 | NO. III.
SUBTERRANEAN NEWS. Sporting scenes and sundry sketches |  |
4. NO. III.
SUBTERRANEAN NEWS.
Dear Editor,—I was reading the fifth book of the æneid
one afternoon last week, after dining magnificently upon roast
pig and green peas, when, almost imperceptibly, and with a
sensation of gradual, languid, pleasant metamorphosis, I was,
in the body, taken out of the body, and transported to the unmonopolized
public lands of poetry and classic story. Animal
magnetism carried me over the track we flew. Cumœa received
me, ambitious pilgrim, seeking safe convoy and a passport
for travel through the interesting regions that own Pluto
for their king. I stood upon the margin of the sacred grove,
where grows the golden tree, whose branches are at once the
protection-papers and the pilot of the specially favored living,
to the country of ghosts and infernal gods. Mighty enterprise,
glorious riches of glowing incidents! What subterranean
treasures shall I glorify to the wondering upper air, if ever I
get back! “Pencillings by the way”—“Crayon Sketches”
—Trolloping “inklings” of a jaunt through Tartarus during
the year 1839. Shade of æneas, help me to break through
these cat-briars and blackberry bushes, that guard the entrance
to the sacred tree!
With this invocation I pressed boldly into the penetralia of
the wood. I readily discovered the individual who keeps
watch over the aureal vegetable, and expressed to her my desire
to go to Hell. My request was received with courtesy,
and the trusty watch-woman accompanied her acknowledgment
putting into my hand a sister branch of the bough which marshalled
the pious son of Anchises some thousand years ago.
I felt the god running through my veins as I touched the scion
of the tree of knowledge and power.
“I presume, sir, I need not show you the way,” said the
civil sybil; “you New-Yorkers are generally familiar with
the road; but if you should miss your track, the rod will direct
you. Follow the rod. The gold will keep you straight.”
I touched my hat to the old lady in acknowledgment of the
complimentary observation which she was pleased to express
touching my fellow-citizens, and bidding her good day, turned
to commence my journey.
Immediately the under-brush and matted trees fell apart,
disclosing a broad avenue of spiral green sward running down
into the earth at about an angle of thirty-two and a half degrees.
Down this declivity I walked, or rather was whirled
by a vehement power of centripetal locomotion, which soon
brought me to the boundary of the dusky empire. High,
higher than sight; far—farther than thought, stretched the
everlasting walls. Gloomily and fearfully the grand portals
frowned before me. The gates were swung wide open, but
old Cerberus was wide awake, and his three heads were
busily occupied in fighting a family quarrel in reference to a
bone which each appeared desirous to appropriate.
The moment he noticed me he saluted me with an ululatory
recognition, which made me somewhat doubt the sufficiency
of my nerves for the journey I had undertaken. I trembled
more especially, because in the hurry of my setting out I had
neglected to bring with me the customary viaticum to grease
and bribe his jaws. Moreover, one does not like to strike a
gentleman's dog, particularly when he is on a visit to him,
But the impetus of my progress was such, that there
was no time for adjustment of the difficulty. “I must settle
this business with Pluto,” said I to myself. Then I took
courage and thought of Hercules, who dragged the cur to
earth and back again; and raising my metal, no lightly-loaded
weapon, I got in readiness—a blow at the rushing whelp,
which, if it had been discharged in the proper direction, would
have probably made him a constellation alongside of his brother
Sirius. But, oh! wonder-working gold! the moment that the
treasure glittered in his eyes, the three-mouthed coward fawned
and grovelled at my feet, kissing the yellow rod, like a skinner
before a money-lender at a quarter before three.
“Charge! good dog,” said I, patting his heads successively,
to make sure of his good opinion when I should return; and
under these established terms of friendship, we separated. I
soon arrived at the east bank of the Styx, where I found innumerable
ghosts, walking up and down, and waiting their
turn to cross. The throng at this landing place reminded me
of the congregation at the Brooklyn ferry on a race day; only
the people were all on foot. My magic passport gained me
an easy opening through the multitude, most of whom seemed
to be Ethiopians and low Irish. Those who held themselves
more respectable stood back at a distance from the river, and
a few groups that I particularly noticed, appeared by their gestures,
and the occasional emphatic words which sruck my ear,
to be discussing some question about the monopoly of the
ferry. The doctrine of equal rights, however, was faithfully
regarded. No exclusive facilities for entering into the kingdom
were allowed. Every candidate was duly billeted, the
moment he arrived by the constables of the vestibule, and each
took turn according to the number of his ticket, without any
that was required was the paying for his ferriage. When I
arrived at the brink of the sluggish stream, the ferryman had
just put out with a cargo of small children. But on the instant
he caught a glimpse of the golden rod, he returned and
hurried out his passengers with fierce precipitation, forgetting,
in his haste, to pay back the ferriage he had received.
“Step in, step in, step in. Welcome to Erebus. Don't
see flesh and blood every day. Give us your fist. Where do
you hail from? Allow me to inhale once again the fragrance
of that—snuff, snuff—my soul! Over! Ov—a—re—no,
I beg your pardon, sir. You shall not be annoyed with any
of the greasy ghosts. A mere slip of the tongue—my calling.
I'll row you over alone with pleasure.”
I gave the hand of the veteran mariner a hearty grasp, and
at his beckoning, took a seat in the stern-sheets, and off he
put.
We had hardly got six yards from the bank, when a familiar
voice, a little way down the stream, assailed my ears
with a loud hilloa. I turned at the cry, and to my utter astonishment,
saw my old friend Jack Furnace, who had sailed
only ten days before for Liverpool, in perfect health, swinging
his hands above his head, and shouting.
“Mercy! protect us!” cried I. “Jack, is that you?
Charon, my dear boy, shove back and take him in.”
“That's contrary to law,” replied the old gentleman.
“Don't you see his ticket is numbered 11,251,956? There's
a whole army to cross before he can tread my plank.”
“You will most particularly oblige me, my esteemed friend,
if you will, in this single instance, suspend the operation of
the provisions of your charter. That gentleman, whose demise
I am thus suddenly called on to deplore, owes me a very
fortnight since, and I should be happy to get his order upon
his executors or administrators, to pay the amount to me out
of his assets. Poor Jack! What could have killed him?
Indeed, dear Charon, you must take him in. Allow me to
present to you this twig of my bough, as a trifling token of
my regard to your friendship, and the firmness of your adherence
to the established usages of your boat.”
“Don't mention this on the other side,” said the old man,
thrusting the argument into his pantaloons' pocket, with some
rapidity; at the same time bending and pretending to fix a
thole-pin and backing water. “Old Minos would have me
indicted, if he were to find out that in a single case bribery and
corruption had made me lose sight of the equal rights of the
ghosts. I should certainly be turned out of office.”
Jack jumped in about mid-ship, and, ghost as he was, nearly
swamped the ricketty craft with his irregular weight. He
was fat, puffed, and, strange for a shade, red-faced, and worse
and worse, was evidently inebriated. His marvellous appearance
excited very natural inquiry. His story was soon told.
He and the captain, crew, and passengers of the vessel he had
sailed in, had just got down from the bed of the Atlantic
Ocean. On the tenth day out at 4 A.M. sea time, they ran
upon a mountain of ice floating under water, and in five minutes
after, in a brisk flaw, foundered and went to the bottom.
Jack was at his wine at the time, when he was quite as unpleasantly
as unexpectedly called upon to change his liquor.
Jack's inclination always did use to be in favor of drinking
many bumpers rather than to submit to a single glass of brine.
I could not, therefore, help saying to him, that it must have
been rather mortifying to be subjected to the punishment imposed
upon people who want to keep sober, while he was giving
My suggestion did not seem to find favor with my—now—fellow-passenger,
and former fellow-sinner.
“No post mortem reflections, Jerry,” said Jack, mournfully;
“you're not Coroner—it's a bad business—bad—bad. I'm
very penitent. Cut off in my prime—no notice to quit—unhouselled—unanointed!—What
killed you my boy?”
“I'm not dead, Jack; I'm on a voyage of discovery—playing
Orpheus. Though I don't mean to pick up a wife here.
By-the-by—do you remember that thousand? Can't you give
me an order on your executors?”
“No money, Jerry—no money. Bursted. I'll give you a
deed, when we get across, for my New Brighton speculation,
and my City Lots in Kimakewahamaya. Have you got such
a thing as an obolus about you, to pay this old cock? what's
that? Gold! by Jove! I haven't seen such a piece of bullion
for—” And here my dear friend sprang up and dashed
at my magic branch.
“Sit down—sit down—you'll upset us—you'll be overboard;”
cried our oarsman. But the caution came too late.
Our whiffling skiff shivered quick from larboard to starboard,
dipping her gunnels into the water, and Jack lost his feet, and
then there was a splash, and the waters of the Styx closed over
the head of my unfortunate debtor.
“There he goes. Served him right. Just as I expected,”
remarked the philosophic boatman, as he kept pulling on.
“Stop! stop! Charon, back water! the man will be
drowned!”
“Drowned, will he? He was drowned this morning.
That's three kinds of liquor he's been in to-day;” and the
grim ferryman grinned.
“But he hasn't secured my debt; what will become of
him?”
“Go to the bottom, to be sure. Here's where I generally
lose such fellows. Just half way from shore. Call it `half
seas over hole.' Grand place for eels.”
“But my venerable Remex, consider my deep interest in
his fate.—Consider my thousand dollars. Can't you get him
up? How deep is it?”
“Never went down to see. Don't fret. He can't exundize
for as many years as he owes you dollars. When the
time comes, he'll float ashore t'other side, and take his trial
with the ghosts of people who have never been buried. Don't
you know it's the law that people that an't buried can't cross
the Styx for a thousand years?”
I remembered the statute as quoted by divers of the poets,
and yielded to the necessity of its requisitions.
Seeing me melancholy, the old man lit up a good-natured
smile.—“Come, cheer up,” said he, “cheer up. What's the
news on earth? How do parties get on in America? Glorious
country, that.—In danger, though—terrible danger!
Italian Opera—loco focoism—gambling in stocks—Animal
Magnetism—French legs—Irish heads—Maine mill sites—
Oregon building lots—phrenology—banks—brokers—twig
that snapping turtle! What are your politics?”
“Mine, sir? I am a federal democratic whig republican,
of the loco foco genus, conservative species, whole hog in the
abstract, and always ready to sacrifice personal opinion to the
judicious principles of public policy, rightly understood in reference
to the individual interests of the citizen. Those are
my sentiments, my friend. Permit me to inquire the state of
parties in Hell. Do the Whigs or Democrats rule the roast?
about the firemen. How does that department vote?”
“O, we have no people to put out fire here. We don't admit
them.—They're so uncertain. But we've had our own
time of it, nevertheless.—Pluto has had his hands full. Listen!
First, up gets a company of speculating ghosts, with not
an obolus among the whole lot of them, and whose turn
to cross hadn't come yet, and presents a petition to the throne,
for an act of incorporation under the title of “The Salamander
Styx Bridge, and Acheron Death and Trust Company,” with
banking privileges. As this was got up merely to raise the
price of building lots near Colonel Tantalus' pond, which they
had bought of Colonel Ixion at a high price with their promissory
notes, all the loafer ghosts that had sixpence cash in
their pockets, consulted and kicked. Free Trade and Sinners'
Rights Associations were formed in every part of Tartarus.
A special committee was sent up stairs for Fanny Wright.
They contrived to get off unobserved, and the first thing we
knew, down came the man giantess. The way she walked
over the sulphur was a caution. She throttled Cerberus, and
almost choked him with a copy of the “Emancipator,” and
strode on to the ferry. Seeing me half way across, she dashed
into the river and came after me like a shark—upset the boat
—tumbled me and six old women and a young Baptist minister
overboard, mounted the skiff, and sculled herself ashore.
Soon as she landed, she stole away my boat hook, stuck upon
its top her handkerchief, upon which was stamped, in indelible
red ink, the motto “Equal Rights and Free Ferries—now
and forever, one and inseparable.” The ghosts turned pale,
Acheron boiled, Tartarus trembled. Pluto came out, and took
off his hat, mistaking her for Minerva on a spree. Yielding
to the divine afflatus which possessed her he followed her
raised the watchword cry of “Reform,” and demanded that
he should abandon his Pagan notion of devotion to a single
wife, and that she should be made queen of Hell, No. 2.
Aschalaphus standing by, ran off, on hearing the negotiation, and
told Proserpine. Then there was the Devil to pay. Proserpine
started, in a rage, and brought out the Fates and Furies, and
rushed to the rescue of monogamy. Did you ever see women
fight?—Snakes! such a row! The people in Elysium heard
it, and came rushing in. Socrates and Adam Smith, Plato
and Malthus flew to the rescue, with cries of “turn her out!
turn her out!” “Order! Order!” sung out Pluto; but no
more order could be had than on the last night of a session of
Congress when Wise is speaking. Puff—puff—it's hot!”
“Well; how did you finally succeed in getting her out?”
“I can't say, my dear boy. Her ascent was as mysterious
as her advent. Both immense. Some think she's here yet.”
I am interrupted, my dear Editor. If you don't hear from
below before, I will tell you the rest of the adventure, next
time I write. Please consider this letter private.
| NO. III.
SUBTERRANEAN NEWS. Sporting scenes and sundry sketches | |