Continental Monthly Volume 1 Issue 3 by Various

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Shortly after the inauguration of President Lincoln, and during
the period in which the throng of office-seekers was greatest, an
applicant for a clerkship in one of the departments received
notification to appear before the 'examining committee' for
examination as to qualifications. In due time he appeared, and
announced himself 'ready.' The aforesaid 'committee,' supposing
that they had before them a decidedly 'soft one,' determined to
enjoy a little 'sport' at the poor fellow's expense. After having
put a great many questions to him, none of which in the least
applied to the duties he would be expected to perform, he was
asked how he would ascertain the number of square feet occupied by
the Patent Office building. This question aroused in him
suspicions that 'all was not right,' and, with a promptness and
emphasis that effectually dampened the hopes of his questioners,
he replied, '_Well, gentlemen, I should employ an experienced
surveyor._'

The same correspondent tells us that--

In one of the rural towns of Illinois lived, a few years agone, a
very eccentric individual known as 'DICKEY BULARD,' whose original
sayings afforded no little amusement to his neighbors.

DICKEY had his troubles, the saddest of which was the loss of his
only son. Shortly after this event, in speaking of it to some
friends, he broke out in the following pathetic expression of
feeling:

'I'd rather a' lost the best cow I have, and ten dollars besides,
than that boy. If it had been a gal, it wouldn't a' made so much
difference; but it was the only boy I had.'

On another occasion, in referring to the death of his grandmother,
who had been fatally injured by a butt from a pet ram, DICKEY gave
vent to his feelings as follows:

'I never felt so bad in all my life as I did when grandmother
died. She had got so old, and we had kept her so long, _we wanted
to see how long we could keep her_.

* * * * *

It is the 'turn of the tune' which gives point to the far-famed legend
of 'The Arkansaw Traveler,'--which legend, in brief, is to the effect
that a certain fiddling 'Rackensackian,' who could never learn more than
the first half of a certain tune, once bluntly refused all manner of
hospitality to a weary wayfarer, avowing with many an oath that his
house boasted neither meat nor whisky, bed nor hay. But being taught by
the stranger the 'balance' of the tune,--'the turn,' as he called
it,--he at once overwhelmed his musical guest with all manner of
dainties and kindnesses. And it is the 'turn of the tune,' in the
following lyric, from the soft tinkle of the guitar to the harsh notes
of the 'beaten parchment,' which gives it a peculiar charm.

THE GUITAR AND THE DRUM.

BY R. WOLCOTT, CO. B., TENTH ILLINOIS

Evening draws nigh, and the daylight
In golden splendor dies;
And the stars look down through the gloaming
With soft and tender eyes.

I sit alone in the twilight,
And lazily whiff my cigar,
Watching the blue wreaths curling,
And thrumming my old guitar:

Old, and battered, and dusty,--
A veteran covered with scars;
Yet to me the most precious of treasures,
The sweetest of all guitars.

For a gentle spirit dwells in it,
That speaks through the trembling strings,
And in echo to my thrumming
A wonderful melody sings.

As I softly strike the measures,
The spirit murmurs low
A song of departed pleasures,
A dream of the long ago.

And like a weird enchanter
It paints in the star-lit sky
Pictures from memory's record,
Scenes of the days gone by.

And as the ripples of music
Float out on the evening air,
There comes to me a vision
Of the girl with the golden hair.

Kindly she turns upon me.
Those lustrous, violet eyes,
And my heart with passionate yearnings
To meet her eagerly flies.

Nearer she comes, and yet nearer,
At the beck of the spirit's wand,
And I feel the gentle pressure
On my brow of her warm, white hand--

_Tr-r-r-rum-ti-tum-tum, tr-r-r-rum-ti-tum-tum!_
'Tis the warning voice of the rolling drum.
Through the awakened night air come
The stern command and the busy hum
Of hurried preparation.
'Tis no time now for idle strumming
Of light guitars: in that loud drumming
Is fearful meaning; the hour is coming
That for some of us will be the summing
Of all life's preparation.

Quick, quick, my boys: fall in! fall in!
Now is the hour when we begin
The battle with this monstrous sin.
Onward to victory!--or to win
A patriot's martyrdom!
Stay no longer to bandy words;
Trust we now to our gleaming swords;
For foul rebellion's dastardly hordes
A terrible hour has come.

By all that you love beneath the skies;
By the world of cherished memories;
By your hopes for the coming years;
By the tender light of your loved one's eyes;
By the warm, white hands you so highly prize;
By your mothers' parting tears,
Swear the horrible wrong to crush!
What though you fall in the battle's rush,
And the velvet leaves of the greensward blush
With your young life's crimson tide?
The angels look down with pitying love,
And your tale will be told in the record above:
'For his country's honor he died.'

The gentle strings of the light guitar,
Waking soft echoes from memory's chords,
And tender dreams of home--
The noise, and the pomp, and the glitter of war;
The furious charge, and the clashing swords;
The song of the rolling drum.

How many a young heart has, in these later days, been turned from soft
guitar-tones of idleness, to the brave, rattling measures of drum-life!
It will do good, this war of ours; and many a brave fellow will, in
after years, look back upon it as the school in which he first learned
to be a thoroughly practical and sensible MAN.

* * * * *

We are indebted to a gossiping and ever most welcome New Haven friend
for the following anecdote of one of the men who, clothed in a little
brief authority, 'go about 'restin' people:'

Our village we consider one of the most pleasant in the country;
our boys full of life and activity, and our officers men of energy
and perseverance, and men who understand their importance. In
proof of these assertions, I offer the following sketch of an
occurrence a few years ago.

DICK BARNES was a blacksmith, and a man of considerable notoriety
in those days, and from the peculiar prominence of his front upper
teeth he had derived, from the boys of the village, the singular
nick-name of 'Tushy.' For two or three successive years he had
been elected constable, and the duties of this great public office
appeared to demand that he should neglect his legitimate private
business, so that it was said that the safest place for him to
secrete himself--the most unlikely place where he would be
sought--would be behind his own anvil. Like many others 'clothed
with a little brief authority' he was not overmodest in showing
his importance.

The boys were then, as they are now, fond of skating, and there
was a large pond near the centre of the village on which they used
to have fine times on moonlight evenings, and especially Sunday
evenings, and, as a natural consequence, when large numbers of
boys are engaged in sport, they were somewhat noisy.

One Sunday evening, when the ice was very smooth and the boys were
enjoying themselves, BARNES made his appearance on the ice and
ordered them off, in tones, and exclamations of authority. The
boys did not like this interference in their sports and couldn't
see the justice of his demand. 'That's old Tushy,' says one, and
the cry of 'Tushy,' 'Tushy,' soon passed among the crowd of
skaters, till BARNES began to think it personal, and was
determined to catch one of them and make of him an example. The
ice was 'glib,' as they termed it, and as they all had skates
except 'Tushy,' they were rather rude in their behavior towards
him,--a not very uncommon circumstance,--and though they were
careful to keep out of harm's way, they kept near enough to him to
annoy him. Finding all efforts to catch one of them fruitless,
with the advantage they had,--for 'the wicked _stand_ on slippery
places,'--he announced his determination to catch one of them
anyhow, and started for the shore.

Boys are usually quicker in arriving at conclusions than older
people, and one of them suggested that he had gone for his skates.
'Good! now we'll have some fun, boys,' says Phil Clark, who was a
good skater, and withal a good leader in a frolic. 'You follow me
and do as I tell you, and I don't believe old "Tushy" will follow
us far.' By general consent he led them to the dry, sandy shore,
and such as had them filled their handkerchiefs, and such as could
not boast of that superfluity filled their caps, with sand. 'Now,'
says Phil, 'when he comes back, and it won't be long, we'll form a
line and wait till he gets his skates on, when he'll put chase for
some of us. If he gets near any of us, some one sing out "Bully,"
and every boy drop his sand, and if he catches any one we'll all
pitch in.'

'Tushy' in a little while made his appearance, and soon had his
skates strapped to his feet, and after a few stamps upon the ice,
to see that they were properly secured, glided a few strokes and
started off for the boys. The moon was shining 'as bright as day,'
and old Tushy's movements were perfectly apparent. The pond was
huge, and afforded a good opportunity for a trial of speed, and,
though many of the boys were good skaters, 'Tushy' perseveringly
determined to capture one of them, and started for the one
nearest. This was 'Phil,' who was the master spirit of the frolic,
and as 'Tushy' approached with almost the certainty of capturing
him, he would glide gracefully aside and let him pass on. He had
almost caught up with a group of the smaller boys who were going
at full speed, when 'Phil' shouted out the word 'Bully.' In an
instant the contents of handkerchiefs and caps was deposited on
the glaring ice, the boys continuing their flying course. 'Tushy,'
elated with the prospect of capturing at least one of the urchins,
increased his speed with lunger strides, and was in the act of
grasping one, when the sparks from his steel runners, the sudden
arrest of his feet and the onward movement of his body, convinced
him that _he_ was caught. The impetus he had acquired with the few
last strokes on the smooth ice, and the sudden check his feet had
received from the sand, sent him sliding headlong many yards
towards an air-hole,--one of those dangerous places on ponds
suddenly frozen,--and soon the ice began to crack around him. The
water in the pond was not deep, but the ice continued to break
with his efforts to extricate himself. He found that the boys had
successfully entrapped him, and it was not until he had made a
promise not again to interfere with their sport that they
consented to assist him out. He kept his promise, and the boys
ever after, when they designed any extra sport on the ice, had his
nick-name for a by-word.

JAY G. BEE.

* * * * *

'Salt,' according to MORESINUS, 'is sacred to the infernal
deities,'--for which reason, we presume, those who were seated 'below
the salt' at the banquets of the Middle Ages were always 'poor devils.'
Attic salt is always held to be more pungent when there is a touch of
the diabolical and caustic in it,--and therefore caustic itself is known
as _lapis infernalis_. 'Poor Mr. N----,' said a country dame, of a
recently deceased neighbor who was over-thrifty, 'he always saved his
salt and lost his pork.' 'Yes,' replied a friend, 'and now the salt has
lost its Saver.' The reader has doubtless heard of the lively young
lady, named Sarah, whom her friends rechristened Sal Volatile.
Apropos--a New Haven friend writes us that--

My chum, Dr. B., is not a little of a wag. At a social gathering,
shortly after he had received his diploma, the young ladies were
very anxious to put his knowledge of medicine to the test.
'Doctor,' queried one of the fair, 'what will cure a man who has
been hanged?' 'Salt is the best thing I know of,' replied the
tormented, with great solemnity.

* * * * *

According to a cotemporary--the Boston _Herald_--the best Christians may
be known by the pavements before their houses being cleaned of ice and
snow. This reminds us of a spiritual anecdote. A deceased friend having
been summoned through a medium and asked where he had spent the first
month after his decease, rapped out,--

'I-n--p-u-r-g-a-t-o-r-y.'

'Did you find it uncomfortable?'

'Not very. While I lived I always had my pavements cleared in winter,
and all the ice and snow shoveled away was given back to me in
orange-water ices, Roman punch, vanilla and pistachio creams, frozen
fruits, cobblers, juleps, and smashes.'

Somebody has spoken in an Arctic voyage of the musical vibrations of the
ice. There is certainly music in the article. 'Take care,' said a Boston
girl to her companion, as they were navigating the treacherously
slippery pavement of our city a few days since; 'it's See sharp or Be
flat.'

* * * * *

Somebody once wrote a book on visiting-cards. There is a great variety
of that article; an English ambassador once papered his entire suit of
rooms with that with which a Chinese mandarin honored him. MICHAEL
ANGELO left a straight line as a card, and was recognized by it. Our
friend H---- once distributed blank pasteboards in Philadelphia, and
everybody said, 'Why, H---- has been here!' Not long since, a lady
dwelling in New York asked her seven-year-old GEORGY where he had been.

'Out visiting.'

'Did you leave your card?'

'No; I hadn't any, so I left a marble!'

GEORGY'S idea was that cards were playthings. And _cartes de visite_ are
most assuredly the playthings for children of an older growth, most in
vogue at the present day. Go where you will, the albums are examined,
nay, some collectors have even one or two devoted solely to children, or
officers, or literary men, or young ladies. The following anecdote
records, however, as we believe, 'an entirely new style' of
visiting-card:--

Madam X. was busy the other morning. Miss Fanny Z. 'just ran in to
see her' _en amie_, without visiting-cards.

The waiter carried her name to Madam X. Meanwhile Miss Fannie,
circulating through the parlors, saw that there was dust on the
lower shelf of an etagere, so she delicately traced the letters

_Smut_

thereon and therefore. Waiter enters, and regrets that Madam X. is
so very much engaged that she is invisible. Miss Fanny flies home.

In the evening she meets Madam X., who is 'perfectly enchanted' to
see her. 'Ah, Fanny, dear, I am charmed to see you; the waiter
forgot your name this morning, but I was delighted to see your
ingenuity. Would you believe it, the first thing I saw on entering
the parlor was your card on the etagere!'

* * * * *

The Naugatuck railroad, according to a friend of the CONTINENTAL,

Is in many places cut through a rugged country, and the rocks
thereabout have an ugly trick of rolling down upon the track when
they get tired of lying still. So the company employ sentinels
who traverse the dangerous territory before the morning train goes
through. One of these,--Pat K. by name,--while on his beat, met
Dennis, whose hand he had last shaken on the 'Green Isle.' After
mutual inquiries and congratulations, says Dennis, 'What are you
doin' these days, Pat?' 'Oh, I'm consarned in this railroad
company. I go up the road fur the likes o' four miles ivry mornin'
to see is there ony rocks on the thrack.' 'And if there is?' 'Why,
I stops the trains, sure.' 'Faith,' said Dennis, 'what the divil's
the good o' that--_wouldn't the rocks stop 'em?_'

* * * * *

The Hibernian idea of a meeting is, we should judge, peculiar, and not,
as a rule, amicable. 'What are ye doing here, Pat?' inquired one of the
Green Islanders who found a friend one morning in a lonely spot. 'Troth,
Dinnis, and it's waiting to mate a gintleman here I'm doing.' 'Waiting
for a frind is it?' replied Dennis; 'but where is yer shillaly thin?'
This was indeed a misapprehension, and of the kind which, as a
benevolent clergyman complained, who was actively engaged in home
mission work, was one of the most constant sources of his frequent
annoyances. 'Why,' he remarked, 'it was only the other morning that I
heard of a poor girl who was dying near the Five Points, and went to
administer to her such comfort as it might be in my power to render. I
met an impudent miss leaving the room, who, when I inquired for the
sufferer by name, replied, "It's no use; you're too late, old
fellow,--she's give me her pocket-book and all her things."'

* * * * *

A friend has called our attention to the following extract from an
advertisement in a New York evening paper, and requests an
explanation:--

STRABISMUS, OR CROSS-EYE, IN ITS WORST STAGES, CURED IN ONE
MINUTE. READ!

NEWARK, August 14th, 1861.

Dear Doctor: I write to express my thanks for the great difference
you have made in my appearance by your operation on my eye. I have
had a _squint_, or _cross-eye_, since birth, and in less than one
minute, and with VERY LITTLE PAIN, you have made my eyes perfectly
straight and natural. Having consulted in Europe the greatest
_Aurists_, I, therefore, can testify that your system of restoring
the _hearing_ to the deaf is at once scientific, safe and sure;
and I confidently recommend all deaf to place themselves under
your care. W.T.

There's a nut to crack. Having had a cross-eye cured in one minute, Mr.
T. can _therefore_ testify that the system by which he was enabled to
see is just the thing to enable the deaf to hear! But an instant's
reflection convinced us of the true state of the case. There is an old
German song which translated saith:

'I am the Doctor Iron-beer,
The one who makes the blind to hear,
The man who makes the deaf to see:--
Come with your invalids to me.'

We evidently have a Doctor Iron-beer among us. 'He still lives,' and
enables people to outdo the clairvoyants, who read with their fingers,
by qualifying his patients to peruse the papers with their auricular
organs.

* * * * *

Walter will receive our thanks for the following aesthetic
communication:--

DEAR CONTINENTAL:

Do you know the superb picture of Judith and Holofernes, by
ALLORI? Of course. But the legend?

The painter ALLORI was blessed and cursed with a mistress, one of
the most beautiful women in an age of beauty. He loved her, and
she tormented him, until, to set forth his sufferings, he painted
_la belle dame sans mercy_ as Judith, holding his own decapitated
head by the hair.

'She was more than a match for her lover,' said a young lady,
who--between us--I think is more beautiful than the 'Judith.'

'Yes,' was the answer; 'the engraving proves that she got a-head
of him.'

Of course it was Holofernally bad. I once heard a better one on
the same subject, of scriptural be-head-edness. Where is a centaur
first mentioned? John's head on a charger. The postage stamp on
your lawyer's bill--mine especially--represents the same thing,
with the substitution of General Washington for John. Rarey tamed
Cruiser--I wonder if he could do anything by way of 'taking down'
this legal 'charger' of mine.

Yours truly,
WALTER

* * * * *

Much has been written on oysters. There was a time when England sent
nothing else abroad. 'The poor Britons--they are good for something,'
says SALLUST, in 'The Last Days of Pompeii;' 'they produce an oyster.'
In these days, they export no oysters, but in lieu thereof give us
plenty of pepper-sauce. But to the point,--we mean to the poem,--for
which we are indebted to a Philadelphia contributor:--

OYSTERS!

He stood beside the oysters. Near him lay
A dozen raw upon the half-shell: he
With fork stood ready to engulf them all,
When to his side a reverend gray-beard came.
Pointing his index finger to the Natives,
Slowly he spoke, with measured voice and low:--
'They are the same, THE SAME! I've eaten them
In London, small and coppery; at Ostend,
A little better; and in the Condotti,
Yea, in the Lepre--'tis an eating-house
Frequented by the many-languaged artists
Of great imperial Rome. At Baiae: also
I've tasted that nice kind described by MARTIAL,
Who calls them ears of Venus;--there I've had 'em.
Also at Memphis--now I'm coming to it:
I've seen amid the desert sands of Egypt,
Exposed among the hieroglyphs, these Natives.
(The hieroglyphs, you know, are outward forms
Of things or creatures which unfold strange myths,
Read by the common eye in vulgar way,
But to the learned are types of truths gigantic.)
Thus unto you those oysters are but bivalves;
But unto me they're--P'raps you'll stand a dozen?'
'Well, I will, old hoss; it seems to me you need 'em!'
'Good! Then to me they are as hieroglyphs
Of our poor human state; as PLATO says,
"The soul of man, a substance different from
The body as the oyster from the shell,
Does stick to it, and is imprisoned in it.
Its weight of shell doth keep it down and force it
To stay upon its muddy bottom. So does
Man's body hold his soul in these dark regions,
Keeping it ever steadily from rising
To those superior heights where are abodes
More fitting its serene and noble nature."
Good as a quarter-dollar lecture. Boy! fork over.'
'Another "doz." to this old gentleman;
For I perceive he plainly hath it in him
To swallow down two dozen oysters' souls.
See what it is to be a philosopher!'

This is indeed finding sermons in 'shells.'

* * * * *

'Punning is a power,' according to somebody, and, like most power, is
sadly abused. Take, for illustration, the following specimen of the
'narrative pun:'

The reader knows that BYRON once punned on the word Bullet-in, and
was proud of it; distinctly proud, be it remembered. After which
comes the following:--

Some years ago it was summer time, and in the office of the
Philadelphia _Evening Bulletin_, one, as the French say, was
preparing the daily paper. Along Third Street streamed Shinners,
Bulls, Bears, and Newsboys,--in the sanctum, Editors wrote and
clipped,--proof rose up and down in the dumb waiter,--there was
the shrill scream of the whistle calling to the foreman far on
high,--

Suddenly there was a tremendous run in the front office.

A maddened cow,--an infuriate, delirious, over-driven
animal,--breaking loose from the cow-herdly creature who had her
in charge,--careered wildly past the _Ledger_ building.

One would have thought that the straw paper on which that sheet
was then printed might have tempted her to repose.

It didn't.

Past FORNEY'S paper:--he was proprietor of the _Pennsylvanian_ in
those days. Those days!--when he was Warwick, the king-maker, and
carried Pennsylvania for Old Buck. Bitter were the changes in
aftertimes, and bitterly did Forney give fits where he had before
bestowed benefits. On went the cow.

Right smack into the office of the evening paper, then engineered
by ALEXANDER CUMMINGS, now held by GIBSON PEACOCK.

Rush! went the cow. Right into the next door--turn to the left,
oh, infuriate--charge into the newsboys! By Santa Maria, little
DUCKEY is down--ha! Saint Joseph! the beast gains the front
office--she faceth streetwards--she jaculates herself
outwards--she is gone.

By the door stood a Philadelphia punster.

The cow switched him with her tail; he heeded it not. His soul
felt the morning gleam of a revelation,--the flash of a Boehmic
Aurora,--

Far, far above the world, oh dreamer!--in the pure land of
Pun-light, where the silent Calembergs rise in the sunset sea.

And he spake,--

'_I see you have_ A COW LET OUT _there, and a_ BULL LET IN HERE!'

This is going through a great deal to get at a pun, says some
over-heated and perspiring disciple.

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