer us to the House
Committee on Commerce and Manufactures. PUNCHINELLO never did love the
ways of the Washington Circumlocution Office, but if there is one thing
which he dislikes more than anything else, 'tis the idea of being
pigeonholed by the Committee on Commerce. The uses to which valuable
information is put by that august body of traffickers in public
credulity, are not for us. That we might penetrate their benighted minds
with many rays of knowledge is not to be doubted, but that we should be
snubbed in proportion to the value of our opinions is also equally
clear. There are some pretty dark places in this world: the Black Hole
of Calcutta; the _oubliette_ of Chillon Castle, the Torture Chambers of
Nuremberg, and the grottoes of the Mammoth Cave, for instance; but there
is no such utter exclusion of light, such profound oblivion, such
blackness of darkness, as awaits anything which may be committed to the
dungeon of a Congressional Committee. Most decidedly, therefore, we
would rather not be referred.
* * * * *
Learned men in Massachusetts are just now confronted with an alarming
possibility. They have been racking their brains to solve the problem
whether population is increasing there faster than the means of
subsistence, and with the expectation of discovering that it is, they
have reached a precisely opposite result. The awful announcement is put
forth, that the supply of babies is diminishing, and the question "What
shall we do to remedy it?" is asked. So persistently is this
interrogatory urged, that young unmarried men perambulating the streets
of Boston, or sauntering leisurely about the Common, are liable at any
moment to be accosted by advanced single ladies with wild, haggard
looks, who stop them face to face, seize them by the shoulders, and
gazing at them with keen, imploring glances, as if they would read their
souls through their eyes, seem to cry "And what have _you_ got to say
about it, O wifeless youth? and why do _you_ let the precious moments
fly when we are willing and ready to be sacrificed? and what are _we_
all coming to, and where are _you_ all going to, and where will Boston
be if this thing goes on?" But these thoughtless and jeering bachelors
will not stop to hear the wail of their challengers; they feel no pity
for their despair; they have no stomach for their agony; but go their
ways, leaving the wretched females rooted, transfixed, the picture of
perfect hopelessness, and greeting them, ere they disappear from sight,
with shouts of scoffing laughter, which the winds catch up and carry
away out of earshot.
* * * * *
~Something that most People would like a Little Longer.~
Strawberry Short Cake.
* * * * *
[Illustration: INTERNATIONAL YACHTING.
JOHN BULL, NETTLED AT THE DEFEAT OF LITTLE ASHBURY, WHO IS SETTING UP A
HOWL ABOUT IT, ORDERS MASTERS DOUGLAS AND BENNETT AWAY WITH THEIR BOATS,
LEST THEY SHOULD "FOSTER MISCHIEVOUS JEALOUSIES."]
* * * * *
~CONDENSED CONGRESS.~
SENATE.
[Illustration: 'I'.]
In spite of the obstinate silence of SUMNER, the Senate has been lively.
Its first proceeding was to pass a bill--an interminable and long-drawn
bill--ostensibly to enforce the Fifteenth Amendment. But the title is a
little joke. As no single person can read this bill and live, and as no
person other than a member of the bar of Philadelphia could understand
it, if he survived the reading of it, PUNCHINELLO deemed it his duty to
have the bill read by relays of strong men. What, is the result? Six of
his most valued contributors sleep in the valley. But what are their
lives to the welfare of the universe, for which he exists. The bill
provides,
1. That any person of a darker color than chrome yellow shall hereafter
be entitled to vote to any extent at any election, without reference to
age, sex, or previous condition, anything anywhere to the contrary
notwithstanding.
2. That any person who says that any such person ought not to vote shall
be punishable by fine to the extent of his possessions, and shall be
anathema.
3. That any person who shall, with intent to prevent the voting of any
such person, strike such person upon the nose, eye, mouth, or other
feature, within one mile of any place of voting, within one week of any
day of voting, shall be punishable by fine to the extent of twice his
possessions, and shall be disentitled to vote forever after. Moreover he
shall be anathema.
4. That any person who shall advise any other person to question the
right of any person of the hue hereinbefore specified to vote, or to do
any other act whatsoever, shall be punishable by fine to the extent of
three times his possessions, and shall be anathema.
5. That all the fines collected under this act shall be expended upon
the endowment of "The Society for Securing the Pursuit of Happiness to
American Citizens of African Descent." And if any person shall call in
question the justice of such a disposition of such fines, he shall be
punishable by fine to the extent of four times his possessions, and
shall be anathema.
Mr. WILSON objected to anathema. He said nobody in the Senate but SUMNER
knew what it meant. Besides, it was borrowed from the syllabus of a
degraded superstition. He moved to substitute the simple and
intelligible expression, "Hebedam."
The Senate settled their little dispute about who was entitled to a
medal for coming first to the defence of the Capital. They decided to
give medals to everybody. Mr. CAMERON was satisfied. If the Senate only
medalled enough, that was all he asked. There were about five thousand
wavering voters in his district, whom he thought he could fix, if he
could give them a medal apiece.
Mr. CONKLING said he would like to medal some men. But he did not like
such meddlesome men as CAMERON.
Mr. DRAKE moved to deprive anybody in Missouri who differed from him in
politics of practicing any profession. He said that many of the citizens
of that State were incarnate demons--so much so that when they had an
important law case they would rather intrust it to somebody else than
himself. Was this right? He asked the Senate to protect him as a native
industry.
HOUSE.