NO. XII.—SATURDAY, JUNE 27, 1807.

FROM MY ELBOW-CHAIR.

Some men delight in the study of plants, in the dissection of a leaf, or in the contour and complexion of a tulip; others are charmed with the beauties of the feathered race, or the varied hues of the insect tribe. A naturalist will spend hours in the fatiguing pursuit of a butterfly, and a man of the ton will waste whole years in the chase of a fine lady. I feel a respect for their avocations, for my own are somewhat similar. I love to open the great volume of human character; to me the examination of a beau is more interesting than that of a daffodil or narcissus, and I feel a thousand times more pleasure in catching a new view of human nature, than in kidnapping the most gorgeous butterfly—even an Emperor of Morocco himself!

In my present situation I have ample room for the indulgence of this taste; for, perhaps, there is not a house in this city more fertile in subjects for the anatomist of human character, than my Cousin Cockloft’s. Honest Christopher, as I have before mentioned, is one of those hearty old cavaliers who pride themselves upon keeping up the good, honest, unceremonious hospitality of old 255times. He is never so happy as when he has drawn about him a knot of sterling-hearted associates, and sits at the head of his table dispensing a warm, cheering welcome to all. His countenance expands at every glass and beams forth emanations of hilarity, benevolence, and goodfellowship, that inspire and gladden every guest around him. It is no wonder, therefore, that such excellent social qualities should attract a host of friends and guests; in fact, my cousin is almost overwhelmed with them, and they all, uniformly, pronounce old Cockloft to be one of the finest old fellows in the world. His wine also always comes in for a good share of their approbation; nor do they forget to do honor to Mrs. Cockloft’s cookery, pronouncing it to be modeled after the most approved recipes of Heliogabalus and Mrs. Glasse. The variety of company thus attracted is particularly pleasing to me; for, being considered a privileged person in the family, I can sit in a corner, indulge in my favorite amusement of observation, and retreat to my elbow-chair like a bee to his hive, whenever I have collected sufficient food for meditation.

Will Wizard is particularly efficient in adding to the stock of originals which frequent our house; for he is one of the most inveterate hunters of oddities I ever knew; and his first care, on making a new acquaintance, is to gallant him to old Cockloft’s, where he never fails to receive the freedom of the house in a pinch from his gold box. Will has, without exception, the queerest, most eccentric, and indescribable set of intimates 256that ever man possessed; how he became acquainted with them I cannot conceive, except by supposing there is a secret attraction or unintelligible sympathy that unconsciously draws together oddities of every soil.

Will’s great crony for some time was Tom Straddle, to whom he took a great liking. Straddle had just arrived in an importation of hardware, fresh from the city of Birmingham, or rather, as the most learned English would call it, Brummagem, so famous for its manufactories of gimlets, penknives, and pepper-boxes; and where they make buttons and beaux enough to inundate our whole country. He was a young man of considerable standing in the manufactory at Birmingham, sometimes had the honor to hand his master’s daughter into a tim-whisky, was the oracle of the tavern he frequented on Sundays, and could beat all his associates, if you would take his word for it, in boxing, beer-drinking, jumping over chairs, and imitating cats in a gutter and opera singers. Straddle was, moreover, a member of a Catch Club, and was a great hand at ringing bob-majors; he was, of course, a complete connoisseur of music, and entitled to assume that character at all performances in the art. He was likewise a member of a Spouting Club, had seen a company of strolling actors perform in a barn, and had even, like Abel Drugger, “enacted” the part of Major Sturgeon with considerable applause; he was consequently a profound critic, and fully authorized to turn up his nose at any American performances. He had twice partaken of annual dinners, given 257to the head manufacturers of Birmingham, where he had the good fortune to get a taste of turtle and turbot, and a smack of champagne and Burgundy; and he had heard a vast deal of the roast beef of Old England; he was therefore epicure sufficient to d—n every dish, and every glass of wine he tasted in America, though, at the same time, he was as voracious an animal as ever crossed the Atlantic. Straddle had been splashed half a dozen times by the carriages of nobility, and had once the superlative felicity of being kicked out of doors by the footman of a noble duke; he could, therefore, talk of nobility and despise the untitled plebeians of America. In short, Straddle was one of those dapper, bustling, florid, round, self-important “gemmen” who bounce upon us, half beau, half button-maker; undertake to give us the true polish of the bon-ton, and endeavor to inspire us with a proper and dignified contempt of our native country.

Straddle was quite in raptures when his employers determined to send him to America as an agent. He considered himself as going among a nation of barbarians, where he would be received as a prodigy; he anticipated, with a proud satisfaction, the bustle and confusion his arrival would occasion; the crowd that would throng to gaze at him as he passed through the streets; and had little doubt but that he should occasion as much curiosity as an Indian chief or a Turk in the streets of Birmingham. He had heard of the beauty of our women, and chuckled at the thought of how completely he should eclipse their unpolished 258beaux, and the number of despairing lovers that would mourn the hour of his arrival. I am even informed by Will Wizard that he put good store of beads, spike-nails, and looking-glasses in his trunk to win the affections of the fair ones as they paddled about in their bark canoes. The reason Will gave for this error of Straddle’s, respecting our ladies, was, that he had read in Guthrie’s Geography that the aborigines of America were all savages; and not exactly understanding the word “aborigines,” he applied to one of his fellow-apprentices, who assured him that it was the Latin word for inhabitants.

Wizard used to tell another anecdote of Straddle, which always put him in a passion: Will swore that the captain of the ship told him, that when Straddle heard they were off the banks of Newfoundland, he insisted upon going on shore there to gather some good cabbages, of which he was excessively fond. Straddle, however, denied all this, and declared it to be a mischievous quiz of Will Wizard; who indeed often made himself merry at his expense. However this may be, certain it is, he kept his tailor and shoemaker constantly employed for a month before his departure; equipped himself with a smart crooked stick about eighteen inches long, a pair of breeches of most unheard-of length, a little short pair of Hoby’s white topped boots, that seemed to stand on tip-toe to reach his breeches, and his hat had the true transatlantic declination toward his right ear. The fact was—nor did he make any secret of it—he was determined to “astonish the natives a few!”

259Straddle was not a little disappointed on his arrival, to find the Americans were rather more civilized than he had imagined; he was suffered to walk to his lodgings unmolested by a crowd, and even unnoticed by a single individual; no love-letters came pouring in upon him; no rivals lay in wait to assassinate him; his very dress excited no attention, for there were many fools dressed equally ridiculously with himself. This was mortifying indeed to an aspiring youth, who had come out with the idea of astonishing and captivating. He was equally unfortunate in his pretensions to the character of critic, connoisseur, and boxer; he condemned our whole dramatic corps, and everything appertaining to the theatre; but his critical abilities were ridiculed; he found fault with old Cockloft’s dinner, not even sparing his wine, and was never invited to the house afterward; he scoured the streets at night, and was cudgeled by a sturdy watchman; he hoaxed an honest mechanic, and was soundly kicked. Thus disappointed in all his attempts at notoriety, Straddle hit on the expedient which was resorted to by the Giblets—he determined to take the town by storm. He accordingly bought horses and equipages, and forthwith made a furious dash at style in a gig and tandem.

As Straddle’s finances were but limited, it may easily be supposed that his fashionable career infringed a little upon his consignment, which was indeed the case, for, to use a true cockney phrase, Brummagem suffered. But this was a circumstance that made little impression upon Straddle 260who was now a lad of spirit, and lads of spirit always despise the sordid cares of keeping another man’s money. Suspecting this circumstance, I never could witness any of his exhibitions of style, without some whimsical association of ideas. Did he give an entertainment to a host of guzzling friends, I immediately fancied them gormandizing heartily at the expense of poor Birmingham, and swallowing a consignment of hand-saws and razors. Did I behold him dashing through Broadway in his gig, I saw him, “in my mind’s eye,” driving tandem on a nest of tea-boards; nor could I ever contemplate his cockney exhibitions of horsemanship, but my mischievous imagination would picture him spurring a cask of hardware, like rosy Bacchus bestriding a beer barrel, or the little gentleman who bestraddles the world in the front of Hutching’s almanac.

Straddle was equally successful with the Giblets, as may well be supposed; for though pedestrian merit may strive in vain to become fashionable in Gotham, yet a candidate in an equipage is always recognized, and like Philip’s ass, laden with gold, will gain admittance everywhere. Mounted in his curricle or his gig, the candidate is like a statue elevated on a high pedestal, his merits are discernible from afar, and strike the dullest optics. O, Gotham, Gotham! most enlightened of cities!—how does my heart swell with delight when I behold your sapient inhabitants lavishing their attention with such wonderful discernment!

Thus Straddle became quite a man of ton, and 261was caressed, and courted, and invited to dinners and balls. Whatever was absurd or ridiculous in him before, was now declared to be the style. He criticised our theatre, and was listened to with reverence. He pronounced our musical entertainments barbarous; and the judgment of Apollo himself would not have been more decisive. He abused our dinners: and the god of eating, if there be any such deity, seemed to speak through his organs. He became at once a man of taste, for he put his malediction on everything; and his arguments were conclusive, for he supported every assertion with a bet. He was likewise pronounced, by the learned in the fashionable world, a young man of great research and deep observation; for he had sent home, as natural curiosities, an ear of Indian corn, a pair of moccasins, a belt of wampum, and a four-leaved clover. He had taken great pains to enrich this curious collection with an Indian and a cataract, but without success. In fine, the people talked of Straddle and his equipage, and Straddle talked of his horses, until it was impossible for the most critical observer to pronounce, whether Straddle or his horses were most admired, or whether Straddle admired himself or his horses most.

Straddle was now in the zenith of his glory. He swaggered about parlors and drawing rooms with the same unceremonious confidence he used to display in the taverns at Birmingham. He accosted a lady as he would a bar-maid; and this was pronounced a certain proof that he had been 262used to better company in Birmingham. He became the great man of all the taverns between New York and Harlem, and no one stood a chance of being accommodated, until Straddle and his horses were perfectly satisfied. He d——d the landlords and waiters with the best air in the world, and accosted them with the true gentlemanly familiarity. He staggered from the dinner-table to the play, entered the box like a tempest, and staid long enough to be bored to death, and to bore all those who had the misfortune to be near him. From thence he dashed off to a ball time enough to flounder through a cotillon, tear half a dozen gowns, commit a number of other depredations, and make the whole company sensible of his infinite condescension in coming amongst them. The people of Gotham thought him a prodigious fine fellow; the young bucks cultivated his acquaintance with the most persevering assiduity; and his retainers were sometimes complimented with a seat in his curricle, or a ride on one of his fine horses. The belles were delighted with the attentions of such a fashionable gentleman, and struck with astonishment at his learned distinctions between wrought scissors and those of cast-steel; together with his profound dissertations on buttons and horse flesh. The rich merchants courted his acquaintance because he was an Englishman, and their wives treated him with great deference because he had come from beyond seas. I cannot help here observing that your salt water is a marvelous great sharpener of men’s wits, and I intend to recommend 263it to some of my acquaintance in a particular essay.

Straddle continued his brilliant career for only a short time. His prosperous journey over the turnpike of fashion was checked by some of those stumbling-blocks in the way of aspiring youth, called creditors, or duns—a race of people who, as a celebrated writer observes, “are hated by gods and men.” Consignments slackened, whispers of distant suspicion floated in the dark, and those pests of society, the tailors and shoemakers, rose in rebellion against Straddle. In vain were all his remonstrances, in vain did he prove to them that though he had given them no money, yet he had given them more custom, and as many promises as any young man in the city. They were inflexible, and the signal of danger being given, a host of other prosecutors pounced upon his back. Straddle saw there was but one way for it; he determined to do the thing genteelly, to go to smash like a hero, and dashed into the limits in high style, being the fifteenth gentleman I have known to drive tandem to the—ne plus ultra—the d——l.

Unfortunate Straddle! May thy fate be a warning to all young gentlemen who come out from Birmingham to astonish the natives! I should never have taken the trouble to delineate his character had he not been a genuine cockney, and worthy to be the representative of his numerous tribe. Perhaps my simple countrymen may hereafter be able to distinguish between the real English gentleman, and individuals of the cast 264I have heretofore spoken of, as mere mongrels, springing at one bound from contemptible obscurity at home to daylight and splendor in this good-natured land. The true-born and true-bred English gentleman is a character I hold in great respect; and I love to look back to the period when our forefathers flourished in the same generous soil, and hailed each other as brothers. But the cockney!—when I contemplate him as springing, too, from the same source, I feel ashamed of the relationship, and am tempted to deny my origin. In the character of Straddle is traced the complete outline of a true cockney, of English growth, and a descendant of that individual facetious character mentioned by Shakespeare, “who, in pure kindness to his horse, buttered his hay.”^[61]

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THE STRANGER AT HOME; OR, A TOUR IN BROADWAY.

BY JEREMY COCKLOFT, THE YOUNGER.

PREFACE.

Your learned traveller begins his travels at the commencement of his journey; others begin theirs at the end; and a third class begin anyhow and anywhere, which I think is the true way. A late facetious writer begins what he calls a “Picture of New York,” with a particular description of Glen’s Falls, from whence, with admirable dexterity, he makes a digression to the celebrated Mill Rock on Long Island! Now, this is what I like; and I intend, in my present tour, to digress as often and as long as I please. If, therefore, I choose to make a hop, skip, and jump to China, or New Holland, or Terra Incognita, or Communipaw, I can produce a host of examples to justify me, even in books that have been praised by the English reviewers, whose fiat being all that is necessary to give books a currency in this country, I am determined, as soon as I finish my edition of travels in seventy-five volumes, to transmit it forthwith to them for judgment. If these Transatlantic censors praise it, I have no fear of its success in this country, where their approbation gives, like the Tower stamp, a fictitious value, and makes tinsel and wampum pass current for classic gold.

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