CHAPTER XXIII.
A few days ago when the blistering sun had converted the whole of New York city into one vast bake-oven, Nix called at our office, and proposed a flying trip to a certain watering-place. We will not mention its name for fear of incurring the suspicion of writing puffs. It was, however, sufficiently unfashionable to be tolerably comfortable. In order to reach our destination we took an early steamboat, leaving New York at six o'clock in the morning. With what intense satisfaction we became conscious of possessing lungs as we inhaled the cool air which had been washing itself all night in the great waves of the Atlantic ocean, or sleeping among the pine-woods of Delaware and New Jersey. There is nothing surely which makes one feel more grateful for the gift of life than to breathe the early morning air, laden with the perfume of salt-water. On this occasion the bracing atmosphere gave a relish to everything. The crisp broiled ham, the clam-fritters, and even the miserable coffee we had for breakfast on board, all tasted like food worthy of the gods. And as for our cigars (genuine Havanas) which followed the meal, their incense fairly sent us up to the seventh heaven of delight. But our business is to write on the Art of Amusing, and although an early steamboat trip may be one of the most enjoyable of things, it scarcely comes within the sphere of our work.
When we arrived at the hotel, we found the lady guests were in process of organizing a fair for the benefit of the sufferers by the great Portland fire.
Nix rushed into the enterprise with his usual enthusiasm; and by that evening, when the fair commenced, had fully qualified himself to start in business as a Three-sticks-a-penny-man. This plebeian pastime he had picked up at some English race or fair he had once visited, and now attempted with considerable success to acclimatize in America. His first step was to go to the village store and purchase a number of penknives, jack-knives, pincushions, tobacco-boxes, and similar contraptions. His second care was to cut half-a-dozen hickory-sticks or wands, of about four feet six inches in length, and of the thickness of your middle finger—that is, if you are blest with as spacious a paw as ourself; if not, we feel at a loss how to convey to your mind an approximate idea of the measurement. But suppose you take any healthy Irish day-laborer, and make his third finger the standard, not the part where the knobs are, but the spaces between them. Well, Nix cut six sticks of about the thickness of a healthy Irish day-laborer's third finger, in the spaces between the joints or knobs. He then cut a dozen other sticks of about the thickness of anybody's wrist, and about two feet long. Good! When he wished to commence operations on the fair-ground he selected a piece of level turf, and on one side of it dug six holes about the size of the late Daniel Webster's hat; these holes he half filled with sand, and in the centre of every hole he then stuck one of the sticks of about the thickness of a healthy Irish, etc., etc. Then on the top of each stick he balanced a jack-knife, pin-cushion, or some other object of more or less value. Now all his preparations were completed. He was prepared to receive customers. Standing in a commanding attitude, at a distance of about thirty feet from the arrangement we have described, he cried out in truly English style:
"Now, ladies and gents, ere yer are—three sticks a penny. Any lady or gent wishin to make a immediate fortin, and marry the being of his art on the result, have only to invest a few dollars in my establishment, and he will retire wealthy in arf a nour. Here, ladies and gents, look at these ere sticks" (holding up one of the clubs about the thickness of anybody's wrist), "hall you ave to do is to throw one of these ere at them there" (pointing to the pincushions, etc.); "hany article you knock orf is yourn, provided it don't fall inter the ole. Now, all I charge you for the priviledge orf throwin' three of these sticks, is the radicerlously small sum of ten cents. You are sure to win five dollars each time. Now, walk up; walk up, and take yer chance, and make yer everlastin fortin; marry the hobject of yer haffections, and build yer pallatial willa on the Udson."
Here a courageous youth stepped up, examined the whole arrangement minutely, and concluded to invest ten cents. Fortunately for Nix and the cause this youth knocked off a dollar jack-knife at the first throw. The consequence was an immense rush of patronage; indeed, the sport became so exciting that two similar establishments could have been kept in active operation. As it was, Nix cleared fifty-four dollars over and above all expenses for the good of the fair, and the benefit of the poor folks of Portland.
One of Nix's most profitable customers was a good-natured flashy young man of the wholesale dry-goods pattern, who appeared each day in some new shade of mustard-colored clothing, from the delicate yellow of freshly mixed pure Durham to the rich tones of stale German. He told us in confidence that he had intended to go to Saratoga, but the old gentleman and old lady (his father and mother) had insisted on his coming down with them to "this d——d hole;" then, suddenly recollecting that we had all probably come from chance, he added:
"Oh, this is a very nice place; first-rate; I don't say anything about that, only I had a party of friends going up to Saratoga, and they'll expect me; they know there's always fun going on where I am. It don't make any difference to me whether I spend fifty dollars or five hundred. I'm bound to have a good time. I appreciate anything; tha's—anything, you know—tha's got any wit into it, you know. Well, you know, there are some people who ain't got any idea; don't seem to appreciate, you know. Now, when I saw you throwin' sticks, well, I piled right in; I didn't care about it, of course, only I saw what you were doing it for, and I didn't care. Some people would think it awful vulgar, you know, but I don't care; that's the sort of man I am. Perhaps I shouldn't have liked some of my aristocratic lady friends to have seen me; but then down here, you know. Oh, I'd just as lief have given the money to the fair; I'd spent thirty dollars before in slippers and things, and then gave 'em back. I didn't want 'em, you know, only I like to see things lively; there's bound to be fun when I'm round."
However, we will not follow our good-natured friend through his long monologue of refined egotism; we merely introduced him because he showed us a variety of tricks, two of which we think worth recording in our book on amusements. On the morning after the fair, Nix and ourself, in company with the mustard-colored aristocrat, took a bath in the ocean. The aristocrat appeared in the water attired in a sumptuous bathing dress, smoking a cigar which he told us cost $800 per thousand; which, he frankly confessed, he thought too high a price for a man to pay for cigars in these times. He further stated that he relished smoking in the water very much. To our inquiry whether there was no danger of the waves putting it out, he replied by informing us that he could dive under water with a lighted cigar in his mouth without extinguishing it.