Now, here"s a note just come from Fred: "Old fellow, will you dine With me to-day? and meet the boys, A jolly number--nine?"
Ah, Fred is quite as free to-day As just a year ago, And ignorant, happily, I may say, Of things _I"ve_ learned to know.
I"d like, yes, if the truth were known, I"d like to join the boys, But then a Bened.i.c.k must learn To cleave to other joys.
So, here"s my answer: "Fred, old chum, I much regret--oh, pshaw!
To tell the truth, I"ve got to dine With--_my dear mother-in-law!_"
--_Harper"s Weekly._
CONCERNING MOSQUITOES.
_Feelingly Dedicated to their Discounted Bills._
BY MISS ANNA A. GORDON.
Skeeters have the reputation Of continuous application To their poisonous profession; Never missing nightly session, Wearing out your life"s existence By their practical persistence.
Would I had the power to veto Bills of every mosquito; Then I"d pa.s.s a peaceful summer, With no small nocturnal hummer Feasting on my circulation, For his regular potation.
Oh, that rascally mosquito!
He"s a fellow you must see to; Which you can"t do if you"re napping, But must evermore be slapping Quite promiscuous on your features; For you"ll seldom hit the creatures.
But the thing most aggravating Is the cool and calculating Way in which he tunes his harpstring To the melody of sharp sting; Then proceeds to serenade you, And successfully evade you.
When a skeeter gets through stealing, He sails upward to the ceiling, Where he sits in deep reflection How he perched on your complexion, Filled with solid satisfaction At results of his extraction.
Would you know, in this connection, How you may secure protection For yourself and city cousins From these bites and from these buzzin"s?
Show your sense by quickly getting For each window--skeeter netting.
THE STILTS OF GOLD.
BY METTA VICTORIA VICTOR.
Mrs. Mackerel sat in her little room, Back of her husband"s grocery store, Trying to see through the evening gloom, To finish the baby"s pinafore.
She st.i.tched away with a steady hand, Though her heart was sore, to the very core, To think of the troublesome little band, (There were seven, or more), And the trousers, frocks, and ap.r.o.ns they wore, Made and mended by her alone.
"Slave, slave!" she said, in a mournful tone; "And let us slave, and contrive, and fret, I don"t suppose we shall ever get A little home which is all our own, With my own front door Apart from the store, And the smell of fish and tallow no more."
These words to herself she sadly spoke, Breaking the thread from the last-set st.i.tch, When Mackerel into her presence broke-- "Wife, we"re--we"re--we"re, wife, we"re--we"re _rich_!"
"_We_ rich! ha, ha! I"d like to see; I"ll pull your hair if you"re fooling me."
"Oh, don"t, love, don"t! the letter is here-- You can read the news for yourself, my dear.
The one who sent you that white c.r.a.pe shawl-- There"ll be no end to our gold--he"s dead; You know you always would call him stingy, Because he didn"t invite us to Injy; And I am his only heir, "tis said.
A million of pounds, at the very least, And pearls and diamonds, likely, beside!"
Mrs. Mackerel"s spirits rose like yeast-- "How lucky I married you, Mac," she cried.
Then the two broke forth into frantic glee.
A customer hearing the strange commotion, Peeped into the little back-room, and he Was seized with the very natural notion That the Mackerel family had gone insane; So he ran away with might and main.
Mac shook his partner by both her hands; They dance, they giggle, they laugh, they stare; And now on his head the grocer stands, Dancing a jig with his feet in air-- Remarkable feat for a man of his age, Who never had danced upon any stage But the High-Bridge stage, when he set on top, And whose green-room had been a green-grocer"s shop.
But that Mrs. Mac should perform so well Is not very strange, if the tales they tell Of her youthful days have any foundation.
But let that pa.s.s with her former life-- An opera-girl may make a good wife, If she happens to get such a nice situation.
A million pounds of solid gold One would have thought would have crushed them dead; But dear they bobbed, and courtesied, and rolled Like a couple of corks to a plummet of lead.
"Twas enough the soberest fancy to tickle To see the two Mackerels in such a pickle!
It was three o"clock when they got to bed; Even then through Mrs. Mackerel"s head Such gorgeous dreams went whirling away, "Like a Catherine-wheel," she declared next day, "That her brain seemed made of sparkles of fire Shot off in spokes, with a ruby tire."
Mrs. Mackerel had ever been One of the upward-tending kind, Regarded by husband and by kin As a female of very ambitious mind.
It had fretted her long and fretted her sore To live in the rear of the grocery-store.
And several times she was heard to say She would sell her soul for a year and a day To the King of Brimstone, Fire, and Pitch, For the power and pleasure of being rich.
Now her ambition had scope to work-- Riches, they say, are a burden at best; Her onerous burden she did not shirk, But carried it all with commendable zest; Leaving her husband with nothing in life But to smoke, eat, drink, and obey his wife.
She built a house with a double front-door, A marble house in the modern style, With silver planks in the entry floor, And carpets of extra-magnificent pile.
And in the hall, in the usual manner, "A statue," she said, "of the chased Diana; Though who it was chased her, or whether they Caught her or not, she could, really, not say."
A carriage with curtains of yellow satin-- A coat-of-arms with these rare devices: "A mackerel sky and the starry Pisces--"
And underneath, in the purest fish-latin, _If fishibus flyabus They may reach the skyabus!_
Yet it was not in common affairs like these She showed her original powers of mind; Her soul was fired, her ardor inspired, To stand apart from the rest of mankind; "To be A No. one," her husband said; At which she turned very angrily red, For she couldn"t endure the remotest hint Of the grocery-store, and the mackerels in"t.
Weeks and months she plotted and planned To raise herself from the common level; Apart from even the few to stand Who"d hundreds of thousands on which to revel.
Her genius, at last, spread forth its wings-- Stilts, golden stilts, are the very things-- "I"ll walk on stilts," Mrs. Mackerel cried, In the height of her overtowering pride.
Her husband timidly shook his head; But she did not care--"For why," as she said, "Should the owner of more than a million pounds Be going the rounds On the very same grounds As those low people, she couldn"t tell who, They might keep a shop, for all she knew."
She had a pair of the articles made, Of solid gold, gorgeously overlaid With every color of precious stone Which ever flashed in the Indian zone.
She privately practised many a day Before she ventured from home at all; She had lost her girlish skill, and they say That she suffered many a fearful fall; But pride is stubborn, and she was bound On her golden stilts to go around, Three feet, at least, from the plebeian ground.
"Twas an exquisite day, In the month of May, That the stilts came out for a promenade; Their first _entree_ Was made on the shilling side of Broadway; The carmen whistled, the boys went mad, The omnibus-drivers their horses stopped.
The chestnut-roaster his chestnuts dropped, The popper of corn no longer popped; The daintiest dandies deigned to stare, And even the heads of women fair Were turned by the vision meeting them there.
The stilts they sparkled and flashed and shone Like the tremulous lights of the frigid zone, Crimson and yellow and sapphire and green, Bright as the rainbows in summer seen; While the lady she strode along between With a majesty too supremely serene For anything _but_ an American queen.
A lady with jewels superb as those, And wearing such very expensive clothes, Might certainly do whatever she chose!
And thus, in despite of the jeering noise, And the frantic delight of the little boys, The stilts were a very decided success.
The _creme de la creme_ paid profoundest attention, The merchants" clerks bowed in such wild excess, When she entered their shops, that they strained their spines, And afterward went into rapid declines.
The papers, next day, gave her flattering mention; "The wife of our highly-esteemed fellow-citizen, A Mackerel, of Codfish Square, in this city, Scorning French fashions, herself has. .h.i.t on one So very piquant and stylish and pretty, We trust our fair friends will consider it treason _Not_ to walk upon stilts, by the close of the season."
Mrs. Mackerel, now, was never seen Out of her chamber, day or night, Unless her stilts were along--her mien Was very imposing from such a height, It imposed upon many a dazzled wight, Who snuffed the perfume floating down From the rustling folds of her gorgeous gown, But never could smell through these bouquets The fishy odor of former days.
She went on her golden stilts to pray, Which never became her better than then, When her murmuring lips were heard to say, "Thank G.o.d, I am not as my fellow-men!"
Her pastor loved as a pastor might-- His house that was built on a golden rock; He pointed it out as a shining light To the lesser lambs of his fleecy flock.
The stilts were a help to the church, no doubt, They kindled its self-expiring embers, So that before the season was out It gained a dozen excellent members.
Mrs. Mackerel gave a superb soiree, Standing on stilts to receive her guests; The gas-lights mimicked the glowing day So well, that the birds, in their flowery nests, Almost burst their beautiful b.r.e.a.s.t.s, Trilling away their musical stories In Mrs. Mackerel"s conservatories.
She received on stilts; a distant bow Was all the loftiest could attain-- Though some of her friends she did allow To kiss the hem of her jewelled train.
One gentleman screamed himself quite hoa.r.s.e Requesting her to dance; which, of course, Couldn"t be done on stilts, as she Halloed down to him rather scornfully.
The fact is, when Mackerel kept a shop, His wife was very fond of a hop, And now, as the music swelled and rose, She felt a tingling in her toes, A restless, tickling, funny sensation Which didn"t agree with her exaltation.
When the maddened music was at its height, And the waltz was wildest--behold, a sight!
The stilts began to hop and twirl Like the saucy feet of a ballet-girl.
And their haughty owner, through the air, Was spin, spin, spinning everywhere.
Everybody got out of the way To give the dangerous stilts fair play.
In every corner, at every door, With faces looking like unfilled blanks, They watched the stilts at their airy pranks, Giving them, unrequested, the floor.
They never had glittered so bright before; The light it flew in flashing splinters Away from those burning, revolving centres; While the gems on the lady"s flying skirts Gave out their light in jets and spirts.
Poor Mackerel gazed in mute dismay At this unprecedented display.