Chapter VII: Part 7

They had all they bargained for, to get safely through that key-hole, too. There was not much spare room, I can tell you. But for the great pressure from behind kept up by others anxious to get through, many a large fellow would have been sticking in that opening yet. But once they got started in, there was no backing out; no, indeed! On! on’, was the cry, and they pressed forward with a rush, often sacrificing a leg or wing by the maneuver. But they didn’t seem to care for the loss of one of those members so long as their bill remained intact. Deprive a mosquito of one wing, and he will seem to laugh at you while he makes the other do double duty. Brush off one leg, and he will shake the remaining ones triumphantly in your face.

But damage his bill and you demoralize him at once. He becomes immediately disheartened. He loses caste among his companions and confidence in himself. He wabbles about here and there to no purpose, like an old bachelor. You deprive him at once of his song and his supper. You can hardly picture to yourself a more dejected insect, one more hopelessly down in the mouth. He withdraws to the ceiling, or curtain, and looks with envious eyes upon his associates gorging themselves while his poor digestive organs are drying through inactivity.

We would be inclined to pity him in his sad condition, were it not that we hold the whole insect race as coming under our ban. The whine of disappointment, long, loud and quavering, that went up when they ascertained I was protected, will always remain a fixture in my memory.

As they closed around the bed, so numerous were they, their flight was actually impeded. Down they settled with locked wings on the bar above me, thick as snow-flakes around some old uprooted pine by the Madawaska. I had long heard of the mosquitoes of this locality, and was prepared for an introduction to formidable insects, but found them even worse than I expected.

Discouraged by the mosquitoes, I fled to a neighboring city, only to find that it is the stronghold of fever and ague. In other parts it may be more active for a few months of the year, but here it stays by the people like their consciences. The winds may rise and comb the valley until the very grass is lifted by the roots and borne to the mountains. The sun may grow weary of well doing, enter Capricorn, and for a season be hid; or the rains may descend until the narrow slough—by which the city is situated—becomes a wide-spreading lake, through which ships of the line might plow with safety; but the chills and fever stays by them still. There is no “shaking” it off. It holds its grip like a mortgage. The tender limbs of the new-born babe, and the pithless bones of ripe old age, shiver alike in its awful grasp.

The citizens of this sad place are a serious, matter-of-fact people, who seem to think it was not the original intention that men should spend any time in laughter, for they indulge very little in witticisms or humor. A good joke is often lost upon them, and the perpetrator of a bad one places himself in jeopardy. A person who attempts a pun that does not carry its point before it, like a sword-fish, is in danger of being immediately seized from behind and hurried in the direction of the Insane Asylum.

While stopping in this delightful place I visited the small theatre of which the inhabitants are justly proud, and shall never forgive myself if I fail to mention the orchestra, that discoursed most eloquent music on that occasion.

Whether the regular musicians of the theatre were on a strike for higher wages, and the manager was obliged to bring in outside talent, I did not learn; but certain it was, the sole instrument that kept the audience awake between the acts, the night in question, was a large piece—a bassoon, I think—filled and manipulated by a stout, spectacled representative from the Faderland.

In addition to the musician’s frog-shaped body—which of itself would doubtless have attracted my attention—he had a head that was truly a study. To say he was bald, is to make a remark that would be applicable to about two-thirds of the gentlemen in the theatre, but to say that his head was as smooth, as shiny, and devoid of hair, from the eyebrows to the very nape of the neck, as a billiard ball, is hardly doing the head justice. It seemed actually peeled.

Besides, it was of a conical form, and as I looked upon it I thought what an advantage it would have been to me in my younger days if I had had some such thing in the barn-yard, over which to break pumpkins for the cattle. I am certain a pumpkin or squash brought down upon such an object with well-centred precision, would fly into as many fragments as the Turkish Empire.

I was not the only person whose attention was arrested by that marvelous development. If a diamond the size of a rutabaga had suddenly flashed, the audience would scarcely have turned with greater haste to contemplate its beauties than they did to regard that head the instant the hat was removed.

It had such a smooth and polished surface that the actors, as they passed back and forth upon the stage, were mirrored out upon it in Liliputian proportions. The large globe light was reflected so perfectly upon that glossy scalp that it shed a positive light to remote corners of the auditorium; and a person would look first at the head, then up at the globe, and then down at the head again, and _then_ hardly be prepared to decide from which object the original rays of light proceeded.

The musician had one original “turn” which afforded me much amusement. At the commencement of a tune he would sit facing the stage, which was proper enough; but as he proceeded he would turn by degrees until he was sitting full face to the audience.

The gods in the gallery seemed to consider it their especial privilege to pelt his head with peanuts; and when one would happen to hit—which was quite often—it would bound and skip from the polished object in a manner that would invariably bring down the house.

Standing as it did in bold relief from the dark panel-work and drapery behind, it was a most excellent and inviting mark. Man though I am, with the sobering cares of life closing gloomily around me, I actually regretted I couldn’t try a shot at the old codger’s head myself.

It has been said “The king of Shadows loves a shining mark.” If this is so, how that musician managed to escape the arrows so long is more than I can understand. For many a year he certainly has presented a target worthy the whole archery of the realm of Death.

The evening’s entertainment was made up of selections from Shakespeare’s tragedies, “Macbeth,” and “Othello.”

The principal actor, whose name I forget, was the oddest and hungriest looking player I ever saw stalk across a stage, or foam and fret in histrionic effort. He looked as though he had been dangling from the lowest spoke of Fortune’s wheel for the last twenty years. His make-up was terrible also, and after I learned the performance was not an intentional burlesque, I could hardly keep from hooting whenever he appeared. As the evening advanced, however, he warmed up considerably. When he appeared as the murderous Thane moving toward the apartments of his slumbering victim, huskily repeating the thrilling lines, “The bell invites me! I go, and it is done!” he looked every inch a villain, and the little theatre rung again with the clapping and clattering of the enthusiastic audience. In “Othello” his dress was even worse than in “Macbeth.” In the scene where he smothers Desdemona, he was barefooted, and looked supremely ridiculous. I would have given double the amount I paid for admission for the glorious privilege of kicking him across the stage.

The customary pitcher-shaped lamp which the “Moor” usually bears in his hand upon this occasion, and to which he alludes when he says:—

“If I quench thee, thou flaming minister,
I can again thy former light restore,
Should I repent me,”

was not procurable. The tragedian therefore carried a candle stuck in the neck of a large wine-bottle, and under his left arm he carried a pillow about the size of a single-bed mattress, with which to put out the light of the fair Desdemona, who was lying upon a lounge at the left of the stage. I was too great a lover of Shakespeare to sit longer by and witness the terrible butchery. I arose and left the house, and as I passed out, the pitying glances of the audience informed me that they didn’t understand the real state of affairs, but thought I was taken suddenly ill. I was ill at ease, and had been, during the entire evening.

On the way down the next morning an over land passenger made my acquaintance on the cars, and while conversing about the long snow sheds and tunnels he had passed, I informed him of the long tunnel through which we would pass on leaving the valley.

“Are we near that tunnel now?” he asked. “Yes,” I answered, “we will enter it in about fifteen minutes.” “Is the tunnel dark?” he inquired. “Yes, very dark,” I replied, “ten shades darker than a cloudy midnight.” “By jingo!” he cried, “that’s just the thing for me. I forgot to put on a clean shirt last night, and I hate like the deuce to arrive at my destination looking as I do now. Do you think a fellow would have time to put a shirt on while passing through it?” he continued, earnestly.

“He might,” I answered, “if he had it ready before reaching the tunnel.”

“Well, I’ll try a pull, anyway,” he said, as he took down the valise from a rack overhead to select the garment. “I’ll have it all ready for a hoist,” he continued, “and if I don’t climb into it faster than a spark into a chimney, I’m not what I think I am, that’s all;” and with a look of determination he went to a seat in the rear of the car, and for a time seemed busily engaged preparing for the great change.

I had made an error in regard to the time that would elapse before we reached the tunnel, and the result was we reached it before he was fully prepared for it. Into it the locomotive plunged with a wild scream. Gloom closed around the passengers, hiding the nearest objects from their view. On we sped. The rattling of the trucks told us rail after rail was passed, but still a darkness that might be felt enveloped the rushing train.

Those who were conversing as the car entered the tunnel, stopped as though the icy hand of death had been laid upon their throat. The half-uttered word rested upon the tongue, and the tunnel, like a long dash, stretched between the parts of a sentence.

I thought of the passenger, doubtless by this time struggling into his linen, and turned around in my seat facing him. With considerable interest I waited the return of light. At last it came glimmering far ahead. Plainer and plainer the objects grew around, and first and most noticeable of all, was the tall form of the passenger from over the mountains, leaning over the seat in front of him, enveloped in his snowy linen, his hands stuck in the sleeves at the elbows, and his head vainly endeavoring to shoot through the opening at the neck, which in his haste he had neglected to unbutton.

Notwithstanding his head was enveloped, he was conscious that light had dawned upon the scene, and his struggles and frantic thrusts became painful to look upon.

Finally the fastening at the neck gave way, and his face came through the opening, red as a pickled beet. Fortunately most of the passengers were sitting with backs toward him and but few witnessed the terrible struggle. One old lady, however, got nearly frightened out of her wits. When objects began to grow visible around her, she became suddenly apprised of the startling fact that a white figure was bent over her, with outstretched wings fanning the air, and she very naturally came to the conclusion that an angel was about to gather her to her fathers.

The ashen look of the poor old body, as she stole a glance over her shoulder at the white object behind, showed that however fitted she was—in respect of years—for the final taking off, she was anything but willing to start upon such an uncertain journey.

HUNTING WITH A VENGEANCE.

“That man received his charge from me.”
—_Shakespeare._

My friend butcher Gale has been quail hunting under difficulties. His case is a sad one, and as I feel in somewhat of a rhyming mood at present, I will invoke the gods, and with eyes in “fine frenzy rolling,” proceed to state his case in verse.

“Come leave your hogs,” said lawyer Boggs
To red-faced butcher Gale,
“We’ll take a day across the bay,
And slather lots of quail.”

Soon guns were got, and bags of shot,
With powder, wads, and caps,
And up the canyons dry and hot,
Tramped these two city chaps.

Old lawyer Boggs had borrowed dogs
Well worth their weight in gold;
The setter had a “double nose,”
And it of her was told,

That she could scent two different ways
As easy as you please;
While one nose smelled along the ground,
The other sniffed the trees.

The pointer had peculiar traits;
His power of scent was small;
But if he saw three birds at once,
He pointed at them all.

For while his nose would indicate
Where one poor piper sat,
His tail, straight as a marline-spike,
Would point another at;

Then if a third one raised its head,
Preparing for the air,
That dog would balance on three legs,
And aim the other there.

With such a pair the quick to scare,
And then retrieve the dead,
The hunters’ sole remaining care
Was how to scatter lead.

They traversed gorge and gully low,
And many a slippery height,
And though their feet did heavier grow,
Their game bags still were light.

While roving o’er the mountain side,
It seemed that every quail
Within the county limits wide
Was piping in the vale;

But when they would forsake the hills,
And in the valleys dive,
It seemed as if the heights around
With bevies were alive.

Boggs had one fault, from childhood brought,
More marked with age it grew;
He never failed to shut both eyes
Whilst he the trigger drew.

This plan might do, if lead he threw
At barns or target rings;
But frightened quail, when turning tail,
Are visionary things.

And let him sight, quick as he might,
Space still would grow between,
And bang! would go the shower of woe
Just where the bird—had been.

’Tis said those knowing canines knew
While men were taking aim,
Whether or not ’twould be their lot
To gather in some game.

So when they saw Boggs shut both eyes
Whene’er the piece he fired,
They dropped upon their hams and howled,
And from the hunt retired.

And he as soon could cause a stump
To walk upon its roots,
As from a sitting posture coax
The two disgusted brutes.

Wide was their aim, and wild the game,
And when such facts do yoke,
There’s many a shot goes off, I wot,
Brings nothing to the “poke.”

The grains were sown, the fields were mown,
The crops proved rather thin;
Oft was the raking summons thrown,
But slow the heads came in.

At last while Gale, just in advance,
Was clambering o’er some logs,
He got a charge of shot by chance,
From the excited Boggs.

Then was there rustling there a spell,
And as you may suppose,
From out the shaking chaparral
Linked oaths profusely rose.

Boggs dropped his gun and forward run,
With apprehension bleached,
And this poor lame excuse begun
When he the butcher reached:

“A splendid shot! I quite forgot
Precisely where you stood;
The birds flew fast, were nearly passed
Behind a screen of wood;

“I must let go, or lose a show
Of bagging three or four,
And in my mind you were behind,
Until I heard you roar.”

He cursed the logs and kicked the dogs,
And wished the quail on toast,
But that did not take out the shot,
Which then was needed most.

The doctors who have dressed his wounds
Have to his friends declared,
That though he is a sorry sight,
His sight is not impaired.

There is a moral this within,
And shaped the times to suit,
But lest it should appear too thin,
Here’s this advice to boot:—

Ne’er venture on a hunting cruise
With any green galoot,
Who shuts both eyes whene’er he tries
The flitting game to shoot.

THE ART GALLERY.

Hearing that a large collection of paintings were on exhibition at the Art Gallery, I visited the rooms this afternoon, and was agreeably surprised to discover that quite a number were by eminent artists.

It is pleasant to gaze upon an old picture that has come down through the dust of ages, so I made it a point to employ the hour at my disposal in sketching several subjects most admired by the visitors. I did not learn the author of the large picture from which the first of my sketches was taken, but was assured that it came from the hand of an old master.

I would have thought it a representation of “Cleopatra before Cæsar,” if the female had been running toward the man instead of away from him.

A gentleman present who examined the painting closely, gave it as his opinion, that the couple represented “Tarquin and Lucrece.”

He informed me he had visited many art galleries of the Old World, and found several paintings which had been copied from this masterpiece by artists, who paid homage to such creative genius.

As he claimed to be something of a connoisseur, his supposition was probably a correct one, though he was not able to thoroughly account for the singular looking bonnet that shadowed the head of the prancing “Lucrece.”

It is certainly anything but a Roman head-dress, and why it should be dangling from her royal top, is something for critics to comment on, and antiquarians to inquire into.

Another little sketch attracted great attention, especially from the ladies, whose love for the beautiful is only excelled by their love for the good. It was entitled “Love’s Young Dream.” I regret I am not able to give the artist’s name. I could not get near enough to decipher the signature, owing to the crowd of ladies admiring the beautiful gem.

The members of the Graphic Club were sketching. Accepting an invitation from one I stepped into their room to see them draw. Quite a number of artists were present. The famous marine painter was there, who loves to paint the vessel going before the wind, when in its might it takes “the ruffian billows by the top.” It was pleasant to watch his pencil pile up the “yeasty waves” at will.

It was also interesting to lean over the landscape painter’s shoulder and see the branches sprout from his grand old oaks, against whose trunks it would seem the storms of centuries had spent their force.

It was no less pleasant or interesting to perceive the horns shoot from the animal painter’s cows. As the creature grows under his active pencil, we may be inclined to think she will be of the Mooley species, and never shake a gory horn above a prostrate victim; but alas! a few hasty but well directed strokes, and she stands forth more formidable than the armed rhinoceros or rampant unicorn. Then we hold our breath, as we see the pencil slide away to some other locality before a tail is attached to the body, and inwardly wonder whether the artist has forgotten to bestow upon her that graceful adjunct, or is intentionally giving us a new species of cattle. We heave a sigh of relief when the pencil returns, after a brief skirmish along the ribs, to bestow upon the cow that terminal appendage, at once a scourge for milk-maids and a swing for dogs.

A ROLLING STONE.

This afternoon, while climbing a steep hill that overlooks the bay, in company with a gentleman named Stone, I saw an illustration of the old maxim, “A rolling stone gathers no moss.” We had almost completed the ascent, when Stone’s feet slipped from under him, and striking upon his side he commenced a rapid descent.

About four hundred feet of steep grade stretched before him without let or hindrance. I saw at a glance he was bound to pass over every inch of the space before he stopped. Onward he went, gathering speed as he proceeded, and catching wildly around him at every revolution; but, as there was nothing growing upon the barren slope but stunted grass or brittle moss, his efforts to “slow speed” were in vain. After he had made about ten revolutions his hat came off, and for a short time the race between him and his tile was truly interesting. It would have been an even bet, which would first reach the fence at the bottom of the hill. After making about half the distance, however, the hat swung in ahead of him.

Whether it was the wind acted upon it I couldn’t tell, but Stone overhauled it, and passing over it, materially injured its form as a roller, by giving it an oblong shape, and soon left the crushed hat wabbling far behind. He turned neither to the right nor to the left, but rolled as straight down the hill as a saw-log down the bank of a river into a mill-pond. Goats nibbling in the vicinity paused in their repast and looked pitifully at the gentleman as he went tumbling by them, and evidently congratulated themselves on being goats, that feel at home on the steepest hillside that nature can present to their hoofs. When, in his mad career, my friend Stone would reach some intercepting shelf he would bounce about three feet into the air, and continue down the incline with increased velocity. Nor did he stop his brilliant course until he brought up whack against the fence.

Fortunately he was unhurt, but was so dizzy that everything was turning around him for an hour afterwards. He declares that though he should live until he becomes so old as to forget the way to his mouth, he has taken his last look at the city and the surrounding bay from the summit of that hill. And when we think of his last descent from that high altitude, we can hardly wonder at the declaration.

RIDING IN THE STREET CARS.

A chiel’s amang ye takin’ notes,
And faith he’ll prent it.
—_Burns._

The greater portion of this day I have spent riding in the street cars. I find it is quite a pleasant way of passing a few leisure hours. Neither is it an extravagant way of entertaining one’s self.

On figuring up I find, by choosing the longest routes, it cost just seven and one-quarter cents per hour. This is certainly reasonable.

There is always something amusing to look at as you pass along. There stands the nervous old lady upon the street corner. She wishes to ride, and endeavors to signal the driver and prepare for embarking at one and the same time. She proves the truth of the old saying that a person may get too many irons in the fire. In her eagerness to attract the attention of the driver or conductor, she is not aware that in lifting her skirts she has elevated one or two thicknesses more than she intended, or than is at all necessary. Poor old lady! She does indeed present a picture that might well attract the artistic eye. We in more becoming order turn our eyes from the singular spectacle and study the advertisements ranged around for our special benefit. She emits a short, quick cry, half whoop and half squeal, and signals repeatedly, to do which the inevitable umbrella is brought into requisition, and flourished around her head as though she was warding off a detachment of aggressive wasps. She gives the conductor a look of surprise, if not anger, because he completes the curve before stopping to take her up. The old lady means business, and has never got it through her head that conductors have rights which she is bound to respect. She no doubt believes that on all occasions and at all times he ought to seize the strap and stop the car as suddenly as he would a clock by grasping the pendulum.

Then there are the fashions which we can study without having to pay exorbitant prices for seats in the theatres. It is even better than to go to a fashionable church.

Besides the advantages which a ride in the street car offers us in the way of studying the fashions, we often see strange sights, well calculated to awaken humor. There, for instance, we encounter the sleepy passenger, who, in charity let us hope, is drowsy through loss of rest, rather than loss of reason! Let us hope he is some physician who has been attending to his patients; or a minister of the gospel who has spent the night by the bedside of some sinking penitent; or a supervisor, who—while his constituents have been snugly dreaming away their troubles—has been legislating, and growing hoarse declaiming for the public good. Doctor or supervisor, as the case may be, it is evident he is sleepy, and cares not who knows it. Otherwise he would pick up his hat, which has fallen off, before it has twice been stepped on by passengers staggering through the car while it is in motion.

With a persistency truly amusing he tips in the direction of some old lady, who apparently hates men, especially when excessive drowsiness makes them familiar. He, however, is oblivious of her likes or dislikes, even of her presence, it would seem.

He bobs towards her until his dishevelled forelock actually tickles her under the ear, which sensation causes her to start suddenly, and look around so quickly, that a person must think the movement gave her a crick in the neck, and her subsequent rubbing of the cords below the ear would seem to bear out the supposition as correct.

Then, as we ride along we can see the bold policeman! standing by the corner of a building. He is earnestly looking down a narrow lane, taking notes perhaps; but more likely watching the progress of a fight, and wisely waiting until all the pistols are discharged before venturing to arrest any of the belligerent parties. He looks as though it would not take much longer reflection or many more shots, to make him forego that duty _in toto_, and turn around to arrest the poor Chinese vegetable peddler, who, with his basket pole upon his shoulder, is trotting along upon the sidewalk, and thereby violating one of the city ordinances. While hustling the prisoner to the station house he would escape performing more unpleasant and risky business.

He is in the right of it, too, when a person comes right down to reason the case. The policeman may have a family depending on him for support. Or it may be upon the very stroke of the hour when his duty for the day will cease, and he can saunter to his home, leaving his successor to rush in and stay the slaughter.

It may be argued that the policeman is paid to take prisoners, and consequently to take chances. This is true, but he is not paid to commit suicide. For a broad man like him to move down a narrow lane up which the bullets are whistling, can hardly be considered anything short of it. Oh! he is a cunning fellow I tell you, and revolves the matter carefully in his mind before taking action.

He has been too long a resident of the city, and too long a member of the “star brigade,” not to know that the city can better afford to lose two or three indifferent citizens than it can one able and efficient policeman.

We turn from the policeman to contemplate the blooming blonde, who comes bouncing in with her poodle dog in her arms.

After she is seated she amuses some of the passengers and displeases more, by the affectionate names she lavishes upon the little watery-eyed pet in her lap. Some of the passengers would doubtless like to be the dog and others would like to be a distemper that they might legally kill the cur. She temporarily ends her caresses by repeatedly kissing its cold peaked nose, to the infinite disgust of the majority of the passengers, who, rather than witness a repetition of the silly act, look out of the windows and become suddenly interested in the construction of the buildings or fences along the route.

And then there is the impatient passenger, who is either limited in time or sense, probably in both.

He foolishly attempts to leave the car while it is in motion, in order to save a few moments. Immediately afterwards he wishes he hadn’t, and sits down with considerable feeling to think over his rashness. There was a time, no doubt, when he could jump on and off a car like a newsboy; but that time has evidently gone by.

When we consider the roughness of his seat, and the unexpected manner in which he settled on it, we have to acknowledge that he sits with considerable grace. However, as he has lost time instead of gaining it, by the action, he will perhaps try to catch a better hold of the old rascal’s forelock the next time he is running past him.

SIMON RAND.

No poet, however gifted, can get along without his muse, any better than a navigator can without his compass. If the goddess is not at his elbow, the lyre hangs mute upon the wall, and the pen corrodes in the ink. Then what can the poor limited rhymer do without a muse to inspire him? As mine is at present leaning over the back of my chair in a very encouraging manner, I will strike my harp and lay the following heart-rending tale before the world in verse.

_First Gossip_—“Was she false?”
_Second Gossip_—“Ay, false as her teeth.”
—_Old Volume._

In Siskiyou, a tanner lived,
Whose name was Simon Rand;
He loved the miller’s daughter, fair
Annetta Hildebrand.
The maiden loved the tanner, too,
(At least the maid so said,)
And she the happy day had named
The parson would them wed.

The golden day-dreams lengthened as
The season shorter grew,
And Cupid slung his bow across
His shoulder, and withdrew.
A golden pointed arrow lay
Imbedded in each heart;
The little god conjectured they
Could never live apart.

But fire will test the iron safe,
And powder prove the mine,
And tempests try the ship at sea,
The woodman’s axe the pine;
And gold will sound the human heart,
The maiden’s love it tries;
It is the plummet weight that proves
How deep affection lies.

One Jacob Towle, a rival, came
To darken Simon’s days;
His clothes were fine, his purse a mine,
He drove a span of bays!
The fair Annetta was his mark;
He deftly played his hand;
He turned her giddy head around,
And love, from Simon Rand.

The tanner saw his dove prove daw,
And scarce believed his eyes;
But change was there, in look and air,
And in her curt replies.
He called one night, in hopes he might
Back his affianced win;
Word came by “sis” (an old game this),
“Annetta was not in.”

But ah! how keen are lovers’ eyes
When rivals are around;
A glossy hat hung in the hall;
He reached it with a bound.
“See, my child, a pleasing sight!”
Said he with a ghastly smile;
“For into fraction, into mite,
I’ll smash the villain’s tile.”

He seized it, and he squeezed it, too,
He bowled it on the floor,
He thumped it, and he jumped it, and
He kicked it through the door.
So through the gate he then escaped,
And he was heard to say,
“By all the hides that I have scraped
With life I’ll make away.”

Next morning he was missing, and
The neighbors thought it queer:
For he at work was ever found
Throughout the busy year.
Noon came, but brought not Simon back;
And then their wonder grew
Into a fear, that he had done
What he had sworn to do.

A search was instituted, and
All work was at a stand,
For weak and stout alike turned out
To search for Simon Rand.
Across the mill-pond and the flume,
The grappling drag they drew,
They scanned the trees and probed the wells
The little village through.
But tale or tidings none they found;
So all the search gave o’er,
And sat them down to talk and smoke,
Around the tavern door.

When teamster Joe picked up a hoe
That by his side was laid,
And turning round to farmer Pound,
He slapped his thigh and said,
“I’ll stake my strongest pair of mules
Against Moll Benson’s cat,
That Simon Rand, the missing man,
Lies dead in his own vat!”

No face was there, beard-hid or bare,
Light, tawny-hue, or dark,
But on the instant plainly showed
The weight of that remark.
To feet they sprung, both old and young,
And down the shortest road,
By Silly’s still and Burrill’s mill,
To Simon’s shop they strode.

One pace in front leaned Parson Lunt,
Who let his dinner stand,
And joined the throng that surged along
In search of Simon Rand.
Across his shoulder, stooped with age,
He poised his garden rake,
And those had need to urge their speed
Who followed in his wake.

Then side and side, with equal stride,
Pressed Joe and Jasper Lane;
Next Elder Chase kept even pace
With stout old Sidney Vane.
Then two and two, and three and three,
And sometimes four abreast,
With hoes and hooks, and thoughtful looks,
Come clattering on the rest.

The place was gained, all eyes were strained
Upon the brimming vat;
But not an eye its depths could spy,
Or pierce its scum of fat.

“A fearful place,” sighed Elder Chase,
As down he dipped his pole;
“No love or woe could make him throw
Himself in such a hole.
A man would choose a hempen noose,
A pistol, drug, or knife,
If he designed through troubled mind
To make away with life.”

A silent group they kneel and stoop,
And shove their poles around,
Now left, now right, till all affright
One cried, “I’ve something found!
It’s him I know, I must let go!
I dare not see his face
When coming from the depths below;
Will some one take my place?”

Then Parson Lunt stepped to the front,
And clasped his hands in prayer;
And cried, “We thank thee for his dust,
His soul in mercy spare.”
Then took the pole from Selby’s hand,
Who quickly sought the rear,
Yet dodged and peeped his best to see
If Rand indeed was there.

Up rose the heavy burdened hook;
“That’s him!” a dozen cried;
But when they took a second look
It proved a brindled hide!
Then impious Brown, the village clown,
Turned from that vat aside,
And laughed until the tears ran down
His cheeks as though he cried.

Still round he went, with body bent,
His face one endless grin,
Because the Parson praised the Lord,
Then raised—the heifer’s skin!
The tools once more sink as before,
To scrape the bottom slow:
Another mass—they strike—and pass,
It rolls along below!

“I have him now!” cried Dennis Howe,
The blacksmith’s helping man;
While down his face, in rapid race,
The perspiration ran.
With mighty grip, and backward tip,
Stout Dennis manned the pole,
Which bent as though ’twould snap and go,
And Howe would backwards roll.

And woe is me, that tanner man,
And woe is me, that maid!
And woe is me, that staring group
Around that vat, afraid.
The hold was good, the pole has stood,
And up the hook has drawn
The poor discarded Simon Rand,
Dead as a pickled prawn!

And lo! a great cast-iron weight
Fast to one leg was tied;
Which, as he rose did oscillate,
And swing from side to side.
Upon a door his form they bore
Back slowly through the town,
And still behind them left a trail
Where dripped the water down.

For every step fresh showers drew
Down from that litter bare,
From garments soaked quite through and through,
From mouth and nose and hair.
’Twere sad to tell of funeral show
That in that town was seen;
Enough to know that Simon low
Lies where the grass is green.

Annetta, now, is Mrs. Towle,
And servants on her wait;
And dogs with uninviting growl
Drive beggars from her gate.
And Simon’s shop has gone to wreck,
No bark is needed now,
No more before the greasy door
Lie horns of ox or cow!

But on the anniversary
Of that distressful night,
The superstitious people say—
Within it burns a light.

And there the tanner may be seen
His thin arms shining bare,
Bent o’er the bench, as though at work
Fast scraping off the hair!
Anon, slow rising from his toil
A woeful sigh he gives,
And gazes long towards the hill,
Where false Annetta lives.

Then turning round he gives a bound,
As when he crushed the hat,
And fastening to his leg a weight
He leaps into the vat!
And with him goes the wondrous light
That shed its ghostly ray;
And dismal darkness wraps the place
Until the dawn of day.

THE VALUE OF A COLLAR.

Dear me! what a terrible dodging life the poor city cur leads, to be sure, whose owner does not consider him of sufficient importance to warrant taking out a license. His excursions must necessarily be limited.

He never dares to bark in the daytime, and now I think of it, that may account for his howling all night. To bark between the hours of seven in the morning and six in the evening would be equivalent to running his head into the pound-keeper’s lariat. He knows it, too, the rascal, and hardly indulges in a yelp, even if his tail is trod upon. I have always noticed that the eyes of the cur that wears no collar—(which would entitle him to the freedom of the city)—protrude from the sockets much farther than the optics in the head of the licensed animal. I have noticed this fact and pondered over it, striving not a little to arrive at some satisfactory conclusion in regard to the matter. It may be that this strange protrusion is brought about by the continual strain while on the lookout for the pound-keeper or his sneaking aids.

Another peculiarity about the unlicensed cur,—his eyes are invariably the color of tobacco juice. “Why are they so?” you probably inquire. Be patient, and I will tell you? It is the result of the burning envy continually agitating his breast and adding a bloodier lustre to his orbs.

How must envy consume his very vitals when he beholds his younger brother, perhaps, trotting forth into the street, his neck encircled with the leather zone that insures him respect and immunity from assault; while he must cower behind the ash barrel, and wait for night to temporarily shield him from insult and injury.

The old adage is hardly applicable to his case. He has no _day_, but he has his night, however, and he would be a fool not to make the most of it.

How trifling a thing will draw the line between him and his licensed brother. One white foot, perhaps, a spot too many on the head, or want of one above the tail may have cursed him through the length and breadth of his existence. If he lives it must be by his wits. Every man’s hand or boot seems to be against him. The licensed dog can stretch lazily upon the sidewalk and oblige the pedestrians to go around him rather than take the chances of stepping over, or stirring him up with a kick.

It is dangerous business, this waking up a dog with your boot. You may take him in a time when not in the mood for permitting such familiar demonstrations.

Perhaps he may be hungry, and since the dogs devoured poor painted Jezebel, their weakness for human flesh will occasionally make itself manifest. I, who have been thrice vaccinated by a canine tooth (and it took each time, too), speak knowingly on this subject.

Now, as I gaze out upon the street, I mark the slow approach of the pound-keeper’s dingy cart. Ever and anon it comes to a sudden halt, and skirmishers are deployed on each side to search the alley-ways and lanes along the route. Hark! what cry is this that comes quavering forth from that shaky prison? A bark? No, never a bark, but a quavering bleat from the pale lips of a poor old goat. Alas! poor goat.

It, too, was evidently straying about unlawfully, in some one’s garden, perhaps, or stripping the posters off the fence before the paste was dry, or the bill-sticker a block away, and in consequence he is now occupying a position that, however exalted it may be in one sense, makes him feel very ill at ease all the same.

His fellow prisoners are dogs of every breed under the sun.

There is no discrimination in that moving prison, no separate cells. The full blood setter pup fares no better than the worthless poodle that couldn’t smell a quail a yard distant unless it was roasting. The big, sour, surly mastiff, with blood-shot eyes and pendent jowl, who long has been the acknowledged champion of a block, and in his day lacerated many a paw, hasn’t even a growl to offer, but crouches side by side with the poor maimed and mongrel cur that for years has been racking through life on three legs.

Still the dismal looking cart jolts along attracting the attention of the passing crowds. Still the villainous-looking aids, who flank the vehicle, trail their ready lariats, and dart exploring glances into every nook and corner. And as I gaze, I marvel to see how quickly the outlaws get a knowledge of its approach, and stand not upon the order of their going, but precipitately leave for back yards and kitchens.

QUAINT EPITAPHS.

While strolling through an old cemetery this afternoon I was surprised at the number of quaint epitaphs there to be found.

For a while I almost imagined myself rummaging among the old time-worn tombstones in some English or Welsh burying-ground. Many are written in verse, especially on the stones erected during a certain period, extending over about ten years, which proves that during these years the city had a tombstone poet among her citizens.

He was an odd genius, whoever he was, this graveyard rhymer.

One peculiarity seems to have been his coupling with the epitaph a brief account of the manner in which the deceased party was taken off. The first inscription which attracted my notice as odd, was chiseled upon a large marble slab which leaned over the spot where a party who had borne the ancient and honorable name of “Smith,” rested from his labors. The obituary ran thus:—

“Smith ran to catch his fatted hog,
And carried the knife around;
He slipped and fell;
The hog is well,
But Smith is under ground.”

This stanza should be introduced into public schools, and adopted as a morning chant, to impress upon the mind of the pupils the importance of a person’s having his wits about him. Death brought about by such gross carelessness as Smith showed, is—to say the least—first cousin to suicide, and doubtless there will come a time when Smith’s case will be inquired into.

Under a large oak tree on the south side I came upon a tombstone which bore no date, but had evidently been erected many years. The fence which once enclosed the grave had nearly disappeared, nothing remaining except a few rotten stakes protruding through the grass. What once had been a mound was now a hollow, which told the mute gazer, decay had done its worst.

Through a rank growth of weeds and briers, a few pale neglected flowers raised their delicate faces, like virtue struggling heavenward through the retarding throng inhabiting this naughty world.

The headstone was evidently erected before the poet’s day, and he who erected it had composed the epitaph. It is more than likely he chiseled it also, as the letters were ill-shaped and irregular, and looked as though carved out with a pick.

Here is a _fac-simile_ of the inscription:—

“Cynthy Ann is berried here.
Be easy with her,
Lord,
And, you won’t lose nothin’,
She was a plaguey good wife to me
But
She wouldn’t be druv.”

That “Cynthia Ann” had faults is evident from the tone. But I thought as I turned from the spot, if her greatest fault lay in not allowing herself to be “druv,” her prospects were better than the average.

What a contrast was the line inscribed upon a tombstone directly opposite:—

“He sleeps in Heaven.”

Mere speculation only, and wild at that. The extravagant notion that a person sleeps in Paradise must have emanated from the brain of some sluggard, who thought that heaven without sleep would be a wearisome place. The “sleeper’s” name was Gregg, and from a representation of a pair of scissors cut upon the slab I presumed he was a tailor. On making inquiry of the sexton, busily engaged closing a grave at the time, I found my supposition was right. Gregg was a tailor, but met death at the heels of a horse. To use the sexton’s own words, which were spoken in pure Greek—

“Begorra he _was_ a tailor, and it was meself that planted him there. He was killed in the barn beyant, while sthrivin’ to pull the makin’s of a fish-line out of the tail of owld Gleason’s stallion.”

When a person learns what his occupation had been, and how he died, the assertion that he had gone to heaven, strikes one as too ridiculous for anything.

Not less amusing or quaint was the verse inscribed upon the plain marble slab which marked the resting-place of Mr. and Mrs. Barradier. The stone was probably put up by some acquaintance of the deceased couple who knew that their marriage had been anything but a happy one; the verse upon it also informs the passer-by that they left no descendants to perform that pious duty. It said—

“Released from worldly care and strife,
Here side and side lie man and wife;
And with the couple buried here
Expired the name of Barradier.”

MISTAKEN IDENTITY.

An amusing scene occurred this afternoon as I was coming up from the post-office. It was a case of mistaken identity. It seems a somewhat dissipated old Irish woman was deserted some weeks ago by her husband.

Through her domestic troubles and excessive drinking she at times becomes quite crazy,—so much so that her friends have to keep a constant watch over her to prevent her from doing mischief. She is very large and powerful, and when in one of her tantrums is no easy person to manage. It appears that when she has one of these crazy spells, she imagines she recognizes her husband’s Milesian features in almost every face she looks upon.

This afternoon, while the crazy fit was upon her, she escaped from her keepers, and rushed into the street with dilated eyes and dishevelled hair. With sleeves rolled above the elbows and clenched hands, she charged up the street, looking right and left for some person on whom to fasten.

She was indeed ripe for an encounter, and nearly the first person she met was a prominent clergyman returning to his residence from the Mercantile Library, with his newly selected book under his arm. She stood for a moment directly in front of the minister, and riveted her red optics upon his face in an inquiring stare, which soon kindled into one of recognition.

Anticipating trouble, he attempted to pass around her and proceed quietly on his way.

But she was too quick for him.

Reaching out her long bare arm, she brought it around like the boom of a sloop, and with one wide sweep knocked his hat spinning to the sidewalk at her feet.

He stooped to pick it up again, and while bent in the act, she seized him by the hair with both hands, and giving a guttural laugh, not unlike the self-satisfied croak of a down east bullfrog, exclaimed:—

“Ah! Barney, ye galavantin’ spalpeen! ye can’t desave me wid yer stove-pipe! So ye’d dezart the wife o’ yer boosome, would ye? ah, ha! come home wid me now, or I’ll be afther takin’ your durty ould scalp along wid me!”

A soft rabbit under the wide paw of a California lion, or a sparrow in the talons of a hawk, is not more utterly helpless than was the poor dominie in her terrible clutch. His position was anything but an enviable one. It actually seemed as if every hair upon his head was gathered and drawn into one mass, over which her muscular fingers held complete control.

He dropped his book and shouted loudly, partly through pain, and partly anger at seeing the fate of his fashionable hat, now lying under her great broad foot, flat as a German pancake.

His cries of fear only made the crazy woman more confident of her abilities. She commenced backing along the street, in the direction of home, and at every step, with an irresistible yank, she dragged the expostulating minister along with her over the uneven sidewalk.

She had snaked him along fully two rods in this manner, and was making, to use a nautical phrase, such good stern-way that she was on the point of breaking into a trot, when her heel caught on the edge of a plank.

The result was terrible in the extreme.

She fell backwards, pulling the unfortunate captive to the sidewalk after her, where they gyrated in the most ludicrous positions imaginable.

A couple of gentlemen, emerging from a store at that instant, looked on the pair in blank astonishment for a moment. Recognizing their own gifted pastor, they ran to his assistance, and lost no time in raising him to his feet, and turning over the old crazy woman to an officer who happened at that moment to step out of a saloon.

FLIRTING, AND WHAT CAME OF IT.

At an open window wide, just across the way,
Sits a roguish little blonde nearly all the day,
Playing with a tabby cat, and gazing down below,
Flirting with conductors that are passing to and fro.
Some receive a passing nod, and some receive a smile;
But she watches Number 6 whilst going half a mile.

And the gay conductor while he’s throwing kisses there,
Doesn’t hear the signals given by an aged pair,
Though the man, as best he can, whistles loud and shrill,
And the wife, as though for life, charges down the hill.

And the blameful driver, while he gazes wistful back,
Doesn’t see the little child a creeping on the track.
Soon the jury summoned there to question how it died,
Will as their opinion give, “a case of suicide;”
And the driver and his mate acquitted from all blame,
Kisses at the blonde will throw, and she’ll return the same.

THE CHAMPION MEAN MAN.

Yesterday I came across a singular looking individual dressed in a greasy, dingy suit. He was sitting on a log before his door engaged in repairing a shovel-handle.

“Say, stranger,” I said, addressing him, “can you inform me where Deacon Shellbark lives?”

The farmer looked up, pushed his slouched hat back on his head, and after surveying me some time in silence, drawled out:—

“Be you any relation of his’n?”

“No,” I replied, a little surprised at his manner of answering; “I haven’t a relative in the State.”

“By thunder! I congratulate you upon your good fortune,” he ejaculated, “particularly because there’s no tie of consanguinity existin’ atwixt you and old Deacon Shellbark. He’s expectin’ a son home, and I thought you mout be him.