CHAPTER I. DAWNATION. A modern American Ritualistic Spire! How can the modern American Ritualistic Spire be here! The well-known tapering brown Spire, like a closed umbrella on end? How can that be here? There is no rusty rim of a shocking bad hat between the eye and that Spire in the real prospect. What is the rusty rim that now intervenes, and confuses the vision of at least one eye? It must be an... more...

HIGH NOTES BY OUR MUSICAL CRITIC. PUNCHINELLO'S critic, always the friend of fair-play, resents the insinuation that Mr. CARL ROSA has been a careless director of Opera. The truth is that Mr. ROSA has not produced the smallest work without a great deal of Preparation. FLOTOW'S Shadow is to be brought out in London. It will not stand the ghost of a chance unless well mounted. Music light and... more...

THE ALMS-HOUSE. For the purpose of preventing an inconvenient rush of literary tuft-hunters and sight-seers thither next summer, a fictitious name must be bestowed upon the town of the Ritualistic church. Let it stand in these pages as Bumsteadville. Possibly it was not known to the Romans, the Saxons, nor the Normans by that name, if by any name at all; but a name more or less weird and full of damp... more...

CHAPTER X.—(Continued.) The Pond at Bumsteadville is sufficiently near the turnpike to be readily reached from the latter, and, if mentioned in the advertisement of a summer boarding-house, would be called Lake Duckingham, on account of the fashionable ducks resorting thither for bathing and flirtation in the season. When July's sun turns its tranquil mirror to hues of amber and gold, the... more...

In the warm sun of the southern morning the great plantation lay as though half-asleep, dozing and blinking at the advancing day. The plantation house, known in all the country side as the Big House, rested calm and self-confident in the middle of a wide sweep of cleared lands, surrounded immediately by dark evergreens and the occasional primeval oaks spared in the original felling of the forest. Wide... more...

They all climbed up on a high board-fence—Nine little Goblins, with green-glass eyes—Nine little Goblins that had no sense,And couldn't tell coppers from cold mince pies;And they all climbed up on the fence, and sat—And I asked them what they were staring at. And the first one said, as he scratched his headWith a queer little arm that reached out of his earAnd rasped its claws in his hair so... more...

Never rains where Jim is—People kickin', whinin';He goes round insistin',—"Sun is almost shinin'!" Never's hot where Jim is—When the town is sweatin';He jes' sets and answers,—"Well, I ain't a-frettin'!" Never's cold where Jim is—None of us misdoubt it,Seein' we're nigh frozen! He "ain't thought about... more...

GRAINS OF TRUTH BY BILL NYE A young friend has written to me as follows: "Could you tell me something of the location of the porcelain works in Sèvres, France, and what the process is of making those beautiful things which come from there? How is the name of the town pronounced? Can you tell me anything of the history of Mme. Pompadour? Who was the Dauphin? Did you learn anything of Louis XV... more...

BREITMANN AND THE TURNERS BY CHARLES GODFREY LELANDHans Breitmann choined de ToornersNovemper in de fall,Und dey gifed a boostin' benderAll in de Toorner Hall.Dere coomed de whole GesangvereinMit der Liederlich Aepfel Chor,Und dey blowed on de drooms und stroomed on de fifesTill dey couldn't refife no more.Hans Breitmann choined de Toorners,Dey all set oop some shouts,Dey took'd him into... more...

MELONS BY BRET HARTE As I do not suppose the most gentle of readers will believe that anybody's sponsors in baptism ever wilfully assumed the responsibility of such a name, I may as well state that I have reason to infer that Melons was simply the nickname of a small boy I once knew. If he had any other, I never knew it. Various theories were often projected by me to account for this strange... more...