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with his arms akimbo, he could easily, as I
thought, with his long, bony fingers, have
spanned it. Around him, his coat, which was
very tight, was held together by one button,
and in consequence, an inch or more of tape,
to which the button was attached, was per
ceptible where it was pulled through the
cloth. About his neck he wore a white era*
vat, in which his chin was occasionally bu
ried as he moved his head in conversation ;
no shirt collar was perceptible; every other
person seemed to pride himself on the size of
his, as they were then worn large. Mr.
Randolph’s complexion was precisely that of
a mummy —withered, saffron, dry, and blood
less : you could not have placed a pin’s point
on his face, where you would not have touch
ed a wrinkle. His lips were thin, compressed
and colorless; the chin, beardless as a boy’s,
was broad for the size of his face, which was
small; his nose was straight, with nothing
remarkable in it, except that it was too short.
He wore a fur cap, which he took off, stand
ing a few minutes uncovered. Fancy a dead
man struck into life by lightning, and all his
life in his eye, and you have a picture of
John Randolph.”— Magooris Orators of the
American Revolution.
(Sdcctic of lllit.
A TALE OF A TURKEY.
AN UNFORTUNATE FACT.
BY F. A. DURIVAGE.
Orlando. — Forbear ! and eat no more ?
Duke —We have eat none yet.
Orlando. —Nor shall you till my appetite be served.
As You Like It.
One Saturday evening, not long ago, a trio
of young gentlemen going home in the even
ing, after the labors of the week had ended,
chancing to look upwards at a third story
window of a certain house in a certain street,
not many levies from the well-known Marl
boro’ Hotel, Boston, tenanted by an acquant
ance of theirs, a young man of great histrion
ic ability and repute, espied one of “ Plato’s
Men,” i. e. a bird of the genus Turkey, de
nuded of its feathers, and in fact prepared for
spitting, hanging in a melancholy manner
from a window-fastening, for thebenefit of
pure air.
Mr. TANARUS., the proprietor of the bird, being
something of a bird-fancier, had, a few days
previous, purchased this choice turkey, for the
purpose of regaling himself and family there
with on Sunday, wisely deferring the luxuri
ous feast to a day of rest, whereon the wick
ed prompter ceaseth from troubling, and the
annoying call-boy is quiescent. So there the
turkey—or the ding-dong, as Paul Shack has
it, liung in the night breeze:
And like a mighty pendulum,
All solemnly he swung.
But if Mr. TANARUS., loved turkey, so did his
three friends, and Mephistopheles prompted
them to a “ deed without a name(null and
void, accordingly, their easy consciences ar
gued,) and this was no other than the abduc
tion of the bird.
“Turkies are high,” said one of the trio.
“Yes, but they’ll come down,” answered
another, who, by chance, had become posses
sed of a long cedar pole, which had been drop
ped out of an unconscious countryman’s cart.
‘To lash the hooked blade of an open jack
knife to the extremity of this pole was the
work of a moment; in another, the string
which attached the turkey to his nail was
cut.
“The last link was broken,” and down
came the bird— facihs descensus , as the poet
has it.
The watchman was slumbering, and the
prize was secured. They carried it into an
eating-house, and ordered mine host to roast
it, and serve it up the next day with appro
priate “fixins” for their Sunday dinner.
The next day, punctual to the appointed
hour, the friends assembled and were told
their meal would soon be served. While
waiting for this desirable consummation, in
came the owner of the abducted bird. He
was pale and wan, and in a state of consid
erable agitation. Walking up to the land
lord in a nervous manner, he begged to know
if he could, as a great, favor, accommodate
him with about five pounds of beaf-steak.
“ It’s all gone,” was the answer.
“Mutton V ’
“All out.”
“ What have you got ?” gasped the des
paring victim. “I’ve got nothing for my
Sunday dinner.”
“You’d ought to have provided before
liand,” said the sententious host.
“ So I did,” replied the agonized actor:
§®®TFH IS &S3 1L UTF H©& IB ¥ BABISIf IF IS *
“ I had a turkey, and a better one
Ne’er did repose upon a rusty nail;
But he is gone ; whither, I know not sir.
The earth has bubbles as the water hath,
And he was ono of these ,
A turkey towering in his pride of place,
Was hawked and moused at
by some prowling rascal—l only wish I knew
who it was.”
“ Won’t you dine with us ?” asked one of
the conspirators, “ we are going to have tur
key.”
“ No—no—l thank you —think of my fam
ily. they would have no turkey.
“ Farewell, a long farewell to dreams of turkey;”
Landlord, what can you give me?”
“ I’m sorry to say,” said the host, after a
wink from one of the initiated, “that I can’t
spare you any meat or poultry. I'm hard up
myself. If it was any other day but Sun
day. As far as a pot of baked beans goes,
however ”
“ Beans!” shrieked the victim, “do you
take us for Mexicans, that you would feed
us on their national rations ? Begone ! thou
troublest me- —I’m not in the bean-eating vein.
My wife! my little ones! Beans. m he repeat
ed, with a sneering and demoniac emphasis.
“ Better have ’em.” said the landlord.
“Beans he it, then !” said the victim, in
the deep, hollow tones of forced resignation.
“Salubrious, savory, economical beans!”
suggested the landlord pleasantly and mildly.
“ Ah !” he added soothingly, as he folded up
a brown pot in a napkin and delivered it to
the despairing applicant, “I could almost
pick a bean with you myself.”
“ Gentlemen !” said tne victim, folding the
bean-pot in his arms with an air of great dig
nity, “ you cannot fully appreciate my feel
ings—you cannot sympathize entirely with
me. You called for turkey, and you had it:
i, who had for four days been preparing my
palate for the inordinate delectation which a
well-roasted dindon invariably affords, am
obliged to satisfy it with an article compared
to which, turkey is, as Shakspeare observes,
‘ Hyperion to a Satyr.’ Imagine the transi
tion from roast turkey to baked beans ! Par
don these tears! Truly there is but one step
from the sublime to the ridiculous!” And
with these words Mr.T. disappeared with his
sorrowful burthen.
The conspirators dined well that day, while
their victim—but we will forbear to draw
aside the veil which should shroud the sor
rows of a bereaved and afflicted family.
On New Year’s eve, however, Mr. T. was
agreeably surprised by the reception of a note
and a parcel. The former was anonymous,
and contained condolences upon his loss;
the latter contained a turkey, finer, fatter,
heavier than the lamented and lost bird.
When the remains of this atonement were
removed from the table upon New Year’s
day, Mr. T. leaned back in his chair, weary
with his labors. “That was capital!” said
he—“but, upon my soul, I wish I could find
out who stole that other turkey’' 1
NctDopa])£r Analects.
AN EXTRAORDINARY -WOMAN.
The Princess Belgiose has been, for the
last ten years, one of the most renowned
belles of Paris. At her first arrival in the
French capital, she took the lead as a beau
ty ; the perfection, as she was, of a glowing
young Italian, but her wit and conversation
al powers soon left her beauty a secondary
thing, and even of this pre-eminence she, in
a year or two, became impatient. With
keen and ready industry, she took up sci
ence, and before long became the beautiful
centre of a circle of men of learning ; lastly,
[ even, having written a work of divinity,
j which added to the respect of superior men,
for her powers.
The Princess was lately called upon by a
scientific gentleman. On entering her draw
ing-room, he observed a young officer, and
did not immediately recognise his fair friend
under the disguise of the uniform. Her hair
had been cropped short, and curled close to
her head ala Titus. Her military frock w T as
buttoned over her well-rounded chest to the
throat. The stripe down the pantaloons was
fitted to the boot with an imperative turn that
gives a meaning to the spur, and there was
but one exception, which all women make to
the correctness of masculine costume—the
cap was cocked too far one side.
“How am I to explain this new phase of
our favorite planet?” said the astronomer,
making, at the fame time, the best possible
use of his eyes.
“Ah !” replied the Princess, “you did not
observe my traveling carriage in the court
yard, as you came up?”
“And where bound in these troubled
times ?” he asked with wonder.
“To the wars—to the wars !” she exclaim
ed, striking her heels together with a drill
thump that made the apartment ring. “ Ita
ly, my country, is at war with the tyrannical
Austrians, and I am off in an hour!”
“ Not famous enough, my dear Princess !”
pathetically sighed the astronomer. “Beau
ty, wit, science, theology, have all done their
best for you, and still you are athirst for dis
tinction ?”
The Princess threw off her dramatic man
ner, and looked grave.
“It is not altogether for anew fame,” she
said in another tone, “ though that goes for
something, as it w T ell may—but my country,
Italy, is a land worth striking a blow for,
even with so poor a hand as this; and I go
to raise men with what money I can command
and to lead them if need be.”
The Princess looked like an enthusiastic
officer of 18, while she spoke, though she is
now past thirty—her male dress had so reju
venated her —and her learned friend describes
her expression, tone and beauty together, as
having been memorably attractive.
The account of this morning call has be
come current since the news from Italy, that
in the late attack of the Sardinian army upon
the Austrian, the Princess led two hundred of
her own arming and equipping, and behaved
herself most gallantly. — French Paper.
-i M i —_
TIME’S CHANGES.
A late letter in the Concordia Intelligencer
has the following notice of a gentleman, who
died recently in Mexico:
“ Among the recent deaths here, I noticed
one that scarcely attracted a passing remark,
yet he was a man who, twenty years ago,
stood at the head of society—Martin Duralde.
Born of an influential and affluent family in
Attakapas, extensively connected, augment
ing his hereditary fortunes by successful in
vestments, married to a daughter of the Hon.
Henry Clay, who was then at the zenith of
his popularity and power, Mr. Duralde was,
on all sides, courted, consulted and caressed.
But reverses overtook him ; city property ra
pidly ran down; his wife died; his friends
diminished with his fortune, and at the com
mencement of the Mexican war, this man,
once so rich, so popular, and so honored,
found himself obliged, for subsistence, to fol
low our march with a few packages of mer
chandize. He recently embarked on a trad
ing schooner at Tampico, to return home.
The deadly fever of that coast swept off eve
ry one of the crew but a small boy, and when
the vessel, after beating about in the gulf, fi
nally made the bar of the river, with a signal
of distress, the captain was found dead on a
pallet, and the unfortunate Duralde by his
side in the last agonies, and no medicine, no
water, and scarcely a ration of food onboard.
What an illustration of the vanity and vicis
situdes of life!”
AN ODD SIMILE.
Do you remember a description given of
the Sloth by Sydney Smith, in his review of
“Waterton’s Wanderings in South America.”
“The Sloth in its wild state spends its life in
trees, and never leaves them but from force
or accident; and what is most extraordinary,
he lives not upon the branches, but under
them. He moves suspended, sleeps suspend
ed, and passes his life in suspence—like a
young clergyman distantly related to a Bish
op !”— Knickerbocker.
A PAINFUL FROLIC.
Among the facetiae of Charles ll.’s days, it
was the custom when a gentleman drank a
lady’s health as a toast, by way of doing her
greater honor, to throw some part of his dress
into the fire, an example which his compan
ions were bound to follow, by consuming the
article of their apparel, whatever it might be.
One of his friends perceiving at a tavern din
ner that Sir Charles Sedley had on a very
rich lace cravat, when he named his toast,
committed his cravat to the flames, as a burnt
offering to the temporary divinity, and Sir
Charles and the rest of the party were obliged
to do the same. The poet bore his loss with I
great composure, observing it was a good
joke, but that he would have as good a one
some other time. He watched, therefore, his
opportunity, when the same party was as
sembled on a similar occasion, and drinking
off a bumper to the health of Nelj Gwynne
or some other beauty of the day, he called the
waiter, and ordering a tooth-drawer into the
room, whom he had previously brought to the
tavern for the purpose, made him draw a de
cayed tooth which long had plagued him.—
The rules of good fellowship, as then in force,
clearly required that every one of the compa
ny should have a tooth drawn also, but they j
very naturally expressed a hope that SedW
would not be so unmerciful as to enforce th
law. Deaf, however, to all their remonstraf
ces, persuasions and entreaties, he saw them
one after another put themselves into th
hands of the operator, and whilst writhing
with pain, added to their torment by exclaim
ing—“Patience, gentlemen, patience’ V ou
promised that 1 should have my frolic too';’
-—■—
IRISH INGENUITY,
When General Y was quartered in
a small town in Ireland, he and his lady were
regularly besieged, whenever they got into
their carriage, by an old beggar woman, who
kept her post at the door, assailing them dai
ly with fresh importunities and fresh tales of
distress. At last the lady’s charity and the
General's patience were nearly exhausted
but their petitioner's wit was still in its pris
tine vigor. One morning, at the accustomed
hour, when the lady was getting into her car
riage, the old woman began :
“ Agia ! my lady; success to your lady
ship, and success to your honor’s honor
this morning, of all days in the year- for
sure didn’t 1 dream last night, that her lady
ship gave me a pound of ta, and that your
honor gave me a pound of tobacco?”
“ But, my good woman,” said the General,
“ do you know that dreams always goby the
rule of contrary ?”
“ Do they so, plase your honor ?” rejoined
the old woman.
“Then it must be your honor that will give
me the fa, and her ladyship that will give me
the tobacco.”
The General being of Sterne’s opinion, that
a bon mot is always worth something, even
more than a pinch of snuffy gave the inge
nious dreamer, the value of her dream.
i i
AN HAPPY DEVICE.
We know of a couple, not many hundred
miles from the capital of Hoosierdom, who
carried on their courtship in rather a novel
manner. A young gentleman had fallen in
love with the daughter of his employer, but
from certain ideas of wealth anything like a
match was strenuously opposed by the fath
er. The consequence was, the young man
was forbidden visiting at his employer's
house. During the winter season, as the old
gentleman was in the habit of wearing his
cloak, the young couple made him the inno
cent and unsuspecting bearer of their corres
pondence. The young lady would pin a let
ter inside the lining of the old man’s cloak
during the dinner hour, and when the father
had returned to the counting-house, and
thrown off his cloak, the young lover would
go take out the lady’s epistle, read it, and
send the reply back in the same manner. It
is needless to say, that love and ingenuity
were finally successful.
> i
- PARLIAMENTARY FORMS.
The following passage occurs in a late
London letter to the N. Y. Evening Mirror:
The process of receiving bills in the Com
mons from the Lords will bear alluding to
for the purpose of showing the capacity in
which the brother of the Premier of England
figures in respect to it. An old man (some
times two) with a wig three times as large
and six as hideous, if that be posstble, as
judges’ wigs, and a lawyer’s gown, presents
himself at the bar and makes a profound sa
laam, a regular stage, Bluebeard sort of an
affair. The eye of the speaker catches the
movement —he can’t help it—and he calls
out, “What have you got there?” Answer
—“ Such and such” a bill from the Lords.”—
The speaker then inquires, but without wait
ing for a response, which is never given, if it
be the pleasure of the House to receive the
communication ? Whereupon the Sergent-at
arms, Lord Charles Russell, hops out of his
little pigeon hole of a seat at the entrance of
the house, and walks up to the table, making
obeisances to the chair with a mot oriental
suppleness of back all the way, he being ac
courted in court costume —knee breeches,
silk stockings, buckled shoes and small
sword. On arriving at the table he takes
hold of the immense mace (Cromwell’s “bub
ble”) and back he inarches backwards, front
ing the speaker all tiie time, to the bar. Here
he acts as convoy to the Peers’ messenger,
and up the centre of the floor the pair strut,
stopping every four or five paces to go through
a particular emphatic cringe. The bill being
laid upon the table the pair creep backwards,
back again—and this is the part of the per
formance which most disturbs the gravity of
the gravest beholder ; and assuredly nothin)?
so profoundly grosteque did mortal eyes ever
behold in the serious business of life, as tw°
full-grown men thus shambling about on tn