“Ah, my dear boy,” said he, “I have to-day listen to one ver’ excellent narratif by ze reverence preacher. It was about David and Nasan. You see Nasan he vish to make to David one grand reproof. So Nasan he come to David one day, and tell to him one ver’ long, big sheep story. He fool David—Nasan do—wiz ze story of ze sheep and ze big rich man zat steal ze sheep of ze poor man, till by and by David become ver’[ver’] moche interest in ze narratif—become ver’ much enrage wiz ze rich man. Wiz zat, and precisement at zat moment, Nasan he jump up on ze top of a bench and he proclaim to David: ‘Zou art ze man! I see ze wool in you teef!’ Ah, my boy, zat was one gran’ reproof—one ver’ big what you call sell, on Monsieur David—eh?”
“Uncle Pete,” the curb-stone philosopher, always had his “say” on all topics of the day, and he also looked after the welfare of such of the rising generation as fell in his way. His disciples were generally of the genus “hoodlum.” Propped at ease against a favorite lamp-post, with one of these before him, he would say: “Young man, don’t you go to strivin’ for a big name, or frettin’ yourself to make a mark in the world. It’s all wanity and wexation of spirit.[spirit.] Study to become a philosopher. Look at me! Life has no terrors for me; yet I toil not, neither do I spin. To live without care is my philosophy. That’s a motto to live up to. All else is wanity. What does a man get by doin’ things, makin’ inwentions and the like? Nuthin.
“Look at Christopher Columbus! What does he get for the trouble he had in discovering America? He gits called a swindler and a imposture. He had all his trouble for nuthin’, for they have found out that he wasn’t the feller that discovered America after all. It was some Laplander—one of them fellers away up north. But he never said nuthin’ about it until lately. The next generation will find out that the Laplander was a humbug.
“What does William H. Shakespeare git for the trouble he had in writin’ them plays o’ his? He gits busted out intirely. They now say there never was no sich man as William H. Shakespeare, and I believe ’em. No one man could a-done it.
“What[“What] was the use of William Tell shootin’ old Geyser? He run a big risk of passin’ in his own checks, and now they say there never was no sich man. He’d better staid up in the mountains and prospected.
“See the life that Robinson Crusoe led on that ‘lone barren isle,’ as the song says, and now they say there never was no Crusoe.
“Young man, don’t you never try to discover America, nor the steam-engine, nor the cotton-gin, nor the telegraft—as old Moss did—’cause you’ll find out when its too late to be of any benefit to you that it wasn’t you at all, but some other jackass that died before you was born, and don’t know whether he ever done anything or not. Lead the life of a philosopher, young man. Get all you can out of the world, and never do nothin’ for the world—then you are ahead of the world and are a true philosopher!” The disciples of Uncle Pete are many and promising.
The inebriated individual who took his friend by the button and read to him the following lecture on matrimony, was also something of a philosopher: “Now, don’t get married, Afferd—don’t git married! If you git married yer gone up the flume—busted out. You won’t be married a week ’fore yer wife’ll put on her worst shoes and stick ’em rite up on the stove under your nose. When she gits all the clothes she wants, she’ll have a sick sister down to San Jose; wants two hunerd fifty dollar go see’r poor sisser. Goes; sisser dies; father-in-lor straitened sirkstances; wants two hunerd fifty more—bury poor sisser. Goes into hunerd fifty dollar wuth mournin’, then wants more money to come home on. Comes home’n calls you nassy, dirty, drunken beas’—don’t you git married, Afferd—don’t!”
This man should have had a dog such as that owned by the ranchman on Truckee Meadows. This rancher once brought his dog to Virginia City. The dog rode into town by the side of his master on a load of potatoes. He was not a pretty dog.[dog.] He was a tall, gaunt, shaggy-haired, wild-eyed, brindle beast of unrecorded pedigree. When the wagon halted in town some men who were lounging in the neighborhood began to remark upon the ungainly appearance of the countryman’s dog.
“Fellers,” said the owner of the animal, coming to the front, “that air ain’t a purty dog, I know—he’s like me, makes no pertentions to nat’ral beauty—but he’s jist the durndest knowenest dog what ever wore har. Now, he’s got more instink, that dog has, an’ more savey, an’ pen’tration into human natur, right in that ugly old cabeza of his, nor can be found in the heds of a whole plaza full of eddicated town dogs—poodles and sich.