Chapter VI: Part II: Fancy Titles for Books (2)

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And first, should NE NV U,
B EZ, mind it not;
Should NE friendship show, B true;
They should not be forgot.

But friends and foes alike DK,
As U may plainly C,
In every funeral RA,
And every LEG.

From virtU never DV8;
Her influence B9
Alike induces 10dernS,
And 40tude divine.

This SA until U I C,
I pray U 2 to XQQ;
And not to burn in FIG
My young and 10der muse.

Now fare U well, DR KT J,
I trust that U R true;
When this U C, then U can say
An SA IOU.

AN AFFECTING STORY.

IIAR BB loved a maid,
He loved her to XS,
And XRSIId his NRGG
2 C her and confS.

Says he, “A meeting I’ll proQR,
B4 the day is past;
In spite of all my NMEE,
She shall B mine at last.”

Now UUULe, MLE
Was 10dR and B9,
FMN8 and gentL 2,
Some th0 she was Divine,

But poor IIAR made her X,
She said he was a calf--
SPCLE ODS;
0 spoke in his B½.

She said, “Should you go on UR nEE,
And melt awA in TRR,
Or WR at 10tions 4
The futR 50 years.

“U still would 0 B 2 me,
UR not 2 my mind,
So prA B YYR, sir, and go
Some betR maid 2 find.

“DR MLE, my love’s XS,
PrithE X10U8,
XQQ--4give--and love me, or
I’ll take an OP8.”

And so he did. Alas! poor man!
Kind readR shed a TR,
He took the OPM so strong,
It laid him on his BR!

GEORGE AND HIS POPPAR.

FEB. 22, A.D. 1738.

There livèd once a plan-ti-er
With his son, his only love,
To whom, upon his birth-day,
A brand new ax he guv.

This farmer had a gar-di-ing,
All filled with apple trees,
Which, for the city mar-ki-et,
He trièd for to reeze.

The son he takes the hatch-i-et,
Quite jolly and jocund,
And, going to the apple trees,
He chops them to the grund.

The farmer called his serv-i-ents,
And ranged them in a row;
“Now, who has chopped my apple trees,
And killed them, root and bo’?”

The servants stand ama-zi-ed,
All drawn up in a line;
Then comes a running up to him,
His young and hopeful sci’n.

“I cannot tell a lie, poppar,”
This truthful boy began;
“’Twas I who chopped your apple trees,
’Twas I, your little san.”

Now, who’d you s’pose this buffer was?
And who his filial kin?
It was the immortal Bushrod,
And the late G. Washingtin!

Feb. 22, 1875. MORAL.

Now, whoso takes a hatch-i-et,
And apple trees cuts down,
Will be, if he lives long enough,
A great and pious moun.

* * * * *

The preceding poem, while it places in a new light the immortal history of the hatchet, also illustrates the wonderful adaptability of the English language to the purposes of the poet. Thus, in the last stanza, a rhyme is required for “down,” while the sense demands the word “man” at the end of the corresponding line. Instantly the ingenious author perceives the remedy, and changes “man” to “moun,” which doesn’t mean anything to interfere with the sense, and rhymes with “down” in the most satisfactory manner.

Other fine illustrations of this kind are found in that learned translation of a part of the Eneid, published a few years since at Winsted, Connecticut. Thus:

“The hair stood endwise on his powdered wig,
Like quills upon the fretful porcupig;
He wants to go, and then again he doesn’t;
The situation is indeed unpluzzent.”

The temptation is strong to quote just here several parallel passages from Davidson’s very literal translation and from this Winsted version. We will give one, for the sake of the contrast.

“Returning Aurora now illuminates the earth with the lamp of Phœbus, and has chased away the dewy shades from the sky, when Dido, half-frenzied, thus addressed her sympathizing sister:

Sister Anna, what dreams terrify and distract my mind! What think you of this wondrous guest who has come to our abode? In mien how graceful he appears! In manly fortitude and warlike deeds how great! I am fully persuaded, (nor is my belief groundless,) that he is the offspring of the gods. Had I not been fixed and steadfast in my resolution never to join myself to any in the bonds of wedlock, since my first love by death mocked and disappointed me, I might, perhaps, give way. Anna, since the death of my unhappy spouse Sichæus, since the household gods were stained with his blood, shed by a brother, this stranger alone has warped my inclinations, and interested my wavering mind. I recognize the symptoms of my former flame. But he who first linked me to himself, hath borne away my affection. May he possess it still, and retain it in the grave. (_Liber Quartus. Ibid._)

Next day the sun rose at the proper time,
And much improved the Carthaginian clime,
When thus her sister Anna she addressed:
“Sister, my nights are full of wild unrest:
This nice young man that’s now a-stopping here
To my affections is a-growing dear;
Celestial is his origin I _know_,--
Such fearless souls don’t emanate below.
My grief! what savage fights that man has fit,
And how genteel he can get up and git!
’F I hadn’t vowed not to unite again,
I’m not quite certain but I should cave in.
Since poor dear Sic was slew by brother Pyg,
For no live man I’ve ever cared a fig,
Till unto Carthage this brave hero came--
But now--I swan--I feel the ancient flame.
Yet, while Sichæus keeps his coffined state,
My heart lies with his ashes--that’s my gait.”

* * * * *

Prizes having been offered for rhymes corresponding to “Ipecacuanha,” and “Timbuctoo,” it is to be hoped that the ingenious authors of the following verses gained them:

As I was walking in the grove
With my Julianna,
Some oranges I gave my love,
Pine-apple and banana;
And then, her headache to remove,
Some ipecacuanha.

* * * * *

If I were a cassowary
On the plains of Timbuctoo,
I would eat a missionary,
Flesh and bones, and hymn-book, too.

“And the moral of that is,” as the Duchess observed:

That step can find no place
In rhyme, is not the case:
’Tis quite absurd:
To find a rhyme for “step,”
You only have to sep-
Arate a word.

Also: (“month” having been declared unrhymable;)

They seized a soldier in Broadway,
December was the month;
He saw his pistols thrown away,
He also saw his gun th-
rown away!

* * * * *

In W. G. Clarke’s youth he was requested by a young lady in the millinery line to contribute a poem to her album. Her “Album” was an account book diverted from its original purpose, and he responded as follows:

_To Miss Lucretia Sophonisba Matilda Jerusha Catling_:

Thus, my dear maid, I send to you
The balance of my meter due;
Please scrutinize the above amount,
And set it down to my account.

“FRAGMENTS OF AN ORIGINAL LOVE STORY.”

J. G. STAUNTON, AND A SOUTH CAROLINA LADY.

After a “lovers’
quarrel,” when the party of the first part
----Meekly approached and knelt down at her feet,
Praying loud as before he had ranted,
That she would forgive him, and try to be sweet,
And said “Can’t you?” the dear girl re-canted.

Then softly he whispered “How could you do so?
I certainly thought I was jilted;
But come now with me; to the parson we’ll go!
Say, wilt thou, my dear?” and she wilted.

Then gaily he took her to see his new home;
A cottage by no means enchanted;
“Ah! here we can live without longing to roam,”
He said, “Sha’n’t we, my love?” and they shantied,

And gently beamed o’er them love’s rose-colored ray;
(The bridegroom and bride of this ballad;)
He said “Let us walk at the close of the day,
My own lovely Sall,” and they sallied.

He plucked her the sweetest and loveliest flowers
That scented the path where they wandered;
And when she exclaimed “Let us turn from these bowers,
To roam near the pond!” then they pondered.

Old time softly paused o’er the home of this pair,
Nor grief nor perplexity haunted;
And when the meek husband asked “What shall I wear?”
“Plaid pants,” she replied, and he panted.

She, like a good wife, made his wardrobe her care;
(Neglecting it seemed to her wicked;)
So, when she brought linen, all shining and fair,
Saying “Wear this, dear Dick!” then he dickied.

And when a bright bud of divinity came,
To gladden the home where it tarried,
They put it to vote that the young stranger’s name
Sweet CARRIE should be, and _’twas carried_.

* * * * *

But perhaps the most “pronounced” example of adaptability, as referred to above, is found in a poem recently contributed to a Rochester paper.

Spring, sprang, beautiful sprung!
The wild-winged warblers are wanging a wung,
And the soft southern breezes are brazing a broze,
That thaws up the ice with remarkable thoze.

O betterest time of all moments of tome,
I’ll rhyme thee a rhimelet in tenderest rhome,
And tell thee how oft in my longing, I’ve lung
To welcome thy coming, O beautiful sprung!

Symbolical season! exquisitest soze!
All nature uprising in gleefulest gloze,
Wide opens its larynx to sing and to shout,
Exuberant pleasure and gratefulest grout.

The blithe little rivulets run to the seas,--
The little buds start on the hemlocks and trees;
The wild geese are screaming their vigorest scream,
And the frogs that were dreaming no longer will dream.

Of course there is sadness in thinking the thought
That there’ll be no more skating for skaters who skaught;
But the Erie Canal, with its _de_crease in tolls,
Will cause us to smile a succession of smoles.

* * * * *

If “the exigencies of rhyme” need not be considered in constructing English verse, neither need the exigencies of rhythm, as shown by the following highly artistic couplets:

The wind blew down our well-sweep,
And father and I put it up again ---- sheep.

* * * * *

Wasn’t Pharaoh a Rascal
Because he wouldn’t let the children of Israel go three days’
journey into the wilderness, to celebrate the Paschal?

* * * * *

In ’73, a modest volume of poems was published by an Hon. and Rev. gentleman of Central New York,[3] in which occur the following rather surprising verses: (not consecutively, but here and there.)

O bright shining morn of the year,
I cannot foretell thy events;
Trusting in God, why should I fear,
Though having so many relents!

* * * * *

I looked on his form; ’twas like mine;
Transparent his body did seem;
His vigor could never repine;
With glory his features all gleam.

* * * * *

Oh, that the great ocean of love,
Where all the inhabitants bathe,
Ere they go to the bright realms above,
In His sight to whom they have clave.

* * * * *

We saw there as beacons of light
God’s temples of worship, so fair;
We saw there, enlisted in fight,
The wicked who cursed God with dare.

* * * * *

O then they all sang as before,
And the prophets they came rushing down;
And skipping, they came to that shore
Where saints shall forever be crowned!

* * * * *

To find the “concealed sense” (concealed _non_sense!) of the verses that follow, the first and third, second and fourth lines, are read consecutively:

That man must lead a happy life,
Who’s free from matrimonial chains;
Who is directed by a wife,
Is sure to suffer for his pains.

Adam could find no solid peace,
When Eve was given for a mate;
Till he beheld a woman’s face,
Adam was in a happy state.

In all the female race appear
Hypocrisy, deceit, and pride,
The tokens of a heart sincere,
In woman never did reside.

What tongue is able to unfold
The failings that in woman dwell?
The merits in her we behold,
Are almost imperceptible.

Confusion take the man, I say,
Who makes a woman his delight!
Who will no court to women pay,
Keeps always reason in his sight.

This is nonsense, too; though, certainly, women are the faultiest of human beings--except men.

Be that as it may, few women have ever been more severely, or, perhaps, more justly, cauterized, than poor Job’s poor wife, in Coleridge’s celebrated _Epigram_:

Sly Beelzebub took all occasions
To try Job’s constancy and patience.
He took his honor, took his health,
He took his children, took his wealth,
His servants, horses, oxen, cows--
But cunning Satan did _not_ take his spouse.

But Heaven, that brings out good from evil,
And loves to disappoint the Devil,
Had predetermined to restore
Twofold all Job had lost before:
His servants, horses, oxen, cows.
Short-sighted Satan! NOT to take his spouse?

SECRET CORRESPONDENCE.

A young lady, newly married, being obliged to show her husband all the letters she wrote, sent the following to an intimate friend:

I cannot be satisfied, my dearest friend,
blest as I am in the matrimonial state,
until I confide to your most friendly keeping
trusting to your interest in what interests me,
the various deep sensations which swell
with the liveliest feelings of satisfaction
my almost bursting heart. I tell you, my dear
husband is one of the most amiable of men.
I have been married nearly seven weeks, and
have never found the least possible reason to
repent the day that joined us. My husband is
in person and manners far from resembling those
ugly, cross, old, disagreeable and jealous
monsters, who think by confining to secure
a wife, it is his maxim to treat as a
bosom friend and confidant and not as a
plaything or menial slave the woman
chosen to be his companion. Neither party
he frequently says, ought to obey implicitly,
but each yield to the other in turn.
I know my husband loves nothing more
than he does me; he flatters me more
than the glass, and his intoxication
(for I must so call the excess of his love,)
often makes me blush for the unworthiness
of its object, and wish I could be more deserving
of the man whose name I bear. To
say all in one word, my dearest friend, and to
crown the whole, my former gallant lover
is now my indulgent husband. My fondness
is returned, and I might have married
a prince, without the felicity I find with
him! Adieu! May you be blest as I am unable
to wish that I could be more
happy.

(The key to the above letter is to omit every alternate line: reading the first, third, fifth, &c., consecutively.)

* * * * *

It is said that among ancient Christian devices the figure of a fish occurs very frequently, with the inscription _anthropou_ (in Greek letters), signifying _of man_. The following explanation has been given: The Greek word for _fish_ is _ichthus_, and each of the five letters composing the Greek word, (ch and th being each represented by only one letter,) is the initial of a significant word, as follows:

iesus--Jesus,
christos--Christ,
theou--of God,
uios--Son,
soter--Saviour.

The whole, followed by anthropou, (the word inscribed upon the figure of the fish,) forms a profession of Christian faith:

JESUS CHRIST, SON OF GOD, SAVIOUR OF MEN.

* * * * *

Pilate’s question addressed to our Lord, “What is truth?” “Quid est Veritas?” contains in itself, by a perfect anagram, its own answer: “Est vir qui adest:” “_It is the Man who stands before you._”

When “I cry that I sin” is transposed, it is clear
My resource, “Christianity,” soon will appear.

* * * * *

The following very curious sentence, “_Sator arepo teret opera rotas_,” is not first-class Latin, but may be freely translated: “I cease from my work; the mower will wear his wheels.” It is, in fact, something like a nonsensical verse, but has these peculiarities: 1st. It spells backward and forward the same. 2d. Then, the first letter of each word spells the first word. 3d. Then, all the second letters of each word spell the second word. 4th. Then, all the third, and so on through, the fourth and fifth. 5th. Then, commencing with the last word, the last letter of each word spells the first word. 6th. Then, the next to the last, and so on, through.

* * * * *

The lines which constitute the Pyramid below, may be read from the base upward, or from the apex downward, indifferently.

There
For aye
To stay,
Commanding,
’Tis standing,
With God-like air,
Sublimely fair.
Its form declaring,
Its height admiring,
Looks on it from afar
Lo! every smiling star.
To raise the pile to heaven
These beauteous stones are given,
Each prayer for truth-inspiring light,
Each manly struggle for the right,
Each kindly word to cheer the lowly,
Each aspiration for the holy,
Each strong temptation overcome,
Each clamorous passion held in silence dumb.
As it arises slowly toward the upper heaven
Stone after stone until the mass is given.
Its base upon the earth, its apex in the skies,
The good man’s character, a pyramid doth rise.

* * * * *

“Revolution” is transposed “to love ruin,” and “French Revolution,” “Violence run forth.”

One of the prettiest of modern anagrams is “Florence Nightingale,” “Flit on, cheering angel.”

* * * * *

If the name Napoleon be successively “beheaded” till only two letters are left, each remainder forms a significant word; and these words, combined in a certain manner, form a concise sketch of Napoleon the First. Thus:

Napoleon, Apoleon, Poleon, Oleon,
destroying, cities, destructive,
Leon, Eon, On,
lion, going about, being.

Napoleon, on, oleon, leon, eon, apoleon, poleon.

Napoleon being a destructive lion, going about destroying cities.

* * * * *

The following sentence of only thirty-four letters contains all the letters of the alphabet:

John quickly extemporized five tow bags.

HISTORY.

Sir Walter Raleigh, in his prison, was composing the second volume of his “History of the World.” Leaning on the sill of his window, he meditated on the duties of the historian to mankind, when suddenly his attention was attracted by a disturbance in the court yard before his cell. He saw one man strike another whom he supposed by his dress to be an officer; the latter at once drew his sword, and ran the former through the body. The wounded man felled his adversary with a stick, and then sank upon the pavement. At this juncture the guard came up, and carried off the officer insensible, and then the corpse of the man who had been run through.

Next day Raleigh was visited by an intimate friend, to whom he related the circumstances of the quarrel, and its issue. To his astonishment, his friend unhesitatingly declared that the prisoner had mistaken the whole series of incidents which had passed before his eyes.

The supposed officer was not an officer at all, but the servant of a foreign ambassador; it was he who had dealt the first blow; he had not drawn his sword, but the other had snatched it from his side, and had run _him_ through the body before any one could interfere; whereupon a stranger, from among the crowd, knocked the murderer down with his stick; and some of the foreigners belonging to the ambassador’s retinue carried off the corpse.

Raleigh’s friend added that the Government had ordered the arrest and immediate trial of the murderer, as the man assassinated was one of the principal servants of the Spanish ambassador.

“Excuse me,” said Raleigh, “but I cannot have been deceived as you suppose, for I was eye-witness to the events, which took place under my own window; and the man fell there on that spot where you see a paving stone standing up above the rest.”

“My dear Sir Walter,” replied his friend, “I was sitting on that stone when the fray took place, and I received this slight scratch on my cheek in snatching the sword from the murderer. Upon my word of honor, you were deceived in every particular.”

Sir Walter, when alone, took up the second volume of his history, which was in manuscript, and, contemplating it, thought: “If two men see the same thing so differently--nay, if I cannot believe my own eyes, how can I be assured of the truth of a tithe of the events which happened ages before I was born?” and he flung the manuscript into the fire.

Charles Dudley Warner, travelling in Nubia and Egypt, asserts that “The Arabian Nights’ Entertainment” is the best history ever written. In the light of the above facts, perhaps it is.

ST. ANTHONY’S FISH-SERMON.

From a German versification of a passage from the works of Abraham à Santa Clara, a Jesuit preacher of the Seventeenth Century.

St. Anthony, _one_ day
Found the Church empty, Sunday:
So he goes to the river,
A discourse to deliver:
They’re ready to listen--
Their tails flop and glisten.

The carps, those old scorners,
Come out of their corners;
Their carping suspended,
Their jaws wide extended,
(Ears wanting--) to swallow
Remarks that might follow.

The pouts, cross-grained pouters--
Those well-known come-outers,--
For this once go-_inners_,
Confessed themselves sinners.
The pouts said they never
Heard a sermon so clever.

Crabs and mud-turtles also,
That usually crawl so,
And in dirt their heads bury,
Came up in a hurry.
Crabs and turtles had never
Heard sermon so clever.

Eels and sturgeons, best livers
Of all in the rivers--
Forsaking their dinners
Bewailed themselves sinners.
Eels and sturgeons had never
Heard sermon so clever.

And lastly, those odd fish
We mortals call codfish--
Their glass eyes distended--
Devoutly attended,
Like rational creatures,
This greatest of preachers.

And dog-fish and cat-fish,
And flounders and flat-fish,
And, finally, all fish,
Both great fish and small fish,
Came swimming and squirming
In shoals to the sermon;
And all said they never
Had heard one so clever.

But when it was ended,
To their business all wended;
The pikes to their thieving,
The eels to good living;
The crab still went crooked,
The codfish was stupid:
Yet none of them ever
Heard sermon so clever!

* * * * *

A susceptible youth addressed the following highly classical letter to a young lady whose poetical effusions, dated “Pine Woods,” had won his heart:

Permittere me dicere, carissima puella, ego habeo visus vestris dulces funes in papyrus. Ego lignum simile videre te plurimo. Ego nosco nos lignum autumnus in amore cum unus alter. Tuus versus spectaculum genius et tener cors. Ego lignum calcitro tuum durum cordatum patrem ex portis, et ego possum duo, si ille erat non complacens et omnis rectus. Volo ad vistare te, sed non nosco ubi Pinus Sylva sit. Prendam Erie maledictum-viam? Ubi est id? Ero membrum legis, proximo vero, et tun, cum pocket libro pleno stamporum, cano in manu, silko castore super capito, ego non curo pro omnibus tauricanibus in Pino-silva, nam meum canum est fors, et decutiam sua capita--sed sufficit.

Omnium pro te,
Unus qui amat.

FELIS ET MURES.

BY GREENE KENDRICK.

Felis sedit by a hole;
Intenta she, cum omne soul,
Prendere rats;
Mice cucurrerunt over the floor,
In numero, duo, tres, or more,
Obliti cats.

Felis saw them oculis;
“I’ll have them,” inquit she, “I guess,
Dum ludunt;”
Tunc illa crept toward the group,--
“Habeam,” dixit, “good rat soup;
Pingues sunt!”

Mice continued all ludere;
Intenti they in ludum vere,
Gaudenter:
Tunc rushed the felis into them,
Et tore them omnes, limb from limb,
Violenter.

MORAL.

Mures, omnes, now beware!
Of hungry felis have a care
Nox et die;
Si hoc facis “verbum sat;”
Avoid a huge and hungry cat,
Studiose!

* * * * *

Ego nunquam audivi such terrible news,
As at this present tempus my senses confuse;
I am drawn for a miles, I must go cum Marte,
Et, communis ense, engage Bonapar-te;
But soon we will show to this Corsican vaunter,
That, though _times_ may change, BRITONS _never_ mutantur.

_Dr. Porson._

* * * * *

Tres fratres stolidi
Took a boat for Philippi;
Stormum surgebat
Et boatum overturnebat;
Omnes drownerunt
Qui swimmere non potuerunt

THE RHINE.

Oh the Rhine, the Rhine, the Rhine!
Comme c’est beau! wie schön! che bello!
He who quaffs thy Lust and Wein,
Morbleu! is a lucky fellow.

How I love thy rushing streams,
Groves of ash and birch and hazel,
From Schaffhausen’s rainbow beams,
Jusqu ’à l’echo d’ Oberwesel!

Oh, que j’aime the Brüchen, when
The crammed Dampschiff gayly passes!
Love the bronzed pipes of thy men,
And the bronzed cheeks of thy lasses!

Oh, que j’aime the “oui,” the “bah,”
From the motley crowd that flow,
With the universal “ja,”
And the Allgemeine “So!”

LATIN POEM.

FOR THE LEARNED.

Hei didulum, didulum, atque iterum didulum,
Felisque, Fidisque!
Vacca super Lunæ cornua prosiluit
Nescio qua catulus risit dulcedine ludi,
Abstunt et turpi lanx cochleare fuga!

FRENCH SONG.

Chantons une chanson à six sous,
La poche pleine de blé;
Vingt-quatre oiseaux noirs
Cuits dans un pâté!
Quand le pâté s’ouvrit,
Les oiseaux levaient leurs voix;
N’était-ce pas un joli plat,
Mettre devant le Roi?

ICH BIN DEIN.

ENGLISH, LATIN, GREEK, FRENCH AND GERMAN “MACARONI.”

In tempus old a hero lived
Qui loved puellas deux,
He ne pouvait pas quite to say
Which one amabat mieux.

Dit-il lui-même, un beau matin,
“Non possum both avoir;
Sed si address Amanda Anne,
Then Kate and I have war!”

Amanda habet argent coin
Sed Kate has aureas curls
Et both sunt very agathæ
Et quite formosæ girls.

Enfin, the youthful anthropos
Philoun the duo maids,
Resolved proponere ad Kate
Avant cet evening’s shades.

Procedens then to Kate’s domo,
Il trouve Amanda there,
Kai quite forgot his late resolves
Both sunt so goodly fair.

Sed, smiling on the new tapis,
Between puellas twain,
Cœpit to tell his vœux to Kate
Dans un poëtique strain.

Mais, glancing ever and anon
At fair Amanda’s eyes,
Illæ non possunt dicere
Pro which he meant his sighs.

Each virgo heard his demi vow
With cheeks as rouge as wine,
And, offering each a milk-white hand,
Both whispered “Ich bin dein.”

MACARONIC ADVERTISEMENT.

An inn-keeper in Germany sets forth the accommodations of his house in the following lines, inscribed upon one of its windows:

In questa casa trovarete
Toutes les choses que vous souhaitez;
Vinum bonum, costas, carnes,
Neat post-chaise, and horse and harness.

ANN HATHAWAY.

(PROBABLY NOT SHAKESPEARE’S.)

Would ye be taught, ye feathered throng,
With love’s sweet notes to grace your song,
To charm the heart in thrilling lay,
Listen to Ann Hathaway.
She hath a way to sing so clear,
Phœbus might, listening, stoop and hear:
To melt the sad, make blithe the gay,
And nature charm, Ann hath a way.
She hath a way,
Ann Hathaway.

When Envy’s tongue and Rancor’s tooth
Do soil and bite fair worth and truth,
And merit to distress betray,
To soothe the soul, Ann hath a way.
She hath a way to chase despair;
To heal all grief, to cure all care,
Turn foulest night to fairest day,
Thou knowest, fond heart, Ann hath a way,
She hath a way,
Ann Hathaway.

Tell not of gems the Orient list;
The diamond, topaz, amethyst,
The emerald mild, the ruby gay;
Talk of my gem Ann Hathaway.
She hath a way with her bright eye,
Their various lustre to defy;
The jewel she, and the foil they,
So sweet to look Ann hath a way.
She hath a way,
Ann Hathaway.

But to my fancy were it given
To rate her charms, I’d call it heaven;
For, though a mortal made of clay,
Angels might love Ann Hathaway.
She hath a way so to control
And rapture the imprisoned soul,
And love and truth so to display
That to be heaven Ann hath a way.
She hath a way,
Ann Hathaway.

INSTRUCTIVE FABLES.

THE DOG AND THE SPARE RIB.--A mastiff crossing a bridge and bearing in his mouth a piece of meat, suddenly swallowed the meat. He immediately observed that the shadow of the aforesaid in the water had disappeared.

_Moral_: We learn from this fable that life is but a shadow.

THE ASS AND THE LOCOMOTIVE.--A donkey one day was quietly munching thistles when he heard the screaming whistle of a locomotive. Pricking up his ears, he started into a gallop and raced across lots, with his tail high in the air.

_Moral_: This fable teaches what an ass he was.

THE MOUSE AND THE CAT.--A mouse once peeped from his hole and saw a cat. The cat was looking the other way, and happened not to see the mouse.

Nobody killed.

_Moral_: This little fable doesn’t teach anything.

PRONUNCIATION.

The difficulty of applying rules to the pronunciation of our language may be illustrated in two lines, wherein the combination of the letters _ough_ is pronounced in no less than seven different ways, viz: as _o_, _uf_, _off_, _up_, _ow_, _oo_, and _ock_.

Though the tough cough and hiccough plough me through,
O’er life’s dark lough my course I still pursue.

And in the subjoined couplets, which should be read rhymingly:

Peasant Arcadian, guiding the plough,
Loam on your garments, your aspect is rough.

Peasant imprudent, I hear you’ve a cough:
Do you feel sure you’re clad warm enough?

Home to your cottage, and bend o’er the trough,
Kneading the loaves of digestible dough.

Though the bread’s heavy, unsweetened and tough,
Well sharpened teeth can go easily through.

And the opposite difficulty, which sometimes occurs, of determining the sense of a word from its pronunciation, is shown in the following verses:

Write, we know, is written right,
When we see it written w-r-i-t-e;
But when we see it written r-i-g-h-t,
We know it is not written right.
For write, to have it written right,
Must not be written r-i-g-h-t, or r-i-t-e,
Nor yet must it be written w-r-i-g-h-t,
But w-r-i-t-e, for so ’tis written right.

* * * * *

Some one asks: “If W-o-r-c-e-s-t-e-r is pronounced Wooster, wouldn’t r-o-r-c-e-s-t-e-r be an excellent way to spell rooster?”

That is “the English of it,” and, on the same principle--whatever it is--C-h-o-l-m-o-n-d-e-l-e-y is pronounced Chumley; M-i-c-h-i-l-i-m-a-c-i-n-a-c, Mackinaw; M-a-r-j-o-r-i-b-a-n-k-s, Marchbank; L-e-i-c-e-s-t-e-r, Lester; N-o-r-w-i-c-h, Norrij, and C-o-l-o-n-e-l, Curnel.

The ways of English pronunciation are, indeed, past finding out.

So are the secret motives of those who, having once adopted a false pronunciation, adhere to it in the face of all precept and example; who persist in calling Garibaldi, Gar-i-bawld-i; guipure, gim-pure; alpaca, al-a-pac-a; and a polonaise, a polo-nay. Of this class was the young person of Boston--she _couldn’t_ have been a young person of BOSTON!--who, passing out of an Art Gallery with a friend not long since, read aloud the inscription beneath a statuette of Psyche, and pronounced it Pi-sish. Her friend mildly suggesting the true pronunciation, the young person rejoined: “I know it. Some folks call it Si-kee, and some Pi-sish. I like Pi-sish the best.”

THE QUESTION.

It is said that when a young lady enters society in one of our leading Eastern cities, the question invariably asked about her, by those who have not met her, is, in New York, “How much is she worth?” in Baltimore, “How does she look?” in Boston, “What does she know?” in Philadelphia, “_Who_ is she?”

ALLITERATION.

The best specimen of alliteration in the English language is, perhaps,

THE SIEGE OF BELGRADE.

An Austrian army, awfully arrayed,
Boldly, by battery, besieged Belgrade.
Cossack commanders cannonading come,
Dealing destruction’s devastating doom;
Every endeavor engineers essay,
For fame, for fortune, fighting, furious fray!
Generals ’gainst generals grapple--Gracious God!
How honors Heaven heroic hardihood!
Infuriate, indiscriminate, in ill,
Kinsmen kill kindred--kindred kinsmen kill.
Labor low levels longest, loftiest lines,--
Men march ’mid mounds, ’mid moles, ’mid murderous mines.
Now noisy, noxious, numbers notice naught
Of outward obstacles opposing ought;
Poor patriots! partly purchased, partly pressed,
Quite quaking, quickly “Quarter! Quarter!” quest.
Reason returns; religious right redounds,
Suwarrow stops such sanguinary sounds.
Truce to thee, Turkey! triumph to thy train,
Unjust, unwise, unmerciful, Ukraine!
Vanish, vain victory! Vanish, victory vain!
Why wish we warfare! Wherefore welcome were
Xerxes, Ximenes, Xanthus, Xavier!
Yield, yield, ye youths; ye yeomen yield your yell!
Zeno’s, Zarpater’s, Zoroaster’s zeal,
Attracting all, arms against arms appeal.

A droll example of French alliteration is the following inquiry as to the efficacy of a certain remedy:

“Ton thé, a-t-il oté ta toux?”

One of the neatest of ACROSTICS was written by Desmond Ryan, for the _London Musical World_:

Art and Genius burn within her,
Dearest fondling of the Graces!
Every charm is centered in her;
Like a poet’s page her face is!
In her voice the lark is thrilling--
Now to weep the heart is willing--
And now with joy and hope ’tis filling!

Praised, admired, two worlds all hail her--
Artless, pure, no tongues assail her!
Trust, love, triumph, never fail her!
Tell me, sooth, whose praise all that is?
I say, ADELINA PATTI’S!

But apropos of ingenuity, the author of the following exquisite poem seems, without half trying, to have distanced all competitors.

Many years ago, twenty-five or thirty, perhaps, two Cincinnati editors engaged in a newspaper controversy, which was, for a long time, conducted with all candor and courtesy. At length, however, one of them so far forgot himself as to become first personal, then scurrilous, then virulent; and the other, at an early stage of this radical change, quietly withdrew from the contest. Editor No. One thereupon indulged in loud pæans of victory: he had spiked his adversary’s guns, put him to rout, utterly demolished him. While he was in this complacent frame of mind, he received from an anonymous contributor a seasonable poem on SPRING, which he published with a eulogium on its beauty, and a warmly-expressed wish that he might often hear from its gifted author:

SPRING.

The genial Spring once more with chaplets crowned,
Has showered her choicest blessings all around.
Each silent valley, and each verdant lawn,
Enriched with flowers, looks smiling as the dawn;
Demure and modest here the violet grows,
In yonder garden blooms the blushing rose:
To these the lilac adds her fragrant dower
Of perfume cherished by the sun and shower:
Reviving Flora walks the world, a queen
Of kingdoms peerless as a fairy scene.
Far o’er the hills, in many a graceful line,
The rainbow blossoms of the orchard shine.
How softly mingled all their tints unite,
Embalm the air, and bless the grateful sight!
Sweet voices now are heard on every tree,
The breeze, the bird, the murmur of the bee;
And down the cliff, where rocks oppose in vain,
Runs the clear stream in music to the plain.
In noisy groups, far from their southern home,
Now ’round the lofty spire the swallows roam;
The fearless robin builds, with glossy leaves,
Her fragile nest beneath the farmer’s eaves;
Embowered in woods the partridge makes her bed
With silken moss o’er tender osiers spread:
Each happy bird expands his dappled wings,
Soars with his gentle mate and sweetly sings.
The sounds of early husbandry arise,
In pleasing murmurs, to the pale blue skies;
Shrill floats the ploughman’s whistle, while he speeds
Along the yielding earth his patient steeds.
Joyous the life which tills the pregnant soil,
And sweet the profits of the farmer’s toil:
Content, as smiling as an angel’s face,
Keeps peaceful vigil ’round his dwelling-place;
And gentle Hope, and Love, forever bright,
Smiling like seraphs in their bowers of light,
Salute his mornings, and embalm each night.

A few days passed, and this self-complacent gentleman had the satisfaction of reading in a Boston paper that the editor of _The Star in the West_ had fully justified the acrostic contained in a late beautiful poem on SPRING, by publishing and praising it in his paper.

EXTEMPORE SPEAKING.

It is no small thing to be called suddenly to address a public meeting of any sort, and to find all your wits gone wool-gathering, when you most require their services. Such being the case, and standing admitted, the following speech of a compulsory order, at the opening of a free hospital, is recommended as a model:

Gentlemen--ahem! I--I--I rise to say--that is, I wish to propose a toast--wish to propose a toast. Gentlemen, I think that you’ll all say--ahem--I think, at least, that this toast is, as you’ll all say, the toast of the evening--toast of the evening. Gentlemen, I belong to a good many of these things--and I say, gentlemen, that this hospital requires no patronage--at least, you don’t want any recommendation. You’ve only got to be ill--got to be ill. Another thing--they are all locked up--I mean they are all shut up separate--that is, they have all got separate beds--separate beds. Now, gentlemen, I find by the report (turning over the leaves in a fidgety manner), I find, gentlemen, that from the year seventeen--no, eighteen--no, ah, yes, I’m right,--eighteen hundred and fifty--no, it’s a three, thirty-six--eighteen hundred and thirty-six, no--less than one hundred and ninety-three millions--no--ah? (to a committee-man at his side), what? thank you!--thank you, yes--one hundred and ninety-three thousand, two hundred and thirty-one! Gentlemen, I beg to propose:

Success to this Institution!

* * * * *

If no selections from the writings of our modern humorists, Artemus Ward, P. V. Nasby, Mark Twain, and others, grace these pages, the omission arises partly from the difficulty of selecting and partly from the fact that these writings are only too well known for our purpose. While the compiler has, doubtless, brought her readers face to face with many of their old acquaintances, she naturally prefers not to introduce those whom they are certain to meet every day at their own tables. “There must be a line drawn somewhere.”

But there is a word to be said about K. N. Pepper, whose irresistibly droll papers were contributed to the _Knickerbocker Magazine_, early in the ’50’s. He was, in fact, pioneer in that region of illiterature, in which so many others, since he withdrew, have apparently settled for life. Artemus Ward learned from him (and never hesitated to give him credit for the original idea,) the trick of bad spelling, and caught many of his fantastic ways of thought. His Betsey Jane was Pepper’s Hannah Gane amplified,--but the twins, and the son who read the _Clipper_, and the daughter who delighted in the _Ledger_, were original Wards. (And what a guardian they had, in their hi-minded father!)

K. N. Pepper describes in the _Knickerbocker_, his first visit to New York. He arrived there on the twenty-fifth of November, and that anniversary suggested many solemn reflections. “I thinc,” he pensively remarks, “that I see the British evacuating of the sitty. I thinc I se them gathering up their goods and things. I thinc I hear them cuss, and then I thinc I doant.”

Very suddenly he retired from the field, leaving his laurels to be picked up and won by others, and presently disappeared from public view. But it is possible that Mr. James W. Morris, of Onondaga County, N. Y., could, if he chose, furnish some information concerning him.[4]

The Widow Bedott, too, was precursor and prototype of Miss Slimmins, Josiah Allen’s wife, and all of that ilk; and, among her imitators, has, thus far, had no equal. Her prose was a model of absurdity; but there are no words to characterize her poetry.

Listen, as she condoles with a widower, on his recent bereavement:

Sickness and afflictions is trials sent
By the will of a wise creation,
And always ought to be underwent
With fortitude and resignation.
Then mourn not for your pardner’s death,
But to forgit endevver,
For, sposen she hadn’t a died so soon,
She couldn’t a lived forever.

And when, at last, she secured a widower of her own, the Rev. Shadrack Sniffles, how jubilant her muse became:

The heart that was scornful and cold as a stun,
Has surrendered at last to the fortinit one.
Farewell to the miseries and griefs I have had!
I’ll never desert thee, O Shadrack, my Shad.

The wonderful puns and repartees of Charles Lamb and Sydney Smith, prince and king of wits! are open to the same objection as those alluded to above: they are only too familiar, already. But as that is equivalent to saying that they have charmed only too many people; turned too many sorrowful or wearied minds out of their ordinary channels; excited too much healthful and delightful laughter; we are, after all, not disposed to complain. Rather let us, Sancho-Panza-like, invoke a benison, first on Cervantes himself; then on the English Hood and Hook, and Moore and Sheridan and Lamb, on the three Smiths, Sydney and James and Horace; on Dickens, Thackeray and Jerrold, and Edmund Lear; on our own Irving, Derby, Whicher, Morris, Brown, the Clarkes; our Lowell, Saxe, Holmes, Strong; our Warner, Cozzens, Dodgson, Gilbert, Locke, Bret Harte; our Grail Hamilton, and our Phebe Carey; and on all the named and unnamed, known and unknown writers, through whom have come to us the exquisite sense of fun, the blessing of irrepressible mirth, and of hearty, wholesome, innocent, delicious laughter!

And if, despite our struggles, we are accused, as we shall be, and justly, of having told some more than twice-told tales, of quoting already hackneyed quotations charity will urge in our behalf (and, let us trust, not vainly), Burns’ pathetic plea, reminding the critics, that while

“What’s done they” easily “compute.
They know not what’s resisted.”

“SOUND AND” UNSOUND, “SIGNIFYING NOTHING.”

A young gentleman of Rochester, suspecting that the poetical enthusiasm of certain of his young lady acquaintances was not genuine; that they appreciated the musical jingle of verses, without in the least regarding the sentiment, laid a wager with one of his friends, that he could write a set of stanzas, which should not contain one grain of sense, and yet would be just as warmly applauded by those young ladies as the most eloquent poetry.

He won the wager. (But this occurred many years ago. There are no such young ladies in Rochester now).

See! the fragrant twilight whispers
O’er the orient western sky,
While Aurora’s verdant vespers
Tell her evening reign is nigh.

Now a louder ray of darkness,
Carols o’er the effulgent scene,
And the lurid light falls markless
On the horizon’s scattered screen.

Night is near, with all his horrors,
Sweetly swerving in his breast,
And the ear of fancy borrows
Morning mists to lull the west.

Ere he comes in all his splendor,
Hark! the milky way is seen,
Sighing like a maiden tender
In her bower of ruby green.

Such a scene, ah! who can list to,
And not saddened, silent, seek
To unveil the burning vista
Of Diana’s raven cheek?

Thus tremulous, and ever dear,
Robed in repellant rapture;
Our hours shall stay, swift as the year,
Illumed by Cupid’s capture!

And when hyenal joys are ours,
And memory soars above us,
Hope shall retrace for future years
The love of all who love us.

Something of the same character is the subjoined:

EVENING SONG.

Brightly blue the stars shine o’er us,
While the sinking sun ascends
To the wide spread waves before us,
And a pleasing softness lends.

Homeward now the aged plough-boys
Wing their way o’er hill and dale,
And the laughter-loving cow goes
Tripping lightly down the vale.

Gentle zephyrs’ ink-stained fingers
Point the hour-hand of the clock,
There the warbling sheep-fold lingers--
Save it from the cruel hawk!

Thus excoriate the hours,
Till the red volcano’s powers
Kindle on the hearth its fires:
Poets! dissipate your lyres!

* * * * *

In the following musical poem, the letter e does duty so well for all the other vowels, as to suggest the idea that our ordinary lavish use of them is a piece of extravagance!

When the September eves were new,
When fresh the western breezes blew,
When meek Selene, gem-besprent,
The dew her crested jewels lent;
We met, Belle, where the beeches grew,
When the September eves were new.

When the September eves were new,
Endless, meseemed, the sweets we knew!
Sweet fell the dew; sweet swept the breeze;
Sweet were the templed beechen trees;
The spell yet sweeter, tenderer grew,
When the September eves were new!

When the September eves were eld,
The templed beechen trees were felled;
Keen-edged the western breezes blew;
Crestless the meek Selene grew;
The fettered dew her jewels held,
When the September eves were eld.

When the September eves were eld,
Fled were the scenes we erst beheld--
Reft were the tender scenes we knew;--
The desert, where the beeches grew!
Yet, Belle, we sweeter secrets held,
Ere the September eves were eld!

* * * * *

The construction of the following verses, from which the letter s is omitted, shows that our language is not of necessity a succession of sibilant sounds, as it is generally supposed to be:

Oh! come to-night, for naught can charm
The weary time when thou’rt away.
Oh, come! the gentle moon hath thrown
O’er bower and hall her quivering ray.
The heather bell hath mildly flung
From off her fairy leaf the bright
And diamond dew-drop that had hung
Upon that leaf a gem of light.
Then come, love, come!

To-night the liquid wave hath not,
(Illumined by the moonlit beam
Playing upon the lake beneath,
Like frolic in a fairy dream--)
The liquid wave hath not, to-night,
In all her moonlit pride, a fair
Gift-like to them that, on thy lip,
Do breathe and laugh and home it there.
Then come, love, come!

To-night, to-night, my gentle one,
The flower-bearing Amra tree
Doth long, with fragrant moan, to meet
The love-lip of the honey-bee.
But not the Amra tree can long
To greet the bee, at evening light,
With half the deep, fond love _I_ long
To meet my Nama here to-night.
Then come, love, come!

What a boon would a volume of poems, modeled on the above principle of architecture, be to perthonth troubled with a lithp; whose reading at present (through the perverseness of the English language), sounds thus:

Thweetly murmurth the breethe from the thea,
Thoothing my thoul to thlumberth,
Fond memorieth bearing to me,
Of the patht, in endleth numberth.
I thigh ath I think how yearth have thped,
How joy hath left me to thorrow;
My heart now thleepeth the thleep of the dead;
Will it waken to gladneth to-morrow?

THE NIMBLE BANK-NOTE.

“And he rose with a sigh,
And he said, ‘Can this be?’”

(_Motto chosen chiefly for its inappropriateness._)

One evening at the house of a friend of mine, while we were seated at the table, Mr. Baker, my friend’s husband, absently feeling in his vest pocket, found a five dollar note which he had no recollection of putting there.

“Hallo!” he exclaimed, “that is no place for you. I should have put you in my pocketbook. Here, wife, don’t you want some ready money?” and he threw the note across the table to her.

“Many thanks,” she replied; “money is always acceptable, although I have no present need of it.” She folded the note and put it under the edge of the tea-tray, and then proceeded to pour out the tea and attend to the wants of her guests.

At her right sat Mrs. Easton, or Aunt Susan, whom we all knew as an acquaintance who, from time to time, spent a week with Mrs. Baker. Her visit was just at an end, and she was to return home that evening.

As Mrs. Baker was pouring her tea, it occurred to her that she was in her aunt’s debt for certain small matters, and when she had the opportunity, she pushed the note under her plate, saying:

“Here, auntie, take this five dollars in part payment of my debt.”

“Very well,” she replied, “but the money does not belong to me. I owe you fifteen dollars, my dear Grace, which you lent me last Saturday. I had to pay the taxes on my little home, and had not the ready money, and Grace lent it to me,” explained Aunt Susan.

Grace, an orphan, was a cousin of Mrs. Baker. She and her brother Frank boarded with her, and made a very pleasant addition to the family circle. She was studying music, and her brother was a clerk in a mercantile establishment.

As soon as Aunt Susan received the note, she handed it to Grace, saying:

“I will give you this now on account, and the rest as soon as I get it.”

“All right,” answered Grace, laughing, “and since we all seem in the humor of paying our debts, I will follow suit. Frank, I owe you something for music you bought me; here is part of it,” and she threw the bank-note across the table to her brother, who sat opposite.

We were all highly amused to see how the note wandered around the table.

“This is a wonderful note,” said Mr. Baker; “I only wish somebody owed me something, and I owed somebody something, so that I might come into the ring.”

“You can,” said Frank. “I owe Mrs. Baker--or you, it’s all the same--for my board; I herewith pay you part of it.”

Amid general laughter, Mr. Baker took the note and playfully threw it to his wife again, saying:

“It’s yours again, Lucy, because what belongs to me belongs to you. It has completed the round, and we have all had the benefit of it.”

“And now it must go around again,” replied she gayly. “I like to see money circulate; it should never lie idle. Aunt Susan you take it. Now I have paid you ten dollars.”

“Dear Grace, here is another five dollars on my account,” said Aunt Susan, handing it to Grace.

“And you Frank, have paid ten dollars for the music you bought me,” said Grace, handing it to her brother.

“And I pay you ten dollars for my board,” he continued, and the note once more rested in Mr. Baker’s hands.

The exchanges were quick as thought, and we were convulsed with laughter.

“Was there ever so wonderful an exchange?” exclaimed Grace.

“It’s all nonsense!” exclaimed Mr. Baker.

“Not in the least,” answered his wife. “It’s all quite right.”

“Certainly,” said Frank; “when the money belonged to you, you could dispose of it as you would; I have the same right; it is a fair kind of exchange, though very uncommon.”

“It shows the use of money,” said Aunt Susan. “It makes the circuit of the world and brings its value to every one who touches it.”

“And this note has not finished its work yet, as I will show you, my dear, if you will give it to me again, said Mrs. Baker to her husband.

“I present you with this five dollar note,” said Mr. Baker.

“And I give it to you, Aunt Susan--I owed you fifteen dollars, and I have paid my debt.”

“You have, my dear friend, without doubt; and now, my dear Grace, I pay you my indebtedness, with many thanks for your assistance.”

“I take it with thanks, Aunt Susan,” replied Grace; “and now the time has come when this wonder-working, this inexhaustibly rich bank-note must be divided, because I do not owe Frank five dollars more. How much have I to pay you?”

“Two dollars and sixty-two cents,” replied Frank.

“Can you change it?”

“Let me see; sixty-two, thirty-eight, yes, there is the change; the spell is broken, Grace, and you and I divide the spoils.”

“This bank-note beats all I ever saw. How much has it paid? Let us count up,” said Grace. “Mrs. Baker gave Aunt Susan fifteen dollars, which Aunt Susan gave me; I gave Frank twelve dollars and sixty-two cents; Frank gave Mr. Baker ten dollars--altogether fifty-two dollars and sixty-two cents.”

“It’s all nonsense, I tell you,” cried Mr. Baker, again; “you all owe each other what you owed before.”

“You are deceived, my dear, by the rapid, unbroken race this little sum has made; to me it is as clear as daylight,” replied Mrs. Baker.

“If it is all nonsense, how could the note which you gave Mrs. Baker, if nothing to me or to you, be divided between us two?” asked Grace.

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Puzzles and odditiesChapter VI: Part II: Fancy Titles for Books (2)

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