The Atlantic Monthly Part 19

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

"In Koln, 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-c.u.mulus, whose huge bulk arose out of the bowels of the ship itself. Up and down, in and out, here and there, into every c.h.i.n.k 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-b.u.t.tresses, 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 Duspeptos, with Satellite stationary on the right quarter.

_Eupeptos._--Coffee,--that's good. John, fill my cup. Have it strong, mind,--no milk.

_Duspeptos._ (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.

_Duspeptos._--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?

_Duspeptos._--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?

_Duspeptos._--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, pa.s.s the fried steak, salt mackerel, and fried potatoes to Mr. Rink.

_Duspeptos._--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 appet.i.te for anything, and the digestion of an ostrich.

Risk it, won't you?

_Duspeptos._ (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 t.i.t-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----

_Duspeptos._ (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.

Raal 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 ash.o.r.e, 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 dest.i.tute of equanimity, and have no particle of stability in my disposition. Not a drop of Scotch blood in my veins.

_Duspeptos._--There's no oats about these; an' ef there was, 't wouldn't hurt ye none. It's jest the kernel an' the sh.e.l.l 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.

_Duspeptos._--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'

n.o.body's the wiser. Natur' allers makes ye foot the bill all the same on sea an' sh.o.r.e.

_Eupeptos._ (Trolling in a low voice the celebrated barcarole,

"My bark is by the sh.o.r.e," 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!

_Duspeptos._ (--Muttering in the distance.)--That feller's a raal 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 ... s.e.xton ... six-board box ...

coroner's verd.i.c.k ... 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 st.i.tched 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, cla.s.sifying 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 sh.o.r.e, and, reverently stooping, saluted with fond grat.i.tude 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 gra.s.s 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 rect.i.tude of purpose than it now daily affords. Were the contest one relating to the conduct of the war, and had the Democratic party a.s.sumed 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 a.s.sociates 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 indors.e.m.e.nt 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 a.s.suredly 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 ma.s.ses 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 a.s.sociated with some of the n.o.blest pa.s.sages 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 ma.s.ses composing it any other than the best intentions. It is not of those ma.s.ses 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 pa.s.s away. The Federalists, the National Republicans, the Antimasons, the Whigs, and the Know-Nothings have each appeared, flourished for a short time, and then pa.s.sed 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 a.s.sistance of the slaveholders in war, as formerly it went to their a.s.sistance 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 ma.s.ses, 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.