66

The cacoethes scribendi " must have been among the "Jesta Romanorum."

27. In sealing a letter-the wax in so very melting a mood, as frequently to leave a burning kiss on your hand, instead of the paper; next, when you have applied the seal, and all, at last, seems over, said wax voluntarily "rendering up its trust," the moment after it has undertaken it. So much for "Fyn sigellak; well brand, en vast houd !”

28. Writing at the top of a very long sheet of paper, so that you either rumple and crease the lower end of it with your arm against the table, in bringing it lower down, or bruise your chest, and drive out all your breath, in stretching forward to the upper end.

Ned Tes. Long as it is, to begin with, you find it in creases as you go on down.

29. Straining your eyes over a book in the twilight, at the rate of about five minutes per line, before it occurs to you to order candles; and when they arrive, finding that you have totally lost the sense of what you have been reading, by the tardy operation of getting it at piecemeal.

30. Attempting to erase writing; but, in fact, only scratching holes in the paper.

31. Writing at the same rickety table with another, who employs his shoulder, elbow, and body more actively than his fingers.

32. Writing, on the coldest day in the year, in the coldest room in the house, by a fire which has sworn not to burn; and so, perpetually dropping your full pen upon your paper, out of the five icicles with which you vainly endeavor to hold it.

33. A pen that makes nothing but blots-that seems to be made solely for a medium to receive the ink from the inkstand, and scatter it over the sheet, putting it in deep mourning.

Ned Tes. A pen of a pen-sieve turn.

34. To drop your gold pen on the floor, and pick it up with the points curled up, so as to resemble the things the children make out of dandelion stalks, and call "rams' horns."

Most authors write an infamous short-hand. Sin-copy personified.

35. While writing with a pencil, to dash the point into the inkstand through absence of mind.

36. Writing with ink of about the consistency of pitch, which leaves alternately a blot and a blank.

37. Writing a long letter with one or more of the cut fingers of your right hand bundled up; or else (for more comfort) with your left hand.

Tes. The miseries of writing lead naturally to the miseries of printing, if we only knew any thing about it.

Sen. Yes; and the more miserable the former, the more the latter must have to complain of. Many an unfortunate "Jour" could tell us of poor men, whose time is their money, spending half of it in making out illegible "copy," and the other half in correcting what they had set up, because no mortal man (not even a printer) could guess right at the author's meaning the first time.

Ned Tes. And the foreman could tell of teaching the trade to a boy of a pi-ous turn; which, curiously enough, is rather conducive to profanity than piety in the teacher.

Tes. If our mass of scraps were ever to go to the printer, we had better save a place to put in what he has to say about his troubles, for he certainly would experience them all!

Sen. But what shall we attack next time?

Tes. My friend. Can we dare we make what we eat and drink the subject of thought for one sitting?

Sen. Testy, pardon my weakness, but spare me this.-

"Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise."

Foolhardiness is not bravery. There are mysteries into which it is not meant that we should inquire.

The printer is author-ized to offer the incredulous convincing proofs.

Tes. Still I don't like the idea of turning back, after having marched up to the citadel.

do our duty without shrinking.

No, no; we'll enter, and

Ned Tes. As the boys always say to both sides in a fight,

Eating annoyances. The Devil sends cooks, so there's the devil to pay.

CHAPTER VII.

Eating annoyances. The Devil sends cooks, so there's the devil to pay.-The chea eating-house in two phases. Din or dinner.-The most thriving bug in New York, except bum-bug. An enc-roach-ment on our liberties.-The upper 10,000 vs. the lower 490,000 for lie-ability and reliability.-An imported article of domestics.— The brick-in-hod-and-in-hat-carrying race's aptness for all sorts of fabrication.The declension of boarding-houses favorable to the conjugation of bachelors.—A moving theme. Con-fusion, i. e., a melting together.-Boarding-houses, not to be accused of un-chary-table-ness.-Efforts at carving proving rather a hindrance than a help.-Specimens of gold-baring quartz from the dough-minions of the baker.— A formal dinner. Courses that are not race-courses.-The binn, proved to be a sell, by the hermit that comes out.-A good roll on the carpet-buttered side down.-Contrariness is the won't of things. What's a-curd to sour your temper ?— The cold chairy-teas of the world!-Beer miseries-that have nothing to do with the berry-ing that follows.-A preparation sooted to the most fastidious taste. Making a mull of it.

Sen. The Table ought to furnish good fare for our miseries to fatten and increase on.

Tes. So it would, except that it is so intimately connected with all the rest. Travelling, boarding, society, &c., all look to the universal operations of eating and drinking as opening assailable points for their efforts against the comfort of mankind. However, it is worth while to try a few, even at the risk of some repetition of miseries included under other heads. So let us devote this chapter exclusively to the table.

Ned Tes. It's "all a board that's going." By the by, the Chapter on the Table ought to be illustrated with plates. Tes. (in perfect innocence* of his son's duplicity of mean

* Innocence in no sense but that, however; for if Ned had had more punishment in the past, he would not have perpetrated so many punnish meanings in the present.

The cheap eating-house in two phases. Din or dinner.

ings.) Yes, a good cut or steel-engraving would be very appropriate to set off the dullness of a dinner misery. But Mrs. T. ought to be here to start us off with some of the agonies of a hostess; such as seeing the appearance of her pretty and tasteful table ruined by the inopportune oversetting of a gravy-boat, &c., &c.

Sen. Even the best of us are subject to such accidents. Ned Tes. Clergymen themselves sometimes forget the respect due to the cloth.

Sen. Boarding-houses should not be excluded. They are particeps criminis with all feeding discomforts, especially eating-houses. These belong together as naturally as mutton and turnips.

Tes. Thank heaven, the reign of both is over, as far as I am concerned, since I went to housekeeping.

Ned Tes. You are no longer under the dine-nasty of eating-houses

Tes. Nor bored with another family under the same roof.

Sen. Well do I remember the time, Testy, when it was "neck or nothing" with me between a cheap eating-house, or no dinner! I have scarcely the heart to abuse them, on that account; but I can tell you how one would strike me now, without denying heartfelt and stomach-felt obligations to them in times gone by.

1. The noise is deafening. Every body is in a hurry-money-taker, carvers, waiters, and guests. Every thing is hot and smoking, waiters included, as they rush back and forth as if possessed, each bringing six, seven, or eight plates of food arranged, with complicated ingenuity, on one red hand and naked arm, while the other hand grasps twelve, fourteen, or sixteen knives and forks to match. Then when he turns back, he roars out the names of the incongruous dishes his next load is to be composed of. "Tew plates rose-beef-rose porkanonions-plumhard-bolasoop