TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE

The weird spelling in this book is mostly intentional, and it has been retained as in the original, this includes inconsistencies in spelling and hyphenation. A few changes to which seemed more likely typographic errors have been made, they are marked with a dotted underline, and the printed text may appear in a “pop-up box” when hovering the cursor on it. The changes are listed [at the end of the book].

Titles in the [Table ov Kontents] do not always correspond exactly to the titles in the main text, this has been retained, but the spelling has been changed in some cases to match the text. Some texts, near the end of the book are printed with no title in the original, this has been maintained too. The [List of Illustrations] contains some entries for non-existing (in this edition, at least) illustrations and the numbering is not consecutive, this reproduces the printed book as well.

The original printed book was apparently divided into large “sections”, which were marked only as running page headers. In this version the titles for these sections are written between {braces} where they start.

PUBLISHERS’ ANNOUNCEMENT.

Among the many humorists of America, not one is better known, or more readily accorded a high rank by the public, than Henry W. Shaw (Josh Billings). No writer of the present age is so universally quoted from as he. His name is familiar to every tongue, and scarcely a paper in the country appears without more or less space devoted to the sayings of “Josh Billings.” His ready pen seems adapted to all subjects, and he is equally at home, whether writing on the gravest or the most trivial matters.

PUNGENCY, BREVITY, AND QUAINTNESS

seem to be prominent characteristics of his productions, while a fountain of the richest wit supplies his pen with humor, and its waters sparkle and glimmer like diamonds upon the paper, as he traces thereon his description of objects in his undisputably original style. His jokes are always clear and perceptible, and his satire, pointed and keen, invariably strikes home.

As laughter is conducive to health, and as nothing is learned so easily and remembered so tenaciously as that with which something pleasant is connected, this volume will prove doubly advantageous, as it consists of matter in which wit and wisdom are so equally mingled, that the reader will rise from its perusal undecided whether he has gained most by its reading, bodily health, or general knowledge.

Thousands are eager to place upon their tables and in their libraries a volume which will be a fair specimen of the writings of this great American humorist, and the publishers of this book take great pleasure in being able to offer them an opportunity to gratify so laudable a desire.

THE COMPLETE WORKS OF JOSH BILLINGS

THE COMPLETE WORKS

OF

JOSH BILLINGS,

(HENRY W. SHAW.)

WITH ONE HUNDRED ILLUSTRATIONS

BY THOMAS NAST AND OTHERS,

AND

A BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION.

REVISED EDITION.

NEW YORK:

G. W. DILLINGHAM CO., Publishers.

MDCCCXCIX.

Copyright, 1876, by
G. W. CARLETON & CO.

Josh Billings.

TO
FRANCIS S. STREET, and FRANCIS S. SMITH
[EDITORS AND PROPRIETORS
OF
“THE NEW YORK WEEKLY.”]
MY PATRONS AND FRIENDS,
THIS BOOK
IS
DEDICATED.

New York, 1873. Josh Billings.

TABLE OV KONTENTS.

THE END.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION.
ADAPTED FROM THE LONDON EDITION.

In the United States of America a “show” is the generic name comprising every description of entertainment, being equally applied to an equestrian performance, a dramatic company, an operatic concert, a political oration, or a lecture on the geology of the oil district of Pennsylvania. A few years ago, when I did not know America quite so well as I do now, I was asked by Mr. Barnum to meet him on a matter of business at his celebrated Museum on Broadway. Every one who has visited New York and called in at that strangely-jumbled exhibition, will remember a small room on the first landing, with “Mr. Barnum—Private” painted on the door. I don’t know whether any show-case in the Museum was as attractive to the crowds of country visitors as that little room proved to be. Though privacy was written on the post, publicity was ever peeping in at the door. Shrewd, astute, and rusé as Barnum is, none knew better than he that the greatest object of interest in the Museum was himself. Hence he arranged to have his private room immediately in front of the public xiv staircase, with the door always a little open, to pique curiosity, unless really important business required absolute seclusion. In this room, or rather in this glass-case, for its three sides were of glass, like the cases containing the wax-figures and the stuffed animals, Barnum and I met. He conversed about different speculations he had on hand, and various ideas which he wished to carry out. Some of them were very characteristic of the man and his spirit of enterprise. One, was to organize an expedition to the mouth of Davis’s Straits at the proper season, select a very large iceberg, bring it down in the tow of two or three steamers to New York Bay, put a floating fence around it, exhibit the iceberg at twenty-five cents admission, and realize a large profit by making and vending sherry cobblers with ice from the real iceberg! Another idea suggested by the man of many shows was to get the American Minister at the Court of Constantinople to apply to the Sultan for a firman to permit Barnum or his agent to visit the mosque at Hebron, traditionally asserted to be built over the Cave of Machpelah, in which the remains of the patriarchs were buried. “If we could only get the remains of Abraham and bring them to New York!” exclaimed the deus ex machinâ of the Museum, rubbing his hands with delight at the ingenuity of the thought. Then, after a moment’s reflection, and knowing me to be well acquainted with England, he remarked, inquiringly, “What do you think of Spurgeon for a show? Could he be got over here?” To me unused as I then was to American xv can manners, the association of a clergyman with Bartlemy Fair and Barnum’s Museum seemed ludicrously incongruous. Subsequently my experience taught me to believe that some of the preachers of the United States look at their position from the same point of view as did Mr. Barnum in wishing to speculate in Spurgeon.

A “showman,” as well as an author, Josh Billings is now regarded in the cities of the Union. In England we would style him a facetious lecturer, but the lecturing business in America is carried out with all the arts, formulæ and appurtenances of showmanship. There are the large posters, the puff advertisements, the agent in advance, and the lithographs plain or colored, all brought into requisition. It is quite true that if Charles Dickens visited Manchester or Birmingham to read “Doctor Marigold” or “The Christmas Carol,” he also had his agent and his yellow window-bills with the black and red printing; but the window-bill is limited to a size and is printed in a style fitting to the superior class of entertainment; while, in America, the posters of the popular lecturer are as showy and as exciting as those of Van Amburgh with his wild beasts, or the Hanlon Brothers with their feats on the trapeze. Quaintness, however, is an essential requisite in the placard of the facetious lecturer. Artemus Ward used to announce in large letters on the walls that he would “Speak a Piece” at a certain place and on a certain date. Josh Billings announces in a still more mystic manner, strongly reminding the observer xvi of Ruskin’s bizarre, grotesque, enigmatical titles. I have before me, as I write, a printed notice which reads thus:—

“ALLYN HALL, HARTFORD.
JOSH BILLINGS,
On the 7th,
With his
HOBBY HORSE.”

The reader who is anxious to know what Josh Billings means by an advertisement so eccentric in its character can have his curiosity satisfied by turning to page 404 of this work. The chapter is headed “How to pick out a good Horse,” and the caption is assuredly none the more inappropriate or infelicitous than are the titular conundrums of the “Seven Lamps of Architecture,” “Unto this Last,” or “A Crown of Wild Olives.” John Ruskin and Josh Billings understand with equal clearness the value of a title which shall arrest attention by not being too easy of comprehension.

I first heard of Josh Billings several years ago when crossing the Isthmus of Panama by that remarkable railway which connects the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. When Nuñez de Balboa in the olden time had his first peep of the Pacific, and beheld the ocean which no European had before seen, from an eminence which is now a station of the railway, he little thought that in a few centuries hence the steam xvii engine would haul thousands upon thousands of Christians up to the same summit, and allow them to enjoy the same sight at so many American dollars each. Terribly prosaic is this earth becoming! And, despite Schiller and Coleridge, it is scarcely Jupiter who “brings whate’er is good,” or Venus “who brings everything that’s fair.” A locomotive or a steamboat will bring or take you to both; and a railway it was which brought me to know of Josh Billings. The incident was simply this:

Midway on the Panama railway there is a station at which travellers alight while the engineer looks after his supply of wood and water. A beautifully picturesque station it is, looking from it along the road which you have come, or adown that portion of the railway track which you have to go—a luxuriance of tropical vegetation meets the eye, overpowering the mind with the wild profusion of its beauty. Nature seems to revel in a wealth of verdure. Palms, bananas, and trees innumerable of every graceful form tower upwards to the unclouded sky, or arch over the flower-garnished earth. The trunk of each is invisible; for creeping plants of the most delicate growth entwine around the wood, hang in loops from the boughs, connect tree to tree with a lace-work of exquisite elegance and sun-dyed brilliancy, and sway in wreaths of natural arabesque to and fro in the fragrant, moist, and enervating air. The station lies back from the road, and, if I remember rightly, is thatched with palm leaves. As I alighted at it, groups of native New-Grenadians clustered around xviii me, the younger ones being almost in a state of nudity. Some offered me oranges, some bananas, some milk in a green-glass bottle, and one of them wished me to buy a monkey. Pushing through them, I made my way for the station, the sultry atmosphere having rendered me languid and a gentle stimulus being desirable. I expected to find the refreshment department in the care of a native, or, at any rate, of a Spaniard; but the ubiquitous Yankee was master of the premises, and a forlorn ague-stricken, quinine-and-calomel-looking master he seemed to be. His whiskey was something not to be forgotten; nor were his dogs, half a dozen of which were running about the place, the greatest burlesques of the race canine I had hitherto seen. They were all lean, hungry, and wolfish-eyed. Their tails drooped mournfully, as if the seething heat had melted the sinews and softened the bones; they whined peevishly, but bark there was none—their owner required it all to keep the ague away. I had drunk my whiskey, become Christian in my feelings, and was silently pitying the poor animals, when the proprietor of the miserable dog-flesh, stationing himself beside me, and placing his hands on his hips, sententiously observed,—

“Them critturs are the pride of the Isthmus. They’re a pair of the most elegant puppies in this State. Nary one of ’em would flunk out before any dog.”

“They look very cowardly about the tail,” I remarked.

“That’s the way of dogs’ tails on the Isthmus,” xix was his response. “Do you know what Josh Billings says about dogs’ tails?”

I frankly confessed that I did not; adding, that I was profoundly ignorant of Josh Billings, and pleasantly intimating that I supposed him to be one of the guards on the line.

“I guess you haven’t read the papers lately,” continued my new acquaintance, as though pitying my ignorance. “Josh Billings knows that there are some dogs’ tails which can’t be got to curl no ways, and some which will, and you can’t stop ’em. He says, that if you bathe a curly-tailed dog’s tail in oil and bind it in splints, you cannot get the crook out of it; and Josh, who says a sight of good things, says that a man’s way of thinking is the crook in the dog’s tail, and can’t be got out, and that every one should be allowed to wag his own peculiarity in peace.”

That my Yankee acquaintance was partial to Josh Billings, and that anything which related to dogs was congenial with his tastes, I furthermore ascertained by noticing two scraps of paper posted on the rough wall of his cabin. I copied both. One was in prose and the other in rhyme. Here is the prose one:—

Dogs.

“Dogs are not vagabones bi choise and luv tew belong tu sumbody. This fac endears them tew us, and i have alwas rated the dog az about the seventh cusin tew the human specious. Tha kant talk but tha can lik yure hand; this shows that their hearts iz in the plase where other folks’ tungs is.—Josh Billings.”

Thus it was that I first heard of Josh Billings. In the course of my voyage from Aspinwall to New York, while seated on the deck of the steamer, listening to the drolleries of a group of very convivial passengers, and gliding along the coast of Cuba in the brightness, sheen, and splendor of a tropical night, I heard many of his best things recited, and his name frequently quoted as that of one who had already taken his place in American literature. Oliver Wendell Holmes I had known for years, Artemus Ward was a household name in California, James Russell Lowell had become a familiar acquaintance through the “Biglow Papers;” but who was Josh Billings? I asked my compagnons de voyage, but all they knew of him was that he was a very clever fellow who had written some very clever things. Whether he lived in New York State, Pennsylvania, Vermont, or Missouri, no one could tell me, nor could I get any satisfactory information as to the journal in which his articles had first appeared, what his antecedents were, or whether the name attached to his writings was that of his parentage and christening, or merely a whimsical nomme de plume.

Long after my arrival in New York the mystery remained unsolved. I applied to literary friends for its solution, but all they seemed to know was that various smart things had run the round of the papers with the signature of “Josh Billings” to them, but in what paper they had originated or by whom they were written none could give me information. My friend George Arnold, a well-known wit of xxi the New York Leader, knew of my anxiety. Meeting me one day at Crook and Duff’s Restaurant, the mid-day rallying point of most of the genial spirits of New York, he drew me aside and gravely asked—

“Have you found out yet who Josh Billings is?”

“I have not,” I answered. “Do you know?”

“Yes; but keep it dark. Only five of his friends have been let into the secret. It would not do to let the world know. His position would be damaged.”

“Who is it?” I demanded eagerly. “Is it Hosea Biglow under a new name?”

“No; somebody better known.”

“Horace Greeley?” I suggested, interrogatively.

“No. A still greater man. Can’t you guess?”

“Really, I cannot. Don’t keep me in suspense. Tell me.”

“The author is ——” and my friend paused—“the author of Josh Billings is none other than—President Lincoln!”

My informant made the communication so gravely, that for the moment I believed it; especially as some few days previous, being down in Washington, I had occasion to know that Barney Williams, the actor, was summoned to the White House on a Sunday afternoon, that he spent some hours with the President, and that on his return in the evening to Willard’s Hotel he assured me that the President had beaten him in telling funny stories, and had said the drollest things he had heard for many a day. That my information was nothing more than a hoax the xxii reader will readily suppose; but I felt bound to “pass it on” to my acquaintances, with a like injunction to secresy, until at length I had the amusement of hearing that it had reached the ears of Mr. Lincoln, who laughed heartily at the joke, and pleasantly observed that his shoulders were hardly broad enough to bear the burdens of the State, without having to carry the sins of all its wits and jesters.

Time passed on and business called me to take a trip one day up the Hudson River to the pleasant little town of Poughkeepsie. What a quiet, charming little town it is, those who have visited it can well remember. I selected the steamer Armenian for my trip up the river. The Rhine of America never was seen to more advantage than it was on that bright summer’s day, and Poughkeepsie never looked fairer than as I saw it from the middle of the stream. I landed at a town on the left bank, crossed the river, went down to Poughkeepsie by rail, and arrived there late in the evening, I knew of only two staple products of the place, and they were—whiskey and spiritualism. The whiskey I tasted, and the spiritualism I went in search of in the person of Andrew Jackson Davis, the Swedenborg of the United States, whose books on the unseen world have been introduced to the British public by Mr. Howitt. A kindly Poughkeepsian volunteered to conduct me to where the great mysticist had lived; but I found, to my disappointment, that he was then absent from the town. To console me for my ill-luck, in not being able to see so great a celebrity, my guide soothingly xxiii observed that there was another great writer resident in and belonging to Poughkeepsie.

“Who is he?” I asked.

“Why, Josh Billings!” was the reply.

Eureka! I had found him. I had unearthed my game at last and discovered my eremite in his mystic seclusion. I lost no time in inquiring who Josh Billings was and where he lived.

“His name is Shaw—Henry W. Shaw. He’s an auctioneer, and I’ll show you the way to his house,” volunteered my friendly guide.

We went to the house; but like Mr. Davis, Mr. Shaw was not at home. All that I could then learn about him was that he belonged to Poughkeepsie, that he had been the Auctioneer of the town for many years, that he was by no means a young man, that his address for the general public was “Box 467” at the Post-office, that he was a very business-like person, and that he wrote articles for the newspapers, as well as sold property by auction and acted as agent for the transfer of real estate. The reader will therefore fully comprehend how much Mr. Shaw felt himself to be in his element while writing the chapter headed “Advertizement,” in which he offers

“To sell for eighteen hundred and thirty-nine dollars a pallas, a sweet and pensive retirement, lokated on the virgin banks of the Hudson river, kontaining 85 acres. Walls ov primitiff rock, laid in Roman cement, bound the estate, while upward and downward, the eye catches far away, the magesta and slow grander ov the Hudson. As the young moon hangs xxiv like a cutting of silver from the blue brest of the ski, an angel may be seen each night dansing with golden tiptoes on the green. (N. B. The angel goes with the place).”

Better fortune led me at last to meet Mr. Shaw in New York City. We were introduced to one another at Artemus Ward’s Mormon entertainment on Broadway. I found a man rather above the middle height, sparse in build, sharp in features, his long hair slightly turning gray, and his age between forty and fifty, reserved in manner, a rustic, unpolished demeanor, and looking more like a country farmer than a genial man of letters or a professed wit and a public lecturer on playful subjects. I can vouch for his geniality, for, on the evening of our first meeting, we adjourned from Dodworth Hall to the St. Denis Hotel opposite, and, in the company of a few friends, spent a mirthful hour or two. The night was bitter cold; but warm sherry, excellent Bourbon, and jovial spirits made the bleak wind which whistled up Broadway from the Bay, as melodious as the music of lutes.

Mr. Shaw informed me that he was born in the State of Massachusetts, town of Lanesboro, county of Berkshire, and came from Puritan stock. He said that his father and grandfather both had been members of Congress, and each one had left so pure a political record, that he himself had never dared to enter the arena of politics. His first literary efforts in the comic line were published in the country papers of New York State; many of them first attracted attention in the columns of the Poughkeepsie Daily xxv Press. In America a popular author has much more scope for gaining publicity and popularity than he has in England. The newspapers of the Union are always ready to receive pithy paragraphs from clever men, and to attach the authors’ name to them. The great secret of the popularity of Artemus Ward and of Josh Billings is simply that which the late Albert Smith of England so well understood years ago, never to publish any article, however trivial or lengthy, without the signature or the initials of the writer to it. A smart, terse, pungent paragraph inserted with the author’s real or assumed name attached, in one of the journals of the United States, soon finds its way from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from the Gulf of St. Lawrence to the Gulf of Mexico. With comparatively little trouble, except to worry his brains for comic ideas—no slight trouble, nevertheless—the wit of the Western world soon gains notoriety, if not fame. His racy article of a few lines is copied into paper after paper, until his name becomes familiar in all the cities of the Union. This accomplished, a new field of enterprise opens up. Some speculative man in New York or Boston thinks what a good and profitable enterprise it would be to engage the funny man whose printed jokes circulate everywhere, engage to give him so much per month for a year or two, have some large woodcuts engraved, some showy posters struck off, some smart advertisements written, halls taken throughout the country, and the man of many jokes made to retail them all over the land at an admission fee varying from one xxvi dollar down to twenty-five cents. Only a few years ago the business of joking in public—the joker himself appearing before the audience—was pretty well confined to the clown of the circus and the “middle-man” and “end-man” of the negro minstrel troupe. Things change rapidly across the Atlantic, and at the present day the clown in motley and the minstrel in burnt-cork have their vocation superseded by the facetious lecturer, dressed in evening costume, travelling with gaudy show-bills, and having a literary as well as an oratorical reputation. Not a single writer on “Punch” or “Fun,” if he had been trained in America and had written there, but would have thrown the desk aside for the rostrum long ago. Simply to write is not excitement enough for your ardent American, if he can enjoy the applause of an audience, and make dollars at the same time, merely by being the mouthpiece of his own jokes.

Bowing to the fate of nearly all comic men in his native country, Mr. Shaw was ferreted out in his Poughkeepsie home, and urgently solicited to accept an engagement as a public lecturer. He tried the experiment in the Athenæums and Lyceums of his own State, and succeeding, followed up his new calling until now he is recognized as an established, legitimate, and lucrative “show,” having his proper value in the market, and is assigned status on the rostrum. He travels over the United States with his Lectures, entitled, “Hobby Horse”—“Specimen Brix”—“Sandwiches”—“What I kno about Hotels”—etc., and is making money more rapidly than ever he did xxvii with the hammer of an auctioneer. Many good stories are told of him. One is that being in Washington, and asked by a politician there relative to his opinion of Thaddeus Stevens, of Pennsylvania, who opposed President Johnson so hotly in the Government, and who figured as a thoroughly ultra-radical, Mr. Shaw replied, “Give me leave to recite a little dream I had last night. I fancied that I was in the lower regions, and while engaged in conversation with the proprietor, an imp announced that Thad Stevens was at the door desiring admission. Old Nick promptly and emphatically refused him entrance on the ground that he would be continually disturbing the peace and order of the place. The imp soon returned, saying that Thaddeus insisted on coming in, declaring that he had no other place to go to. After much deliberation, Old Nick’s face suddenly brightened with a new idea, and he exclaimed, ‘I’ve got it. Tell the Janitor to give him six bushels of brimstone and a box of matches, and let him go and start a little place of his own.’”

Having described who Josh Billings is, it may be fitting to add a few words relative to his writings and their position in the comic literature of America. Fun is indigenous to the soil, it wells up from the Western prairie, sparkles in the foam of Niagara, springs up in the cotton-fields of the South, and oozes out from the paving-stones of the cities of the North. The people of the United States are fun-loving and fun-makers. Of the peculiar character of the fun a word or two may be written presently. There is xxviii always some popular man wearing the cap and bells, and reflecting the humor of his land. At one period the author, whom all the papers quote, is Sam Slick, Doesticks, then John Phœnix, then Major Downing, then Artemus Ward, then Orpheus C. Kerr, and then Josh Billings. As fast as one resigns the position, another takes his place—“Uno avulso non deficit alter.” During the war, joking went on at a faster pace than ever, and even those who did not esteem President Lincoln for his patriotism valued him immensely for his jokes. The jingle of the bells in the hand of Momus and the clank of the sabre attached to the waist of the modern sons of Mars, were ever mingled throughout the long and fiercely-contested conflict.

Take a little of Martin Farquhar Tupper, and a little of Artemus Ward, knead them together, and you may make something which approaches to a Josh Billings. That Mr. Shaw aspires to be a comic Tupper is evidenced in the various chapters headed “Proverbs,” “Remarks,” “Sayins,” and “Afferisims.” That he has had Artemus Ward before him is demonstrable by comparing the chapter in which “Josh Billings Insures his Life,” with Artemus Ward’s celebrated paper, entitled “His Autobiography.”[*] But Artemus is great in telling a story, having an imaginative power to conceive an accident, plan the action of a piece of drollery, invent an odd character, and describe his creation with infinite humor and force. The talent of Mr. Shaw is of xxix another kind. He is aphoristically comic, if I may use the phrase. He delights in being ludicrously sententious—in Tupperizing laughingly, and in causing an old adage to appear a new one through the fantastic manner in which it is dished up. He is the comic essayist of America, rather than her comic story-teller.

His first book was issued May 19, 1866, in New York, by George W. Carleton, the publisher of Artemus Ward’s Works, and was entitled “Josh Billings, His Book.” This volume had a large sale, and was followed in July, 1868, by a new work entitled “Josh Billings on Ice.” But his greatest success, in a literary line, was the publication of

Josh Billings’ Farmer’s Allminax,

of which the New York Tribune, in 1875, says:—

“Several years ago Mr. Carleton, the publisher was seized with the belief that a burlesque of the popular almanac, such as the “Old Farmers’ Almanac,” to which New England pinned its meteorological faith, would be remunerative. He suggested the idea first to “Artemus Ward,” afterwards to “Orpheus C. Kerr,” and next to “Doesticks,” but none of them thought favorably of it. An arrangement was at last made with “Josh Billings,” and so the “Allminax” came about. Nearly 150,000 copies were sold the first year, 1870, and almost as many since, and though the retail price is only a quarter of a dollar, Mr. Shaw is said to have received nearly $5,000 the first year, and over $30,000 in all.”

It has been said of Josh Billings by one of the xxx critics of his own land that “His wit has no edge to betray a malicious motive; but is rather a Feejee club, grotesquely carved and painted, that makes those who feel it grin while they wince. All whom he kills die with a smile upon their faces.” In directing his shafts against humbug, pretension, and falsity he worthily carries out the true vocation of the comic writer. Many authors there are who write funnily merely to amuse. There is always a higher purpose peeping out from among the quaint fancies and odd expressions of Josh Billings. Just inasmuch as America is prolific of humorists and satirists, does she require them. The bane and the antidote grow in the same garden.

Were it not for the satirists of America—of whom Josh Billings is one as well as a humorist—it is difficult to imagine to what ludicrous eccentricities the people would lend themselves. Too self-sufficient to listen to argument, they are keenly sensitive to ridicule, and a little of Josh Billings is more effective in doing good than the best sermon a foreign friend could preach them. Burlesque their salient, amiable weaknesses—that is, let them be burlesqued by one of their own people, not by a foreigner—and they at once see the point of the joke. In illustration of this, there was a paper in Cincinnati which was very much given to use the phrase, “this great country,” and carried the use of it to an unwarrantable extent. It ceased to do so when the following appeared in a neighboring journal:—

“This is a glorious country! It has longer rivers xxxi and more of them, and they are muddier and deeper, and run faster, and rise higher, and make more noise, and fall lower, and do more damage than anybody else’s rivers. It has more lakes, and they are bigger and deeper, and clearer, and wetter than those of any other country. Our rail-cars are bigger, and run faster, and pitch off the track oftener, and kill more people than all other rail-cars in this and every other country. Our steamboats carry bigger loads, are longer and broader, burst their boilers oftener, and send up their passengers higher, and the captains swear harder than steamboat captains in any other country. Our men are bigger, and longer, and thicker, can fight harder and faster, drink more mean whiskey, chew more bad tobacco, and spit more, and spit further than in any other country. Our ladies are richer, prettier, dress finer, spend more money, break more hearts, wear bigger hoops, shorter dresses, and kick up the devil generally to a greater extent than all other ladies in all other countries. Our children squall louder, grow faster, get too expansive for their pantaloons, and become twenty years old sooner by some months than any other children of any other country on the earth.”

Burlesques, such as the above, whether written by Artemus Ward or Josh Billings, have not been without their good effect in the United States. The genius of “hifaluten” as the Americans call it—the word is derived, I believe, from “hyphen-looping”—has received many mortal wounds lately from the hands of the satirists and good results have ensued.

The writings of Josh Billings cannot be read with out exciting mirth, without sometimes hitting home, nor without the reader becoming satisfied that America has added to her humorous authors one in every way well qualified to take foremost rank.

For real side-shaking fun, the reader may turn to many pages of this volume and find a copious supply; but, if he is desirous of humor and pathos allied, let him turn to the chapter on “The Fust Baby,” page 383. He will there find that, underlying the caustic wit of Josh Billings, and a stratum or two deeper than his quaint fun, is a quiet layer of genuine feeling capable of comprehending and of originating the power to express the very poetry of pathos. The “fust baby” born “on the wrong side of the garden ov Eden” is invested in this humorous essay with all the interest which babyhood is susceptible of acquiring.

There is little that remains to be said relative to Mr. Shaw, except to express the opinion that he has taken a very worthy position among the authors of his own country, and is likely to become a general favorite in England in his character of “Josh Billings.” Some of his latest papers were contributed to the New York Saturday Press, under the head of “Cooings and Billings,” with a commendatory notice by the editor of that paper, Henry Clapp, jun., whose name is not altogether unknown to the literary men of London and of Paris.

[*] “Artemus Ward, His Book,” p. 316.

{ESSAYS.}

KONTENTMENT.

Kontentment is the gift ov God, as it kan be cultivated a little, but it is hard tew acquire. Kontentment is sed to be the same az happiness, this ackounts for the small amount ov happiness laying around loose, without enny owner. I don’t beleave that man was made tew be kontented, nor happy in this world, for if he had bin, he wouldn’t hav hankered enuff for the other world.

When a man gits perfektly kontented, he and a clam are fust couzins.

Contentment iz a kind ov moral laziness; if thare want ennything but kontentment in this world, man wouldn’t be any more of a suckcess than an angleworm iz.

When a man gits so he don’t want ennything more, he iz like a rackcoon with his intestines full ov green corn.

Contentment iz one ov the instinkts, i admit it tew be happiness, but it iz kind ov spruce gum chawing happiness.

We all find fault with Adam and Eve, for not being kontented, but if they had bin satisfied with the gardin ov Eden, and themselfs, they would hav been living thare now, the only two human beings on the face ov the arth, az innocent as a couple of vegetable oysters.

They would hav bin two splendid specimens ov the handy work ov God, elegant portraits in the vestibule ov heaven, but they would not hav developed reazon, the only God-like attribute in man.

When a man iz thoroly kontented, he iz either too lazy to want ennything, or too big a phool tew enjoy it.

I hav lived in naberhoods whare everyboddy seemed to be kontented, but if the itch had ever broke out in them naberhoods, the people would have skratched to this day.

PERFEKTLY SATISFIED.

I am in favor of all the vanitys, and petty ambishuns, all the jealousys and backbitings in the world, not bekauze i think they am hansome, but bekauze I think they stir up men, and wimmin, git them onto their muscle, cultivating their venom and reazon at the same time, and proving what a brilliant cuss man may be, at the same time that it proves what a miserable cuss he iz.

I had rather see two wimmin pull hair, than tew see them set down, thoroughly satisfied with an aimless life, and never suffer eney excitement, greater than bleeding tears together, through their noze, for a parcel of shirtless heathen on the coast ov Madagaskar, or, once in a while, open their eyes, from a dream ov young hyson contentment tea, tew sarch the allmiknak, for the next change in the moon.

Contentment, in this age of the world, either means death, or dekay, in the days ov Abraham, contentment was simply ignorance.

The world iz now full ov larning, the arts, and sciences, and all the thousand appliances ov reazon, these things 35 make ignorance the exception, and no man haz a right tew cultivate contentment, enny more than he haz tew cut oph hiz thum, and set quietly down, and nuss the stub.

Show me a thoroughly contented person, and i will show yu an useless one.

What we want iz folks who won’t be kontented, who kant be kontented, who git up in the morning, not simply to hav their bed made, but for the sake ov gitting tired; not for the sake ov nourishing kontentment, but for the sake ov putting turpentine in sum ded place, and stiring up the animals.

Contentment was born with Adam, and died when Adam ceased tew be an angel, and bekum a man.

I don’t say that a man couldn’t be hatched out, and, like a young owl, set on a dri limb, awl hiz days, with hiz branes az fasst asleep az a mudturkles, and at last sneak into heaven, under the guize of kontentment, but i do say, that 10 generashuns ov sich men would run most of the human race into the ground, and leave the ballance az lifeless, and az base, as a currency made out ov puter ten cent pieces.

I would like jist az well az the next man, tew crawl into a hole, that jist fitted me, hed fust, and thus shutting out all the light, be contented, for i know how awfully unsothening the aims, and ambishuns ov life are, but this would only be burying mi few tallents, and sacrificing on the ded alter ov kontentment, what war given me, to make a fire or a smudge with.

Thare aint no sich thing as contentment and reazon existing together; thoze who slip out ov the crowd, into sum alley, and pretend they are chawing the cud of sweet kontentment, the verry best specimens ov them, are no better than pin cushions, stuck full.

They have jist az menny longings az ennybody, they have jist az menny vices, their virtews are too often simply a mixtur ov jealousy and cowardice.

Contentment is not desighned, as a stiddy bizziness, for the sons ov man, while on this arth.

A yeller dogg, with a tin kittle tew his tale, climbing a hill, at a three minit gate iz a more reazonable spektacle for me, than a slimy snail, contented and happy.

MARRIAGE.

Marriage iz a fair transaction on the face ov it.

But thare iz quite too often put up jobs in it.

It iz an old institushun, older than the pyramids, and az phull ov hyrogliphicks that noboddy kan parse.

History holds its tounge who the pair waz who fust put on the silken harness, and promised tew work kind in it, thru thick and thin, up hill and down, and on the level, rain or shine, survive or perish, sink or swim, drown or flote.

But whoever they waz they must hav made a good thing out ov it, or so menny ov their posterity would not hav harnessed up since and drov out.

Thare iz a grate moral grip in marriage; it iz the mortar that holds the soshull bricks together.

But there ain’t but darn few pholks who put their money in matrimony who could set down and giv a good written opinyun whi on arth they cum to did it.

This iz a grate proof that it iz one ov them natral kind ov acksidents that must happen, jist az birds fly out ov the nest, when they hav feathers enuff, without being able tew tell why.

Sum marry for buty, and never diskover their mistake; this iz lucky.

Sum marry for money, and—don’t see it.

Sum marry for pedigree, and feel big for six months, and then very sensibly cum tew the conclusion that pedigree ain’t no better than skimmilk.

Sum marry tew pleze their relashuns, and are surprized 37 tew learn that their relashuns don’t care a cuss for them afterwards.

Sum marry bekauze they hav bin highsted sum whare else; this iz a cross match, a bay and a sorrel; pride may make it endurable.

Sum marry for love without a cent in their pocket, nor a friend in the world, nor a drop ov pedigree. This looks desperate, but it iz the strength ov the game.

If marrying for love ain’t a suckcess, then matrimony iz a ded beet.

Sum marry bekauze they think wimmin will be skarse next year, and liv tew wonder how the crop holds out.

Sum marry tew git rid ov themselfs, and diskover that the game waz one that two could play at, and neither win.

Sum marry the seckond time to git even, and find it a gambling game, the more they put down, the less they take up.

Sum marry tew be happy, and not finding it, wonder whare all the happiness on earth goes to when it dies.

Sum marry, they kan’t tell whi, and liv, they kan’t tell how.

Almoste every boddy gits married, and it iz a good joke.

Sum marry in haste, and then set down and think it careful over.

Sum think it over careful fust, and then set down and marry.

Both ways are right, if they hit the mark.

Sum marry rakes tew convert them. This iz a little risky, and takes a smart missionary to do it.

Sum marry coquetts. This iz like buying a poor farm, heavily mortgaged, and working the ballance ov yure days tew clear oph the mortgages.

Married life haz its chances, and this iz just what gives it its flavour. Every body luvs tew phool with the chances, bekauze every boddy expekts tew win. But i am authorized tew state that every boddy don’t win.

But, after all, married life iz full az certain az the dry goods bizziness.

No man kan swear exackly whare he will fetch up when he touches calico.

Kno man kan tell jist what calico haz made up its mind tew do next.

Calico don’t kno even herself.

Dri goods ov all kinds iz the child ov circumstansis.

Sum never marry, but this iz jist az risky, the diseaze iz the same, with no other name to it.

The man who stands on the bank shivvering, and dassent, iz more apt tew ketch cold, than him who pitches hiz hed fust into the river.

Thare iz but phew who never marry bekauze they won’t they all hanker, and most ov them starve with slices ov bread before them (spread on both sides), jist for the lack ov grit.

Marry yung! iz mi motto.

I hav tried it, and kno what i am talkin about.

If enny boddy asks yu whi yu got married, (if it needs be), tell him, yu don’t reccollekt.

Marriage iz a safe way to gamble—if yu win, yu win a pile, and if yu loze, yu don’t loze enny thing, only the privilege ov living dismally alone, and soaking yure own feet.

I repeat it, in italicks, marry young!

Thare iz but one good excuse for a marriage late in life, and that iz—a second marriage.

FASHION’S PRAYER.

Kind Fortune may thi mersys endure forever; smile thou out ov thi loving eyes upon this fine bust ov mine.

Strengthen mi husband, and may hiz faith and hiz money hold out to the last.

Draw the lamb’s wool ov unsuspicious twilight over hiz 39 eyes, that mi flirtashuns may look to him like viktorys, and that mi bills may strengthen hiz pride in me.

Bless, oh! Fortune, mi crimps, rats, and frizzles, and let thi glory shine upon mi paint and powder.

When i walk out before the gaze ov vulgar man, regulate mi wiggle, and add nu grace tew mi gaiters.

Bless all dri goods klerks, milliners, manty-makers and hair-frizzers, and give immortality to Lubin and hiz heirs, and assighns forever.

Lead me bi the side ov colone waters, and fatten mi calves upon the bran ov thi love.

Blister, oh! Fortune, with the heat ov thi wrath, the man who treds upon the trail ov my garments.

Take mi two children oph from mi hands, for they bother me, and take them to be thi children, and bring them up to suit thiself.

When i bow miself in worship, grant that i may do it with ravishing elegance, and perserve unto the last the lily-white ov mi flesh, and the taper ov mi fingers.

Smile thou graciously, oh! Fortune, upon mi nu silk dress, now in the hands of the manty-maker, and may it fit me all over like unto, as the ducks foot fitteth the mud.

Destroy mine enemys with the gaul ov jealousy, and eat thou up with the teeth ov envy, all thoze who gaze at mi style.

Save me from wrinkles, and foster mi plumpness.

Fill both mi eyes, oh! Fortune, with the plaintive pizon ov infatuashun, that i may lay out mi viktims, the men as knumb-images graven.

Let the lily, and the roze, strive together in mi cheek, and may mi nek swim like a goose on the buzzum ov krystal waters.

Enable me, oh Fortune, to wear shoes still a little smaller, and save me from all korns, and bunyons.

Bless Fanny mi lap dog, and rain down bezom ov destruckshun upon thoze who would hurt a hair ov Hektor mi kitten.

Remove far from me all the wails of the sorrowful, and 40 shield mi sensitiff natur from the klamours ov the widder.

Shed the light ov thi countenance on mi kammel’s hair shawl, and mi necklace ov dimonds, I beseech thee.

Enable the poor to shirk for themselfs, and save me from all missionary beggars.

I hav always ben a friend to thee, oh Fortune, therefore bless me for ever, and ever.

THE BIZZY BODY.

I don’t mean the industrious man, intent, and constant in the way of duty, but he who, like a hen, tired ov setting, cums clucking oph from the nest in a grate hurry, and full ov sputter, az fat spilt on the fire; scratching a little here, and suddenly a little thare; chuck full ov small things, like a ritch cheeze; up and down the streets, wagging around evry boddy, like a lorst dorg; in and out like a long-tailed mouse; az full ov bizzness az a pissmire, just before a hard shower; more questions tew ask than a prosekuting attorney; az fat with pertikulars, az an inditement for hog stealing; as knowing az a tin weathercock.

This breed ov folks do a small bizznes on a big capital, they alwus know all the sekrets within ten miles, that aint worth keeping, they are a bundle of faggot fakts, and kan tell which sow in the neighborhood haz got the most pigs, and what Squire Benson got for marrying hiz last couple.

All ov this iz the result ov not knowing how to use a few brains to advantage, if they only knew a little less they would be fools, and a little more would enable them to tend a fresh lettered gideboard, with credit to themselfs, and not confusion to the travellers.

The Bizzy Body iz az full ov leizure az a yearling heifer, hiz time, (nor noboddy else’s) aint worth nothing to him, he will button hole an auctioneer on the block, or a minister in the pulpit, and wouldn’t hesitate tew stop a phuneral procession to ask what the corpse died of. They are az familiar with every boddy az a cockroach, but are no more use to you, az a friend, than a sucked orange.

Theze bizzy people are of awl genders—maskuline, feminine and nuter, and sumtimes are old maids, and then are az necessary in a community as dried herbs in the garret.

One bizzy old maid, who enjoys her vittles, and dont keep a lot ov tame kats for stiddy employment, is worth more than a daily paper; she iz better than the “Cook’s Own Book,” or a volume of household receipts, and works harder and makes more trips every day than a railroad hoss on the Third avenue cars.

The bizzybody iz generally az free from malice az a fly; he lights on you only for a roost, but iz always az unprofitable to know, or to hav ennything to do with, az a jewelry peddlar.

Thare are sum ov the bizzy folks who are like the hornets—never bizzy only with their stings. Theze are vipers, and are to be feared, not trifled with; but my bizzybody has no gaul in his liver; his whole karackter iz his face, and he iz as eazy to inventory az the baggage of a traveling colporter.

They are a cheerful, moderately virtuous, extremely patient, modestly impudent, ginger-pop set ov vagrants, who have got more leggs than brains, and whose really greatest sin iz not their waste ov facultys, but waste ov time. But time, to one ov theze fellows, flies as unconscious az it duz tew a tin watch in a toy shop window.

They are welcomed, not bekauze they are necessary, but bekauze they aint feared, and are soon dropt, like peanut shells, on the floor.

Thare iz no radikal cure for the bizzybody, no more than thare iz for the fleas in a long-haired dogg—if yu git rid ov the fleas yu hav got the dogg left, and if yu git rid ov the dogg yu hav got the fleas left, and so, whare are you?

Bizzyness and bissness are two diffrent things, altho they pronounce out loud similar.

But after all i don’t want tew git shut ov the Bizzy people; they are a noosanse for a small amount, but sumboddy haz got to be a noosanse, and being aktive about nothing, and energetically lazy, iz no doubt a virtuous dodge, but iz 10 per cent better than counterfitting, or even the grand larceny bizziness. Thare iz one thing about them, they are seldum deceitful, they trade on a floating capital, and only deal in second-hand articles; they haint got the tallent to invent, they seldum lie, bekauze their bizziness don’t require it; thare iz stale truth enuff lieing around loose for their purpose.

Don’t trust them only with what you want to have scattered, they will find a ready market for every thing that a prudent man would hesitate tew offer, and they always suppoze they are learned, for they mistake rumors, skandals, and gossip for wisdum.

It iz a sad sight to see a whole life being swopped off for the glory of telling what good people don’t love to hear, and what viscious ones only value for the malice it contains. I should rather be the keeper ov a rat pit, or ketch kats for a shilling a head to feed an anaconda with.

FASTIDIOUSNESS.

Fastidiousness iz merely the ignorance ov propriety. I hav saw people who had rather die and be buried than say bull. They wouldn’t hesitate tew say male cow. 43 If the thoughts are pure and the language iz chaste, it will do tew say almoste ennything.

FASTIDIOUSNESS.

The young lady who, a fu years ago, refused tew walk akrost a potato field, bekauze the potatoze had eyes, ran away from home, soon afterwards, with a jewelry pedlar.

Fastidiousness, az a general thing iz a holyday virtew, and i hav frequently notissed that thoze individuals who are alwus afrade they shal cum akrost sumthing hily improper, are generally looking for it.

Fastidiousness and delikasy are often konfounded, but thare iz this difference—the truly delikate aint afrade tew take holt ov things that they are willing tew touch at all with their naked hands, while the fastidious are willing tew take holt ov enny thing with gloves on.

Delikasy iz the coquetry ov truth; fastidiousness iz the prudery ov falsehood.

LOVE.

Love iz one ov the pashuns, and the most diffikult one ov all tew deskribe.

I never yet hav herd love well defined.

I hav read several deskripshuns ov it, but they were written 44 by thoze who were in love, (or thought they waz), and i wouldn’t beleave such testimony, not even under oath.

Almoste every boddy, sum time in their life, haz bin in love, and if they think it iz an eazy sensashun tew deskribe, let them set down and deskribe it, and see if the person who listens tew the deskripshun will be satisfied with it.

I waz in love once miself for 7 long years, and mi friends all sed i had a consupshun, but i knu all the time what ailed me, but couldn’t deskribe it.

Now all that i kan rekolekt about this luv sikness iz, that for thoze 7 long years i waz, if enny thing, rather more ov a kondem phool than ordinary.

Love iz an honorabel disseaze enuff tew hav, bekauze it iz natral; but enny phellow who haz laid sik with it for 7 long years, after he gits over it, feels sumthing like the phellow who haz phell down on the ice when it iz verry wet—he dont feel like talking about it before folks.

FEAR.

Sum pholks think fear iz the result ov edukashun, but i dont.

I notiss that thoze who are edukated the most, and thoze who are edukated the least, are troubled with fear just alike.

Fear and courage are instinkts.

A man who iz a koward iz born so, and, when he iz full ov skare, hiz hare on hiz hed will git up on end, I dont kare how mutch edukashun yu pile on top ov it.

The gratest kowards in the world are the men ov the most genius—they are the most silly kowards.

One ov theze kind ov men will quake with fear when a mouse knaws in the wainskote at night, but they will face an earthquake next day with composure.

I dont kno ov a more terrible sensashun than fear; it iz deth when it exhausts itself and ends in despair.

I am a grate koward miself, and beleave i waz born so, and yet thare is nothing which i despize so mutch as kowardice.

I would give all the other virtews i hav got (provided i hav got enny), and throw in a hundred dollars in munny besides, for an unlimited supply ov courage.

I would like tew hav courage enuff tew face the devil himself, if he waz the least bit sassy tew to me.

I am satisfied that courage iz an instinkt, for i notiss all the animal kreashun hav it well defined.

BUTY.

Buty iz a very handy thing tew hav, espeshily for a woman who aint hansum.

Thare iz not mutch ov enny thing more diffikult tew define than buty.

It iz a blessed thing that there ain’t no rules for it, for the way it iz now, every man gits a hansum woman for a wife.

Thare iz grate power in female buty; its viktorys reach klear from the Garden ov Eden down to yesterday.

Adam waz the fust man that saw a butiful woman, and waz the fust man tew acknowledge it.

But beauty in itself iz but a very short-lived viktory—a mere perspektive to the background.

Thare aint noboddy but a butterfly kan liv on buty, and git phatt.

When buty and good sense jine each other, yu hav got a mixtur that will stand both wet and dry weather.

I hav never seen a woman with good sense but what had buty enuff tew make herself hily agreeable; but i hav seen 3 or 4 wimmin in mi day who hadn’t sense enuff tew make a good deal ov buty the least bit charming.

But, az i sed before, thare ain’t no posatiff rule for buty, and i am dredful glad ov it, for every boddy would be after 46 that rule, and sumboddy wouldn’t git enny rule, besides running a grate risk ov gitting jammed in the rush.

Man buty iz a awful weak komplaint—it iz wuss, if possible, than the nosegay disseaze.

If there iz sitch a thing az a butiful man on earth, he haz mi simpathy. Even mithology had but one Adonis, and the only accomplishment he had waz tew blatt like a lamb.

FAITH.

Faith iz the rite bower ov Hope.

If it want for faith, thare would be no living in this world. We couldn’t even eat hash with enny safety, if it want for faith.

Human knowledge is very short, and don’t reach but a little ways, and even that little ways iz twilite; but faith lengthens out the road, and makes it light, so that we kan see tew read the letterings on the mile stuns.

Faith haz won more viktorys than all the other pashuns or sentiments ov the heart and hed put together.

Faith iz one ov them warriors who dont kno when she iz whipped.

But Faith iz no milksop, but a live fighter. She dont set down and gro stupid with resignashun, and git weak with the buty ov her attributes; but she iz the heroine ov forlorn Hope—she feathers her arrows with reazon, and fires rite at the bull’s eye ov fate.

I think now if i couldn’t hav but one ov the moral attributes, i would take it all in faith—red hot faith I mean; and tho i mite make sum fust rate blunders, i would do a rushing bizzness amung the various dri bones thare iz laying around loose in this world.

BRANES.

Branes are a sort ov animal pulp, and by common konsent are suppozed tew be the medium ov thought.

How enny boddy knows that the branes do the thinking, or are the interpreters ov thought, iz more than i kan tell; and, for what i kno, this theory may be one ov thoze remarkable diskoverys ov man which aint so.

Theze subjeks are tew mutch for a man ov mi learning tew lift. I kant prove any ov them, and i hav too mutch venerashun tew guess at them.

Branes are generally supozed tew be lokated in the hed, but investigashun satisfys me that they are planted all over the boddy.

I find that a dansing master’s are situated in hiz heels and toze, while a fiddler’s all center in hiz elbows.

Sum people’s branes seem tew be placed in their hands and fingers, which explains their grate genius for taking things which they kan reach.

I hav seen cases whare all the branes seemed tew kongregate in the tounge; and once in a grate while they inhabit the ears, and then we hav a good listener, but theze are seldum cases.

Sum times the branes ain’t enny whare in partikular, but all over the boddy in a minnit. These fellows are like a pissmire just before a hard shower, in a big hurry, and alwus trieing tew go 4 different ways tew once.

Thare seems tew be kases whare thare aint enny branes at all, but this iz a mistake. I thought i had cum akrost one ov theze kind once, but after watching the pashunt for an hour, and see him drink 5 horns ov poor whiskey during the time, i had no trouble in telling whare hiz branes all lay.

I hav finally cum tew the konclushun that branes, or sum thing else that iz good tew think with, are excellent tew hav: but yu want tew keep yure eye on them, and not let them phool away their time, nor yures neither.

SPRING AND BILES.

Spring came this year az mutch az usual, hail butuous virgin 5000 years old and upwards, hale and harty old gal, welcum tew York State, and parts adjacent!

Now the birds jaw, now the cattle holler, now the pigs skream, now the geese warble, now the kats sigh, and natur is frisky, the earnest pissmire, the virtuous bed-bug, and the nobby cockroach, are singing Yankee Doodle, and “coming thru the rhi.” Now may be seen the muskeeter, that gray outlined critter ov destiny, solitary and alone, examining his last year’s bill, and may now be heard, with the naked ear, the hoarse shanghigh, bawling in the barnyard.

Kittens in the doorway, the pupys on the green, neighbor chats with neighbor, and the languid urchin creeps listless toward the school. These things are all fust rate in their place, but spring brings pesky biles, and plants them carelessly, sometimes among the maiden’s charms, and sometimes among the young men’s. I kan tork like a preshure poet about biles, just now, for i have one in full bloom growing on me, almost reddy to pick, az big az an eggplant, and az full ov anguish az a broken heart.

Biles are the sorest things ov their size on reckord, and az kross tew the touch az a setting hen, or a dog with a fresh bone. Biles alwus pick out the handyest place on youre boddy tew bild their nest, and if you undertake tew brake them up, it only makes them mad, and takes them longer tew hatch out. Thare aint no sutch thing az coaxing, nor driving them away. They are like an impudent bed bug, they won’t move till they hav got their fill.

Biles are az old az religion. Job, the proffit, waz the first champion ov biles, and he iz currently reported tew hav more biles, and more pashunce, to the square inch, than enny one, two very rare things to be found, in enny man.

Biles and pashunce! i should as soon think ov mixing courting and muskeeters together, for luxury.

I hav got a grate deal more faith than i hav pashunce, but i hain’t got enough faith in biles. I wouldn’t trust a bile, even on one ov mi boots.

I think faith iz a better artikle than pashunce. Faith sumtimes iz an evidence ov brains, and pashunce quite often iz only numbness, but i don’t thinkin these smoothe shod times it iz best to have too mutch capital invested in either ov them.

But i am out ov the road. I must git back onto biles agin.

If a fellow begins tew wander, and git out ov the straight and narrow path, it is curious how quick he will begin to go to the——. Biles are very sassy; sumtimes when yer go to set down, they will get between yer and the chair; this iz one evidence ov their ill-breeding, and i had one once plant herself on the frunt end of mi nose, which was a most remarkabel piece ov bad manners, for there iz no room on mi noze ennywhere fora bile, for when it iz even ebb tide with mi noze, it covers half ov mi face. Biles are sed tew be helthy, and i guess they am, for i hav seen sum helthy old biles, az big az a hornet’s nest, and az full ov stings. I always want to be helthy—i am willing tew pay the highest market price for a good deal ov helthy—but if i had to hav 2 biles on me, awl the time, in order to be helthy, i should think that i was bulling the market.

There iz one more smart thing about biles; they are like twins; they hardly ever cum singly, and i hav known them to throw double sixes.

What! twelve biles on one man at a time! This is wus than fighting bumblebees with your summer clothes on.

Biles are sed, by the edukated and correkt spellers ov the land, to be an operashun ov natur tew git rid ov sumthing which she wants to spare. This is so without doubt, but it don’t strike me az being a very polite thing in natur, tew shov oph her biles onto other folks. I say, let evry boddy take care ov their own biles.

But say aul yer kan about biles, call them all the mean 50 names current amung fishmungers, revile and persecute, and spit on them, groan, grin and swear when they visit yer, hit them over the head and set on them if yer pleaze, there iz a time in their career when they concentrate aul the pathos ov joy that a man haz on hand to spare, and that iz—when they bust!

CONSULTING YOUR DOCTOR ON BILES.

This iz bliss, glory, and revenge on the haff shell. A man leans back in rektified comfort, az innocent and az limber az a mermaid.

This pays for the fretful nights and nervous days while the bile haz been hatching. Exit Biles.

TIGHT BOOTS.

I would jist like to kno who the man waz who fust invented tite boots.

He must hav bin a narrow and kontrakted kuss.

If he still lives, i hope he haz repented ov hiz sin, or iz enjoying grate agony ov sum kind.

I hav bin in a grate menny tite spots in mi life, but generally could manage to make them average; but thare iz no sich thing az making a pair of tite boots average.

Enny man who kan wear a pair ov tite boots, and be humble, and penitent, and not indulge profane literature, will make a good husband.

Oh! for the pen ov departed Wm. Shakspear, to write an anethema aginst tite boots, that would make anshunt Rome wake up, and howl agin az she did once before on a previous ockashun.

Oh! for the strength ov Herkules, to tare into shu strings all the tite boots ov creashun, and skatter them tew the 8 winds ov heaven.

Oh! for the buty ov Venus, tew make a bigg foot look hansum without a tite boot on it.

Oh! for the payshunce ov Job, the Apostle, to nuss a tite boot and bles it, and even pra for one a size smaller and more pinchfull.

Oh! for a pair of boots bigg enuff for the foot ov a mountain.

I have been led into the above assortment ov Oh’s! from having in my posseshun, at this moment, a pair ov number nine boots, with a pair ov number eleven feet in them.

Mi feet are az uneazy az a dog’s noze the fust time he wears a muzzle.

I think mi feet will eventually choke the boots to deth.

I liv in hopes they will.

I suppozed i had lived long enuff not to be phooled agin in this way, but i hav found out that an ounce ov vanity weighs more than a pound ov reazon, espeshily when a man mistakes a bigg foot for a small one.

Avoid tite boots, mi friend, az you would the grip of the devil; for menny a man haz caught for life a fust rate habit for swareing bi encouraging hiz feet to hurt hiz boots.

I hav promised mi two feet, at least a dozen ov times during mi checkured life, that they never should be strangled agin, but i find them to-day az phull ov pain az the stummuk ake from a suddin attak ov tite boots.

But this iz solemly the last pair ov tite boots i will ever wear; i will hereafter wear boots az bigg az mi feet, if i have to go barefoot to do it.

I am too old and too respektable to be a phool enny more.

Eazy boots iz one of the luxurys ov life, but i forgit what the other luxury iz, but i don’t kno az i care, provided i kan git rid ov this pair ov tite boots.

Enny man kan hav them for seven dollars, just half what they kost, and if they don’t make his feet ake wuss than an angle worm in hot ashes, he needn’t pay for them.

Methuseles iz the only man, that i kan kall to mind now who could hav afforded to hav wore tite boots, and enjoyed them, he had a grate deal ov waste time tew be miserable in, but life now days, iz too short, and too full ov aktual bizzness to phool away enny ov it on tite boots.

Tite boots are an insult to enny man’s understanding.

He who wears tite boots will hav too acknowledge the corn.

Tite boots hav no bowells or mersy, their insides are wrath, and promiskious cussing.

Beware ov tite boots.