I believe that story is new, although perhaps it is not of an uproariously mirthful character; but one hears stories at the store that are old enough, goodness knows—stories which, no doubt, diverted Methuselah in the sunny days of his giddy and thoughtless boyhood.
There is an exciting scene at the store occasionally. Yesterday an athletic peasant, in a state of beer, smashed in a counter and emptied two tubs of butter on the floor. His father—a white-haired old man, who was a little boy when the Revolutionary war closed, but who doesn't remember Washington MUCH, came round in the evening and settled for the damages. "My son," he said, "has considerable originality." I will mention that this same son once told me that he could lick me with one arm tied behind him, and I was so thoroughly satisfied he could, that I told him he needn't mind going for a rope.
Sometimes I go a-visiting to a farmhouse, on which occasions the parlor is opened. The windows have been close-shut ever since the last visitor was there, and there is a dingy smell that I struggle as calmly as possible with, until I am led to the banquet of steaming hot biscuit and custard pie. If they would only let me sit in the dear old-fashioned kitchen, or on the door-stone—if they knew how dismally the new black furniture looked—but, never mind, I am not a reformer. No, I should rather think not.
Gloomy enough, this living on a farm, you perhaps say, in which case you are wrong. I can't exactly say that I pant to be an agriculturist, but I do know that in the main it is an independent, calmly happy sort of life. I can see how the prosperous farmer can go joyously a-field with the rise of the sun, and how his heart may swell with pride over bounteous harvests and sleek oxen. And it must be rather jolly for him on winter evenings to sit before the bright kitchen fire and watch his rosy boys and girls as they study out the charades in the weekly paper, and gradually find out why my first is something that grows in a garden, and my second is a fish.
On the green hillside over yonder there is a quivering of snowy drapery, and bright hair is flashing in the morning sunlight. It is recess, and the Seminary girls are running in the tall grass.
A goodly seminary to look at outside, certainly, although I am pained to learn, as I do on unprejudiced authority, that Mrs. Higgins, the Principal, is a tyrant, who seeks to crush the girls and trample upon them; but my sorrow is somewhat assuaged by learning that Skimmerhorn, the pianist, is perfectly splendid.
Looking at these girls reminds me that I, too, was once young—and where are the friends of my youth? I have found one of 'em, certainly. I saw him ride in the circus the other day on a bareback horse, and even now his name stares at me from yonder board-fence, in green, and blue, and red, and yellow letters. Dashington, the youth with whom I used to read the able orations of Cicero, and who, as a declaimer on exhibition days, used to wipe the rest of us boys pretty handsomely out—well, Dashington is identified with the halibut and cod interest—drives a fish cart, in fact, from a certain town on the coast, back into the interior. Hurbertson, the utterly stupid boy—the lunkhead, who never had his lesson—he's about the ablest lawyer a sister State can boast. Mills is a newspaper man, and is just now editing a Major-General down South.
Singlinson, the sweet-voiced boy, whose face was always washed and who was real good, and who was never rude—HE is in the penitentiary for putting his uncle's autograph to a financial document. Hawkins, the clergyman's son, is an actor, and Williamson, the good little boy who divided his bread and butter with the beggarman, is a failing merchant, and makes money by it. Tom Slink, who used to smoke short-sixes and get acquainted with the little circus boys, is popularly supposed to be the proprietor of a cheap gaming establishment in Boston, where the beautiful but uncertain prop is nightly tossed. Be sure, the Army is represented by many of the friends of my youth, the most of whom have given a good account of themselves. But Chalmerson hasn't done much. No, Chalmerson is rather of a failure. He plays on the guitar and sings love songs. Not that he is a bad man. A kinder-hearted creature never lived, and they say he hasn't yet got over crying for his little curly haired sister who died ever so long ago. But he knows nothing about business, politics, the world, and those things. He is dull at trade—indeed, it is a common remark that "everybody cheats Chalmerson." He came to the party the other evening, and brought his guitar. They wouldn't have him for a tenor in the opera, certainly, for he is shaky in his upper notes; but if his simple melodies didn't gush straight from the heart, why were my trained eyes wet? And although some of the girls giggled, and some of the men seemed to pity him I could not help fancying that poor Chalmerson was nearer heaven than any of us all!
1.37. ABOUT EDITORS.
We hear a great deal, and something too much, about the poverty of editors. It is common for editors to parade their poverty and joke about it in their papers. We see these witticisms almost every day of our lives. Sometimes the editor does the "vater vorks business," as Mr. Samuel Weller called weeping, and makes pathetic appeals to his subscribers. Sometimes he is in earnest when he makes these appeals, but why "on airth" does he stick to a business that will not support him decently? We read of patriotic and lofty-minded individuals who sacrifice health, time, money, and perhaps life, for the good of humanity, the Union, and that sort of thing, but we don't SEE them very often. We must say that we could count up all the lofty patriots in this line that we have ever seen, during our brief but chequered and romantic career, in less than half a day. A man who clings to a wretchedly paying business, when he can make himself and others near and dear to him fatter and happier by doing something else, is about as near an ass as possible, and not hanker after green grass and corn in the ear. The truth is, editors as a class are very well fed, groomed and harnessed. They have some pains that other folk do not have, and they also have some privileges which the community in general can't possess. While we would not advise the young reader to "go for an editor," we assure him he can do much worse. He mustn't spoil a flourishing blacksmith or popular victualler in making an indifferent editor of himself, however. He must be endowed with some fancy and imagination to enchain the public eye. It was Smith, we believe, or some other man with an odd name, who thought Shakespeare lacked the requisite fancy and imagination for a successful editor.