I usefully put in a few weeks in the Charity Subscription Dodge. The number of needy missionaries, dilapidated clergymen, forlorn widows, et cetera, that I presented to the sympathizing feelings of my associates was heart-rending. Fellows who can't get on class or society committees, with some funds at their command, will find this a pleasant and remunerative employment for a short time. When I got through this, I was nearly on my beam ends. I thought and thought, but the more I thought, the more I couldn't think of any thing. With my last red I invited my friend Jones to a last supper. Shade of Apicius, what a supper! Banquet of Trimalchio, what a feast! Elysium of Epicurus, what a carousal ! Some have said that I weathered Point Judith that night. This is a malicious falsehood. On the contrary, I returned to my room and sat down to think. My eye fell on a book. It was the rare and curious Isagoge Magico-Medico-Necromantica of the famous Basque wizzard, Quien Sabe Quien. It lay open at the seventeenth Schedula,omnes sylphas et aerit spiritus necnon Apollyonem ipsum excitandi modus. "Thrice greatest Hermes," mused I. "Strange that this should have escaped me. Who better could raise the wind than the Prince of the Powers of the Air." I delineated the mystic pentagram, turned round on my left toe three times, muttered an Ave backwards, somebody knocked-somebody walked in. As he wasn't dressed in black, and had no hoofs, I supposed it was somebody that owed me money, and so informed him that Mr. Scroggs (that's me) had gone to the country, and didn't expect to return for several weeks. Upon which he remarked— "Ah, yes. I see you forget me. I have the pleasure of being the Old Boy, at your service, otherwise called Sir Urian, familiarly known to my friends as Old Nick, Auld Hornie, Clootie, and such like. Others call me the Adversary, the Slanderer, the Father of Lies, but among my oldest acquaintances, the Hebrews, I am betitled the Prince of Flies and-" "The devil you are," exclaimed I. แ Exactly," said he, "you've hit it. Wonderful shrewdness. I am. How are you?" "Oh," replied I, "tolerable. Forked end downwards yet." We immedialely proceeded to business. Remembering Peter Schlemil, I proposed to barter my shadow for some such trifling consideration as the City of New York, or State of Connecticut. I think the devil misunderstood me, for he replied that his domicile smelt so strongly of shadeaters already that it was no comfort to stay there. I don't see what he meant, but as he seemed to refuse, I picked up a pack that lay bandy, and began shuffling. But I am sorry to say that the Old Boy was so ungentlemanly as to pull down the sinister corner of his dexter peeper, and desire me to inform him whether I could perceive the fourth color of the spectrum therein. Having satisfied him on this point, I asked what propositions he had to make. "Oh, ah," hemmed he, "of course you perceive my end in view." As by this time he had unfolded an appendage that looked like something between a whip cord and a rattlesnake, and was busy chewing one end of it, I replied with confidence that I did. 66 "Well," said he, "I'll fling you a million and a half. All you've got to do is to write me an autograph." I hate writing autographs. But to particular friends I don't mind it. I scratched "Scroggs." Something must have been the matter with that ink. The big S and little s looked exactly like snakes. The c seemed the triangular mouth of a coluber just swallowing the ro, while the twogg took immediately the form of pitchforks throwing it back. I shuddered; ro was the first two letters of roasted. I handed it over. "Now," said I, "old chap, down with the dust." As certain as I have two eyes, there stood two devils, each chewing the end of his tail! "Haw, haw, good joke, but the rocks, the filthy!" One made a dive at the key hole; the other stuck one leg up the chimney. "Ho ho, rum load, but the lucre, the pelf?" I rushed at the key hole. Smash, went my lamp. "Hi hi, quite funny, but the rhino, the tin ?" I plunged at the chimney. "He he, very jolly, but the I pitched for the key-hole. Crash, went my table. Clatterbang, went my chairs. "Hu hu, tall sell, but the mint-drops, the yellow-boys?" I lurched at the chimney. bled and fell. Rattleting, went my bookcase. I stum "Haw haw, ho ho, hu hu, he he, hi hi," resounded from half a dozen quarters at once. I maintain to this day that I lay there exactly one second and a half. I impute it entirely to diablérie, that when I opened my eyes it was broad daylight, that I was lying on the bed instead of the floor, and that in place of the devil, there stood my friend Jones, calmly eyeing a heap of chair legs, table tops, pipes, books, and oil cans. "Hello!" said I, "I raised the devil last night." "I rather guess you did," drawled he, (Jones is a Yankee.) "Mon strous drunk, I tell you. Smashed your truck to flinders. Tried my best to stop you, but couldn't do it." I immediately perceived that Jones had been inebriated the night previous, but didn't hurt his feelings by telling him so. I got up with a splitting headache. This I impute to the smell of brimstone that must have pervaded the apartment the evening before. I have since been lying on my oars. The versatility of my genius will, undoubtedly, turn up something before long. At that time, if successful, I will make that public also, and unless you should think that the present article is without a moral, I append the following maxim: Never raise the devil when you want to raise the wind. D. G. B. From the German of Malvaro. Ar the North, far away, Rolls a great sea for aye- Round it on every hand Ice-towers majestic stand- Never there man hath been, Telling to ears of men What is this sea within. Under the holy starlight— Bathed in the gentle moonlight Drinking the golden sunlight Ever silently-never seen Throbbing eternally there it hath been. From our Life far away, Roll the dark waves for aye, Of an Eternity Silently-awfully. Round it on every hand, Death's icy barriers stand- Never there man hath been, None of the souls of men Loosed from Earth's fated chain, Who could return again— Who could tell mortal ken, What is within the sea Of this Eternity. Terrible is our Life In its whole blood-written history Only a feverish strife In its beginning, a mystery In its dark ending, an agony. Terrible is our death Black-hanging cloud over Life's setting sun— Rolls the ever-throbbing sea And we-all we Are drifting rapidly, And floating silently, Into that unknown sea Into Eternity. KAPPA. Literary Lamentations. I. Non quia delector, studeo literis. My name is Grum. I am what the world calls-an old scholar. The turning of many dictionaries has bent my form, the yellow rays of the midnight lamp have bleached and thinned my hair, my eye is dim and sunken for want of sleep, my face wrinkled and pinched for want of sleep, my voice hollow and cracked for want of use. I am not accustomed to the sunlight, and when I wander forth, as I do once every few weeks, I wear a pair of long green goggles. Equipped thus when walking feebly through the street, boys sometimes call me 'Old Spindleshanks,' and as I passed a young woman and her beau the other day, I heard her whisper, "look out, here is the green-eyed monster." If I was not a philosopher I should feel hurt by these remarks, but as I am, I bear them with equanimity and pity those young persons' parents. But I do not write this to moralize; my object is, to relate my literary experience, how I came to be an old scholar, and what obstacles I encountered, that those who intend to follow in my footsteps may have a map, as it were, of the route. I will not say anything about Greek, for you have already sat upon those hard benches where Tutors, day by day, doled out small shreds of the finely-wrought tapestry of the ancients, which you were to tear in pieces and carefully examine the color and texture of each particular thread, wondering, meanwhile, where it belonged and what part of the picture it formed; you have all in your time, in cold winter mornings dragged your slow reluctant steps from the Chapel to the Atheneum, while cramming with the concentrated power of whatever intellect you could muster from a half-asleep brain, the hateful two inches of Greek grammar and examples; you have all been deeply interested in the struggle in which the "true old Ablative, the once undisputed lord of the whole domain of indirect relations, appears to have contested every inch of ground with the new claimant that presented itself in the new Genitive," how rejoiced you were when the brave young Genitive "prevailed in the construction of one substantive as the compliment of the other," how indignant you were when the bullying old Ablative went off, got the Adjective as an ally, and came down upon the poor little G like a wolf upon the fold. Nor will I mention Latin. Your feelings shall not be harrowed with sad recollections of 'acer, acris, acre,' of your younger days of 'hypercatalectic hexameter' in the middle ages, and of the 'præfatio' and 'hair of Berenice' of more modern times. You are already satiated with the classics. You have with me gnawed at the root of some of the most beautiful creations of the ancient authors, while the flower faded and died above you; with me you have gone down on your knees, and with your blear eyes carefully examined the dust of ages which had settled upon ancient literature, assisted by Alschfeschski, Völler, Sehütz, and Lord Brougham. Therefore, my classical labors I will not recount, but will begin at a different point. First, then, I began to stndy Botany. I always had in my youth a great love for flowers, and used to spend whole days in search of them, alone and far from the dwellings of men. I knew the seasons when each flower would blossom, the spots where the most perfect were abundant, and as carefully guarded my tongue lest these secrets should |