The Mayor sent east, west, north and south To offer the Piper, by word of mouth, Wherever it was men's lot to find him, Should think their records dated duly, To shock with mirth a street so solemn; But opposite the place of the cavern They wrote the story on a column, And on the great church window painted The same, to make the world acquainted How their children were stolen away; And there it stands to this very day. And I must not omit to say That in Transylvania there's a tribe Of alien people, that ascribe The outlandish ways and dress On which their neighbors lay such stress, Out of Hamelin town, in Brunswick land, THE INDIAN CHIEFTAIN. 'Twas late in the autumn of '53 That, making some business-like excuse, I went to school in Battery Row, Of clerks with souls above their sphere, To feast on intellectual cheer. ANON. We talked of Irving and Bryant and Spratt— We wrote little pieces on purling brooks, And meadow, and zephyr, and sea, and skyThings of which we had seen good descriptions in books, And the last between houses some sixty feet high! Somehow in this way my soul got fired; I wanted to see and hear and know The glorious things that our hearts inspired- And I had heard of the dark-browed braves Of the famous Onondaga race, Who once paddled the birch o'er Mohawk's waves, I'd see that warrior stern and fleet! Aye, bowed though he be with oppression's abuse, I'd grasp his hand!-so in Chambers Street I took my passage for Syracuse. Arrived at last, I gazed upon The smoke-dried wigwam of the tribe. "The depot, sir"-suggested one- "Oh, point me an Indian chieftain out!" Wounded, I turn-when lo, e'en now I know him by his falcon eye, His raven tress and mien of pride; I exclaim, as I gaze into his face, How right the wrongs of thine injured race? What shall I do for thee, glorious one? To soothe thy sorrows my soul aspires. Speak! and say how the Saxon's son May atone for the wrongs of his ruthless sires." THE MULE. ANON. The mule is the only animal that Noah didn't take into the ark with him. I've looked over the freight list carefully, and could not see a mule way-billed for any place. So clear-headed a man did not dare take one on board, as he knew he would kick a hole through her in less than a week. I don't know a man on whose head you could pour quicksilver and run less risk of its spilling off than on Noah's. He was a dreadful level-headed man, and before the freshet was over everybody on earth realized the fact. The origin of the mule is enveloped in a good deal of mystery. Tradition informs us that when the flood subsided, and the ark had landed on Mount Ararat, Noah was very much surprised in one of his first observations to find a good healthy mule standing on the top of an adjoining mountain. The same tradition informs us that the mule is the only animal that lived through the flood outside of the ark. The mule can be considered in a good many ways, though the worst place to consider him is right from behind-anywhere within a radius of ten feet. I never consider a mule from that point unless I am looking out through the flue of a boiler. Sea captains and people who have to do with mules always pay an extra rate to life insurance companies. A mule and a belt of country where yellow fever is indigenous generally stand the same as regards the death-rate. The mule has one more leg than a milking-stool, and he can stand on one and wave the other three round in as many different directions. He has only three senseshearing, seeing and smelling. He has no more sense of taste than a stone jug, and will eat anything that contains nutriment, and he don't care two cents whether it be one per cent. or ninety-nine. All he asks is to pass him along his plate with whatever happens to be handy, and he won't go away and blow how poor the steak is. He just eats whatever is set before him, and asks no questions. Mules are chiefly found in the South and West. They have been more abused than Judas Iscariot. A boy who would not throw a stone at a mule when he got a chance would be considered by his parents too mean to raise. The mule is a good worker, but he cannot be depended on. He is liable to strike, and when a mule strikes, human calculation fails to find out any rule by which to reckon when he will go to work again. It is useless to pound him, for he will stand more beating than a sitting-room carpet. He has been known to stand eleven days in one spot, apparently thinking of something, and then start of again as though nothing had happened. Down South, when they have a surplus of small darkies on the plantation, they send them out into the barn-yard to play where there is a loose mule. They always bid them good-by when they start out, for they are sure the parting will be final. This is the most economical style of funeral now in the market. One of the dead certainties about a mule is that he is sure-footed, especially with his hind feet. He never misplaces them. If he advertises that his feet will be at a certain spot at a certain time, with a sample of mule shoes, you will always find them there at the appointed time. He is as reliable as the day of judgment, and he never cancels an engagement. Every man now living who drove a mule team during the war now draws a pension. I never owned a mule. I came near buying one once. He was a fine-looking animal; his ears stood up like the side spires of an Episcopal church. His tail was trimmed down so that it looked like a tar brush leaning up against him. He was striped off like the American flag, and Raphael's cherubs never looked more angelic than did that mule. He looked all innocence, though he was in no sense. The owner sat in the wagon, with his chin resting on his hand and his elbow resting on his knee. In the other hand he held a stick with a brad in the end of it. I examined the mule and asked the man a few questions, and, out of mere form, inquired if the mule was kind, or if he kicked. "Kind? Kicked?" said the man, and those were the last words he ever uttered. He reached his stick over the front |