“That’s German—from Schiller. ‘And if I die, at least I die—for

thee—for thee!’ Here it is clear that you are apostrophizing the

cause of your disaster, the chicken. Indeed what gentleman (or

lady either) of sense, wouldn’t die, I should like to know, for a

well fattened capon of the right Molucca breed, stuffed with

capers and mushrooms, and served up in a salad-bowl, with

orange-jellies _en mosaïques_. Write! (You can get them that way

at Tortoni’s)—Write, if you please!

“Here is a nice little Latin phrase, and rare too, (one can’t be

too _recherché_ or brief in one’s Latin, it’s getting so

common—ignoratio elenchi. He has committed an ignoratio

elenchi—that is to say, he has understood the words of your

proposition, but not the idea. The man was a fool, you see. Some

poor fellow whom you address while choking with that

chicken-bone, and who therefore didn’t precisely understand what

you were talking about. Throw the ignoratio elenchi in his teeth,

and, at once, you have him annihilated. If he dares to reply, you

can tell him from Lucan (here it is) that speeches are mere

anemonae verborum, anemone words. The anemone, with great

brilliancy, has no smell. Or, if he begins to bluster, you may be

down upon him with insomnia Jovis, reveries of Jupiter—a phrase

which Silius Italicus (see here!) applies to thoughts pompous and

inflated. This will be sure and cut him to the heart. He can do

nothing but roll over and die. Will you be kind enough to write?

“In Greek we must have some thing pretty—from Demosthenes, for

example. Ανερο φευων και παλιν μαχεσεται. [Aner o pheugoen kai

palin makesetai.] There is a tolerably good translation of it in

Hudibras—

‘For he that flies may fight again,

Which he can never do that’s slain.’

In a Blackwood article nothing makes so fine a show as your

Greek. The very letters have an air of profundity about them.

Only observe, madam, the astute look of that Epsilon! That Phi

ought certainly to be a bishop! Was ever there a smarter fellow

than that Omicron? Just twig that Tau! In short, there is nothing

like Greek for a genuine sensation-paper. In the present case

your application is the most obvious thing in the world. Rap out

the sentence, with a huge oath, and by way of ultimatum at the

good-for-nothing dunder-headed villain who couldn’t understand

your plain English in relation to the chicken-bone. He’ll take

the hint and be off, you may depend upon it.”

These were all the instructions Mr. B. could afford me upon the

topic in question, but I felt they would be entirely sufficient.

I was, at length, able to write a genuine Blackwood article, and

determined to do it forthwith. In taking leave of me, Mr. B. made

a proposition for the purchase of the paper when written; but as

he could offer me only fifty guineas a sheet, I thought it better

to let our society have it, than sacrifice it for so paltry a

sum. Notwithstanding this niggardly spirit, however, the

gentleman showed his consideration for me in all other respects,

and indeed treated me with the greatest civility. His parting

words made a deep impression upon my heart, and I hope I shall

always remember them with gratitude.

“My dear Miss Zenobia,” he said, while the tears stood in his

eyes, “is there anything else I can do to promote the success of

your laudable undertaking? Let me reflect! It is just possible

that you may not be able, so soon as convenient, to—to—get

yourself drowned, or—choked with a chicken-bone, or—or

hung,—or—bitten by a—but stay! Now I think me of it, there are a

couple of very excellent bull-dogs in the yard—fine fellows, I

assure you—savage, and all that—indeed just the thing for your

money—they’ll have you eaten up, auricula and all, in less than

five minutes (here’s my watch!)—and then only think of the

sensations! Here! I say—Tom!—Peter!—Dick, you villain!—let out

those”—but as I was really in a great hurry, and had not another

moment to spare, I was reluctantly forced to expedite my

departure, and accordingly took leave at once—somewhat more

abruptly, I admit, than strict courtesy would have otherwise

allowed.

It was my primary object upon quitting Mr. Blackwood, to get into

some immediate difficulty, pursuant to his advice, and with this

view I spent the greater part of the day in wandering about

Edinburgh, seeking for desperate adventures—adventures adequate

to the intensity of my feelings, and adapted to the vast

character of the article I intended to write. In this excursion I

was attended by one negro servant, Pompey, and my little lap-dog

Diana, whom I had brought with me from Philadelphia. It was not,

however, until late in the afternoon that I fully succeeded in my

arduous undertaking. An important event then happened of which

the following Blackwood article, in the tone heterogeneous, is

the substance and result.

A PREDICAMENT

What chance, good lady, hath bereft you thus?—COMUS.

It was a quiet and still afternoon when I strolled forth in the

goodly city of Edina. The confusion and bustle in the streets

were terrible. Men were talking. Women were screaming. Children

were choking. Pigs were whistling. Carts they rattled. Bulls they

bellowed. Cows they lowed. Horses they neighed. Cats they

caterwauled. Dogs they danced. _Danced!_ Could it then be

possible? Danced! Alas, thought I, my dancing days are over! Thus

it is ever. What a host of gloomy recollections will ever and

anon be awakened in the mind of genius and imaginative

contemplation, especially of a genius doomed to the everlasting,

and eternal, and continual, and, as one might say,

the—continued—yes, the continued and continuous, bitter,

harassing, disturbing, and, if I may be allowed the expression,

the very disturbing influence of the serene, and godlike, and

heavenly, and exalted, and elevated, and purifying effect of what

may be rightly termed the most enviable, the most truly

enviable—nay! the most benignly beautiful, the most deliciously

ethereal, and, as it were, the most pretty (if I may use so bold

an expression) thing (pardon me, gentle reader!) in the world—but

I am always led away by my feelings. In such a mind, I repeat,

what a host of recollections are stirred up by a trifle! The dogs

danced! I—I could not! They frisked—I wept. They capered—I sobbed

aloud. Touching circumstances! which cannot fail to bring to the

recollection of the classical reader that exquisite passage in

relation to the fitness of things, which is to be found in the

commencement of the third volume of that admirable and venerable

Chinese novel the Jo-Go-Slow.

In my solitary walk through, the city I had two humble but

faithful companions. Diana, my poodle! sweetest of creatures! She

had a quantity of hair over her one eye, and a blue ribbon tied

fashionably around her neck. Diana was not more than five inches

in height, but her head was somewhat bigger than her body, and

her tail being cut off exceedingly close, gave an air of injured

innocence to the interesting animal which rendered her a favorite

with all.

And Pompey, my negro!—sweet Pompey! how shall I ever forget thee?

I had taken Pompey’s arm. He was three feet in height (I like to

be particular) and about seventy, or perhaps eighty, years of

age. He had bow-legs and was corpulent. His mouth should not be

called small, nor his ears short. His teeth, however, were like

pearl, and his large full eyes were deliciously white. Nature had

endowed him with no neck, and had placed his ankles (as usual

with that race) in the middle of the upper portion of the feet.

He was clad with a striking simplicity. His sole garments were a

stock of nine inches in height, and a nearly-new drab overcoat

which had formerly been in the service of the tall, stately, and

illustrious Dr. Moneypenny. It was a good overcoat. It was well

cut. It was well made. The coat was nearly new. Pompey held it up

out of the dirt with both hands.

There were three persons in our party, and two of them have

already been the subject of remark. There was a third—that person

was myself. I am the Signora Psyche Zenobia. I am not Suky

Snobbs. My appearance is commanding. On the memorable occasion of

which I speak I was habited in a crimson satin dress, with a

sky-blue Arabian mantelet. And the dress had trimmings of green

agraffas, and seven graceful flounces of the orange-colored

auricula. I thus formed the third of the party. There was the

poodle. There was Pompey. There was myself. We were three. Thus

it is said there were originally but three Furies—Melty, Nimmy,

and Hetty—Meditation, Memory, and Fiddling.

Leaning upon the arm of the gallant Pompey, and attended at a

respectable distance by Diana, I proceeded down one of the

populous and very pleasant streets of the now deserted Edina. On

a sudden, there presented itself to view a church—a Gothic

cathedral—vast, venerable, and with a tall steeple, which towered

into the sky. What madness now possessed me? Why did I rush upon

my fate? I was seized with an uncontrollable desire to ascend the

giddy pinnacle, and then survey the immense extent of the city.

The door of the cathedral stood invitingly open. My destiny

prevailed. I entered the ominous archway. Where then was my

guardian angel?—if indeed such angels there be. If! Distressing

monosyllable! what world of mystery, and meaning, and doubt, and

uncertainty is there involved in thy two letters! I entered the

ominous archway! I entered; and, without injury to my

orange-colored auriculas, I passed beneath the portal, and

emerged within the vestibule. Thus it is said the immense river

Alfred passed, unscathed, and unwetted, beneath the sea.

I thought the staircase would never have an end. Round! Yes, they

went round and up, and round and up and round and up, until I

could not help surmising, with the sagacious Pompey, upon whose

supporting arm I leaned in all the confidence of early

affection—I could not help surmising that the upper end of the

continuous spiral ladder had been accidentally, or perhaps

designedly, removed. I paused for breath; and, in the meantime,

an accident occurred of too momentous a nature in a moral, and

also in a metaphysical point of view, to be passed over without

notice. It appeared to me—indeed I was quite confident of the

fact—I could not be mistaken—no! I had, for some moments,

carefully and anxiously observed the motions of my Diana—I say

that I could not be mistaken—Diana smelt a rat! At once I called

Pompey’s attention to the subject, and he—he agreed with me.

There was then no longer any reasonable room for doubt. The rat

had been smelled—and by Diana. Heavens! shall I ever forget the

intense excitement of the moment? Alas! what is the boasted

intellect of man? The rat!—it was there—that is to say, it was

somewhere. Diana smelled the rat. I—I could not! Thus it is said

the Prussian Isis has, for some persons, a sweet and very

powerful perfume, while to others it is perfectly scentless.

The staircase had been surmounted, and there were now only three

or four more upward steps intervening between us and the summit.

We still ascended, and now only one step remained. One step! One

little, little step! Upon one such little step in the great

staircase of human life how vast a sum of human happiness or

misery depends! I thought of myself, then of Pompey, and then of

the mysterious and inexplicable destiny which surrounded us. I

thought of Pompey!—alas, I thought of love! I thought of my many

false steps which have been taken, and may be taken again. I

resolved to be more cautious, more reserved. I abandoned the arm

of Pompey, and, without his assistance, surmounted the one

remaining step, and gained the chamber of the belfry. I was

followed immediately afterward by my poodle. Pompey alone

remained behind. I stood at the head of the staircase, and

encouraged him to ascend. He stretched forth to me his hand, and

unfortunately in so doing was forced to abandon his firm hold

upon the overcoat. Will the gods never cease their persecution?

The overcoat is dropped, and, with one of his feet, Pompey

stepped upon the long and trailing skirt of the overcoat. He

stumbled and fell—this consequence was inevitable. He fell

forward, and, with his accursed head, striking me full in the—in

the breast, precipitated me headlong, together with himself, upon

the hard, filthy, and detestable floor of the belfry. But my

revenge was sure, sudden, and complete. Seizing him furiously by

the wool with both hands, I tore out a vast quantity of black,

and crisp, and curling material, and tossed it from me with every

manifestation of disdain. It fell among the ropes of the belfry

and remained. Pompey arose, and said no word. But he regarded me

piteously with his large eyes and—sighed. Ye Gods—that sigh! It

sunk into my heart. And the hair—the wool! Could I have reached

that wool I would have bathed it with my tears, in testimony of

regret. But alas! it was now far beyond my grasp. As it dangled

among the cordage of the bell, I fancied it alive. I fancied that

it stood on end with indignation. Thus the happy-dandy Flos Aeris

of Java bears, it is said, a beautiful flower, which will live

when pulled up by the roots. The natives suspend it by a cord

from the ceiling and enjoy its fragrance for years.

Our quarrel was now made up, and we looked about the room for an

aperture through which to survey the city of Edina. Windows there

were none. The sole light admitted into the gloomy chamber

proceeded from a square opening, about a foot in diameter, at a

height of about seven feet from the floor. Yet what will the

energy of true genius not effect? I resolved to clamber up to

this hole. A vast quantity of wheels, pinions, and other

cabalistic-looking machinery stood opposite the hole, close to

it; and through the hole there passed an iron rod from the

machinery. Between the wheels and the wall where the hole lay

there was barely room for my body—yet I was desperate, and

determined to persevere. I called Pompey to my side.

“You perceive that aperture, Pompey. I wish to look through it.

You will stand here just beneath the hole—so. Now, hold out one

of your hands, Pompey, and let me step upon it—thus. Now, the

other hand, Pompey, and with its aid I will get upon your

shoulders.”

He did every thing I wished, and I found, upon getting up, that I

could easily pass my head and neck through the aperture. The

prospect was sublime. Nothing could be more magnificent. I merely

paused a moment to bid Diana behave herself, and assure Pompey

that I would be considerate and bear as lightly as possible upon

his shoulders. I told him I would be tender of his feelings—ossi

tender que beefsteak. Having done this justice to my faithful

friend, I gave myself up with great zest and enthusiasm to the

enjoyment of the scene which so obligingly spread itself out

before my eyes.

Upon this subject, however, I shall forbear to dilate. I will not

describe the city of Edinburgh. Every one has been to the city of

Edinburgh. Every one has been to Edinburgh—the classic Edina. I

will confine myself to the momentous details of my own lamentable

adventure. Having, in some measure, satisfied my curiosity in

regard to the extent, situation, and general appearance of the

city, I had leisure to survey the church in which I was, and the

delicate architecture of the steeple. I observed that the

aperture through which I had thrust my head was an opening in the

dial-plate of a gigantic clock, and must have appeared, from the

street, as a large key-hole, such as we see in the face of the

French watches. No doubt the true object was to admit the arm of

an attendant, to adjust, when necessary, the hands of the clock

from within. I observed also, with surprise, the immense size of

these hands, the longest of which could not have been less than

ten feet in length, and, where broadest, eight or nine inches in

breadth. They were of solid steel apparently, and their edges

appeared to be sharp. Having noticed these particulars, and some

others, I again turned my eyes upon the glorious prospect below,

and soon became absorbed in contemplation.

From this, after some minutes, I was aroused by the voice of

Pompey, who declared that he could stand it no longer, and

requested that I would be so kind as to come down. This was

unreasonable, and I told him so in a speech of some length. He

replied, but with an evident misunderstanding of my ideas upon

the subject. I accordingly grew angry, and told him in plain

words, that he was a fool, that he had committed an ignoramus

e-clench-eye, that his notions were mere insommary Bovis, and his

words little better than an ennemywerrybor’em. With this he

appeared satisfied, and I resumed my contemplations.

It might have been half an hour after this altercation when, as I

was deeply absorbed in the heavenly scenery beneath me, I was

startled by something very cold which pressed with a gentle

pressure on the back of my neck. It is needless to say that I

felt inexpressibly alarmed. I knew that Pompey was beneath my

feet, and that Diana was sitting, according to my explicit

directions, upon her hind legs, in the farthest corner of the

room. What could it be? Alas! I but too soon discovered. Turning

my head gently to one side, I perceived, to my extreme horror,

that the huge, glittering, scimetar-like minute-hand of the clock

had, in the course of its hourly revolution, descended upon my

neck. There was, I knew, not a second to be lost. I pulled back

at once—but it was too late. There was no chance of forcing my

head through the mouth of that terrible trap in which it was so

fairly caught, and which grew narrower and narrower with a

rapidity too horrible to be conceived. The agony of that moment

is not to be imagined. I threw up my hands and endeavored, with

all my strength, to force upward the ponderous iron bar. I might

as well have tried to lift the cathedral itself. Down, down, down

it came, closer and yet closer. I screamed to Pompey for aid; but

he said that I had hurt his feelings by calling him “an ignorant

old squint-eye.” I yelled to Diana; but she only said

“bow-wow-wow,” and that I had told her “on no account to stir

from the corner.” Thus I had no relief to expect from my

associates.

Meantime the ponderous and terrific Scythe of Time (for I now

discovered the literal import of that classical phrase) had not

stopped, nor was it likely to stop, in its career. Down and still

down, it came. It had already buried its sharp edge a full inch

in my flesh, and my sensations grew indistinct and confused. At

one time I fancied myself in Philadelphia with the stately Dr.

Moneypenny, at another in the back parlor of Mr. Blackwood

receiving his invaluable instructions. And then again the sweet

recollection of better and earlier times came over me, and I

thought of that happy period when the world was not all a desert,

and Pompey not altogether cruel.

The ticking of the machinery amused me. Amused me, I say, for my

sensations now bordered upon perfect happiness, and the most

trifling circumstances afforded me pleasure. The eternal

click-clak, click-clak, click-clak of the clock was the most

melodious of music in my ears, and occasionally even put me in

mind of the graceful sermonic harangues of Dr. Ollapod. Then

there were the great figures upon the dial-plate—how intelligent

how intellectual, they all looked! And presently they took to

dancing the Mazurka, and I think it was the figure V. who

performed the most to my satisfaction. She was evidently a lady

of breeding. None of your swaggerers, and nothing at all

indelicate in her motions. She did the pirouette to

admiration—whirling round upon her apex. I made an endeavor to

hand her a chair, for I saw that she appeared fatigued with her

exertions—and it was not until then that I fully perceived my

lamentable situation. Lamentable indeed! The bar had buried

itself two inches in my neck. I was aroused to a sense of

exquisite pain. I prayed for death, and, in the agony of the

moment, could not help repeating those exquisite verses of the

poet Miguel De Cervantes:

Vanny Buren, tan escondida

Query no te senty venny

Pork and pleasure, delly morry

Nommy, torny, darry, widdy!

But now a new horror presented itself, and one indeed sufficient

to startle the strongest nerves. My eyes, from the cruel pressure

of the machine, were absolutely starting from their sockets.

While I was thinking how I should possibly manage without them,

one actually tumbled out of my head, and, rolling down the steep

side of the steeple, lodged in the rain gutter which ran along

the eaves of the main building. The loss of the eye was not so

much as the insolent air of independence and contempt with which

it regarded me after it was out. There it lay in the gutter just

under my nose, and the airs it gave itself would have been

ridiculous had they not been disgusting. Such a winking and

blinking were never before seen. This behavior on the part of my

eye in the gutter was not only irritating on account of its

manifest insolence and shameful ingratitude, but was also

exceedingly inconvenient on account of the sympathy which always

exists between two eyes of the same head, however far apart. I

was forced, in a manner, to wink and to blink, whether I would or

not, in exact concert with the scoundrelly thing that lay just

under my nose. I was presently relieved, however, by the dropping

out of the other eye. In falling it took the same direction

(possibly a concerted plot) as its fellow. Both rolled out of the

gutter together, and in truth I was very glad to get rid of them.

The bar was now four inches and a half deep in my neck, and there

was only a little bit of skin to cut through. My sensations were

those of entire happiness, for I felt that in a few minutes, at

farthest, I should be relieved from my disagreeable situation.

And in this expectation I was not at all deceived. At twenty-five

minutes past five in the afternoon, precisely, the huge

minute-hand had proceeded sufficiently far on its terrible

revolution to sever the small remainder of my neck. I was not

sorry to see the head which had occasioned me so much

embarrassment at length make a final separation from my body. It

first rolled down the side of the steeple, then lodge, for a few

seconds, in the gutter, and then made its way, with a plunge,

into the middle of the street.

I will candidly confess that my feelings were now of the most

singular—nay, of the most mysterious, the most perplexing and

incomprehensible character. My senses were here and there at one

and the same moment. With my head I imagined, at one time, that

I, the head, was the real Signora Psyche Zenobia—at another I

felt convinced that myself, the body, was the proper identity. To

clear my ideas on this topic I felt in my pocket for my

snuff-box, but, upon getting it, and endeavoring to apply a pinch

of its grateful contents in the ordinary manner, I became

immediately aware of my peculiar deficiency, and threw the box at

once down to my head. It took a pinch with great satisfaction,

and smiled me an acknowledgement in return. Shortly afterward it

made me a speech, which I could hear but indistinctly without

ears. I gathered enough, however, to know that it was astonished

at my wishing to remain alive under such circumstances. In the

concluding sentences it quoted the noble words of Ariosto—

Il pover hommy che non sera corty

And have a combat tenty erry morty;

thus comparing me to the hero who, in the heat of the combat, not

perceiving that he was dead, continued to contest the battle with

inextinguishable valor. There was nothing now to prevent my

getting down from my elevation, and I did so. What it was that

Pompey saw so very peculiar in my appearance I have never yet

been able to find out. The fellow opened his mouth from ear to

ear, and shut his two eyes as if he were endeavoring to crack

nuts between the lids. Finally, throwing off his overcoat, he

made one spring for the staircase and disappeared. I hurled after

the scoundrel these vehement words of Demosthenes—

Andrew O’Phlegethon, you really make haste to fly,

and then turned to the darling of my heart, to the one-eyed! the

shaggy-haired Diana. Alas! what a horrible vision affronted my

eyes? Was that a rat I saw skulking into his hole? Are these the

picked bones of the little angel who has been cruelly devoured by

the monster? Ye gods! and what do I behold—is that the departed

spirit, the shade, the ghost, of my beloved puppy, which I

perceive sitting with a grace so melancholy, in the corner?

Hearken! for she speaks, and, heavens! it is in the German of

Schiller—

“Unt stubby duk, so stubby dun

Duk she! duk she!”

Alas! and are not her words too true?

“And if I died, at least I died

For thee—for thee.”

Sweet creature! she too has sacrificed herself in my behalf.

Dogless, niggerless, headless, what now remains for the unhappy

Signora Psyche Zenobia? Alas—nothing! I have done.

MYSTIFICATION

Slid, if these be your “passados” and “montantes,” I’ll have none

o’ them.

—NED KNOWLES.

The Baron Ritzner von Jung was a noble Hungarian family, every

member of which (at least as far back into antiquity as any

certain records extend) was more or less remarkable for talent of

some description—the majority for that species of _grotesquerie_

in conception of which Tieck, a scion of the house, has given a

vivid, although by no means the most vivid exemplifications. My

acquaintance with Ritzner commenced at the magnificent Chateau

Jung, into which a train of droll adventures, not to be made

public, threw me during the summer months of the year 18—. Here

it was that I obtained a place in his regard, and here, with

somewhat more difficulty, a partial insight into his mental

conformation. In later days this insight grew more clear, as the

intimacy which had at first permitted it became more close; and

when, after three years separation, we met at G——n, I knew all

that it was necessary to know of the character of the Baron

Ritzner von Jung.

I remember the buzz of curiosity which his advent excited within

the college precincts on the night of the twenty-fifth of June. I

remember still more distinctly, that while he was pronounced by

all parties at first sight “the most remarkable man in the

world,” no person made any attempt at accounting for his opinion.

That he was unique appeared so undeniable, that it was deemed

impertinent to inquire wherein the uniquity consisted. But,

letting this matter pass for the present, I will merely observe

that, from the first moment of his setting foot within the limits

of the university, he began to exercise over the habits, manners,

persons, purses, and propensities of the whole community which

surrounded him, an influence the most extensive and despotic, yet

at the same time the most indefinite and altogether

unaccountable. Thus the brief period of his residence at the

university forms an era in its annals, and is characterized by

all classes of people appertaining to it or its dependencies as

“that very extraordinary epoch forming the domination of the

Baron Ritzner von Jung.”

Upon his advent to G——n, he sought me out in my apartments. He

was then of no particular age, by which I mean that it was

impossible to form a guess respecting his age by any data

personally afforded. He might have been fifteen or fifty, and was

twenty-one years and seven months. He was by no means a handsome

man—perhaps the reverse. The contour of his face was somewhat

angular and harsh. His forehead was lofty and very fair; his nose

a snub; his eyes large, heavy, glassy, and meaningless. About the

mouth there was more to be observed. The lips were gently

protruded, and rested the one upon the other, after such a

fashion that it is impossible to conceive any, even the most

complex, combination of human features, conveying so entirely,

and so singly, the idea of unmitigated gravity, solemnity and

repose.

It will be perceived, no doubt, from what I have already said,

that the Baron was one of those human anomalies now and then to

be found, who make the science of mystification the study and the

business of their lives. For this science a peculiar turn of mind

gave him instinctively the cue, while his physical appearance

afforded him unusual facilities for carrying his prospects into

effect. I firmly believe that no student at G——n, during that

renowned epoch so quaintly termed the domination of the Baron

Ritzner von Jung, ever rightly entered into the mystery which

overshadowed his character. I truly think that no person at the

university, with the exception of myself, ever suspected him to

be capable of a joke, verbal or practical:—the old bull-dog at

the garden-gate would sooner have been accused,—the ghost of

Heraclitus,—or the wig of the Emeritus Professor of Theology.

This, too, when it was evident that the most egregious and

unpardonable of all conceivable tricks, whimsicalities and

buffooneries were brought about, if not directly by him, at least

plainly through his intermediate agency or connivance. The

beauty, if I may so call it, of his art mystifique, lay in that

consummate ability (resulting from an almost intuitive knowledge

of human nature, and a most wonderful self-possession,) by means

of which he never failed to make it appear that the drolleries he

was occupied in bringing to a point, arose partly in spite, and

partly in consequence of the laudable efforts he was making for

their prevention, and for the preservation of the good order and

dignity of Alma Mater. The deep, the poignant, the overwhelming

mortification, which upon each such failure of his praise worthy

endeavors, would suffuse every lineament of his countenance, left

not the slightest room for doubt of his sincerity in the bosoms

of even his most skeptical companions. The adroitness, too, was

no less worthy of observation by which he contrived to shift the

sense of the grotesque from the creator to the created—from his

own person to the absurdities to which he had given rise. In no

instance before that of which I speak, have I known the habitual

mystific escape the natural consequence of his manoevres—an

attachment of the ludicrous to his own character and person.

Continually enveloped in an atmosphere of whim, my friend

appeared to live only for the severities of society; and not even

his own household have for a moment associated other ideas than

those of the rigid and august with the memory of the Baron

Ritzner von Jung.

During the epoch of his residence at G——n it really appeared that

the demon of the _dolce far niente_ lay like an incubus upon the

university. Nothing, at least, was done beyond eating and

drinking and making merry. The apartments of the students were

converted into so many pot-houses, and there was no pot-house of

them all more famous or more frequented than that of the Baron.

Our carousals here were many, and boisterous, and long, and never

unfruitful of events.

Upon one occasion we had protracted our sitting until nearly

daybreak, and an unusual quantity of wine had been drunk. The

company consisted of seven or eight individuals besides the Baron

and myself. Most of these were young men of wealth, of high

connection, of great family pride, and all alive with an

exaggerated sense of honor. They abounded in the most ultra

German opinions respecting the duello. To these Quixotic notions

some recent Parisian publications, backed by three or four

desperate and fatal rencounters at G——n, had given new vigor and

impulse; and thus the conversation, during the greater part of

the night, had run wild upon the all-engrossing topic of the

times. The Baron, who had been unusually silent and abstracted in

the earlier portion of the evening, at length seemed to be

aroused from his apathy, took a leading part in the discourse,

and dwelt upon the benefits, and more especially upon the

beauties, of the received code of etiquette in passages of arms

with an ardor, an eloquence, an impressiveness, and an

affectionateness of manner, which elicited the warmest enthusiasm

from his hearers in general, and absolutely staggered even

myself, who well knew him to be at heart a ridiculer of those

very points for which he contended, and especially to hold the

entire fanfaronade of duelling etiquette in the sovereign

contempt which it deserves.

Looking around me during a pause in the Baron’s discourse (of

which my readers may gather some faint idea when I say that it

bore resemblance to the fervid, chanting, monotonous, yet musical

sermonic manner of Coleridge), I perceived symptoms of even more

than the general interest in the countenance of one of the party.

This gentleman, whom I shall call Hermann, was an original in

every respect—except, perhaps, in the single particular that he

was a very great fool. He contrived to bear, however, among a

particular set at the university, a reputation for deep

metaphysical thinking, and, I believe, for some logical talent.

As a duellist he had acquired great renown, even at G——n. I

forget the precise number of victims who had fallen at his hands;

but they were many. He was a man of courage undoubtedly. But it

was upon his minute acquaintance with the etiquette of the

duello, and the nicety of his sense of honor, that he most

especially prided himself. These things were a hobby which he

rode to the death. To Ritzner, ever upon the lookout for the

grotesque, his peculiarities had for a long time past afforded

food for mystification. Of this, however, I was not aware;

although, in the present instance, I saw clearly that something

of a whimsical nature was upon the tapis with my friend, and that

Hermann was its especial object.

As the former proceeded in his discourse, or rather monologue, I

perceived the excitement of the latter momently increasing. At

length he spoke; offering some objection to a point insisted upon

by R., and giving his reasons in detail. To these the Baron

replied at length (still maintaining his exaggerated tone of

sentiment) and concluding, in what I thought very bad taste, with

a sarcasm and a sneer. The hobby of Hermann now took the bit in

his teeth. This I could discern by the studied hair-splitting

farrago of his rejoinder. His last words I distinctly remember.

“Your opinions, allow me to say, Baron von Jung, although in the

main correct, are, in many nice points, discreditable to yourself

and to the university of which you are a member. In a few

respects they are even unworthy of serious refutation. I would

say more than this, sir, were it not for the fear of giving you

offence (here the speaker smiled blandly), I would say, sir, that

your opinions are not the opinions to be expected from a

gentleman.”

As Hermann completed this equivocal sentence, all eyes were

turned upon the Baron. He became pale, then excessively red;

then, dropping his pocket-handkerchief, stooped to recover it,

when I caught a glimpse of his countenance, while it could be

seen by no one else at the table. It was radiant with the

quizzical expression which was its natural character, but which I

had never seen it assume except when we were alone together, and

when he unbent himself freely. In an instant afterward he stood

erect, confronting Hermann; and so total an alteration of

countenance in so short a period I certainly never saw before.

For a moment I even fancied that I had misconceived him, and that

he was in sober earnest. He appeared to be stifling with passion,

and his face was cadaverously white. For a short time he remained

silent, apparently striving to master his emotion. Having at

length seemingly succeeded, he reached a decanter which stood

near him, saying as he held it firmly clenched—“The language you

have thought proper to employ, Mynheer Hermann, in addressing

yourself to me, is objectionable in so many particulars, that I

have neither temper nor time for specification. That my opinions,

however, are not the opinions to be expected from a gentleman, is

an observation so directly offensive as to allow me but one line

of conduct. Some courtesy, nevertheless, is due to the presence

of this company, and to yourself, at this moment, as my guest.

You will pardon me, therefore, if, upon this consideration, I

deviate slightly from the general usage among gentlemen in

similar cases of personal affront. You will forgive me for the

moderate tax I shall make upon your imagination, and endeavor to

consider, for an instant, the reflection of your person in yonder

mirror as the living Mynheer Hermann himself. This being done,

there will be no difficulty whatever. I shall discharge this

decanter of wine at your image in yonder mirror, and thus fulfil

all the spirit, if not the exact letter, of resentment for your

insult, while the necessity of physical violence to your real

person will be obviated.”

With these words he hurled the decanter, full of wine, against

the mirror which hung directly opposite Hermann; striking the

reflection of his person with great precision, and of course

shattering the glass into fragments. The whole company at once

started to their feet, and, with the exception of myself and

Ritzner, took their departure. As Hermann went out, the Baron

whispered me that I should follow him and make an offer of my

services. To this I agreed; not knowing precisely what to make of

so ridiculous a piece of business.

The duellist accepted my aid with his stiff and _ultra recherché_

air, and, taking my arm, led me to his apartment. I could hardly

forbear laughing in his face while he proceeded to discuss, with

the profoundest gravity, what he termed “the refinedly peculiar

character” of the insult he had received. After a tiresome

harangue in his ordinary style, he took down from his book

shelves a number of musty volumes on the subject of the duello,

and entertained me for a long time with their contents; reading

aloud, and commenting earnestly as he read. I can just remember

the titles of some of the works. There were the “Ordonnance of

Philip le Bel on Single Combat”; the “Theatre of Honor,” by

Favyn, and a treatise “On the Permission of Duels,” by Andiguier.

He displayed, also, with much pomposity, Brantome’s “Memoirs of

Duels,” published at Cologne, 1666, in the types of Elzevir—a

precious and unique vellum-paper volume, with a fine margin, and

bound by Derome. But he requested my attention particularly, and

with an air of mysterious sagacity, to a thick octavo, written in

barbarous Latin by one Hedelin, a Frenchman, and having the

quaint title, “Duelli Lex Scripta, et non; aliterque.” From this

he read me one of the drollest chapters in the world concerning

“Injuriae per applicationem, per constructionem, et per se,”

about half of which, he averred, was strictly applicable to his

own “refinedly peculiar” case, although not one syllable of the

whole matter could I understand for the life of me. Having

finished the chapter, he closed the book, and demanded what I

thought necessary to be done. I replied that I had entire

confidence in his superior delicacy of feeling, and would abide

by what he proposed. With this answer he seemed flattered, and

sat down to write a note to the Baron. It ran thus:

Sir,—My friend, M. P.-, will hand you this note. I find it

incumbent upon me to request, at your earliest convenience, an

explanation of this evening’s occurrences at your chambers. In

the event of your declining this request, Mr. P. will be happy to

arrange, with any friend whom you may appoint, the steps

preliminary to a meeting.

With sentiments of perfect respect,

Your most humble servant,

JOHANN HERMAN.

“_To the Baron Ritzner von Jung,

August 18th, 18_—.”

Not knowing what better to do, I called upon Ritzner with this

epistle. He bowed as I presented it; then, with a grave

countenance, motioned me to a seat. Having perused the cartel, he

wrote the following reply, which I carried to Hermann.

“SIR,—Through our common friend, Mr. P., I have received your

note of this evening. Upon due reflection I frankly admit the

propriety of the explanation you suggest. This being admitted, I

still find great difficulty, (owing to the refinedly peculiar

nature of our disagreement, and of the personal affront offered

on my part,) in so wording what I have to say by way of apology,

as to meet all the minute exigencies, and all the variable

shadows, of the case. I have great reliance, however, on that

extreme delicacy of discrimination, in matters appertaining to

the rules of etiquette, for which you have been so long and so

pre-eminently distinguished. With perfect certainty, therefore,

of being comprehended, I beg leave, in lieu of offering any

sentiments of my own, to refer you to the opinions of Sieur

Hedelin, as set forth in the ninth paragraph of the chapter of

“_Injuriae per applicationem, per constructionem, et per se_,” in

his “_Duelli Lex scripta, et non; aliterque_.” The nicety of your

discernment in all the matters here treated, will be sufficient,

I am assured, to convince you _that the mere circumstance of me

referring you_ to this admirable passage, ought to satisfy your

request, as a man of honor, for explanation.

“With sentiments of profound respect,

“Your most obedient servant,

“VON JUNG.”

“The Herr Johann Hermann,

August 18th, 18—”

Hermann commenced the perusal of this epistle with a scowl,

which, however, was converted into a smile of the most ludicrous

self-complacency as he came to the rigmarole about Injuriae per

applicationem, per constructionem, et per se. Having finished

reading, he begged me, with the blandest of all possible smiles,

to be seated, while he made reference to the treatise in

question. Turning to the passage specified, he read it with great

care to himself, then closed the book, and desired me, in my

character of confidential acquaintance, to express to the Baron

von Jung his exalted sense of his chivalrous behavior, and, in

that of second, to assure him that the explanation offered was of

the fullest, the most honorable, and the most unequivocally

satisfactory nature.

Somewhat amazed at all this, I made my retreat to the Baron. He

seemed to receive Hermann’s amicable letter as a matter of

course, and after a few words of general conversation, went to an

inner room and brought out the everlasting treatise “_Duelli Lex

scripta, et non; aliterque_.” He handed me the volume and asked

me to look over some portion of it. I did so, but to little

purpose, not being able to gather the least particle of meaning.

He then took the book himself, and read me a chapter aloud. To my

surprise, what he read proved to be a most horribly absurd

account of a duel between two baboons. He now explained the

mystery; showing that the volume, as it appeared _prima facie_,

was written upon the plan of the nonsense verses of Du Bartas;

that is to say, the language was ingeniously framed so as to

present to the ear all the outward signs of intelligibility, and

even of profundity, while in fact not a shadow of meaning

existed. The key to the whole was found in leaving out every

second and third word alternately, when there appeared a series

of ludicrous quizzes upon a single combat as practised in modern

times.

The Baron afterwards informed me that he had purposely thrown the

treatise in Hermann’s way two or three weeks before the

adventure, and that he was satisfied, from the general tenor of

his conversation, that he had studied it with the deepest

attention, and firmly believed it to be a work of unusual merit.

Upon this hint he proceeded. Hermann would have died a thousand

deaths rather than acknowledge his inability to understand

anything and everything in the universe that had ever been

written about the _duello_.

DIDDLING

CONSIDERED AS ONE OF THE EXACT SCIENCES.

Hey, diddle diddle

The cat and the fiddle

Since the world began there have been two Jeremys. The one wrote

a Jeremiad about usury, and was called Jeremy Bentham. He has

been much admired by Mr. John Neal, and was a great man in a

small way. The other gave name to the most important of the Exact

Sciences, and was a great man in a great way—I may say, indeed,

in the very greatest of ways.

Diddling—or the abstract idea conveyed by the verb to diddle—is

sufficiently well understood. Yet the fact, the deed, the thing

_diddling_, is somewhat difficult to define. We may get, however,

at a tolerably distinct conception of the matter in hand, by

defining—not the thing, diddling, in itself—but man, as an animal

that diddles. Had Plato but hit upon this, he would have been

spared the affront of the picked chicken.

Very pertinently it was demanded of Plato, why a picked chicken,

which was clearly “a biped without feathers,” was not, according

to his own definition, a man? But I am not to be bothered by any

similar query. Man is an animal that diddles, and there is no

animal that diddles but man. It will take an entire hen-coop of

picked chickens to get over that.

What constitutes the essence, the nare, the principle of diddling

is, in fact, peculiar to the class of creatures that wear coats

and pantaloons. A crow thieves; a fox cheats; a weasel outwits; a

man diddles. To diddle is his destiny. “Man was made to mourn,”

says the poet. But not so:—he was made to diddle. This is his

aim—his object—his end. And for this reason when a man’s diddled

we say he’s “_done_.”

Diddling, rightly considered, is a compound, of which the

ingredients are minuteness, interest, perseverance, ingenuity,

audacity, _nonchalance_, originality, impertinence, and grin.

_Minuteness:_—Your diddler is minute. His operations are upon a

small scale. His business is retail, for cash, or approved paper

at sight. Should he ever be tempted into magnificent speculation,

he then, at once, loses his distinctive features, and becomes

what we term “financier.” This latter word conveys the diddling

idea in every respect except that of magnitude. A diddler may

thus be regarded as a banker _in petto_—a “financial operation,”

as a diddle at Brobdignag. The one is to the other, as Homer to

“Flaccus”—as a Mastodon to a mouse—as the tail of a comet to that

of a pig.

_Interest:_—Your diddler is guided by self-interest. He scorns to

diddle for the mere _sake_ of the diddle. He has an object in

view—his pocket—and yours. He regards always the main chance. He

looks to Number One. You are Number Two, and must look to

yourself.

_Perseverance:_—Your diddler perseveres. He is not readily

discouraged. Should even the banks break, he cares nothing about

it. He steadily pursues his end, and

‘Ut canis a corio nunquam absterrebitur uncto,’

so he never lets go of his game.

_Ingenuity:_—Your diddler is ingenious. He has constructiveness

large. He understands plot. He invents and circumvents. Were he

not Alexander he would be Diogenes. Were he not a diddler, he

would be a maker of patent rat-traps or an angler for trout.

_Audacity:_—Your diddler is audacious.—He is a bold man. He

carries the war into Africa. He conquers all by assault. He would

not fear the daggers of Frey Herren. With a little more prudence

Dick Turpin would have made a good diddler; with a trifle less

blarney, Daniel O’Connell; with a pound or two more brains,

Charles the Twelfth.

_Nonchalance:_—Your diddler is nonchalant. He is not at all

nervous. He never had any nerves. He is never seduced into a

flurry. He is never put out—unless put out of doors. He is

cool—cool as a cucumber. He is calm—“calm as a smile from Lady

Bury.” He is easy—easy as an old glove, or the damsels of ancient

Baiæ.

_Originality:_—Your diddler is original—conscientiously so. His

thoughts are his own. He would scorn to employ those of another.

A stale trick is his aversion. He would return a purse, I am

sure, upon discovering that he had obtained it by an unoriginal

diddle.

_Impertinence:_—Your diddler is impertinent. He swaggers. He sets

his arms a-kimbo. He thrusts his hands in his trowsers’ pockets.

He sneers in your face. He treads on your corns. He eats your

dinner, he drinks your wine, he borrows your money, he pulls your

nose, he kicks your poodle, and he kisses your wife.

_Grin:_—Your true diddler winds up all with a grin. But this

nobody sees but himself. He grins when his daily work is

done—when his allotted labors are accomplished—at night in his

own closet, and altogether for his own private entertainment. He

goes home. He locks his door. He divests himself of his clothes.

He puts out his candle. He gets into bed. He places his head upon

the pillow. All this done, and your diddler grins. This is no

hypothesis. It is a matter of course. I reason _à priori_, and a

diddle would be no diddle without a grin.

The origin of the diddle is referrable to the infancy of the

Human Race. Perhaps the first diddler was Adam. At all events, we

can trace the science back to a very remote period of antiquity.

The moderns, however, have brought it to a perfection never

dreamed of by our thick-headed progenitors. Without pausing to

speak of the “old saws,” therefore, I shall content myself with a

compendious account of some of the more “modern instances.”

A very good diddle is this. A housekeeper in want of a sofa, for

instance, is seen to go in and out of several cabinet warehouses.

At length she arrives at one offering an excellent variety. She

is accosted, and invited to enter, by a polite and voluble

individual at the door. She finds a sofa well adapted to her

views, and upon inquiring the price, is surprised and delighted

to hear a sum named at least twenty per cent. lower than her

expectations. She hastens to make the purchase, gets a bill and

receipt, leaves her address, with a request that the article be

sent home as speedily as possible, and retires amid a profusion

of bows from the shopkeeper. The night arrives and no sofa. A

servant is sent to make inquiry about the delay. The whole

transaction is denied. No sofa has been sold—no money

received—except by the diddler, who played shop-keeper for the

nonce.

Our cabinet warehouses are left entirely unattended, and thus

afford every facility for a trick of this kind. Visitors enter,

look at furniture, and depart unheeded and unseen. Should any one

wish to purchase, or to inquire the price of an article, a bell

is at hand, and this is considered amply sufficient.

Again, quite a respectable diddle is this. A well-dressed

individual enters a shop, makes a purchase to the value of a

dollar; finds, much to his vexation, that he has left his

pocket-book in another coat pocket; and so says to the

shopkeeper—

“My dear sir, never mind; just oblige me, will you, by sending

the bundle home? But stay! I really believe that I have nothing

less than a five dollar bill, even there. However, you can send

four dollars in change with the bundle, you know.”

“Very good, sir,” replies the shop-keeper, who entertains, at

once, a lofty opinion of the high-mindedness of his customer. “I

know fellows,” he says to himself, “who would just have put the

goods under their arm, and walked off with a promise to call and

pay the dollar as they came by in the afternoon.”

A boy is sent with the parcel and change. On the route, quite

accidentally, he is met by the purchaser, who exclaims:

“Ah! This is my bundle, I see—I thought you had been home with

it, long ago. Well, go on! My wife, Mrs. Trotter, will give you

the five dollars—I left instructions with her to that effect. The

change you might as well give to me—I shall want some silver for

the Post Office. Very good! One, two, is this a good

quarter?—three, four—quite right! Say to Mrs. Trotter that you

met me, and be sure now and do not loiter on the way.”

The boy doesn’t loiter at all—but he is a very long time in

getting back from his errand—for no lady of the precise name of

Mrs. Trotter is to be discovered. He consoles himself, however,

that he has not been such a fool as to leave the goods without

the money, and re-entering his shop with a self-satisfied air,

feels sensibly hurt and indignant when his master asks him what

has become of the change.

A very simple diddle, indeed, is this. The captain of a ship,

which is about to sail, is presented by an official looking

person with an unusually moderate bill of city charges. Glad to

get off so easily, and confused by a hundred duties pressing upon

him all at once, he discharges the claim forthwith. In about

fifteen minutes, another and less reasonable bill is handed him

by one who soon makes it evident that the first collector was a

diddler, and the original collection a diddle.

And here, too, is a somewhat similar thing. A steamboat is

casting loose from the wharf. A traveller, portmanteau in hand,

is discovered running toward the wharf, at full speed. Suddenly,

he makes a dead halt, stoops, and picks up something from the

ground in a very agitated manner. It is a pocket-book, and—“Has

any gentleman lost a pocketbook?” he cries. No one can say that

he has exactly lost a pocket-book; but a great excitement ensues,

when the treasure trove is found to be of value. The boat,

however, must not be detained.

“Time and tide wait for no man,” says the captain.

“For God’s sake, stay only a few minutes,” says the finder of the

book—“the true claimant will presently appear.”

“Can’t wait!” replies the man in authority; “cast off there, d’ye

hear?”

“What _am_ I to do?” asks the finder, in great tribulation. “I am

about to leave the country for some years, and I cannot

conscientiously retain this large amount in my possession. I beg

your pardon, sir,” [here he addresses a gentleman on shore,] “but

you have the air of an honest man. _Will_ you confer upon me the

favor of taking charge of this pocket-book—I _know_ I can trust

you—and of advertising it? The notes, you see, amount to a very

considerable sum. The owner will, no doubt, insist upon rewarding

you for your trouble—”

“_Me!_—no, _you!_—it was you who found the book.”

“Well, if you _must_ have it so—_I_ will take a small reward—just

to satisfy your scruples. Let me see—why these notes are all

hundreds—bless my soul! a hundred is too much to take—fifty would

be quite enough, I am sure—”

“Cast off there!” says the captain.

“But then I have no change for a hundred, and upon the whole,

_you_ had better—”

“Cast off there!” says the captain.

“Never mind!” cries the gentleman on shore, who has been

examining his own pocket-book for the last minute or so—“never

mind! _I_ can fix it—here is a fifty on the Bank of North

America—throw the book.”

And the over-conscientious finder takes the fifty with marked

reluctance, and throws the gentleman the book, as desired, while

the steamboat fumes and fizzes on her way. In about half an hour

after her departure, the “large amount” is seen to be a

“counterfeit presentment,” and the whole thing a capital diddle.

A bold diddle is this. A camp-meeting, or something similar, is

to be held at a certain spot which is accessible only by means of

a free bridge. A diddler stations himself upon this bridge,

respectfully informs all passers by of the new county law, which

establishes a toll of one cent for foot passengers, two for

horses and donkeys, and so forth, and so forth. Some grumble but

all submit, and the diddler goes home a wealthier man by some

fifty or sixty dollars well earned. This taking a toll from a

great crowd of people is an excessively troublesome thing.

A neat diddle is this. A friend holds one of the diddler’s

promises to pay, filled up and signed in due form, upon the

ordinary blanks printed in red ink. The diddler purchases one or

two dozen of these blanks, and every day dips one of them in his

soup, makes his dog jump for it, and finally gives it to him as a

bonne bouche. The note arriving at maturity, the diddler, with

the diddler’s dog, calls upon the friend, and the promise to pay

is made the topic of discussion. The friend produces it from his

escritoire, and is in the act of reaching it to the diddler, when

up jumps the diddler’s dog and devours it forthwith. The diddler

is not only surprised but vexed and incensed at the absurd

behavior of his dog, and expresses his entire readiness to cancel

the obligation at any moment when the evidence of the obligation

shall be forthcoming.

A very mean diddle is this. A lady is insulted in the street by a

diddler’s accomplice. The diddler himself flies to her

assistance, and, giving his friend a comfortable thrashing,

insists upon attending the lady to her own door. He bows, with

his hand upon his heart, and most respectfully bids her adieu.

She entreats him, as her deliverer, to walk in and be introduced

to her big brother and her papa. With a sigh, he declines to do

so. “Is there no way, then, sir,” she murmurs, “in which I may be

permitted to testify my gratitude?”

“Why, yes, madam, there is. Will you be kind enough to lend me a

couple of shillings?”

In the first excitement of the moment the lady decides upon

fainting outright. Upon second thought, however, she opens her

purse-strings and delivers the specie. Now this, I say, is a

diddle minute—for one entire moiety of the sum borrowed has to be

paid to the gentleman who had the trouble of performing the

insult, and who had then to stand still and be thrashed for

performing it.

Rather a small but still a scientific diddle is this. The diddler

approaches the bar of a tavern, and demands a couple of twists of

tobacco. These are handed to him, when, having slightly examined

them, he says:

“I don’t much like this tobacco. Here, take it back, and give me

a glass of brandy and water in its place.” The brandy and water

is furnished and imbibed, and the diddler makes his way to the

door. But the voice of the tavern-keeper arrests him.

“I believe, sir, you have forgotten to pay for your brandy and

water.”

“Pay for my brandy and water!—didn’t I give you the tobacco for

the brandy and water? What more would you have?”

“But, sir, if you please, I don’t remember that you paid me for

the tobacco.”

“What do you mean by that, you scoundrel?—Didn’t I give you back

your tobacco? Isn’t that your tobacco lying there? Do you expect

me to pay for what I did not take?”

“But, sir,” says the publican, now rather at a loss what to say,

“but sir—”

“But me no buts, sir,” interrupts the diddler, apparently in very

high dudgeon, and slamming the door after him, as he makes his

escape.—“But me no buts, sir, and none of your tricks upon

travellers.”

Here again is a very clever diddle, of which the simplicity is

not its least recommendation. A purse, or pocket-book, being

really lost, the loser inserts in one of the daily papers of a

large city a fully descriptive advertisement.

Whereupon our diddler copies the facts of this advertisement,

with a change of heading, of general phraseology and address. The

original, for instance, is long, and verbose, is headed “A

Pocket-Book Lost!” and requires the treasure, when found, to be

left at No. 1 Tom Street. The copy is brief, and being headed

with “Lost” only, indicates No. 2 Dick, or No. 3 Harry Street, as

the locality at which the owner may be seen. Moreover, it is

inserted in at least five or six of the daily papers of the day,

while in point of time, it makes its appearance only a few hours

after the original. Should it be read by the loser of the purse,

he would hardly suspect it to have any reference to his own

misfortune. But, of course, the chances are five or six to one,

that the finder will repair to the address given by the diddler,

rather than to that pointed out by the rightful proprietor. The

former pays the reward, pockets the treasure and decamps.

Quite an analogous diddle is this. A lady of ton has dropped,

some where in the street, a diamond ring of very unusual value.

For its recovery, she offers some forty or fifty dollars

reward—giving, in her advertisement, a very minute description of

the gem, and of its settings, and declaring that, on its

restoration at No. so and so, in such and such Avenue, the reward

would be paid instanter, without a single question being asked.

During the lady’s absence from home, a day or two afterwards, a

ring is heard at the door of No. so and so, in such and such

Avenue; a servant appears; the lady of the house is asked for and

is declared to be out, at which astounding information, the

visitor expresses the most poignant regret. His business is of

importance and concerns the lady herself. In fact, he had the

good fortune to find her diamond ring. But perhaps it would be as

well that he should call again. “By no means!” says the servant;

and “By no means!” says the lady’s sister and the lady’s

sister-in-law, who are summoned forthwith. The ring is

clamorously identified, the reward is paid, and the finder nearly

thrust out of doors. The lady returns and expresses some little

dissatisfaction with her sister and sister-in-law, because they

happen to have paid forty or fifty dollars for a fac-simile of

her diamond ring—a fac-simile made out of real pinch-beck and

unquestionable paste.

But as there is really no end to diddling, so there would be none

to this essay, were I even to hint at half the variations, or

inflections, of which this science is susceptible. I must bring

this paper, perforce, to a conclusion, and this I cannot do

better than by a summary notice of a very decent, but rather

elaborate diddle, of which our own city was made the theatre, not

very long ago, and which was subsequently repeated with success,

in other still more verdant localities of the Union. A

middle-aged gentleman arrives in town from parts unknown. He is

remarkably precise, cautious, staid, and deliberate in his

demeanor. His dress is scrupulously neat, but plain,

unostentatious. He wears a white cravat, an ample waistcoat, made

with an eye to comfort alone; thick-soled cosy-looking shoes, and

pantaloons without straps. He has the whole air, in fact, of your

well-to-do, sober-sided, exact, and respectable “man of

business,” _par excellence_—one of the stern and outwardly hard,

internally soft, sort of people that we see in the crack high

comedies—fellows whose words are so many bonds, and who are noted

for giving away guineas, in charity, with the one hand, while, in

the way of mere bargain, they exact the uttermost fraction of a

farthing with the other.

He makes much ado before he can get suited with a boarding house.

He dislikes children. He has been accustomed to quiet. His habits

are methodical—and then he would prefer getting into a private

and respectable small family, piously inclined. Terms, however,

are no object—only he must insist upon settling his bill on the

first of every month, (it is now the second) and begs his

landlady, when he finally obtains one to his mind, not on any

account to forget his instructions upon this point—but to send in

a bill, and receipt, precisely at ten o’clock, on the first day

of every month, and under no circumstances to put it off to the

second.

These arrangements made, our man of business rents an office in a

reputable rather than a fashionable quarter of the town. There is

nothing he more despises than pretense. “Where there is much

show,” he says, “there is seldom any thing very solid behind”—an

observation which so profoundly impresses his landlady’s fancy,

that she makes a pencil memorandum of it forthwith, in her great

family Bible, on the broad margin of the Proverbs of Solomon.

The next step is to advertise, after some such fashion as this,

in the principal business six-pennies of the city—the pennies are

eschewed as not “respectable”—and as demanding payment for all

advertisements in advance. Our man of business holds it as a

point of his faith that work should never be paid for until done.

“WANTED.—The advertisers, being about to commence extensive

business operations in this city, will require the services of

three or four intelligent and competent clerks, to whom a liberal

salary will be paid. The very best recommendations, not so much

for capacity, as for integrity, will be expected. Indeed, as the

duties to be performed involve high responsibilities, and large

amounts of money must necessarily pass through the hands of those

engaged, it is deemed advisable to demand a deposit of fifty

dollars from each clerk employed. No person need apply,

therefore, who is not prepared to leave this sum in the

possession of the advertisers, and who cannot furnish the most

satisfactory testimonials of morality. Young gentlemen piously

inclined will be preferred. Application should be made between

the hours of ten and eleven A. M., and four and five P. M., of

Messrs.

“Bogs, Hogs, Logs, Frogs & Co.,

“No. 110 Dog Street.”

By the thirty-first day of the month, this advertisement has

brought to the office of Messrs. Bogs, Hogs, Logs, Frogs, and

Company, some fifteen or twenty young gentlemen piously inclined.

But our man of business is in no hurry to conclude a contract

with any—no man of business is ever precipitate—and it is not

until the most rigid catechism in respect to the piety of each

young gentleman’s inclination, that his services are engaged and

his fifty dollars receipted for, just by way of proper

precaution, on the part of the respectable firm of Bogs, Hogs,

Logs, Frogs, and Company. On the morning of the first day of the

next month, the landlady does not present her bill, according to

promise—a piece of neglect for which the comfortable head of the

house ending in ogs would no doubt have chided her severely,

could he have been prevailed upon to remain in town a day or two

for that purpose.

As it is, the constables have had a sad time of it, running

hither and thither, and all they can do is to declare the man of

business most emphatically, a “hen knee high”—by which some

persons imagine them to imply that, in fact, he is n. e. i.—by

which again the very classical phrase _non est inventus_, is

supposed to be understood. In the meantime the young gentlemen,

one and all, are somewhat less piously inclined than before,

while the landlady purchases a shilling’s worth of the Indian

rubber, and very carefully obliterates the pencil memorandum that

some fool has made in her great family Bible, on the broad margin

of the Proverbs of Solomon.

THE ANGEL OF THE ODD

AN EXTRAVAGANZA.

It was a chilly November afternoon. I had just consummated an

unusually hearty dinner, of which the dyspeptic _truffe_ formed

not the least important item, and was sitting alone in the

dining-room, with my feet upon the fender, and at my elbow a

small table which I had rolled up to the fire, and upon which

were some apologies for dessert, with some miscellaneous bottles

of wine, spirit and _liqueur_. In the morning I had been reading

Glover’s “Leonidas,” Wilkie’s “Epigoniad,” Lamartine’s

“Pilgrimage,” Barlow’s “Columbiad,” Tuckermann’s “Sicily,” and

Griswold’s “Curiosities”; I am willing to confess, therefore,

that I now felt a little stupid. I made effort to arouse myself

by aid of frequent Lafitte, and, all failing, I betook myself to

a stray newspaper in despair. Having carefully perused the column

of “houses to let,” and the column of “dogs lost,” and then the

two columns of “wives and apprentices runaway,” I attacked with

great resolution the editorial matter, and, reading it from

beginning to end without understanding a syllable, conceived the

possibility of its being Chinese, and so re-read it from the end

to the beginning, but with no more satisfactory result. I was

about throwing away, in disgust,

“This folio of four pages, happy work

Which not even critics criticise,”

when I felt my attention somewhat aroused by the paragraph which

follows:

“The avenues to death are numerous and strange. A London paper

mentions the decease of a person from a singular cause. He was

playing at ‘puff the dart,’ which is played with a long needle

inserted in some worsted, and blown at a target through a tin

tube. He placed the needle at the wrong end of the tube, and

drawing his breath strongly to puff the dart forward with force,

drew the needle into his throat. It entered the lungs, and in a

few days killed him.”

Upon seeing this I fell into a great rage, without exactly

knowing why. “This thing,” I exclaimed, “is a contemptible

falsehood—a poor hoax—the lees of the invention of some pitiable

penny-a-liner—of some wretched concoctor of accidents in

Cocaigne. These fellows, knowing the extravagant gullibility of

the age, set their wits to work in the imagination of improbable

possibilities—-of odd accidents, as they term them; but to a

reflecting intellect (like mine,” I added, in parenthesis,

putting my forefinger unconsciously to the side of my nose,) “to

a contemplative understanding such as I myself possess, it seems

evident at once that the marvelous increase of late in these ‘odd

accidents’ is by far the oddest accident of all. For my own part,

I intend to believe nothing henceforward that has anything of the

‘singular’ about it.”

“Mein Gott, den, vat a vool you bees for dat!” replied one of the

most remarkable voices I ever heard. At first I took it for a

rumbling in my ears—such as a man sometimes experiences when

getting very drunk—but, upon second thought, I considered the

sound as more nearly resembling that which proceeds from an empty

barrel beaten with a big stick; and, in fact, this I should have

concluded it to be, but for the articulation of the syllables and

words. I am by no means naturally nervous, and the very few

glasses of Lafitte which I had sipped served to embolden me no

little, so that I felt nothing of trepidation, but merely

uplifted my eyes with a leisurely movement, and looked carefully

around the room for the intruder. I could not, however, perceive

any one at all.

“Humph!” resumed the voice, as I continued my survey, “you mus pe

so dronk as de pig, den, for not zee me as I zit here at your

zide.”

Hereupon I bethought me of looking immediately before my nose,

and there, sure enough, confronting me at the table sat a

personage nondescript, although not altogether indescribable. His

body was a wine-pipe, or a rum-puncheon, or something of that

character, and had a truly Falstaffian air. In its nether

extremity were inserted two kegs, which seemed to answer all the

purposes of legs. For arms there dangled from the upper portion

of the carcass two tolerably long bottles, with the necks outward

for hands. All the head that I saw the monster possessed of was

one of those Hessian canteens which resemble a large snuff-box

with a hole in the middle of the lid. This canteen (with a funnel

on its top, like a cavalier cap slouched over the eyes) was set

on edge upon the puncheon, with the hole toward myself; and

through this hole, which seemed puckered up like the mouth of a

very precise old maid, the creature was emitting certain rumbling

and grumbling noises which he evidently intended for intelligible

talk.

“I zay,” said he, “you mos pe dronk as de pig, vor zit dare and

not zee me zit ere; and I zay, doo, you mos pe pigger vool as de

goose, vor to dispelief vat iz print in de print. ’Tiz de

troof—dat it iz—eberry vord ob it.”

“Who are you, pray?” said I, with much dignity, although somewhat

puzzled; “how did you get here? and what is it you are talking

about?”

“Az vor ow I com’d ere,” replied the figure, “dat iz none of your

pizzness; and as vor vat I be talking apout, I be talk apout vat

I tink proper; and as vor who I be, vy dat is de very ting I

com’d here for to let you zee for yourzelf.”

“You are a drunken vagabond,” said I, “and I shall ring the bell

and order my footman to kick you into the street.”

“He! he! he!” said the fellow, “hu! hu! hu! dat you can’t do.”

“Can’t do!” said I, “what do you mean?—I can’t do what?”

“Ring de pell,” he replied, attempting a grin with his little

villanous mouth.

Upon this I made an effort to get up, in order to put my threat

into execution; but the ruffian just reached across the table

very deliberately, and hitting me a tap on the forehead with the

neck of one of the long bottles, knocked me back into the

arm-chair from which I had half arisen. I was utterly astounded;

and, for a moment, was quite at a loss what to do. In the

meantime, he continued his talk.

“You zee,” said he, “it iz te bess vor zit still; and now you

shall know who I pe. Look at me! zee! I am te _Angel ov te Odd_.”

“And odd enough, too,” I ventured to reply; “but I was always

under the impression that an angel had wings.”

“Te wing!” he cried, highly incensed, “vat I pe do mit te wing?

Mein Gott! do you take me vor a shicken?”

“No—oh no!” I replied, much alarmed, “you are no

chicken—certainly not.”

“Well, den, zit still and pehabe yourself, or I’ll rap you again

mid me vist. It iz te shicken ab te wing, und te owl ab te wing,

und te imp ab te wing, und te head-teuffel ab te wing. Te angel

ab _not_ te wing, and I am te _Angel ov te Odd_.”

“And your business with me at present is—is—”

“My pizzness!” ejaculated the thing, “vy vat a low bred buppy you

mos pe vor to ask a gentleman und an angel apout his pizziness!”

This language was rather more than I could bear, even from an

angel; so, plucking up courage, I seized a salt-cellar which lay

within reach, and hurled it at the head of the intruder. Either

he dodged, however, or my aim was inaccurate; for all I

accomplished was the demolition of the crystal which protected

the dial of the clock upon the mantel-piece. As for the Angel, he

evinced his sense of my assault by giving me two or three hard

consecutive raps upon the forehead as before. These reduced me at

once to submission, and I am almost ashamed to confess that

either through pain or vexation, there came a few tears into my

eyes.

“Mein Gott!” said the Angel of the Odd, apparently much softened

at my distress; “mein Gott, te man is eder ferry dronk or ferry

zorry. You mos not trink it so strong—you mos put te water in te

wine. Here, trink dis, like a goot veller, und don’t gry

now—don’t!”

Hereupon the Angel of the Odd replenished my goblet (which was

about a third full of Port) with a colorless fluid that he poured

from one of his hand bottles. I observed that these bottles had

labels about their necks, and that these labels were inscribed

“Kirschenwasser.”

The considerate kindness of the Angel mollified me in no little

measure; and, aided by the water with which he diluted my Port

more than once, I at length regained sufficient temper to listen

to his very extraordinary discourse. I cannot pretend to recount

all that he told me, but I gleaned from what he said that he was

the genius who presided over the _contretemps_ of mankind, and

whose business it was to bring about the _odd accidents_ which

are continually astonishing the skeptic. Once or twice, upon my

venturing to express my total incredulity in respect to his

pretensions, he grew very angry indeed, so that at length I

considered it the wiser policy to say nothing at all, and let him

have his own way. He talked on, therefore, at great length, while

I merely leaned back in my chair with my eyes shut, and amused

myself with munching raisins and filliping the stems about the

room. But, by and by, the Angel suddenly construed this behavior

of mine into contempt. He arose in a terrible passion, slouched

his funnel down over his eyes, swore a vast oath, uttered a

threat of some character which I did not precisely comprehend,

and finally made me a low bow and departed, wishing me, in the

language of the archbishop in Gil-Blas, “_beaucoup de bonheur et

un peu plus de bon sens_.”

His departure afforded me relief. The _very_ few glasses of

Lafitte that I had sipped had the effect of rendering me drowsy,

and I felt inclined to take a nap of some fifteen or twenty

minutes, as is my custom after dinner. At six I had an

appointment of consequence, which it was quite indispensable that

I should keep. The policy of insurance for my dwelling house had

expired the day before; and, some dispute having arisen, it was

agreed that, at six, I should meet the board of directors of the

company and settle the terms of a renewal. Glancing upward at the

clock on the mantel-piece, (for I felt too drowsy to take out my

watch), I had the pleasure to find that I had still twenty-five

minutes to spare. It was half past five; I could easily walk to

the insurance office in five minutes; and my usual siestas had

never been known to exceed five and twenty. I felt sufficiently

safe, therefore, and composed myself to my slumbers forthwith.

Having completed them to my satisfaction, I again looked toward

the time-piece and was half inclined to believe in the

possibility of odd accidents when I found that, instead of my

ordinary fifteen or twenty minutes, I had been dozing only three;

for it still wanted seven and twenty of the appointed hour. I

betook myself again to my nap, and at length a second time awoke,

when, to my utter amazement, it _still_ wanted twenty-seven

minutes of six. I jumped up to examine the clock, and found that

it had ceased running. My watch informed me that it was half past

seven; and, of course, having slept two hours, I was too late for

my appointment. “It will make no difference,” I said: “I can call

at the office in the morning and apologize; in the meantime what

can be the matter with the clock?” Upon examining it I discovered

that one of the raisin stems which I had been filliping about the

room during the discourse of the Angel of the Odd, had flown

through the fractured crystal, and lodging, singularly enough, in

the key-hole, with an end projecting outward, had thus arrested

the revolution of the minute hand.

“Ah!” said I, “I see how it is. This thing speaks for itself. A

natural accident, such as _will_ happen now and then!”

I gave the matter no further consideration, and at my usual hour

retired to bed. Here, having placed a candle upon a reading stand

at the bed head, and having made an attempt to peruse some pages

of the “Omnipresence of the Deity,” I unfortunately fell asleep

in less than twenty seconds, leaving the light burning as it was.

My dreams were terrifically disturbed by visions of the Angel of

the Odd. Methought he stood at the foot of the couch, drew aside

the curtains, and, in the hollow, detestable tones of a rum

puncheon, menaced me with the bitterest vengeance for the

contempt with which I had treated him. He concluded a long

harangue by taking off his funnel-cap, inserting the tube into my

gullet, and thus deluging me with an ocean of Kirschenwässer,

which he poured, in a continuous flood, from one of the long

necked bottles that stood him instead of an arm. My agony was at

length insufferable, and I awoke just in time to perceive that a

rat had ran off with the lighted candle from the stand, but _not_

in season to prevent his making his escape with it through the

hole. Very soon, a strong suffocating odor assailed my nostrils;

the house, I clearly perceived, was on fire. In a few minutes the

blaze broke forth with violence, and in an incredibly brief

period the entire building was wrapped in flames. All egress from

my chamber, except through a window, was cut off. The crowd,

however, quickly procured and raised a long ladder. By means of

this I was descending rapidly, and in apparent safety, when a

huge hog, about whose rotund stomach, and indeed about whose

whole air and physiognomy, there was something which reminded me

of the Angel of the Odd,—when this hog, I say, which hitherto had

been quietly slumbering in the mud, took it suddenly into his

head that his left shoulder needed scratching, and could find no

more convenient rubbing-post than that afforded by the foot of

the ladder. In an instant I was precipitated and had the

misfortune to fracture my arm.

This accident, with the loss of my insurance, and with the more

serious loss of my hair, the whole of which had been singed off

by the fire, predisposed me to serious impressions, so that,

finally, I made up my mind to take a wife. There was a rich widow

disconsolate for the loss of her seventh husband, and to her

wounded spirit I offered the balm of my vows. She yielded a

reluctant consent to my prayers. I knelt at her feet in gratitude

and adoration. She blushed and bowed her luxuriant tresses into

close contact with those supplied me, temporarily, by Grandjean.

I know not how the entanglement took place, but so it was. I

arose with a shining pate, wigless; she in disdain and wrath,

half buried in alien hair. Thus ended my hopes of the widow by an

accident which could not have been anticipated, to be sure, but

which the natural sequence of events had brought about.

Without despairing, however, I undertook the siege of a less

implacable heart. The fates were again propitious for a brief

period; but again a trivial incident interfered. Meeting my

betrothed in an avenue thronged with the _élite_ of the city, I

was hastening to greet her with one of my best considered bows,

when a small particle of some foreign matter, lodging in the

corner of my eye, rendered me, for the moment, completely blind.

Before I could recover my sight, the lady of my love had

disappeared—irreparably affronted at what she chose to consider

my premeditated rudeness in passing her by ungreeted. While I

stood bewildered at the suddenness of this accident, (which might

have happened, nevertheless, to any one under the sun), and while

I still continued incapable of sight, I was accosted by the Angel

of the Odd, who proffered me his aid with a civility which I had

no reason to expect. He examined my disordered eye with much

gentleness and skill, informed me that I had a drop in it, and

(whatever a “drop” was) took it out, and afforded me relief.

I now considered it high time to die, (since fortune had so

determined to persecute me,) and accordingly made my way to the

nearest river. Here, divesting myself of my clothes, (for there

is no reason why we cannot die as we were born), I threw myself

headlong into the current; the sole witness of my fate being a

solitary crow that had been seduced into the eating of

brandy-saturated corn, and so had staggered away from his

fellows. No sooner had I entered the water than this bird took it

into its head to fly away with the most indispensable portion of

my apparel. Postponing, therefore, for the present, my suicidal

design, I just slipped my nether extremities into the sleeves of

my coat, and betook myself to a pursuit of the felon with all the

nimbleness which the case required and its circumstances would

admit. But my evil destiny attended me still. As I ran at full

speed, with my nose up in the atmosphere, and intent only upon

the purloiner of my property, I suddenly perceived that my feet

rested no longer upon _terra-firma_; the fact is, I had thrown

myself over a precipice, and should inevitably have been dashed

to pieces but for my good fortune in grasping the end of a long

guide-rope, which depended from a passing balloon.

As soon as I sufficiently recovered my senses to comprehend the

terrific predicament in which I stood or rather hung, I exerted

all the power of my lungs to make that predicament known to the

æronaut overhead. But for a long time I exerted myself in vain.

Either the fool could not, or the villain would not perceive me.

Meantime the machine rapidly soared, while my strength even more

rapidly failed. I was soon upon the point of resigning myself to

my fate, and dropping quietly into the sea, when my spirits were

suddenly revived by hearing a hollow voice from above, which

seemed to be lazily humming an opera air. Looking up, I perceived

the Angel of the Odd. He was leaning with his arms folded, over

the rim of the car; and with a pipe in his mouth, at which he

puffed leisurely, seemed to be upon excellent terms with himself

and the universe. I was too much exhausted to speak, so I merely

regarded him with an imploring air.

For several minutes, although he looked me full in the face, he

said nothing. At length removing carefully his meerschaum from

the right to the left corner of his mouth, he condescended to

speak.

“Who pe you,” he asked, “und what der teuffel you pe do dare?”

To this piece of impudence, cruelty and affectation, I could

reply only by ejaculating the monosyllable “Help!”

“Elp!” echoed the ruffian—“not I. Dare iz te pottle—elp yourself,

und pe tam’d!”

With these words he let fall a heavy bottle of Kirschenwasser

which, dropping precisely upon the crown of my head, caused me to

imagine that my brains were entirely knocked out. Impressed with

this idea, I was about to relinquish my hold and give up the

ghost with a good grace, when I was arrested by the cry of the

Angel, who bade me hold on.

“Old on!” he said; “don’t pe in te urry—don’t. Will you pe take

de odder pottle, or ave you pe got zober yet and come to your

zenzes?”

I made haste, hereupon, to nod my head twice—once in the

negative, meaning thereby that I would prefer not taking the

other bottle at present—and once in the affirmative, intending

thus to imply that I _was_ sober and _had_ positively come to my

senses. By these means I somewhat softened the Angel.

“Und you pelief, ten,” he inquired, “at te last? You pelief, ten,

in te possibilty of te odd?”

I again nodded my head in assent.

“Und you ave pelief in _me_, te Angel of te Odd?”

I nodded again.

“Und you acknowledge tat you pe te blind dronk and te vool?”

I nodded once more.

“Put your right hand into your left hand preeches pocket, ten, in

token ov your vull zubmizzion unto te Angel ov te Odd.”

This thing, for very obvious reasons, I found it quite impossible

to do. In the first place, my left arm had been broken in my fall

from the ladder, and, therefore, had I let go my hold with the

right hand, I must have let go altogether. In the second place, I

could have no breeches until I came across the crow. I was

therefore obliged, much to my regret, to shake my head in the

negative—intending thus to give the Angel to understand that I

found it inconvenient, just at that moment, to comply with his

very reasonable demand! No sooner, however, had I ceased shaking

my head than—

“Go to der teuffel, ten!” roared the Angel of the Odd.

In pronouncing these words, he drew a sharp knife across the

guide-rope by which I was suspended, and as we then happened to

be precisely over my own house, (which, during my peregrinations,

had been handsomely rebuilt,) it so occurred that I tumbled

headlong down the ample chimney and alit upon the dining-room

hearth.

Upon coming to my senses, (for the fall had very thoroughly

stunned me,) I found it about four o’clock in the morning. I lay

outstretched where I had fallen from the balloon. My head

grovelled in the ashes of an extinguished fire, while my feet

reposed upon the wreck of a small table, overthrown, and amid the

fragments of a miscellaneous dessert, intermingled with a

newspaper, some broken glass and shattered bottles, and an empty

jug of the Schiedam Kirschenwasser. Thus revenged himself the

Angel of the Odd.

[Mabbott states that Griswold “obviously had a revised form” for

use in the 1856 volume of Poe’s works. Mabbott does not

substantiate this claim, but it is surely not unreasonable. An

editor, and even typographical errors, may have produced nearly

all of the very minor changes made in this version. (Indeed, two

very necessary words were clearly dropped by accident.) An editor

might have corrected “Wickliffe’s ‘Epigoniad’” to “Wilkie’s

‘Epigoniad’,” but is unlikely to have added “Tuckerman’s

‘Sicily’” to the list of books read by the narrator. Griswold was

not above forgery (in Poe’s letters) when it suited his purpose,

but would have too little to gain by such an effort in this

instance.]

MELLONTA TAUTA

TO THE EDITORS OF THE LADY’S BOOK:

I have the honor of sending you, for your magazine, an article

which I hope you will be able to comprehend rather more

distinctly than I do myself. It is a translation, by my friend,

Martin Van Buren Mavis, (sometimes called the “Poughkeepsie

Seer”) of an odd-looking MS. which I found, about a year ago,

tightly corked up in a jug floating in the Mare Tenebrarum—a sea

well described by the Nubian geographer, but seldom visited

now-a-days, except for the transcendentalists and divers for

crotchets.

Truly yours,

EDGAR A. POE

{this paragraph not in the volume—ED}

ON BOARD BALLOON “SKYLARK”

_April_, 1, 2848

Now, my dear friend—now, for your sins, you are to suffer the

infliction of a long gossiping letter. I tell you distinctly that

I am going to punish you for all your impertinences by being as

tedious, as discursive, as incoherent and as unsatisfactory as

possible. Besides, here I am, cooped up in a dirty balloon, with

some one or two hundred of the canaille, all bound on a pleasure

excursion, (what a funny idea some people have of pleasure!) and

I have no prospect of touching terra firma for a month at least.

Nobody to talk to. Nothing to do. When one has nothing to do,

then is the time to correspond with ones friends. You perceive,

then, why it is that I write you this letter—it is on account of

my ennui and your sins.

Get ready your spectacles and make up your mind to be annoyed. I

mean to write at you every day during this odious voyage.

Heigho! when will any Invention visit the human pericranium? Are

we forever to be doomed to the thousand inconveniences of the

balloon? Will nobody contrive a more expeditious mode of

progress? The jog-trot movement, to my thinking, is little less

than positive torture. Upon my word we have not made more than a

hundred miles the hour since leaving home! The very birds beat

us—at least some of them. I assure you that I do not exaggerate

at all. Our motion, no doubt, seems slower than it actually

is—this on account of our having no objects about us by which to

estimate our velocity, and on account of our going with the wind.

To be sure, whenever we meet a balloon we have a chance of

perceiving our rate, and then, I admit, things do not appear so

very bad. Accustomed as I am to this mode of travelling, I cannot

get over a kind of giddiness whenever a balloon passes us in a

current directly overhead. It always seems to me like an immense

bird of prey about to pounce upon us and carry us off in its

claws. One went over us this morning about sunrise, and so nearly

overhead that its drag-rope actually brushed the network

suspending our car, and caused us very serious apprehension. Our

captain said that if the material of the bag had been the

trumpery varnished “silk” of five hundred or a thousand years

ago, we should inevitably have been damaged. This silk, as he

explained it to me, was a fabric composed of the entrails of a

species of earth-worm. The worm was carefully fed on mulberries—a

kind of fruit resembling a water-melon—and, when sufficiently

fat, was crushed in a mill. The paste thus arising was called

papyrus in its primary state, and went through a variety of

processes until it finally became “silk.” Singular to relate, it

was once much admired as an article of female dress! Balloons

were also very generally constructed from it. A better kind of

material, it appears, was subsequently found in the down

surrounding the seed-vessels of a plant vulgarly called

euphorbium, and at that time botanically termed milk-weed. This

latter kind of silk was designated as silk-buckingham, on account

of its superior durability, and was usually prepared for use by

being varnished with a solution of gum caoutchouc—a substance

which in some respects must have resembled the gutta percha now

in common use. This caoutchouc was occasionally called Indian

rubber or rubber of twist, and was no doubt one of the numerous

fungi. Never tell me again that I am not at heart an antiquarian.

Talking of drag-ropes—our own, it seems, has this moment knocked

a man overboard from one of the small magnetic propellers that

swarm in ocean below us—a boat of about six thousand tons, and,

from all accounts, shamefully crowded. These diminutive barques

should be prohibited from carrying more than a definite number of

passengers. The man, of course, was not permitted to get on board

again, and was soon out of sight, he and his life-preserver. I

rejoice, my dear friend, that we live in an age so enlightened

that no such a thing as an individual is supposed to exist. It is

the mass for which the true Humanity cares. By-the-by, talking of

Humanity, do you know that our immortal Wiggins is not so

original in his views of the Social Condition and so forth, as

his contemporaries are inclined to suppose? Pundit assures me

that the same ideas were put nearly in the same way, about a

thousand years ago, by an Irish philosopher called Furrier, on

account of his keeping a retail shop for cat peltries and other

furs. Pundit knows, you know; there can be no mistake about it.

How very wonderfully do we see verified every day, the profound

observation of the Hindoo Aries Tottle (as quoted by

Pundit)—“Thus must we say that, not once or twice, or a few

times, but with almost infinite repetitions, the same opinions

come round in a circle among men.”

April 2.—Spoke to-day the magnetic cutter in charge of the middle

section of floating telegraph wires. I learn that when this

species of telegraph was first put into operation by Horse, it

was considered quite impossible to convey the wires over sea, but

now we are at a loss to comprehend where the difficulty lay! So

wags the world. Tempora mutantur—excuse me for quoting the

Etruscan. What would we do without the Atalantic telegraph?

(Pundit says Atlantic was the ancient adjective.) We lay to a few

minutes to ask the cutter some questions, and learned, among

other glorious news, that civil war is raging in Africa, while

the plague is doing its good work beautifully both in Yurope and

Ayesher. Is it not truly remarkable that, before the magnificent

light shed upon philosophy by Humanity, the world was accustomed

to regard War and Pestilence as calamities? Do you know that

prayers were actually offered up in the ancient temples to the

end that these evils (!) might not be visited upon mankind? Is it

not really difficult to comprehend upon what principle of

interest our forefathers acted? Were they so blind as not to

perceive that the destruction of a myriad of individuals is only

so much positive advantage to the mass!

April 3.—It is really a very fine amusement to ascend the

rope-ladder leading to the summit of the balloon-bag, and thence

survey the surrounding world. From the car below you know the

prospect is not so comprehensive—you can see little vertically.

But seated here (where I write this) in the luxuriously-cushioned

open piazza of the summit, one can see everything that is going

on in all directions. Just now there is quite a crowd of balloons

in sight, and they present a very animated appearance, while the

air is resonant with the hum of so many millions of human voices.

I have heard it asserted that when Yellow or (Pundit will have

it) Violet, who is supposed to have been the first aeronaut,

maintained the practicability of traversing the atmosphere in all

directions, by merely ascending or descending until a favorable

current was attained, he was scarcely hearkened to at all by his

contemporaries, who looked upon him as merely an ingenious sort

of madman, because the philosophers (?) of the day declared the

thing impossible. Really now it does seem to me quite

unaccountable how any thing so obviously feasible could have

escaped the sagacity of the ancient savans. But in all ages the

great obstacles to advancement in Art have been opposed by the

so-called men of science. To be sure, our men of science are not

quite so bigoted as those of old:—oh, I have something so queer

to tell you on this topic. Do you know that it is not more than a

thousand years ago since the metaphysicians consented to relieve

the people of the singular fancy that there existed but two

possible roads for the attainment of Truth! Believe it if you

can! It appears that long, long ago, in the night of Time, there

lived a Turkish philosopher (or Hindoo possibly) called Aries

Tottle. This person introduced, or at all events propagated what

was termed the deductive or a priori mode of investigation. He

started with what he maintained to be axioms or “self-evident

truths,” and thence proceeded “logically” to results. His

greatest disciples were one Neuclid, and one Cant. Well, Aries

Tottle flourished supreme until advent of one Hog, surnamed the

“Ettrick Shepherd,” who preached an entirely different system,

which he called the a posteriori or inductive. His plan referred

altogether to Sensation. He proceeded by observing, analyzing,

and classifying facts-instantiae naturae, as they were affectedly

called—into general laws. Aries Tottle’s mode, in a word, was

based on noumena; Hog’s on phenomena. Well, so great was the

admiration excited by this latter system that, at its first

introduction, Aries Tottle fell into disrepute; but finally he

recovered ground and was permitted to divide the realm of Truth

with his more modern rival. The savans now maintained the

Aristotelian and Baconian roads were the sole possible avenues to

knowledge. “Baconian,” you must know, was an adjective invented

as equivalent to Hog-ian and more euphonious and dignified.

Now, my dear friend, I do assure you, most positively, that I

represent this matter fairly, on the soundest authority; and you

can easily understand how a notion so absurd on its very face

must have operated to retard the progress of all true

knowledge—which makes its advances almost invariably by intuitive

bounds. The ancient idea confined investigations to crawling; and

for hundreds of years so great was the infatuation about Hog

especially, that a virtual end was put to all thinking, properly

so called. No man dared utter a truth to which he felt himself

indebted to his Soul alone. It mattered not whether the truth was

even demonstrably a truth, for the bullet-headed savans of the

time regarded only the road by which he had attained it. They

would not even look at the end. “Let us see the means,” they

cried, “the means!” If, upon investigation of the means, it was

found to come under neither the category Aries (that is to say

Ram) nor under the category Hog, why then the savans went no

farther, but pronounced the “theorist” a fool, and would have

nothing to do with him or his truth.

Now, it cannot be maintained, even, that by the crawling system

the greatest amount of truth would be attained in any long series

of ages, for the repression of imagination was an evil not to be

compensated for by any superior certainty in the ancient modes of

investigation. The error of these Jurmains, these Vrinch, these

Inglitch, and these Amriccans (the latter, by the way, were our

own immediate progenitors), was an error quite analogous with

that of the wiseacre who fancies that he must necessarily see an

object the better the more closely he holds it to his eyes. These

people blinded themselves by details. When they proceeded

Hoggishly, their “facts” were by no means always facts—a matter

of little consequence had it not been for assuming that they were

facts and must be facts because they appeared to be such. When

they proceeded on the path of the Ram, their course was scarcely

as straight as a ram’s horn, for they never had an axiom which

was an axiom at all. They must have been very blind not to see

this, even in their own day; for even in their own day many of

the long “established” axioms had been rejected. For example—“Ex

nihilo nihil fit”; “a body cannot act where it is not”; “there

cannot exist antipodes”; “darkness cannot come out of light”—all

these, and a dozen other similar propositions, formerly admitted

without hesitation as axioms, were, even at the period of which I

speak, seen to be untenable. How absurd in these people, then, to

persist in putting faith in “axioms” as immutable bases of Truth!

But even out of the mouths of their soundest reasoners it is easy

to demonstrate the futility, the impalpability of their axioms in

general. Who was the soundest of their logicians? Let me see! I

will go and ask Pundit and be back in a minute.... Ah, here we

have it! Here is a book written nearly a thousand years ago and

lately translated from the Inglitch—which, by the way, appears to

have been the rudiment of the Amriccan. Pundit says it is

decidedly the cleverest ancient work on its topic, Logic. The

author (who was much thought of in his day) was one Miller, or

Mill; and we find it recorded of him, as a point of some

importance, that he had a mill-horse called Bentham. But let us

glance at the treatise!

Ah!—“Ability or inability to conceive,” says Mr. Mill, very

properly, “is in no case to be received as a criterion of

axiomatic truth.” What modern in his senses would ever think of

disputing this truism? The only wonder with us must be, how it

happened that Mr. Mill conceived it necessary even to hint at any

thing so obvious. So far good—but let us turn over another paper.

What have we here?—“Contradictories cannot both be true—that is,

cannot co-exist in nature.” Here Mr. Mill means, for example,

that a tree must be either a tree or not a tree—that it cannot be

at the same time a tree and not a tree. Very well; but I ask him

why. His reply is this—and never pretends to be any thing else

than this—“Because it is impossible to conceive that

contradictories can both be true.” But this is no answer at all,

by his own showing, for has he not just admitted as a truism that

“ability or inability to conceive is in no case to be received as

a criterion of axiomatic truth.”

Now I do not complain of these ancients so much because their

logic is, by their own showing, utterly baseless, worthless and

fantastic altogether, as because of their pompous and imbecile

proscription of all other roads of Truth, of all other means for

its attainment than the two preposterous paths—the one of

creeping and the one of crawling—to which they have dared to

confine the Soul that loves nothing so well as to soar.

By the by, my dear friend, do you not think it would have puzzled

these ancient dogmaticians to have determined by which of their

two roads it was that the most important and most sublime of all

their truths was, in effect, attained? I mean the truth of

Gravitation. Newton owed it to Kepler. Kepler admitted that his

three laws were guessed at—these three laws of all laws which led

the great Inglitch mathematician to his principle, the basis of

all physical principle—to go behind which we must enter the

Kingdom of Metaphysics: Kepler guessed—that is to say imagined.

He was essentially a “theorist”—that word now of so much

sanctity, formerly an epithet of contempt. Would it not have

puzzled these old moles too, to have explained by which of the

two “roads” a cryptographist unriddles a cryptograph of more than

usual secrecy, or by which of the two roads Champollion directed

mankind to those enduring and almost innumerable truths which

resulted from his deciphering the Hieroglyphics.

One word more on this topic and I will be done boring you. Is it

not passing strange that, with their eternal prattling about

roads to Truth, these bigoted people missed what we now so

clearly perceive to be the great highway—that of Consistency?

Does it not seem singular how they should have failed to deduce

from the works of God the vital fact that a perfect consistency

must be an absolute truth! How plain has been our progress since

the late announcement of this proposition! Investigation has been

taken out of the hands of the ground-moles and given, as a task,

to the true and only true thinkers, the men of ardent

imagination. These latter theorize. Can you not fancy the shout

of scorn with which my words would be received by our progenitors

were it possible for them to be now looking over my shoulder?

These men, I say, theorize; and their theories are simply

corrected, reduced, systematized—cleared, little by little, of

their dross of inconsistency—until, finally, a perfect

consistency stands apparent which even the most stolid admit,

because it is a consistency, to be an absolute and an

unquestionable truth.

April 4.—The new gas is doing wonders, in conjunction with the

new improvement with gutta percha. How very safe, commodious,

manageable, and in every respect convenient are our modern

balloons! Here is an immense one approaching us at the rate of at

least a hundred and fifty miles an hour. It seems to be crowded

with people—perhaps there are three or four hundred

passengers—and yet it soars to an elevation of nearly a mile,

looking down upon poor us with sovereign contempt. Still a

hundred or even two hundred miles an hour is slow travelling

after all. Do you remember our flight on the railroad across the

Kanadaw continent?—fully three hundred miles the hour—that was

travelling. Nothing to be seen though—nothing to be done but

flirt, feast and dance in the magnificent saloons. Do you

remember what an odd sensation was experienced when, by chance,

we caught a glimpse of external objects while the cars were in

full flight? Every thing seemed unique—in one mass. For my part,

I cannot say but that I preferred the travelling by the slow

train of a hundred miles the hour. Here we were permitted to have

glass windows—even to have them open—and something like a

distinct view of the country was attainable.... Pundit says that

the route for the great Kanadaw railroad must have been in some

measure marked out about nine hundred years ago! In fact, he goes

so far as to assert that actual traces of a road are still

discernible—traces referable to a period quite as remote as that

mentioned. The track, it appears was double only; ours, you know,

has twelve paths; and three or four new ones are in preparation.

The ancient rails were very slight, and placed so close together

as to be, according to modern notions, quite frivolous, if not

dangerous in the extreme. The present width of track—fifty

feet—is considered, indeed, scarcely secure enough. For my part,

I make no doubt that a track of some sort must have existed in

very remote times, as Pundit asserts; for nothing can be clearer,

to my mind, than that, at some period—not less than seven

centuries ago, certainly—the Northern and Southern Kanadaw

continents were united; the Kanawdians, then, would have been

driven, by necessity, to a great railroad across the continent.

April 5.—I am almost devoured by _ennui_. Pundit is the only

conversible person on board; and he, poor soul! can speak of

nothing but antiquities. He has been occupied all the day in the

attempt to convince me that the ancient Amriccans governed

themselves!—did ever anybody hear of such an absurdity?—that they

existed in a sort of every-man-for-himself confederacy, after the

fashion of the “prairie dogs” that we read of in fable. He says

that they started with the queerest idea conceivable, viz: that

all men are born free and equal—this in the very teeth of the

laws of _gradation_ so visibly impressed upon all things both in

the moral and physical universe. Every man “voted,” as they

called it—that is to say meddled with public affairs—until at

length, it was discovered that what is everybody’s business is

nobody’s, and that the “Republic” (so the absurd thing was

called) was without a government at all. It is related, however,

that the first circumstance which disturbed, very particularly,

the self-complacency of the philosophers who constructed this

“Republic,” was the startling discovery that universal suffrage

gave opportunity for fraudulent schemes, by means of which any

desired number of votes might at any time be polled, without the

possibility of prevention or even detection, by any party which

should be merely villainous enough not to be ashamed of the

fraud. A little reflection upon this discovery sufficed to render

evident the consequences, which were that rascality must

predominate—in a word, that a republican government could never

be any thing but a rascally one. While the philosophers, however,

were busied in blushing at their stupidity in not having foreseen

these inevitable evils, and intent upon the invention of new

theories, the matter was put to an abrupt issue by a fellow of

the name of Mob, who took every thing into his own hands and set

up a despotism, in comparison with which those of the fabulous

Zeros and Hellofagabaluses were respectable and delectable. This

Mob (a foreigner, by-the-by), is said to have been the most

odious of all men that ever encumbered the earth. He was a giant

in stature—insolent, rapacious, filthy, had the gall of a bullock

with the heart of a hyena and the brains of a peacock. He died,

at length, by dint of his own energies, which exhausted him.

Nevertheless, he had his uses, as every thing has, however vile,

and taught mankind a lesson which to this day it is in no danger

of forgetting—never to run directly contrary to the natural

analogies. As for Republicanism, no analogy could be found for it

upon the face of the earth—unless we except the case of the

“prairie dogs,” an exception which seems to demonstrate, if

anything, that democracy is a very admirable form of

government—for dogs.

April 6.—Last night had a fine view of Alpha Lyrae, whose disk,

through our captain’s spy-glass, subtends an angle of half a

degree, looking very much as our sun does to the naked eye on a

misty day. Alpha Lyrae, although so very much larger than our

sun, by the by, resembles him closely as regards its spots, its

atmosphere, and in many other particulars. It is only within the

last century, Pundit tells me, that the binary relation existing

between these two orbs began even to be suspected. The evident

motion of our system in the heavens was (strange to say!)

referred to an orbit about a prodigious star in the centre of the

galaxy. About this star, or at all events about a centre of

gravity common to all the globes of the Milky Way and supposed to

be near Alcyone in the Pleiades, every one of these globes was

declared to be revolving, our own performing the circuit in a

period of 117,000,000 of years! We, with our present lights, our

vast telescopic improvements, and so forth, of course find it

difficult to comprehend the ground of an idea such as this. Its

first propagator was one Mudler. He was led, we must presume, to

this wild hypothesis by mere analogy in the first instance; but,

this being the case, he should have at least adhered to analogy

in its development. A great central orb was, in fact, suggested;

so far Mudler was consistent. This central orb, however,

dynamically, should have been greater than all its surrounding

orbs taken together. The question might then have been asked—“Why

do we not see it?”—we, especially, who occupy the mid region of

the cluster—the very locality near which, at least, must be

situated this inconceivable central sun. The astronomer, perhaps,

at this point, took refuge in the suggestion of non-luminosity;

and here analogy was suddenly let fall. But even admitting the

central orb non-luminous, how did he manage to explain its

failure to be rendered visible by the incalculable host of

glorious suns glaring in all directions about it? No doubt what

he finally maintained was merely a centre of gravity common to

all the revolving orbs—but here again analogy must have been let

fall. Our system revolves, it is true, about a common centre of

gravity, but it does this in connection with and in consequence

of a material sun whose mass more than counterbalances the rest

of the system. The mathematical circle is a curve composed of an

infinity of straight lines; but this idea of the circle—this idea

of it which, in regard to all earthly geometry, we consider as

merely the mathematical, in contradistinction from the practical,

idea—is, in sober fact, the practical conception which alone we

have any right to entertain in respect to those Titanic circles

with which we have to deal, at least in fancy, when we suppose

our system, with its fellows, revolving about a point in the

centre of the galaxy. Let the most vigorous of human imaginations

but attempt to take a single step toward the comprehension of a

circuit so unutterable! It would scarcely be paradoxical to say

that a flash of lightning itself, travelling forever upon the

circumference of this inconceivable circle, would still forever

be travelling in a straight line. That the path of our sun along

such a circumference—that the direction of our system in such an

orbit—would, to any human perception, deviate in the slightest

degree from a straight line even in a million of years, is a

proposition not to be entertained; and yet these ancient

astronomers were absolutely cajoled, it appears, into believing

that a decisive curvature had become apparent during the brief

period of their astronomical history—during the mere point—during

the utter nothingness of two or three thousand years! How

incomprehensible, that considerations such as this did not at

once indicate to them the true state of affairs—that of the

binary revolution of our sun and Alpha Lyrae around a common

centre of gravity!

April 7.—Continued last night our astronomical amusements. Had a

fine view of the five Neptunian asteroids, and watched with much

interest the putting up of a huge impost on a couple of lintels

in the new temple at Daphnis in the moon. It was amusing to think

that creatures so diminutive as the lunarians, and bearing so

little resemblance to humanity, yet evinced a mechanical

ingenuity so much superior to our own. One finds it difficult,

too, to conceive the vast masses which these people handle so

easily, to be as light as our own reason tells us they actually

are.

April 8.—Eureka! Pundit is in his glory. A balloon from Kanadaw

spoke us to-day and threw on board several late papers; they

contain some exceedingly curious information relative to

Kanawdian or rather Amriccan antiquities. You know, I presume,

that laborers have for some months been employed in preparing the

ground for a new fountain at Paradise, the Emperor’s principal

pleasure garden. Paradise, it appears, has been, literally

speaking, an island time out of mind—that is to say, its northern

boundary was always (as far back as any record extends) a

rivulet, or rather a very narrow arm of the sea. This arm was

gradually widened until it attained its present breadth—a mile.

The whole length of the island is nine miles; the breadth varies

materially. The entire area (so Pundit says) was, about eight

hundred years ago, densely packed with houses, some of them

twenty stories high; land (for some most unaccountable reason)

being considered as especially precious just in this vicinity.

The disastrous earthquake, however, of the year 2050, so totally

uprooted and overwhelmed the town (for it was almost too large to

be called a village) that the most indefatigable of our

antiquarians have never yet been able to obtain from the site any

sufficient data (in the shape of coins, medals or inscriptions)

wherewith to build up even the ghost of a theory concerning the

manners, customs, &c., &c., &c., of the aboriginal inhabitants.

Nearly all that we have hitherto known of them is, that they were

a portion of the Knickerbocker tribe of savages infesting the

continent at its first discovery by Recorder Riker, a knight of

the Golden Fleece. They were by no means uncivilized, however,

but cultivated various arts and even sciences after a fashion of

their own. It is related of them that they were acute in many

respects, but were oddly afflicted with monomania for building

what, in the ancient Amriccan, was denominated “churches”—a kind

of pagoda instituted for the worship of two idols that went by

the names of Wealth and Fashion. In the end, it is said, the

island became, nine tenths of it, church. The women, too, it

appears, were oddly deformed by a natural protuberance of the

region just below the small of the back—although, most

unaccountably, this deformity was looked upon altogether in the

light of a beauty. One or two pictures of these singular women

have in fact, been miraculously preserved. They look very odd,

very—like something between a turkey-cock and a dromedary.

Well, these few details are nearly all that have descended to us

respecting the ancient Knickerbockers. It seems, however, that

while digging in the centre of the emperors garden, (which, you

know, covers the whole island), some of the workmen unearthed a

cubical and evidently chiseled block of granite, weighing several

hundred pounds. It was in good preservation, having received,

apparently, little injury from the convulsion which entombed it.

On one of its surfaces was a marble slab with (only think of it!)

an inscription—a legible inscription. Pundit is in ecstacies.

Upon detaching the slab, a cavity appeared, containing a leaden

box filled with various coins, a long scroll of names, several

documents which appear to resemble newspapers, with other matters

of intense interest to the antiquarian! There can be no doubt

that all these are genuine Amriccan relics belonging to the tribe

called Knickerbocker. The papers thrown on board our balloon are

filled with fac-similes of the coins, MSS., typography, &c., &c.

I copy for your amusement the Knickerbocker inscription on the

marble slab:—

This Corner Stone of a Monument to

The Memory of

GEORGE WASHINGTON

Was Laid With Appropriate Ceremonies

on the

19th Day of October, 1847

The anniversary of the surrender of

Lord Cornwallis

to General Washington at Yorktown

A. D. 1781

Under the Auspices of the

Washington Monument Association of

the city of New York

This, as I give it, is a verbatim translation done by Pundit

himself, so there can be no mistake about it. From the few words

thus preserved, we glean several important items of knowledge,

not the least interesting of which is the fact that a thousand

years ago actual monuments had fallen into disuse—as was all very

proper—the people contenting themselves, as we do now, with a

mere indication of the design to erect a monument at some future

time; a corner-stone being cautiously laid by itself “solitary

and alone” (excuse me for quoting the great American poet

Benton!), as a guarantee of the magnanimous intention. We

ascertain, too, very distinctly, from this admirable inscription,

the how as well as the where and the what, of the great surrender

in question. As to the where, it was Yorktown (wherever that

was), and as to the what, it was General Cornwallis (no doubt

some wealthy dealer in corn). He was surrendered. The inscription

commemorates the surrender of—what?—why, “of Lord Cornwallis.”

The only question is what could the savages wish him surrendered

for. But when we remember that these savages were undoubtedly

cannibals, we are led to the conclusion that they intended him

for sausage. As to the how of the surrender, no language can be

more explicit. Lord Cornwallis was surrendered (for sausage)

“under the auspices of the Washington Monument Association”—no

doubt a charitable institution for the depositing of

corner-stones.—But, Heaven bless me! what is the matter? Ah, I

see—the balloon has collapsed, and we shall have a tumble into

the sea. I have, therefore, only time enough to add that, from a

hasty inspection of the fac-similes of newspapers, &c., &c., I

find that the great men in those days among the Amriccans, were

one John, a smith, and one Zacchary, a tailor.

Good-bye, until I see you again. Whether you ever get this letter

or not is point of little importance, as I write altogether for

my own amusement. I shall cork the MS. up in a bottle, however,

and throw it into the sea.

Yours everlastingly,

PUNDITA.

THE DUC DE L’OMELETTE.

And stepped at once into a cooler clime.—_Cowper_.