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Looking for Child to be on Cover of a New Book, 'The Model Child'
PHILADELPHIA, Pa. -- The Philadelphia literary world will celebrate the launch of two new players today, April 10th: Kay Square Press, a new publishing company focused on Philadelphia-area artists, their stories, and their art; and Kay Square's first release, 'With the Rich and Mighty: Emlen Etting of Philadelphia' (ISBN: 978-0-9815129-0-7), a critical biography by Kenneth C. Kaleta.

FlatSigned Press Alleges Don Imus Remarks Damage Legacy of President Gerald R. Ford
NEW YORK, N.Y. -- Nathan Yungerberg, an accomplished model scout and professional child photographer is launching a nation-wide casting call to find the cover model for his highly anticipated book release, 'The Model Child: A Parents Guide to the Child Modeling Industry' (ISBN: 978-0-9817018-0-6).

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Dr. Reasono had accordingly taken his departure from the capital for
the mountains, where he instructed his wards in a practical
commentary of the ups and downs of life, by exposing them on the
verges of precipices and in the delights of the most fertile valleys
(which, as he justly observed, was the greater danger of the two),
leading them over flinty paths, hungry and cold, in order to try
their tempers; and setting up establishments with the most awkward
peasants for servants, to ascertain the depth of Chatterissa's
philosophy; with a variety of similar ingenious devices, that will
readily suggest themselves to all who have any matrimonial
experience, whether they live in palaces or cottages. When this part
of the trial was successfully terminated (the result having shown
that the gentle Chatterissa was of proof, so far as mere temper was
concerned), the whole party were ordered off to the barrier of ice,
which divides the monikin from the human region, with a view to
ascertain whether the warmth of their attachment was of a nature
likely to resist the freezing collisions of the world. Here,
unfortunately, (for the truth must be said), an unlucky desire of
Dr. Reasono, who was already F. U. D. G. E., but who had a devouring
ambition to become also M. O. R. E., led him into the extreme
imprudence of pushing through an opening, where he had formerly
discovered an island, on an ancient expedition of the same sort; and
on which island he thought he saw a rock, that formed a stratum of
what he believed to be a portion of the forty thousand square miles
that were discomposed by the great eruption of the earth's boiler.
The philosopher foresaw a thousand interesting results that were
dependent on the ascertaining of this important fact; for all the
learning of Leaphigh having been exhausted, some five hundred years
before, in establishing the greatest distance to which any fragment
had been thrown on that memorable occasion, great attention had
latterly been given to the discovery of the least distance any
fragment had been hurled. Perhaps I ought to speak tenderly of the
consequences of a learned zeal, but it was entirely owing to this
indiscretion that the whole party fell into the hands of certain
mariners who were sealing on the northern shores of this very
island, (friends and neighbors, as it afterwards appeared, of
Captain Poke), who remorselessly seized upon the travellers, and
sold them to a homeward-bound India-man, which they afterwards fell
in with near the island of St. Helena--St. Helena! the tomb of him
who is a model to all posterity, for the moderation of his desires,
the simplicity of his character, a deep veneration for truth,
profound reverence for justice, unwavering faith, and a clear
appreciation of all the nobler virtues.

We came in sight of the island in question, just as Dr. Reasono
concluded his interesting narrative; and, turning to Captain Poke, I
solemnly asked that discerning and shrewd seaman,--

"If he did not think the future would fully avenge itself of the
past--if history would not do ample justice to the mighty dead--if
certain names would not be consigned to everlasting infamy for
chaining a hero to a rock; and whether HIS country, the land of
freemen, would ever have disgraced itself, by such an act of
barbarism and vengeance?"

The captain heard me very calmly; then deliberately helping himself
to some tobacco, he replied,--

"Harkee, Sir John. At Stunin'tun, when we catch a ferocious
critter', we always put it in a cage. I'm no great mathematician, as
I've often told you; if my dog bites me once, I kick him--twice, I
beat him--thrice, I chain him."

Alas! there are minds so unfortunately constituted, that they have
no sympathies with the sublime. All their tendencies are direct and
common-sense like. To such men, Napoleon appears little better than
one who lived among his fellows more in the character of a tiger
than in that of a man. They condemn him because he could not reduce
his own sense of the attributes of greatness to the level of their
home-bred morality. Among this number, it would now seem, was to be
classed Captain Noah Poke.

A wish to relate the manner in which Dr. Reasono and his companions
fell into human hands, has caused me to overlook one or two matters
of lighter moment, that should not, in justice to myself, however,
be entirely omitted.

When we had been at sea two days, a very agreeable surprise for the
monikin party was prepared and executed. I had caused a certain
number of jackets and trousers to be made of the skins of different
animals, such as dogs, cats, sheep, tigers, leopards, hogs, etc.,
etc., with the proper accompaniments of snouts, hoofs, and claws;
and, when the ladies came on deck, after breakfast, their eyes were
no longer offended by our rude innovations upon nature, but the
whole crew were flying about the rigging, like so many animals of
the different species named. Noah and myself appeared in the
characters of sea-lions, the former having intimated that he
understood the nature of that beast better than any other. Of
course, this delicate attention was properly appreciated, and
handsomely acknowledged.

I had taken the precaution to order imitation-skins to be made of
cotton, which were worn in the low latitudes; and, as we got near
the Falkland Islands, the real skins were resumed, with promptitude,
and I might add, with pleasure.

Noah had, at first, raised some strong objections to the scheme,
saying that he should not feel safe in a ship manned and officered
altogether by wild beasts; but, at last, he came to enjoy the thing
as a good joke, never failing to hail the men, not by their names as
formerly, but, as he expressed it himself, "by their natur's";
calling out "You cat, scratch this"; "You tiger, jump here"; "You
hog, out of that dirt"'; "You dog, scamper there"; "You horse, haul
away," and divers other similar conceits, that singularly tickled
his fancy. The men themselves took up the ball, which they kept
rolling, embellished with all sorts of nautical witticisms; their
surname--they had but one, viz. Smith--being entirely dropped for
the new appellations. Thus, the sounds of "Tom Dog," "Jack Cat,"
"Bill Tiger," "Sam Hog," and "Dick Horse," were flying about the
deck from morning to night.

Good humor is a great alleviator of bodily privation. From the time
the ship lost sight of Staten Land, we had heavy weather, with hard
gales from the southward and westward; and we had the utmost
difficulty in making our southing. Observations now became a very
difficult matter, the sun being invisible for a week at a time. The
marine instinct of Noah, at this crisis, was of the last importance
to all on board. He gave us the cheering assurance, however, from
time to time, that we were going south, although the mates declared
that they knew not where the ship was, or whither she was running;
neither sun, moon, nor star having now been seen for more than a
week.

We had been in this state of anxiety and doubt for about a
fortnight, when Captain Poke suddenly appeared on deck, and called
for the cabin-boy, in his usual stentorian and no-denial voice, by
the name of "You Bob Ape"; for the duty of Robert requiring that he
should be much about the persons of the monikins, I had given him a
dress of apes' skins, as a garb that would be more congenial to
their tastes than that of a pig, or a weasel. Bob Ape was soon
forthcoming, and, as he approached his master, he quietly turned his
face from him, receiving, as a matter of course, three or four smart
admonitory hints, by way of letting him know that he was to be
active in the performance of the duty on which he was about to be
sent. On this occasion I made an odd discovery. Bob had profited by
the dimensions of his lower garment, which had been cut for a much
larger boy (one of those who had broken down in essaying the true
Doric of "Sir"), by stuffing it with an old union-jack-a sort of
"sarvice," as he afterwards told me, that saved him a good deal of
wear and tear of skin. To return to passing events, however; when
Robert had been duly kicked, he turned about manfully, and demanded
the captain's pleasure. He was told to bring the largest and fairest
pumpkin he could find, from the private stores of Mr. Poke, that
navigator never going to sea without a store of articles that he
termed "Stunin'tun food." The captain took the pumpkin between his
legs, and carefully peeled off the whole of its greenish-yellow
coat, leaving it a globe of a whitish color. He then asked for the
tar-bucket, and, with his fingers, traced various marks, which were
pretty accurate outlines of the different continents and the larger
islands of the world. The region near the south pole, however, he
left untouched; intimating that it contained certain sealing
islands, which he considered pretty much as the private property of
the Stunin'tunners.

"Now, Doctor," he said, pointing to the pumpkin, "there is the
'arth, and here is the tar-pot--just mark down the position of your
island of Leaphigh, if you please, according to the best accounts
your academy has of the matter. Make a dab here and there, if you
happen to know of any rocks and shoals. After that, you can lay down
the island where you were captured, giving a general idee of its
headlands and of the trending of the coast."

Dr. Reasono took a fid, and with its end he traced all the desired
objects with great readiness and skill. Noah examined the work, and
seemed satisfied that he had fallen into the hands of a monikin who
had very correct notions of bearings and distances, one, in short,
on whose local knowledge it might do to run even in the night. He
then projected the position of Stunnin'tun, an occupation in which
he took great delight, actually designing the meeting-house and the
principal tavern; after which, the chart was laid aside.




CHAPTER XIV.

HOW TO STEER SMALL--HOW TO RUN THE GAUNTLET WITH A SHIP--HOW TO GO
CLEAR--A NEW-FASHIONED SCREW--DOCK, AND CERTAIN MILE-STONES.


Captain Poke no longer deliberated about the course we were to
steer. With his pumpkin for a chart, his instinct for an
observation, and his nose for a compass, the sturdy sealer stood
boldly to the southward; or, at least, he ran dead before a stiff
gale, which, as he more than once affirmed, was as true a norther as
if bred and born in the Canadas.

After coursing over the billows at a tremendous rate for a day and a
night, the captain appeared on deck, with a face of unusual meaning,
and a mind loaded with its own reflections, as was proved by his
winking knowingly whenever he delivered himself of a sentiment; a
habit that he had most probably contracted, in early youth, at
Stunin'tun, for it seemed to be quite as inveterate as it was
thoroughbred.

"We shall soon know, Sir John," he observed, hitching the sea-lion
skin into symmetry, "whether it is sink or swim!"

"Pray explain yourself, Mr. Poke," cried I, in a little alarm. "If
anything serious is to happen, you are bound to give timely notice."

"Death is always untimely to some critturs, Sir John."

"Am I to understand, sir, that you mean to cast away the ship?"

"Not if I can help it, Sir John; but a craft that is foreordained to
be a wrack, will be a wrack, in spite of reefing and bracing. Look
ahead, you Dick Lion--ay, there you have it!"

There we had it, sure enough! I can only compare the scene which now
met my eyes, to a sudden view of the range of the Oberland Alps,
when the spectator is unexpectedly placed on the verge of the
precipice of the Weissenstein. There he would see before him a
boundless barrier of glittering ice, broken into the glorious and
fantastic forms of pinnacles, walls, and valleys; while here, we saw
all that was sublime in such a view heightened by the fearful action
of the boisterous ocean, which beat upon the impassable boundary in
ceaseless violence.

"Good God! Captain Poke," I exclaimed, the instant I caught a
glimpse of the formidable danger that menaced us, "you surely do not
mean to continue madly on, with such a warning of the consequences
in plain view?"

"What would you have, Sir John? Leaphigh lies on the t'other side of
these ice-islands!"

"But you need not run the ship against them--why not go round them?"

"Because they go round the 'arth, in this latitude. Now is the time
to speak, Sir John. If we are bound to Leaphigh, we have the choice
of three pretty desperate chances; to go through, to go under, or to
go over that there ice. If we are to put back, there is not a moment
to lose, for it may be even now questioned whether the ship would
claw off, as we are, with a sending sea, and this heavy norther."

I believe I would, at that moment, gladly have given up all my
social stakes to be well rid of the adventure. Still pride, that
substitute for so many virtues, the greatest and the most potent of
all hypocrites, forbade my betraying the desire to retreat. I
deliberated, while the ship flew; and when, at length, I turned to
the captain to suggest a doubt that might, at an earlier notice,
possibly have changed the whole aspect of affairs, he bluntly told
me it was too late. It was safer to proceed than to return, if
indeed, return were possible, in the present state of the winds and
waves. Making a merit of necessity, I braced my nerves to meet the
crisis, and remained a submissive, and, apparently, a calm spectator
of that which followed.

The Walrus (such was the name of our good ship) by this time was
under easy canvas, and yet, urged by the gale, she rolled down with
alarming velocity towards the boundary of foam where the congealed
and the still liquid element held their strife. The summits of the
frozen crags waved in their glittering glory in a way just to show
that they were afloat; and I remembered to have heard that, at
times, as their bases melted, entire mountains had been known to
roll over, engulfing all that lay beneath. To me it seemed but a
moment, before the ship was fairly overshadowed by these shining
cliffs, which, gently undulating, waved their frozen summits nearly
a thousand feet in air. I looked at Noah, in alarm, for it appeared
to me that he intentionally precipitated us to destruction. But,
just as I was about to remonstrate, he made a sign with his hand,
and the vessel was brought to the wind. Still retreat was
impossible; for the heave of the sea was too powerful, and the wind
too heavy, to leave us any hope of long keeping the Walrus from
drifting down upon the ragged peaks that bristled in icy glory to
leeward. Nor did Captain Poke himself seem to entertain any such
design; for, instead of hugging the gale, in order to haul off from
the danger, he had caused the yards to be laid perfectly square, and
we were now running, at a great rate, in a line nearly parallel with
the frozen coast, though gradually setting upon it.

"Keep full! Let her go through water, you Jim Tiger," said the old
sealer, whose professional ardor was fairly aroused. "Now, Sir John,
unluckily, we are on the wrong side of these ice mountains, for the
plain reason that Leaphigh lies to the south'ard of them. We must be
stirring, therefore, for no craft that was ever launched could keep
off these crags with such a gale driving home upon them, for more
than an hour or two. Our great concern, at present, is to look out
for a hole to run into."

"Why have you come so close to the danger, with your knowledge of
the consequences?"

"To own the truth, Sir John, natur' is natur', and I'm getting to be
a little near-sighted as I grow old; besides, I'm not so sartain
that the danger is the more dangerous, for taking a good, steady
look plump in its face."

Noah raised his hand, as much as to say he wished no answer, and
both of us were immediately occupied in gazing anxiously to leeward.
The ship was just opening a small cove in the ice, which might have
been a cable's length in depth, and a quarter of a mile across its
outer, or the widest part. Its form was regular, being that of a
semicircle; but, at its bottom, the ice, instead of forming a
continued barrier, like all the rest we had yet passed, was
separated by a narrow opening, that was bounded on each side by a
frowning precipice. The two bergs were evidently drawing nearer to
each other, but there was still a strait, or a watery gorge between
them, of some two hundred feet in width. As the ship plunged onward,
the pass was opened, and we caught a glimpse of the distant view to
leeward. It was merely a glimpse--the impatient Walrus allowing us
but a moment for examination--but it appeared sufficient for the
purposes of the old sealer. We were already across the mouth of the
cove, and within a cable's length of the ice again; for as we drew
near what may be called the little cape, we found ourselves once
more in closer proximity to the menacing mountain. It was a moment
when all depended on decision; and fortunately, our sealer, who was
so wary and procrastinating in a bargain, never had occasion to make
two drafts on his thoughts, in situations of emergency. As the ship
cleared the promontory on the eastern side of the cove, we again
opened a curvature of the ice, which gave a little more water to
leeward. Tacking was impossible, and the helm was put hard aweather.
The bow of the Walrus fell off, and as she rose on the next wave, I
thought its send would carry us helplessly down upon the berg. But
the good craft, obedient to her rudder, whirled round, as if
sensible herself of the danger, and, in less time than I had ever
before known her to wear, we felt the wind on the other quarter. Our
cats and dogs bestirred themselves, for there was no one there,
Captain Noah Poke excepted, whose heart did not beat quick and hard.
In much less time than usual, the yards were braced up on the other
tack, and the ship was ploughing heavily against the sea, with her
head to the westward. It is impossible to give one who has never
been in such a situation, a just idea of the feverish impatience,
the sinking and mounting of hope, as we watch the crablike movement
of a vessel that is clawing off a lee-shore, in a gale. In the
present case, it being well known that the sea was fathomless, we
had run so near the danger that not even the smallest of its horrors
was veiled from sight.

While the ship labored along, I saw the clouds fast shutting in to
windward, by the interposition of the promontory of ice--the certain
sign that our drift was rapid--and, as we drew nearer to the point,
breathing became labored and even audible. Here Noah took a chew of
tobacco, I presume on the principle of enjoying a last quid, should
the elements prove fatal; and then he went to the wheel in person.

"Let her go through the water," he said, easing the helm a little--
"let her jog ahead, or we shall lose command of her in this devil's-
pot!"

The vessel felt the slight change, and drew faster through the
foaming brine, bringing us, with increasing velocity, nearer to the
dreaded point. As we came up to the promontory the water fell back
in spray on the decks, and there was an instant when it appeared as
if the wind was about to desert us. Happily the ship had drawn so
far ahead as to feel the good effects of a slight change of current
that was caused by the air rushing obliquely into the cove; and, as
Noah, by easing the helm still more, had anticipated this
alteration, which had been felt adversely but a moment before, while
struggling to the eastward of the promontory, we drew swiftly past
the icy cape, opening the cove handsomely, with the ship's head
falling off fast towards the gorge.

There was but a minute or two, for squaring the yards and obtaining
the proper position to windward of the narrow strait. Instead of
running down in a direct line for the latter, Captain Poke kept the
ship on such a course as to lay it well open, before her head was
pointed towards the passage. By this time, the two bergs had drawn
so near each other as actually to form an arch across its mouth; and
this, too, at a part so low as to render it questionable whether
there was sufficient elevation to permit the Walrus to pass beneath.
But retreat was impossible, the gale urging the ship furiously
onwards. The width of the passage was now but little more than a
hundred feet, and it actually required the nicest steerage to keep
our yard-arms clear of the opposite precipices, as the vessel
dashed, with foaming bows, into the gorge. The wind drew through the
opening with tremendous violence, fairly howling as if in delight at
discovering a passage by which it might continue its furious career.
We may have been aided by the sucking of the wind and the waves,
both of which were irresistibly drawn towards the pass, or it is
quite probable that the skill of Captain Poke did us good service on
this awful occasion; but, owing to the one or the other, or to the
two causes united, the Walrus shot into the gorge so accurately as
to avoid touching either of the lateral margins of the ice. We were
not so fortunate, however, with the loftier spars; for scarcely was
the vessel beneath the arch, when she lifted on a swell, and her
main-top-gallant-mast snapped off in the cap. The ice groaned and
cracked over our heads, and large fragments fell both ahead and
astern of us, several of them even tumbling upon our decks. One
large piece came down within an inch of the extremity of Dr.
Reasono's tail, just escaping the dire calamity of knocking out the
brains of that profound and philo-monikin philosopher. In another
instant the ship was through the pass, which completely closed, with
the crash of an earthquake, as soon as possible afterwards.

Still driven by the gale, we ran rapidly towards the south, along a
channel less than a quarter of a mile in width, the bergs evidently
closing on each side of us, and the ship, as if conscious of her
jeopardy, doing her utmost, with Captain Poke still at the wheel. In
a little more than an hour, the worst was over--the Walrus issuing
into an open basin of several leagues in extent, which was, however,
completely encircled by the frozen mountains. Here Noah took a look
at the pumpkin, after which he made no ceremony in plumply telling
Dr. Reasono that he had been greatly mistaken in laying down the
position of Captivity Island, as he himself had named the spot where
the amiable strangers had fallen into human hands. The philosopher
was a little tenacious of his opinion; but what is argument in the
face of facts? Here was the pumpkin, and there were the blue waters!
The captain now quite frankly declared that he had great doubts
whether there was any such place as Leaphigh at all; and as the ship
had a capital position for such an object, he bluntly, though
privately proposed to me, that we should throw all the monikins
overboard, project the entire polar basin on his chart as being
entirely free from islands, and then go a-sealing. I rejected the
propositions, firstly, as premature; secondly, as inhuman; thirdly,
as inhospitable; fourthly, as inconvenient; and lastly, as
impracticable.

There might have arisen a disagreeable controversy between us on
this point; for Mr. Poke had begun to warm, and to swear that one
good seal, of the true quality of fur, was worth a hundred monkeys;
when most happily the panther at the masthead cried out that two of
the largest mountains, to the southward of us, were separating, and
that he could discern a passage into another basin. Hereupon Captain
Poke concentrated his oaths, which he caused to explode like a bomb,
and instantly made sail again in the proper direction. By three
o'clock, P.M., we had run the gauntlet of the bergs a second time,
and were at least a degree nearer the pole, in the basin just
alluded to.

The mountains had now entirely disappeared in the southern board;
but the sea was covered, far as the eye could reach, with field-ice.
Noah stood on, without apprehension; for the water had been smooth
ever since we entered the first opening, the wind not having rake
enough to knock up a swell. When about a mile from the margin of the
frozen and seemingly interminable plain, the ship was brought to the
wind, and hove-to.

Ever since the vessel left the docks, there had been six sets of
spars of a form so singular, lying among the booms, that they had
often been the subject of conversation between the mates and myself,
neither of the former being able to tell their uses. These sticks
were of no great length, some fifteen feet at the most, of sound
English oak. Two or three pairs were alike, for they were in pairs,
each pair having one of the sides of a shape resembling different
parts of the ship's bottom, with the exception that they were
chiefly concave, while the bottom of a vessel is mainly convex. At
one extremity each pair was firmly connected by a short, massive,
iron link, of about two feet in length; and, at its opposite end, a
large eye-bolt was driven into each stick, where it was securely
forelocked. When the Walrus was stationary, we learned, for the
first time, the uses of these unusual preparations. A pair of the
timbers, which were of great solidity and strength, were dropped
over the stern, and, sinking beneath the keel, their upper
extremities were separated by means of lanyards turned into the eye-
bolts. The lanyards were then brought forward to the bilge of the
vessel, where, by the help of tackles, the timbers were rowsed up in
such a manner that the links came close to the false keel, and the
timbers themselves were laid snug against each side of the ship. As
great care had been taken, by means of marks on the vessel, as well
as in forming the skids themselves, the fit was perfect. No less
than five pairs were secured in and near the bilge, and as many more
were distributed forwards and aft, according to the shape of the
bottom. Fore-and-aft pieces, that reached from one skid to the
other, were then placed between those about the bilge of the ship,
each of them having a certain number of short ribs, extending
upwards and downwards. These fore-and-aft pieces were laid along the
waterline, their ends entering the skids by means of mortices and
tenons, where they were snugly bolted. The result of the entire
arrangement was, to give the vessel an exterior protection against
the field-ice, by means of a sort of network of timber, the whole of
which had been so accurately fitted in the dock, as to bear equally
on her frame. These preparations were not fairly completed before
ten o'clock on the following morning, when Noah stood directly for
an opening in the ice before us, which just about that time began to
be apparent.