perplexed eloquence; who are the oracles of barber's committees strut about looking like wooden oracles; shops, market-places, and porter-houses; and who the puffers put on the airs of mighty consequence you may see every day at the corners of the streets, the slang-whangers deal out direful innuendoes, and taking honest men prisoners by the button, and talk-threats of doughty import; and all is buzz, murmur, ing their ribs quite bare without mercy and without suspense, and sublimity!

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people are running helter-skelter, they know not whither, and they know not why; the hackney coaches rattle through the streets with thundering vehemence, loaded with recruiting serjeants who have been prowling in cellars and caves, to unearth some miserable minion of poverty and ignorance, who will barter his vote for a glass of beer, or a ride in a coach with such fine gentlemen!—the buzzards of the party scamper from poll to poll, on foot or on horseback; and they worry from committee to committee, and buzz, and fume, and talk big, and-do nothing: like the vagabond drone, who wastes his time in the laborious idleness of see-saw-song, and busy nothingness."

end. These orators, in addressing an audience, At length the day arrives. The storm that has generally mount a chair, a table, or an empty beer been so long gathering, and threatening in distant barrel, which last is supposed to afford considerable thunders, bursts forth in terrible explosion: all busiinspiration, and thunder away their combustible sen-ness is at an end; the whole city is in a tumult; the timents at the heads of the audience, who are generally so busily employed in smoking, drinking, and hearing themselves talk, that they seldom hear a word of the matter. This, however, is of little moment; for as they come there to agree at all events to a certain set of resolutions, or articles of war, it is not at all necessary to hear the speech; more especially as few would understand it if they did. Do not suppose, however, that the minor persons of the meeting are entirely idle.-Besides smoking and drinking, which are generally practised, there are few who do not come with as great a desire to talk as the orator himself; each has his little circle of listeners, in the midst of whom he sets his hat on one side of his head, and deals out matter-of-fact information; and draws self-evident conclusions, with the pertinacity of a pedant, and to the great edification of his gaping auditors. Nay, the very urchins from the nursery, who are scarcely emancipated from the dominion of birch, on these occasions strut pigmy great men ;—bellow for the instruction of gray-bearded ignorance, and, like the frog in the fable, endeavour to puff themselves up to the size of the great object of their emulation-the principal

orator.'

I know not how long my friend would have continued his detail, had he not been interrupted by a squabble which took place between two old continentals, as they were called. It seems they had entered into an argument on the respective merits of their cause, and not being able to make each other clearly understood, resorted to what is called knock-down arguments, which form the superlative degree of argumentum ad hominem; but are, in my opinion, extremely inconsistent with the true spirit of a genuine logocracy. After they had beaten each other soundly, and set the whole mob together by the ears, they came to a full explanation; when it was discovered that they were both of the same way of thinking;-whereupon they shook each other heartily by the hand, and laughed with great glee at their humorous misunderstanding.

But is it not preposterous to a degree," cried I, "for those puny whipsters to attempt to lecture age and experience? They should be sent to school to learn better." "Not at all," replied my friend; "for as an election is nothing more than a war of words, the man that can wag his tongue with the greatest elasticity, whether he speaks to the purpose or not, I could not help being struck with the exceeding is entitled to lecture at ward meetings and polls, and great number of ragged, dirty-looking persons that instruct all who are inclined to listen to him: you swaggered about the place and seemed to think may have remarked a ward meeting of politic dogs, themselves the bashaws of the land. I inquired of where although the great dog is, ostensibly, the my friend, if these people were employed to drive leader, and makes the most noise, yet every little away the hogs, dogs, and other intruders that might scoundrel of a cur has something to say; and in thrust themselves in and interrupt the ceremony? proportion to his insignificance, fidgets, and worries," By no means," replied he; "these are the repreand puffs about mightily, in order to obtain the sentatives of the sovereign people, who come here to notice and approbation of his betters." Thus it is make governors, senators, and members of assembly, with these little, beardless, bread-and-butter poli- and are the source of all power and authority in this ticians who, on this occasion, escape from the juris- nation." "Preposterous!" said I, "how is it posdiction of their mammas to attend to the affairs of sible that such men can be capable of distinguishing the nation. You will see them engaged in dreadful between an honest man and a knave; or even if they wordy contest with old cartmen, cobblers, and tailors, were, will it not always happen that they are led by the and plume themselves not a little if they should nose by some intriguing demagogue, and made the chance to gain a victory.-Aspiring spirits! how in- mere tools of ambitious political jugglers? Surely teresting are the first dawnings of political greatness! it would be better to trust to providence, or even to an election, my friend, is a nursery or hot-bed of chance, for governors, than resort to the discrimigenius in a logocracy; and I look with enthusiasm nating powers of an ignorant mob.-I plainly peron a troop of these Lilliputian partizans, as so many ceive the consequence. A man who possesses chatterers, and orators, and puffers, and slang-superior talents, and that honest pride which ever whangers in embryo, who will one day take an important part in the quarrels, and wordy wars of their country.

accompanies this possession, will always be sacrificed to some creeping insect who will prostitute himself to familiarity with the lowest of mankind; "As the time for fighting the decisive battle ap- and, like the idolatrous Egyptian, worship the walproaches, appearances become more and more alarm-lowing tenants of filth and mire." ing; committees are appointed, who hold little encampments from whence they send out small detachments of tattlers, to reconnoitre, harass, and skirmish with the enemy, and if possible, ascertain their numbers; every body seems big with the mighty event that is impending; the orators they gradually swell up beyond their usual size; the little orators they grow greater and greater; the secretaries of the ward

"All this is true enough," replied my friend, "but after all, you cannot say but that this is a free country, and that the people can get drunk cheaper here, particularly at elections, than in the despotic countries of the east." I could not, with any degree of propriety or truth, deny this last assertion; for just at that moment a patriotic brewer arrived with a load of beer, which, for a moment, occasioned a cessation

of argument. The great crowd of buzzards, puff-raising ghosts, and not only raising them, but mak ers, and "old continentals of all parties, who ing them speak, was one of the miracles of electhrong to the polls, to persuade, to cheat, or to force tions. "And believe me," continued he, “there the freeholders into the right way, and to maintain is good reason for the ashes of departed heroes the freedom of suffrage, seemed for a moment to for- being disturbed on these occasions, for such is the get their antipathies and joined, heartily, in a copious sandy foundation of our government, that there Ebation of this patriotic and argumentative beverage. never happens an election of an alderman, or a colThese beer-barrels indeed seem to be most able lector, or even a constable, but we are in imminent logicians, well stored with that kind of sound argu- danger of losing our liberties, and becoming a provment, best suited to the comprehension, and most ince of France, or tributary to the British islands." relished by the mob, or sovereign people; who are By the hump of Mahomet's camel," said I, "but never so tractable as when operated upon by this this is only another striking example of the prodig convincing liquor, which, in fact, seems to be imbued ious great scale on which every thing is transacted with the very spirit of a logocracy. No sooner does in this country!" it begin its operation, than the tongue waxes exceeding valorous, and becomes impatient for some mighty conflict. The puffer puts himself at the head of his body-guard of buzzards, and his legion of ragamuffins, and wo then to every unhappy adversary who is uninspired by the deity of the beerbarrel he is sure to be talked and argued into complete insignificance.

By this time I had become tired of the scene; my head ached with the uproar of voices, mingling in all the discordant tones of triumphant exclamation, nonsensical argument, intemperate reproach, and drunken absurdity.-The confusion was such as no language can adequately describe, and it seemed as if all the restraints of decency, and all the bands of law, had been broken and given place While I was making these observations, I was sur-to the wide ravages of licentious brutality. These, prised to observe a bashaw, high in office, shaking a fellow by the hand, that looked rather more ragged than a scare-crow, and inquiring with apparent solicitude concerning the health of his family; after which he slipped a little folded paper into his hand and turned away. I could not help applauding his humility in shaking the fellow's hand, and his benevolence in relieving his distresses, for I imagined the paper contained something for the poor man's necessities; and truly he seemed verging towards the last stage of starvation. My friend, however, soon undeceived me by saying that this was an elector, and that the bashaw had merely given him the list of candidates for whom he was to vote. "Ho! ho!" said I, "then he is a particular friend of the bashaw?' By no means," replied my friend, "the bashaw will pass him without notice, the day after the election, except, perhaps, just to drive over him with his coach.

My friend then proceeded to inform me that for some time before, and during the continuance of an election, there was a most delectable courtship, or intrigue, carried on between the great bashaws and mother mob. That mother mob generally preferred the attentions of the rabble, or of fellows of her own stamp; but would sometimes condescend to be treated to a feasting, or any thing of that kind, at the bashaw's expense; nay, sometimes when she was in good humour, she would condescend to toy with them in her rough way;-but wo be to the bashaw who attempted to be familiar with her, for she was the most pestilent, cross, crabbed, scolding, thieving, scratching, toping, wrongheaded, rebellious, and abominable termagant that ever was let loose in the world, to the confusion of honest gentlemen bashaws.

Just then a fellow came round and distributed among the crowd a number of hand-bills, written by the ghost of Washington, the fame of whose illustrious actions, and still more illustrious virtues, has reached even the remotest regions of the east, and who is venerated by this people as the Father of his country. On reading this paltry paper, I could not restrain my indignation. Insulted hero," cried I, "is it thus thy name is profaned, thy memory disgraced, thy spirit drawn down from heaven to administer to the brutal violence of party rage-It is thus the necromancers of the east, by their infernal incantations, sometimes call up the shades of the just, to give their sanction to frauds, to lies, and to every species of enormity." My friend smiled at my warmth, and observed, that

thought I, are the orgies of liberty! these are the manifestations of the spirit of independence! these are the symbols of man's sovereignty! Head of Mahomet! with what a fatal and inexorable despotism do empty names and ideal phantoms exercise their dominion over the human mind! The experience of ages has demonstrated, that in all nations, barbarous or enlightened, the mass of the people, the mob, must be slaves, or they will be tyrants; but their tyranny will not be long-some ambitious leader, having at first condescended to be their slave, will at length become their master; and in proportion to the vileness of his former servitude, will be the severity of his subsequent tyranny. Yet, with innumerable examples staring them in the face, the people still bawl out liberty; by which they mean nothing but freedom from every species of legal restraint, and a warrant for all kinds of licentiousness: and the bashaws and leaders, in courting the mob, convince them of their power; and by administering to their passions, for the purposes of ambition, at length learn, by fatal experience, that he who worships the beast that carries him on its back, will sooner or later be thrown into the dust and trampled under foot by the animal who has learnt the secret of its power by this very adoration.

Ever thine,

MUSTAPHA.

FROM MY ELBOW-CHAIR.
MINE UNCLE JOHN.

To those whose habits of abstraction may have let them into some of the secrets of their own minds, and whose freedom from daily toil has left them at leisure to analyze their feelings, it will be nothing new to say that the present is peculiarly the season of remembrance. The flowers, the zephyrs, and the warblers of spring, returning after their tedious absence, bring naturally to our recollection past times and buried feelings; and the whispers of the full-foliaged grove, fall on the ear of contemplation, like the sweet tones of far distant friends whom the rude jostles of the world have severed from us and cast far beyond our reach. It is at such times, that casting backward many a lingering look we recall, with a kind of sweet-souled melancholy,

the days of our youth, and the jocund companions | go before the horse, and his Eclipse colt, he was who started with us the race of life, but parted mid- pleased to return home to dinner. way in the journey to pursue some winding path that allured them with a prospect more seducing and never returned to us again. It is then, too, if we have been afflicted with any heavy sorrow, if we have even lost-and who has not !-an old friend, or chosen companion, that his shade will hover around us; the memory of his virtues press on the heart; and a thousand endearing recollections, forgotten amidst the cold pleasures and midnight dissipations of winter, arise to our remembrance.

These speculations bring to my mind MY UNCLE JOHN, the history of whose loves, and disappointments, I have promised to the world. Though I must own myself much addicted to forgetting my promises, yet, as I have been so happily reminded of this, I believe I must pay it at once, "and there is an end." Lest my readers-good-natured souls that they are!-should, in the ardour of peeping into millstones, take my uncle for an old acquaintance, I here inform them, that the old gentleman died a great many years ago, and it is impossible they should ever have known him:-I pity them -for they would have known a good-natured, benevolent man, whose example might have been of service.

The last time I saw my uncle John was fifteen years ago, when I paid him a visit at his old mansion. I found him reading a newspaper-for it was election time, and he was always a warm federalist, and had made several converts to the true political faith in his time;-particularly one old tenant, who always, just before the election, became a violent anti;- -in order that he might be convinced of his errors by my uncle, who never failed to reward his conviction by some substantial

benefit.

After we had settled the affairs of the nation, and I had paid my respects to the old family chronicles in the kitchen,-an indispensable ceremony, -the old gentleman exclaimed, with heart-felt glee, "Well, I suppose you are for a trout-fishing; I have got every thing prepared ;-but first you must take a walk with me to see my improvements." I was obliged to consent; though I knew my uncle would lead me a most villainous dance, and in all probability treat me to a quagmire, or a tumble into a ditch. If my readers choose to accompany me in this expedition, they are welcome; if not, let them stay at home like lazy fellows-and sleep or be hanged.

After dinner and returning thanks,-which with him was not a ceremony merely, but an offering from the heart,-my uncle opened his trunk, took out his fishing-tackle, and, without saying a word, sallied forth with some of those truly alarming steps which Daddy Neptune once took when he was in a great hurry to attend to the affair of the siege of Troy. Trout-fishing was my uncle's favourite sport; and, though I always caught two fish to his one, he never would acknowledge my superiority; but puzzled himself often and often to account for such a singular phenomenon.

Following the current of the brook for a mile or two, we retraced many of our old haunts, and told a hundred adventures which had befallen us at different times. It was like snatching the hour-glass of time, inverting it, and rolling back again the sands that had marked the lapse of years. At length the shadows began to lengthen, the south-wind gradually settled into a perfect calm, the sun threw his rays through the trees on the hill-tops in golden lustre, and a kind of Sabbath stillness pervaded the whole valley, indicating that the hour was fast ap proaching which was to relieve for a while the farmer from his rural labour, the ox from his toil, the school-urchin from his primer, and bring the loving ploughman home to the feet of his blooming dairymaid.

As we were watching in silence the last rays of the sun, beaming their farewell radiance on the high hills at a distance, my uncle exclaimed, in a kind of half-desponding tone, while he rested his arm over an old tree that had fallen-"I know not how it is, my dear Launce, but such an evening, and such a still quiet scene as this, always make me a little sad; and it is, at such a time, I am most apt to look forward with regret to the period when this farm, on which I have been young, but now am old,' and every object around me that is endeared by long acquaintance,-when all these and I must shake hands and part. I have no fear of death, for my life has afforded but little temptation to wickedness; and when I die, I hope to leave behind me more substantial proofs of virtue than will be found in my epitaph, and more lasting memorials than churches built or hospitals endowed; with wealth wrung from the hard hand of poverty by an unfeeling landlord or unprincipled knave;-but still, when I pass such a day as this and contemplate such a scene, I cannot help feeling a latent wish to linger yet a little longer in Though I had been absent several years, yet this peaceful asylum; to enjoy a little more sunshine there was very little alteration in the scenery, and in this world, and to have a few more fishingevery object retained the same features it bore matches with my boy." As he ended he raised his when I was a school-boy: for it was in this spot hand a little from the fallen tree, and dropping it that I grew up in the fear of ghosts, and in the languidly by his side, turned himself towards home. breaking of many of the ten commandments. The The sentiment, the look, the action, all seemed to be brook, or river as they would call it in Europe, still | prophetic. And so they were, for when I shook him murmured with its wonted sweetness through the by the hand and bade him farewell the next morning meadow; and its banks were still tufted with dwarf-it was for the last time! willows, that bent down to the surface. The same He died a bachelor, at the age of sixty-three, echo inhabited the valley, and the same tender air of repose pervaded the whole scene. Even my good uncle was but little altered, except that his hair was grown a little grayer, and his forehead had lost some of its former smoothness. He had, however, lost nothing of his former activity, and laughed heartily at the difficulty I found in keeping up with him as he stumped through bushes, and briers, and hedges; talking all the time about his improvements, and telling what he would do with such spot of ground and such a tree. At length, after showing me his stone fences, his famous twoyear-old bull, his new invented cart, which was to

though he had been all his life trying to get married; and always thought himself on the point of accomplishing his wishes. His disappointments were not owing either to the deformity of his mind or person; for in his youth he was reckoned handsome, and I myself can witness for him that he had as kind a heart as ever was fashioned by heaven; neither were they owing to his poverty,-which sometimes stands in an honest man's way;-for he was born to the inheritance of a small estate which was sufficient to establish his claim to the title of "one well-to-do in the world." The truth is, my uncle had a prodig. ious antipathy to doing things in a hurry.-. “A man

best parlour, as an honest tradesman does his certifi cate of admission into that enlightened body yclept the Mechanic Society.

should consider," said he to me once-"that he can always get a wife, but cannot always get rid of her. For my part," continued he, "I am a young fellow, with the world before me," he was but about forty! -“and am resolved to look sharp, weigh matters well, and know what's what, before I marry:-in short, Launce, I don't intend to do the thing in a hurry, depend upon it." On this whim-wham, he proceeded: he began with young girls, and ended with widows. The girls he courted until they grew old maids, or married out of pure apprehension of incurring certain penalties hereafter; and the widows not having quite as much patience, generally, at the end of a year, while the good man thought himself in the high road to success, married some harum-to such proofs of attachment, and accordingly rescarum young fellow, who had not such an antipathy to doing things in a hurry.

With this accomplished young lady then did my uncle John become deeply enamoured, and as it was his first love, he determined to bestir himself in an extraordinary manner. Once at least in a fortnight, and generally on a Sunday evening, he would put on his leather breeches, for he was a great beau, mount his gray horse Pepper, and ride over to see his Miss Pamela, though she lived upwards of a mile off, and he was obliged to pass close by a church-yard, which at least a hundred creditable persons would swear was haunted!-Miss Pamela could not be insensible ceived him with considerable kindness; her mother always left the room when he came, and my uncle had as good as made a declaration by saying one evening, very significantly, "that he believed that he should soon change his condition;" when, some how or other, he began to think he was doing things in too great a hurry, and that it was high time to consider; so he considered near a month about it, and there is no saying how much longer he might have spun the thread of his doubts had he not been roused from this state of indecision by the news that his mistress had married an attorney's apprentice who she had seen the Sunday before at church; where he My uncle had been told by a prodigious number had excited the applause of the whole congregation of married men, and had read in an innumerable by the invincible gravity with which he listened to a quantity of books, that a man could not possibly be Dutch sermon. The young people in the neighbourhappy except in the married state; so he determined hood laughed a good deal at my uncle on the occaat an early age to marry, that he might not lose his sion, but he only shrugged his shoulders, looked only chance for happiness. He accordingly forth-nysterious, and replied, “Tut, boys! I might have with paid his addresses to the daughter of a neigh- | had her." bouring gentleman farmer, who was reckoned the beauty of the whole world; a phrase by which the honest country people mean nothing more than the circle of their acquaintance, or that territory of land which is within sight of the smoke of their own hamlet.

My uncle would have inevitably sunk under these repeated disappointments-for he did not want sensibility-had he not hit upon a discovery which set all to rights at once. He consoled his vanity,-for he was a little vain, and soothed his pride, which was his master-passion,-by telling his friends very significantly, while his eye would flash triumph, "that he might have had her."-Those who know how much of the bitterness of disappointed affection arises from wounded vanity and exasperated pride, will give my uncle credit for this discovery.

NOTE BY WILLIAM WIZARD, ESQ.

Our publisher, who is busily engaged in printing a celebrated work, which is perhaps more generally read in this city than any other book, not excepting the Bible;-I mean the New-York Directory-has begged so hard that we will not overwhelm him with too much of a good thing, that we have, with Langstaff's approbation, cut short the residue of uncle John's amours. whenever Launcelot is in the humour for it--he is such In all probability it will be given in a future number, an odd-but, mum-for fear of another suspension.

No. XII-SATURDAY, JUNE 27, 1807.

FROM MY ELBOW-CHAIR.

This young lady, in addition to her beauty, was highly accomplished, for she had spent five or six months at a boarding-school in town; where she learned to work pictures in satin, and paint sheep that might be mistaken for wolves; to hold up her head, set straight in her chair, and to think every species of useful acquirement beneath her attention. When she returned home, so completely had she forgotten every thing she knew before, that on seeing one of the maids milking a cow, she asked her father, with an air of most enchanting ignorance, "what that odd-looking thing was doing to that queer animal?” The old man shook his head at this; but the mother was delighted at these symptoms of gentility, and so enamoured of her daughter's accomplishments that she actually got framed a picture worked in satin by the young lady. It repre- SOME men delight in the study of plants, in the sented the Tomb Scene in Romeo and Juliet. Ro- dissection of a leaf, or the contour and complexion meo was dressed in an orange-coloured cloak, fas- of a tulip ;-others are charmed with the beauties of tened round his neck with a large golden clasp; a the feathered race, or the varied hues of the insect white satin, tamboured waistcoat, leather breeches, tribe. A naturalist will spend hours in the fatiguing blue silk stockings, and white topt boots. The ami- pursuit of a butterfly, and a man of the ton will waste able Juliet shone in a flame-coloured gown, most whole years in the chase of a fine lady. I feel a regorgeously bespangled with silver stars, a high-spect for their avocations, for my own are somewhat crowned muslin cap that reached to the top of the similar. I love to open the great volume of human tomb;-on her feet she wore a pair of short-quar- character:--to me the examination of a beau is tered, high-heeled shoes, and her waist was the ex- more interesting than that of a Daffodil or Narcissus; act fac-simile of an inverted sugarloaf. The head and I feel a thousand times more pleasure in catchof the "noble county Paris" looked like a chimney-ing a new view of human nature, than in k.dnapping sweeper's brush that had lost its handle; and the the most gorgeous butterfly,-even an Emperor of cloak of the good Friar hung about him as grace- Morocco himself! fully as the armour of a rhinoceros. The good lady considered this picture as a splendid proof of her daughter's accomplishments, and hung it up in the

In my present situation I have ample room for the indulgence of this taste; for, perhaps, there is not a house in this city more fertile in subjects for the

anatomist of human character, than my cousin Cock-been splashed half a dozen times by the carriages loft's. Honest Christopher, as I have before men- of nobility, and had once the superlative felicity of tioned, is one of those hearty old cavaliers who pride being kicked out of doors by the footman of a themselves upon keeping up the good, honest, un-noble Duke; he could, therefore, talk of nobility and ceremonious hospitality of old times. He is never so despise the untitled plebeians of America. In short, happy as when he has drawn about him a knot of Straddle was one of those dapper, bustling, florid, sterling-hearted associates, and sits at the head of round, self-important "gemmen" who bounce upon his table dispensing a warm, cheering welcome to us half beau, half button-maker; undertake to give all. His countenance expands at every glass and us the true polish of the bon-ton, and endeavour to beams forth emanations of hilarity, benevolence, and inspire us with a proper and dignified contempt of good fellowship, that inspire and gladden every guest our native country. around him. It is no wonder, therefore, that such Straddle was quite in raptures when his employers excellent social qualities should attract a host of determined to send him to America as an agent. friends and guests; in fact, my cousin is almost over- He considered himself as going among a nation of whelmed with them; and they all, uniformly, pro-barbarians, where he would be received as a prodigy; nounce old Cockloft to be one of the finest fellows in he anticipated, with a proud satisfaction, the bustle the world. His wine also always comes in for a and confusion his arrival would occasion; the crowd good share of their approbation; nor do they forget that would throng to gaze at him as he passed to do honour to Mrs. Cockloft's cookery, pronouncing through the streets; and had little doubt but that he it to be modelled after the most approved recipes of should occasion as much curiosity as an IndianHeliogabulus and Mrs. Glasse. The variety of com- chief or a Turk in the streets of Birmingham. He pany thus attracted is particularly pleasing to me had heard of the beauty of our women, and chuckled for, being considered a privileged person in the at the thought of how completely he should eclipse family, I can sit in a corner, indulge in my favour- their unpolished beaux, and the number of despairing ite amusement of observation, and retreat to my lovers that would mourn the hour of his arrival. I elbow-chair, like a bee to his hive, whenever I have am even informed by Will Wizard that he put good collected sufficient food for meditation. store of beads, spike-nails, and looking-glasses in his trunk to win the affections of the fair ones as they paddled about in their bark canoes;-the reason Will gave for this error of Straddle's, respecting our ladies, was, that he had read in Guthrie's Geography that the aborigines of America were all savages; and not exactly understanding the word aborigines, he applied to one of his fellow apprentices, who assured him that it was the Latin word for inhabitants.

Will Wizard is particularly efficient in adding to the stock of originals which frequent our house; for he is one of the most inveterate hunters of oddities I ever knew; and his first care, on making a new acquaintance, is to gallant him to old Cockloft's, where he never fails to receive the freedom of the house in a pinch from his gold box. Will has, without exception, the queerest, most eccentric, and indescribable set of intimates that ever man possessed; how he became acquainted with them I cannot conceive, except by supposing there is a secret attraction or unintelligible sympathy that unconsciously draws together oddities of every soil.

Wizard used to tell another anecdote of Straddle, which always put him in a passion; Will swore that the captain of the ship told him, that when Straddle heard they were off the banks of NewfoundWill's great crony for some time was TOM STRAD- land, he insisted upon going on shore there to gather DLE, to whom he really took a great liking. Strad- some good cabbages, of which he was excessively dle had just arrived in an importation of hardware, fond; Straddle, however, denied all this, and defresh from the city of Birmingham, or rather, as the clared it to be a mischievous quiz of Will Wizard : most learned English would call it, Brummagem, so who indeed often made himself merry at his expense. famous for its manufactories of gimblets, pen-knives, However this may be, certain it is, he kept his tailor and pepper-boxes; and where they make buttons and and shoe-maker constantly employed for a month beaux enough to inundate our whole country. He before his departure; equipped himself with a smart was a young man of considerable standing in the crooked stick about eighteen inches long, a pair of manufactory at Birmingham, sometimes had the breeches of most unheard-of length, a little short honour to hand his master's daughter into a tim- pair of Hoby's white-topped boots, that seemed to whiskey, was the oracle of the tavern he frequented stand on tip-toe to reach his breeches, and his hat on Sundays, and could beat all his associates, if you had the true trans-atlantic declination towards his would take his word for it, in boxing, beer-drinking, right ear. The fact was, nor did he make any secret jumping over chairs, and imitating cats in a gutter of it-he was determined to “astonish the natives a and opera singers. Straddle was, moreover, a mem-few!"

ber of a Catch-club, and was a great hand at ringing Straddle was not a little disappointed on his arbob-majors; he was, of course, a complete connois- rival, to find the Americans were rather more civilseur of music, and entitled to assume that characterized than he had imagined;-he was suffered to at all performances in the art. He was likewise a member of a Spouting-club, had seen a company of strolling actors perform in a barn, and had even, like Abel Drugger, "enacted " the part of Major Sturgeon with considerable applause; he was consequently a profound critic, and fully authorized to turn up his nose at any American performances. He had twice partaken of annual dinners, given to the head manufacturers of Birmingham, where he had the good fortune to get a taste of turtle and turbot; and a smack of Champaign and Burgundy; and he had heard a vast deal of the roast beef of Old England ;| he was therefore epicure sufficient to d—n every dish, and every glass of wine, he tasted in America; though at the same time he was as voracious an animal as ever crossed the Atlantic. Straddle had

walk to his lodgings unmolested by a crowd, and even unnoticed by a single individual;-no loveletters came pouring in upon him; no rivals lay in wait to assassinate him; his very dress excited no attention, for there were many fools dressed equally ridiculously with himself. This was mortifying indeed to an aspiring youth, who had come out with the idea of astonishing and captivating. He was equally unfortunate in his pretensions to the character of critic, connoisseur, and boxer; he condemned our whole dramatic corps, and every thing appertaining to the theatre; but his critical abilities were ridiculed-he found fault with old Cockloft's dinner, not even sparing his wine, and was never invited to the house afterwards;-he scoured the streets at night, and was cudgelled by a sturdy