This is a buoy swung over the rocks. If it shallkeep ship, bark, fore-and-aft schooner, or hermaphroditebrig from driving on a lee shore, "all's well."
The book is not more for young men than old.The Calabria was wrecked "the last day out."
Nor is the book more for men than women. Thebest being that God ever made is a good woman, andthe worst that the devil ever made is a bad one. Ifanything herein shall be a warning either to man orwoman, I will be glad that the manuscript was caughtup between the sharp teeth of the type.
T.D.W.T.
BROOKLYN, January 1st, 1872.
The Curtain Lifted 9
Winter Nights 25
The Power of Clothes 38
After Midnight 59
The Indiscriminate Dance 79
The Massacre by Needle and Sewing-Machine 94
Pictures in the Stock Gallery 114
Leprous Newspapers 137
The Fatal Ten-Strike 154
Some of the Club-Houses 186
Flask, Bottle, and Demijohn 201
House of Blackness of Darkness 226
The Gun that Kicks over the Man who Shoots it off 241
Lies: White and Black 262
The Good Time Coming 276
Pride of city is natural to men, in all times,if they live or have lived in a metropolis notedfor dignity or prowess. Cæsar boasted of hisnative Rome; Lycurgus of Sparta; Virgil ofAndes; Demosthenes of Athens; Archimedes ofSyracuse; and Paul of Tarsus. I should suspecta man of base-heartedness who carried aboutwith him no feeling of complacency in regard tothe place of his residence; who gloried not in itsarts, or arms, or behavior; who looked with noexultation upon its evidences of prosperity, itsartistic embellishments, and its scientific attainments.
I have noticed that men never like a placewhere they have not behaved well. Swarthoutdid not like New York; nor Dr. Webster,Boston. Men who have free rides in prison-vansnever like the city that furnishes thevehicle.
When I see in history Argos, Rhodes, Smyrna,Chios, Colophon, and several other citiesclaiming Homer, I conclude that Homer behavedwell.
Let us not war against this pride of city,nor expect to build up ourselves by pullingothers down. Let Boston have its Common,its Faneuil Hall, its Coliseum, and its AtlanticMonthly. Let Philadelphia talk about its Mint,and Independence Hall, and Girard College.When I find a man living in either of thoseplaces, who has nothing to say in favor ofthem, I feel like asking him, "What meanthing did you do, that you do not like yournative city?"
New York is a goodly city. It is one cityon both sides of the river. The East River isonly the main artery of its great throbbing life.After a while four or five bridges will span thewater, and we shall be still more emphaticallyone than now. When, therefore, I say "NewYork city," I mean more than a million of people,including everyth