Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

They are known by a slightly contracted brow, fiery eye, and halfopened mouth, which compose the organ of Punchvolubleness.

VI. TODDYTIVENESS. There is a warm drink called Toddy, of which old bachelors and old maids are extremely fond. The former, especially, imbibe it until their ratiocinative disposition has oozed out, and they are left in a state of blissful obmutescence. The appetite for this drink may be discovered by the organ of Toddytiveness, which is situated upon the nose, and is vulgarly known by the name of Toddy-blossom.

VII. BRANDIFORMITY. It is not difficult to find this organ in the brandy drinker. The deep vermilion hue of his countenance, and the strong development of the organ of Vinefretability, are always sufficient indications of it.

VIII. CARBUNCLIVITY. This is truly a wonderful organ. It is almost always to be found upon the nose of the old brandy and gin toper, and is composed of shining pustules, of various sizes and hues. When the possessor of this organ has been long addicted to inebriety, it extends itself to the cheek-bones and forehead. It has been said that it is used in dark nights, as a lantern to light its owner from the bar-room to his cheerless home. Whether we credit this or not, we may safely believe that it is the only lantern with which he should be trusted. For a farther description of the organ, I refer to Sir John Falstaff.

IX. POTHEASIVENESS. Those persons who make pot-houses their constaut resort, and drink the chief part of their subsistence, are always possessed of this organ. It is too well known to require any description here. Look at the confirmed drunkard, and in his countenance you will see the organ of Potheasiveness.

I have thus given some of the outlines of this wonderful science; a science before which all other sciences will hide their diminished heads; a science which, for simplicity and definiteness, certainly cannot be equalled; a science which for sublimity is unrivalled, and for usefulness cannot be matched; a science which requires no bombastic parade, no fulsome panegyric, to obtain for it immediate and lasting celebrity. Time shall be no longer, when it shall cease to

exist!

J. E. G.

VOL. XV.

[blocks in formation]

MOMENTS of life there are, in which whole years
Of incident, and thrilling thought combined,
Are crowded; and the heart can, save in tears,
No channel for its deep emotions find.
Such, is the present-richly fraught, as brief!
Big with remembrances which charm the mind,
Of joys, as fading as the autumn leaf;

Past-but whose fragrance lingers still behind.
All that this pen might say, if Time would pause,
And rest his wing, till thought in words found vent,
Would leave the fount within but yet unspent,
And sad adieus be still the final clause:
But 'Time' that 'waits for no man,' pauseth not
Farewell! To meet again, be yet our happy lot!

18

[ocr errors]

E. C. E.

[blocks in formation]

'THE beauty of Lebanon shall come unto thee; the fir tree, the pine tree, and the box, together; to beautify the place of my sanctuary.'

FROM the leafless wood we have gathered the pine,
With the hemlock branch and the winter vine,

And the laurel hath sprung from its frozen sod,
To wreathe in beauty the house of God!
For this the fir-tree and box shall wave,
Its leafy wing o'er the holy pave;

Round the sainted altar the wreath shall fall,

And the holy cross on the hallowed wall.

For this the cedar its leaf unfurled,

And bent in shade o'er an icy world:

And we strew thy path, oh SAVIOUR! now,

With the living green and the deathless bough.

"T is our hosanna! a voiceless prayer,

Feeling that language can never share;
The silent worship of heart to Thee,
And this is its bright orthography.

Death has touch'd our home, and the spirit grieves,
Its loved have past with the summer leaves;
Yet brighter thoughts crest the surge of wo,
Work'd white from the turbid depth below!
A thought of heaven, a trust in God,

That faith which springs from its darken'd sod,
A winter vine that the storm has traced;
God's autograph on a blighted waste!

L'ABEILLE.

LIMNINGS IN THE

THOROUGHFARES.

EY GEORGE D. STRONG.

THE NEWS MAN AND

NEWS-BOY.

In tracing the progress of the political and social movement which marks the present era, our attention is frequently arrested by specimens of the Genus Homo, created as it were out of the elements of society, as at present organized, and if not new in themselves, yet exhibiting novel combinations of the primal elements of human character.

Conspicuous among these monuments of a remodelled organization, stand the NEWS-MAN and NEWS-BOY. In analyzing the distinct claims to notice of these Mercurys of hebdomadal and diurnal literature, we shall find the news-boy to possess the most prominent and piquant attributes. Moving, it is true, with more erratic steps than his senior, but exhibiting in his eccentricities and vagaries those Hogarthian peculiarities which are now readily transferred to the canvass, and when happily sketched, are universally recognized and appreciated.

The news-man is the messenger of the larger newspaper establishments, satirically termed by their Lilliputian rivals, the respectable sixpennies. The news-boy is born and nurtured in the more exciting purlieus of the penny press, and bears about him no doubtful tokens of his birth-place and lineage. Heir to the wit and slang, the

drollery and impertinence, the humor aud frolic, the curiosity and perseverance, of his official parentage, he thrusts his wares alike in the face of the aristocrat and the plebeian, the belle and the slattern; carrying out the principle of equal privileges to its utmost boundary, and hurling defiance alike at the frowns of the haughty, and the menaces of the testy.

The news-man, on the contrary, moves with the sober pace befitting his rank in the social scale; and in the very whirlwind of excitement, caused by the receipt of important and unexpected intelligence, which serves to throw editors, clerks, pressmen, and compositors into a fever, never for a moment compromises his dignity by exhibitions of undue haste, or nervous anxiety. Scan him narrowly, and you may observe that his lips are slightly compressed, and his brow is a thought contracted; that his features bear the impress of a consciousness that he is conveying to the ignorant mass tidings of high import: but his gravity of deportment is still admirably sustained, and his cool and practised bearing might serve as a study for even practised diplomatists.

The news-boy is a being of different order; exhibiting not only the spirit, and confidence, and animation of youth, bounding with the spring of that elasticity which is lost in later life, but carrying into public highways and by-ways the evidence of his familiarity with the mysteries of the craft, of which he is at once the type and the ornament. To awaken his enthusiasm, it is not requisite that his sheet should contain important intelligence, foreign or domestic. The editor of the paper of which he is the distributor may vainly have searched for novelties of a quality to arouse the flagging curiosity of his heterogenous patrons; but let him not despair. The news-boy will remedy the evil. His inventive mind is at work, and ere he has traversed a square, you may recognise his voice, high above the city's din, proclaiming to the gaping crowd the information his sheet imparts, of accidents and casualties which came not beneath the editorial ken of his employer, and the murderous barbarities of savages, which were never perpetrated, except in his own teeming fancy.

Question him closely, and he will give you a wink and a nod; and if he deems you, in his expressive phrase, a knowing one,' will slily thrust his tongue out of the side of his cheek; but of these mysterious movements the inquiring crowd shall not be permitted to take cognizance; and the next moment finds him at another point, heralding a series of novelties of which his former auditors remained in happy ignorance.

If loquacity be the prominent characteristic of the news-boy, his senior may be termed the High Priest of Silence. Follow him in his daily rounds, and no sound will be permitted to escape his lips. Does a dissatisfied subscriber require the delivery of his paper at an earlier hour? The news-man hears the request, but deigns no reply. He has been known, on such occasions to nod intelligence, but his courtesy goes, no further.

The news-man, in outward seeming, is decent and staid, and his dress is in keeping with his official character. In summer, it consists of a round jacket and trowsers, of some light material, with a hat so placed as to preserve the equilibrium of the owner's general bearing; neither leaning to the one side nor to the other; neither thrown back

slovenly, nor perched forward foppishly. His winter clothing is usually a peet jacket and trowsers, of strong pilot cloth, boots made of thick leather, with heavy soles, a fur cap, and woollen mittens.

The news-boy, deeming propriety of costume or manner a slavish obedience to social tyranny, discards all such degrading shackles, and exhibits his independence no less in the selection of his clothing, than in more important particulars. Combining in his personal contour the picturesque abandonment of the Italian Lazzaroni with the inartificial contempt of adornment of the Fulton-market lounger, his fur cap in winter, and open-flapped beaver in summer, appear thrown upon his fertile cranium by the Genius of Disorder; now displaying its front to the left, anon to the right, and again to the rear; causing this oracle of penny-a-liners not unfrequently to appear like a crab walking backward-when the rogue is using his pedals in the due order of nature.

His rough, out-at-the-elbows monkey-jacket, fished from the lowest depths of a pawn-broker's omnium gatherum, and trowsers to match, may be similar in form and texture to other articles of the like kind; but no sooner are they transferred to the wardrobe of the news-boy, than they seem invested with a new-being; as unlike any clothing extant, as is the wearer in comparison with the rest of his species. Watch him daily, and you will not detect a button-hole of his coat in conjunction with its lawfully-wedded button, nor any other part of his dress, in the position which the artist designed. The left angle of his coat collar will be found perched high above his ear, while its mate is quietly dosing in unambitious obscurity, under the right shoulder of the garment. His shoes are akin to his upper-benjamin; out at the toes, slip-shod, and exhibiting at every point that disregard of the unities which would throw a modern critic into convulsions.

[ocr errors]

The news-boy entertains some highly dangerous doctrines in relation to the distinction between meum and tuum. According to his logic, the cause which justifies war between nations, is equally a warrant for individual hostilities; and emulating the enlightened conduct of the British people toward their Gallic neighbors, he holds the juvenile venders of matches and pocket-combs to be his natural foes, against whom it is justifiable to declare eternal warfare. The faithful representative of the social movement of which he is the walking title-page, the catch-words and leading head-lines of the penny-press are familiar to him as household gods. He opens his mouth, and out flies a winged army of proverbs calculated to ridicule wealth, and contemn station. The news-boy hath no existence out of his vocation. From whence he emerges at the early dawn to run his erratic course, or whither he vanishes at the close of his daily labors, are profound mysteries, of which the public have not the clue. We may entertain a shadowy and imperfect idea that this running commentary on the superficial acquirements of the masses has at some period been like unto other children, in the possession of parents, guardians, and play-fellows; but in endeavoring to solve the problem, we at once are lost in the individuality of the official, nor can our mental laboratory furnish the wherewithal to separate the news-boy from his functional existence. His kindred or friends, if such he possess, have no being distinct from him; but like lesser lights, are lost in the blaze of his renown.'

The news-boy may be known by certain infallible characteristics. Meet him where and when you will, whether on the trottoir of Wallstreet, or in the purlieus of the Exchange; on the thronged quay, or in the busy market-place; at morning, noontide, or evening; his hat or cap will be thrown rakishly on the side of his head, his literary burthen under one arm, while the other appears ever making preparation to single out a sheet for his customer; his eyes roving on every side to catch the slightest intimation that his paper is in demand. During his perambulations in the centre of a block, he will trot along at a gait between a walk and a pace, but on reaching a corner, he invariably pauses to survey the scene on every side; and if no customer is in view, his feet involuntarily strike up a jig, the twin of which hath not yet been heralded in any work of the professors of the sublime art, nor reduced to practice by Taglioni or Celeste. It partakes, in truth, neither of the spirit of the horn-pipe, the life of the fandango, the voluptuousness of the waltz, nor the grace of the quadrille. If it beareth affinity to any dance extant, the 'doubleshuffle' of old Virginia, or the come-it-strong' of Communipaw, are entitled to the distinction; but there are so many scientific touches engrafted on the parent movement, that it may be safely classed among the novelties of the day.

While the news-man moves steadily around, in his accustomed circle, discarding innovation, and repudiating change, the news-boy delights in the invention of novel conceits, and rejoices in throwing off the quips and quiddities engendered in the exuberance of his wayward fancy. Regularity and system are the tutelar deities of the first, while the latter scorns to worship at their shrine. He points triumphantly to Napoleon, who subverted dynasties in defiance of all rules, overthrew systems like nine-pins, and planted his throne amid their ruins! If reminded of the necessity of continued patience and sustained energy, to accomplish any important result, he will inform you that ever-restless Genius leaps to its goal, while dull-paced Mediocrity lingers at the starting-post. He who would challenge him to a contest of wits, must don his most defensive armor, and look well to his guards, if he would not be worsted in the encounter. Many a rash gallant has rued the day, when he dared the news-boy to such a tilt; and it would make an anchorite smile, to view the crest-fallen champion of the upper ranks retreat, followed by the huzzas of the crowd, as his Lilliputian antagonist raises his thumb to his nose, extends his fingers, and with a wink and a leer, demands of his vanquished foe 'if he knows Joe Smith,' and with mock-gravity inquires if he sees any thing green in his (the news-boy's) eye!'

[ocr errors]

The news-boy is emphatically a creation of the new world, bearing on his front the impress of that rapidity of motion, and absence of repose, which exist in perfection in no other quarter of the globe. In other lands, the spirit of innovation affects but a small portion of the multitude; but with us, it is the great trait of national character; exhibiting itself in the cabinet of the statesman, the counting-room of the merchant, the work-shop of the mechanic, the drawing-room of the man of fashion, and the granary of the farmer. As the locomo

tive and the steam-boat are the mute heralds of its sway, so the newsboy may be termed its speaking representative. He cries his lite

« ZurückWeiter »