University of Virginia Library

6. CHAPTER VI.

Peter Quince.

Our task in the way of describing town society will
soon be ended. The gentlemen of the Effingham
family had been invited to meet Sir George Templemore
at one or two dinners, to which the latter had
been invited in consequence of his letters, most of
which were connected with his pecuniary arrangements.
As one of these entertainments was like all
the rest of the same character, a very brief account
of it will suffice to let the reader into the secret of the
excellence of the genus.

A well-spread board, excellent viands, highly respectable
cookery, and delicious wines, were every
where met. Two rows of men clad in dark dresses,
a solitary female at the head of the table, or, if fortunate,
with a supporter of the same sex near her, invariably
composed the convives. The exaggerations of a
province were seen ludicrously in one particular custom.
The host, or perhaps it might have been the

hostess, had been told there should be a contrast between
the duller light of the reception-room, and the
brilliancy of the table, and John Effingham actually hit
his legs against a stool, in floundering through the
obscurity of the first drawing-room he entered on one
of the occasions in question.

When seated at table, the first great duty of restauration
performed, the conversation turned on the prices
of lots, speculations in towns, or the currency. After
this came the regular assay of wines, during which it
was easy to fancy the master of the house a dealer,
for he usually sat either sucking a syphon or flourishing
a cork-screw. The discourse would now have
done credit to the annual meeting and dinner of the
German exporters, assembled at Rudesheim to bid for
the article.

Sir George was certainly on the point of forming a
very erroneous judgment concerning the country,
when Mr. Effingham extricated him from this set, and
introduced him properly into his own. Here, indeed,
while there was much to strike a European as peculiar,
and even provincial, the young baronet fared
much better. He met with the same quality of table,
relieved by an intelligence that was always respectable,
and a manliness of tone which, if not unmixed,
had the great merit of a simplicity and nature that are
not always found in more sophisticated circles. The
occasional incongruities struck them all, more than the
positive general faults; and Sir George Templemore
did justice to the truth, by admitting frankly, the danger
he had been in of forming a too hasty opinion.

All this time, which occupied a month, the young
baronet got to be more and more intimate in Hudson
Square, Eve gradually becoming more frank and unreserved
with him, as she grew sensible that he had
abandoned his hopes of success with herself, and Grace
gradually more cautious and timid, as she became conscious

of his power to please, and the interest he took
in herself.

It might have been three days after the ball at Mrs.
Houston's that most of the family was engaged to
look in on a Mrs. Legend, a lady of what was called
a literary turn, Sir George having been asked to make
one of their party. Aristabulus was already returned
to his duty in the country, where we shall shortly have
occasion to join him, but an invitation had been sent
to Mr. Truck, under the general, erroneous impression
of his real character.

Taste, whether in the arts, literature, or any thing
else, is a natural impulse, like love. It is true both may
be cultivated and heightened by circumstances, but the
impulses must be voluntary, and the flow of feeling, or
of soul, as it has become a law to style it, is not to be
forced, or commanded to come and go at will. This
is the reason that all premeditated enjoyments connected
with the intellect, are apt to baffle expectations,
and why academies, literary clubs, coteries and dinners
are commonly dull. It is true that a body of clever
people may be brought together, and, if left to their
own impulses, the characters of their mind will show
themselves; wit will flash, and thought will answer
thought spontaneously; but every effort to make the
stupid agreeable, by giving a direction of a pretending
intellectual nature to their efforts, is only rendering
dullness more conspicuous by exhibiting it in contrast
with what it ought to be to be clever, as a bad picture
is rendered the more conspicuous by an elaborate and
gorgeous frame.

The latter was the fate of most of Mrs. Legend's
literary evenings, at which it was thought an illustration
to understand even one foreign language. But, it
was known that Eve was skilled in most of the European
tongues, and, the good lady, not feeling that such
accomplishments are chiefly useful as a means, looked
about her in order to collect a set, among whom our

heroine might find some one with whom to converse
in each of her dialects. Little was said about it, it is
true, but great efforts were made to cause this evening
to be memorable in the annals of conversazioni.

In carrying out this scheme, nearly all the wits, writers,
artists and literati, as the most incorrigible members
of the book clubs were styled, in New-York, were
pressingly invited to be present. Aristabulus had contrived
to earn such a reputation for the captain, on the
night of the ball, that he was universally called a man
of letters, and an article had actually appeared in one
of the papers, speaking of the literary merits of the
“Hon. and Rev. Mr. Truck, a gentleman travelling in
our country, from whose liberality and just views, an
account of our society was to be expected, that should,
at last, do justice to our national character.” With
such expectations, then, every true American and
Americaness, was expected to be at his or her post,
for the solemn occasion. It was a rally of literature,
in defence of the institutions—no, not of the institutions,
for they were left to take care of themselves—but of
the social character of the community.

Alas! it is easier to feel high aspirations on such
subjects, in a provincial town, than to succeed; for
merely calling a place an Emporium, is very far from
giving it the independence, high tone, condensed intelligence
and tastes of a capital. Poor Mrs. Legend,
desirous of having all the tongues duly represented,
was obliged to invite certain dealers in gin from Holland,
a German linen merchant from Saxony, an Italian
Cavaliero, who amused himself in selling beads, and a
Spanish master, who was born in Portugal, all of
whom had just one requisite for conversation in their
respective languages, and no more. But such assemblies
were convened in Paris, and why not in New-York?

We shall not stop to dwell on the awful sensations
with which Mrs. Legend heard the first ring at her

door, on the eventful night in question. It was the
precursor of the entrance of Miss Annual, as regular
a devotee of letters as ever conned a primer. The
meeting was sentimental and affectionate. Before
either had time, however, to disburthen her mind of
one half of its prepared phrases, ring upon ring proclaimed
more company, and the rooms were soon as
much sprinkled with talent, as a modern novel with
jests. Among those who came first, appeared all the
foreign corps, for the refreshments entered as something
into the account with them; every blue of the
place, whose social position in the least entitled her to
be seen in such a house, Mrs. Legend belonging quite
positively to good society.

The scene that succeeded was very characteristic.
A professed genius does nothing like other people, except
in cases that require a display of talents. In all
minor matters, he, or she, is sui generis; for sentiment
is in constant ebullition in their souls; this being what
is meant by the flow of that part of the human system.

We might here very well adopt the Homeric method,
and call the roll of heroes and heroines, in what
the French would term a catalogue raisonnée; but our
limits compel us to be less ambitious, and to adopt a
simpler mode of communicating facts. Among the
ladies who now figured in the drawing-room of Mrs.
Legend, besides Miss Annual, were Miss Monthly,
Mrs. Economy, S. R. P., Marion, Longinus, Julietta,
Herodotus, D. O. V. E., and Mrs. Demonstration; besides
many others of less note; together with at least
a dozen female Hajjis, whose claims to appear in such
society were pretty much dependent on the fact, that
having seen pictures and statues abroad, they necessarily
must have the means of talking of them at home.
The list of men was still more formidable in numbers,
if not in talents. At its head stood Steadfast Dodge,
Esquire, whose fame as a male Hajji had so far swollen
since Mrs. Jarvis's réunion, that, for the first time in

his life, he now entered one of the better houses of his
own country. Then there were the authors of “Lapis
Lazuli,” “The Aunts,” “The Reformed,” “The
Conformed,” “The Transformed,” and “The Deformed;”
with the editors of “The Hebdomad,” “The
Night Cap,” “The Chrysalis,” “The Real Maggot,”
and “The Seek no Further;” as also, “Junius,” “Junius
Brutus,” “Lucius Junius Brutus,” “Captain Kant,”
“Florio,” the `Author of the History of Billy Linkum
Tweedle', the celebrated Pottawattamie Prophet,
“Single Rhyme,” a genius who had prudently rested
his fame in verse, on a couplet composed of one line;
besides divers amateurs and connoisseurs, Hajjis, who
must be men of talents, as they had acquired all they
knew, very much as American Eclipse gained his laurels
on the turf; that is to say, by a free use of the
whip and spur.

As Mrs. Legend sailed about her rooms amid such
a circle, her mind expanded, her thoughts diffused themselves
among her guests on the principle of Animal
Magnetism, and her heart was melting with the tender
sympathies of congenial tastes. She felt herself to be
at the head of American talents, and, in the secret recesses
of her reason, she determined that, did even the
fate of Sodom and Gomorrah menace her native town,
as some evil disposed persons had dared to insinuate
might one day be the case, here was enough to save it
from destruction.

It was just as the mistress of the mansion had come
to this consoling conclusion, that the party from Hudson
Square rang. As few of her guests came in carriages,
Mrs. Legend, who heard the rolling of wheels, felt persuaded
that the lion of the night was now indeed at
hand; and with a view to a proper reception, she requested
the company to divide itself into two lines, in
order that he might enter, as it were, between lanes
of genius.

It may be necessary to explain, at this point of our
narrative, that John Effingham was perfectly aware

of the error which existed in relation to the real character
of Captain Truck, wherein he thought great injustice
had been done the honest seaman; and, the old
man intending to sail for London next morning, had
persuaded him to accept this invitation, in order that
the public mind might be disabused in a matter of so
much importance. With a view that this might be done
naturally and without fuss, however, he did not explain
the mistake to his nautical friend, believing it most
probable that this could be better done incidentally, as
it were, in the course of the evening; and feeling certain
of the force of that wholesome apothegm, which
says that “truth is powerful and must prevail.” “If
this be so,” added John Effingham, in his explanations
to Eve, “there can be no place where the sacred quality
will be so likely to assert itself, as in a galaxy of
geniuses, whose distinctive characteristic is `an intuitive
perception of things in their real colours.”'

When the door of Mrs. Legend's drawing-room
opened, in the usual noiseless manner, Mademoiselle
Viefville, who led the way, was startled at finding herself
in the precise situation of one who is condemned
to run the gauntlet. Fortunately, she caught a
glimpse of Mrs. Legend, posted at the other end of the
proud array, inviting her, with smiles, to approach.
The invitation had been to a “literary fête,” and Mademoiselle
Viefville was too much of a Frenchwoman
to be totally disconcerted at a little scenic effect on
the occasion of a fête of any sort. Supposing she was
now a witness of an American ceremony for the first
time, for the want of representation in the country had
been rather a subject of animadversion with her, she
advanced steadily towards the mistress of the house,
bestowing smile for smile, this being a part of the programme
at which a Parisienne was not easily outdone.
Eve followed, as usual, sola; Grace came next; then
Sir George; then John Effingham; the captain bringing
up the rear. There had been a friendly contest,

for the precedency, between the two last, each desiring
to yield it to the other on the score of merit; but
the captain prevailed, by declaring “that he was navigating
an unknown sea, and that he could do nothing
wiser than to sail in the wake of so good a pilot as
Mr. John Effingham.”

As Hajjis of approved experience, the persons who
led the advance in this little procession, were subjects
of a proper attention and respect; but as the admiration
of mere vulgar travelling would in itself be vulgar,
care was taken to reserve the condensed feeling of
the company for the celebrated English writer and
wit, who was known to bring up the rear. This was
not a common house, in which dollars had place, or
belles rioted, but the temple of genius; and every one
felt an ardent desire to manifest a proper homage to
the abilities of the established foreign writer, that should
be in exact proportion to their indifference to the twenty
thousand a year of John Effingham, and to the nearly
equal amount of Eve's expectations.

The personal appearance of the honest tar was well
adapted to the character he was thus called on so unexpectedly
to support. His hair had long been getting
grey, but the intense anxiety of the chase, of the
wreck, and of his other recent adventures, had rapidly,
but effectually, increased this mark of time; and his
head was now nearly as white as snow. The hale,
fresh, red of his features, which was in truth the result
of exposure, might very well pass for the tint of port,
and his tread, which had always a little of the quarterdeck
swing about it, might quite easily be mistaken by
a tyro, for the human frame staggering under a load
of learning. Unfortunately for those who dislike mystifications,
the captain had consulted John Effingham
on the subject of the toilette, and that kind and indulgent
friend had suggested the propriety of appearing
in black small-clothes for the occasion, a costume that
he often wore himself of an evening. Reality, in this

instance, then, did not disappoint expectation, and the
burst of applause with which the captain was received,
was accompanied by a general murmur in commendation
of the admirable manner in which he “looked
the character.”

“What a Byronic head,” whispered the author of
“The Transformed” to D. O. V. E.; “and was there
ever such a curl of the lip, before, to mortal man!”

The truth is, the captain had thrust his tobacco into
“an aside,” as a monkey is known to empocher a spare
nut, or a lump of sugar.

“Do you think him Byronic?—To my eye, the cast
of his head is Shaksperian, rather; though I confess
there is a little of Milton about the forehead!”

“Pray,” said Miss Annual, to Lucius Junius Brutus,
“which is commonly thought to be the best of his
works; that on a—a—a,—or that on e—e—e?”

Now, so it happened, that not a soul in the room,
but the lion himself, had any idea what books he had
written, and he knew only of some fifteen or twenty
log-books. It was generally understood, that he was
a great English writer, and this was more than sufficient.

“I believe the world generally prefers the a—a—a,”
said Lucius Junius Brutus; “but the few give a decided
preference to the e—e—e—”

“Oh! out of all question preferable!” exclaimed
half a dozen, in hearing.

“With what a classical modesty he pays his compliments
to Mrs. Legend,” observed “S. R. P.”—“One
can always tell a man of real genius, by his tenu!”

“He is so English!” cried Florio. “Ah! they are
the only people, after all!”

This Florio was one of those geniuses who sigh
most for the things that they least possess.

By this time Captain Truck had got through with
listening to the compliments of Mrs. Legend, when he
was seized upon by a circle of rabid literati, who

badgered him with questions concerning his opinions,
notions, inferences, experiences, associations, sensations,
sentiments and intentions, in a way that soon
threw the old man into a profuse perspiration. Fifty
times did he wish, from the bottom of his soul, that
soul which the crowd around him fancied dwelt so
high in the clouds, that he was seated quietly by the
side of Mrs. Hawker, who, he mentally swore, was
worth all the literati in Christendom. But fate had
decreed otherwise, and we shall leave him to his fortune,
for a time, and return to our heroine and her
party.

As soon as Mrs. Legend had got through with her
introductory compliments to the captain, she sought
Eve and Grace, with a consciousness that a few civilities
were now their due.

“I fear, Miss Effingham, after the elaborate soirées
of the literary circles in Paris, you will find our reunions
of the same sort, a little dull; and yet I flatter
myself with having assembled most of the talents of
New-York on this memorable occasion, to do honour
to your friend. Are you acquainted with many of the
company?”

Now, Eve had never seen nor ever heard of a single
being in the room, with the exception of Mr. Dodge
and her own party, before this night, although most
of them had been so laboriously employed in puffing
each other into celebrity, for many weary years; and,
as for elaborate soirées, she thought she had never seen
one half as elaborate as this of Mrs. Legend's. As it
would not very well do, however, to express all this in
words, she civilly desired the lady to point out to her
some of the most distinguished of the company.

“With the greatest pleasure, Miss Effingham,” Mrs.
Legend taking pride in dwelling on the merits of her
guests.—“This heavy, grand-looking personage, in
whose air one sees refinement and modesty at a glance,
is Captain Kant, the editor of one of our most decidedly

pious newspapers. His mind is distinguished
for its intuitive perception of all that is delicate, reserved
and finished in the intellectual world, while, in
opposition to this quality, which is almost feminine, his
character is just as remarkable for its unflinching love
of truth. He was never known to publish a falsehood,
and of his foreign correspondence, in particular, he is
so exceedingly careful, that he assures me he has
every word of it written under his own eye.”

“On the subject of his religious scruples,” added
John Effingham, “he is so fastidiously exact, that I
hear he `says grace' over every thing that goes from
his press, and `returns thanks' for every thing that
comes to it.”

“You know him, Mr. Effingham, by this remark?
Is he not, truly, a man of a vocation?”

“That, indeed, he is, ma'am. He may be succinctly
said to have a newspaper mind, as he reduces every
thing in nature or art to news, and commonly imparts
to it so much of his own peculiar character, that it
loses all identity with the subjects to which it originally
belonged. One scarcely knows which to admire
most about this man, the atmospheric transparency of
his motives, for he is so disinterested as seldom even to
think of paying for a dinner when travelling, and yet
so conscientious as always to say something obliging
of the tavern as soon as he gets home—his rigid regard
to facts, or the exquisite refinement and delicacy that
he imparts to every thing he touches. Over all this,
too, he throws a beautiful halo of morality and religion,
never even prevaricating in the hottest discussion,
unless with the unction of a saint!”

“Do you happen to know Florio?” asked Mrs. Legend,
a little distrusting John Effingham's account of
Captain Kant.

“If I do, it must indeed be by accident. What are
his chief characteristics, ma'am?”

“Sentiment, pathos, delicacy, and all in rhyme, too.

You, no doubt, have heard of his triumph over Lord
Byron, Miss Effingham?”

Eve was obliged to confess that it was new to her.

“Why, Byron wrote an ode to Greece, commencing
with `The Isles of Greece! the Isles of Greece!' a
very feeble line, as any one will see, for it contained a
useless and an unmeaning repetition.”

“And you might add vulgar, too, Mrs. Legend,”
said John Effingham, “since it made a palpable allusion
to all those vulgar incidents that associate themselves
in the mind, with these said common-place isles.
The arts, philosophy, poetry, eloquence, and even old
Homer, are brought unpleasantly to one's recollection,
by such an indiscreet invocation.”

“So Florio thought, and, by way of letting the
world perceive the essential difference between the
base and the pure coin, he wrote an ode on England,
which commenced as such an ode should!”

“Do you happen to recollect any of it, ma'am?”

“Only the first line, which I greatly regret, as the
rhyme is Florio's chief merit. But this line is, of itself,
sufficient to immortalize a man.”

“Do not keep us in torment, dear Mrs. Legend, but
let us have it, of heaven's sake!”

“It began in this sublime strain, sir—`Beyond the
wave!—Beyond the wave!' Now, Miss Effingham,
that is what I call poetry!”

“And well you may, ma'am,” returned the gentleman,
who perceived Eve could scarce refrain from
breaking out in a very unsentimental manner—“So
much pathos.”

“And so sententious and flowing!”

“Condensing a journey of three thousand miles, as
it might be, into three words, and a note of admiration.
I trust it was printed with a note of admiration,
Mrs. Legend?”

“Yes, sir, with two—one behind each wave—and
such waves, Mr. Effingham!”

“Indeed, ma'am, you may say so. One really gets
a grand idea of them, England lying beyond each.”

“So much expressed in so few syllables!”

“I think I see every shoal, current, ripple, rock,
island, and whale, between Sandy Hook and the Land's
End.”

“He hints at an epic.”

“Pray God he may execute one. Let him make
haste, too, or he may get `behind the age,' `behind the
age.”'

Here the lady was called away to receive a guest.

“Cousin Jack!”

“Eve Effingham?”

“Do you not sometimes fear offending?”

“Not a woman who begins with expressing her admiration
of such a sublime thing as this. You are
safe with such a person, any where short of a tweak
of the nose.”

“Mais, tout ceci est bien drôle!”

“You never were more mistaken in your life, Mademoiselle;
every body here looks upon it as a matter
of life and death.”

The new guest was Mr. Pindar, one of those careless,
unsentimental fellows, that occasionally throw off
an ode that passes through Christendom, as dollars are
known to pass from China to Norway, and yet, who
never fancied spectacles necessary to his appearance,
solemnity to his face, nor soirées to his renown. After
quitting Mrs. Legend, he approached Eve, to whom
he was slightly known, and accosted her.

“This is the region of taste, Miss Effingham,” he
said, with a shrug of the jaw, if such a member can
shrug; “and I do not wonder at finding you here.”

He then chatted pleasantly a moment, with the party,
and passed on, giving an ominous gape, as he drew
nearer to the oi polloi of literature. A moment after
appeared Mr. Gray, a man who needed nothing but
taste in the public, and the encouragement that would

follow such a taste, to stand at, or certainly near, the
head of the poets of our own time. He, too, looked
shily at the galaxy, and took refuge in a corner.
Mr. Pith followed; a man whose caustic wit needs
only a sphere for its exercise, manners to portray, and
a society with strong points about it to illustrate, in
order to enrol his name high on the catalogue of satirists.
Another ring announced Mr. Fun, a writer of
exquisite humour, and of finished periods, but who,
having perpetrated a little too much sentiment, was
instantly seized upon by all the ultra ladies who were
addicted to the same taste in that way, in the room.

These persons came late, like those who had already
been too often dosed in the same way, to be impatient
of repetitions. The three first soon got together in a
corner, and Eve fancied they were laughing at the rest
of the company; whereas, in fact, they were merely
laughing at a bad joke of their own; their quick perception
of the ludicrous having pointed out a hundred
odd combinations and absurdities, that would have
escaped duller minds.

“Who, in the name of the twelve Cæsars, has Mrs.
Legend got to lionize, younder, with the white summit
and the dark base?” asked the writer of odes.

“Some English pamphleteer, by what I can learn,”
answered he of satire; “some fellow who has achieved
a pert review, or written a Minerva Pressism, and who
now flourishes like a bay tree among us. A modern
Horace, or a Juvenal on his travels.”

“Fun is well badgered,” observed Mr. Gray.—“Do
you not see that Miss Annual, Miss Monthly, and that
young alphabet D. O. V. E., have got him within the
circle of their petticoats, where he will be martyred on
a sigh?”

“He casts longing looks this way; he wishes you
to go to his rescue, Pith.”

“I!—Let him take his fill of sentiment! I am no
homœpathist in such matters. Large doses in quick

succession, will soonest work a cure. Here comes the
lion, and he breaks loose from his cage, like a beast
that has been poked up with sticks.”

“Good evening, gentlemen,” said Captain Truck,
wiping his face intensely, and who having made his
escape from a throng of admirers, took refuge in the
first port that offered. “You seem to be enjoying
yourselves here in a rational and agreeable way. Quite
cool and refreshing in this corner.”

“And yet we have no doubt that both our reason
and our amusement will receive a large increase from
the addition of your society, sir,” returned Mr. Pith.—
“Do us the favour to take a seat, I beg of you, and
rest yourself.”

“With all my heart, gentlemen; for, to own the
truth, these ladies make warm work about a stranger.
I have just got out of what I call a category.”

“You appear to have escaped with life, sir,” observed
Pindar, taking a cool survey of the other's
person.

“Yes, thank God, I have done that, and it is pretty
much all,” answered the captain, wiping his face. “I
served in the French war—Truxtun's war, as we
call it—and I had a touch with the English in the
privateer trade, between twelve and fifteen; and here,
quite lately, I was in an encounter with the savage
Arabs down on the coast of Africa; and I account
them all as so much snow-balling, compared with the
yard-arm and yard-arm work of this very night. I
wonder if it is permitted to try a cigar at these conversation-onies,
gentlemen?”

“I believe it is, sir,” returned Pindar, coolly. “Shall
I help you to a light?”

“Oh! Mr. Truck!” cried Mrs. Legend, following
the chafed animal to his corner, as one would pursue
any other runaway, “instinct has brought you into this
good company. You are, now, in the very focus of
American talents.”

“Having just escaped from the focus of American
talons,” whispered Pith.

“I must be permitted to introduce you myself. Mr.
Truck, Mr. Pindar—Mr. Pith—Mr. Gray—gentlemen,
you must be so happy to be acquainted, being, as it
were, engaged in the same pursuits!”

The captain rose and shook each of the gentlemen
cordially by the hand, for he had, at least, the consolation
of a great many introductions that night. Mrs.
Legend disappeared to say something to some other
prodigy.

“Happy to meet you, gentlemen,” said the captain.
“In what trade do you sail?”

“By whatever name we may call it,” answered Mr.
Pindar—“we can scarcely be said to go before the
wind.”

“Not in the Injee business, then, or the monsoons
would keep the stun'sails set, at least.”

“No, sir.—But yonder is Mr. Moccasin, who has
lately set up secundum artem, in the Indian business,
having written two novels in that way already, and
begun a third.”

“Are you all regularly employed, gentlemen?”

“As regularly as inspiration points,” said Mr. Pith.
“Men of our occupation must make fair weather of it,
or we had better be doing nothing.”

“So I often tell my owners, but `go ahead' is the
order. When I was a youngster, a ship remained in
port for a fair wind; but, now, she goes to work and
makes one. The world seems to get young, as I get
old.”

“This is a rum litterateur,” Gray whispered to Pindar.

“It is an obvious mystification,” was the answer;
“poor Mrs. Legend has picked up some straggling
porpoise, and converted him, by a touch of her magical
wand, into a Boanerges of literature. The thing
is as clear as day, for the worthy fellow smells of tar

and cigar smoke. I perceive that Mr. Effingham is
laughing out of the corner of his eyes, and will step
across the room, and get the truth, in a minute.”

The rogue was as good as his word, and was soon
back again, and contrived to let his friends understand
the real state of the case. A knowledge of the captain's
true character encouraged this trio in the benevolent
purpose of aiding the honest old seaman in his
wish to smoke, and Pith managed to give him a lighted
paper, without becoming an open accessary to the plot.

“Will you take a cigar yourself, sir,” said the captain,
offering his box to Mr. Pindar.

“I thank you, Mr. Truck, I never smoke, but am a
profound admirer of the flavour. Let me entreat you
to begin as soon as possible.”

Thus encouraged, Captain Truck drew two or three
whiffs, when the rooms were immediately filled with
the fragrance of a real Havana. At the first discovery,
the whole literary pack went off on the scent.
As for Mr. Fun, he managed to profit by the agitation
that followed, in order to escape to the three wags in
the corner, who were enjoying the scene, with the
gravity of so many dervishes.

“As I live,” cried Lucius Junius Brutus, “there is
the author of a—a—a— actually smoking a cigar!—
How excessively piquant!”

“Do my eyes deceive me, or is not that the writer
of e—e—e— fumigating us all!” whispered Miss
Annual.

“Nay, this cannot certainly be right,” put in Florio,
with a dogmatical manner. “All the periodicals
agree that smoking is ungenteel in England.”

“You never were more mistaken, dear Florio,”
replied D. O. V. E. in a cooing tone. “The very last
novel of society has a chapter in which the hero and
heroine smoke in the declaration scene.”

“Do they, indeed!—That alters the case. Really,
one would not wish to get behind so great a nation,

nor yet go much before it. Pray, Captain Kant, what
do your friends in Canada say; is, or is not smoking
permitted in good society there? the Canadians must,
at least, be ahead of us.”

“Not at all, sir,” returned the editor in his softest
tones; “it is revolutionary and jacobinical.”

But the ladies prevailed, and, by a process that is
rather peculiar to what may be called a “credulous”
state of society, they carried the day. This process
was simply to make one fiction authority for another.
The fact that smoking was now carried so far in
England, that the clergy actually used cigars in the
pulpits, was affirmed on the authority of Mr. Truck
himself, and, coupled with his present occupation, the
point was deemed to be settled. Even Florio yielded,
and his plastic mind soon saw a thousand beauties in
the usage, that had hitherto escaped it. All the literati
drew round the captain in a circle, to enjoy the spectacle,
though the honest old mariner contrived to throw
out such volumes of vapour as to keep them at a safe
distance. His four demure-looking neighbours got behind
the barrier of smoke, where they deemed themselves
entrenched against the assaults of sentimental
petticoats, for a time, at least.

“Pray, Mr. Truck,” inquired S. R. P., “is it commonly
thought in the English literary circles, that
Byron was a development of Shakspeare, or Shakspeare
a shadowing forth of Byron?”

“Both, marm,” said the captain, with a coolness
that would have done credit to Aristabulus, for he had
been fairly badgered into impudence, profiting by the
occasion to knock the ashes off his cigar; “all incline
to the first opinion, and most to the last.”

“What finesse!” murmured one. “How delicate!”
whispered a second. “A dignified reserve!” ejaculated
a third. “So English!” exclaimed Florio.

“Do you think, Mr. Truck,” asked D. O. V. E.,
“that the profane songs of Little have more pathos

than the sacred songs of Moore; or that the sacred
songs of Moore have more sentiment than the profane
songs of Little?”

“A good deal of both, marm, and something to
spare. I think there is little in one, and more in the
other.”

“Pray, sir,” said J. R. P., “do you pronounce the
name of Byron's lady-love, Guy-kee-oh-ly, or, Gwy-ky-o-
lee?”

“That depends on how the wind is. If on shore, I
am apt to say `oh-lee;' and if off shore, `oh-lie.' ”

“That's capital!” cried Florio, in an extasy of admiration.
“What man in this country could have
said as crack a thing as that?”

“Indeed it is very witty,” added Miss Monthly—
“what does it mean?”

“Mean! More than is seen or felt by common
minds. Ah! the English are truly a great nation!—
How delightfully he smokes!”

“I think he is much the most interesting man we
have had out here,” observed Miss Annual, “since the
last bust of Scott!”

“Ask him, dear D. O. V. E.,” whispered Julietta,
who was timid, from the circumstance of never having
published, “which he thinks the most ecstatic feeling,
hope or despair?”

The question was put by the more experienced lady,
according to request, though she first said, in a hurried
tone, to her youthful sister—“you can have felt but
little, child, or you would know that it is despair, as a
matter of course.”

The honest captain, however, did not treat the matter
so lightly, for he improved the opportunity to light
a fresh cigar, throwing the still smoking stump into
Mrs. Legend's grate, through a lane of literati, as he
afterwards boasted, as coolly as he could have thrown
it overboard, under other circumstances. Luckily for
his reputation for sentiment, he mistook “ecstatic,” a

word he had never heard before, for “erratic;” and
recollecting sundry roving maniacs that he had seen,
he answered promptly—

“Despair, out and out.”

“I knew it,” said one.

“It's in nature,” added a second.

“All can feel its truth,” rejoined a third.

“This point may now be set down as established,”
cried Florio, “and I hope no more will be said about
it.”

“This is encouragement to the searchers after truth,”
put in Captain Kant.

“Pray, Hon. and Rev. Mr. Truck,” asked Lucius
Junius Brutus, at the joint suggestion of Junius Brutus
and Brutus, “does the Princess Victoria smoke?”

“If she did not, sir, where would be the use in being
a princess. I suppose you know that all the tobacco
seized in England, after a deduction to informers, goes
to the crown.”

“I object to this usage,” remarked Captain Kant,
“as irreligious, French, and tending to sans-culotteism.
I am willing to admit of this distinguished instance as
an exception; but on all other grounds, I shall maintain
that it savours of infidelity to smoke. The Prussian
government, much the best of our times, never smokes.”

“This man thinks he has a monoply of the puffing,
himself,” Pindar whispered into the captain's ear;
“whiff away, my dear sir, and you'll soon throw him
into the shade.”

The captain winked, drew out his box, lighted another
cigar, and, by way of reply to the envious
remark, he put one in each corner of his mouth, and
soon had both in full blast, a state in which he kept
them for near a minute.

“This is the very picturesque of social enjoyment,”
exclaimed Florio, holding up both hands in a glow of
rapture. “It is absolutely Homeric, in the way of
usages! Ah! the English are a great nation!”

“I should like to know excessively if there was
really such a person as Baron Mun-chaw-sen?” said
Julietta, gathering courage from the success of her
last question.

“There was, Miss,” returned the captain, through
his teeth, and nodding his head in the affirmative. “A
regular traveller, that; and one who knew him well,
swore to me that he hadn't related one half of what
befel him.”

“How very delightful to learn this from the highest
quarter!” exclaimed Miss Monthly.

“Is Gatty (Goethe) really dead?” inquired Longinus,
“or, is the account we have had to that effect,
merely a metaphysical apotheosis of his mighty soul?”

“Dead, marm—stone dead—dead as a door-nail,”
returned the captain, who saw a relief in killing as
many as possible.

“You have been in France, Mr. Truck, beyond
question?” observed Lucius Junius Brutus, in the way
one puts a question.

“France!—I was in France before I was ten years
old. I know every foot of the coast, from Havre de
Grace to Marseilles.”

“Will you then have the goodness to explain to us
whether the soul of Chat-to-bri-ong is more expanded
than his reason, or his reason more expanded than his
soul?”

Captain Truck had a very tolerable notion of Baron
Munchausen and of his particular merits; but Chateaubriant
was a writer of whom he knew nothing. After
pondering a moment, and feeling persuaded that a
confession of ignorance might undo him; for the old
man had got to be influenced by the atmosphere of the
place; he answered coolly—

“Oh! Chat-to-bri-ong, is it you mean?—As wholesouled
a fellow as I know. All soul, sir, and lots of reason,
besides.”

“How simple and unaffected!”

“Crack!” exclaimed Florio.

“A thorough Jacobin!” growled Captain Kant, who
was always offended when any one but himself took
liberties with the truth.

Here the four wags in the corner observed that head
went to head in the crowd, and that the rear rank of
the company began to disappear, while Mrs. Legend
was in evident distress. In a few minutes, all the Romans
were off; Florio soon after vanished, grating his
teeth in a poetical frenzy; and even Captain Kant,
albeit so used to look truth in the face, beat a retreat.
The alphabet followed, and even the Annual and the
Monthly retired, with leave-takings so solemn and precise,
that poor Mrs. Legend was in total despair.

Eve, foreseeing something unpleasant, had gone
away first, and, in a few minutes, Mr. Dodge, who
had been very active in the crowd, whispering and
gesticulating, made his bow also. The envy of this
man had, in fact, become so intolerable, that he had
let the cat out of the bag. No one now remained but
the party entrenched behind the smoke, and the mistress
of the house. Pindar solemnly proposed to the
captain that they should go and enjoy an oyster-supper,
in company; and, the proposal being cordially
accepted, they rose in a body, to take leave.

“A most delightful evening, Mrs. Legend,” said Pindar,
with perfect truth, “much the pleasantest I ever
passed in a house, where one passes so many that are
agreeable.”

“I cannot properly express my thanks for the obligation
you have conferred by making me acquainted
with Mr. Truck,” added Gray. “I shall cultivate it
as far as in my power, for a more capital fellow never
breathed.”

“Really, Mrs. Legend, this has been a Byronic
night!” observed Pith, as he made his bow. “I shall
long remember it, and I think it deserves to be commemorated
in verse.”

Fun endeavoured to look sympathetic and sentimental,
though the spirit within could scarcely refrain
from grinning in Mrs. Legend's face. He stammered
out a few compliments, however, and disappeared.

“Well, good night, marm,” said Captain Truck,
offering his hand cordially. “This has been a pleasant
evening, altogether, though it was warm work at
first. If you like ships, I should be glad to show you
the Montauk's cabins when we get back; and if you
ever think of Europe, let me recommend the London
line as none of the worst. We'll try to make you
comfortable, and trust to me to choose a state-room, a
thing I am experienced in.”

Not one of the wags laughed until they were fairly
confronted with the oysters. Then, indeed, they burst
out into a general and long fit of exuberant merriment,
returning to it, between the courses from the kitchen,
like the refrain of a song. Captain Truck, who was
uncommonly well satisfied with himself, did not understand
the meaning of all this boyishness, but he has
often declared since, that a heartier or a funnier set of
fellows he never fell in with, than his four companions
proved to be that night.

As for the literary soirée, the most profound silence
has been maintained concerning it, neither of the wits
there assembled having seen fit to celebrate it in rhyme,
and Florio having actually torn up an impromptu for
the occasion, that he had been all the previous day
writing.