Salmagundi

Contents

VOLUME I.

NO. PAGE

I. Satttrday, January 24, 1807 6

Chapter I

The man in the moon^ — preparations for departure — hints to travellers about packing their trunks^ — straps, buckles, and bed-cords, — case of pistols, cila cockney — five trunks — three bandboxes — a cocked hat — and a medicine chest, a la Frangaise — parting advice of my two sisters — quere, why old maids are so particular in their cautions against naughty women — description of Powles-Hook ferry-boats — might be converted into gunboats, and defend our port equally well with Albany sloops — Brom, the black ferryman — Charon — river Styx — ghosts ; — major Hunt — good story — ferryage nine-pence ; — city of Harsimus — built on the spot where the folk once danced on their stumps, while the devil fiddled; — quere, why do the Harsimites talk Dutch? — story of the tower of Babel, and confusion of tongues — get into the stage — driver a wag — famous fellow for running stage races — killed three passengers and crippled nine in the course of his practice — philosophical

1 vide Carr's Stranger in Ireland. ^ vide Weld.

reasons why stage drivers love grog — causevi^ay — ditch on each side for folk to tumble into — famous place for skilly -pols ; Philadelphiaus call 'em tarapins — roast them under the ashes as we do potatoes — quere, may not this be the reason that the Philadelphiaus are all turtle-heads ? — Hackensack bridge — good painting of a blue horse jumping over a mountain — wonder who it was painted by; — mem. to ask the Baroyi de Gusto about it on m}' return ; — Rattlesnake hill, so called from abounding with butterflies ; — salt marsh, surmounted here aud there by a solitary haystack ; — more tarapins — wonder why the Philadelphiaus don't establish a fishery here, and get a patent for it ; — bridge over the Passaic — rate of toll — description of toll-boards — toll man had but one eyo. — story how it is possible he may have lost the other — pence-table, etc.^

Chapter II

Newark — noted for its fine breed of fat mosquitoes — sting through the thickest boot" — story about Gallynipers — Archer Gifford and his man Caliban — jolly fat fellows; — a knowing traveller always judges of every thing by the inn-keepers and waiters ; ^ set down Newark people all fat as butter — learned dissertation on Archer Gifford's green coat, with philosophical reasons wh^- the Newarkites wear red worsted night-caps, and turn their noses to the south when the wind blows — Newark academy full of windows — sunshine excellent to make little boys grow — Elizabeth-town — 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 merpber of the legislature — treats everybody who has a vote — mem., all the inn-keepers members of legislature in New Jersey ; Bridge-town, vulgarly called Spank-town., from a story of a 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 ; — Rahwa}' River — good place for gunboats — wonder wh}' Mr. Jefferson don't send a river Jieet there to protect the hay-ves-

1 vide Carr. ^ vide Weld.

3 ride Can-, vide Moore, vide AVeld. vide Parkinson, vide Priest, vide Linkum Fidelius, and vide Messrs. Tag, Rag, aud Bobtail.

— sublime apostrophe to conjugal affection and the fair sex ; ^

— Woodbridge famous for its cral)-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 III

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 ; — Vernon's tavern — fine place to sleep, if the noise would let you — another Caliban ! — Vernon s/ew-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 — coteraporary with mother Shoulders — particulars of his history — died one day — lines to his memory, which found their way into my jjocket-book ; ^ — 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 burnt out the professors ; an excellent joke, but not wortli repeating — mem., American students very much addicted to burning down colleges — reminds me of a good stor}-, nothing at all to the purpose — two societies in the college — good notion — encourages emulation, and makes little boj^s fight; — students famous for their eating and erudition — saw two at the tavern, who had just got their allowance of spending-monej'

— laid it all out in a supper — got fuddled, and d d the

professors for nincoms. N.B. Southern gentlemen — Church-

' vide The Sentimental Kotzebue. 2 ^{([g Carr and Blind Bet I yard — apostrophe to grim death — saw a cow feeding on a grave

— metemps3chosis — 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^ — 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 York, Philadelphia, and Albany — great contest which spoke the best English — Albanians vociferous in their demand for sturgeon — Philadelphians gave the preference to raccoon ^ and splacnuncs — 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 — great favorite with Queen Bess on that account — Sir Walter Raleigh — good story about his smoking — his descent into New Spain — El Dorado — Candid — Dr. Pangloss — Miss Cunegunde — earthquake at Lisbon — Baron of Thundertentronck — 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 haystacks ^ — saw a man riding along 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 sioig — 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 —

1 vide Carr. * vide Priest. * vide Carr.

story about that — derivation of words hippy, hppy, f^'ppy and shoo-pig ^ — negro driver could not write his own name — languishing state of literature in this countrj' ; ^ — philosophical inquiry of 'Sbidlikens, wdiy the Americans are so much inferior to the nobility of Cheapside and Shoreditch, and why they do not eat plum-pudding on Sunda3's ; — superfine reflections about any thing.