Copyright 1880 by POLLARD & MOSS.

"Well sirt what do they say of me in England ?"

Salmagundi p.234

ernment more evident, than in its grand national | government. In case of any domestic grievance, divan, or congress, where the laws are framed: this or an insult from a foreign foe, the people are all is a blustering, windy assembly, where every thing in a buzz;-town-meetings are immediately held is carried by noise, tumult and debate; for thou must where the quidnuncs of the city repair, each like know, that the members of this assembly do not an atlas, with the cares of the whole nation upon meet together to find wisdom in the multitude of his shoulders, each resolutely bent upon saving his counsellors, but to wrangle, call each other hard country, and each swelling and strutting like a names, and hear themselves talk. When the con- turkey-cock; puffed up with words, and wind, and gress opens, the bashaw first sends them a long nonsense. After bustling, and buzzing, and bawlmessage, i. e., a huge mass of words-vox et preterea ing for some time; and after each man has shown nihil, all meaning nothing; because it only tells them himself to be indubitably the greatest personage what they perfectly know already. Then the whole in the meeting, they pass a string of resolutions, assembly are thrown into a ferment, and have a long i. e. words, which were previously prepared for the talk about the quantity of words that are to be re- purpose; these resolutions are whimsically denomiturned in answer to this message; and here arises nated the sense of the meeting, and are sent off many disputes about the correction and alteration for the instruction of the reigning bashaw, who reof "if so be's," and "how so ever's." A month, ceives them graciously, puts them into his red perhaps, is spent in thus determining the precise breeches pocket, forgets to read them-and so the number of words the answer shall contain; and then matter ends. another, most probably, in concluding whether it As to his highness, the present bashaw, who is shall be carried to the bashaw on foot, on horseback, at the very top of the logocracy, never was a digor in coaches. Having settled this weighty matter, nitary better qualified for his station. He is a man they next fall to work upon the message itself, and of superlative ventosity, and comparable to nothing hold as much chattering over it as so many magpies but a huge bladder of wind. He talks of vanover an addled egg. This done they divide the mes- quishing all opposition by the force of reason and sage into small portions, and deliver them into the philosophy: throws his gauntlet at all the nations hands of little juntoes of talkers, called committees: of the earth, and defies them to meet him-on the these juntoes have each a world of talking about their field of argument!-is the national dignity insulted, respective paragraphs, and return the results to the a case in which his highness of Tripoli would imgrand divan, which forthwith falls to and retalks the mediately call forth his forces;- -the bashaw of matter over more earnestly than ever. Now, after America-utters a speech. Does a foreign invaall, it is an even chance that the subject of this pro-der molest the commerce in the very mouth of the digious arguing, quarrelling, and talking, is an affair harbours; an insult which would induce his highof no importance, and ends entirely in smoke. May ness of Tripoli to order out his fleets;-his highit not then be said, the whole nation have been talk-ness of America-utters a speech. Are the free ing to no purpose? The people, in fact, seem to be somewhat conscious of this propensity to talk, by which they are characterized, and have a favourite proverb on the subject, viz.: "all talk and no cider;" this is particularly applied when their congress, or assembly of all the sage chatterers of the nation, have chattered through a whole session, in a time of great peril and momentous event, and have done nothing but exhibit the length of their tongues and the emptiness of their heads. This has been the case more than once, my friend; and to let thee into a secret, I have been told in confidence, that there have been absolutely several old women smuggled into congress from different parts of the empire; who, having once got on the breeches, as thou mayest well imagine, have taken the lead in debate, and overwhelmed the whole assembly with their garrulity; for my part, as times go, I do not see why old women should not be as eligible to public councils as old men who possess their dispositions;-they certainly are eminently possessed of the qualifications requisite to govern in a logocracy.

Nothing, as I have repeatedly insisted, can be done in this country without talking; but they take so long to talk over a measure, that by the time they have determined upon adopting it, the period has elapsed which was proper for carrying it into effect. Unhappy nation!-thus torn to pieces by intestine talks! never, I fear, will it be restored to tranquillity and silence. Words are but breath; breath is but air; and air put into motion is nothing but wind. This vast empire, therefore, may be compared to nothing more nor less than a mighty windmill, and the orators, and the chatterers, and the slang-whangers, are the breezes that put it in motion; unluckily, however, they are apt to blow different ways, and their blasts counteracting each other-the mill is perplexed, the wheels stand still, the grist is unground, and the miller and his family starved.

Every thing partakes of the windy nature of the

citizens of America dragged from on board the vessels of their country, and forcibly detained in the war ships of another power- -his highness-utters a speech. Is a peaceable citizen killed by the marauders of a foreign power, on the very shores of his country- -his highness utters a speech.Does an alarming insurrection break out in a distant part of the empire his highness utters a speech!-nay, more, for here he shows his “energies;"-he most intrepidly despatches a courier on horseback and orders him to ride one hundred and twenty miles a day, with a most formidable army of proclamations, i. e. a collection of words, packed up in his saddle bags. He is instructed to show no favour nor affection; but to charge the thickest ranks of the enemy; and to speechify and batter by words the conspiracy and the conspirators out of existence. Heavens, my friend, what a deal of blustering is here! it reminds me of a dunghill cock in a farm-yard, who, having accidentally in his scratchings found a worm, immediately begins a most vociferous cackling;-calls around him his hen-hearted companions, who run chattering from all quarters to gobble up the poor little worm that happened to turn under his eye. Oh, Asem! Asem! on what a prodigious great scale is every thing in this country!

Thus, then, I conclude my observations. The infidel nations have each a separate characteristic trait, by which they may be distinguished from each other:-the Spaniards, for instance, may be said to sleep upon every affair of importance ;-the Italians to fiddle upon every thing;-the French to dance upon every thing;-the Germans to smoke upon every thing;-the British islanders to eat upon every thing;-and the windy subjects of the American logocracy to talk upon every thing.

For ever thine,

MUSTAPHA.

FROM THE MILL OF PINDAR COCKLOFT, Garnish'd with vulgar cant, and proverbs bald,

conclusion, the parties being overcome with extatic | This is the universal remark among the almanac fatigue, the lady seems almost sinking into the gen- quidnuncs and weather-wiseacres of the day; and I tleman's arms, and then" Well, Sir, and what have heard it at least fifty-five times from old Mrs. then?"-lord, Madam, how should I know!

Cockloft, who, poor woman, is one of those walking 2]. My friend Pindar, and, in fact, our whole almanacs that foretell every snow, rain, or frost, by junto, has been accused of an unreasonable hostility the shooting of corns, a pain in the bones, or an to the French nation: and I am informed by a "ugly stitch in the side." I do not recollect, in the Parisian correspondent, that our first number whole course of my life, to have seen the month of played the very devil in the court of St. Cloud. March indulge in such untoward capers, caprices, His imperial majesty got into a most outrageous and coquetries, as it has done this year: I might passion, and being withal a waspish little gentle- have forgiven these vagaries, had they not comman, had nearly kicked his bosom friend, Talley-pletely knocked up my friend Langstaff, whose feelrand, out of the cabinet, in the paroxysms of his ings are ever at the mercy of a weathercock, whose wrath. He insisted upon it that the nation was as- spirits sink and rise with the mercury of a baromesailed in its most vital part; being, like Achilles, ter, and to whom an east wind is as obnoxious as a extremely sensitive to any attacks upon the heel. Sicilian sirocco. He was tempted some time since, When my correspondent sent off his despatches, it by the fineness of the weather, to dress himself with was still in doubt what measures would be adopted; more than ordinary care and take his morning stroll; but it was strongly suspected that vehement repre- but before he had half finished his peregrination, he sentations would be made to our government. Will- was utterly discomfited, and driven home by a treing, therefore, to save our executive from any em-mendous squall of wind, hail, rain, and snow; or, as barrassment on the subject, and above all from the he testily termed it, "a most villainous congregation disagreeable alternative of sending an apology by of vapors." the HORNET, we do assure Mr. Jefferson, that there This was too much for the patience of friend is nothing further from our thoughts than the sub- Launcelot; he declared he would humour the version of the Gallic empire, or any attack on the weather no longer in its whim-whams; and, accordinterests, tranquillity, or reputation of the nation ing to his immemorial custom on these occasions, at large, which we seriously declare possesses the retreated in high dudgeon to his elbow-chair to lie highest rank in our estimation. Nothing less than in of the spleen and rail at nature for being so fanthe national welfare could have induced us to tastical:-"confound the jade," he frequently extrouble ourselves with this explanation; and in the name of the junto, I once more declare, that when we toast a Frenchman, we merely mean one of these inconnus, who swarmed to this country, from the kitchens and barbers' shops of Nantz, Bordeaux, and Marseiles; played game of leap-frog at all our balls and assemblies;-set this unhappy town hopping mad--and passed themselves off on our tender-hearted damsels for unfortunate noblemen ruined in the revolution! such only can wince at the lash, and accuse us of severity; and we should be mortified in the extreme if they did not feel our well-intended castigation.

3. [Fair Penitent]. The story of this play, if told in its native language, would exhibit a scene of guilt and shame, which no modest car could listen to without shrinking with disgust; but, arrayed as it is in all the splendour of harmonious, rich, and polished verse, it steals into the heart like some gay, luxurious, smooth-faced villain, and betrays it insensibly to immorality and vice; our very sympathy is enlisted on the side of guilt; and the piety of Altamont, and the gentleness of Lavinia, are lost in the splendid debaucheries of the "gallant, gay Lothario," and the blustering, hollow repentance of the fair Calisto, whose sorrow reminds us of that of Pope's Heloise--"“I mourn the lover, not lament the fault." Nothing is more easy than to banish such plays from our stage. Were our ladies, instead of crowding to see them again and again repeated, to discourage their exhibition by absence, the stage would soon be indeed the school of morality, and the number of Fair Penitents," in all probability, diminished.

claims, "what a pity nature had not been of the masculine instead of the feminine gender; the almanac makers might then have calculated with some degree of certainty."

When Langstaff invests himself with the spleen, and gives audience to the blue devils from his elbowchair, I would not advise any of his friends to come within gunshot of his citadel with the benevolent purpose of administering consolation or amusement: for he is then as crusty and crabbed as that famous coiner of false money, Diogenes himself. Indeed, his room is at such times inaccessible; and old Pompey is the only soul that can gain admission, or ask a question with impunity; the truth is, that on these occasions, there is not a straw's difference between them, for Pompey is as grum and grim and cynical as his master.

I

Launcelot has now been above three weeks in this desolate situation, and has therefore had but little to do in our last number. As he could not be prevailed on to give any account of himself in our introduction, will take the opportunity of his confinement, while his back is turned, to give a slight sketch of his character;-fertile in whim-whams and bachelorisms, but rich in many of the sterling qualities of our nature. Annexed to this article, our readers will perceive a striking likeness of my friend, which was taken by that cunning rogue Will Wizard, who peeped through the key-hole and sketched it off as honest Launcelot sat by the fire, wrapped up in his flannel robe de chambre, and indulging in a mortal fit of the hyp. Now take my word for it, gentle reader, this is the most auspicious moment in which to touch off the phiz of a genuine humorist.

Of the antiquity of the Langstaff family I can say but little; except that I have no doubt it is equal to

No. VIII.-SATURDAY, APRIL 18, 1807. that of most families who have the privilege of mak

BY ANTHONY EVERGREEN, GENT.

"In all thy humours, whether grave or mellow, Thou'rt such a touchy, testy, pleasant fellow; Hast so much wit, and mirth, and spleen about thee, There is no living with thee-nor without thee." "NEVER, in the memory of the oldest inhabitant, has there been known a more backward spring."

ing their own pedigree, without the impertinent interposition of a college of heralds. My friend Launcelot is not a man to blazon any thing; but I have heard him talk with great complacency of his ancestor, Sir ROWLAND, who was a dashing buck in the days of Hardiknute, and broke the head of a gigantic Dane, at a game of quarter-staff, in presence of the whole court. In memory of this gallant exploit, Sir