Oh, you cunning little curly-headed, fairy-footed, dimple-limbed pet! Who is blessed enough to own you? Did you know, you little human blossom, that I was aunt to all the children in creation? Your eyes are as blue as the violets, and your little pouting lip might tempt a bee from a rose. Did mamma make you that dainty little kirtle? and papa find you that horsewhip?
“Papa is dead, and mamma is dead, too. Mamma can’t see Charley any more.”
God bless your sweet helplessness! creep into my arms, Charley. My darling, you are never alone!—mamma’s sweet, tender eyes look lovingly on Charley out of Heaven; mamma’s bright angel wings ever overshadow little Charley’s head; mamma and the holy stars keep watch over Charley’s slumbers. Mamma sings a sweeter song when little Charley says a prayer. Going?—well, then, one kiss; for sure I am, the angels will want you before long.
What is that? A sick gentleman, borne in on a litter, from shipboard. Poor fellow! how sunken are his great dark eyes! how emaciated his limbs! What can ail him? Nobody knows; not a word of English can he speak; and the captain is already off, too happy to rid himself of all responsibility. Lucky for the poor invalid that our gallant host has a heart warm and true. How tenderly he lifts the invalid to his room; how expeditiously he despatches his orders for a Spanish doctor and nurse; how imploringly the sufferer’s speaking eyes are fastened upon his face. Ah! Death glides in at yonder door with the sick man; his grasp is already on his heart; the doctor stands aside and folds his hands—there’s no work for him to do; dark shadows gather round the dying stranger’s eyes; he presses feebly the hand of his humane host, and gasps out the last fluttering breath on that manly heart. Strange hands are busy closing his eyes; strange hands straighten his limbs; a strange priest comes all too late to shrive the sick man’s soul; strange eyes gaze carelessly upon the features, one glimpse of which were worth Golconda’s mines to far-off kindred. Now the undertaker comes with the coffin. Touch him gently, man of business; lay those dark locks tenderly on the satin pillow; hear you not a far-off wail from sunny Spain, as the merry song at the vintage feast dies upon the lip of the stricken-hearted?
CITY SCENES AND CITY LIFE.
NUMBER FOUR—BARNUM’S POULTRY SHOW.
Defend my ears! Do you suppose Noah had to put up with such a cackling and crowing as this in his ark? I trust ear-trumpets are cheap, for I stand a chance of becoming as deaf as a husband, when his wife asks him for money.
I have always hated a rooster; whether from his perch, before daylight, he shrilly, spitefully, and unnecessarily, recalled me from rosy dreams to stupid realities; or when strolling at the head of his hang-dog looking seraglio of hens, he stood poised on one foot, gazing back at the meek procession with an air that said, as plain as towering crests and tail feathers could say it, “Stir a foot if you dare, till I give you the signal!”—at which demonstration I looked instinctively about, for a big stone, to take the nonsense out of him!
Save us, what a crowd! There are more onions here than patchouli, more worsted wrappers than Brummel neck-ties, and more brogans than patent leather. Most of the visitors gaze at the perches through barn-yard spectacles. For myself, I don’t care an egg-shell, whether that old “Shanghai” knew who her grandfather was or not, or whether those “Dorkings” were ever imprudent enough to let their young affections rove from their native roost. Yankee eyes were made to be used, and the first observation mine take is, that those gentlemen fowls seem to have reversed the order of things here in New York, being very superior in point of beauty to the feminines. Of course they know it. See them strut! There never was a masculine yet whom you could enlighten on such a point.
Now, were I a hen (which, thank the parish register, I am not), I would cross my claws, succumb to that tall Polander, with his crested helmet of black and white feathers, and share his demonstrative perch.
Oh, you pretty little “carrier doves!” I could find a use for you. Do you ever tap-tap at the wrong window, you little snow-flakes? Have you learned the secret of soaring above the heads of your enemies? Are you impregnable to bribes, in the shape of food?