Volume 2 — Whiz Bang Editorials

“The Bull is Mightier Than the Bullet”

“Life is a jest and all things show it; I thought so once but now I know it,” is Gay’s gloomy epitaph in Westminster Abbey. Did he receive this impression when he walked the streets of London? In his poem, “Trivia,” he tells us how to walk the streets, what to wear, the good people to address, the industrious ones to encourage, and the bad folks to pass by.

Poe, in his “Man in the Crowd,” writes of the mass of people, and of beggar, tramp and peddler; of the modest, pretty girl; of the women of the town like the statue in Lucian “with a surface of Parian marble and with interior filled with filth”; and of a man who walked all the crowded streets of London to get away from himself.

De Quincy visits the Strand and says: “There one feels like a single wave in the total Atlantic—like one plant in the forest of America.” The loneliness of his heart oppresses him among the crowd of unending faces which have no friendly word for him, and he stands “among hurrying figures of men weaving to and fro, seeming like a masque of maniacs or a pageant of phantoms.”

Stand on the corners, walk the streets of our own big cities, the capitals of the Old World, or far-away countries, and behold the extremes of work and idleness, vice and virtue, sickness and health, innocent mirth and mad amusement. The people follow each other like the waves of a storm-tossed sea, and long after you have returned to your room their walking, talking, laughing and crying comes to you like the sad moan of the sea trying to be at peace.

Nature is the place to study God in the book of field, mountain and ocean. City streets are the place to study man in the sham, struggle and sin of life.

In the afternoon and evening, work gives way to play. All classes meet and mingle on the street; silk and cotton, glove and hard hand, auto and carriage, revel in a democracy of delight. It is as necessary and natural to play as to work, and we must have rest, recreation and rejoicing.

At night good people say an early “Good night,” read their Bible, pray, put out the light, and snore. The Devil begins just then to light his red lamp and lead his votaries into paths that too often end in disease of body, darkness of mind, and death of soul. Next morning high society may hush up the disgrace and infamy, but guilty hearts know their own bitterness and that evening’s comedy has turned to morning’s tragedy.

Cities resemble a Demon’s brain, and the women of the night are its evil thoughts. There are too many wantons with powdered face, brazen look and leering laughter; too many giddy girls with bare necks and shoulders, abbreviated skirts and hobbled feet walking the streets.

If there were no girls,—but there are more girls than boys, and necessarily for wives and mothers to fill the vacancies caused by war, vice and death. If there were no streets,—but streets are essential as arteries of commerce, avenues of friendly meeting and public parade.

Morning, noon and night we walk the street and see dishonesty, impurity, poverty and disease,—old and young jostling each other in seeming joy; but their tell-tale faces speak of a heart with a secret grave of shame, where they fear they may stumble over a ghastly grinning skull that will mock their joy.

It will take more than Art Galleries, Symphony Concerts, Parks, Vice Commissions and Grand Jury reports to make the streets of city life clean and its boys and girls good citizens. The cure for sin is not a piece of court-plaster to cover over wrong, but the Gospel of hand, head and heart that trains a child’s soul, mind and will in the way he should go so that when he is old his steps will not depart from it.

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The merits and demerits of prohibition and the lawful consumption of the grand old hootch of the good old days have been subject to warm debates as far back as history can be traced. Here’s one from Hollinshed’s Chronicles of 1577:

We distinguisheth three sortes thereof—Simplex, Composita, Perfectissima—Beying Moderately taken, sayeth he, it sloweth age, it strengthen youth; it helpeth digestion; it cutteth fleume; it abandoneth melancholie; it relisheth the taste; it lighteneth the mynd; it quickeneth the spirites; it cureth the hydropsie; it healeth the strangury; it pounceth the stone; it repelleth gravel; it puffeth away ventositie; it kepyth and preserveth the bed from whyrlyng, the eyes from dazelyng, the tongue from lispyng, the mouth from snafflyng, the teethe from chatteryng, the throte from ratlyng, the reason from stieflyng, the stomach from womblyng, the harte from swellyng, the bellie from wirtchyng, the guts from rumblyng, the hands from shiveryng, the sinoews from shrinkyng, the veynes from crumplyng, the bones from akyng, the marrow from soakyng—and trulie it is a sovereign liquor if it be orderlie taken.

Sir Walter Scott brought out the point that prohibition is as intemperate as drunkenness, when he wrote:

“Know, foolish Saracen,” replied the Christian without hesitation, “that thou blasphemest the gifts of God....

“The juice of the grape is given to him that will use it wisely, as that which cheers the heart of man after toil, refreshes him in sickness and comforts him in sorrow. He who so enjoyeth it may thank God for His wine cup as for His daily bread; and he who abuseth the gift of Heaven is not a greater fool in his intoxication than thou in thine abstinence.”

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Literary criticism is prone to make a great deal of bother about something that nobody cares two pins for, but sometimes, after the fabric of discussion has been thoroughly masticated, literary criticism does come down to bed rock and agree on one point which is incontrovertible. Among the subjects in which there is at present a universal agreement is the declaration that the American short story is the highest in perfection of any form of fiction that is put out in the world. Even the French, artists as they are, must take a back seat when it comes to the writing of tales that are brief and effective.

It was the coruscating Ouida who emphasized the fact that flowers of the most exquisite beauty have their origin in the backyard heaps—wonderful passion blossoms bloom gorgeously in surroundings that are the worst. The connection has never been established, but the coincidence is indisputable, that the vaunted American short story, so clean morally and so harmless that the most modest virgin may read it without fear of being corrupted, is modeled upon the naughty story, conspicuously American in its construction, which would paralyze with horror any virgin who should happen to lend to its recital an attentive ear.

If one could but divest himself of his moral pulchritude, what paeans of praise would be poured forth in honor of that sinful and abhorrent thing, the naughty story! It is so brilliant, so forceful, so perfectly filed down and sharpened and polished until its edge is like the edge of a Damascus blade and its point is finer than a needle’s! Instinctively the teller of such a tale flings aside every detail which is not absolutely essential to the narrative. There is not a word too much. There is not a trace of description which, could be dispensed with. All—all is sacrificed to the exigency of brevity and to the final effect.

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A Song Without Music

My sweetheart’s a mule in the mine; I drive her without any line; on the bumper I sit, and tobacco I spit, all over my sweet Jenny’s spine.

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Our Monthly Motto

Wine, women and song are the ruination of man, so I’ve cut out singing.

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Baseball Extra

The game opened with Molasses at the stick and Smallpox catching. Cigar was in the box with plenty of smoke. Horn played first base and Fiddle on second base. Backed by Corn in the field made it hot for the umpire. Apple, who was rotten. Axe came to bat and chopped. Cigars let Brick walk and Sawdust filled the bases. Song made a hit and Twenty scored. Cigar went out and Balloon started to pitch, but went straight up. Then Cherry tried, but went wild. Old Ice kept cool in the game until he was hit by a pitched ball, then you ought to have heard Ice scream. Cabbage had a good head and kept quiet. Grass covered lots of ground and the crowd cheered when Spider caught a fly. Bread loafed on third base and bumped. Organ, who played a fast game, put out Lightning. In the fifth inning Wind began to blow what he could do. Hammer began to knock and Trees began to leave. The way they roasted Peanuts was a fright. Knife was put out for cutting first base. Lightning finished pitching and struck out six men. In the ninth Apple told Fiddle to take first base and then Song made a hit. Trombone made a slide and Meat was put out on the plate. There was a lot of betting on the game. But Soap cleaned up. The score was 1-0. Door said if he had pitched he would have shut them out.

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Jonah to the whale: How far are we from land?

Whale: Three thousand miles.

Jonah: Don’t leave me, big boy!