gave forth during the conflict. Certain it is, no one can describe them,
and, therefore, I shall not attempt it. The battle ended, Miss Augusta
moved as though she would have arisen, but this was protested against by
a number of voices at once.
“One song, my dear Aurelia,” said Miss Small; “you must sing that sweet
little French air you used to sing in Philadelphia, and which Madame
Piggisqueaki was so fond of.”
Miss Augusta looked pitifully at her mamma, and her mamma looked “sing”
at Miss Augusta; accordingly, she squared herself for a song.
[Illustration: “SOME VERY CURIOUS SOUNDS, WHICH APPEARED TO PROCEED FROM
THE LIPS OF MISS AUGUSTA.”]
She brought her hands to the campus this time in fine style, and they
seemed now to be perfectly reconciled to each other. They commenced a
kind of colloquy; the right whispering treble very softly, and the left
responding bass very loudly. The conference had been kept up until I
began to desire a change of the subject, when my ear caught,
indistinctly, some very curious sounds, which appeared to proceed from
the lips of Miss Augusta; they seemed to be compounded of a dry cough, a
grunt, a hiccough, and a whisper; and they were introduced, it appeared
to me, as interpreters between the right and the left.
Things progressed in this way for about the space of fifteen seconds,
when I happened to direct my attention to Mr. Jenkins, from
Philadelphia. His eyes were closed, his head rolled gracefully from side
to side; a beam of heavenly complacency rested upon his countenance; and
his whole man gave irresistible demonstration that Miss Crump’s music
made him feel good all over. I had just turned from the contemplation of
Mr. Jenkins’ transports, to see whether I could extract from the
performance anything intelligible, when Miss Crump made a fly-catching
grab at half-a-dozen keys in a row and at the same instant she fetched a
long, dunghill-cock crow, at the conclusion of which she grabbed as many
keys with her left. This came over Jenkins like a warm bath, and over me
like a rake of bamboo briers.
My nerves had not recovered from this shock before Miss Augusta repeated
the movement, and accompanied it with a squall of a pinched cat. This
threw me into an ague fit; but, from respect to the performer, I
maintained my position.
She now made a third grasp with the right, boxed the faces of six keys
in a row with the left, and at the same time raised one of the most
unearthly howls that ever issued from the throat of a human being. This
seemed the signal for universal uproar and destruction. She now threw
away all her reserve, and charged the piano with her whole force. She
boxed it, she clawed it, she raked it, she scraped it. Her neck-vein
swelled, her chin flew up, her face flushed, her eye glared, her bosom
heaved; she screamed, she howled, she yelled, cackled, and was in the
act of dwelling upon the note of a screech-owl, when I took the St.
Vitus’s dance, and rushed out of the room. “Good Lord,” said a
bystander, “if this be her _singing_, what must her _crying be_!” As I
reached the door I heard a voice exclaim, “By heavens! she’s the most
enchanting performer I ever heard in my life!” I turned to see who was
the author of this ill-timed compliment, and who should it be but Nick
Truck, from Lincoln, who seven years before was dancing “Possum up the
Gumtree” in the chimney-corner of his father’s kitchen. Nick had entered
the counting-room of a merchant in Charleston some five or six years
before, had been sent out as supercargo of a vessel to Bordeaux, and
while the vessel was delivering one cargo and taking in another, had
contracted a wonderful relish for French music.
As for myself, I went home in convulsions; took sixty drops of laudanum,
and fell asleep. I dreamed that I was in a beautiful city, the streets
of which intersected each other at right angles; that the birds of the
air and the beasts of the forest had gathered there for battle, the
former led on by a Frenchman, the latter by an Italian; that I was
looking on their movements towards each other, when I heard the cry of
“Hecate is coming!” I turned my eye to the north-east, and saw a female
flying through the air toward the city, and distinctly recognised in her
the features of Miss Crump. I took the alarm, and was making my escape,
when she gave command for the beasts and birds to fall on me. They did
so, and, with all the noises of the animal world, were in the act of
tearing me to pieces, when I was waked by the stepping of Hall, my
room-mate, into bed.
“Oh, my dear sir,” exclaimed I, “you have waked me from a horrible
dream. What o’clock is it?”
“Ten minutes after twelve,” said he.
“And where have you been to this late hour?”
“I have just returned from the party.”
“And what kept you so late?”
“Why, I disliked to retire while Miss Crump was playing.”
“In mercy’s name!” said I, “is she playing yet?”
“Yes,” said he; “I had to leave her playing at last.”
“And where was Jenkins?”
“He was there, still in ecstasies, and urging her to play on.”
“And where was Truck?”
“He was asleep.”
“And what was she playing?”
“An Italian——”
Here I swooned, and heard no more.
_Augustus Baldwin Longstreet._
------------------------------------------------------------------------
_A POLYGLOT BARBER._
[Illustration]
MY first tonsorial experience is in a barber shop of the old town of
Prinkipo. Most of the barbers are polyglotically inclined. My particular
barber is either a Greek, a Maltese, a Sclav, a Bulgarian, or a
Montenegrin. It is impossible at first to tell his native tongue. He has
French glibly. He speaks a “leetle Inglis,” and understands less. He is
well up in Italian, as many of the families in this vicinage are. He had
some knowledge of Spanish, as kindred to the Italian. This extraordinary
learning always gives me a shudder, and especially when under his razor
or shears. Being a stranger on the island, and having no very pronounced
national features, it was equally difficult for him to ascertain my
nationality, except by inquisition long and pitiless. All I could do was
to arm myself with the affirmatives and negatives of various languages.
With these I made myself complaisant, to save my face from bloodshed. My
first conversation with this artist confirmed the general reputation as
to the gossipy quality of the Barber of Seville. He had all the gossip
of the isles, including its languages. The conversation ran somewhat
after this style—
Barber: “You have been here long?”
I reply in Bohemian, “_Ne!_”
He easily understood that.
“You are here for your health?”
I reply in Danish, affirmatively and negatively, “_Ja!_” “_Nei,
minherre!_” “Yes, sir,” and “No, sir.” This puzzled him.
“An army gentleman, perhaps?”
I reply in German, “_Nein, mein herr_.”
“Oh, then you are a navy officer?”
Having in view my position as admiral of the launch, I reply in
Hungarian; because, _lucus a non lucendo_, Hungary is an inland country,
and, like our own, without a navy.
“_Igen!_” “Yes.”
“Your vessel is at Constantinople?”
Remembering that there was an Italian emigrant named Christopher
Columbus of naval renown, I reply: “_Si, signore_.”
“You will bring your vessel to Prinkipo?”
Ah! here was my opportunity. It is the modern Greek in which I reply:
“_Nae vevayos_.”
He is thunderstruck. It is evidently his mother-tongue. Likely he has a
Polish father; who knows? When he asks me in French—
“Will your vessel touch at Athens?”
I respond in Polish, “_Tak!_” “No.” And then, with some hesitation, I
add the French word, “_peut-être_.” “Perhaps.”
“You will visit Egypt?”
“_Sim, senhor._” This is Portuguese for “Yes, sir.”
The gesture or the manner with which these responses are made encourages
him, for he immediately asks whether I have ever been in Alabania. I
have no negative or affirmative in any of the languages of the Adriatic.
My Dalmatian servitor, Pedro, is absent, and my next best affirmative is
in Russian.
“_Do prawda._” Perhaps, being affiliated with the Sclav, he understands
this language.
“You have never been in Egypt?”
As the pine and the palm are associated in my mind, and having connected
the Polar midnight sun with the Pyramids of the Pharaohs, I respond in
Swedish, making it intense—
“_Ja!_” adding a little affirmative in Roumanian, to give intensity to
the remark, “_Gie_.”
After a pause in the conversation he resumes. He believes that he has my
nationality fixed. He surmises that I am from some Balkan province, and
he asks—
“Have you been in Roumelia, Bulgaria, Servia, Montenegro, and
Herzegovina?”
Knowing that I could not answer this truthfully, and not being able to
answer it partially, I give him back in Roumanian an emphatic negative—
“_Na canna, bucca._”
“You have been quite a traveller!”
This suggests the Chinese as the fitting language for the affirmative,
and I say—
“_She!_”
Having no reference to Haggard’s novel, for it was not then out. To make
the “_she_” expressive I add another affirmative, which I had carefully
studied while boarding with the Chinese Legation in Washington.
“_Ta Jin!_”
“You like the Chinese, Monsieur?”
Having succeeded so well with the Chinese, I answer promptly in the
negative—
“_Puh!_”
This monosyllable disgusts him. His subordinates gather around the chair
where I was being shaved, interested in this composite conversation. The
artist then asks if I had visited Jerusalem. Here was my great
breakdown. Notwithstanding I had represented a Hebrew community in New
York, with more synagogues than Jerusalem had in the time of Solomon, I
was at a loss for a Hebrew affirmative. Happy thought! I respond
promptly in the Arabic tongue, with its guttural peculiarity—
“_Na’am._”
It sounded to me after I uttered it like profanity, and I fell back as
gracefully as I could, waiting for the next attack, and equipped with a
Japanese expletive.
“You like Constantinople?”
I respond in a sweet Japanese accent—
“_Sama, san!_”
“How long have you been in Constantinople?”
I give it to him in English—
“I arrived there in the year 1851—thirty-six years ago.”
“_Mon Dieu!—mon Dieu!—mon Dieu!_” he exclaims, “Have you lived there
ever since that time?”
“_Beaucoup, Monsieur!_”
He has not yet learned my nationality. I am afraid every moment that he
will strike America. It comes—
“Perhaps you have been in America?”
“Wa’al, yaas, I guess!”
He could not understand this, for he had not been educated at Robert
College, nor had he abided in Vermont. I ask him in French which America
he means. He says—
“South America. I have a cousin of my wife’s there, and I would like to
know how the country looks.”
“_Le nom du cousin de votre femme?_” I ask.
“Pierre Moulka Pari Michipopouli. He is like you, Monsieur—quite a
traveller.”
Then began a fusillade of questions and rattling replies.
“You have lived in Paris, Monsieur?”
“_Jamais!_” “Never.” “Been to Genoa?” “_Si, Signore._” “Ah, you are
English, are you not?” With the intense Turkish negative I respond,
“_Yok!_” “French?” “_Non._” “German?” “_Nein._” “Sclav?” “_Nee._”
“Italian?” “_No, Signore._” “Ah! Espagnol? You look like one.”
“Pardon, Monsieur, I am not.”
“Well,” said he, taking breath, “will you tell me, Monsieur, where you
do come from?”
“Don’t you remember the only nation in the world where the barber is as
good as a king?” I said proudly.
“Oh, Switzerland. _Sapristi! Corpo de Bacco!_”
Understanding that last remark perfectly, I offer him a cigarette, and
say, “No, I am not Swiss.”
“Brazeel?” “_Jamais._”
The way that barber rubs the unguent into my hairless scalp and hirsute
beard shows that he is a disappointed man.
The next time I visit the shop I receive marked attention. The hands all
rise up. They pick up the earth in a Turkish _salaam_. They distribute
it in courtesy to the American minister, whom they have meanwhile
discovered. As I have been frequently turned away from the doors of our
American Congress after twenty-five years’ service, because I did not
act or look like a member, so I was unrecognised here, by the “_Oi
Barberoi_,” as having no national characterisation. America was the last
race or people to which this Greek barber assigned me.
_Samuel S. Cox._
------------------------------------------------------------------------
_AT THE GIANT’S CAUSEWAY._
“YIS, sur. It’s many a wan av yure countrymin Oi’ve taken over the
Causeway, sur.”
“How do you know what countryman I am?”
“Thrust me fur knowing the American accent, sur.”
“I haven’t the American accent. You have it. Go to New York if you don’t
believe me.”
“There’s many an Oirishman there, I’m tould, sur.”
“More than in Dublin.”
“De ye tell me thot, sur? Well, sur, Oi took Gineral Grant himsilf over
the Causeway, and a foine mawn he was. An’ Gineral Sheridan, too, sur.
Many’s the great mawn Oi’ve taken over the Causeway, sur.”
“Besides me?”
“Well, sur, ye may be the greatest av thim all, sur; fur, as Oi’ve often
noticed, them that’s laste like it is sometimes bether than they look,
sur.”
“True. So we won’t pursue _that_ subject any further.”
“Oi took the Duke av Connaught himsilf down this very road, sur, an’ do
you know what he says to me, sur? He says, ‘Pat,’ says he, ‘have ye had
anything to ate the day?’ ‘Saving yer presence, sur,’ says Oi, ‘except a
bite at breakfast’—an’ before the words were out of my mout’, says the
Duke to me, says he, ‘Sit down wid us,’ says he; an’ no sooner said than
done, and Oi had moy lunch with the Duke av Connaught. De ye moind
_thot_, now?”
“That was a great honour—for the Duke.”
“It was—what’s that, sur? It was a great honour fur _me_, sur.”
“Just depends on how a man looks at it. If you think it was a great
honour for you, it was.”
“An’ Oi’ve taken great professors over the Causeway, sur—min that knew
more in wan minute, sur, than you and Oi wud know in all our loives,
sur. An’ they’ve tould me that this was the greatest soight in the whole
wurrold.”
“Curious how education develops the power of lying.”
“Loying is it, sur? Don’t you know that there’s nothing in the whole
wurrold loike the Goiant’s Causeway, sur?”
“What for? For mud?”
“The road _is_ a troifle muddy at this toime av the year, sur. It’s not
many comes to see it in the winther toime, sur; indade, yure the first
wan this week. There’s a power av rain in the nort’ av Oireland in the
winter toime, sur.”
“How much further away is this Causeway?”
“Is it the Causeway, sur? But a troifle, sur. Ye’ll see it the minute we
turn that bit av rock, sur. Sure an’ begorra it’s well worth the walk,
for there is no place that is as noted as the Causeway, sur.”
“Yes. They told me about it at Derry. That’s why I came.”
“De ye mane to say, sur, that ye niver heard av the Goiant’s Causeway
till ye came to Derry? Well, sur, Oi’ve taken tins av thousands av
people over this ground, sur, and yure the first wan that iver tould me
he never heard av the Causeway. Where were ye brought up, sur?”
“I’m a Belfast man.”
“De ye mane thot? Troth! Oi don’t think the professors are the biggest
loiers, saving yer prisince, sur.”
“Where’s your old Causeway? We’re round that rock now.”
“Where’s the Causeway is it, sur? Where should it be but just before yer
two eyes?”
“You don’t mean that foundation, do you?”
“What foundation, sur?”
“Looks like as if a building society had started a big stone tabernacle,
and went bankrupt when the foundation was laid.”
“The greatest min in this wurrold, sur, tould me that——”
“Never mind what the greatest men said. _Is_ that the Causeway? That’s
what I want settled.”
“It is, sur.”
“Let’s get back.”
“Back, is it, sur? Troth, ye’r not there yet. Divil a fut will Oi go
back till ye’ve seen what ye paid for, sur.”
“All right, I’ll go on—under protest—merely to please you, you know.”
“Oi’m afraid ye’r hard to plaze yersilf, sur. It’s wan av the siven
wondhers av the wurrold, sur.”
“That people come here? It _is_ a wonder, as you say. I’ll bet they
don’t come a second time.”
“Now, beggin’ ye’r pardon, ye’r wrong there, sur. Not the sickond toime,
but the twintieth toime have Oi known educated min to come, sur. And the
aftener a man av sinse sees it, sur, the more wondherful he thinks it.
Now, sur, ye’r fut is on the smaller Causeway, and be careful how you
stip, fur it’s moighty slippery undherfut. There are three Causeways,
sur, the Great Causeway bein’ in the centhre, and that we’ll come to in
a minute, sur.”
“What is it used for?”
“The Causeway, is it?”
“Yes.”
“It’s used for nothin’ at all, sur.”
“Then why did they go to all this expense?”
“What expinse, sur?”
“The building of it.”
“Be all the powers, sur, it’s surely not running through your hid that
the Goiant’s Causeway was built by the hand av man, sur!”
“How was it built, then? By contract?”
“Oi see plainly Oi’ll hay to begin at the beginnin’ wid you, sur. It was
built by a mighty convulsion av nathure, sur.”
“Oh, yes, I remember reading about it in the papers at the time. It was
the beginning of the Irish troubles.”
“It was at the beginning av toime, sur. Professor Gneiss, av Edinburgh,
tould me its origin was volcanic, and that——”
“Oh, you can’t believe what a professor says. Was _he_ there?”
“He was not.”
“Well, then!”
“If you, sur, will excuse the liberty Oi’ll take, sur, in recommending
you to kape silence fur a few minutes, sur, ye’ll know a good dale more
whin ye lave here than ye did whin ye came, sur.”
“All right; go ahead.”
“These columns, sur, are basaltic.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s a term used by Professor Gneiss. Now Oi’ll call ye’r attention to
the ind av this column. That we call octagon, meaning eight-sided, as ye
can see. And if yer measure the eight sides, sur, yer’ll foind them the
same to a hair’s breadth.”
“And yet you say nobody chiselled it?”
“Oi do, sur.”
“You evidently think I’ll believe anything. But no matter. Go on, go
on.”
“Now, if ye’ll notice, around this octagon are eight other pillars,
forming an octagon group, as we call thim here, sur, all the columns
being aqual in size. Now, sur, if ye follow me here, ye will see a
septagon column, from the Latin word maning siven, and around that there
are siven columns.”
“Is there any sixtogon one?”
“There is not, sur.”
“It’s a sort of seven-by-eight Causeway then?”
“There, sur, Oi tould ye ye would slip down, sur. A man broke his leg
there once. Are ye hurt, sur?”
“Not in the least.”
“Thank the powers for that, sur! Oi always notice that the quieter a man
kapes, the more attention he can pay to his futin’.”
“And you’re paid to do the talking, too. I hadn’t thought about that.”
“Now, sur, ye see from here the Great Causeway. Isn’t that a grand
soight, sur?”
“Well, that depends on what you call a——”
“Oh! tare an’ ’owns, sur, ye’ve kilt yerself entoirely this toime. Don’t
attempt to roise, sur, till Oi get down to ye. Dear! dear!! Are ye badly
hurt, sur?”
[Illustration: “‘DON’T ATTEMPT TO ROISE, SUR, TILL OI GET DOWN TO YE.’”]
“Groggy, but still in the ring. Say, are my trousers——”
“They _are_ torn a little, sur, Oi regret to say.”
“Why the Old Harry didn’t you tell me this place was so slippery? Do you
want to break a man’s neck over this Causeway of yours?”
“Sure, sur, Oi warned ye the very first afgo. Beggin’ your pardon, sur,
if ye’d pay as much attintion to ye’r fut as you do to your tongue——”
“Who’s been doing all the talking? Have I opened my mouth since we
started? Well, now that we’re down here, what’s there to see?”
“Ye see these columns, sur. They’re the tallest in the Causeway. Ye can
see their formation now, sur. They’re all in short lengths of three or
four feet, and every joint is a perfect ball and socket wan.”
“What’s the object of the ball and socket?”
“Ah, who can tell that, sur?”
“Hadn’t the professor some pet fiction about it?”
“He _did_ say, sur——”
“I was sure of it.”
“——That it was on account of the uneven cooling of the lava. Now, look
at this, sur. This is—_be_ careful, sur. Ye were nearly aff that toime
again. This is the Goiant’s Wishin’ Chair. If ye sit down here, ye can
have three wishes, sur.”
“I won’t sit down.”
“Have ye nothing to wish, sur?”
“No. All I wanted was to meet the biggest liar in the world, but I don’t
need to wish for that now.”
“Then ye’ve met him, sur. Well, Oi suppose ye like company, sur?”
“Anything else to be seen around here?”
“Do ye see those basaltic columns on the face av the cliff, sur? That’s
the Goiant’s Organ, sur.”
“Who plays on it?”
“Well, sur, the storms do. When the wind comes dhriving in from the
Atlantic, and the waves lash up the Causeway, they do be sayin’ that
whin the timpast is at its hoight all the grand tones av an organ can be
heard comin’ from thim pipes.”
“Good enough. That’s worth the money. Here you are. I must be going now
to catch my train. Good-bye.”
“Here’s a very dacent mon, sur, that sells picturs av the Causeway.”
“I don’t care for any.”
“They’re very chape, sur.”
“I want to forget the Causeway.”
“Then good-bye, sur, an’ thank ye, sur.”
“Good-bye.”
* * * * *
The Guide (to the Picture-seller): “De ye see thot mon sprawlin’ over
the Causeway? Well, thot’s the dombdest fule Oi iver tuk over these
racks. Oi wouldn’t take that mon over the Causeway agin fur all the
money in the North av Oireland. De ye mind _thot_ now?”
_Robert Barr_ (“_Luke Sharp_”).
------------------------------------------------------------------------
_HANS BREITMANN’S BARTY._
HANS BREITMANN gife a barty;
Dey had biano-blayin’,
I felled in lofe mit a ’Merican frau,
Her name vas Madilda Yane.
She hat haar as prown ash a pretzel,
Her eyes vas himmel-plue,
Und vhen dey looket indo mine,
Dey shplit mine heart in dwo.
[Illustration: “VENT SHPINNEN’ ROUND UND ROUND.”]
Hans Breitmann gife a barty,
I vent dere you’ll pe pound;
I valtzet mit Madilda Yane,
Und vent shpinnen’ round und round.
De pootiest Fraulein in de house,
She vayed ’pout dwo hoondred pound,
Und every dime she gife a shoomp
She make de vindows sound.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty,
I dells you it cost him dear;
Dey rolled in more ash sefen kecks
Of foost-rate lager beer.
Und vhenefer dey knocks de shpicket in
De Deutschers gifes a cheer;
I dinks dat so vine a barty
Nefer coom to a het dis year.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty;
Dere all vas Souse and Brouse,
Vhen de sooper comed in, de gompany
Did make demselfs to house;
Dey ate das Brot and Gensy broost,
De Bratwurst and Braten vine,
Und vash der Abendessen down
Mit four parrels of Neckarwein.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty;
Ve all cot troonk ash bigs.
I poot mine mout’ to a parrel of beer,
Und emptied it oop mit a schwigs;
Und den I gissed Madilda Yane.
Und she shlog me on de kop,
Und de gompany vighted mit daple-lecks
Dill de coonshtable made oos shtop.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty—
Vhere ish dot barty now?
Vhere ish de lofely golden cloud
Dot float on de moundain’s prow?
Vhere ish de himmelstrahlende stern—
De shtar of de shpirit’s light?
All goned afay mit de lager beer—
Afay in de Ewigkeit.
_Charles Godfrey Leland._
------------------------------------------------------------------------
_OUR NEW BEDSTEAD._
[Illustration: “WE HAD TO TURN OUT EVERY HOUR.”]
I HAVE bought me a new patent bedstead, to facilitate early rising,
called a “wake-up.” It is a good thing to rise early in the country.
Even in the winter time it is conducive to health to get out of a warm
bed by lamplight; to shiver into your drawers and slippers; to wash your
face in a basin of ice-flakes; and to comb out your frigid hair with an
uncompromising comb, before a frosty looking-glass. The only difficulty
about it lies in the impotence of human will. You will deliberate about
it and argue the point. You will indulge in specious pretences, and lie
still with only the tip end of your nose outside the blankets; you will
pretend to yourself that you _do_ intend to jump out in a few minutes;
you will tamper with the good intention, and yet indulge in the
delicious luxury. To all this the “wake-up” is inflexibly and
triumphantly antagonistic. It is a bedstead with a clock scientifically
inserted in the head-board. When you go to bed you wind up the clock,
and point the index-hand to that hour on the dial at which you wish to
rise in the morning. Then you place yourself in the hands of the
invention and shut your eyes.
You are now, as it were, under the guardianship of King Solomon and
Doctor Benjamin Franklin. There is no need to recall those beautiful
lines of the poet’s—