Kitabı oku: «The Continental Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 6, June, 1862», sayfa 16
KYNG COTEN
A 'DARK' CONCEIT
(Being an ensample of a longe poeme.)
O muse! that did me somedeal favour erst,
Whereas I piped my silly oaten reede,
And songs in homely guise to mine reherst,
Well pleased with maiden's smilings for my meed;
Sweet muse, do give my Pegasus good speede,
And send to him of thy high, potent might,
Whiles mortalls I all of my theme do rede,
Thatte is the story of a doughty knight,
Who eftsoons wageth war, Kyng COTEN is he hight.
Kyng Coten cometh of a goodly race,
Though black it was, as records sothly tell;
But thatte is nought, which only is the face,
And ne the hart, where alle goode beings dwell;
For witness him the puissant Hannibal,
Who was in veray sooth a Black-a-Moor;
And Cleopatra, Egypt's darksome belle,
And others, great on earth, a hundred score;
Howbeit, ilke kyng was white, which doth amaze me sore.
Kyng Coten cometh of a goodly race,
As born of fathers clean as many as
The sands thatte doe the mighty sea-shore grace,
But black, as sayde, as dark is Erebus.
His rule the Southron Federation was,
Thatte was a part of great Columbia,
Which was as fayre a clyme as man mote pass;
And situate where Vesper holds his swaye,
But habited wilome by men of salvage fray.
Farre in the North he had an enimie,
Who certes was the knight's true soveraine,
Who likéd not his wicked slaverie,
Which 'cross God's will was counter-wisely laine,
Whiles he himself, it seemeth now right playne,
Did seek to have a kyngdom of his kynde,
Where he, as tyrant-like, mote lonly raine;
So to a treacherie he fetched his mynde,
Which soon was rent in four, and sent upon each wynde.
His enimie thatte liveth in the North,
Who, after all, was not his enimie,
Ydeemed he was a gentilman of worth,
Too proud to make so vile a villianie,
And, therefore, did ne tent his railerie,
But went his ways, as was his wont wilome;
Goliah, he turned out eftsoons, ah! me,
Who leaned upon his speare when David come,
And laughed to scorn the sillie boy his threat'ning doom.
But when his stronghold in ye Southron land,
Of formidable front, Forte Sumter hight,
Did fall into Kyng Coten's rebell hand,
Who coward-wise did challenge to the fight,
Some several men again his host of might;
Then Samuel, for so was he yclipt,
Begun in batail's gear himself to dight,
As being fooled by him with whom he sippt,
And hied him out, loud crying, 'Treason must be nippt!'
O ye who doe the crusades' musters tell,
In wise that maketh myndes incredulous,
And paynte how like Dan Neptune's sweeping swell
The North bore down on the perfidious!
Ne nigh so potent thatte as was with us;
Where men, like locusts, darkened all the land,
As marched they toward the place that's treacherous,
And shippes, that eke did follow the command,
Like forests, motion-got, doe walk along the strand.
Fierce battails ther were fought upon the ground,
Thatte rob'd the heavens alle in ayer dunne;
And shoke the world as doth the thunder's sound,
Till, soth to say, it well-nigh was undone:
But of them alle, ther is an one
That frayle pen dispairs for to descrive,
Which mortalls call the Battail of Bull Run;
But why I mote ne tell, as I'm alive,
Unless it haply be ther running did most thrive.
LAWRENCE MINOT.
'Our Orientalist' appears this month with
EGYPT IN TWENTY-FOUR HOURS
BY A FAST TRAVELER
'You ought to go to the East,' said Mr. Swift, with a wave of his hand; 'I've been there, and seen it under peculiar circumstances.'
'Explain, O howaga! Give us the facts.
'Immediately. Just place the punch-pitcher where I can reach it easily. That's right! Light another Cabañas. So; now for it. In 1858, month of December, I was settled in comfortable quarters in the Santa Lucia, Naples, and fully expected to winter there at my ease, when, to my disgust, I received letters from England, briefly ordering me by first steamer to Alexandria, thence per railroad to Cairo, there to see the head of a certain banking-house; transact my business, and return to Naples with all possible dispatch. No sooner said than done; there was one of the Messagérie steamers up for Malta next day; got my passport visaed, secured berth, all right. Next night I was steaming it past Stromboli, next morning in Messina; then Malta, where I found steamer up for Alexandria that night; in four days was off that port, at six o'clock in the morning, and at half-past eight o'clock was in the cars, landing in Cairo at four o'clock in the afternoon. Posted from the railroad-station to the banker's, saw my man, arranged my business, was to receive instructions at seven o'clock the next morning, and at eight o'clock take the return train to Alexandria, where a steamer was to sail next day, that would carry me back to Naples, presto! as the jugglers say.
'There, breathe a little, and take another glass of punch, while I recall my day in the East.
'Through at the banker's, he recommended me to the Hotel –, where I would find a good table, clean rooms, and none of my English compatriots. I love my native land and my countrymen in it, but as for them out of it, and as Bohemians—ugh! I am too much of a wolf myself to love wolves. Arrived at the hotel, with my head swimming with palm-trees, railroad, turbans, tarbooshes, veiled women, camels, pipes, dust, donkeys, oceans of blue calico, groaning water-wheels, the Nile, far-off view of the Pyramids, etc., I at once asked the headwaiter for a room, water, towels; he passed me into the hands of a very tall Berber answering to the name of Yusef, who was dressed in flowing garments and tarboosh, and who was one of the gentlest beings entitled to wear breeches I have ever seen; he had feet that in my recollection seem a yard long, and how he managed to move so noiselessly, unless both pedals were soft-shod, worries me to the present time. Well, at six o'clock the gong sounded for dinner, and out I went over marble floors to the dining hall, where I found only three other guests, who saluted me courteously when I entered, and at a signal from Yusef, a compromise between a bow and a salaam, we seated ourselves at table. Of the three guests, one was particularly a marked man, apart from his costume, that of a cavalry officer in the Pacha's service; there was something grand in his face, large blue eyes, full of humor and bonhommie, a prominent nose, a broad forehead, burned brown with the sun, his head covered with the omnipresent tarboosh, a mustache like Cartouche's; such was my vis-à-vis at the hotel-table.
'In conversation with this officer, it turned up that one of my most intimate friends was his cousin, and so we had a bottle of old East-India pale sherry over that; then we had another to finally cement our acquaintance; I said finally—I should say, finally for dinner.
'I have seen the interiors of more than three hundred hotels in Europe, Africa, and America; but I have yet to see one that appeared so outrageously romantic as that of the Hotel –, at Cairo, after that second bottle of sherry! The divans on which we reposed, the curious interlacing of the figures on the ceiling, the raised marble floor at the end of the room overlooking the street, the arabesques on the doors, and finally the never-ending masquerade-ball going on in the street under the divans where we sat and smoked.
'I can't tell you how it happened, but after very small cups of very black coffee and a pousse café, in the officer's room, of genuine kirschwasser and good curaçoa, I was mounted on a bay horse; there was a dapple-gray alongside of me; and running ahead of us, to clear the way, the officer's sais afoot, ready to hold our horses when we halted. We were quickly mounted and off like the wind, past turbans, flowing bournouses, tarbooshes, past grand old mosques, petty cafés, where the faithful were squatting on bamboo-seats, smoking pipes or drinking coffee-grounds, while listening to a storyteller, possibly relating some story in the Arabian Nights; then we were through the bazaars, all closed now and silent; then up in the citadel, and through the mosque of Yusef; then down and scouring over the flying sand among the grand old tombs of the Mamelukes and of the caliphs; then off at break-neck speed toward the Mokatamma mountains, from a rise on the lower spur of one of which we saw, in the shadow of the coming night, the Pyramids and the slow-flowing Nile.
'Again we were in Cairo, and now threading narrow street after street, the fall of our horses' hoofs hardly heard on the unpaved ways, as we were passing under overhanging balconies covered with lace-work lattices. As it grew darker, our sais preceded us with lighted lantern, shouting to pedestrians, blind and halt, to clear the road for the coming effendis.
'Halte la!
'My foaming bay was reined in with a strong hand, I leaped from the saddle, and found the sais at hand to hold our horses, while we saw the seventh heaven of the Koran, and by no means al Hotama.
'With a foresight indicating an old campaigner, the officer produced a couple of bottles of sherry from the capacious folds of the sais' mantle, and unlocking the door of the house in front of which we stood, invited me to enter. Two or three turns, a court-yard full of rose-bushes, and an enormous palm-tree, a fountain shooting up its sparkling waters in the moonlight, a clapping of hands, chibouks, sherry cooled in the fountain.
'Then, in the moonlight, the gleam of white flowing garments, the nervous thrill breathed in from perfumes filling the evening air; the great swimming eyes; the kiss; the ah!—other bottles of sherry. The fingans of coffee, the pipe of Latakiah tobacco, the blowing a cloud into dreamland, while Fatima or Zoe insists on taking a puff with you.
'But as she said, 'Hathih al-kissah moaththirah, which, in the vernacular, is. 'This history is affecting,' so let us pass it by. We finished those two bottles of sherry, and if Mohammed, in his majesty, refuses admittance to two Peris into paradise, because they drank sherry that night, let the sins be on our shoulders, WE are to blame.
'Next morning, at seven o'clock, I was at the banker's, and received his orders, and at six o'clock that evening was steaming out of Alexandria, bound to Naples via Malta. A little over twenty-four hours, and I had SEEN THE ORIENT THROUGH SHERRY—pale, golden, and serenely beautiful!
'Pass the punch.'
Very welcome is our pleasant contributor—he who of late discoursed on 'honeyed thefts' and rural religious discipline—and now, in the present letter, he gives us his views on meals, feeds, banquets, symposia, or by whatever name the reader may choose to designate assemblies for the purpose of eating.
Please make room at this table, right here, for me. Surely at a table of such dimensions, there should be plenty of room. Many a table-scene do I now recall, in days gone by, 'all of which I saw, and part of which I was,' but nothing like this. Tables of all sorts and sizes, but never a CONTINENTAL table before. I suppose the nearest approach to it was the picnic dinner the wee youngsters used to eat off the ground! A CONTINENTAL table! The most hospitable idea imaginable. Give place! Do you demand my credentials, my card, my ticket? Here we have it all; a little note from mine host, Mr. LELAND, inviting the bearer to this monthly repast, and requesting, very properly—it was the way we always did, when we used to get up picnics—that the receiver of the note bring some sort of refreshments along. Thank you. This seat is very comfortable. What more appropriate, at such a time, than the discussion of the Meal?
I protest I am no glutton; in fact, I despise the man whose meal-times are the epochs of his life; yet I frankly confess to emotions of a very positive character, in contemplating the associations of the table, and I admit farther, that I take pleasure in the reality as well as in the imagination. I like to be 'one of the company,' whether in palace or in farm-house. I always brighten up when I see the dining-room door thrown open to an angle hospitably obtuse, and am pleased alike with the politely-worded request, 'Will the ladies and gentlemen please walk out and partake of some refreshments?' or the blunt, kindly voice of mine host, 'Come, friends; dinner's ready.' Still I assert my freedom from any slavish fondness for the creature comforts. It is not the bill of fare that so pleases me. In fact, some of the best meals of which I have ever partaken, were those the materials of which I could not have remembered twenty minutes after. Exquisite palatal pleasures, then, are not a sine qua non in the enjoyment of table comforts. No, indeed. There is a condiment which is calculated to impart a high relish to the humblest fare; but without this charmed seasoning, every banquet is a failure. Solomon was a man of nice observation, even in so humble a matter as a meal. Let him reveal the secret in his own words: 'Better is a dinner of herbs, where LOVE is, than a stalled ox and hatred therewith.'
By a merciful arrangement of Providence, man is so constituted that he may think, talk, and eat, all at one and the same time. Hence, the table is often the scene of animated and very interesting conversations, provided love is there. Many of our Saviour's most interesting and instructive discourses were delivered while 'sitting at meat,' and the 'table-talk' of some authors is decidedly the most meritorious of all their performances.
But the truth is, there are not many meals where love is entirely absent. Cheerfulness is naturally connected with eating; eating begets it probably. It is difficult for a man to eat at all, if he is in a bad humor. Quite impossible, if he is in a rage; especially if he is obliged to sit down to his dinner in company with the man he hates. There are so many little kind offices that guests must perform for each other at table, so many delicate compliments may be paid to those we love or revere, by polite attentions to them, and so necessary, indeed, have these become to our notion of a satisfactory repast, that to banish such amiable usages from our tables would be not only to degrade us to the level of the brute, but would deprive us of a most humanising and refining means of enjoyment. How beautiful and necessary, then, is the arrangement by which, morning, noon, and night, (I pity folks who only eat twice a day,) the members of the household are brought together in such kindly intercourse around the family board! How seldom would they assemble thus pleasantly, were it not for the meal!
The little wounds and scratches which the sharp edges of our characters will inflict upon each other, when brought together in the necessary contact of daily intercourse, would otherwise be suffered to fret and vex us sorely; but before they have had time to fester and inflame, meal-time comes, and brings with it the magic, mollifying oil.
It is meet, then, (we spell the word with two e's, mind you,) that, on any occasion of public rejoicing, the banquet should be an indispensable accompaniment. The accomplishment of some important public enterprise, the celebration of the birth-days of great and good men, a nation's holidays, the reünions of friends engaged in a common cause, are occasions in which the dinner, very properly, constitutes one of the leading features.
And what can be more exhilarating than the innocent mirthfulness, the unaffected kindnesses, the witty speeches, the sprightly conversations which are universally incident to such occasions? No wonder Lycurgus decreed that the Spartans should eat in public. Ostensibly, it was for the sake of the grave conversations of the elders at such times, but really, I imagine, it was to keep the citizens (who had been at swords' points with each other) in a good humor, by bringing them around a common table.
He knew that if any thing would soften their mutual asperities and cultivate mutual good feeling, such a measure would. Would it not be well for modern times to take a hint here? Had I been appointed architect of the Capitol, I think I could have saved the feuds which long ago sprang up, and which have resulted in, and will yet bring about, alas! we know not how much bloodshed. I would have constructed a couple of immense dining-rooms, with all the necessary appurtenances. Just to think how different would have been the aspect of things in the chamber where Sumner once lay bleeding, and in the hall where a gentleman, in a mêlée, 'stubbed his toe and fell!' There would have been Mr. Breckinridge, in a canopied seat at the head of one of the tables, rapping the Senate to order with his knife-handle, and Mr. Orr at the head of the other, uncovering an immense tureen, with the remark that 'the House will now proceed to business!' How strange it would be to hear any angry debate at such a time! Imagine a Congressman helping himself to a batter-cake and at the same time calling his brother-member a liar! or throwing down his napkin, by way of challenge to 'the gentleman on the opposite side of the table!' Think of Keitt politely handing Grow the cream-pitcher, and attempting to knock him down before the meal was dispatched. Had the discussion of the Lecompton Constitution been carried on simultaneously with that of a couple of dozen roast turkeys, I sometimes think we might have avoided this war.
Not only in public but in private rejoicings, is the table the scene of chief enjoyment. When was it that the fatted calf was killed? On what occasion was the water turned into wine? What better way to rejoice over the return of a long-absent one than to meet him around the hospitable table? Ye gods! let your mouths water! There's a feast ahead for our brave soldiers, when they come home from this war, that will make your tables look beggarly. I refer to that auspicious moment when the patriot now baring his bosom to the bloody brunt of war, shall sit down once more to the table, in his own dear home, however humble, and partake of the cheerful meal in peace, with his wife and his little ones about him. Oh! for the luxury of that first meal! I almost feel as if I could endure the hardships of the fierce campaign that precedes it.
There is no memory so pleasant to me as that of the annual reünion of my aunts and uncles, with their respective troops of cousins, at the house of my dear grandmother of blessed memory. It was pleasant to watch the conveyances one by one coming in, laden with friends who had traveled many a weary mile to be present on the great occasion. It was pleasant to witness the mutual recognitions of brothers and sisters with their respective wives and husbands; to observe the transports of the little fellows, in their hearty greetings, after a twelve months' separation, and to hear their expressions of mingled surprise and delight on being introduced to the strange little cousins, whose presence increased the number considerably above the preceding census. But the culminating point was yet to come. That was attained when all the brothers and sisters had gathered around the great long table, just as they did when they were children, with their dear mother at the head, surveying the scene in quiet enjoyment, and one of the 'older boys' at the foot, to ask a blessing. There were the waffle-cakes, baked in the irons which had furnished every cake for that table for the last quarter of a century. There was the roast-turkey, which grandma had been putting through a generous system of dietetics for weeks, preparatory to this occasion. It rested on the same old turkey-plate, with its two great birds sitting on a rose-bush, and by its side was the great old carving-knife, which had from time immemorial been the instrument of dissection on such occasions. And there was maple-molasses from Uncle D–'s 'sugar-camp,' and cheese from Aunt N–'s press, and honey from Uncle T–'s hives, and oranges which Aunt I–, who lived in the city, had provided, and all contained in the old-fashioned plates and dishes of a preceding generation.
I discover I am treating my subject in a very desultory manner. Perhaps I should have stated that under the head of the complete genus, meal, there are three distinct species, public, social, and private. That the grand banquet, celebrating some great man's birth, or the success of some noble public enterprise, with its assemblages of the great and the good from every part of the country; the Fourth of July festival, in honor of our nation's independence, with its speeches, its drums, its toasts, and its cannon; the 'table d'hôte,' or in plain English, the hotel dinner-table, so remarkable for the multitude of its dishes and the meagreness of their contents; the harvest-feast, the exact opposite of the last-named, even to the mellow thirds and fifths that come floating over the valleys from the old-fashioned dinner-horn, calling in the tired laborers; its musical invitation in such striking contrast with the unimagined horrors of the gong that bellows its expectant victims to their meals; the family repast, where one so often feels gratified with the delicate compliment of a mother, a sister, or a wife, in placing some favorite dish or flower near his plate; the annual gatherings of jolly alumni; the delightful concourse of relatives and friends; the gleesome picnic lunch, with its grassy carpet and log seats; the luxurious oyster-supper, with its temptations 'to carry the thing too far;' the festival at the donation-party, which, in common parlance, would be called a dish of 'all sorts;' the self-boarding student's desolate corn-cake, baked in a pan of multifarious use: all these are so many modifications under their respective species.
Let me remark, in conclusion, that there are some meals from which I pray to be delivered. There is the noisy dinner of the country-town tavern or railroad station, where each individual seems particularly anxious that number one should be provided for, and where, in truth, he is obliged often to make pretty vigorous efforts, if he succeeds. Again, have you ever observed how gloomy is the look of those who for the first time gather around the table, after the departure of a friend? The breakfast was earlier than usual, and the dishes were suffered to stand and the beds to go unmade, and housemaid, chamber-maid, cook, and seamstress, all engaged in the mélée of packing up, and of course came in for their share of 'good-bys.' After the guests were fairly off, 'things took a stand-still' for a while. All hands sat down and rested, and looked very blank, and didn't know just where to begin. Slowly, confusion began to relax his hold, and order, by degrees, resumed her sway; (for the life of me, I can't bring myself to determine the genders in any other way.) But when, at last, the dinner-hour came, how strangely silent were the eaters! Ah! if the departed one have gone to his long home, how solemn is this first meeting of the family, after their return to their lonely home! It may be the sire whose place at the head of the table is now vacant, and whose silvery voice we no longer hear humbly invoking the divine blessing; or perhaps the mother, and how studiously we keep our eye away from the seat where her generous hand was wont to pour our tea. Perhaps the little one, the idol of the household, whose chirruping voice was wont to set us all laughing with droll remarks, expressed in baby dialect. How we miss the little high-chair that was always drawn up close by papa!' How our eyes will swim and our hearts swell up and choke us when we see it pushed back into the corner, now silent and vacant! Hast thou not wept thus? Be grateful. Thou hast been spared one of life's keenest pangs.
Thou speakest well. Dr. Doran has pleased us with his Table Traits, but a great book yet remains to be written on the social power of meals. The immortals were never so lordly as when assembled at the celestial table, where inextinguishable laughter went the rounds with the nectar. The heroes of Valhalla were most glorious over the ever-growing roast-boar and never-failing mead. Heine suggests a millennial banquet of all nations, where the French are to have the place of honor, for their improvements in freedom and in cookery, and Master Rabelais could imagine nothing more genial than when in the Moyen de Parvenir, he placed all the gay, gallant, wise, brave, genial, joyous dames and demoiselles, knights, and scholars of all ages at one eternal supper. Ah! yes; it matters but little what is 'gatherounded,' as a quaint Americanism hath it, so that the wit, and smiles, and good-fellowship be there.
It is stated in the newspapers—we know not on what authority—that Charles A. Dana, late of the New-York Tribune, will probably receive an important appointment in the army. A man of iron will, of indomitable energy, undoubted courage, and of an inexhaustible genius, which displays itself by mastering every subject as by intuition, Dana is one whom, of all others, we would wish to see actively employed in the war. We have described him in by-gone days as one who was 'an editor by destiny and a soldier by nature,' and sincerely trust that his career will yet happily confer upon him military honors. No man in America—we speak advisedly—has labored more assiduously, or with more sterling honest conviction in politics, than Charles A. Dana. The influence which he has exerted has been immense, and it is fit that it be recognized. Men who, like him, combine stern integrity with vigorous practical talent, have a claim to lead.
Among the most striking songs which the war has brought forth, we must class that grim Puritanical lyric, 'The Kansas John Brown,' which appeared originally in the Kansas Herald, and which is, as we are informed, extensively sung in the army. The words are as follows:
THE KANSAS JOHN BROWN SONG
Old John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the grave,
While the bondmen all are weeping whom he ventured for to save;
But though he lost his life a-fighting for the slave,
His soul is marching on.
Glory, glory, Hallelujah!
Glory, glory, Hallelujah!
Glory, glory, Hallelujah!
His soul is marching on.
John Brown was a hero undaunted, true and brave,
And Kansas knew his valor when he fought her rights to save;
And now, though the grass grows green above his grave,
His soul is marching on.
He captured Harper's Ferry with his nineteen men so few,
And frightened Old Virginia till she trembled through and through;
They hung him for a traitor—themselves a traitor crew,
But his soul is marching on.
John Brown was John the Baptist of the Christ we are to see;
CHRIST, who of the bondmen shall the Liberator be;
And soon through all the South the slaves shall all be free,
For his soul goes marching on.
John Brown he was a soldier—a soldier of the LORD;
John Brown he was a martyr—a martyr to the WORD;
And he made the gallows holy when he perished by the cord,
For his soul goes marching on.
The battle that John Brown begun, he looks from heaven to view,
On the army of the Union with its flag, red, white and blue;
And the angels shall sing hymns o'er the deeds we mean to do,
As we go marching on!
Ye soldiers of JESUS, then strike it while you may,
The death-blow of Oppression in a better time and way,
For the dawn of Old John Brown is a-brightening into day,
And his soul is marching on.
Glory, glory, Hallelujah!
Glory, glory, Hallelujah!
Glory, glory, Hallelujah!
His soul is marching on.
There! if the soldiers of Cromwell and of Ireton had any lyric to beat that, we should like to see it. Among its rough and rude rhymes gleams out a fierce fire which we supposed was long since extinct. Verily, old Father Puritan is not dead yet, neither does he sleep; and to judge from what we have heard of the effects of this song among the soldiers, we should say that grim Old John Brown himself, far from perishing, is even now terribly alive. There is something fearful in the inspiration which can inspire songs like this.
'GALLI VAN T' is welcome, and will be 'welcomer' when he again visits us in another letter like this:
DEAR CONTINENTAL: I have a friend who is not an artful man, though he be full of art; and yesterday evening he told me the following:
'In my early days, when I took views of burly farmers and their bouncing daughters in oil, and painted portraits of their favorite horses for a very moderate honorarium, and in short, was the artist of a small country town—why, then, to tell the truth, I was held to be one of the greatest painters in existence. Since studying abroad, and settling down in New-York mdash;—'
'And getting your name up among the first,' I added.
'Never mind that—I'm not 'the greatest painter that ever lived' here. But in Spodunk, I was. Folks 'admired to see me.' I was a man that 'had got talent into him,' and the village damsels invited me to tea. There were occasional drawbacks, to be sure. One day a man who had heard that I had painted Doctor Hewls's house, called and asked me what I would charge to paint his little 'humsted.' I offered to do it for twenty dollars.
'He gave me a shrewd gimlet-look and said:
'Find your own paint—o' course?'
''Of course,' I replied. What color?'
''Why, the same color you now have,' was my astonished answer.
''Wall, I don't know. My wife kind o' thinks that turtle-color would suit our house better than Spanish brown. You put on two coats, of course?'
'I now saw what he meant, and roaring with laughter, explained to him that there was a difference between apainter of houses and a house-painter.
'One morning I was interrupted by a grim, Herculean, stern-looking young fellow—one who was manifestly a man of facts—who, with a brief introduction of himself, asked if I could teach 'the pictur business.' I signified my assent, and while talking of terms, continued painting away at a landscape. I noticed that my visitor glanced at my work at first as if puzzled, and then with an air of contempt. Finally he inquired:
'''S that the way you make your pictures?'
''That is it,' I replied.
''Do you have to keep workin' it in, bit by bit, slow—like as a gal works woosted-patterns?'
''Yes, and sometimes much slower, to paint well.'
''How long 'll it take to learn your trade?'
''Well, if you've any genius for it, you may become a tolerable artist in two years.'
''Two—thunder! Why, a man could learn to make shoes, in that time!'
''Very likely. There is not one man in a hundred, who can make shoes, who would ever become even a middling sort of artist.'
''Darn paintin'!' was the reply of my visitor, as he took up his club to depart—his hat had not been removed during the whole of the visit. 'Darn paintin'! I thought you did the thing with stencils, and finished it up with a comb and a scraper. Mister, I don't want to hurt your feeling—but cordin' to my way o' thinkin', paintin' as you do it, an't a trade at all—it's nothin' but a darned despisable fine art!'
'And with this candid statement of his views, my lost pupil turned to go. I burst out laughing. He turned around squarely, and presenting an angry front not unlike that of a mad bull, inquired abruptly, as he glared at me:
''Maybe you'd like to paint my portrit?'
'I looked at him steadily in the eyes, as I gravely took up my spatula, (I knew he thought it some deadly kind of dagger,) and answered:
''I don't paint animals.
'He gave me a parting look, and abscondulated.' When I saw him last, he was among the City Fathers! GALLI VAN T.'
