VOLUME II. PART 11.} "BIZARRE, BIZARRE, WHAT SAY YOU, MAD-CAP?”—Farquhar. Bizarre. FOR FIRESIDE AND WAYSIDE. FOR THE FORTNIGHT ENDING SATURDAY, OCTOBER 16, 1852. DAGUERREOTYPES-TAKEN GRATIS. {SINGLE COPIES FIVE CTS. or the Amethatype. Do you read Hebrew without the points? At any rate whether Gentle reader, probably if we sketch you you understand the dead languages or no, off, just as you appear to your neighbors, you we will give you and you alone, the living will advance with a menacing stride to wreak type-the breathing delineation; and then your vengeance; but like Mercury, we grasp we will expect you to hang it up in the a sword which renders us quite invisible, sir, chamber of conscience, and refer to it as so if you do make an attack you will only often, as you do to your time-piece; and beat the air. Take a seat, draw up the straighten that feature, and correct that, and light, pshaw, don't look up at the sun. We modify that, and develope that more stronghave no reference to the sun; draw up the ly, and bring yourself up to the true standlight of truth. That's the true light after ard of moral perfection. If you do this, all, and let the ray fall just so on your men- then the world will fall in love with you, and tal profile, on your moral phiz, on your you will be one of the most popular, yes, the whole system of habitudes which constitute most popular of the moderns. You will your actual features. That is, the real man. eclipse old Aristides you will contest the When you have depicted on the canvass, or palm with Titus the son of Vespasian, to be portrayed in the daguerreotype, your corpo- called Delicia humanarum generum-the real lineaments, you think you have got women will all be enamored of you, and yourself. Get away with that kind of phi- when you select one for a companion, they losophy. You have no more got yourself, will pine away in troops, as the virgins are than you have got the grand Lama of Thibet. said to have done in the case of Mahomet, When you have got the nut-shell, do you because good luck did not predestine you think you have got the kernel? When you to be the happy and successful fair one; and have got the melon-rind, (excuse the exceed-twenty to one, if some of these days you will ing homeliness of the illustration,) have you got the refreshing fruit? And when you have got lines and coloring, and a' that and a' that, have you got the man? Is this mere surface the faithful delineator of your temperament and habitudes? Is it the exponent of your higher nature? Oh! take a seat; for you have never had your likeness taken yet, although you have got a box of miniatures and daguerreotypes. Don't look astonished and indignant don't think we are cracking a joke on you. We speak the words of truth and soberness. But as we perceive you are beginning to acquiesce in our decision, we will promise you to treat you politely and mildly, while we sketch you. We will say everything with a view to your best interest, and after we have drawn you, we pledge ourselves not to put a label on you, and place you in a show case. No other eye but your own shall rest upon the daguerreotype shall we coin a word, and say the Alethotype? Do you understand Greek? or Veritype. Do you comprchend Latin? not be a candidate for the Presidency, and drive the whole world before you, as you used to drive a snow-ball or trundle a hoop. That is with the same indefinable ease. In a word you will be facile princeps. But you are in the chair, and we commence. Fix your eye on that point, while we admit a ray of truth. Look steadily at that end of the box. There, that will do. You are on the plate and you need no coloring. The plate says that you possess a good deal of self-conceit, and have pretty exalted notions of your acquired abilities, and that you frequently underrate the respectable claims of others. Now you promised not to get angry, didn't you? The plate says that you have not quite that amount of sympathy which prompts the good man to rejoice with those that do rejoice, and weep with those who weep; that you sometimes pass by on the other side with the Priest and Levite, and leave the poor wounded man, to his pains and misery; that you do not often pluck the thorn from the pillow of misfortune, and that you plant more dahlias in your garden, than | homely features of the old-fashioned dame are you do flowers of genuine beneficence, in the pathway of the disconsolate. Don't start so! The light I hope does not materially injure your eyes. The plate says that you are sometimes a little wanting in filial affection; and while you are full of bows among your acquaintances, you at home leave off the Frenchman, and assume the box-coat of Amsterdam; that you draw on the amiable when you go abroad, as you would draw on your kid gloves; and throw it off when you enter the domicile of your youth, as you do that loose morning wrapper, which your kind old grandmother made you; she who has gone to God. You seem to sit uneasy-keep calm-I am not at all angry with you. We will part the best of friends, when I put the daguerreotype in its showy little case. I am informed by the talismanic plate, that at a party the other night, you professed to be quite a proficient in French literature, and had been duly initiated into the profound mysteries of Racine and Moliere, when you were perfectly confident that you had only dipped a little into the contents of the aforesaid authors, but not been sufficiently immersed for the scent of the roses to cling to you still. You did this to please a dashing young belle, who had proved to your entire satisfaction, that your heart was not made of the tongs, and who being fresh from the select seminary of Monsieur Recherché, was enamoured with any one who could equal her ladyship in a smattering of the lingo Français. Has any mosquito stung you my friend, or has some attic bee got inside of your neckcloth? Don't dream that I am getting waspish in temperament, for I never felt more of the milk of human kindness in my veins, than at the very moment I am holding you so uneasy. You must not be so perplexed, because you have been ferreted out by this so searching ray of truth, which seems to be akin to the lynx, in its investigating properties. I want to know if you are the first fellow who has whispered a little soft exaggeration into the ear of some captivating Desdemona, and spoken the verity with a few insignificant variations. Certainly not, it is as fashionable to annex variations to narrative, as it is too add variations to popular pieces of music. Musical connoiseurs inform us, that the essence of the melody actually resides in such variations, and by parity of reasoning, the essence of the spice of colloquy is hidden in the slight modifications of the narrative which enliven, while they develope very materially the inventive genius of the speaker. Ecartezvous, mon ami; Comprenez-vous? But not to be hypocritical, I am informed by the plate, that you do generally bow at the shrine of truth, and it is only on occasions when the habita repulsive to the exquisites, that you take her by the shoulders, and Goddess though she is, tell her that although you are avowedly her worshipper, yet at a soiree she is rather out of her element. But the unequivocating old lady, not liking your special pleading, goes off, at the same time stirring up the embers of conscience, to advocate her cause during her absence. Now, if you can sit right quiet for about ten minutes, we will prorogue the parliament without any flourish of trumpets, and dismiss you to your tion, with your picture in your hand, and we trust a love of good principles in your heart of hearts. We suspect by this time you begin to think that you are either Shadrach, Mershach, or Abednego, and that we are Nebuchadnezzar revivified, heating the furnace one seven times more than it was wont to be heated. But no, my friend, you are not one of the Jewish children at all. Be careful not to put yourself in the wrong catalogue. And certainly, we ourselves, claim no blood-relationship to old Nebuchadnezzar. Still, if you do get a little taste of the fire, it will eventuate we trust in purifying you from a little of your dross, and then we shall see the fine gold of that true nature which has been somewhat alloyed by conventional silliness. Ah! we had almost forgotten to say, that the plate intimates pretty strongly, that you are comparatively delinquent in meeting your pecuniary obligations. Oh, dear friend, the plate does say it. Look for yourself. Do you not observe that dark cloudy something, which is moving over, and now resting on that peculiarly straight line, which is labelled honesty? When that dark shadow rests there, it tells a tale. It says that when the precise tailor presents his lawful bill, you dodge him as you would a horned rhinoceros; that when you meet him on the street, you shirk from his keen look as if each of his visual orbs darted poisoned copper_balls to make way with you completely; that you sometimes pay indeed a liberal per centage of your debts, say twenty cents on the dollar, and then felicitate yourself, that thousands are far more roguish than you are, and far less inclined to be just before they are generous; that you would rather live genteelly, even if it came out of the popular revenue, than emulate old Diogenes in his tub, luxuriating on his meal and water; in fine, that you consider to be pressed by debt, which has nothing in it of dishonor, unless the legal functionary is positively down upon you with his warrant; and that John Randolph, was only evincing one of his eccentricities, when he got up in the Senate, and said that he had discovered the philosopher's stone, which would transmute everything to gold, and that was, "Pay as you go." My friend don't pick up your hat. It is not at all polite when a man is so cordially welcomed, and so agreeably entertained as you have been to-day, to get up in that summary way, and make for the door, as if he had suddenly been blessed with a sight of the boa constrictor. Do make yourself perfectly at home, I beseech you. Do you smoke? For if you do, in a few minutes I will hand you one of the finest flavored cigars, that you ever laid eyes on, or lips to. We will turn out aborigines of the first water, and smoke the pipe of peace, with a vigor which would astonish King Philip of Mount Hope, or any Sachem of the Narragansetts. There is you know nothing equal to a smoke, for conciliating differences. The rainbow of peace encircles every ascending whiff, and tells us that the storm-cloud has rolled off to all intents and purposes, and golden-tinctured amity comes forth to be major-domo and master of the ceremonies. Well, as we said before, we promise you a cigar, if you will only keep quiescent, and lend a willing ear to the balance of our observations on your peculiar characteristics. On the line which indicates reverence for religious observances, quite a bright light seems to linger. That testifies that you are by no means indisposed to evince your practical regard for the Sabbath, by attending a place of worship, and listening to a finely elaborated discourse on doctrinal topics. For moral sermons, those which enforce the paramount obligation of relative duties, you have no special regard. You love the music of a good choir. Indeed, you regard music as the life of devotion, and look upon the man who has no taste for it as "fit for treason, stratagems and spoil," nay,fit for the old fiend himself; who cannot be moved by concord of sweet sounds to amend his ways, and be more refined and polished in his manners. This element in your character is ominous of future good. No man can frequent the sanctuary, without being somewhat influenced for right and justice. My delineation of your character is nearly over. You have one good feature, and that is perseverance. There is about you an elastic energy which is calculated to prompt to the achievement of worthy deeds. When once you have commenced an undertaking, you adhere to it like a United States post stamp to a letter. Difficulties do not often intimidate you, nor obstacles dampen your generous ardor. Taken on the whole you might be a worse fellow, yes, infinitely worse. You might be all black, while now you are grizzly grey, and that you know is a decided approximation to virgin white. You must not think that I have rubbed you with attic salt, with the avowed design of taking the skin off. I do not hold to the doctrine of skinning one of the feline brotherhood, much less one who belongs to a fraternity with heavier whiskers than the cat tribe; and that is the biped whose mouth is concealed by one vast wilderness, one boundless contiguity of hair. But are you running off without your cigar. Stop, stop, and, whether you smoke or not, carry home with a good heart your secret daguerreotype. Suspend it in some safe spot, and if you want to emulate the ancients in classical propriety and gracefulness, procure the services of a little page, and let him whisper in your ear at stated intervals, "Philip of Macedon, that is thy daguerreotype." This will wake you up if you happen to get into a reverie, recal your scattered senses, and settle you nicely on the mount of meditation. We sincerely hope that since we have made no charge for our trouble, you will recommend us to the commonwealth, as one who shows off to advantage, the internal frame-work, the actual existing homo, as a sentient of responsible being, and places a man in spite of his endeavors to the contrary, in the very best of company-that is, in company with himself: "Oh, if the Gods the gift would gie us, We just thought as we were about to finish our discursive disquisition, whether, if the daguerreotypes of the actual man, were suspended in show-cases at the bulk-windows of our fancy stores, quite so many citizens would complacently stand to contemplate the delineations as now gaze at the shadowy semblances of those they love? Whether a visitor would have placed in his hand the likeness of his host, of that likeness was a tell-tale affair, which in a few artistic lines summed up his biography from the day he chiselled his schoolmate out of his jack-knife, to the hour that he shaved that note so dexterously, and chuckled over his success as a broker of the first water. We have an idea that show-cases in such a state of affairs would be soon demolished, and Talbotypes, and all other kind of types, put carefully away in the garret by the frightened antitypes. Theologians even, might lose their regard for everything typical in Moses, and like the Iconolasts, wield the axe of extermination. As such a state of society would be too disastrous, we will deprecate its occurrence, and pray that the time will never come when our neighbors shall see us just as we are, and keek through us, to use the words of the Ayeshire bard with sharp and sly inspection. No, give us the graceful mantle of a feigned nature, and we will have envelopes for our hearts, as well as for our first settlement in Richmond, I was somewhat out of my element, I missed the usages of Bolivia, and felt non-plussed at some of the customs prevailing in conventional life, I believe an inkstand can get as much attached to localities as those who are denominated reflective and sentient beings, and regret as much as they the dissolution of old and sacred ties. But I gradually accommodated myself to existing circumstances, and in the course of a few months had all the set tled complacency about me which characterizes the fully-naturalized citizen. But now a change came o'er the spirit of my dream, ink. One morning an agent for a new speor rather a change came o'er the color of my cies of blue ink called upon William and urged his claims so very strenuously that my master purchased some bottles and forthwith replenished me with a tide of blue. I never uttered a remonstrance but I am confitions which assailed me at the moment, he dent had my master known the bitter reflecthe cold shoulder to all innovation. I had would have adhered to the black and given been furnishing my partner, the goose-quill, with black potations for a century, and now to stop off his supply of the Simon pure article, and offer him some fanciful ethereal milk and water stuff which could scarcely be perceptible on paper was rather too much for my nerves. I felt like a fellow, who, in spite of his conscience, has to get off his damaged goods to the best advantage, while all the But I question whether reasoning bipeds ever while he repudiates the principle of roguery. do repudiate the principle. Men change their politics with a good conscience. They turn from black to blue and from blue to vermilion with very little compunction of the inward monitor. They avow theories of every shade till they have got through all the colors of the prism, and then congratulate themselves upon being men of consummate policy and wondrous forecast. Equally prompt are they at changing their theological tenets. They empty their craniums of the black and fill them with the blue without experiencing a single emotion of grief; heterodox to-day, orthodox to-morrow, the third day on the socialist order, and,. finally squinting towards atheism. Let some one come along like the agent for the model ink, and with great pomposity of manner, and a share of modest assurance, recite most AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF AN INKSTAND. glowingly the numberless advantages of a PART SECOND. My life has been passed as I have already intimated in three distinct quarters of this terrestrial ball. Upon the decease of Tom I fell into the legitimate custody of his son William, who has for a number of years been settled in one of the Southern States. Upon my new creed whether religious or political, and followers throng his steps like the locusts of Egypt when spoken into existence by the magic fiat of him who acted as the ambassador of Jehovah to scourge the rebellious land of Miriam. An old preacher once said that if he were to judge of people by their restlessness, he would say that most of man kind were stung by the gad-fly. My old | be a standard of universal imitation. He had Master Jennings used to remark that variety just completed a complex calculation in the was the spice of life that gave it all its flavor. mathemathics, which had quite exhausted But when the whole meal is metamorphosed into condiments, we think that the stomach had better resign its commission, for certainly too much spice will debilitate its functions. Variety however was not the spice for me, I longed heartily to get back to my old color, and although I knew perfectly well that Minerva was blue-eyed, and the celestial expanse was of an azure tint, and the meandering streamlet was blue, still I recalled the fact that a rigid Puritan was called a true blue rather reproachfully, and that a man who had dipped into alcohol was said to be rather blue. And somehow or other the reproachful epithets were more in my mind's eye than the poetical associations. I anticipated with rapture the auspicious era when my master could draw up a statement, or make out a bill, or despatch a letter, and say with emphasis, "there I have it in black and white." This expression had been used by my master's family as far back as my memory served me. But now he was silent. He never said, I hardly think he could have said, "there I have it in blue and white." Ink his physical strength, and the result of his elaborate study was before his delighted eyes in the tangible form of writing; his little dog Diamond, in skirmishing about the table of our philosopher, upset the contents of the inkstand very unceremoniously upon the papers which contained the calculations and completely marred the performance of the profound astronomer. Sir Isaac, however, was composed. He neither demolished the inkstand, nor shot the dog, although he had emphatically proved himself to be a diamond in the rough. With perfect equanimity he first looked at his damaged papers, and then at the canine culprit, and exclaimed in accents of sorrow, but not of anger, "Oh! Diamond, thou little knowest the mischief thou hast done." I have no doubt that the inkstand of Newton, which had been thus an unwilling accessory to the disaster, felt more inclined to castigate the quadruped than any one imagines, but being in the presence of so great a dignitary, it wisely kept its tongue, and only looked black at the offender. stands, you know, like passengers in a stageMy master William was a singularly im- coach, will sometimes be upset against their patient being, I hope I will not be looked will. They always endeavor to retain their upon as hypocritical for thus recording his position, and that is more than can be said defects. He was a perfect flash in the pan, as of mankind at large; for some men, the much so as the stump-orator, when you tell drunkard for instance, are perfectly reckless him his candidate stands a poor chance of as to whether they keep their standing or election. He was up in a minute if you dif- not, and tilt over, not caring for the blots fered from him or thwarted his desires, and they make on their reputation, which are in case of any mishap or accident which de- certainly far more to be deprecated than ranged him he was altogether off his guard in blots upon paper, or peach-stains on your deprecating the approach of such contingent new pair of white pants. My poor masdisasters, and heaping invectives upon dame ter however was a kind-hearted man dechance for allowing them to occur to ruffle spite his impulsive temperament. I believe his equanimity. If the goose-quill got a lit- he honestly bewailed his quickness of temtle fractious, and spouted a jet of ink over per, and I have often heard him read the very the sheet of white paper, the unfeeling knife incident in the life of Newton just adverted was set to work upon it with all the merciless to, and bestow the highest encomiums on the rapacity of a surgeon, and it was split up and great Christian sage. Ah! how many see still split up till nothing but feathers were their errors but have not the moral power to left to testify that "Troja once fuit, but was correct them! How many bewail what they not any more," I have repeatedly thought on never attempt to rectify, and mourn over such occasions, when expecting myself to be what they seem unable to restrain! Had my broken in pieces, like a potter's vessel, of the master William a wife, who could lay her wonderful self-control of Sir Isaac Newton. gentle hand upon his shoulder just at the It appears that no disaster or contingency time when he was chafing with vexation, could in the least discompose his spirit; his could he hear the expostulating syllables of was that uniform complacency which confers some sweet charmer just as he was launchlasting happiness on its possessor, and which ing out into a strain of invective, doubtless I am sorry to say, is rarely found in this un- he would soon be metamorphosed, into a subquiet, restive, factious age of the world. He dued Isaac Newton. But he is without a could close down the valves of passion with wife. And probably his petulance is on the the ease and skill of the engineer, and thus increase because he has none. If it would not escape getting scalded himself, and helping his be stepping out of my sphere I would like to fellow-man with the hot-steam of irritation. suggest the propriety of his taking to himMy readers have doubtless heard of that beau-self a better half, but I am very slow to move tiful instance of his self-control which should in the premises, as an inkstand in the gener |