American citizen. (Butler, Butler County, Pa.) 1863-1872, December 23, 1863, Image 1
VOLUME 1. -i. • THE AMERICAN CITIZEN, II pnhllaheri erery Wedne»l»y In lh» borough "112 Butler, by THOMAS BOWS»O**C. K. ASDMSOS ™ Main Opposite to Jark'» Hotel—office lip stairs 111 the brick Tormerlv accupici by Kli Yotter, a* ft store TKRMH: —SI 50 ft year, if paid in tuirance, or within the first six month*: or'f'2 if not paid until after tlie t-xj.inv "lion of the first Hi* months. • BATKOOH Anrrtmsiso: —One wjnure non., (ten line" or UM.) three inner!lon* *■ Kvery snl»«o,|uenl insertion, per square Business cards of 10 lines or loss for one year, Inciil illnir imper. ' Card of in lim* or less 1 year without paper * '«• X< eolnmn for six months ' 'JV for one year i^rt, column for six months 1? " % column for one year 1 column for six months r; 1 column for one year - 80 ™ Fsom the Sew Vork Tribune. The Southerner at Home. [from the Journal of a Northern Travelerou Horseback.] MISSISSIPPI. Yesterday I met a well-dressed man upon the road, and inquired of him if he could recommend me to a comfortable place to pass the night ? "Yes, lean," said he ; "You stop at John Watson's. He is a real good fellow, and his wife is a nice, tidy woman; he s got a good house, and you'll be as well taken care of there as any place I know. " What I am most concerned about is a clean bej," said I. you are safe for that there." j So distinct a recommendation was un t usual, and when 1 reached the house lie had described to me, somewhat before nightfall. I of course stopped to solicit entertainment. In the gallery sat a fine, stMwart man, and a woman who in sine and figure match ed him well. Smite ruddy, lat children were playing on the steps. The man wore a full beard, which is very uncommon in these parts. 1 rode ton horse-block, ucai the gallery, and asked if 1 could be ac commodated for the night? "Oh. yes. you can stay here if you can get along without anything to eat; we don't have anything but once a week. " Well. you look as if it agrees with you, I reckon I'll try it for one night." " Alight, then. sir. alight. Why,you came from Texas, didn't you? Your rig looks like it,"he said"as I dismounted. " Yes, I've just crossed Texas, all the way from the Rio Grande.' " Have you. though ? Well. I'll be right glad to hear something of that country." He threw my saddle and bags across the rail of the gallery, and we walked together to the stable. " I hear that there arc a great many Germans in the western part of Texas.' lie said presently. " There arc a great many; west of the Guadeloupe, more Germans than American born." '• Have they got many slaves ?" "No." "Well, won't they break off and make a Free State down there, by and by?" " I should think it not impossible that they might." "I wish to God they would; I would like right well togo and settle there if it was free from slavery. You see, Kansas and all the Free States are too far North for was raise.l in Alabama, and I don t want to move into a colder climate ; +>ut I would like togo into a country where they hadn't got this curse of slavery." lie said this not knowing that I was a ; Northern man ; greatly surprised, I asked, " What are your objections to slavery, sir.' " Objections ! The first is here (strik ing his breast): I was brought up in a nigger State, una have always been used to it, but I could never bring myself to like it. Well.sir, I know slavery is wrong, and God 'll put an end to it. It's bound to come to an end, and when the end does come, there'll be woe in the land. And, instead of preparing for it.and trying to make it as light as possible, we are doing nothing but making it worse and worse. That's the way it appears to me, and I'd rather get away from here bofore it comes. Then. I've another objection to it.l don't like to have slaves about me. Now, I tell a nigger togo and feed your horse ; T never know if he's done it unless I go and sec; and if he didn't know I would goand see. and would whip if I found he hadn't fed him, would he feed him? He'd let him starve. Pre got as good niggers as any b>dy, but I never can on them; they will lie and they will steal, and mke advantage of me in every way they dare. Of course they will, if they arc slaves. Lying and stealing are not the worst of it. J've got a family of children, aud I don't like to have such degraded beings round my houie while they are growing up. 1 know what the consequences are to chil dren growing up among slaves." I here told him that I was a Northern .man, and asked if he could safely utter «uch sentiments among the people of this •district., who bore the reputation of being among the mostcxtreme and fanatical dev .otees of slavery. " I've been.told a hun .dred times I should be killed if I were •not more prudent in expressing my opin ions; but, when it comes to killing, I'm as good as the next man, and they know it. I never came the worst out of a fight since I was a boy. I never am afraid to speak what I think to anybody. I don't think I ever shall be." " Are there many persons here who have as bad an opinion of slavery as you have?" AMERICAN CITIZEN. "I reckon you never saw a conscientious man who had been brought up among slavery who did not think of it pretty much as I do—did you?" "Yes, I think I have, a good many." " Ah, self-interest warps men's minds wonderfully, but I don't believe there are many who don't think sometimes—it's im possible, I know that they don't." Were there any others in this neigh borhood, I asked, who avowedly hated slavery? He replied that there were a good many Mechanics, all the mechanics he knew, who felt slavery to be a great curse to them, and who wanted to see it brought to an end in some way. The competition in which they were constant ly made to feel themselves engaged with slave labor, was degrading to them, and they felt it to be so. There was a good deal of talk now among them about get ting laws passed to prevent the owners of slaves from having them taught trades, and to prohibit slave mechanics 'from be ing hired out. He could go out to-mor row. he supposed, anil in the course of a day get two hundred signatures to a paper alleging that slavery was a curse to Mis sissippi, and praying the Legislature to take measures to relieve them of it as soon as practicable. He knew a poor, hard working man who was lately offered the services of three negroes for six years each if he would let them learn his trade, but he refused the proposal with indigua tion. saying he would starve before he helped a slave to become a mechanic. He considered a coersive government of the negroes by the whites, forcing them to labor systematically, and restraining them from a reckless destruction of life and property, to be necessary. Of course he did not think it wrong to hold slaves, and the profits of their labor were not more than cuough to pay a man for look ing after them—not if he did his duty to them. What was wrong was making slav ry so much worse than was necessary. Ne groes would improve very rapidly, if they \9ere allowed any considerable measure of the ordinary incitements to improvement. He knew hosts of negroes who showed ex traordinary talents, considering their op portunities for mental devclopement: there were a great many in this part of the coun try who could read anil write, and calcu late mentally, as well as the general run of white men who had been to schools.— There were Colonel 's negroes, some fifty of them ; they were almost as free as any people in the world, and he did not suppose there were any fifty more con tented people, perhaps. They were not driven hard, and work was stopped three times a day for meals; they had plenty to eat, and good clothes; aud through the whole year they had from Friday night to Monday morning to do what they liked with themselves. Saturdays the men gen erally worked in their patches (private gardens), and the women washed and mended clothes. Sundays, tlicy nearly all went to Sunday-school the mistress taught, and to meeting, but they were not obliged to; they could come and go as they pleased all Saturday and Sunday; they were not looked after at all. Only on Mon day motning. if there should be any one missing, or any one should come to the field with ragged or dirty clothes, lie would havb to be whipped, lie had of ten noticed how much more intelligent and sprightly these negroes were than the common run; a great many of them had books and could read and write; and, on Sundays, they were smartly dressed, some of them better than he or his wi<S ever thought of dressing. This was from the money they made out of their patches, working Saturdays. Well, then, there wtre two other plant ations near him, in both of which the ne groes were turned out to work at half past three every week-day morning—l might hear the bell ring for them—and frequently they were not stopped till nine o'clock that night. Saturday nights the same as any other. One of them belong ed to a very religious lady, and on Sun day morning at half-past nine she had her bell rang for Sunday-school, aud after Suu day-school they had a meeting, and anoth er religious service after dinner. Every negro on the plantation was obliged to at tend all these exercises, and if they were not . dressed clean they were whipped.— They were never allowed togo off the plantation, and if they were caught speak ing to a negro from any other place, they were whipped. They could all of them repeat the catechism, he believed, but they were the dumbest, and laziest, and most sorrowful looking negroes he had ever seen. As a general rule, the condition of the slaves, as regard their material comfort, is greatly improved within twenty years.— Otherwise, he did not know that it had. It would not be a bit safer to turn them free, to shift for themselves, than it would have been twenty years ago. Of this he was quite confident. Perhaps they were "Let us have Faith that Right makes Might; aiTd in that Faith let us, to the end,dare to do our duty as we understand it"~ A - LINCOLN BUTLER, BUTLER COUNTY, PA., WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1863, a little more intelligent, knew more, but they were not as free, not as much accus tomed to work and contrive for themselves, as they used to be, when they were not fed and clothed nearly as .well as now. Except by the excessive and incessant labor required of them on some planta tions, he did not think slaves were often treated with unnecessary cruelty. It was necessary to use the lash occasionally.— Slaves never really felt under any moral obligation to obey their masters. Faith ful service .was preached to them as a Christian duty, &nd they pretended to ac knowledge it, Wit the fact was they were obedient just so far as they saw they must be to avoid punishment; and punishment was necessary, now and then, to maintain their faith in their master's power. He had seventeen slaves, and he did not sup pose there had been a hundred strokes of the whip on the place for a year past. lie asked if there were many Ameri cans in Texas who wore opposed to slave ry, and if they were free To express them selves. I said that the wealthy Ameri cans there we're all slaveholders themselves —that their influence all went to make slave servants fashionable, and labor by whites disreputable. They were all parti sans of slavery, and there were a great many miserable, ignorant and desperate fellows whom they could employ or en courage to bully down anything that was given the name of Abolitionism. " Hut, arc there not a good many Northern men there?" he asked. The Northern men,l replied, were chiefly merchants or specu lators, who had but one idea, which was to make money as fast as they could ; and as nearly all the little money there was in that country was in the hands of the large slaveholders, they never lflst'an opportuni ty to establish their reputation as zealously loval to the institution. If that was the way of tilings there, he said, there was not much chance of its be cominga free State.l thought the chances were against it, hut if the Germans con tinued to flock into the country, it would rapidly acquire all the characteristic social features of a free-labor community, having an abundance and variety of skilled labor, a home market for a variety of crops, den ser settlements, and consequently nioro abundant social, educational and commer cial conveuicneies. There would soon be a numerous body of small proprietors, not so wealthy that the stimulus to personal and active industry would have been lost, I but yet able to indulge in a good many luxuries, and to give employment to nu merous tradesmen, mechanics and school teachers, and the laborers who were not land-holders would be intimately involved in all their interests with them ; the two classes not living dissociated -from each other, as was the case generally in the South, but engaged in a constant fulfill ment of reciprocal obligations. If snob a character of society could once be firmly and extensively established before the country got to be much taken up with these little independent negro kingdoms, which had prevailed from the beginning in every other part of the South, 1 did not think any laws would be necessary to prevent slavery. It might be a slave State but it would be a free people. We had an excellent supper, the bread being wheat of his own raising, the first plantation-grown wheat that I have met with. He said this was an excellent wheat-growing country if people took any pains with it. He always grew a little more than he used in his family. His crop had never been less than twenty bushels per acre, and he had once raised over thirty without manuring or especial pains-taking. He had grown wheat weighing sixty six pounds to the bushel. There was a good market for wheat as it was rarely raised in that vicinity. Cotton, however, was ordinarily a more profitable crop, es pecially since a railroad had lessened the expense of wagoning it to market. Judg ing that events in Europe were likely to lessen the demand for cotton,he had planted but little thi3 summer, giving his labor chiefly to corn. On coming from my room iu the morn ing my host met me with a hearty grasp of the hand. " I have slept very little with thinking of what you told me about Western Texas. I think I shall have to go there. If we could get a free State in this elimaic, I believe it would soon be the most prosperous in the Union. What a disadvantage it must be to have your ground all frozen up and to be obliged to fodder your cattle six months in the year, as you do at the North. I don't see how you live. I think I should like to buy a small farm near some town where I could send my children to school—a farm that I could take care of with one or two hired men. One thing I wanted to ask you : are the Germans learning English at alt V " Oh, yes; they teach the children En glish in their schools." " And have thev good sbhools T" " Wherever thev have settled a't all closely they have. At New Braunfels, they employ American as well as German teachers, and instruction can be had in the classics, natural history, aud the higher mathematics." When I lelt, ho mounted a horse and rode on with me some miles, saying he did not often find an intelligent man who liked to converse with him on the question of slavery. It seemed to him there was an epidemic insanity on the subject. It is unnecessary to state his views at length. They were precisely those which used to be common among all respectable men at the South. I have recently received a letter from him, in which, after alluding to the excitement which the Kansas ques tion has produced, lie says he thinks a considerable change of sentiment has oc curred from reflection, stimulated by the discussion of Kansas affairs. He is fully determined togo to Western Texas, and reckons that 10 families, and 30 single men would go with him if there was a prospect that free servants and laborers could be hired there and negroes be kept away. lam sorry to say that, since the outbreak of the Know-Nothing pestilence, which was extremely rancorous in Texas, the German immigration has almost en tirely ceased, and tho discouragement of two failures of crops leaves little reason to expect its revival. The country will soon, probably, be occupied by the slave labor withdrawing from Missouri, and the German population,dispirited and dispers ed, lose all its respectable qualities. A slaveholding country cannot support towns, and without towns or village communities, the maintenance of varied, intelligent in dustry, is impossible. The Germans will relapse to boors or progress to ruffians. As we rode, an old negro met us, and we greeted him warmly. lie observed to me that he had never uttered his senti ments in the presence of a slave, but in some way all tho slaves in the country bad, he thought, been informed what they were, for they all looked to him as their special friend. When tliey got trouble they would often come to liinPW* advice or assistance. This morning, before I was up, a negro came to him from some miles distant, who had been working for a wjiite man on Sundays till lie owed him three dollars, which, now the negro wanted it, lie said lie, could not pay. He had given the negro the three dollars, for he thought lie could manage to get it from the white man. He confirmed the impression I had formed of the purely dramatic and decep tive character of what passed for religion with most of the slaves. One of his slaves was a preacher aud a favorite among them. He sometimes went to plantations twenty miles away —even further—on a Sunday, to preach a funeral sermon, making jour neys of' fifty miles a day on foot. After the sermon, a hat would be passed round, and he sometimes brought home as much as ten dollars. He was the biggest rascal, the worst liar, thief and adulterer on his place. THE RUI.INO PROPENSITY. —Success in the allotted or chosen walk of life is the passion, the ruling propensity, in every condition of society. And it is as potent in the cottage as in the mansion—the stu dio of the author and artist as the office of the merchant—the theatre of pleasure as as the sanctuary of prayer. It is, in short, the motive power that creates and holds together nations, strengthens the bonds that maintain communities in subjection to law and order, gives a stimulus to the func tions of the brain, and imparts consistency and usefulness to the natural selfishness of every human creature. It is the presid ing jjenius of labor in all its branches, and in both its aggregate and individual ef forts tenaciously strives to compel the phantoms that dazzle the imagination to give place to those realities which tempt both body and soul to take some path or another that will ultimately lead to the promised land—the glittering, fruitful, and luscious Canaan of our respective, every day longings. This, in general terms, is the condition symbolized as prosperity; and to he acquisition of which, in all its varied/orms, mankind apply themselves with marvelous devotion. A HAPPY RETORT.—A few days since, during the trial of a case of assault and bat tery in the Superior Court in this city, a lawyer, who is fond of quoting Latin, used the expression, "Nihil fit;" whereupon his witty opponent, assuming a grave and in dignant expression of countenance, said to the jury that as "Nihil" was not a party to the action, either as the assaulter or the assaulted, it made no difference whether "St" or not, or where, or when, or for what purpose, or with whom, he fought. This happy '-turn" threw the judge, jury and spectators into a fit of hearty laughter, and so disconcerted the quoter of foreign tongues that he could not even make use of his own. WHITH TZ It. BT ALICE CART. * All the time my soul Is calling, "Whither, whither do I go?** Fur my days like leave* are fulling , Front my tree of life below. Who will come and be my lover 1 Who in strung enough to save, Now that lam leaning over The dark silence of the grave? Who will linger to environ With a smile tliartiwful place- Leaving 'Death the lid of iron Tender kisses on my face! Wherefore should my soul he calling, "Whither, whither do I go?" For my days like leaves are falling , In the hands of God, I know. As the seasons touch their ending, As the dim year* fade and fleo, Let me rather still be sending B<>me goal deed to plend fir me. Then, though none should stay to weep me, Lovedike. within the shade, He will hold me, He will keep me, And I will not be afraid, Even that dread time that's coming, Hut will hide mi- In 111- power, • And death find my heart there, humming Like a bee within a flower. WIT AXi» WISDOM. KK(IARI) the interests of others, as well as your own. THK Trials of life are the tests which ux certain how much gold there is in us. THK mercy of man is to bo just, the justice of woman is to he merciful. GENUINE politeness is the first-horn off spring of generosity and modesty. LITERATURE is a garden, books arc par ticular views of it, and readers arc visi tors. THE intoxication of danger, like that of the grape, shows us to others, but hides us from ourselves. HE submits himself to be seen through a microscope who suffers himself to be caught in a passion. DELIBERATE with caution, but act with decision, and yield with graciousncss, or oppose with firmness. TIIE best cough mixture: A suit of warm clothing, mixed with plenty of air and plenty of exercise. WHY are crows tho most sensible of birds?— Because they never complain without cuws. TF motives were always visible, men would ofteu blush for their most bril liant actions. A WARNING.—It is said that the peo ple who dine on colt steak arc subject to night-mare. » " I know by a little what a great deal means," as the gardncr said when he saw the tip of a foxe's tail sticking out of a hollow tree. PEOPLE who take cart loads of medi cine every day, they imagine they are go ing to be sick, are the fools upon whom the quacks feed and fatten. " I have an idea in my head," said a noodle to his companion. " Have you ? Then, keep it there —it may be some time before you get another." " I REPEAT," said a person of question able veracity, " that I am an honest man." " Yes—and how often will you have.to repeat it before you believe it yourself?" IT is said some babies are so small that they can creep into quart measures. But the way in which some adults can walk into such measures is astonishing. GOLD watches, guitars, pianos, looking glasses beyond a certain size, and dogs arc to be placed under schedule A, and taxed, internally and eternally. CHARLES LAMB'S opinion of water cure is, that "it is neither new nor wonderful; for it is as old as the deluge, when, in my it killed more than it cured !" PRENTICE tells the truth in a nut-shell when he says we arc not fighting theSouth crn States or any other States. We are fighting the rebels. That's all. A young man will compliment his sweet-heart by telling her that her breath has the perfume of roses without being ashamed that his own has the stench of whisky and tobacco. "JOE, what makes your nose so red ?" " Friendship." "Friendship! How do you "lake that out ?" " I've got a friend who is very fond of brandy, and as he is too weak to take it strong, I've constituted myself his taster." THE question has been asked why it is considered impolite for gentlemen togo into the presence of ladies in their ihirt sleeves, whilst it is considered in every way correct for the ladies themselves to appear before gentlemen without any sleeves at-aff! " How old are you ?" said a judge to a German arraigned before him. " I am dirtj." " And how"old is your wife?"— " Mine wife is dirty-too." '• Th6n, sir, you are a very filthy couple, and I wish to have nothing further -to do with either of you." AN absurdity is anything advanced by our opponents contrary to our own opin ion or practice, or above our apprehension —and therefore a term very liberally used, it being applied in exact proportion to our ignorance. An Irishman in a Telegraph Office. " An' is this House's telegraph ?" ask ed a Hibernian the other day as he en tered the office in the Traveler buildings. On being informed that it was, a dialogue ensued, of which the following is as near as verbatim report as our reporter was able to obtain: Pat—ls Misther House in ? Clerk—No. I attend to business here. Pat—Och, do ye? Well can ye send to mc brother Mick, in Now York ? Clerk—Yes. Have you got your mes sage written ? Pat—o, bother! Divil a need of givin' Mick a message in writin', at all at all.— Jist give him this five dollar bill, sure, for tu help pay tho fine the blackguards put u|>ori him. Clerk—But we cannot send money by telegraph. Money must go by mail. l'at—Shure but what 'nd 1 go hvy male for? An isn't it three pecks of illcgant nude 1 have in the house already? Clerk—No. You don't understand. I mean by" post. Pat—Post is it ? In a lotther ? An' ye can't send it by the telegraph ? Clerk—No. All we can do is, if you .have a message, we can send that. That is, we can charge the wire with electrici ty and make it write in New York what ever you wish. l'at— Make, it right, is it! Well, now, be dad, that's tho thing finthirely. Just make it right with Mick, and here's the five dollars, avick ! Clerk (slightly vexed.) —Wo can do nothing of the sort! I mean We write— print the words you want to say to your brother ill New York. l'at— (scratching his head with a puz zled heir) —If you can do that, just be af ter discoorsin' wid him soon as ye like! Clerk—But you must write the message you wish to send upon this bit of paper. Pat—Och ! bad luck to jt! I haven't tho gift o' writin' at all, sure! (Here the clerk arranges his paper, and prepares to write the message for Pat him sel.) Clerk—What's your brother's name ? Pat—Mick. Clerk—And what is his other name? Pat—Same its my own. Sure we're brothers. Clerk—l know that. But what is he called. Pat—What is lie called ? Oh in the owld counthy they called him "Shil lelah Mick," bccase of the mighty fine taste he had atswingin' that bit of a twig; and uany's the sconce lie cracked like an old tea-pot, when— Clerk (exasperated)—l don't "are what they called him in Ireland. Give me his other name. It is " Mick" what ? Pat—Och, botheration, no! Mick Watt is my cousin, as lives in the county- Kerry, and been dead these five years— heaven rest his sowl ! Clerk—Confound it! Can't you tell me your brother's other name ? He has one besides Michael hasn't he ? l'at—O, yes! Sliurc why didn't ye tell mc that's what ye wanted before—for faith, as sure's my name is Pat Finncgan you should have been towld the family name of my ancesthers, begorra! Clerk—Ah ! Finnegan's the name. Pat—No, jewel— Mirk Finnegan. Div il an R. Finnegan is there in the family, savin' Rory. He is 'listed for a soger. Clerk proceeds to write a message to " Mick," as dictated by Pat, after which he counts, the words in the dispatch, and says: " Here are eighteen words. The first will cost you forty cents, and the oth ers twenty-four, making sixty-four cents in all." v Pat—o bother the first tin works! shure Mick'll never miss 'em. Send the last. Clerk—We can't do that. You must pay after cents at any rate. Pat—Sorru a bit can Ido that. Shure ye may tell Mick that the r'ason of his gittin' no message from me, was owin' to the occasion of the money it cost, an' that'll explain the rason of his not hearin' from mc at all. (Exit Pat anathematizing the " dirthy wire machine of a tilegraph ;" and follow ed by a not over friendly ejaculation from the Clerk in attendance.) — Traveler. DEATH OP A GREAT MAN.—Wheh a great man dies, then has the time come for putting us in mind that he was alive. Biographies, sketches, criticisms, charac ters, anecdotes, reminiscences, issue forth ys from opened springing fountains; the world, with a passion r. hotted by impossi bility, will yet awhile retain, yet awhile speak with, though only to the unanswer ing echoes, what it has lost without reme dy p thus is the last event of life often the londest; and real spiritual apparations (*ho have been named men), as false,im aginary ones are fabled to do, vanish in thundor. " Fine feathers make fine birds"— except when applied with tar. NUMBER 3. Aotive Women. As a rule it maybe remarked, that noisy women do much less than they seem to do, and quiet women often do more. But it does not follow that all quiet wumen are active; on the contrary six out of ten are indolent, and work only on compulsion.— Indolent women have their good point*, and one of the most valuable of these is their quietness. It is a great luxury in domestic life : but perhaps it is a luxury which is too expensive for a poor man, unless he can get it combined with activ ity. The wife of a poor man, no matter what his profession or position, ought to be active in the best sense of the word. Sheought to rule her house with diligenoe, but make no boast of it. Iler managing powers ought to bo confined to her own house, and never be sent out to interfere with her neighbors. Iler activity should be kept healthy, by boing exercisod on important matters chiefly, though tho tri fles must not bo disregarded. A woman who will make herself unhappy because the usual custom of cleaning the house on Friday is, on a particular occasion, inevi tably infringed, is inadequate to perceive the difference between the lesser and the greater. Some active women, who pride themselves on their housekeeping, seem to forget that the object in keeping a house is, that human beings may be accommo dated in it; the Role idea seems to bethis, that the object of keeping a house is that tho house may be kept in a certain form and order, and to the maintenance of this form and order thoy sacrifice the comfort the house was established to secure. Much ' active women are pests to society, because they want sense to direct and control their energies. A 1 fkaHTy T'al'Oll.—After all, what a capital, kindly, honest, jolly, glorious thing a good laugh is? What a tonic! What a digester! What an exerciser of evil spirits! Better than a walk before breakfast or a nap after dinner. How it shuts tho mouth of malice, and opens flic brow of kindness ! Whether it discover!, the gums of infancy or age, tho grinders of folly or the pearls of beauty; whether it racks the sides and deforms tho counte nance of vulgarity, or dimples the visage, or moistens the eye of refinement in all its phases; and on all faces, contorting, re laxing, overwhelming, convulsing throw ing the human form into the happy, shak ing and quaking of idiocy, and turning the human countenance intosomethingnp propriatc to Bill Button's transformation —undfir every circumstance and every where, a laugh is a glorious thing. Like a ''thing of beauty," it js a l: joy forever." There is no remorse in it. It leaves nothing—except in the sides, and that goes off. Even a single, unparticipated laugh is a great affair to witness. But it is seldom single. It is more infectious than scarlet fever. You cannot gravely contemplatea laugh. If there isonc laugh er, apd one witness, there are forthwith two laughers. And so on. The convul sion is propagated like sound. What a thing it is when it becomes epidemic. A KEEN ANSWER.—In the days of Queen Elizabeth a scholar happened to bo in disgrace with Iler Majesty, but he managed to secure the good office* of one who was in high favorat the Court, ( with a view to regain his position. The time arrived when he was to be prcscntcjl to the Queen again. " Well," said tho Queen, ,- I understand you are a great scholar. Shall I ask you one question ?" " Anything madame,"said he, " that lies within the compass of my understanding to resolve you, I will." " Howmany vow els are there?" said the Queen. " That, your Majesty," replied the scholar, "is ea«y known ; but as you have asked me I must needs answer. Five." " Which of these five could best bo spared ?" "Not any of them, madams," replied he, "without damaging the language." " Then," retorted Her Majesty, " I will tell you differently. We, for our part, can best spare u" (you.) ELOQUENCE ! —lt is a great pity that the press cannot afford to Lave reporters constantly in court to gather up and pre serve the sweet gems of literature, that often fall from the lips of lawyers in sum ming up cases to the jury. One specimen : "Gentlemen of the jury, if I stole that watch, shouldn't I have carried it off in my pocket; wouldn't you, gentlemen?— wouldn't any consummate fool have done so?"— Janesvillc Standard. FIRST IMPRESSION OP A RAILROAD Dr. Ruff, speaking of tho railroads that have recently been constructed from Cal cutta, says that some of tho old, incredu lous Bra Wins in Bengal, when pursuad ed to be eye-witnesses, have been seen knocking their "foreheads in a sort of ago ny, and exclaiming, as the mighty train rolled swiftly along, that India himself, their god of tho firmament, had no such carriage as that. tUT Instead of saying things to make people stare and wonder, say what will withhold them hereafter from wondering and staring. This is philosophy :to make remote things tangible, common things ex tensively useful, useful things extensively common, and to leave the least necessary for the last. I have always a suspicion of sonorous sentences. JSrWhy is a man making love to a married woman, like a sheriff levying on the wrong man's goods ? Because he ia the victim of a misplaced atrirhnmt.