The immediate effects of this bean—whether white, black, Pythagorean, Lima, kidney, or what not—were three-fold: 1. A pump-handle hand-shaking; 2. A very thorough diagnosis of the weather, including a rapid sketch by Duespeptos of the leading principles of caloric, pneumatics, and hygrology; 3. An exchange of cards. That of which I was the recipient consisted of a sheet of paste-board, rather begrimed and wrinkled, of nearly the same dimensions as the Atlantic (Monthly, not Ocean). The name and address occupied the middle of one side of the document, while all the remaining space was filled in with manifold closest scribblings in lead-pencil,—apparently notes, memoranda, and the like. These were not at all private, so the new-found partner of my bosom assured me. In fact, I should do well to look at them, and make myself master of their contents. My friends also might find profit therein. Stray hints might undoubtedly be gathered from them which would lay open to my eyes the secret things of Nature and life. Thrusting it into my pocket for the moment, I feasted myself in imagination with the treasure that was mine, anticipating the happy hour that should make my hope fruition. Then we, first elect of the bean, set ourselves to determine the status quo ante bellum. And here came in once more the fabaceous maker and marker of destiny, saying that blind justice decreed, that, inasmuch as sound is wont to rise, he who was noonday Sayer and midnight Snorer should couch below, while the Hearer should circle above,—plainly a wise provision, that the good things of Providence might not be wasted. Both Damon and Pythias agreed, that, for once at least, the oracle was not ambiguous.

All things being at last arranged, the Rhapsodist took his leave for the present, going, as he informed me, on an errand of mercy for his stomach. The magazine aboard ship being of dubious character, he had prevailed on himself to supply his concern with a limited number of first-class cereals with his own imprimatur,—copyright and profits to be in his own hands. As some consolation for his absence, I was favored with a brief oral treatise on Fats, considered both dietetically and ethically, with an appendix, somewhat a la Liebig, on the nature, use, and effects of tissue-making and heat-making food, nitrogen, carbon, and the like. By way of improvement, a brilliant peroration was added, supposed to be addressed through me to the mothers of America, urging them to bring up the rising generation fatless. Thus only might war cease, justice prevail, love reign, humanity rise, and a golden age come back again to a world-wide Arcadia. Fat and Anti-Fat! Eros and Anteros, Strophe and Antistrophe. Or, better, the old primeval tale,—Jove and the Titans, Theseus and the Centaurs, Bellerophon and the Chimaera, Thor and the Giants, Ormuzd and Ahriman, Good and Evil, Water and Fire, Light and Darkness. The world has told it over from the beginning.

And do you ask what manner of man was the Fatless one? You shall see him. His most striking feature was a fur cap,—weight some four pounds, I should judge. I think he was born with this cap, and will die with it, for 90 deg. Fahrenheit seemed no temptation to uncover. Boots came second in rank, but twelfth or so in number,—weight probably on a par with the leaded brogans of the little wind-driven poetaster of old. Between these two extremes might be found about five feet ten of humanity, lank, sapless, and stooping. The seedy drapery of the figure hung in lean, reproachful wrinkles. The flabby trousers seemed to say: "Give! give!" The hollow waistcoat murmured: "Pad, oh! pad me with hot biscuits!" The loose coat swung and sighed for forbidden fruit: "Fill me with fat!" A dry, coppery face found pointed expression in the nose, which hung like a rigid sentinel over the thin-lipped mouth,—like Victor Hugo's Javert, loyal, untiring, merciless. No traitorous comfits ever passed that guard; no death-laden bark sailed by that sleepless quarantine. The small ferret-eyes which looked nervously out from under bushy brows, roaming, but never resting, were of the true Minerva tint,—yellow-green. The encircling rings told of unsettled weather. While elf-locks and straggling whiskers marked the man careless of forms, the narrow, knotted brow suggested the thinker persistent in the one idea:—

"deep on his front engraven, Deliberation sat and peptic care."

Not over beds of roses had he walked to ascend the heights. Those boots in which he shambled along his martyr-course were filled with peas. He had learned in suffering what he taught in sing-song. The wreath of wormwood was his, and the statue of brass. Io triumphe!

His gait was a swift, uncertain shuffle, a compromise between a saunter and a dog-trot. The arms hung straight and stiff from the narrow shoulders, like the radii of a governor, diverging more or less according to the rate of speed. When the scourge of his Daemon lashed him along furiously, they stood fast at forty-five degrees. His eyes peered suspiciously around, as he lumbered on, watchful for the avenger of fat, who, perhaps, was even now at his heels. A slouch-hat, crowning hollow eyes and haggard beard, filled him with joy: it marked a bran-bread man and a brother. He smiled approvingly at a shrivelled form with hobbling gait; but from the fat and the rubicund he turned with severest frown. They were fleshly sinners, insults to himself, corrupters of youth, gorged drones, law-breakers. He was ready to say, with the statesman of old: "What use can the state turn a man's body to, when all between the throat and the groin is taken up by the belly?" He had vowed eternal hostility to all such, and from the folds of his toga was continually shaking out war. He was of the race sung by the bard, who

"Quarrel with mince-pies, and disparage Their best and dearest friend, plum-porridge, Fat pig and goose itself oppose, And blaspheme custard through the nose."

Every chance-comer was instantaneously gauged as dyspeptic or eupeptic, friend or foe. On the march, Javert was on the alert, snuffing up the air, until some savory odor crossed his path, when he would shut himself up, like a snail within his shell. Yet he was not sleeping, for no titbit ever passed the portals beneath. Perhaps, however, they were themselves trusty now, having made habit a second nature. I cannot imagine them watering at sight of any dainty.

I have heard it said that certain orders of beings are able to improvise or to interchange organs, just as need calls. Thus a polyp, if hard put to it, may shift what little brain and stomach happen to be in his possession. You may say that he carries his heart in his hand. He can take his stomach, and dump it down in brain-case or thorax, just as he fancies,—can organize viscera and victory anywhere, at any moment; and all works merrily. The Fatless was similar, yet different. His stomach changed not its local habitation, was never victorious; yet, from cap to boot, it was ubiquitous and despotic. Brain and heel alike felt themselves to be mere squatters on another's soil, and had a vague idea that the rightful lord might some day come to oust them, and build up a new capital in these far-away districts. Sometimes they went so far as to style themselves his proconsuls and lieutenants, but they were never suffered to do more than simply to register the decrees of the central power. Duespeptos was king only in name,—roi faineant. Gaster was the power behind the throne,—the Mayor of the Palace,—the great Grand-Vizier. Nought went merrily, for he ruled with a rod of iron. Every day his strange freaks set the empire topsy-turvy. Every day there was growling and ill-feeling at his whimsical tyranny,—but nothing more. Secession was as impossible as in the day of Menenius Agrippa.

Looking at it another way, Gaster might be called the object-glass through which Duespeptos looked out upon the world,—a glass always bubbly, distorted, and cracked, generally filmy and smoky, never achromatic, and decidedly the worse for wear. I think that the world thus seen must have had a very odd look to him. His most fitting salutation to each fellow-peptic, as he crossed the field of vision, would have been the Chinese form of greeting: "How is your stomach? Have you eaten your rice?" or, perhaps, the Egyptian style: "How do you perspire?" With him, the peptic bond was the only real one; all others were shams. All sin was peptic in origin: Eve ate an apple which disagreed with her. The only satisfactory atonement, therefore, must be gastric. All reforms hitherto had profited nothing, because they had been either cerebral or cardiac. None had started squarely from Gaster, the true centre. Moral reform was better than intellectual, since the heart lay nearer than the head to the stomach. Phalansteries, Pantisocracies, Unitary Homes, Asylums, Houses of Refuge,—these were all mere makeshifts. The hope of the world lay in Hygeian Institutes. Heroes of heart and brain must bow before the hero of the stomach. Judged by any right test of greatness, Graham was more a man than was Napoleon or John Howard. He that ruled his stomach was greater than he who took a city. Beranger's Roi d'Yvetot, who ate four meals a day,—the Esquimaux, with his daily twenty-pound quantum of train-oil, gravy, and tallow-candles,—the alderman puffing over callipash and callipee,—the backwoodsman hungering after fattest of pork,—such men as these were no common sinners: they were assassins who struck at the very fountain of life, and throttled a human stomach. Pancreatic meant pancreative. Gastric juice was the long-sought elixir. The liver was the lever of the higher life. Along the biliary duct led the road to glory. All the essence of character, life, power, virtue, success, and their opposites,—all the decrees of Fate even,—were daily concocted by curious chemistry within that dark laboratory lying between the oesophagus and the portal vein. There were brewed the reeking ingredients that fertilize the fungus of Crime; there was made to bloom the bright star-flower of Innocence; there was forged the anchor of Hope; there were twisted the threads of the rotten cable of Despair; there Faith built her cross; there Love vivified the heart, and Hate dyed it; there Remorse sharpened his tooth; there Jealousy tinged his eye with emerald; there was quarried the horse-block from which dark Care leaped into the saddle behind the rider; there were puffed out the smoke-wreaths of Doubt; there were blown the bubbles of Phantasy; there sprouted the seeds of Madness; and there, down in the icy vaults, Death froze his finger for the last, cold touch.

IV.—HARMONICS.

Ah! but the card? you ask. Yes, here it is.

NAPHTALI RINK, 51 Early Avenue. (At the Hygienic Institute.)

Of course, this is only in miniature, and represents every way but a very small part of the document, the address being but a drop in the superscriptive surge,—a rivulet of text meandering through a meadow of marginalia. Inasmuch as Duespeptos courted the widest publicity for these stomachic scraps, no scruples of delicacy forbid me to jot down here some few of them. He thought them fitted for the race,—the more readers the better: perhaps it may be, the more the merrier. If called upon to classify them, I should put them all under the genus Gastric Scholia. The different species and varieties it is hardly worth while to enter upon here. There were intuitions, recollections, and glosses, apparently set down in a fragmentary way from time to time, in a most minute and distinct text. Very probably they were hints of thoughts designed to be worked up in a more formal way. Whether the quotations were taken at first or second hand I cannot say; but internal evidence would seem to indicate that many of them might have been clippings from the columns of "The Old Lancaster Day-Book." It is, perhaps, worthy of note that Mr. Rink was, in fact, a man of rather more thought and general information than one might suppose, if judging him merely by his uncouth grammar, and the clipped coin of his jangling speech:—

"His voice was nasal with the twang That spoiled the hymns when Cromwell's army sang."

Now, then, O reader, returning from this feast of fat things, I lay before you the scraps.

* * * * *

"Character is Digestion."

"There's been a good deal of high-fangled nonsense written about genius. One man says it's in the head; another, that it comes from the heart, etc., etc. The fact is, they're all wrong. Genius lies in the stomach. Who ever knew a fat genius? Now there's De Quincey,—he says, in his outlandish way, that genius is the synthesis of the intellect with the moral nature. No such thing; and a man who sinned day and night against his stomach, and swilled opium as he did, couldn't be expected to know. If there's any synthesis at all about it, it's the synthesis of the stomach with the liver."

"What a complete knowledge of human nature Sam Slick shows, when he says, 'A bilious cheek and a sour temper are like the Siamese twins: there's a nateral cord of union atween them. The one is a sign with the name of the firm written on it in long letters.'"

"The French are a mighty cute people. They know a thing or two about as well as the next man. There's a heap of truth and poetry in these maxims of one of their writers: 'Indigestion is the remorse of a guilty stomach'; 'Happiness consists in a hard heart and a good digestion.'"

"The old tempter—the original Jacobs—was called in Hebrew a nachash, so I'm told. But folks don't seem to understand exactly what this nachash was. Some say it was a rattlesnake, some a straddle-bug. Old Dr. Adam Clarke, I've heard, vowed it was a monkey. They're all out of their reckoning. It's as plain as a pikestaff that it was nothing but Fried Fat cooked up to order, and it's been a-tempting weak sisters ever since. That's what's the matter."

"Let me make the bran-bread of a nation, and I care not who makes its laws."

"It makes me master-sick to hear all these fellows who've just made out to scrape together a few postage-stamps laying down their three-cent notions about the way to get on in the world, the rules for success, and all that. Just as if a couple of greenbacks could make a blind man see clean through a millstone! They're like these old nursing grannies: No. 1 thinks catnip is the only thing; No. 2 believes there's nothing like sage-tea and mustard-poultice; No. 3 swears by burdock. The truth is,—and men might as well own up to it first as last,—success depends on bile."

"Shakspeare was a man who was pretty well posted in human nature all round,—knew the kitchen about as well as the parlor. He knocks on the head the sin of stuffing, in 'All's Well that Ends Well,' where he speaks of the man that 'dies with feeding his own stomach.' In 'Timon of Athens' there's a chap who 'greases his pure mind,' probably with fried sausages, gravy, and such like trash. The fellow in 'Macbeth' who has 'eaten of the insane root' was meant, I calculate, as a hard rap on tobacco-chewers (and smokers too); he called it root, instead of leaf, just to cover up his tracks. What a splendid thought that is in 'Love's Labor's Lost': 'Fat paunches have lean pates'! Everybody knows how Julius Caesar turned up his nose at fat men. The poet never could stand frying; he calls it, in 'Macbeth,' 'the young fry of treachery.' Probably he'd had more taste of the traitor than was good for him. Has a good slap somewhere on the critter that 'devours up all the fry it finds.' I reckon that Shakspeare always set a proper valuation on human digestion; 'cause when he speaks of a man with a good stomach,—an excellent stomach,—he always has a good word for him, and kind of strokes down his fur the right way of the grain; but he comes down dreadful strong on the lout that has no stomach, as he calls it. In 'Henry IV.,' he says, 'the cook helps to make the gluttony.' I estimate that that one sentence alone, if he'd never writ another word, would have made him immortal. If I had my way, I'd have it printed in gold letters a foot long, and sot up before every cook-stove in the land. But just see what a man he was! This very same play that tells the disease prescribes the cure, that is, 'the remainder-biscuit,'—a knock-down proof to any man with a knowledge-box that Graham-bread was known and appreciated in those days, and that Shakspeare himself had cut his own eye-teeth on it."

"A broken heart is only another name for an everlasting indigestion."

"History is merely a record of indigestions,—a calendar of the foremost stomachs of the age. The destinies of nations hang on the bowels of princes. Internal wars come from intestine rebellion. The rising within is father to the insurrection without. The fountain of a national crisis is always found under the waistcoat of one man. There's Napoleon I.,—what settled him for good was just that greasy mutton-chop stewed up in onions, which he took for his grub at Leipsic. If he'd only ordered a couple of slices of dry Graham-toast, with a cup of weak black tea, he'd have saved his stomach, and whipped 'em, sure; and matters and things in Europe would have had a different look all round ever since."

"Emerson is a man who once in a while gets a little inkling of the truth. I see he says that the creed lies in the biliary duct. That's good orthodox doctrine, I don't care who says it."

"Buckwheat-cakes are now leading us back to barbarism faster than the printing-press ever carried us forward towards civilization."

"Temperament means nothing more nor less than just quantity and quality of bile. That old sawbones, Hippocrates, came mighty near hitting the nail square on the head more 'n two thousand year ago, but he felt kind of uncertain, and didn't exactly know what he was driving at. The old heathen made out just four humors, as he called 'em,—the sanguineous, phlegmatic, choleric, and melancholic. If he'd only made one step more on to the other side of the fence, he'd have cracked the nut, and picked the kernel, certain. Those four different humors are only four different ways of modifying bile with fat."

"Every man is dyspeptic. Tell me his dyspepsy, and I'll tell you what he is."

"In sick-headache, a heaping tablespoonful each of salt and common mustard, stirred into a pint of hot water, and drank without breathing, will generally produce an immediate effect. (Mem. But Graham-biscuit is better in the long run.)"

"Society is the meeting of a gang of incurables, who come together to talk over their dyspepsies. And everybody takes his turn in furnishing fodder to keep the thing going hot-foot."

"Professor Bache says sea-sickness comes from the head, 'cause a man gets dizzy in trying to get used to the teetering of the ship. All nonsense. The Professor may be posted in the survey of the coast, but he don't know the lay of the land in the interior. Sea-sickness comes from the stomach: just offer a man a mouthful of fried salt pork."

"It's stated that some old bookworm of a Dutchman, with a jaw-breaking name that I can't recollect, has an idea, that, 'if we could penetrate into the secret foundations of human events, we should frequently find the misfortunes of one man caused by the intestines of another.' There's not the least doubt of it,—true of one man or a million."

"Fate is Fat: Fat is Fate."

V.—NOCTURNE.

Romanza (affettuoso). The Choral Gamut (con espressione).

Was that seething sun never again to plunge his lurid face beneath the waves of old Ocean? Had some latter-day Joshua arisen, and with stern fiat nailed him in mid-heavens, blazing forever? To me as slowly rolled the westering orb down that final slope as ever turned the wheel of Fortune to Murad the Unlucky. Perchance the sun-god had turned cook, and now, burning with 'prentice zeal, and scoffing at Duespeptos and all sound hygiene, was aiming to make of this terrestrial ball one illimitable fry turned over and well done,—a fry ever doing and never done, which should simmer and fizzle on eternally down the ages. An abstract fry—let me here record it—suits me passing well; yet I like not the concrete and personal broil. I trip gayly to a feast, prepared to eat, but not, as in the supper of Polonius, to be eaten. I have very little of the martyr-stuff about me. It is well, it is glorious, to read of those fine things; but does any man relish the application of the Hoc age? To beatified Lawrence I gladly pay meet tribute of tears and praise. Let the luckless one ask of me no more; let him call only upon the succulent; let him recruit among the full ranks of the adipose. Be it mine to lay these spare-ribs athwart no gridiron more fervid than the pavement of his own monumental Escurial. Suum cuique.

So, albeit in a melting mood, I gazed listlessly upon the brazen firmament, with no fellow-feeling for those hot culinary bars. The broiling glow was not at all tempting: I think it would have staggered even the gay salamander that is said to accept so thoroughly the gospel of caloric. And what was the Markerstown without the Great Captain? What was the Victory with no Nelson? Hence, like the patriarch, I went out to meditate at the eventide. But, alack! there were no camels, no Rebekah, no comfort. Even in subterranean grots there was nothing drawn but Tropic's XXX. Every water-cock let on a geyser. But by-and-by Apollo Archimagirus, wearying of gastronomy, stayed his hand, moistened the fierce flames, jerked the half-fried earth out into free space, pocketed his stew-pan, and flung himself supperless to bed. No more, for the nonce at least, should that new Lycidas—the cosmical gridiron—flame in the forehead of the evening sky. Anon came twilight, dusk, darkness, and all the pleasant charities of deep night. Behind the veil of night are sometimes done evil deeds. The snail has been known to start before his time. Laying down these general postulates, I drew therefrom, late in the sultry gloom, this particular inference: Caesar's shallop might possibly breast the deep before dawn; and if Caesar was not on hand, she would carry his fortunes, but not him. Forthwith, groping through the obscurity, I found my fears without foundation. The shallop was quiescent in a remarkable degree, and thoroughly tethered.

Deep darkness reigned throughout the little kingdom. Silence brooded over all, save now and then when some vocal nose, informed by murky visions of the night, brayed out its stertorous tale to the unheeding air. At times a shrill, sharp pipe, screaming with gusts of horror, split my unexpectant ear. With this wrangled fitfully the cracked clarionet of some peevish brother. Ever and anon some vast nostril, punctually thundering, hurled forth the relentless growl of the bassoon,—a very mountain of sound, which crushed all before it, and made the shuddering timbers crack and reel. A pensive flute vainly poured, in swift recurring gushes, its rhythmic oil upon the roaring billows. From some melodious swain came a freakish fiddling, which leaped and danced like mad, now here, now there, like an audible will-o'-the-wisp. A dolorous whistle chimed harmonies, and with regular sibilation came to time, quavering out the chromatic moments of this nasal hour. High over all floated a faint whisper,—a song-cloud rising from the dream-mist of a peaceful breast,—a revelation timidly exhaled to the disembodied spirits of the air. Its hazy lullaby breathed down as from distant heights, and murmured of celestial rest. Its soul was like a star, and dwelt apart.

Save this feeling symphony, all was still. No light shone upon the tuneful beaks. Like Theseus, I picked my way along, guided by an Ariadne's thread. My Ariadne was a slumbering orchestra deftly spinning out a thick proboscis-chord of such stuff as dreams are made of. Taking this web in my ear, I safely traversed the labyrinth, and meandered at last into pen No. 1. In placing my foot on the edge of the under-world crib, I unwittingly pressed some secret spring which straight swung wide the portals of a precipitate dawn.

VI.—THE PEPTIC SYMPHONY.

A.—Andante (smorzando). B.—Adagio (crescendo). C.—Allegro (sforzando).

Instantaneously rose resplendent

THE MIDNIGHT SUN.

The Luminary.—Hullo!

The Satellite.—Ah! got back? Is that you, Mr. Rink?

The Luminary.—Wal, ef 't a'n't me, 't 's my nose. Mebby y' a'n't aware, young man, that you planted your shoe-leather on my olfactory?

The Satellite.—Indeed, no, Sir. I thought I felt something under my foot, as I was getting up. So it seems it was your nose. Beg your pardon, Sir,—entirely unintentional. Hope I——

The Luminary.—Who's your shoemaker? What do you wear for cow-hide?

The Satellite.—An excellent artist, a long way from Paris. I have on at this moment a very neat thing in English gaiters, of respectable dimensions, toe-corners sharp as Damascus blade, three-fourths of an inch in sole, one and a half inches in heel, with a plenty of half-inch, cast-steel nails all round,—quite a neat thing, I assure you.

The Luminary.—Whew!

The Satellite.—But I hope, Sir, I haven't injured your nose?

The Luminary.—Can't tell jest yit. Anyhow, you gev me a proper sneezer, a most pertickler hahnsome socdolager, I vum! Landed jest below the peepers. But hold on till mornin', an' see how breakfast sets. I allers estimate the nose by the stomach. Ef I find my stomach's all right, 't 'll be a sure sign that the smellers are pooty rugged.

The Satellite.—That's rather an odd idea. I was aware that the nose is a natural guide to the stomach, but didn't know that the reverse would hold good. What is the——

The Luminary.—Poor rule that wun't work both ways. Six of one and half a dozen of the other. Do you s'pose the nose could afford to work free gratis for the stomach, with plenty to do an' nothin' to git? No, Sir, not by a jugful! People that want favors mustn't be stingy in givin' on 'em. It's on the scratch-my-back-an'-I'll-tickle-your-elbow system. The stomach's got to keep up his eend o' the rope, or he'll jest go under, sure. One good turn deserves another, you know.

The Satellite.—Yes, a very pretty theory, and certainly a just one. Quite on the Mutual-Benefit principle. Still, I should be inclined to doubt whether there are facts sufficient to sustain it.

The Luminary.—Wal, my hearty, you jest belay a bit up there; clew down your hatches ship-shape, git everythin' all trig, an' lay to. Why, my Christian friend, I intend to post you up thoroughly. Your edication's been neglected. Facts? Facts? Bless your noddle, there's plenty on 'em, ef a man knows beans. Now I'm jest a-goin' to let daylight into that little knowledge-box o' yourn, an' fill it with good, wholesome idees, clean up to the brim, an' runnin' over,—good, honest, Shaker measure. I'll give ye more new wrinkles afore mornin' than ever you dreamed of in your physiology, valooable hints, an' nuthin' to pay.

* * * * *

Being now securely camped on my mountain-height, I peered out upon the horizon beneath, and signified to the Luminary that the gas might at once be turned on full blaze.

"As when the sun new risen Looks through the horizontal misty air,"

so gleamed, no longer nebulous, but now full-orbed, the bright star Diaetetica,—a central sun, holding within its ample bosom the star-dust of whole galaxies, infinite gastric constellations.

The Luminary.—"Any fool'll allow that there's nerves, an' plenty on 'em, all over the body. All these nerves come from the stomach. Fact is, they're the stomach's errand-boys. They run round an' do his chores jest as he says, an' then trot back ag'in. He's an awful hard master, though,—likes to shirk, an' makes 'em lug round all his baggage an' chicken-fixin's. When he gits grumpy, which is pooty consid'able often, he's death on some on 'em,—jest walks into 'em like chain-lightnin' into a gooseberry-bush. When he's gouty, he kicks up a most etarnal touse with the great-toe nerve, an' slaps it right into him fore an' aft, the wust kind. Folks hev asked me why the gout pitches into the great toe wuss than the rest on 'em. It's jest as nateral as Natur'. I cal'late it's a special Providence for the benefit of the hull human family, to hang out a big sign jest where folks ken see it, to show up the man who's ben an' sinned ag'inst his stomach. When he limps round in flannel, he's a conspicoous hobblin' advertisement, a fust-cut lecterer on temperance, an' the horrible example to boot. Now you know the way the stomach an' nerves fay in.

"Wal, then ag'in, there's another set,—the stomach's own blood-relations. He's head o' the family, an' they all work in together nice an' handy, jest as slick as grease. Lam ary one on 'em, an' you got to lam the whole boodle. Jest like a hornet's nest: shake a stick at ary one o' the group, an' they all come buzzin' round te'ble miffy in less 'n no time. There's the nose,—he wears a coat jest as well 's the stomach: he's the stomach's favorite grandson, the Benjamin of the flock. Say anythin' to him, an' the stomach takes it up; say anythin' to the stomach, an' he takes it up. All in a family-way, ye see. Love me, love my dorg. There's no disputin' the fact, that you can't kill ary one on 'em without walkin' over the dead body of the others. You can't whip ary one on 'em except over the others' shoulders. Now you know who the nose is, who his connections are, an' what's his geneology. He's descended from the stomach in the second degree, an' will be heir to all the property, ef so be he's true to himself an' the family. Ef he a'n't, th' old man'll cut him off with a shillin', sure.

"Now dyspepsy's of two kinds,—the mucous an' the nervous; an' as I'm a sinner, every mother's son an' daughter has got one on 'em. The nervous, as you will naterally s'pose from my remarks, is a sort o' hired help,—friend o' the family, like a poor relation,—handy to hev in the house, an' all that. The other allers takes pot-luck with the family, runs in an' out jest as he pleases,—chip o' the old block, one o' the same crowd, you know. It's considered ruther more hon'able, in course, to hev this one. None o' the man-waiter or sarvant-gal about him. A chap with the mucous looks kind o' slick an' smooth, an' feels his oats pooty wal; but a codger with the nervous is sort o' thin an' wild-like. Wholesalers ginerally hev the fust, an' retailers the second; though, 'casionally, I hev known exceptions. A bank-president invariably has the second; an' I never seen an apple-woman without the other. All accordin' to Natur', ye see. But either on 'em 'll do. Take jest whichever you can git,—that's my advice,—an' thank Providence. They'll either on 'em be faithful friends, never desert ye, cling closer than a brother, never say die, stick to ye, in p'int o' fact, like a sick kitten to a hot brick. It's jest as I said,—every critter's got one on 'em. But there's no two men alike, so there's no two dyspepsies alike. There never was, an' never will be. 'T 's exackly like the human family, divided into two great classes, black an' white, long-heel an' short-heel. Jes' so ... nervous ... mucous ... Magna Charta ... Palladium of our liberties ... ark of our safety ... manifest destiny ... Constitootion of our forefathers ... fit, bled, an' died ... independence forever ... one an' inseparable ... last drop o' blood...."

How it was I don't quite know; but I think that at this point the Luminary must have sunk below the horizon. Possibly his Satellite may have suffered an eclipse in this quarter of the heavens. I can barely recall a thin doze, in which these last eloquent fragments, transfigured into sprites and kobolds, wearing a most diabolical grin, seemed to be chasing each other in furious and endless succession through my brain, or playing at hide-and-seek among the convolutions of the cerebrum. After a while, they wearied of this rare sport, scampered away, and left me in profound sleep till morning.

VII.—MATINS.

Whank!—tick-a-lick!—ker-thump!—swoosh!—Whank!—tick-a-lick!— ker-thump!—swoosh!—These were the sounds that first greeted my opening ears. So, then, we were fairly under way, advancing, if not rejoicing. Our freighted Icarus was soaring on well-oiled wings: how soon might his waxy pinions droop under the fierce gaze of the sun! At least it was a satisfaction to know that thus far the gloomy forebodings of the Seer had not been fulfilled. On looking out through a six-inch rose-window, I saw joyous daylight dancing over the boundless, placid waters,—not a speck of land in sight. We must have started long since; but my eyes, fast sealed under the opiate rays of the Luminary, had hitherto refused to ope their lids to the garish beams of his rival. Soon I heard beneath a rustling snap, as of a bow, and suddenly there sped forth the twanging shaft of the

First Victim.—I say!

Second Victim.—Very sensible, but brief. Give us another bit.

First Victim.—How are ye this mornin'?

Second Victim.—Utterly glorified. Delicious sleep,—splendid day,—balmy air, with condiments thrown in. I hope you are nicely to-day?

First Victim.—Wal, no, can't say I be. Feel sort o' seedy like,—feel jest 's ef I'd ben creouped up in a sugar-box. Couldn't even git a cat-nap,—didn't sleep a wink.

Second Victim.—That's bad, indeed; but the bracing air here will soon——

First Victim.—Air! That 'ere dock-smell nigh finished me. No skim-milk smell about that, but the ginooine jam,—an awful pooty nosegay! 'T was reg'lar rank p'is'n. Never see anythin' like it. Oh, 'twas te'ble! Took hold o' my nose dreffle bad; I'm afeard my stomach'll be a goner. 'T wa'n't none o' yer sober perfumes nuther, but kind o' half-seas-over all the time, an' pooty consid'able in the wind. Judge there's ben a large fatality in cats lately. Ugh! that blamed dock-smell! Never forgit it the longest day I live. Don't b'lieve I breathed oncet all night.

Second Victim.—Yes, it was slightly aromatic, I confess,—'Sabaean odors from the spicy shores of Araby the Blest,'—you know what Milton says. But there's one great comfort: this thick night-air is so very healthy, you know. I think you made a very great mistake, Mr. Rink, in not inhaling it thoroughly. I kept pumping it in all night, from a sense of duty, at forty bellows-power.

First Victim.—(Rising, and dragging up to the mountain-crib the artillery of a ghostly face, and training it point-blank at Second Victim.)—Young man, don't trifle!

Second Victim.—Pardon me, Sir, I am not trifling, I have sound reasons for what I say. Your education, Sir, has apparently been neglected. Wait one moment, and I'll give you a new idea, which will contribute materially to your happiness. You will at once admit, I take it, that oxygen and carbonic acid stand at opposite poles in their relations to the respiratory system; also, that said dock-smell was a mixture of carbonic acid of various kinds, and of different degrees of intensity; and, lastly, that animal and vegetable life are complements of each other,—correlatives, so to speak.

First Victim.—Sartin: that's Natur' an' common sense.

Second Victim.—Now, then, plants naturally absorb carbonic acid and give off oxygen during daylight. At night, the process is reversed: then they absorb oxygen and give off carbonic acid. In a similar, but reverse way, man, who was plainly intended to inhale oxygen and exhale carbonic acid in his waking hours, should, in his sleeping hours, in order to be consistent with himself and with Nature, inhale only dense carbonic acid and exhale oxygen. Men and plants make Nature's see-saw: one goes up as the other goes down. Hence it follows as a logical sequence, that the truly wise man, who seeks to comply with the laws of Nature, and to fulfil the great ends of his existence, will choose for his sleeping-apartment the closest quarters possible, and will welcome the fumes which would be noisome by day. For my part, therefore, I feel profoundly grateful even for one night of this little crib. It has already done much for me. I feel confident that it has contributed greatly to my span of life. I am deeply beholden to the owners, to the captain, yea, to all the crew. And for the blessed dock-smell I shall ever be thankful:—

"'T were worth ten years of mortal life, One glance at its array."

It will not be amiss to say to you, Mr. Rink, that this theory is sanctioned by one of the leading ornaments of the French Academy. He has advocated it, in an elaborate treatise, with an eloquence and power worthy of its distinguished author. He shows, in passages of singular purity, that beasts, whose instincts teach them far more of the laws of Nature than our reason teaches us, always retire to sleep in a place where they can obtain the closest, healthiest air. In the last communication sent to me on this subject by the learned Professor, he proves conclusively that——

First Victim. (His artillery now rumbling down the heights on the full gallop.)—I snum, that's awful! Wal, I never see,—'t beats the Dutch! No kind o' use talkin' with sech a chap. Never see so much nonsense in one head 's that critter's got in his.

VIII.—JENTACULAR.

A barrow-tone full of groan and creak, trundling along through the well-known bravura commencing,—

"In Koeln, a town of monks and bones," etc.

Yes, the aroma was highly complicate, but not, like the poet, of imagination all compact. It was not Frangipanni, though in part an eternal perfume; nor was it Bergamot, or Attar, or Millefleurs, or Jockey-Club, or New-Mown Hay. No, it was none of these. What was it, then? you ask. I dissected it as well as I could, though not with entire success; but I will tell you the members of this body of death, so far as I found them. I do not for a moment doubt that it was made up of at least the two-and-seventy several parts which bloomed in the bouquet plucked by the bard in Hermann's land; yet my feeble sense could not distinguish all. There was unquestionably a fry,—nay, several; the fumes of coffee soared riotous; I could detect hot biscuits distinctly; the sausage asked a foremost place; pancakes, griddle-cakes, dough-nuts, gravies, and sauces, all struggled for precedence; the land and the sea waged internecine war for place, through their representative fries of steak and mackerel; and as the unctuous pork—no nursling of the flock, but seasoned in ripe old age with salt not Attic—rooted its way into the front rank, I thought of the wisdom of Moses. All these were, so to speak, the mere outlying flakes, the feathery curls, of the balmy cirro-cumulus, whose huge bulk arose out of the bowels of the ship itself. Up and down, in and out, here and there, into every chink and crevice, rolled the blue-white incense-cloud, dense as the cottony puff at the mouths of the guns in Vernet's "Siege of Algiers." Or you might say that these were but the flying-buttresses, the floriated pinnacles, the frets, and the gargoyles of a great frowzy cathedral lying vast and solid far below.

The Captain sat at the head of the table; next him was the fixed star Duespeptos, with Satellite stationary on the right quarter.

* * * * *

Eupeptos.—Coffee,—that's good. John, fill my cup. Have it strong, mind,—no milk.

Duespeptos. (Placing hand remonstratingly on arm of Eupeptos.)—My friend, man's life a'n't more'n a span, anyhow; yourn wun't be wuth more'n half a span. Don't ye do it.

Eupeptos. (Gayly.)—Dum vivimus, vivamus. Try a cup, Mr. Rink.

Duespeptos.—No, Sir. Thousan' dollars'd be no objick at all. There'd be a dead Rink layin' round in less 'n half a shake. I'd want a permit from the undertaker fust, an' hev my measure for a patent casket to order. This child a'n't anxious to cut stick yit awhile.

Eupeptos.—I'm very much of Voltaire's way of thinking about coffee. I don't know but I would agree with Mackintosh, that the measure of a man's brains is the amount of coffee he drinks. I like it in the French style, all but the lait; that destroys the flavor, besides making it despicably weak. Have a hot biscuit, Mr. Rink? I'm afraid they're like Gilpin,—carry weight, you know. But try one, won't you?

Duespeptos.—I'm shot ef I do. Don't hev any more o' yer nonsense, young man, or I'll git ructions.

Eupeptos.—All right. Advance, pancakes! Here's a prime one, steaming hot, crisp and fizzling. Allow me to put it on your plate, Sir?

Duespeptos.—Not by a long chalk. Hands off, I tell ye, or there'll be a free fight afore shortly. You'd better make up yer mind to oncet thet this 'ere thing a'n't goin' to ram nohow.

Eupeptos.—Sorry I can't suit you. Better luck next time. Ah! here's the very thing. Waiter, pass the fried steak, salt mackerel, and fried potatoes to Mr. Rink.

Duespeptos.—Wun't stan' it,—I snore I wun't! I tell ye, I'm gittin' master-riled. Jest you take yer own fodder, an' keep quiet.

Eupeptos.—Pardon me, Sir, but my eye has just fallen on yonder dish of dough-nuts, faced by those incense-breathing griddle-cakes. Look slightly soggy, but not disagreeable. This sea-air, you know, gives a man a tremendous appetite for anything, and the digestion of an ostrich. Risk it, won't you?

Duespeptos. (With determined air, clenching knife and fork pointing skywards.)—Stranger, le' 's come to a distinct understandin' on this subjick afore we git much older. You know puffickly wal what I am,—a confirmed dyspeptic for twenty-five year. An' I a'n't ashamed on it, nuther; but I'm proud to say I glory in it. You know puffickly wal what my notions is about all this 'ere stuff, an' still you keep stickin' it into my face. Now, ef you want me to lambaste ye, I'm the man to do it, an' do it hahnsome. But ef yer life a'n't insured clean up to the hub, an' ef ye've got any survivin' friends, I advise ye not to tote any more o' that 'ere grub in this direction. I give ye fair warnin',—yer've raised my dander, an' put my Ebenezer up. I'd jest as lieves wallop ye as eat, an' ten times lieveser.

Eupeptos.—Really, Sir, no offence intended. I saw that your taste was delicate, and offered you these various tit-bits in the hope that some one of them might prove acceptable. But pray, Sir, do not starve yourself on my account. What in the world can you eat? Do not, I beseech you, by undue fasting, deprive the world of so distinguished——

Duespeptos. (Mollifying.)—Fact is, I knew jest how 't was goin' to be. They allers fry everythin' an' cook it up in grease, so no respectable man can git any decent vittles t' eat. So I jest went out an' laid in plenty o' my own provender,—suthin' reliable an' wholesome, ye know. Brought aboard a firkin o' Graham-biscuit,—jest the meal mixed up with water,—no salt, no emptins, no nuthin'. 'T's the healthiest thing out o' jail. It's Natur's own food, an' the best eatin' I know. Raael good flavor, git 'em good, besides bein' puffickly harmless an' salubrious. I cal'late I've got enough to run the machine, an' keep it all trig up to concert-pitch, till I git ashore, ef so be th' old tub don't send us to Davy Jones's locker. Here, try one,—I've got a plenty,—an' you'll say they're fust-rate. Leave them 'ere pancakes, an' all that p'is'n truck. Arter you take one o' these, you'll never tech nuthin' else.

Eupeptos.—Thank you, Sir, but if it's all the same to you, please excuse me this time. I have other fish to fry. In fact, Sir, I am entirely destitute of equanimity, and have no particle of stability in my disposition. Not a drop of Scotch blood in my veins.

Duespeptos.—There's no oats about these; an' ef there was, 't wouldn't hurt ye none. It's jest the kernel an' the shell mixed up together.

Eupeptos.—Dangerous combination. I have no military ambition,—wouldn't give a rush for a spread eagle,—don't like the braying by a mortar.

Duespeptos.—Wal, I mout as wal vamose, 's long as I've hove in my rations. Already gone risin' a good half-ounce above my or'nary 'lowance. 'T wun't do to dissipate, even ef a feller a'n't to hum an' nobody's the wiser. Natur' allers makes ye foot the bill all the same on sea an' shore.

Eupeptos. (Trolling in a low voice the celebrated barcarole,

"My bark is by the shore," etc.)—

Stay, oh, stay, gentle stranger! See yon sausage fatly floating! Be not dogged to go, but come! Prithee, return once more to the festive board! Lo! this—the fattest of the flock—shall be thy portion, most favored Benjamin!

Duespeptos. (—Muttering in the distance.)—That feller's a raael jo-fired numbskull. He don't know any more about the fust principles o' human natur' than the babe unborn. Reg'lar goney. Dunno whether he's jokin' or in sober airnest. Good mind to sail into him anyhow. Guess 't 'll do, though, to leave him to Natur'. He'll stuff himself to death fast enough ... pitchin' into p'is'n ... sexton ... six-board box ... coroner's verdick ... run over by a fry ... engineer did his dooty....

IX.—FINALE (con motivo.)

But time would fail me to tell you of the myriad golden spangles so thickly stitched into the hurrying web of those fustian hours. Oh! that dim crepuscular time, when, with toe set to toe squarely on the scratch, we stood up to one another, with eyes glaring through the gloaming, and gave and took manfully, fighting out anew the old battles of the Bourbon vs. China, of King James vs. Virginia, of Graham vs. Greece! I could tell you of the siesta of the new Prometheus, when, perched on the Mount Caucasus of a bleak chain-cable, he gave himself postprandially, in full livery of seisin, to the vulturous sun. Wasted, yet daily renewed, enduring, yet murmuring not, he hurled defiance at Fat, scoffed at the vain rage of Jupiter Pinguis, and proffered to the world below a new life in his fiery gift of stale bran-bread. Would you could have heard that vesper hymn stealing hirsute through the mellow evening-air! It sung the Peptic Saints and Martyrs, explored the bowels of old Time, and at last died away in dulcet cadence as it chanted the glories of the coming Age of Grits. Again, in the silent night-watches, did sage Mentor become vocal, going over afresh the story of the Nervous and the Mucous, classifying their victims, generalizing laws, discriminating the various dyspepsies of the nations, and summing up at last the inestimable benefits conferred by our modern dyspepsy on the character, the literature, and the life of this nineteenth century.

Once more—for the last time—did the sable robe inwrap us. Once more the night-blooming cereus oped its dank petals; and amid its murky fragrance I sank to rest. When I woke, the whank!—tick-a-lick!—whank!—tick-a-lick!—had ceased, and we were safely moored. I leaped lightly to the shore, and, reverently stooping, saluted with fond gratitude my Mother Earth. Rising, I beheld for the last time the gaunt form of the Martyr standing on the deck,—a bar sinister sable blazoned athwart the golden shield of the climbing sun. And once more he lift up his voice:—

"Hullo! What! up killick an' off a'ready? Ye'r' bound to go it full chisel any way,—don't mean to hev grass grow under your heels, that's sartin. Wal, 't 's the early bird thet ketches the worm; an' it's the early worm thet gits picked, too,—recollember that. I cal'late you reckon the Markerstown's about played out, an' a'n't exackly wut she's cracked up to be. It's pooty plain thet that 'ere blamed grease has ben one too many for ye, arter all yer lingo. Ef a man will dance, he's got to pay the fiddler. You can't go it on tick with Natur'; she's some on a trade, an' her motto is, 'Down with the dosh.' Ef you think you can play 'possum, an' pull the wool over her eyes, jest try it on, that's all; you'll find, my venerable hero, thet you're shinnin' a greased pole for the sake of a bogus fo'pence-ha'penny on top.

"Now, young man, afore you hurry up your cakes much further, I've got jest two words to say to ye. Don't cut it too fat, or you'll flummux by the way, an' leave nuthin' but a grease-spot. Don't dawdle round doin' nuthin' but stuffin' yerself to kill. Don't act like a gonus,—don't hanker arter the flesh-pots. Wake up, peel your eyes, an' do suthin' for a dyspeptic world, for sufferin' sinners, for yerself. Allers stick close to Natur' an' hyg'ene. Drop yer nonsense, an' come over an' j'in us, an' we'll make a new man of ye,—jest as good as wheat. You're on the road to ruin now; but we'll take ye, an' build ye up, give ye tall feed, an' warrant ye fust-cut health an' happiness. No cure, no pay. An' look here, keep that 'ere card I gev ye continooally on hand, an' peroose it day an' night. I tell ye it'll be the makin' on ye. An' don't forgit the golden rule:—Don't tech, don't g' nigh the p'is'n upus-tree of gravy; beware o' the dorg called hot biscuits; take keer o' the grease, an' the stomach'll take keer of itself. Ef you're in want o' bran-bread at any time, let me know, an' I'm your man,—Rink by name, an' Rink by natur'. An' ef so be you ever come within ten mile o' where I hang out, jest tie right up on the spot, without the slightest ceremony or delayance, an' take things puffickly free an' easy like. Wal, my hearty, I see ye're on the skedaddle. Take keer o' yerself,—yourn till death, N. Rink."



THE TWENTIETH PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION.

The country is now on the eve of an election the importance of which it would be impossible to overrate. Yet a few days, and it will be decided whether the people of the United States shall condemn their own conduct, by cashiering an Administration which they called upon to make war on the rebellious slaveholders of the South, or support that Administration in the strenuous endeavors which it is making to effect the reconstruction of the Republic, and the destruction of Slavery. It is to insult the intelligence and patriotism of the American people to entertain any serious doubt as to the issue of the contest. It can have but one issue, unless the country has lost its senses,—and never has it given better evidence of its sobriety, firmness, and rectitude of purpose than it now daily affords. Were the contest one relating to the conduct of the war, and had the Democratic party assumed a position of unquestionable loyalty, there would be some room for doubting who is to be our next President. It is impossible that a contest of proportions so vast should not have afforded ground for some complaint, on the score of its management. To suppose that the action of Government has been on all occasions exactly what it should have been is to suppose something so utterly out of the nature of things that it presents itself to no mind. Errors are unavoidable even in the ordinary affairs of common life, and their number and their magnitude increase with the importance of the business, and the greatness of the stage on which it is transacted. We have never claimed perfection for the Federal Administration, though we have ever been ready to do justice to the success which it has achieved on many occasions and to the excellence of its intentions on all. Had the Democrats called upon the country to displace the Administration because it had not done all that it should have done, promising to do more themselves against the Rebels than President Lincoln and his associates had effected, the result of the Presidential election might be involved in some doubt; for the people desire to see the Rebellion brought to an end, and the Democratic party has a great name as a ruling political organization, its history, during most of the present century, being virtually the history of the American nation. But, with a want of wisdom that shows how much it has lost in losing that Southern lead which had so much to do with its success in politics, it chose to place itself in opposition to the national sentiment, instead of adopting it, guiding it, and profiting from its existence. The errors of the various parties that have been opposed to it have often been matter for mirth to the Democratic party, as well they may have been; but neither Federalists, nor National Republicans, nor Whigs, nor Know-Nothings, nor Republicans were ever guilty of a blunder so enormous as that which this party itself perpetrated at Chicago, when it virtually announced its readiness to surrender the country into the hands of the men who have so pertinaciously sought its destruction for the last four years. So strange has been its action, that we should be ashamed to have dreamed that any party could be guilty of it. Yet it is a living fact that the Democratic party, in spite of its loud claims to strict nationality of purpose, has so conducted itself as to show that it is willing to complete the work which the slaveholders began, and not only to submit to the terms which the Rebels would dictate, but to tear the Union still further to pieces, if indeed it would leave any two States in a united condition. Thus acting, that party has defeated itself, and reduced the action of the people to a mere, though a mighty, formality. Either this is a plain statement of the case, or this nation is about to give a practical answer to Bishop Butler's famous question, "What if a whole community were to go mad?" For the ratification of the Chicago Platform by the people would be an indorsement of violence and disorder, a direct approval of wilful rebellion, and an announcement that every election held in this country is to be followed by a revolutionary outbreak, until our condition shall have become even worse than that of Mexico, and we shall be ready to welcome the arrival, in the train of some European army, of a cadet of some imperial or royal house, whose "mission" it should be to restore order in the once United States, while anarchy should be kept at a distance by a liberal exhibition of French or German bayonets. What has happened to Mexico would assuredly happen here, if we should allow the country to Mexicanize itself at the bidding of Belmont and Co.

But it may be said, it is unjust to attribute to the masses of the Democratic party intentions so bad as those of which we have spoken. That party, in past times, has done great things for the land, has always professed the highest patriotism, and its name and fame are most intimately associated with some of the noblest passages in the history of the Republic. All this is very true. We admit, what is indeed self-evident, that the Democratic party has done great things for the country, and that it can look back with just pride over the country's history, until a comparatively recent period; and we do not attribute to the masses composing it any other than the best intentions. It is not of those masses that we have spoken. The sentiment of patriotism is ever strong with the body of the people. The number of men who would wilfully injure their country has never been large in any age. But it is not the less true that parties are but too often the blind tools of leaders, of men whose only interest in their country is to use it for their own purposes, to make all they can out of it, and at its expense. The Democratic party has always been a disciplined party, and nothing is more notorious in its history than its submissiveness to its leaders. This has been the chief cause of its almost unbroken career of success; and it has been its pride and its boast that it has been well-trained, obedient, and consequently successful, while all other parties have been quarrelsome and impatient of discipline, and consequently have risen only to endure through a few years of sickly existence, and then to pass away. The Federalists, the National Republicans, the Antimasons, the Whigs, and the Know-Nothings have each appeared, flourished for a short time, and then passed to the limbo of factions lost to earth. This discipline of the Democracy has not been without its uses, and the country occasionally has profited from it; but now it is to be abused, through application to the service of the Great Anarch at Richmond. The Rebel power, which our fleets and armies are steadily reducing day by day, is to be saved from overthrow, and its agents from the severe and just punishment which should be visited upon them for their great and unprovoked crime,—if they are to be saved therefrom,—through the action of the Democratic party, as it calls itself, and which purposes to go to the assistance of the slaveholders in war, as formerly it went to their assistance in peace, the meekest and most faithful and most useful of their slaves. The Democratic party, as a party, instead of being the sword of the Republic, purposes being the shield of the Rebellion. Such is the intention of its leaders, who control the disciplined masses, if their words have any meaning; and, so far as they have been able to act, their actions correspond strictly with their words. The Chicago Convention, which consisted of the creme de la creme of the Democracy, had not a word to say against either the Rebels or the Rebellion, while it had not words enough, or words not strong enough, to employ in denouncing those whose sole offence consists in their efforts to conquer the Rebels and to put down the Rebellion. With a perversion of history that is quite without a parallel even in the hardy falsehood of American politics, the responsibility for the war was placed to the account of the loyal men of the country, and not to the account of the traitors, who brought it upon the nation by a fierce forcing-process. The speech of Mr. Horatio Seymour, who presided over the Belmont band, is, as it were, a bill of indictment preferred against the American Republic; for Governor Seymour, though not famous for his courage, has boldness sufficient to do that which a far greater man said he would not do,—he has indicted a whole people. It follows from this condemnation of the Federal Government for making war on the Rebels, and this failure to condemn the Rebels for making war on the Federal Government, that the Democrats, should they succeed in electing their candidates, would pursue a course exactly the opposite of that which they denounce. They would withdraw the nation from the contest, and acknowledge the independence of the Southern Confederacy; and then they would make such a treaty with its leading and dominant interest as should place the United States in the condition of dependency with reference to the South. That such would be their course is not only fairly inferrible from the views embodied in the Chicago Platform, and from the speeches made in the Chicago Convention, but it is what Mr. Pendleton, the Democratic candidate for the Vice-Presidency, has said it is our duty to do so, so far as relates to acknowledging the Confederacy. He has deliberately said, that, if we cannot "conciliate" the Rebels, and "persuade" them to come back into the Union, we should allow them to depart in peace. Such is the doctrine of the gentleman who was placed on the Democratic ticket with General McClellan for the avowed purpose of rendering that ticket palatable to the Peace men. No man can vote for General McClellan without by the same act voting for Mr. Pendleton; and we know that Mr. Pendleton has declared himself ready to let the Rebels rend the Union to tatters, and that he has opposed the prosecution of the war. General McClellan is mortal, and, if elected, might die long before his Presidential term should be out, like General Taylor, or immediately after it should begin, like General Harrison. Then Mr. Pendleton would become President, like Mr. Tyler, in 1841, who cheated the Whigs, or like Mr. Fillmore, in 1850, who cheated everybody. Nor is it by any means certain that General McClellan would not, once elected, consider himself the Chicago Platform, as Mr. Buchanan avowed himself to be the Cincinnati Platform. He has written a letter, to be sure, in which he has given it to be understood that he is in favor of continuing the war against the Rebels until they shall be subdued; but so did Mr. Polk, twenty yearn ago, write a letter on the Tariff of 1842 that was even more satisfactory to the Democratic Protectionists of those days than the letter of General McClellan can be to the War Democrats of these days. All of us recollect the famous Democratic blazon of 1844,—"Polk, Dallas, and the Tariff of '42!" It was under that sign that the Democrats conquered in Pennsylvania; and had they not conquered in Pennsylvania, they themselves would have been conquered in the nation. Mr. Polk and Mr. Dallas were the chief instruments used to break down the Tariff of '42, in less than two years after they had been elected to the first and second offices of the nation because they were believed to be its most ardent friends. Mr. Polk, as President, recommended that it should be changed, and employed all the influence of his high station to get the Tariff Bill of 1846 through Congress; and Mr. Dallas, who had been nominated for the Vice-Presidency with the express purpose of "catching" the votes of Protectionists, gave his casting vote in the Senate in favor of the new bill, which meant the repeal of the Tariff of '42. The Democrats are playing the same game now that they played in 1844, with this difference, that the stakes are ten thousand times greater now than they were then, and that their manner of play is far hardier than it was twenty years since. Then, the question, though important, related only to a point of internal policy; now, it relates to the national existence. Then, the Free-Traders did not offensively proclaim their intention to cheat the Protectionists; now, Mr. Fernando Wood and Mr. Vallandigham, and other leaders of the extreme left of the Democratic party, with insulting candor, avow that to cheat the country is the purpose which that party has in view. Mr. Vallandigham, who made the Chicago Platform, explicitly declares that that Platform and General McClellan's letter of acceptance do not agree; at the same time Mr. Wood, who is for peace to the knife, calmly tells us that General McClellan, as President, would do the work of the Democracy,—and we need no Daniel to interpret Mr. Wood's words. We mean no disrespect to General McClellan, on the contrary we treat him with perfect respect, when we say that we do not believe he has a higher sense of honor than Mr. Polk possessed; and as Mr. Polk became a tool in the hands of a faction,—being a Protectionist during the contest of '44, and an Anti-Protectionist after that contest had been decided in his favor,—so is it intended that General McClellan shall become a tool in the hands of another faction. Mr. Polk was employed to effect the destruction of a "black tariff": General McClellan is employed to destroy a nation that is supposed to be given up to "black republicanism." We do not believe that the soldier will be found so successful an instrument as the civilian proved to be.

An ounce of fact is supposed to be worth a ton of theory; and the facts of the last four or five years admit of our believing the worst that can be suspected of the purposes of the Democratic party. It is not uncharitable to say that the leaders and managers of that party contemplate, in the event of their triumph in November, the surrender of the country to the slaveholding oligarchy; in the event of their defeat by a small majority, the extension of the civil war over the North. Four years ago we could not be made to believe that Secession was a possible thing. We admitted that there were Secessionists at the South, but we could not be made to believe in the possibility of Secession. Even "South Carolina couldn't be kicked out of the Union," it was commonly said in the North. There were but few disunionists at the South, almost everybody said, and almost everybody believed what was said concerning the state of Southern opinion. In a few weeks we saw, not South Carolina kicked out of the Union, but South Carolina kicking the Union away from her. In a few months we saw eleven States take themselves out of the Union, form themselves into a Confederacy, and raise great armies to fight against the Union. Yet it is certain that in the month of November, 1860, there were not twenty thousand resolute disunionists in all the Slaveholding States, leaving South Carolina and Mississippi aside,—and not above fifty thousand in all the South, including Mississippi and South Carolina. How, then, came it to pass that nearly the whole of the population of the South became Rebels in so short a time? Because they were under the dominion of their leading men, who took them from the right road, and conducted them into the slough of rebellion. Because they were encouraged so to act by the Northern Democracy as made rebellion inevitable. The Northern Democratic press and Northern Democratic orators held such language respecting "Southern rights" as induced even loyal Southrons to suppose that Slavery was to be openly recognized by the Constitution, and spread over the nation. The President of the United States, a Northern Democrat, gravely declared that there existed no right in the Government to coerce a seceding State, which was all that the most determined Secessionist could ask. Instead of doing anything to strengthen the position of the federal Government, the President did all that he could to assist the Secessionists, and left the country naked to their attacks; and he parted on the best of terms with those Rebels who left his Cabinet, where they had long been busy in organizing resistance to Federal authority. The leaders of the Northern Democracy, far from exhibiting a loyal spirit, urged the slaveholders to make demands which were at war with the Constitution and the laws, and which could not have been complied with, unless it had been meant to admit that there was no binding force in existing institutions, the validity of which had not once been called in question for seventy-two years. The real Secessionists of the South, Rhett and Yancey and their followers, availed themselves of the existing state of affairs, and precipitated rebellion,—a step which they never would have taken, had they not been assured that no resistance would be made to their action so long as Mr. Buchanan should remain in the Presidency, and that he would be supported by the leaders of the Northern Democracy, who would take their followers with them along the road that led to the Union's dissolution. South Carolina, rabid as she was, did not rebel until the last Democratic President of the United States had publicly assured her that he would do nothing to prevent her from reducing the Calhoun theory to practice; and had she not rebelled, not another State would have left the Union. The opportunity that she could not get under President Jackson she obtained under President Buchanan,—and she did not hesitate to make the most of that opportunity, all indeed that could be made of it, well knowing that it could not be expected again to occur.

With these facts before them, the American people should be prepared for further rebellious action on the part of that faction whose creed it is that rebellion is right when directed against the ascendency of their political opponents. They have done their utmost to assist the Rebels all through the war, and the great riots in New York last year were the legitimate consequences of their doctrine, if not of their labors. We know that organizations hostile to the Union have been formed in the West, and that there was to have been a rising there, had any striking successes been achieved by the Confederate forces during the last six months. Nothing but the vigor and the victories of Grant and Sherman and Farragut saved the North from becoming the scene of civil war in 1864. Nothing but the vigor and union of the people in their political capacity can keep civil war from the North hereafter. The followers of the Seymours and other ultra Democrats of the North are not more loyal than were nine-tenths of the Southern people in 1860. Few of them now think of becoming rebels, but they would as readily rebel as did the Southern men who have filled the armies of Lee and Beauregard, and who have poured out their blood so lavishly to destroy that nation which owes its existence to the labors of Southern men, to the exertions of Washington, Jefferson, Henry, and others, natives of the very States that have done most in the cause of destruction. The sentiment of nationality is no stronger among Northern Democrats than it was among Southern Democrats; and as the latter were converted into traitors at the bidding of a few leading politicians whose plans were favored by circumstances, so would the former become traitors at the first signal to any move that their leaders should make. As to the two classes of leaders, the Southern men are far superior in every manly quality to those Northern men who are doing their work. It is possible that the men of the South really did believe that their property was in danger, and it is beyond dispute that they were alarmed about their political power; but the men of the North who sympathize with them, and who are prepared to aid them at the first opportunity that shall offer to strike an effective blow, well knew that the victorious Republicans had neither the will nor the power to injure Southern property or to weaken the protection it enjoyed under the Constitution. Their hostility to the Union is purely gratuitous, or springs from motives of the most sordid character.

There is but one way to meet the danger that threatens us,—a danger that really is greater than that with which we were threatened in 1860, and which we have the advantage of seeing, whereas we could see nothing in that year. We must strengthen the Government, make it literally irresistible, by clothing it with the whole of that power which proceeds from an emphatic and unmistakable expression of the popular will. Give Mr. Lincoln, in the approaching election, the strength that comes from a united people, and we shall have peace maintained throughout the North, and peace restored to the South. Reelect him by a small majority, and there will be civil war in the North, and a revival of warlike spirit in the South. Elect General McClellan, and we shall have to choose between constant warfare, as a consequence of having approved of Secession by approving of the Chicago Platform,—which is Secession formally democratized,—and despotism, the only thing that would save us from anarchy. Anarchy is the one thing that men will not, because they cannot, long endure. Order is indeed now and forever Heaven's first law, and order society must and will have. Order is just as compatible with constitutional government as it is with despotic government; but to have it in connection with freedom, in other words, with the existence of a constitutional polity, the people must do their whole duty. They must rise above the prejudices of party and of faction, and see nothing but their country and liberty. They must show that they are worthy of freedom, or they cannot long have it. Now is the time to prove that the American people know the difference between liberty and license, by their support of the party of order and constitutional government, and by administering a thorough rebuke to those licentious men who are seeking to overwhelm the country and its Constitution in a common ruin.

Of President Lincoln's reelection no doubt can be entertained, whether we judge of the issue by the condition of the country, or by the sentiments that should animate the great majority of the people, and by which, we are convinced, that majority is animated. The Union candidate, no matter what his name or antecedents, should be elected by a majority so great as to "coerce" the turbulent portion of the Democracy into submission to the laws of the land, and into respect for the popular will, the last thing for which Democrats have any respect. Had the Union National Convention seen fit to place a new man in nomination, it would have been the duty of the voters to support him with all the means honestly at their command; but we must say that there is a peculiar obligation upon Americans to reelect Mr. Lincoln, and to reelect him by a vote that should surprise even the most sanguine and hopeful of his friends. The war from which the nation, and the whole world, have been made to suffer so much, and from the effects of which mankind will be long in recovering, was made because of Mr. Lincoln's election to the Presidency. The North was to be punished for having had the audacity to elect him even when the Democracy were divided, and the success of the Republican candidate was a thing of course. He, a mere man of the people, should never become President of the United States! The most good-natured of men, it is known that his success made him an object of personal aversion to the Southern leaders. They did their worst to prevent his becoming President of the Republic, and in that way they wronged and insulted the people far more than they wronged and insulted the man whom the people had elected to the highest post in the land; and the people are bound, by way of vindicating their dignity and establishing their power, to make Mr. Lincoln President of the United States, to compel the acknowledgment of his legal right to be the chief magistrate of the nation as unreservedly, from South Carolina as from Massachusetts. His authority should be admitted as fully in Virginia as it is in New York, in Georgia and Alabama as in Pennsylvania and Ohio. This can follow only from his reelection; and it can follow only from his reelection by a decisive majority. That insolent spirit which led the South to become so easy a prey to the Secession faction, when not a tenth part of its people were Secessionists, should be thoroughly, emphatically rebuked, and its chief representatives severely punished, by extorting from the rebellious section a practical admission of the enormity of the crime of which it was guilty when it resisted the lawful authority of a President who was chosen in strict accordance with the requirements of the Constitution, and who entertained no more intention of interfering with the constitutional rights of the South than he thought of instituting a crusade for the recovery of the Holy Sepulchre. The majesty of the law should be asserted and established, and that can best be done by placing President Lincoln a second time at the head of the Republic, the revolt of the slaveholders being directed against him personally as well as against that principle of which he was the legally elected representative. In him the spirit of order is incarnate; and his reelection by a great popular vote would be the establishment of the fact that under our system it is possible to maintain order, and to humiliate and subdue the children of anarchy.

President Lincoln should be reelected, if for no other reason, that there may go forth to the world a pointed approval of his conduct from his constituents. As we have said, we do not claim perfection for the policy and acts of the Administration; but we are of opinion that its mistakes have been no greater than in most instances would have been committed by any body of men that could have been selected from the entire population of the country. Take the policy that has been pursued with reference to Slavery. Many of us thought that the President issued his Emancipation Proclamation at least a year too late; but we must now see that the time selected for its promulgation was as skilfully chosen as its aim was laudable. Had it come out a year earlier, in 1861, the friends of the Rebels could have said, with much plausibility, that its appearance had rendered a restoration of the Union impossible, and that the slaveholders had no longer any hope of having their property-rights respected under the Federal Constitution. But by allowing seventeen months to elapse before issuing it, the President compelled the Rebels to commit themselves absolutely to the cause of the Union's overthrow without reference to any attack that had been made on Slavery in a time of war. It has not, therefore, been in the power of their allies here to say that the issuing of the Proclamation placed an impassable gulf between the Union and the Confederacy; for the Confederates were as loud in their declarations that they never would return into the Union before the Proclamation appeared as they have been since its appearance. They were caught completely, and deprived of the only pretence that could have been invented for their benefit, by themselves or by their friends. The adoption of an Emancipation policy did not cause us the loss of one friend in the South, while it gained friends for our cause in every country that felt an interest in our struggle. It prevented the acknowledgment of the Southern Confederacy by France, and by other nations, as French example would have found prompt imitation. Its appearance was the turning event of the war, and it was most happily timed for both foreign and domestic effect. It will be the noblest fact in President Lincoln's history, that by the same action he announced freedom to four millions of bondmen, and secured his country against even the possibility of foreign mediation, foreign intervention, and foreign war.

The political state of the country, as indicated by the result of recent elections, is not without interest, in connection with the Presidential contest. Since the nomination of General McClellan, elections have been held in several States for local officers and Members of Congress, and the results are highly favorable to the Union cause. The first election was held in Vermont, and the Union party reelected their candidate for Governor, and all their candidates for Members of Congress, by a majority of more than twenty thousand. They have also a great majority in the Legislature, the Democrats not choosing so much as one Senator, and but few Members of the House of Representatives. The election in Maine took place but six days after that of Vermont, and with similar results. The Union candidate for Governor was reelected, by a majority that is stated at sixteen thousand. Every Congressional District was carried by the Union men. In one district a Democrat was elected in 1862, at the time when the Administration was very unpopular because of the military failures that were so common in the summer of that dark and eventful year. His majority was one hundred and twenty-seven. At the late election his constituents refused to reelect him, and his place was bestowed on a friend of the Administration, whose majority is said to be about two thousand. The majorities of the other candidates were much larger, in two instances exceeding four thousand each. The State Legislature elected on the same day is of Administration politics in the proportion of five to one. These two States may be said to represent both of the old parties that existed in New England during the thirty years that followed the Presidential election of 1824. Vermont was of National-Republican or Whig politics down to 1854, and always voted against Democratic candidates for the Presidency. Maine was almost as strongly Democratic in her opinions and action as Vermont was Anti-Democratic, voting but once, in 1840, against a Democratic candidate for the Presidency, in twenty-four years. Her electoral votes were given for General Jackson in 1832, for Mr. Van Buren in 1836, for Mr. Polk in 1844, for General Cass in 1848, and for General Pierce in 1852. Yet she has acted politically with Vermont for more than ten years, both States supporting Colonel Fremont in 1856, and Mr. Lincoln in 1860,—a striking proof of the levelling effect of that pro-slavery policy and action which have characterized the Democratic party ever since the inauguration of President Pierce, in 1853. Had the Democratic party not gone over to the support of the slaveholding interest, Maine would have been a Democratic State at this day.

There were important elections held on the 11th of October in the great and influential States of Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana, and the verdicts which should be pronounced by these States were expected with an interest which it was impossible to increase, as it was felt that they would go far toward deciding the event of the Presidential contest. Vermont's action might be attributed to her determined and long-continued opposition to the Democratic party, which no change in others could operate to lessen; and the course of Maine could be attributed to her "Yankee" character and position: but Pennsylvania has generally been Democratic in her decisions, and she has nothing of the Yankee about her, while Ohio and Indiana are thoroughly Western in all respects. Down to a few days before the time for voting, the common opinion was, that Pennsylvania would give a respectable majority for the Union candidates, that Ohio would pronounce the same way by a great majority, and that Indiana would be found with the Democrats; but early in October doubts began to prevail with respect to the action of Pennsylvania, though no one could say why they came to exist. What happened showed that the change in feeling did not unfaithfully foreshadow the change that had taken place in the second State of the Union. Ohio's decision was not different from what had been expected, her Union majority being not less than fifty thousand, including the soldiers' vote. Indiana's action astonished every one. Instead of furnishing evidence that General McClellan's nomination had been beneficial to his party, the event in the Hoosier State led to the opposite conclusion. The Democratic majority in that State in 1862 was ten thousand, and that it could be overcome, or materially reduced, was not thought possible. Yet the voting done there on the 11th of October terminated most disastrously for the Democrats, the popular majority against them being not less than twenty thousand, while they lost several Members of Congress, among them Mr. Voorhees, who is to Indiana what Mr. Vallandigham is to Ohio, only that he has a little more prudence than the Ohioan. Indiana was the only one of the States in which a Governor was chosen, which made the returns easy of attainment. Governor Morton, who is reelected, "stumped" the State; and to his exertions, no doubt, much of the Union success is due. In Pennsylvania, at the time we write, it is not settled which party has the majority on the home vote; but, as the soldiers vote in the proportion of about eleven to two for the Republican candidates, the majority of the latter will be good,—and it will be increased at the November election.

The States that voted on the 11th of October give sixty electoral votes, or two more than half the number necessary for a choice of President. They are all certain to be given for Mr. Lincoln, as also are the votes of the six New England States, and those of New York, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Kansas, West Virginia, and California, making 189 in all, the States mentioned being entitled to the following votes:—Massachusetts 12, Maine 7, New Hampshire 5, Vermont 5, Rhode Island 4, Connecticut 6, New York 33, Pennsylvania 26, Ohio 21, Indiana 13, Illinois 16, Michigan 8, Minnesota 4, Wisconsin 8, Iowa 8, Kansas 3, West Virginia 5, and California 5. And so ABRAHAM LINCOLN and ANDREW JOHNSON will be President and Vice-President of the United States for the four years that shall begin on the 4th of March, 1865.



REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES.

An American Dictionary of the English Language. By NOAH WEBSTER, LL.D. Thoroughly revised, and greatly enlarged and improved, by CHAUNCEY A. GOODRICH, LL.D., etc., and NOAH PORTER, D.D., etc. Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam. Royal 4to. pp. lxxii., 1768.

Beyond cavil, this portly and handsome volume makes good the claim which is set forth on the title-page. The revision which the old edition has undergone is manifestly a most thorough one, extending to every department of the work, and to its minutest details. The enlargement it has received is very considerable, the size of the page having been increased, and more than eighty pages added to the number contained in the previous or "Pictorial" edition. The improvements are not only really such, but they are so many and so great that they amount to a complete remodelling of the work; and hence the objections heretofore brought against it—many of them very justly—have, for the most part, no longer any validity or pertinency. It may be questioned, however, whether the Dictionary, in view of the manifold and extensive changes which have been made in its matter and plan, should not be said to have been based on that of Dr. Webster rather than to be by him. St. Anthony's shirt cannot be patched and patched forever and still remain St. Anthony's shirt. But there is doubtless much virtue in a name, and, so long as the publishers have given us a truly excellent work, it matters little by what title they choose to call it.

We are amazed at the vastness of the vocabulary, which embraces upwards of one hundred and fourteen thousand words, being some ten thousand more, it is claimed, than any other word-book of the language. Such unexampled fulness would be apt to excite a suspicion that a deliberately adopted system of crimping had been carried on within the tempting domains of the natural sciences, to furnish recruits for this enormous army of vocables. But we do not find, upon a pretty careful examination, that many terms of this sort have been admitted which are not fairly entitled to a place in a popular lexicon.

In the matter of definition, we can unqualifiedly commend the principles by which the editor and his coadjutors appear to have been guided, notwithstanding an occasional failure to carry out these principles with entire consistency. The crying fault of mistaking different applications of a meaning of a word for essentially different significations—the head and front of Dr. Webster's offending as a definer, and not of Dr. Webster only, but of almost all other lexicographers—has generally been avoided in this edition. The philosophical analysis, the orderly arrangement of meanings, the simplicity, comprehensiveness, and precision of statement, the freedom from prejudice, crotchets, and dogmatism, the good taste and good sense, which characterize this portion of the work, are deserving of the fullest recognition and the highest praise.