JOURNALISM IN TENNESSEE. BY MARK TWAIN. HAT is the way to write," said the chief editor," peppery and to the point. Mush-andmilk journalism gives me the fantods." About this time a brick came through the window with a splintering of a crash, and gave me a considerable of a jolt in the back. I moved out of range-I began to feel in the way. The chief said, "That was the Colonel, likely. I've been expect ing him for two days. He will be up, now, right away." He was correct. The Colonel appeared in the door a moment afterward with a dragoon revolver in his hand. He said, "Sir, I have the honour of addressing the poltroon who edits this mangy sheet?" "You have. Be seated, sir. Be careful of the chair, one of its legs is gone. I believe I have the honour of addressing the blatant scoundrel Col. Blatherskite Tecumseh?" 66 That's me. I have a little account to settle with you. If you are at leisure we will begin." "I have an article on the Encouraging Progress of Moral and Intellectual Development in America to finish, but there is no hurry. Begin." Both pistols rang out their fierce clamour at the same instant. The chief lost a lock of his hair, and the Colonel's bullet ended its career in the fleshy part of my thigh. The Colonel's left shoulder was clipped a little. They fired again. Both missed their men this time, but I got my share, a shot in the arm. At the third fire both gentlemen were wounded slightly, and I had a knuckle chipped. I then said, I believed I would go out and take a walk, as this was a private matter, and I had a delicacy about participating in it further. But both gentlemen begged me to keep my seat, and assured me that I was not in the way. I had thought differently up to this time. They then talked about the elections and the crops a while, and I fell to tying up my wounds. But presently they opened fire again with anima tion, and every shot took effect-but it is proper to remark that five out of the six fell to my share. The sixth one mortally wounded the Colonel, who remarked, with fine humour, that he would have to say good morning now, as he had business up town. He then inquired the way to the undertaker's, and left. The chief turned to me and said, "I am expecting company to dinner, and shall have to get ready. It will be a favour to me if you will read proof and attend to the customers." I winced a little at the idea of attending to the customers, but I was too bewildered by the fusillade that was still ringing in my ears to think of any. thing to say. He continued, "Jones will be here at three-cowhide him. Gillespie will call earlier, perhaps-throw him out of the window. Ferguson will be along about four-kill him. That is all for to-day, I believe. If you have any odd time, you may write a blistering article on the police-give the Chief Inspector rats. The cowhides are under the table-weapons in the drawer-ammunition there in the cornerlint and bandages up there in the pigeon-holes. In case of accident, go to Lancet, the surgeon, down-stairs. He advertises-we take it out in trade." He was gone. I shuddered. At the end of the next three hours I had been through perils so awful, that all peace of mind and all cheerfulness THE GREY MARK. had lost my scalp. Another stranger, by the name of Thompson, left me a mere wreck and ruin of chaotic rags. And at last, at bay in the corner, and beset by an infuriated mob of editors, blacklegs, politicians, and desperadoes, who raved and swore and flourished their weapons about my head till the air shimmered with glancing flashes of steel, I was in the act of resigning my berth on the paper when the chief arrived, and with him a rabble of charmed and enthusiastic friends. Then ensued a scene of riot and carnage such as no human pen, or steel one either, could describe. People were shot, probed, dismembered, blown up, thrown out of the window. There was a brief tornado of roaring rage, with a confused and frantic war-dance glimmering through it, and then all was over. In five minutes there was silence, and the gory chief and I sat alone and surveyed the sanguinary ruin that strewed the floor around 101 The experiences are novel, I grant you, and entertaining too, after a fashion, but they are not judiciously distributed. A gentleman shoots at you through the window and cripples me; a bombshell comes down the stove pipe for your gratification, and sends the stove door down my throat; a friend drops in to swap compliments with you, and freckles me with bullet-holes till my skin won't hold my principles; you go to dinner, and Jones comes with his cowhide; Gillespie throws me out of the window, Thompsc 1 tears all my clothes off, and an entire stranger takes my scalp with the easy freedom of an old acquaintance; and in less than five minutes all the blackguards in the country arrive in their war-paint, and proceed to scare the rest of me to death with their tomahawks. Take it altogether, I never had such a spirited time in all my life as I have had to-day. No; I like you, and I like your calm unruffled way of explaining things to the customers, but you see I am not used to it. The Southern heart is too impulsive, Southern hospitality is too lavish with the stranger. The paragraphs which I have written to-day, and into whose cold sentences your masterly hand has infused the fervent spirit of Tennesseean journalism, will wake up another nest of hornets. All that mob of editors will comeand they will come hungry, too, and want somebody for breakfast. I shall have to bid you adicu. I decline to be present at these festivities. I came South for my health, I will go back on the same errand, and suddenly. Tennessee journalism is too stirring for me." After which we parted with mutual regret, and I took apartments at the hospital. THE GREY A GENTLEMAN, who had seen the world, one day gave his eldest son a pair of horses, a chariot, and a basket of eggs. "Do you," said he to the boy, "travel upon the high road until you come to the first house in which there is a married couple. If you find that the husband is the master there, give him one of the horses. If, on the contrary, the wife is ruler, give her an egg. Return at once if you part with a horse, but do not come back so long as you keep both horses, and there is an egg remaining." Away went the boy full of his mission, and just beyond the borders of his father's estate, lo! a modest cottage. He alighted from his chariot, and knocked at the door. The goodwife opened it for him and curtsied. "Is your husband at home ?" "No," but she would call him from the hay-field. In he came, wiping his brows. MARE. The young man told them his errand. "Why," said the wife, bridling and rolling the corner of her apron, "I always do as John wants me to do; he is my master-aren't you, John?" To which John replied, "Yes." "Then," said the boy," "I am to give you a horse; which will you take?" "I think," said John, "we'll have that bay gelding. "If we have a choice, husband," said the wife, "I think the grey mare will suit us best." "No," replied John, "the bay for me; he is more square in front, and his legs are better." "Now," said the wife, "I don't think so; the grey mare is the better horse, and I shall never be contented unless I get that one." "Well," said John, "if your mind is sot on it, I'll give up; we'll take the grey mare." "Thank you," said the boy; "allow me to give you an egg from this basket." THE SMALL TAIL MOVEMENT. SOON after the Harrison campaign, an eloquent orator in the western part of the state of Virginia was holding forth to an immense assemblage in favour of the hero of Tippecanoe, and Tyler too. Especially the speaker was expatiating upon General Harrison's courage, tact, and success as a military commander. While in the midst of his discourse, a tall gaunt man, probably a school-master in those parts, arose from the crowd, and said, in a voice which penetrated the whole assembly— "Mister-mister, I want to ax you a question." The speaker paused, and begged him to propound. "We are told," the man went on, "fellowcitizens, that Gineral Harrison is a mighty great gineral; but I say he is one of the very meanest sort of ginerals. We are told here to-night that he defended himself bravely at Fort Meigs; but I tell you that on that occasion he was guilty of the Small Tail Movement, and I challenge the orator here to deny it." The orator declared his utter ignorance of what the man meant by the "Small Tail Movement," and asked him to explain himself. "I'll tell you," said the man. "I've got it here in black and white. Here is Grimshaw's History of the United States "-holding up the book"and I'll read what it says-this it is: 'At this critical moment General Harrison executed a NOVEL movement.' Does the gentleman deny that ?" "No, no; go on." "Well, he executed a novel movement. Now, here's "Johnson's Dictionary "-(taking the book out of his pocket and holding it up)-" and here it says 'NOVEL, a small tale. A man who, in the face of an enemy, is guilty of a Small Tail Movement is not fit to be President of the United States, and he sha'nt have my vote." The orator of the evening could make no head against such an argument, and gave it up in despair. DRAWING SOME years since, when all the world was mad upon lotteries, the Irish cook of a middle-aged single gentleman drew from his hands her earnings and savings of some years. Her employer was anxious to know the cause, and she told him that, having repeatedly dreamed that a certain number was a great prize, she had bought the whole ticket. He called her a fool for her pains, and never lost a chance to tease her on the subject. She seemed to take his taunts in good-humour, saying it would all turn out right by-and-by. One morning he opened his paper at breakfast, and saw it announced that the very number which Bridget had dreamed and bought, had drawn the great prize, 100,000 dollars! Bridget was summoned, and the wily gentleman proceeded to inform her that he had long valued her BLANK. as a friend, and being desirous to settle himself for life, he would be willing to make her his wife if she had no objection. Bridget had always thought him a dear, good man, and would be glad to do anything to please him. So he finished his breakfast, told Bridget to put on her best things, the parson was sent for, and made them one that very morning. After it was all over, the cautious husband said to his bride, "Well, Bridget, you have made two good hits to-day; you have got a good husband, and now bring me the lottery ticket you and I have laughed so much about." "Please don't laugh any more about that; I knew there was nothing in them dreams, and I sold it to the butcher a month ago!" Didn't the old fellow draw a blank, and look so when Bridget did that tale unfold! SENSELESS WEIGHTS AND MADDENING MEASURES. A GALLON isn't a gallon. It's a wine gallon, or one of three different sorts of ale gallon, or a corn gallon, or a gallon of oil; and the gallon of oil means seven and a half pounds for train oil, and eight pounds for some other oils. If you buy a pipe of wine, how much do you get? Ninety-three gallons if the wine be Marsala, ninety-two if Madeira, a hundred and seventeen if Bucellas, a hundred and three if Port, a hundred if Teneriffe. What is a stone? Fourteen pounds of a living man, eight of a slaughtered bullock, sixteen of cheese, five of glass, thirty-two of hemp, sixteen and threequarters of flax at Belfast, four-and-twenty of flax at Downpatrick. It is fourteen pounds of wool as sold by the growers, fifteen pounds of wool as sold by the wool-staplers to each other. There are seven measures in use to define an acre. A hundred weight may contain a hundred, a hundred and twelve, or a hundred and twenty pounds. A hundredweight of pork is eight pounds heavier at Belfast than at Cork. A man might live by selling FROM GEORGE AUGUSTUS SALA'S "DIARY IN AMERICA.' THE PEEP. "PEEP" is a very abject and idiotic little bird found in 66 New England. He is to the feathered what the Scallywag" is to the finny creation. Occasionally when he is caught the housewives will condescend to put him into pies, but in general he is contemned, and "left out in the cold." He is weak on the wing, and weaker on his legs; and when the miserable little object alights on earth, he is given to staggering about in an imbecile and helpless manner, suggesting the idea of extreme intoxication. The sharp New England mind, ever on the look-out for similes, has long since indorsed the locution "as tight as a peep," to express an utter state of tipsification. One of the best Yankee stories I ever heard is told, "in this connection," of Mr. Macready, the actor. Once when the great tragedian was starring at Boston, at the Howard Athenæum I think, there happened to be in the stalls a gentleman who, like Roger the Monk, had got "excessively drunk." His behaviour at last became so scandalous that he was forcibly expelled the theatre, not, however, before he had completely spoiled the effect of the "dagger" soliloquy in Macbeth. Mr. Macready was furious; and, the moment the act drop had descended, indignantly demanded who was the wretched man who had thus marred the performance. "Don't distress yourself, Mr. Macready," explained the manager, "it is but an untoward accident. A little too much wine, and that sort of thing. The fact is, the gentleman was 'as tight as a peep.' "Titus A. Peep!" scornfully echoed the tragedian. "I'll tell you what it is, sir. If Mr. Titus A. Peep had misconducted himself in this gross manner in any English theatre, he would have passed the night in the station-house." Mr. Macready's error was excusable. He had been introduced to so many gentlemen with strings of initials to their names, that he had taken the bird meant by the management to be the name of a human being; and it must be confessed that "Titus A. Peep" sounds very human and very American. 999 NOT CLASSICAL. I KNEW an old lady in Liverpool once who kept an alehouse, not for profit, for she had plenty of money, but in order to enjoy the conversation of a select few. For all bar there was her little front parlour, and, but for a beer-engine in one corner, and a row of bottles and glasses on a shelf, you 66 might have imagined the room to be a boudoir, A stranger, say, would enter, and call for a "gill o' ale" in a tone which, somehow, displeased the old lady. Yill!" she would thunder, "Thee gits na' yill heer! Thee's nit classical. I'se nowt but classical foak here. Git oot wi' thee!" If you were classical the gill of ale was brought to you by one of her pretty daughters, and the old lady did not much care whether you paid for it or not. Indeed, there was one specially ragged and unclean person a frequenter of the little ale-house in Button Street, who went, if I remember right, by the name of "Lily-white Muffins," who was incurably drunken and dissipated, but who was a famous Latin and Greek scholar, had been a fellow of a college at Oxford, and whose conversation was still charming. Lily-white Muffins," the old lady would cry, "thee's gude for nowt; but thee's classical. Sally, gi' tauld wretch a gill o' yill." And many a gill of Welsh ale did that deboshed scholar consume at the old lady's expense. "HOW'S THE BABY?" A SATURNINE grin stole over his countenance, and he remarked that, liquor laws notwithstanding, he would back Vermont for a show of drunken men against any other State in the Union. "You get the stuff on the sly," he said. I had heard of the socalled show of the "striped pig" as one illicit method of obtaining alcohol in Maine; but in Vermont it would seem that when you have the "office "given you, and enter the "right place," you ask "how the baby is ?" The keeper of the drug, or fruit, or a grocery store, whichever it may be, winks, and says "Bully." You go downstairs into a cellar or a back yard, and find, in a remote corner, a cupboard full of whiskey, brandy, orrum bottles. You fill for yourself, drink, replace the bottle, and on going out present the proprietor of the "baby" with ten or fifteen cents, wherewith to purchase, I presume, a coral for the infant, The health of "the baby" in Vermont is asked after with much solicitude. By kind permission of Messrs. Tinsley Brothers. to the mountain the ground is impassable for wheeled carriages. You don't know how to ride ? Well, you can have an orderly to lead your horse. Only take my advice. You know what the M'Clellan saddle is. You have a blanket put on the saddle, or you'll suffer." I remembered Mr. William Russell's advice to the senator at the battle of Bull Run, about whiskey poured into melted tallow, and well rubbed in. I remembered it and groaned. We had scarcely got clear of the main-guard, when the tall captain of artillery came galloping up, reining in the pony that was as quiet as a lamb, the which, with many apologies for keeping me waiting, he tendered to me. The pony that was as quiet as a lamb, was a long, low-bodied, brown brute, very shaggy, and with stumpy legs, like an old-fashioned spinet that had been rubbed with macassar oil, and so grown hairy. Suddenly he began to rear and to kick, and to show his teeth, and to assume generally the similitude of a roaring lion. I told the tall captain of artillery that I would have nothing to do with the lamb-like pony, and thanking fortune for spring-waggons, we jogged away. AT NIAGARA. I FOUND a wretched little place open, half tavern and half Indian curiosity shop, but on the roof it had a belvedere. I was permitted to ascend to this, and a civil negro serving-man volunteered to accompany me. There was a good view from the belvedere, and I remained staring at the Falls for another half-hour, the negro remaining silent by my side. I asked him, almost mechanically, whether the water was continually rushing over at that rate. I had spoken like a fool, and he answered me according to my folly. "I 'spect, massa," he said, "they goes on for ebber and ebber." Remarks as absurd and incongruous as mine have become historical among the ana of Niagara. A Swiss watchmaker observed that he was very glad" de beautiful ting was going." He looked upon it as some kind of clockwork arrangement, which would run down and be wound up again. Everybody knows the story of the 'cute Yankee who called it "an almighty water-privilege." It is one, and would turn all the mill-wheels in the world. And quoth another, "I guess this hyar suckles the ocean-sea considerable." We thus wandered about, talking very little, until early in the afternoon, when my friend suggested lunch. We had ascended to the river-bank on the Canada side by this time, and in the highway, close to Table Rock, found to our great joy that Mr. Sol Davis's well-known establishment was open. Mr. Sol Davis sells cigars, and stereoscopic slides of the Falls; and Mr. Sol Davis has, to sum up his wealth of accommodation for tourists, a bar in the rear of his premises, where exciseable articles are retailed. Mrs. Sol Davis is a very comely and affable matron, with a sharp eye to business; and Miss Sol Davis is very beautiful, but haughty. Mr. Sol Davis, junior, the fourth in this worthy quartette, is a character. Said he to me, when he became better acquainted with me "What might be your business now?" Wishing to keep within the limits of the truth, and at the same time not to be too communicative, I replied that paper-staining was my business. "Ah! paper-staining. Do pretty well at it ?" continued Mr. Sol Davis, junior. I said that I did do pretty well, considering. "Ah!" pursued my interlocutor, "you should go in for felt hats. My brother-in-law went out to San Francisco a year and seven months ago, and he's made a hundred and fifty thousand dollars, all out of felt hats. Think of that !" I did think that, in case the paper-staining business came to grief, I would follow the friendly advice of Mr. Sol Davis, junior, and go in for felt hats. We lunched at Mr. Sol Davis's, in a very cosy little back parlour, and an admirable roast fowl and a capital bottle of Médoc we had. Then my friend took a nap, and then, feeling somewhat relieved, with a fragrant planter" from Mr. Sol Davis's private box between my lips, I strolled out to have another view of the Falls. It was now about three o'clock in the afternoon. I stood on the brink of Table Rock, and gazed once more on the great, dreary, colour less expanse of water, foam, and spray. And this was Niagara, and there was nothing more. Nothing? With a burst like the sound of a trumpet, the sudden Sun came out. God bless him! there he was; and there, too, in the midst of the foaming waters was set the Everlasting Bow. The rainbow shone out upon the cataract; the sky turned blue; the bright clarion had served to call all Nature to arms; the very birds, that had been flapping dully over the spray throughout the morning, began to sing; and, looking around me, I saw that the whole scene had become glorified. There was light and colour everywhere. The river ran a stream of liquid gold. The dark hills glistened. The boulders of ice sparkled like gems. The snow was all bathed in iris tints-crimson, and yellow, and blue, and green, and orange, and violet. The white houses and belvederes started up against the azure like the mosques and minarets of Stamboul; and, soaring high behind the Bow, was the great pillar of spray, glancing and flashing like an obelisk of diamonds. And it was then I began, as many men have begun, perchance, to wonder at and to love Niagara. MY DRIVER. I was enabled to secure a little ramshackle " onehorse shay" of a curricle, with a horse not much bigger than an Exmoor pony, and such a very tall and stout Irishman for a driver, that I expected every moment, with my superabundant weight, that the springs would break, and the entire concern go to irremediable " pi." The Irish driver was jocular and loquacious, but appeared somewhat disgusted with the world in general, and Niagara in particular. To every remark he made he added the observation that it was "a divil of a place." I asked if there were any tourists here just now. Begorra, there's nobody," he replied. I asked which was the best hotel. Begorra, there's none," he responded; "they're all shut up. It's a divil of a place." I was somewhat disconsolate at the receipt of this information, so I asked him if he knew where we could get some breakfast. "Divil a bit of breakfast is there for love or money. It's a divil of a place;" but he added, with a glance of that sly humour for which his countrymen are unrivalled, "the Falls are in illigant condition, and you may see them all the year round for nothing." 66 |