| "——That way Madness lies" |
In this connection, dear PUNCHINELLO, let me hasten to disclaim any intention of abusing or "pitching into" the renowned "Editor of Two Newspapers, Both Daily." Everybody has been doing that for the past five or six years, and I do not wish to be vulgar. Besides, to do the gentleman justice, we do not think he is to blame for much of our misery; as he confines his editorial connection with our incubus to writing a weekly letter to the Press, and publishing it in both dailies. At the same time we do wish that he would, out of compassion for our suffering souls, exercise a little supervision over the small boys whom he employs to write the Chronicle, and thus spare us something of what we are now obliged to stand.
Let me give you one or two instances of the course pursued by this tyrannous newspaper.
It frightens timid citizens by its narratives of horrible outrages in the South, especially in Georgia and Tennessee; and my wife, who has relatives in the former place, was in chronic hysterics until it was discovered that the "outrages" were, to use a vulgar expression, "all in my eye." To this day she trembles at the word "loil," (I believe I spell it correctly,) knowing, as she does, that the dreaded and mysterious syllables, Ku-Klux, will most assuredly follow it.
Why, did we not have a great scare here a week or two ago, when it was announced that the mysterious chalk-marks on the pavements were significant of the presence of the awful K.K. in our midst—at our very doors? Did we not sleep with revolvers under our pillows, and dream of cross-bones and coffins? Did not Mayor BOWEN receive a dread missive warning him to evacuate Washington, lest he be made a corpse of in less than no time? Had not several colored gentlemen and white men received similar missives? And does it repay us for our fright and alarm, when it is discovered that the mysterious marks are cunning devices of a gentleman engaged in the oyster trade? By no means. We have suffered our terrors, and no amount of oysters can alleviate them. To such straits has the Chronicle reduced the citizens of Washington.
But we have other causes of complaint against this extraordinary newspaper. Here is one:
It may not be unknown to you that the Chronicle has a habit of identifying itself with the people and subjects which it discusses. Does it put forth an article on naval matters—straightway it becomes salter than Turk's Island, and talks of bobstays and main-top-bowlines and poop-down-hauls in a manner that, to put it mildly, is confusing, and would, if you read it, make you jump as if all your strings were pulled at once! Are financial matters under discussion—behold even JAMES FISK, Jr., is not so keen and shrewd, nor Commodore VANDERBILT so full of "corners." And only the other day, it discussed the Medical Convention which lately met here, and lo! we are amazed by the amount of knowledge displayed by the omniscient journal! In a long article, after mildly remonstrating with the doctors for refusing to admit their colored brethren of the District of Columbia to a share in their deliberations, it closes with this obscurely terrible remark:
"Better die of nostalgia in exile abroad, than remain at home to suffer from ossification of the pericardium—"
or words to that effect, as the lawyers say.
On reading this, with what strength I had left I secured a dictionary, and found that "nostalgia" means homesickness;—a disease not known to Washingtonian exiles—but what "ossification of the pericardium" means I cannot discover. Not only have I searched every dictionary in the Congressional Library, but I have pervaded all the bookstores, and made myself a nuisance to every medical man of my acquaintance—in vain! Nobody ever heard of such a disease, if disease it be. It may be something more dreadful! And not only I, but those whom I have persecuted with my inquiries, are on the verge of insanity; and for all this the Chronicle is responsible.