Chapter I: ADDRESS myself to all the friends of youth, and conjure them to direct (5)

The excellent St. Nicholas, finding they still persisted in their opposition to his rites and ceremonies, determined to inflict on them the last and worst punishment that can befall the sex. He decreed that they should be deprived of all the delights springing from the domestic affections, and all taste for the innocent and virtuous enjoyments of a happy fireside. Accordingly they lost all relish for home; they were continually gadding about from one place to another in search of pleasure, and worried themselves to death to find happiness where it is never to be found. Their whole lives became one long series of disappointed hopes, galled pride, and gnawing envy. They lost their health, they lost their time, and their days became days of harassing impatience, their nights nights of sleeplessness, feverish excitement, ending in weariness and disappointment. The good saint sometimes felt sorry for them, but their continued obstinacy determined him to persevere in his plan to punish the upstart pride of these rebellious females.

Young Shuttle, who had a soul, which I suppose he inherited from his mother, all this while continued his attentions to little Susan Varian, which added to the miseries inflicted on his wicked mother. Mrs. Shuttle insisted that Amos should threaten to disinherit his son, unless he gave up this attachment.

“Lord bless your soul, Abby!” said Amos. “What’s the use of my threatening; the boy knows as well as I do that I’ve no will of my own. Why, bless my soul, Abby——”

“Bless your soul!” interrupted Mrs. Shuttle; “I wonder who’d take the trouble to bless it but yourself? However, if you don’t I will.”

Accordingly she threatened the young man with being disinherited unless he turned his back on little Susan Varian, which no man ever did without getting a heartache.

“If my father goes on as he has done lately,” sighed the youth, “he won’t have anything left to disinherit me of but his affection, I fear. But if he had millions I would not abandon Susan.”

“Are you not ashamed of such a low-lived attachment? You that have been to Europe! But, once for all, remember this, renounce this low-born upstart, or quit your father’s house for ever.”

“Upstart!” thought young Shuttle; “one of the oldest families in the city.” He made his mother a respectful bow, bade Heaven bless her, and left the house. He was, however, met by his father at the door, who said to him—

“Johnny, I give my consent; but mind don’t tell your mother a word of the matter. I’ll let her know I’ve a soul as well as other people,” and he tossed his head like a war-horse.

The night after this Johnny was married to little Susan, and the blessing of affection and beauty lighted upon his pillow. Her old father, who was in a respectable business, took his son-in-law into partnership, and they prospered so well that in a few years Johnny was independent of all the world, with the prettiest wife and children in the land. But Mrs. Shuttle was inexorable, while the knowledge of his prosperity and happiness only worked her up to a higher pitch of anger, and added to the pangs of jealousy perpetually inflicted on her by the rivalry of Mrs. Hubblebubble and Mrs. Doubletrouble, who suffered under the like affliction from the wrathful St. Nicholas, who was resolved to make them an example to all posterity.

No fortune, be it ever so great, can stand the eternal sapping of wasteful extravagance, engendered and stimulated by the baleful passion of envy. In less than ten years from the hatching of the diabolical conspiracy of these three wicked women against the supremacy of the excellent St. Nicholas, their spendthrift rivalship had ruined the fortunes of their husbands, and entailed upon themselves misery and remorse. Rich Amos Shuttle became at last as poor as a church mouse, and would have been obliged to take to the loom again in his old age, had not Johnny, now rich, and a worshipful magistrate of the city, afforded him and his better half a generous shelter under his own happy roof. Mrs. Hubblebubble and Mrs. Doubletrouble had scarcely time to condole with Mrs. Shuttle, and congratulate each other, when their husbands went the way of all flesh—that is to say, failed for a few tens of thousands, and called their creditors together to hear the good news. The two wicked women lived long enough after this to repent of their offence against St. Nicholas; but they never imported any more French curtains, and at last perished miserably in an attempt to set the fashions in Pennypot Alley.

Mrs. Abigail Shuttle might have lived happily the rest of her life with her children and grand-children, who all treated her with reverent courtesy and affection, now that the wrath of mighty St. Nicholas was appeased by her exemplary punishment; but she could not get over her bad habits and feelings, or forgive her lovely daughter-in-law for treating her so kindly when she so little deserved it. She gradually pined away; and though she revived at hearing of the catastrophe of Mrs. Hubblebubble and Mrs. Doubletrouble, it was only for a moment. The remainder of the life of this wicked woman was a series of disappointments and heartburnings, and when she died, Amos tried to shed a few tears, but he found it impossible, I suppose, because, as his wife always said, “he had no soul.”

Such was the terrible revenge of St. Nicholas, which ought to be a warning to all who attempt to set themselves up against the venerable customs of their ancestors, and backslide from the hallowed institutions of the blessed saint, to whose good offices, without doubt, it is owing that this, his favourite city, has transcended all others of the universe in beautiful damsels, valorous young men, mince-pies, and New Year cookies. The catastrophe of these three wicked women had a wonderful influence in the city, insomuch that from this time forward no _grey mares_ were ever known, no French furniture was ever used, and no woman was hardy enough to set herself up in opposition to the good customs of St. Nicholas. And so wishing many happy New Years to all my dear countrywomen and countrymen, saving those who shut their doors to old friends, high or low, rich or poor, on that blessed anniversary which makes more glad hearts than all others put together,—I say, wishing a thousand happy New Years to all, with this single exception, I lay down my pen, with a caution to all wicked women to beware of the revenge of St. Nicholas.

DOMINIE NICHOLAS ÆGIDIUS OUDENARDE.
_James K. Paulding._

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_AN APHORISM AND A LECTURE._

ONE of the Boys mentioned, the other evening, in the course of a very pleasant poem he read us, a little trick of the Commons table-boarders, which I, nourished at the parental board, had never heard of. Young fellows being always hungry——Allow me to stop dead-short, in order to utter an aphorism which has been forming itself in one of the blank interior spaces of my intelligence, like a crystal in the cavity of a geode.

APHORISM BY THE PROFESSOR.

In order to know whether a human being is young or old, offer it food of different kinds at short intervals. If young, it will eat anything at any hour of the day or night. If old, it observes stated periods, and you might as well attempt to regulate the time of high-water to suit a fishing-party as to change these periods.

The crucial experiment is this. Offer a bulky and boggy bun to the suspected individual just ten minutes before dinner. If this is eagerly accepted and devoured, the fact of youth is established. If the subject of the question starts back and expresses surprise and incredulity, as if you could not possibly be in earnest, the fact of maturity is no less clear.

* * * * *

—Excuse me,—I return to my story of the Commonstable. Young fellows being always hungry, and tea and dry toast being the meagre fare of the evening meal, it was a trick of some of the Boys to impale a slice of meat upon a fork, at dinner-time, and stick the fork, holding it, beneath the table, so that they could get it at tea-time. The dragons that guarded this table of the Hesperides found out the trick at last, and kept a sharp look-out for missing forks;—they knew where to find one, if it was not in its place. Now the odd thing was that, after waiting so many years to hear of this College trick, I should hear it mentioned a _second time_ within the same twenty-four hours by a College youth of the present generation. Strange, but true. And so it has happened to me and to every person, often and often, to be hit in rapid succession by these twinned facts or thoughts, as if they were linked like chain-shot.

I was going to leave the simple reader to wonder over this, taking it as an unexplained marvel. I think, however, I will turn over a furrow of subsoil in it. The explanation is, of course, that in a great many thoughts there must be a few coincidences, and these instantly arrest our attention. Now we shall probably never have the least idea of the enormous number of impressions which pass through our consciousness, until in some future life we see the photographic record of our thoughts and the stereoscopic picture of our actions. There go more pieces to make up a conscious life or a living body than you think for. Why, some of you were surprised when a friend of mine told you there were fifty-eight separate pieces in a fiddle. How many “swimming glands”—solid, organised, regularly formed, rounded disks, taking an active part in all your vital processes, part and parcel, each one of them, of your corporeal being—do you suppose are whirled along like pebbles in a stream with the blood which warms your frame and colours your cheeks? A noted German physiologist spread out a minute drop of blood, under the microscope, in narrow streaks, and counted the globules, and then made a calculation. The counting by the micrometer took him a _week_. You have, my full-grown friend, of these little couriers in crimson or scarlet livery, running on your vital errands day and night as long as you live, sixty-five billions, five hundred and seventy thousand millions, errors excepted. Did I hear some gentleman say “Doubted”? I am the Professor; I sit in my chair with a petard under it that will blow me through the skylight of my lecture-room, if I do not know what I am talking about, and whom I am quoting.

Now, my dear friends, who are putting your hands to your foreheads and saying to yourselves that you feel a little confused, as if you had been waltzing until things began to whirl slightly round you, is it possible that you do not clearly apprehend the exact connection of all that I have been saying, and its bearing on what is now to come? Listen, then. The number of these living elements in our bodies illustrates the incalculable multitude of our thoughts; the number of our thoughts accounts for those frequent coincidences spoken of; these coincidences in the world of thought illustrate those which we constantly observe in the world of outward events, of which the presence of the young girl now at our table, and proving to be the daughter of an old acquaintance some of us may remember, is the special example which led me through this labyrinth of reflections, and finally lands me at the commencement of this young girl’s story, which, as I said, I have found the time and felt the interest to learn something of, and which I think I can tell without wronging the unconscious subject of my brief delineation.

A SHORT LECTURE ON PHRENOLOGY.

_Read to the Boarders at our Breakfast-Table._

I shall begin, my friends, with the definition of a _Pseudo-science_. A Pseudo-science consists of _a nomenclature_, with a self-adjusting arrangement, by which all positive evidence, or such as favours its doctrines, is admitted, and all negative evidence, or such as tells against it, is excluded. It is invariably connected with some lucrative practical application. Its professors and practitioners are usually shrewd people; they are very serious with the public, but wink and laugh a good deal among themselves. The believing multitude consists of women of both sexes, feeble-minded inquirers, poetical optimists, people who always get cheated in buying horses, philanthropists who insist on hurrying up the millennium, and others of this class, with here and there a clergyman, less frequently a lawyer, very rarely a physician, and almost never a horse-jockey or a member of the detective police.—I did not say that Phrenology was one of the Pseudo-sciences.

A Pseudo-science does not necessarily consist wholly of lies. It may contain many truths, and even valuable ones. The rottenest bank starts with a little specie. It puts out a thousand promises to pay on the strength of a single dollar, but the dollar is very commonly a good one. The practitioners of the Pseudo-sciences know that common minds, after they have been baited with a real fact or two, will jump at the merest rag of a lie, or even at the bare hook. When we have one fact found us, we are very apt to supply the next out of our own imagination. (How many persons can read Judges xv. 16 correctly the first time?) The Pseudo-sciences take advantage of this.—I did not say that it was so with Phrenology.

I have rarely met a sensible man who would not allow that there was _something_ in Phrenology. A broad, high forehead, it is commonly agreed, promises intellect; one that is “villainous low,” and has a huge hind-head back of it, is wont to mark an animal nature. I have as rarely met an unbiassed and sensible man who really believed in the bumps. It is observed, however, that persons with what the Phrenologists call “good heads” are more prone than others toward plenary belief in the doctrine.

It is so hard to prove a negative, that if a man should assert that the moon was in truth a green cheese, formed by the coagulable substance of the Milky Way, and challenge me to prove the contrary, I might be puzzled. But if he offer to sell me a ton of this lunar cheese, I call on him to prove the truth of the caseous nature of our satellite before I purchase.

It is not necessary to prove the falsity of the phrenological statement. It is only necessary to show that its truth is not proved, and cannot be, by the common course of argument. The walls of the head are double, with a great air-chamber between them, over the smallest and most closely crowded “organs.” Can you tell how much money there is in a safe, which also has thick double walls, by kneading its knobs with your fingers? So when a man fumbles about my forehead, and talks about the organs of _Individuality_, _Size_, etc., I trust him as much as I should if he felt of the outside of my strong-box and told me that there was a five-dollar or a ten-dollar bill under this or that particular rivet. Perhaps there is; _only he doesn’t know anything about it_. But this is a point that I, the Professor, understand, my friends, or ought to, certainly, better than you do. The next argument you will all appreciate.

I proceed, therefore, to explain the self-adjusting mechanism of Phrenology, which is _very similar_ to that of the Pseudo-sciences. An example will show it most conveniently.

A. is a notorious thief. Messrs. Bumpus and Crane examine him and find a good-sized organ of Acquisitiveness. Positive fact for Phrenology. Casts and drawings of A. are multiplied, and the bump _does not lose_ in the act of copying.—I did not say it gained.—What do you look so for? (to the boarders).

Presently B. turns up, a bigger thief than A. But B. has no bump at all over Acquisitiveness. Negative fact; goes against Phrenology.—Not a bit of it. Don’t you see how small Conscientiousness is? _That’s_ the reason B. stole.

And then comes C., ten times as much a thief as either A. or B.,—used to steal before he was weaned, and would pick one of his own pockets and put its contents in another, if he could find no other way of committing petty larceny. Unfortunately, C. has a _hollow_, instead of a bump, over Acquisitiveness. Ah! but just look and see what a bump of Alimentiveness! Did not C. buy nuts and gingerbread, when a boy, with the money he stole? Of course you see why he is a thief, and how his example confirms our noble science.

At last comes along a case which is apparently a _settler_, for there is a little brain with vast and varied powers,—a case like that of Byron, for instance. Then comes out the grand reserve-reason which covers everything and renders it simply impossible ever to corner a Phrenologist. “It is not the size alone, but the _quality_ of an organ, which determines its degree of power.”

Oh! oh! I see.—The argument may be briefly stated thus by the Phrenologist: “Heads I win, tails you lose.” Well, that’s convenient.

It must be confessed that Phrenology has a certain resemblance to the Pseudo-sciences.—I did not say it was a Pseudo-science.

I have often met persons who have been altogether struck up and amazed at the accuracy with which some wandering Professor of Phrenology had read their characters written upon their skulls. Of course the Professor acquires his information solely through his cranial inspections and manipulations.—What are you laughing at? (to the boarders).—But let us just _suppose_, for a moment, that a tolerably cunning fellow, who did not know or care anything about Phrenology, should open a shop and undertake to read off people’s characters at fifty cents or a dollar a-piece. Let us see how well he could get along without the “organs.” I will suppose myself to set up such a shop. I would invest one hundred dollars, more or less, in casts of brains, skulls, charts, and other matters that would make the most show for the money. That would do to begin with. I would then advertise myself as the celebrated Professor Brainey, or whatever name I might choose, and wait for my first customer. My first customer is a middle-aged man. I look at him,—ask him a question or two, so as to hear him talk. When I have got the hang of him, I ask him to sit down, and proceed to fumble his skull, dictating as follows:—

SCALE FROM 1 TO 10.

LIST OF FACULTIES FOR PRIVATE NOTES FOR MY PUPIL:
CUSTOMER. _Each to be accompanied with a wink._

_Amativeness_, 7. Most men love the conflicting sex, and
all men love to be told they do.

_Alimentiveness_, 8. Don’t you see that he has burst off his
lowest waistcoat-button with
feeding—hey?

_Acquisitiveness_, 8. Of course. A middle-aged Yankee.

_Approbativeness_, 7, + Hat well brushed. Hair ditto. Mark the
effect of that _plus_ sign.

_Self-esteem_, 6. His face shows that.

_Benevolence_, 9. That’ll please him.

_Conscientiousness_, 8½ That fraction looks first-rate.

_Mirthfulness_, 7 Has laughed twice since he came in.

_Ideality_, 9. That sounds well.

_Form, Size, Weight, 4 to 6. Average everything that can’t be
Colour_} guessed.
_Locality,
Eventuality_, }
_etc., etc._ }

And so of the other faculties.

Of course, you know, that isn’t the way the Phrenologists do. They go only by the bumps. What do you keep laughing so for? (to the boarders). I only said that is the way _I_ should practise “Phrenology” for a living.

_Oliver Wendell Holmes._

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_APHORISMS._

WE know but few men, a great many coats and breeches.

To be awake is to be alive. I have never yet met a man who was quite awake. How could I have looked him in the face?

I have found that no exertion of the legs can bring two minds much nearer to one another.

A man sits as many risks as he runs.

There are nowadays professors of philosophy, but not philosophers.

If you give money, spend yourself with it.

Sometimes we are inclined to class those who are once-and-a-half-witted with the half-witted, because we appreciate only a third part of their wit.

_Thoreau._

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_AN ENGLISH FUNERAL._

LONDON, _October 15, 1802_.

THE most humorous sight which I have seen was an English funeral, performed in the most fashionable manner; for you must know they _perform funerals_ here. An undertaker’s sign exhibits these words, “Funerals performed.” The first one which I saw was such a novelty, I followed it a short distance, not knowing what it was; and, as my manner is to question every one whom I think can give me any information (a Yankee custom), I asked an honest fellow “what the show was?” He seemed a little offended, but directly replied, “_You may know one day, if you do not come to the gallows._” This man, like Chatham, was “original and unaccommodating.” But, observing that I was surprised at his answer, and feeling, perhaps, a little mortified, he asked, “Do you live in London?” I told him I had just come. “Well, but people die, sometimes, in your town.” By this I discovered that the _performance_ was a funeral.

_William Austin._

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_A LOST CHILD._

YE CRYER.

_Here’s a reward for who’ll find Love!
Love is a-straying
Ever since Maying;
Hither and yon, below, above,
All are seeking Love!_

YE HAND-BILL.

_Gone astray_—between the Maying
And the gathering of the hay,
_Love_, an urchin ever playing—
Folk are warned against his play.

How may you know him? by the quiver,
By the bow he’s wont to bear.
First on your left there comes a shiver,
Then a twinge—the arrow’s there.

By his eye of pansy colour,
Deep as wounds he dealeth free;
If its hue have faded duller,
’Tis not that he weeps for me.

By the smile that curls his mouthlet;
By the mockery of his sigh;
By his breath, a spicy South, let
Slip his lips of roses by.

By the devil in his dimple;
By his lies that sound so true;
By his shaft-string, that no simple
Ever culled will heal for you.

By his beckonings that embolden;
By his quick withdrawings then;
By his flying hair, a golden
Light to lure the feet of men.

By the breast where ne’er a hurt’ll
Rankle ’neath his kerchief hid—
_What?_ you cry; _he wore a kirtle?_
Faith! methinks the rascal did!

_Here’s a reward for who’ll find Love!
Love is a-straying
Ever since Maying;
Hither and you, below, above,
I am seeking Love._

ye Finder pray’d
to Bring her to
Master Corydon,
_Petticoat Lane_.

CRYER: H. BUNNER,
GRUB STREET,
CRY’S WEDDINGS,
BURYINGS, LOFT
CHILDN, AND RIGHT
CHEAPLIE.
YE IID. KNOCKER.

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_AMONG THE SPIRITS._

MY naburs is mourn harf crazy on the new-fangled idear about Sperrets. Sperretooul Sircles is held nitely & 4 or 5 long hared fellers has settled here and gone into the sperret biznis excloosively. A atemt was made to git Mrs. A. Ward to embark into the Sperret biznis but the atemt faled. 1 of the long hared fellers told her she was a ethereal creeter & wood make a sweet mejium, whareupon she attact him with a mop handle & drove him out of the house. I will hear obsarve that Mrs. Ward is a invalerble womun—the partner of my goys & the shairer of my sorrers. In my absunce she watchis my interests & things with a Eagle Eye & when I return she welcums me in afectionate stile. Trooly it is with us as it was with Mr. & Mrs. INGOMER in the Play, to whit—

2 soles with but a single thawt
2 harts which beet as 1.

My naburs injooced me to attend a Sperretooul Sircle at Squire Smith’s. When I arrove I found the east room chock full includin all the old maids in the villige & the long hared fellers a4sed. When I went in I was salootid with “hear cums the benited man”—“hear cums the hory-heded unbeleever”—“hear cums the skoffer at trooth,” etsettery, etsettery.

Sez I, “my frens, it’s troo I’m hear, & now bring on your Sperrets”

1 of the long hared fellers riz up and sed he would state a few remarks. He sed man was a critter of intelleck & was movin on to a Gole. Sum men had bigger intellecks than other men had and thay wood git to the Gole the soonerest. Sum men was beests & wood never git into the Gole at all. He sed the Erth was materiel but man was immateriel, and hens man was different from the Erth. The Erth, continnered the speaker, resolves round on its own axeltree onct in 24 hours, but as man haint gut no axeltree he cant resolve. He sed the ethereal essunce of the koordinate branchis of superhuman natur becum mettymorfussed as man progrest in harmonial coexistunce & eventooally anty humanized theirselves & turned into reglar sperretuellers. [This was versifferusly applauded by the cumpany, and as I make it a pint to get along as pleasant as possible, I sung out “bully for you, old boy.”]

The cumpany then drew round the table and the Sircle kommenst to go it. Thay axed me if thare was anbody in the Sperret land which I wood like to convarse with. I sed if Bill Tompkins, who was onct my partner in the show biznis, was sober, I should like to convarse with him a few periods.

“Is the Sperret of William Tompkins present?” sed 1 of the long hared chaps, and there was three knox on the table.

Sez I, “William, how goze it, Old Sweetness?”

“Pretty ruff, old hoss,” he replide.

That was a pleasant way we had of addressin each other when he was in the flesh.

“Air you in the show biznis, William?” sed I.

He sed he was. He sed he & John Bunyan was travelin with a side show in connection with Shakspere, Jonson & Co.’s Circus. He sed old Bun (meaning Mr. Bunyan) stired up the animils & ground the organ while he tended door. Occashunally Mr. Bunyan sung a comic song. The Circus was doin middlin well. Bill Shakspeer had made a grate hit with old Bob Ridley, and Ben Jonson was delitin the peple with his trooly grate ax of hossmanship without saddul or bridal. Thay was rehersin Dixey’s Land & expected it would knock the peple.

Sez I, “William, my luvly frend, can you pay me that 13 dollars you owe me?” He sed no with one of the most tremenjis knox I ever experienced.

The Sircle sed he had gone. “Are you gone, William?” I axed. “Rayther,” he replide, and I knowd it was no use to pursoo the subjeck furder.

I then called for my farther.

“How’s things, daddy?”

“Middlin, my son, middlin.”

“Ain’t you proud of your orfurn boy?”

“Scacely.”

“Why not, my parient?”

“Becawz you hav gone to writin for the noospapers, my son. Bimeby you’ll lose all your character for trooth and verrasserty. When I helpt you into the show biznis I told you to dignerfy that there profeshun. Litteratoor is low.”

He also statid that he was doin middlin well in the peanut biznis & liked it putty well, tho’ the climit was rather warm.

When the Sircle stopt thay axed me what I thawt of it.

Sez I, “my friends I’ve bin into the show biznis now goin on 23 years. Theres a artikil in the Constitooshun of the United States which sez in effeck that everybody may think just as he darn pleases, & them is my sentiments to a hare. You dowtlis beleeve this Sperret doctrin while I think it is a little mixt. Just so soon as a man becums a reglar out & out Sperret rapper he leeves orf workin, lets his hare grow all over his fase & commensis spungin his livin out of other peple. He eats all the dickshunaries he can find & goze round chock full of big words, scarein the wimmin folks & little children & destroyin the peace of mind of evry famerlee he enters. He don’t do nobody no good & is a cuss to society & a pirit on honest peple’s corn beef barrils. Admittin all you say abowt the doctrin to be troo, I must say the reglar perfessional Sperret rappers—them as makes a biznis on it—air abowt the most ornery set of cusses I ever enkountered in my life. So sayin I put on my surtoot and went home.”

Respectably Yures,
ARTEMUS WARD.

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_POETRY AND THE POET._

[A SONNET.]

(_Found on the Poet’s desk._)

WEARY, I open wide the antique pane
I ope to the air
I ope to
I open to the air the antique pane
And gaze {beyond?} the thrift-sown field of wheat,
{ across } [commonplace?]
A-shimmering green in breezes born of heat;
And lo!
And high
And my soul’s eyes behold { a? } billowy main
{ the }
Whose farther shore is Greece strain
again
vain
[_Arcadia_—mythological allusion.—Mem.: _Lemprière_.]
I see thee, Atalanta, vestal fleet,
And look! with doves low-fluttering round her feet,
Comes Venus through the golden {fields of?} grain.
{ bowing }

(_Heard by the Poet’s neighbour._)

Venus be bothered—it’s Virginia Dix!

(_Found on the Poet’s door._)

_Out on important business—back at 6._

_H. C. Bunner._

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_A NEW SYSTEM OF ENGLISH GRAMMAR._