ABSTRACT

The Literary Humour of the Urban Northeast brings together works by such writers as Mark Twain, P.T. Barnum, Marietta Holley, and the literary comedians Artemus Ward and Josh Billings. The northern writers chronicled a fast-moving world, dominated by government and business. In this anthology, David Sloane recovers satiric writings of the north-eastern humourists of the nineteenth century, a literary school that was formed in the crucible of the daily newspaper. Written to appeal to a newly urbanized audience experiencing the impact of the Industrial Revolution, these humorous articles, sketches and ballads responded to a rapidly changing nation still clinging to rural preconceptions but at the same time beginning to know a sharper more precarious kind of existence.

chapter |34 pages

d ^ r> Introduction

chapter |14 pages

The Aftermath of the War against Slavery

chapter |14 pages

James K. Paulding /

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s J fT * William Cox

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Joseph C. Neal /

chapter |20 pages

Peter Brush; or, The Great Used Up

chapter 3|1 pages

^ * George P. Morris

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Thomas C. Haliburton

chapter |19 pages

Female Colleges

chapter |15 pages

The Pumpkin Freshet

chapter |18 pages

P. T. Bamum

chapter |10 pages

From Pluri-bus-tah Introduction

chapter |4 pages

Pluri-bus-tah / 167 Looking through the unwashed window, Saw her vanish through the garden, Through the shadows of the bean-poles, Through the clouds of smoke, ascending, Rising from his pipe of comfort. What the Hero Worshiped

As the money poured upon him, In a golden stream upon him, Pluri-bus-tah came to love it, Better, every day, and better. As the pile kept on increasing,

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Pluri-bus-tah / 171 And resolved to conquer Cuffee, Make him work and do his drudging. But he didn’t mean to pay him, Pay him for his toiling labor, That would be no speculation, For he loved his darling dollars; And his thought was how to save them, Keep them in his breeches pocket. He resolved to conquer Cuffee, Make him work for him for nothing, Make him work, or else he’d lick him. Pluri-bus-tah then got ready; For the battle then made ready; First took off his coat and jacket, Put his boots on, rolled his sleeves up; Then he took a horn of whisky, Old Monongahela whisky, Whisky made of Indian corn-juice, Of the juice of the Mondainin, Treated of in Hiawatha; Drank about a half a gallon, Then went out to fight with Cuffee. Pretty soon he met with Cuffee, Said, “ Good morning to you, Cuffee; How are all the babies, Cuffee? How is pretty Mistress Cuffee?” For a while he talked with Cuffee; Then he made a face at Cuffee; Then, at once, squared off at Cuffee, Instantly “sailed into” Cuffee; And he whaled away at Cuffee, Injured and astonished Cuffee! Cuffee’s shins were bruised and battered; Cuffee’s ribs were sore and aching; Cuffee’s wool was torn and tangled; Cuffee’s head was mauled and pummeled Till his eyes stuck out like onions, And his nose looked like a sausage, Juicy sausage, damaged sausage. And each lip looked like an oyster,

chapter vi|1 pages

^T* E. Jane Gay (Truman Trumbull, A.M .)

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The New Yankee Doodle / 183 They said “He’d work in handy.” While master led the chivalry At home he’d keep the pot on, Would cure the bacon, grind the corn, And cultivate the cotton. “The mud-sills, on the other hand, Unless ubiquitous, sir, Would have no tillers of the land; The Yanks iniquitous, sir, Would reap destruction close at home, The while they sowed abroad— Supported by no Patriarch’s rule, And governed by no God. “The servile race was trained so well, In case of a disaster Why, Sam would hasten to the field, And battle for his master.” Well, Sambo toiled and Sambo dreamed, And nothing Sambo spoke, sir, Till Yankee guns and bay’nets gleamed, And sleeping Sambo woke, sir. “ Ole Missus,” rising in the morn, And very much belated, Declared the house felt all forlorn— And strange! no breakfast waited. For Sambo Cook the night before, All suddenly inspired, Had closed outside his cabin door,— In Sunday clothes attired— With Dinah and the little ones, Had taken, in the damp, And cold, and dark, the road that runs Into the Yankee camp. Abe’s generals saw the tide set in, It wasn’t to their notion; Some did with their small brooms begin To sweep back, sir, the ocean. Said they, “ Our well digested plan, Our duty strict defines,

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The New Yankee Doodle / 185 Old Jonathan pricked up his ear, Said he, “What is this clatter, About the black man that I hear? It is a serious matter. And British sympathizers were All barking in accord, sir;5 For in perverted garbled guise The news had gone abroad, sir; And hints that looked like threats came back Across the briny water, That Johnny Bull his brains did rack To “stop the horrid slaughter.” And Jonathan had some bad boys, Unfriendly to the cause, sir; They rallied now, and raised a cry Of “Union as it was,” sir.6 They said the war perverted was If Sambo lost his collar; They wouldn’t “give another man, And not another dollar.” Said Jonathan, “My lads, look here, You set of wretched shirks! Your miserable rebel souls You’d bolster with such quirks. ’Tis such as you more mischief do Than Stonewall on the border. To block your, game, you coward crew, A speedy draft I’ll order.” Then Congress, just to show the rebs This spunky Yankee nation Ain’t scared at trifles, made by law An Act of Confiscation.7

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The New Yankee Doodle / 187 “Now who will cross that stream of death, The rifle-pits to try, sir?” Cried Hendershott, the drummer-boy, “ I'm ready, though I die, sir.” Then leaped into a boat.—“My lad, Give way to older hands, sir.” The boy hung on behind the boat, And was the first to land, sir. Slow, dreadful work; at last the stream Is crossed,10 the foe in sight, sir, Secure beyond the sullen town,11 Entrenched upon the heights, sir. Now, up the slopes, where cannon deal Out canister and grape, Good heavens! from such a storm of fire Can anything escape? They stagger back, they charge again, They waver, reel and fall— Recharge, until the carnage might The stoutest heart appall. All day they press, as if their death Were emulous to meet; But never foe at Malvern Hill Won such a dread defeat. Night fell, the battered army lay, Some sunk in dreamless sleep; But eyes there were that o’er that day Hot bitter tears did weep. Twelve thousand men, who in the morn, Were glad in buoyant life, Now “missing”—lying mangled—torn, Or martyred in the strife. How sped the hours on yonder slopes? Did any dream of home, To flickering, fluttering, fainting hearts, Did any succor come?

chapter 190|12 pages

/ E. Jane Gay

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Charles G. Leland

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Der Fader und der Son

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Ballad

chapter 212|10 pages

/ Charles G. Leland Dat as Copdain Breitmann suited oos Egsockdly do an ounce, He vas ged de nomination, And need nod more eckshblain: Der Breitmann dink in silence, And denn roar aloudt, champagne! Den Mishder Twine, while trinken wein, Mitwhiles vent on do say, Dat long insdruckdions in dis age Vere nod de dime of tay; Und de only ding der Breitmann need To pe of any use Vas shoost to dell to afery mans He’s soundt oopon der coose. Und ash dis little frase berhops Vas nod do oos bekannt, He dakes de liberdy do make Dat ve shall oondershtand, And vouldt tell a liddle shdory Vitch dook blace pefore de wars: Here der Breitmann not to Trina, Und she bass aroundt cigars. “Id ish a longe dime, now here, In Bennsylvanien’s Shtate, All in der down of Horrisburg Dere rosed a vierce depate, ’Tween vamilies mit cooses, Und dose vhere none vere foundt— If cooses might, by common law, Go squanderin aroundt? “Dose who vere nod pe-gifted Mit gooses, und vere poor, All shvear de law forbid dis crime, Py shings and cerdain sure; But de coose-holders teklare a coose Greadt liberty tid need, And to pen dem oop vas gruel, Und a mosdt oon-Christian teed.

chapter 222|4 pages

/ Charles G. Leland I hev a lot All sharply sot To eat them pidgings up,” said Boggs. “They are the chosen birds of wrath, They fly like arrers through the air, Or angels sent by orful Death— Jist fifty dollars fur a pair; An’ cheap to keep, because, you see, Upon the enemy they progs.” “Well, try it on, And now begone!” Said Mister Swain to Mister Boggs. The autumn morn was bright and fair, Fresh as a rose with recent rain. The pidgins tortled through the air, But nary one came home again. Some feathers dropped in Chestnut Street, Some bills and claws among the logs: Wipin’ a tear, “I greatly fear That all’s not right,” said Mr. Boggs. Into the Chronicle he went, Twice as mysterious as before, “And hev you heard the orful news?” He whispered as he shet the door. “ Oh, I hev come to tell a tale Of crime, which all creation flogs, Of wretchery And treachery That bangs tarnation sin,” said Boggs. “Them Ledger fellers with their tricks, Hev slopped clean over crime’s dark cup. They’ve bin an’ bought some pidging-horks, And they hev et our pidgings up. Oh, whut is life wuth livin’ fur When editors behave like hogs? An’ ragin’ crime Makes double time; Oh, darn setch villany!” cried Boggs.

chapter |4 pages

Samuel L. Clemens (Mark Twain)

chapter |4 pages

Female Suffrage

chapter |10 pages

Cannibalism in the Cars

chapter |11 pages

John W. DeForest /

chapter |4 pages

An Inspired Lobbyist / 255 and throughout the State there was the liveliest buzzing and humming and clicking of political wheels and cranks and cogs that had ever been known in those hitherto pastoral localities. The case of Fastburg against Slowburg was put in a hundred ways and proved as sure as it was put. It really seemed to the eager burghers as if they already heard the clink of hammers on a new State-House and beheld a perpetual legislature sitting on their fences and curbstones until the edifice should be finished. The great wire-puller and his gang of stipendiaries were the objects of popular gratitude and adoration. The landlord of the hotel which Mr. Pullwool patronized actually would not take pay for that gentleman’s board. “No, sir!” declared this simple Boniface, turning crimson with en­ thusiasm. “You are going to put thousands of dollars into my purse, and I’ll take nothing out of yours. And any little thing in the way of cigars and whiskey that you want, sir, why, call for it. It’s my treat, sir.” “Thank you, sir,” kindly smiled the great man. “That’s what I call the square thing. Mr. Boniface, you are a gentleman and a scholar; and I’ll mention your admirable house to my friends. By the way, I shall have to leave you for a few days.” “Going to leave us!” exclaimed Mr. Boniface, aghast. “I hope not till this job is put through.” “I must run about a bit,” muttered Pullwool, confidentially. “A little turn through the State, you understand, to stir up the country dis­ tricts. Some of the members ain’t as hot as they should be, and I want to set their constituents after them. Nothing like getting on a few deputations.” “ O, exactly!” chuckled Mr. Boniface, ramming his hands into his pockets and cheerfully jingling a bunch of keys and a penknife, for lack of silver. It was strange indeed that he should actually see the Devil in Mr. Pullwool’s eye and should not have a suspicion that he was in danger of being humbugged by him. “And your rooms?” he suggested. “How about them?” “I keep them,” replied the lobbyist, grandly, as if blaspheming the expense—to Boniface. “ Our friends must have a little hole to meet in. And while you are about it, Mr. Boniface, see that they get something to drink and smoke; and we’ll settle it between us.” “ Pre-cisely!” laughed the landlord, as much as to say, “My treat!” And so Mr. Pullwool, that Pericles and Lorenzo de’ Medici rolled in

chapter |7 pages

Jenette Finster’s Story Chapter XII

chapter XIV|14 pages

Chapter XIV

chapter |4 pages

Jenette Finster’s Story / 281

chapter |5 pages

Pickpocket Training Poem on Credit / 291 best terms he could. He put spurs to his old mare, rode before the news, and sold to the widow Lowly and her two sons, who had just come of age, about fifty thousand acres of land, which lay the Lord knows where, and to which he knew he had no title, and took all their father, the old deacon’s farm in mortgage, and threatens to turn the poor widow upon the town, and her two boys upon the world; but this is the way of the world. The ’Squire is a great speculator, he is of the quorum, can sit on the sessions, and fine poor girls for natural misteps; but I am a little rogue, who speculated in only fifty acres of rocks, and must stand here in the pillory. Then there is the state of Georgia. They sold millions of acres, to which they had no more title, than I to David Dray’s land. Their great men pocketed the money; and their Honourable Assembly publicly burnt all the records of their conveyance, and are now selling the lands again. But Georgia is a great Honourable State. They can keep Negro slaves, race horses, gouge out eyes, send, members to fight duels at Congress, and cry out for France and the guillotine, and be honoured in the land; while poor I, who never murdered any one, who never fought a duel or gouged an eye; and had too much honour to burn my forged deed, when I had once been wicked enough to make it, must stand here in the pillory, for I am a little rogue. Take warning by my sad fate; and if you must speculate in lands, let it be in millions of acres; and if you must be rogues, take warning by my unhappy fate and become great rogues.—For as it is said in a pair of verses I read when I was a boy,

by no means difficult to be understood in our times, would not go
ByHints to singers.—This song published a great many years since, and

chapter 296|13 pages

/ Further Selections

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Meleagris Gallopavo—the American Turkey / 309 The moneyed aristokrats are like certain fine coated animals, worth just what their hides will bring. The mackrels are remarkable for their numbers and the small kapi-tal they dew bizziness on; and while arrayed in their false dignity, and straining hard tew cheat us in awl things, are like a drunken man trie-ing tew walk a krack. The pedigrees hav mutch innosense and little courage. Content with the glory ov their ancestors, they are satisfied in holding under our noses a grandfather’s fossils, and fondly beleaf that the bones make them smell ov greatness. Finally, trieing tew be a fust klass aristokrat in America, just yet, appears tew us tew be almost as flattring an enterprise as climbing a greased pole. Thare is great doubt about our being able to reach the top, and if we dew succeed (and don’t pull the pole up after us) we will soon hav the mortifikashun ov seeing some other sheumaker climbing up the same pole. —Don’t be an aristocrat if you kan help it.

Audubon and other scientific bushwhackers having discribed the hab­ its, manners and personal appearance of this distinguished fowl, as it exists in its native thickets, I shall say little or nothing of the Wild Tur­

chapter |7 pages

sJ& T * Bibliographical Essay

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