Life — February 8, 1883 — page 7: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

ts not so deleterious to our national vitality as the trea- sonable trumpetings of monarchy and snobbery with which some of these leading papers are filled, for whose circu- lation we tax the intellect of our country.* The repre- sentations of monarchy at this capital have been sending some of them home to show their leanings toward des- potism.”+ ‘The next day Congress gave itself over to the con- templation of cinerary urns. The occasion was the departure of Senator Hivt to that other and better world where, as the St. Louis editor remarked, all these things shall be made clear, and we shall shoot straighter. Senator IncaLis of Kansas made an_ instructive speech in blank verse, showing the limits of a Senator’s omniscience. We select this, as being original, from the common-place book of cribbed poetry spouted on the occasion : “BEN HILL Has gone unto the undiscovered country. Whether his journey thither was but one step— Across a frontier imperceptible; Oran interminable ocean, black, Unfluctuating, voiceless, stretch between These coasts, and that invisible, We do not know——” Cuorus (Congress) :—Wo ; we haven't any notion, any notion. “ Whether, That August morning after death, he saw In unimaginable splendor a sun rise, More glorious, above celestial skies, Or his unconscious apathetic ashes sleep, In senseless, still oblivion, and obstruction cold, We do not know- : Cuorus (Congress) :—Wo ; we haven't any notion. “Whether His strong and subtle energies found instant exercise in another forum ; or His dexterous and disciplined faculties do now contend. In a higher senate than ours for supremacy ; Or his palestric powers, with parting breath, Were dissipated and dispersed ——” PRESIDENT :—The question is on the adoption of the resolutions presented by the gentleman from Geor- gia. All those in favor—aye? Adjourned. “Pgopte should provide for a Rainy Day,” philo- sophically remarked the thoughtful club man, as he walked off with another member’s umbrella. Ir is to be hoped the politician who is accused of being ankle deep in the mire of corruption, isn’t stand- ing on his head meanwhile. * i.e.—The N. Y. Herald, edited by an habitué of the salons of the British aristocracy. Mr. Robinson exaggerates when he says that the Herald taxed the intellect of the people.—T. B. M. + The member from New York here referred to the Nation, a paper which then sought to curb the simple sports of a free peo- ple. Barring this kindly prejudice against homicide, the Nation was a good paper, and Unitarians still dispute whether it was, in truth, inspired by the Divine Omniscience, or only thought so.— T.B.M. -LIFE-: TARQUINIUS AND THE POPPIES. Targuinius Superbus, being desirous of taking and plundering a certain town, was about to lay siege to it, when he was waited upon by one of his partisans within the walls, who asked in what manner he could aid him. Tarquin for a reply led his visitor into the garden and with his cane struck off the heads of the tallest poppies there, accompanying the action with a haughty wink. The visitor instantly hastened to the capital where the Legislature was in session, and obtaining the necessary amendments to the charter, had the heads of all the obnoxious municipal officials taken off, and so secured for his patron the spoils of the town without incurring the expense and public scandal of a siege and sack. : WisHING to have the unbiased opin- ion of a disinterested expert upon the tobacco habit, we called upon Mr. Levi Samuels. Before Mr. Sam- uels’ door there is acolored wooden image, life size, of an Indian mai- den. Owing to the formation of Mr. Samuels’ nose he cannot turn it up, even if he wishes, but the great- est contempt was expressed in every other feature as he informed us that smoking could not hurt a baby un- less carried to excess. “ And what do you call excess, Mr. Samuels?” “Well, smoking all the time.” Pore adapted (to the latitude of Wilkesbarre, Pa.)— “All are but parts of one stupendous hole.”