Salmagundi

Front matter

Xi.^

*r

HEAT' TERS'

Contents

KO. PAGE

I —SATURDAY, JANUARY 24, 1807 ... I

Publisher's Notice. Shakespeare Gallery, New York 4

Chapter II

Newark — noted for its fine breed of fat mosquitoes — sting through the thickest boots 1 — story about Gallymppers — Archy Gifford and his man Caliban — jolly fat fellows — a knowing traveller always judges of everything by the innkeepers and waiters 2 — set down Newark people all fat as butter — learned dissertation on Archy Gifford's green coat, with philosophical reasons why the Newarkites wear red worsted nightcaps, and turn their noses to the south when the wind blows — Newark academy full of windows — sunshine excellent to make little boys grow — Elizabethtown — fine girls — vile mosquitoes — plenty of oysters — quere, have oysters any feeling? — good story about the fox catching them by his tail — ergo, foxes might be of great use in the pearl fishery — landlord member of

1 Vide Weld. " General Washington,' 5 says Weld, " told me that he never was so much annoyed by mosquitoes in any part of America, as in Skenesborough, for that they used to bite through the thickest boot."

2 Vide Carr ; vide Moore ; vide Weld ; vide Parkinson ; vide Priest. Richard Parkinson, late of Orange Hill, near Baltimore, published in London, 1805, his tour in America, in 1798-1800, exhibiting sketches of Society and Manners, and a particular account of the American system of agriculture, etc. William Priest, who signs himself on the title-page of his book, "Musician, late of the theatres Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Boston," travelled in the United States between the years 1793 and 1797, and published his journals in London, in a thin octavo in 1802. Vide Linkum Fidelius, and vide Messrs. Tag, Rag, an 1 Bobtail.

the legislature — treats everybody who has a vote — mem. all the innkeepers members of the leg islature in New Jersey ; Bridge-town, vulgarly called Spank-town, from a story of quondam parson and his wife — real name, according to Linkum Fidelius, Bridge-town, from bridge, a contrivance to get dry shod over a river or brook ; and town, an appellation given in America to the accidental assemblage of a church, a tavern, and a blacksmith's shop — Linkum as right as my left leg ; — Railway River — good place for gunboats — wonder why Mr. Jefferson don't send a river fleet here, to protect the hay vessels? — Woodbridge — landlady mending her husband's breeches — sublime apostrophe to conjugal affection and the fair sex ; 2 — Woodbridge famous for its crab-fishery — sentimental correspondence between a crab and a lobster — digression to Abelard and Eloisa ; — mem. when the moon is in Pisces, she plays the devil with the crabs.

chapter in.

Brunswick — oldest town in the State — division line between two counties in the middle of the street ; — posed a lawyer with the case of a man standing with one foot in each county — wanted to know in which he was domicil — lawyer couldn't tell for the soul of him ; — mem. all the New Jersey lawyers nums ; — Miss Hay's boarding-school — young ladies not allowed to eat mustard — and why? — fat story of a mustard-pot, with a good saying of Ding- Dong's ; — ■ 1 Vide the Sentimental Kotzebue.

Vernon's tavern — fine place to sleep, if the noise would let you — another Caliban ! — Vernon slew-eyed — people of Brunswick, of course, all squint ; — Drake's tavern — fine old blade — wears square buckles in his shoes — tells bloody long stories about last war — people, of course, all do the same ; — Hook'em Snivy, the famous fortune-teller, born here — contemporary with Mother Shoulders — particulars of his history — died one day — lines to his memory, which found their way into my pocket-book ; l — melancholy reflections on the death of great men — beautiful epitaph on myself.

Chapter IV

Princeton — college — professors wear boots ! — students famous for their love of a jest — set the college on fire, and burned out the professors ; an excellent joke, but not worth repeating — mem. American students very much addicted to burning down colleges — reminds me of a good story, nothing at all to the purpose — two societies in the college — good notion — encourages emulation, and makes little boys fight ; — students famous for their eating and erudition — saw two at the tavern, who had just got their allowance of spending money — laid it all out in a supper,

1 Vide Carr and Blind Bet. Carr, in his travels, meets on the roadside in Wales a stone-blind woman, supporting herself and infirm mother by the sale of gloves and stockings. The traveller perpetrates some verses on the occasion, which he introduces in this ludicrous fashion: "Upon her quitting as, the following lines found their way into my pocket-book I n got fuddled, and d — d the professors for nincoms. N. B. Southern gentlemen — church-yard — apostrophe to grim death — saw a cow feeding on a grave — metempsychosis — who knows but the cow may have been eating up the soul of one of my ancestors — made me melancholy and pensive for fifteen minutes; — man planting cabbages l — wondered how he could plant them so straight — method of mole-catching — and all that — quere, whether it would not be a good notion to ring their noses as we do pigs' — mem. to propose it to the American Agricultural Society — get a premium, perhaps — commencement — students give a ball and supper — company from New Yoik, Philadelphia, and Albany — great contest which spoke the best English — Albanians vociferous in their demand for sturgeon — Philadelphians gave the preference to raccoon 2 and splacnuncs 3 — gave them a long dissertation on the phlegmatic nature of a goose's gizzard — students can't dance — always set off with the wrong foot foremost — Duport's opinion on that subject — Sir Christopher Hatton the first man who ever turned out his toes in dancing — favorite with Queen Bess on that account — Sir Walter Raleigh — good story about his smoking — his

1 Vide Carr.

2 Vide Priest. " At two," says Priest, " the Philadelphians dine on what is usual in England, both a variety of American dishes, such as bear, opossum, raccoon, etc. ! "

3 Gulliver is announced by the town crier in Brobdignag as " a strange creature to be seen at the sign of the Green Eagle, not so big as a splacnuck, an animal in that country very finely shaped, about six feet long."

FURTHER ADVENTURES. 81

— Dr. Pangloss — Miss Cunegunde — earthquake at Lisbon — Baron of Thundertentronck 1 — Jesuits — Monks — Cardinal Woolsey — Pope Joan — Tom Jefferson — Tom Paine, and Tom

the whew ! N. B. Students got drunk as

usual.

Chapter V

Left Princeton — country finely diversified with sheep and hay-stacks 2 — saw a man riding alone in a wagon ! why the deuce didn't the blockhead ride in a chair? fellow must be a fool

— particular account of the construction of wagons, carts, wheelbarrows, and quail-traps — saw a large flock of crows — concluded there must be a dead horse in the neighborhood — mem. country remarkable for crows — won't let the horses die in peace — anecdote of a jury of crows — stopped to give the horses water — good-looking man came up and asked me if I had seen his wife ? heavens ! thought I, how strange it is that this virtuous man should ask me about his wife — story of Cain and Abel — stage-driver took a swig — mem. set down all the people as drunkards — old house had moss on the top — swallows built in the roof — better place than old men's beards — story about that — derivation of words hippy, hippy, hippy, and shoo-pig^ —

1 Jeremy Cockloft appears, in this enumeration, to have come from a recent perusal of Voltaire's Candide.

2 vide Carr.

8 Vide Carr's learned derivation of gee and whoa. 6 negro driver could not write his own name — languishing state of literature in this country; 1 philosophical inquiry of 'Sbidlikens, why the Americans are so much inferior to the nobility of Cheapside and Shoreditch, and why they do not eat plum-pudding on Sundays — superfine reflections about anything.