landlord's distended jaws, and went away.
Returning about midnight, he took off his boots outside, so as not to awaken his friend, entered softly, knocked away the prop, and prepared to turn in. But the noise of pounding on the rail had aroused the householder, and so great was the feeling of relief induced by the relaxation of the maxillary muscles, that he unconsciously shut his mouth to smile, without giving his tenant time to get into the bedroom. The Doctor was just stooping to untie his drawers, when he was caught between the floor and ceiling, like a lemon in a squeezer.
Next day the melancholy remains were given up to our informant, who displays a singular reticence regarding his disposition of them; merely picking his teeth with his claws in an absent, thoughtful kind of way, as if the subject were too mournful to be discussed in all its harrowing details.
None of the Doctor's maps or instruments were recovered; his bereaved landlord holds them as security for certain rents claimed to be due and unpaid. It is probable that Great Britain will make a stern demand for them, and if they are not at once surrendered will-submit her claim to a Conference.
…. The prim young maidens who affiliate with the Young Men's Christian Association of San Francisco-who furnish the posies for their festivals, and assist in the singing of psalms-have a gymnasium in the temple. Thither they troop nightly to display their skill in turning inside out and shutting themselves up like jack-knives of the gentler kind.
Here may be seen the godly Rachel and the serious Ruth, suspended by their respective toes between the heaven to which they aspire and the wicked world they do abhor. Here the meek-eyed Hannah, pendent from the horizontal bar, doubleth herself upon herself and stares fixedly backward from between her shapely limbs, a thing of beauty and a joy for several minutes. Mehitable Ann, beloved of young Soapenlocks, vaults lightly over a barrier and with unspoken prayer lays hold on the unstable trapeze mounting aloft in air. Jerusha, comeliest of her sex, ties herself in a double bow-knot, and meditates upon the doctrine of election.
O, blessed temple of grace divine! O, innocence and youth and simple faith! O, water and molasses and unsalted butter! O, niceness absolute and godly whey! Would that we were like unto these ewe lambs, that we might frisk and gambol among them without evil. Would that we were female, and Christian, and immature, with a flavour as of green grass and a hope in heaven. Then would we, too, sing hymns through our blessed nose, and contort and musculate with much satisfaction of soul, even in the gymnasium of The Straight-backed.
…. Some raging iconoclast, after having overthrown religion by history, upset history by science, and then toppled over science, has now laid his impious hands upon babies' nursing bottles.
'The tubes of these infernal machines,' says this tearing beast, 'are composed of india-rubber dissolved in bisulphide of carbon, and thickened with lead, resin, and sometimes oxysulphuret of antimony, from which, when it comes in contact with the milk, sulphuretted hydrogen is evolved, and lactate of lead formed in the stomach.'
This logic is irresistible. Granting only that the tubes are made in that simple and intelligible manner (and anybody can see for himself that they are), the sulphuretted hydrogen and the lactate of lead follow (down the osophagus) as a logical sequence. But the scientific horror seems to be profoundly unaware that these substances are not only harmless to the child, but actually nutritious and essential to its growth. Not only so, but nature has implanted in its breast an instinctive craving for these very comforts. Often have we seen some wee thing turn disgusted from the breast and lift up its thin voice: 'Not for Joseph; give me the bottle with the oxysulphuret of antimony tube. I take sulphuretted hydrogen and lactate of lead in mine every time!' And we have said: 'Nature is working in that darling. What God hath joined together let no man put asunder!'
And we have thought of the wicked iconoclast.
…. There are a lot of evil-minded horses about the city, who seem to take a fiendish delight in letting fly their heels at whomsoever they catch in a godly reverie unconscious of their proximity. This is perfectly natural and human, but it is annoying to be always getting horse-kicked when one is not in a mood for it.
The worst of it is, these horses always manage it so as to get tethered across the sidewalk in the most populous thoroughfares, where they at once drop into the semblance of a sound slumber. By this means they lure the unsuspecting to their doom, and just as some unconscious pedestrian is passing astern of them they wake up, and without a preliminary yawn, or even a warning shake of the tail like the more chivalrous rattlesnake, they at once discharge their feet at him with a rapidity and effect that are quite surprising if the range be not too long. Usually this occurs in Merchant-street, below Montgomery, and the damage is merely nominal; some worthless Italian fisherman, market gardener, or decayed gentleman oozing out of a second-class restaurant being the only sufferer.
Rut not infrequently these playful brutes get themselves tethered in some fashionable promenade, and the consequence is demoralizing to white people. We speak within the limits of possibility when we say that we have seen no less than seven women and children in the air at once, impelled heavenward by as many consecutive kicks of a single skilled operator. No longer ago than we can remember we saw an aged party in spectacles and a clawhammer coat gyrating through the air like an irregular bolt shot out of a catapult. Before we could ascertain from him the site of the quadruped from whom he had received his impulsion, he had passed like a vague dream, and the equine scoundrel went unwhipped of justice.
These flying squadrons are serious inconveniences to public travel; it is conducive to profanity to have a whizzing young woman, a rattling old man, or a singing baby flung against one's face every few moments by the hoofs of some animal whom one has never injured, and who is a perfect stranger.
It ought to be stopped.
…. In the telegraphic account of a distressing railway accident in New York, we find the following:—'The body of Mr. Germain was identified by his business partner, John Austin, who seemed terribly affected by his loss.'
O, reader, how little we think upon the fearful possibilities hidden away in the womb of the future. Any day may snatch from our life its light. One moment we were happy in the possession of some dear object, about which to twine the tendrils of the heart; the next, we cower and shiver in the chill gloom of a bereavement that withers the soul and makes existence an intolerable burden! To-day all nature smiles with a sunny warmth, and life spreads before us a wilderness of sweets; to-morrow-we lose our business partner!
…. Mr. J. L. Dummle, one of our most respected citizens, left his home to go, as he said, to his office. There was nothing unusual in his demeanour, and he appeared to be in his customary health and spirits. It is not known that there was anything in his financial or domestic affairs to make life distasteful to him. About half an hour after parting with his family, he was seen conversing with a friend at the corner of Kearny and Sutter-streets, from which point he seems to have gone directly to the Vallejo-street wharf. He was here seen by the captain of the steamer New World, standing upon the extreme end of the wharf, but the circumstance did not arouse any suspicion in the mind of the Captain, to whom he was well known. At that moment some trivial business diverted the Captain's attention, and he saw Mr. Dummle no more; but it has been ascertained that the latter proceeded directly home, where he may now be seen by any one desiring to obtain further particulars of the melancholy event here narrated.
Mr. Dummle speaks of it with perfect frankness and composure.
…. In deference to a time-worn custom, on the first day of the year the writer swore to, affixed a revenue stamp upon, and recorded the following document:—
'I will not, during this year, utter a profane word-unless in sport-without having been previously vexed by something.
'I will murder no one that does not offend me, except for his money.
'I will commit highway robbery upon none but small school children, and then only under the stimulus of present or prospective hunger.
'I will not bear false witness against my neighbour where nothing is to be made by it.
'I will be as moral and religious as the law shall compel me to be.
'I will run away with no man's wife without her full and free consent, and never, no never, so help me heaven! will I take his children along.
'I wont write any wicked slanders against anybody, unless by refraining I should sacrifice a good joke.
'I wont beat any cripples who do not come fooling about me when I am busy; and I will give all my neighbours' boots to the poor.'
….A town in Vermont has a society of young men, formed for the express purpose of rescuing young ladies from drowning. We warn these gentlemen that we will not accept even honorary membership in their concern; we do not sympathize with the movement. Upon several occasions we have stood by and seen young ladies' noses
