Some Famous Apologies.

Mr. George Riddle, the promising young actor, who is Miss Kate Field’s cousin, has written an open letter of apology to the Boston press. It appears that Mr. Riddle made his début upon the Boston stage about three weeks ago, and was very coldly received by the public and the critics. Before leaving the city, he sent a saucy letter to the local newspapers, informing the Boston people that they could go to thunder, and declaring that he would never again return to Boston in his professional capacity. Coming to think the thing over, however, Mr. Riddle concluded to apologize; and he has done so in very manly words. It almost kills some men to make an apology, but in very many instances it is the handsome and noble thing to do. If Mr. Riddle thinks that he ought to apologize for having played an engagement in Boston, and if he is sincerely sorry for it—why, all that we can say is, that he has done the manly thing in that apology. Greater men than Mr. Riddle have made mistakes, have recognized the folly thereof, and have apologized therefor. Ajax, for instance, defied the lightning once upon a time: he actually girt on his shield, took up his sword, and went out into a pelting storm, for the declared purpose of hurling opprobrious epithets at the electric 241fluid. He invited the press-reporters to be present; and he stood around in the rain for an hour or two, using very wicked old Greek language, and catching a very bad cold in his mucous membrane. Meanwhile the storm continued, and the lightning went right along doing business at the old stand. Next morning the sky was cloudless: the rain had refreshed all nature, and the air was full of the gratitude of flower and foliage. Ajax had been drinking camomile-tea all night, and he stepped out of his tent with his wife’s shawl tied around his head. Raising his grand, Hellenic countenance heavenward, he cried hoarsely, yet in tones of sincere contrition, “O light-dig, I have gub to abologize; dow if you will gure be of this gold in by head, we will be frieds agaid.”

There was another man, of the name of Canute, who had been so flattered by his courtiers that he imagined he was omnipotent. He had a proscenium-box erected on the seashore, and thereinto he ascended; and, in the presence of as many people as would fill our base-ball park three times, he called out to the sea to quit rolling up on the pebbly beach. No sooner, however, had he uttered this command, than a breaker of unusual size broke over the proscenium-box, ruining the furniture, and soaking Canute so thoroughly that he had great difficulty in getting off his underclothes. The next day Canute sent a written 242apology to the sea; and, as an earnest of his contrition, he ordered about fourscore of his courtiers to be bound to the tails of wild horses, as was a custom in those merry old times.