E. P. Roe - "Miss Lou"

P. G. Wodehouse - "The Intrusion of Jimmy"

Vernon Lee - "A Phantom Lover"

Robert Steele - "Mediaeval Lore from Bartholomew Anglicus"

New Philadelphia Book Publisher Highlights Local Talent
Book and Publishing News from Publishers Newswire(tm)

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).

Books: Title

J >> J. Fenimore Cooper >> Title




The torment of such pictures grew to be intolerable, and I rushed
into the open air for relief. How long or whither I wandered I know
not; but on the morning of the following day I found I was seated in
a guinguette near the base of Montmartre, eagerly devouring a roll
and refreshing myself with sour wine. When a little recovered from
the shock of discovering myself in a situation so novel (for having
no investment in guinguettes, I had not taken sufficient interest in
these popular establishments ever to enter one before), I had
leisure to look about and survey the company. Some fifty Frenchmen
of the laboring classes were drinking on every side, and talking
with a vehemence of gesticulation and a clamor that completely
annihilated thought. This then, thought I, is a scene of popular
happiness. These creatures are excellent fellows, enjoying
themselves on liquor that has not paid the city duty, and perhaps I
may seize upon some point that favors my system among spirits so
frank and clamorous. Doubtless if any one among them is in
possession of any important social secret it will not fail to escape
him here. From meditations of this philosophical character I was
suddenly aroused by a violent blow before me, accompanied with an
exclamation in very tolerable English of the word,

"King!"

On the centre of the board which did the office of a table, and
directly beneath my eyes, lay a clenched fist of fearful dimensions,
that in color and protuberances bore a good deal of resemblance to a
freshly unearthed Jerusalem artichoke. Its sinews seemed to be
cracking with tension, and the whole knob was so expressive of
intense pugnacity that my eyes involuntarily sought its owner's
face. I had unconsciously taken my seat directly opposite a man
whose stature was nearly double that of the compact, bustling
sputtering, and sturdy little fellows who were bawling on every side
of us, and whose skinny lips, instead of joining in the noise, were
so firmly compressed as to render the crevice of the mouth no more
strongly marked than a wrinkle in the brow of a man of sixty. His
complexion was naturally fair, but exposure had tanned the skin of
his face to the color of the crackle of a roasted pig; those parts
which a painter would be apt to term the "high lights" being
indicated by touches of red, nearly as bright as fourth-proof
brandy. His eyes were small, stern, fiery, and very gray; and just
at the instant they met my admiring look they resembled two stray
coals that by some means had got separated from the body of adjacent
heat in the face. He had a prominent, well-shaped nose, athwart
which the skin was stretched like leather in the process of being
rubbed down on the currier's bench, and his ropy black hair was
carefully smoothed over his temples and brows, in a way to show that
he was abroad on a holiday excursion.

When our eyes met, this singular-looking being gave me a nod of
friendly recognition, for no better reason that I could discover
than the fact that I did not appear to be a Frenchman. "Did mortal
man ever listen to such fools, captain?" he observed, as if certain
we must think alike on the subject.

"Really I did not attend to what was said; there certainly is much
noise."

"I don't pretend to understand a word of what they are saying
myself; but it SOUNDS like thorough nonsense."

"My ear is not yet sufficiently acute to distinguish sense from
nonsense by mere intonation and sound--but it would seem, sir, that
you speak English only."

"Therein you are mistaken; for, being a great traveller, I have been
compelled to look about me, and as a nat'ral consequence I speak a
little of all languages. I do not say that I use the foreign parts
of speech always fundamentally, but then I worry through an idee so
as to make it legible and of use, especially in the way of eating
and drinking. As to French, now, I can say 'don-nez-me some van,'
and 'don-nez-vous some pan,' as well as the best of them; but when
there are a dozen throats bawling at once, as is the case with these
here chaps, why one might as well go on the top of Ape's Hill and
hold a conversation with the people he will meet with there, as to
pretend to hold a rational or a discussional discourse. For my part,
where there is to be a conversation, I like every one to have his
turn, keeping up the talk, as it might be, watch and watch; but
among these Frenchmen it is pretty much as if their idees had been
caged, and the door being suddenly opened, they fly out in a flock,
just for the pleasure of saying they are at liberty."

I now perceived that my companion was a reflecting being, his
ratiocination being connected by regular links, and that he did not
boost his philosophy on the leaping-staff of impulse, like most of
those who were sputtering, and arguing, and wrangling, with untiring
lungs, in all corners of the guinguette. I frankly proposed,
therefore, that we should quit the place and walk into the road,
where our discourse would be less disturbed, and consequently more
satisfactory. The proposal was well received, and we left the
brawlers, walking by the outer boulevards towards my hotel in the
Rue de Rivoli, by the way of the Champs Elysees.




CHAPTER VII.

TOUCHING AN AMPHIBIOUS ANIMAL, A SPECIAL INTRODUCTION, AND ITS
CONSEQUENCES.


I soon took an interest in my new acquaintance. He was
communicative, shrewd, and peculiar; and though apt to express
himself quaintly, it was always with the pith of one who had seen a
great deal of at least one portion of his fellow-creatures. The
conversation, under such circumstances, did not flag; on the
contrary, it soon grew more interesting by the stranger's beginning
to touch on his private interests. He told me that he was a mariner
who had been cast ashore by one of the accidents of his calling,
and, by way of cutting in a word in his own favor, he gave me to
understand that he had seen a great deal, more especially of that
castle of his fellow-creatures who like himself live by frequenting
the mighty deep.

"I am very happy," I said, "to have met with a stranger who can give
me information touching an entire class of human beings with whom I
have as yet had but little communion. In order that we may improve
the occasion to the utmost, I propose that we introduce ourselves to
each other at once, and swear an eternal friendship, or, at least,
until we may find it convenient to dispense with the obligation."

"For my part, I am one who likes the friendship of a dog better than
his enmity," returned my companion, with a singleness of purpose
that left him no disposition to waste his breath in idle
compliments. "I accept the offer, therefore, with all my heart; and
this the more readily because you are the only one I have met for a
week who can ask me how I do without saying, 'Come on, cong portez-
vous.' Being used to meet with squalls, however, I shall accept your
offer under the last condition named."

I liked the stranger's caution. It denoted a proper care of
character, and furnished a proof of responsibility. The condition
was therefore accepted on my part as frankly as it had been urged on
his.

"And now, sir," I added, when we had shaken each other very
cordially by the hand, "may I presume to ask your name?"

"I am called Noah, and I don't care who knows it. I am not ashamed
of either of my names, whatever else I may be ashamed of."

"Noah--?"

"Poke, at your service." He pronounced the word slowly and very
distinctly, as if what he had just said of his self-confidence were
true. As I had afterward occasion to take his signature, I shall at
once give it in the proper form--"Capt. Noah Poke."

"Of what part of England are you a native, Mr. Poke?"

"I believe I may say of the new parts."

"I do not know that any portion of the island was so designated.
Will you have the good-nature to explain yourself?"

"I'm a native of Stunin'tun, in the State of Connecticut, in old New
England. My parents being dead, I was sent to sea a four-year-old,
and here I am, walking about the kingdom of France without a cent in
my pocket, a shipwrecked mariner. Hard as my lot is, to say the
truth, I'd about as leave starve as live by speaking their d--d
lingo."

"Shipwrecked--a mariner--starving--and a Yankee!"

"All that, and maybe more, too; though, by your leave, commodore,
we'll drop the last title. I'm proud enough to call myself a Yankee,
but my back is apt to get up when I hear an Englishman use the word.
We are yet friends, and it may be well enough to continue so until
some good comes of it to one or other of the parties."

"I ask your pardon, Mr. Poke, and will not offend again. Have you
circumnavigated the globe?"

Captain Poke snapped his fingers, in pure contempt of the simplicity
of the question.

"Has the moon ever sailed round the 'arth! Look here, a moment,
commodore"--he took from his pocket an apple, of which he had been
munching half a-dozen during the walk, and held it up to view--"draw
your lines which way you will on this sphere; crosswise or
lengthwise, up or down, zigzag or parpendic'lar, and you will not
find more traverses than I've worked about the old ball!"

"By land as well as by sea?"

"Why, as to the land, I've had my share of that, too; for it has
been my hard fortune to run upon it, when a softer bed would have
given a more quiet nap. This is just the present difficulty with me,
for I am now tacking about among these Frenchmen in order to get
afloat again, like an alligator floundering in the mud. I lost my
schooner on the northeast coast of Russia--somewhere hereabouts,"
pointing to the precise spot on the apple; "we were up there trading
in skins-and finding no means of reaching home by the road I'd come,
and smelling salt water down hereaway, I've been shaping my course
westward for the last eighteen months, steering as near as might be
directly athwart Europe and Asia; and here I am at last within two
days' run of Havre, which is, if I can get good Yankee planks
beneath me once more, within some eighteen or twenty days' run of
home."

"You allow me, then, to call the planks Yankee?"

"Call 'em what you please, commodore; though I should prefar to call
'em the 'Debby and Dolly of Stunin'tun,' to anything else, for that
was the name of the craft I lost. Well, the best of us are but
frail, and the longest-winded man is no dolphin to swim with his
head under water!"

"Pray, Mr. Poke, permit me to ask where you learned to speak the
English language with so much purity?"

"Stunin'tun--I never had a mouthful of schooling but what I got at
home. It's all homespun. I make no boast of scholarship; but as for
navigating, or for finding my way about the 'arth, I'll turn my back
on no man, unless it be to leave him behind. Now we have people with
us that think a great deal of their geometry and astronomies, but I
hold to no such slender threads. My way is, when there is occasion
to go anywhere, to settle it well in my mind as to the place, and
then to make as straight a wake as natur' will allow, taking little
account of charts, which are as apt to put you wrong as right; and
when they do get you into a scrape it's a smasher! Depend on
yourself and human natur', is my rule; though I admit there is some
accommodation in a compass, particularly in cold weather."

"Cold weather! I do not well comprehend the distinction."

"Why, I rather conclude that one's scent gets to be dullish in a
frost; but this may be no more than a conceit after all, for the two
times I've been wrecked were in summer, and both the accidents
happened by sheer dint of hard blowing, and in broad daylight, when
nothing human short of a change of wind could have saved us."

"And you prefer this peculiar sort of navigation?"

"To all others, especially in the sealing business, which is my raal
occupation. It's the very best way in the world to discover islands;
and everybody knows that we sealers are always on the lookout for
su'thin' of that sort."

"Will you suffer me to inquire, Captain Poke, how many times you
have doubled Cape Horn?"

My navigator threw a quick, jealous glance at me, as if he
distrusted the nature of the question.

"Why, that is neither here nor there; perhaps I don't double either
of the capes, perhaps I do. I get into the South Sea with my craft,
and it's of no great moment how it's done. A skin is worth just as
much in the market, though the furrier may not happen to have a
glossary of the road it has travelled."

"A glossary?"

"What matters a signification, commodore, when people understand
each other? This overland journey has put me to my wits, for you
will understand that I've had to travel among natives that cannot
speak a syllable of the homespun; so I brought the schooner's
dictionary with me as a sort of terrestrial almanac, and I fancied
that, as they spoke gibberish to me, the best way was to give it to
them back again as near as might be in their own coin, hoping I
might hit on su'thin' to their liking. By this means I've come to be
rather more voluble than formerly."

"The idea was happy."

"No doubt it was, as is just evinced. But having given you a pretty
clear insight into my natur' and occupation, it is time that I ask a
few questions of you. This is a business, you must know, at which we
do a good deal at Stunin'tun, and at which we are commonly thought
to be handy,"

"Put your questions, Captain Poke; I hope the answers will be
satisfactory."

"Your name?"

"John Goldencalf--by the favor of his majesty, Sir John Goldencalf,
Baronet." '

"Sir John Goldencalf--by the favor of his majesty, a baronet! Is
baronet a calling? or what sort of a crittur or thing is it?"

"It is my rank in the kingdom to which I belong."

"I begin to understand what you mean. Among your nation mankind is
what we call stationed, like a ship's people that are called to go
about; you have a certain berth in that kingdom of yours, much as I
should have in a sealing schooner."

"Exactly so; and I presume you will allow that order, and propriety,
and safety result from this method among mariners?"

"No doubt--no doubt, we station anew, however, each v'yage,
according to experience; I'm not so sure that it would do to take
even the cook from father to son, or we might have a pretty mess of
it."

Here the sealer commenced a series of questions, which he put with a
vigor and perseverance that I fear left me without a single fact of
my life unrevealed, except those connected with the sacred sentiment
that bound me to Anna, and which were far too hallowed to escape me
even under the ordeal of a Stunin'tun inquisitor. In short, finding
that I was nearly helpless in such hands, I made a merit of
necessity, and yielded up my secrets as wood in a vice discharges
its moisture. It was scarcely possible that a mind like mine,
subjected to the action of such a pair of moral screws, should not
yield some hints touching its besetting propensities. The Captain
seized this clew, and he went at the theory like a bulldog at the
muzzle of an ox.

To oblige him, therefore, I entered at some length into an
explanation of my system. After the general remarks that were
necessary to give a stranger an insight into its leading principles,
I gave him to understand that I had long been looking for one like
him, for a purpose that shall now be explained to the reader. I had
entertained some negotiations with Tamahamaah, and had certain
investments in the pearl and whale fisheries, it is true; but on the
whole my relations with all that portion of mankind who inhabit the
islands of the Pacific, the northwest coast of America, and the
northeast coast of the old continent, were rather loose, and
generally in an unsettled and vague condition; and it appeared to me
that I had been singularly favored in having a man so well adapted
to their regeneration thrown as it were by Providence, and in a
manner so unusual, directly in my way. I now frankly proposed,
therefore, to fit out an expedition, that should be partly of trade
and partly of discovery, in order to expand my interests in this new
direction, and to place my new acquaintance at its head. Ten minutes
of earnest explanation on my part sufficed to put my companion in
possession of the leading features of the plan. When I had ended
this direct appeal to his love of enterprise, I was answered by the
favorite exclamation of--

"King!"

"I do not wonder, Captain Poke, that your admiration breaks out in
this manner; for I believe few men fairly enter into the beauty of
this benevolent system who are not struck equally with its grandeur
and its simplicity. May I count on your assistance?"

"This is a new idee, Sir Goldencalf--"

"Sir John Goldencalf, if you please, sir."

"A new idee, Sir John Goldencalf, and it needs circumspection.
Circumspection in a bargain is the certain way to steer clear of
misunderstandings. You wish a navigator to take your craft, let her
be what she will, into unknown seas, and I wish, naturally, to make
a straight course for Stunin'tun. You see the bargain is in apogee,
from the start."

"Money is no consideration with me, Captain Poke."

"Well, this is an idee that has brought many a more difficult
contract at once into perigee, Sir John Goldencalf. Money is always
a considerable consideration with me, and I may say, also, just now
it is rather more so than usual. But when a gentleman clears the way
as handsomely as you have now done, any bargain may be counted as a
good deal more than half made."

A few explicit explanations disposed of this part of the subject,
and Captain Poke accepted of my terms in the spirit of frankness
with which they were made. Perhaps his decision was quickened by an
offer of twenty Napoleons, which I did not neglect making on the
spot. Amicable and in some respects confidential relations were now
established between my new acquaintance and myself; and we pursued
our walk, discussing the details necessary to the execution of our
project. After an hour or two passed in this manner, I invited my
companion to go to my hotel, meaning that he should partake of my
board until we could both depart for England, where it was my
intention to purchase without delay a vessel for the contemplated
voyage, in which I also had decided to embark in person.

We were obliged to make our way through the throng that usually
frequents the lower part of the Champs Elysees during the season of
good weather and towards the close of the day. This task was nearly
over when my attention was particularly drawn to a group that was
just entering the place of general resort, apparently with the
design of adding to the scene of thoughtlessness and amusement. But
as I am now approaching the most material part of this extraordinary
work, it will be proper to reserve the opening for a new chapter.




CHAPTER VIII.

AN INTRODUCTION TO FOUR NEW CHARACTERS, SOME TOUCHES OF PHILOSOPHY,
AND A FEW CAPITAL THOUGHTS ON POLITICAL ECONOMY.


The group which drew my attention was composed of six individuals,
two of which were animals of the genus homo, or what is vulgarly
termed man; and the remainder were of the order primates, and of the
class mammalia; or what in common parlance are called monkeys.

The first were Savoyards, and may be generally described as being
unwashed, ragged, and carnivorous; in color swarthy; in lineaments
and expression avaricious and shrewd; and in appetites voracious.
The latter were of the common species, of the usual size, and of
approved gravity. There were two of each sex; being very equally
paired as to years and external advantages.

The monkeys were all habited with more or less of the ordinary
attire of our modern European civilization; but peculiar care had
been taken with the toilet of the senior of the two males. This
individual had on the coat of a hussar, a cut that would have given
a particular part of his body a more military contour than comported
with his real character were it not for a red petticoat that was
made shorter than common; less, however, with a view to show a
pretty foot and ankle than to leave the nether limbs at liberty to
go through with certain extravagant efforts which the Savoyards were
unmercifully exacting from his natural agility. He wore a Spanish
hat, decorated with a few bedraggled feathers, a white cockade, and
a wooden sword. In addition to the latter, he carried in his hand a
small broom.

Observing that my attention was strongly attracted to this party,
the ill-favored Savoyards immediately commenced a series of
experiments in saltation, with the sole view, beyond a question, to
profit by my curiosity. The inoffensive victims of this act of
brutal tyranny submitted with a patience worthy of the profoundest
philosophy, meeting the wishes of their masters with a readiness and
dexterity that was beyond all praise. One swept the earth, another
leaped on the back of a dog, a third threw himself head-over-heels
again and again without a murmur, and the fourth moved gracefully to
and fro, like a young girl in a quadrille. All this might have
passed without calling for particular remark (since, alas! the
spectacle is only too common), were it not for certain eloquent
appeals that were made to me through the eyes by the individual in
the hussar jacket. His look was rarely averted from my face for a
moment, and in this way a silent communion was soon established
between us. I observed that his gravity was indomitable. Nothing
could elicit a smile or a change of countenance. Obedient to the
whip of his brutal master, he never refused the required leap; for
minutes at a time his legs and petticoat described confused circles
in the air, appearing to have taken a final leave of the earth; but,
the effort ended, he invariably descended to the ground with a quiet
dignity and composure that showed how little the inward monkey
partook of the antics of the outward animal. Drawing my companion a
little aside, I ventured to suggest a few thoughts to him on the
subject.

"Really, Captain Poke, it appears to me there is great injustice in
the treatment of these poor creatures!" I said. "What right have
these two foul-looking blackguards to seize upon beings much more
interesting to the eye and, I dare say, far more intellectual than
themselves, and cause them to throw their legs about in this
extravagant manner, under the penalty of stripes, and without regard
to their feelings or their convenience? I say, sir, the measure
appears to me intolerably oppressive, and it calls for prompt
redress."

"King!"

"King or subject, it does not alter the moral deformity of the act.
What have these innocent beings done that they should be subjected
to this disgrace? Are they not flesh and blood like ourselves--do
they not approach nearer to our form and, for aught we know to the
contrary, to our reason, than any other animal? and is it tolerable
that our nearest imitations, our very cousins, should be thus dealt
by? Are they dogs that they are treated like dogs?"

"Why, to my notion, Sir John, there isn't a dog on 'arth that can
take such a summerset. Their flapjacks are quite extraor'nary!"

"Yes, sir, and more than extraordinary; they are oppressive. Place
yourself, Mr. Poke, for a single instant, in the situation of one of
these persons; fancy that you had a hussar jacket squeezed upon your
brawny shoulders, a petticoat placed over your lower extremities, a
Spanish hat with bedraggled feathers set upon your head, a wooden
sword stuck at your side, and a broom put into your hand; and that
these two Savoyards were to menace you with stripes unless you
consented to throw summersets for the amusement of strangers--I only
ask you to make the case your own sir, and then say what course you
would take and what you would do?"

"I would lick both of these young blackguards, Sir John, without
remorse, break the sword and broom over their heads, kick their
sensibilities till they couldn't see, and take my course for
Stunin'tun, where I belong."

"Yes, sir, this might do with the Savoyards, who are young and
feeble--"

"'Twouldn't alter the case much if two of these Frenchmen were in
their places," put in the Captain, glaring wolfishly about him. "To
be plain with you, Sir John Goldencalf, being human, I'd submit to
no such monkey tricks."

"Do not use the term reproachfully, Mr. Poke, I entreat of you. We
call these animals monkeys, it is true; but we do not know what they
call themselves. Man is merely an animal, and you must very well
know--"

"Harkee, Sir John," interrupted the Captain, "I'm no botanist, and
do not pretend to more schooling than a sealer has need of for
finding his way about the 'arth; but as for a man's being an animal,
I just wish to ask you, now, if in your judgment a hog is also an
animal?"

"Beyond a doubt--and fleas, and toads, and sea-serpents, and
lizards, and water-devils--we are all neither more nor less than
animals."

"Well, if a hog is an animal, I am willing to allow the
relationship; for in the course of my experience, which is not
small, I have met with men that you might have mistaken for hogs, in
everything but the bristles, the snout, and the tail. I'll never
deny what I've seen with my own eyes, though I suffer for it; and
therefore I admit that, hogs being animals, it is more than likely
that some men must be animals too."