Twelve on us jammed in a spring c-a-r-t,
The man as lectured now, was drunk; why bless ye,
He’s sent home in a c-h-a-i-s-e.”
Twenty-five years or more ago, in Boston, Monday was the gathering time for Universalist clergymen, Tompkins’ book store being the place of rendezvous. At these unions, King, Chapin, Hosea Ballou, Whittemore, and other notabilities, were pretty sure to be present; and as it was immediately after the graver labors of the Sabbath, the parsons were apt to be in an unusually frisky condition.
Chapin, ordinarily, is of reticent habit; but when the company is congenial, and he is in exhilarant mood, his wonderful flow of language and quick perception make him a companion rarely equalled for wit and repartee. On one occasion, when King and Chapin, and a dozen other clergymen were at Tompkins’s, as was their wont, Chapin began to rhyme upon the names of those present. Without a moment’s hesitation, he ran off the name of each, rhyming it in verse, to the huge delight of the company. Finally, after exhausting that list, the names of absent clergymen were given to the ready poet, and there was not a single failure. At last a clergyman said:—
“I can give you a name, Brother Chapin, to which you cannot make a rhyme.”
“Well, what is it?”
“Brother Brimblecomb.”
Without a moment’s pause, Chapin said:—
“There was a man in our town,