Though I am not and never was an editor, I know something of the trials to which they are submitted.They have nothing to do but to develope enormous calluses at every point of contact with authorship.Their business is not a matter of sympathy, but of intellect.They must reject the unfit productions of those whom they long to befriend, because it would be a profligate charity to accept them.One cannot burn his house down to warm the hands even of the fatherless and the widow.
THE PROFESSOR UNDER CHLOROFORM.
- You haven't heard about my friend the Professor's first experiment in the use of anaesthetics, have you?
He was mightily pleased with the reception of that poem of his about the chaise.He spoke to me once or twice about another poem of similar character he wanted to read me, which I told him I would listen to and criticize.
One day, after dinner, he came in with his face tied up, looking very red in the cheeks and heavy about the eyes.- Hy'r'ye? - he said, and made for an arm-chair, in which he placed first his hat and then his person, going smack through the crown of the former as neatly as they do the trick at the circus.The Professor jumped at the explosion as if he had sat down on one of those small CALTHROPSour grandfathers used to sow round in the grass when there were Indians about, - iron stars, each ray a rusty thorn an inch and a half long, - stick through moccasins into feet, - cripple 'em on the spot, and give 'em lockjaw in a day or two.
At the same time he let off one of those big words which lie at the bottom of the best man's vocabulary, but perhaps never turn up in his life, - just as every man's hair MAY stand on end, but in most men it never does.
After he had got calm, he pulled out a sheet or two of manuscript, together with a smaller scrap, on which, as he said, he had just been writing an introduction or prelude to the main performance.Acertain suspicion had come into my mind that the Professor was not quite right, which was confirmed by the way he talked; but I let him begin.This is the way he read it:-PRELUDE.
I'M the fellah that tole one day The tale of the won'erful one-hoss-shay.
Wan' to hear another? Say.
- Funny, wasn'it? Made ME laugh, -
I'm too modest, I am, by half, -
Made me laugh'S THOUGH I SH'D SPLIT, -
Cahn' a fellah like fellah's own wit? -
- Fellahs keep sayin', - "Well, now that's nice;Did it once, but cahn' do it twice." -
Don' you b'lieve the'z no more fat;
Lots in the kitch'n 'z good 'z that.
Fus'-rate throw, 'n' no mistake, -
Han' us the props for another shake; -
Know I'll try, 'n' guess I'll win;
Here sh' goes for hit 'm ag'in!
Here I thought it necessary to interpose.- Professor, - I said, -you are inebriated.The style of what you call your "Prelude"shows that it was written under cerebral excitement.Your articulation is confused.You have told me three times in succession, in exactly the same words, that I was the only true friend you had in the world that you would unbutton your heart to.
You smell distinctly and decidedly of spirits.- I spoke, and paused; tender, but firm.
Two large tears orbed themselves beneath the Professor's lids, - in obedience to the principle of gravitation celebrated in that delicious bit of bladdery bathos, "The very law that moulds a tear," with which the "Edinburgh Review" attempted to put down Master George Gordon when that young man was foolishly trying to make himself conspicuous.
One of these tears peeped over the edge of the lid until it lost its balance, - slid an inch and waited for reinforcements, -swelled again, - rolled down a little further, - stopped, - moved on, - and at last fell on the back of the Professor's hand.He held it up for me to look at, and lifted his eyes, brimful, till they met mine.
I couldn't stand it, - I always break down when folks cry in my face, - so I hugged him, and said he was a dear old boy, and asked him kindly what was the matter with him, and what made him smell so dreadfully strong of spirits.
Upset his alcohol lamp, - he said, - and spilt the alcohol on his legs.That was it.- But what had he been doing to get his head into such a state? - had he really committed an excess? What was the matter? - Then it came out that he had been taking chloroform to have a tooth out, which had left him in a very queer state, in which he had written the "Prelude" given above, and under the influence of which he evidently was still.
I took the manuscript from his hands and read the following continuation of the lines he had begun to read me, while he made up for two or three nights' lost sleep as he best might.
PARSON TURELL'S LEGACY:
OR THE PRESIDENT'S OLD ARM-CHAIR.
A MATHEMATICAL STORY.
FACTS respecting an old arm-chair.
At Cambridge.Is kept in the College there.
Seems but little the worse for wear.
That's remarkable when I say It was old in President Holyoke's day.
(One of his boys, perhaps you know, Died, AT ONE HUNDRED, years ago.)HE took lodging for rain or shine Under green bed-clothes in '69.
Know old Cambridge? Hope you do.-
Born there? Don't say so! I was, too.
(Born in a house with a gambrel-roof, -
Standing still, if you must have proof.-"Gambrel? - Gambrel?" - Let me beg You'll look at a horse's hinder leg, -First great angle above the hoof, -
That's the gambrel; hence gambrel-roof.)
- Nicest place that ever was seen, -
Colleges red and Common green, Sidewalks brownish with trees between.
Sweetest spot beneath the skies When the canker-worms don't rise, -When the dust, that sometimes flies Into your mouth and ears and eyes.
In a quiet slumber lies, NOT in the shape of unbaked pies Such as barefoot children prize.
A kind of harber it seems to be, Facing the flow of a boundless sea.
Rows of gray old Tutors stand Ranged like rocks above the sand;Rolling beneath them, soft and green, Breaks the tide of bright sixteen, -One wave, two waves, three waves, four, Sliding up the sparkling floor;Then it ebbs to flow no more, Wandering off from shore to shore With its freight of golden ore!
- Pleasant place for boys to play; -
Better keep your girls away;
