The Sun.
London, England, 1865-01-20 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

Broad Grins from Yankeeland.

The American Joe Miller. A Collection of Yankee
Wit and Humour. Compiled by Robert KejApt.
One Vol., pp. 215. Adams and Francis.

A capital name, an excellent notion, and a de-
lightful book is this compilation of " The American
Joe Miller." It already, at starting, numbers up
671 more or less broad Yankee Facetim ! But
compilations of this kind obviously are made to
grow ; and we certainly hope to see many a new
edition of a work of which the present imprint
marks the first publication. As the compiler ob-
serves, with congenial humour, in his Preface, when
alluding to the ultra-extravagant means by which
the Yankees raise the laugh—" Their ordinary
speech is hyperbole or tall talk !" Adding, " they
never go out shooting unless with the long bow !"
Speaking afterwards of the gigantic scale upon
which Nature herself appears, there, in America—as
let us say, in her prairies, and rivers, and cataracts
—he remarks, also, in a kindred mood, that " into
this Brobdingnag of our, cousins, Munschausen
emigrated early !" Turning over the pages of this
comical little book, the reader will find himself
somehow always on the broad grin. He will recog-
nise many an old familiar joke cracked originally on
the other side of the Atlantic, and welcomed long ago
by a hearty roar of appreciative laughter from us
Europeans ! We hear again, thus, of the man who
was so tall that he had to get up a ladder to shave
himself ! And of a Fog so thick that you could cut it
with a ham knife ! But other and far better jokes,
some of them, he will find that the compiler of the
Yankee Joe Miller has altogether overlooked.
As, for example, that about—The Scythe that
was so sharp that the shadow of it cut a man's leg
off ! Or about—The Oyster that was so large that
it took two men to swallow it whole ! Or about—
The Pat of Butter that was made out of the cream
of a joke ! Or about—(this one, by the way, being
Washington Irving's, vide " Bracebridge Hall ")
The little dog whose tail curled so tight that it
lifted him off his hind legs ! Nevertheless—numerous
though the racy pleasantries that one remembers to
have sprung originally from Yankee Land, and that
we look for in vain in this volume—the collection upon
the whole, as a commencement is admirably good.
Here and there we should like to weed out a silly
profanity—but otherwise the work may receive, as it
certainly deserves, our ready commendation. In it we
light, turn by turn (as the compiler forewarns us in
his Preface that we shall do) upon " the wise saws of
Sam Slick, the broad grins of Artemus Ward and
Joshua Billings, the marvellous (impossible ?) feats
of the renowned Major Longbow, and the cute
remarks of those notorious personages, the Down
Easter and the Western Editor." Several of the
specimens of Yankee exaggeration here recorded are
deliciously absurd—some few among them being
entirely new to us. For example—

DRAWING THE LONGBOW.—A fellow was kicked out of
an editorial room the other day for impudently stating
that he had seen in Germany a fiddle so large that it re-
quired two horses to draw the bow across the strings,
which would continue to sound six weeks !

Delightful, too, is the record of the eminent Ameri-
can artist who recently painted a snowstorm so
naturally that he caught a bad cold by incautiously
sitting near it with his coat off ! A wonderfully good
reason, again, Why cream is so dear, is mentioned on
the authority of the Boston Post, namely—Because
the milk has risen so high that the cream can't get to
the top of it ! Another Yankee journalist—evidently
suffering from defalcations among his subscribers—
gives us a vivid notion of his sense of their villainy in
so doing, by observing that the man who would take a
newspaper for a length of time and then send it back
refused and unpaid for, would swallow a blind dog's
dinner, and then stone the dog for being blind ! How
to get "up a tree" many know full well on both
sides of the Atlantic, but How to get down a ladder
seems to be a very different undertaking indeed,
judging from the young Darkey who sings out—

"Mass Tom ! Oh, Mass Tom! How's Ito get down dis
ladder ?" "1 The same way you went up, you blockhead,'
replies the master, running out to see what's the matter.
"De same way as I come up, Mass Tom ?" " Yes, con-
found you, and don't bdther me any more !" " Well, if I
must I must"—and down comes the little darkey head-
foremost !

Reasons enough certainly (and to spare !) are those
by which a Yankee ed4or sums up the causes of his
not being able to sleep one night—a squalling baby
sixteen months old ; a howling dog under the win-
dow ; a cat-fight up the alley ; a nigger serenade
over the way ; a wracking tooth-ache ; and a pig
trying to get in at the back-door ! As exemplifying
agreeably the Law of Compensation, commend us
to Joe's reply to the Sunday School teacher, who
had remarked that he hadn't apparently a good
memory—" No, ma'am," says Joe, hesitating,
"but I've got a first-rate forgettery !" The Reason
Why More Marriages take place in Winter
than in Summer—(we don't know in the
least that they do, but no matter !)—an
American wag obliges us with, when saying that
it is simply because in the winter season the gentle-
men require comforters and the ladies muffs ! Quite
a companion picture to Sydney Smith's famous
sketch of a Fat Woman, is Sam Slick's mere outline
of a Spare Gal—" I had to look twice at her before
I could see her at all, for I warn't sure she warn't
her own shadow !" Everybody, pretty well, we
suppose, is already acquainted with the rough-and-
ready Yankee's definition of Steam, when a con-
sequential dandy, in reply to a lady's query as to
what steam really was, had answered, pompously,
" Steam, ma'am, is, ah !—steam is, ah ! ah !—steam
is—steam !"—" I knew that chap couldn't tell ye ;
but Steam is a bucket of water in a tremendous
perspiration !" A pleasant little tid-bit, in the way
of an exemplar at once of Nigger Explanation and
Nigger Indignation, is the following :

" Where's the hoe, Sambo "Wid de rake, massa."
" Well, where's the rake ?" " Wid de hoe." " But where
are they both 2" " Why, bof togeder. By golly, ole
massa, you 'pears berry 'tickler dis mornin.'"

A charming bon mot of Longfellow's is recorded
here by the compiler of this little volume of Good
Things, in No. 428, upon the authority of the Cin-
cinnati Gazette. " Young INIr. Longworth," runs
the anecdote, "on being introduced to the Poet,
some one present remarked upon the similarity of
the first syllable of the two names—' Yes,' said the
Professor, but in this case, I fear, Pope's line will
apply :
Worth makes the man and want of it the fellow.' "

Brevity, and not a doubt about it, is, as the poet
has it, the soul of wit. Yet, once in a way, never-
theless, our Yankee Joe Miller contrives to spin
out his yarn of joking to advantage. Witness the
pertinacity • with which, upon a very close cross-
examination, Sam the Nigger insists, as follows, upon
the utter isolation of his individuality :

"What's your name ?" " My name's Sam." —" Sam What?'
—" No, sah; not Sam Watt. I'se jist Sam."—" What's your
other name? "—"I hasn't got no other name, sah. I'se Sam—
dat's all,"—" What's your master's name ?"—" I'se got no
massa now. Massa runned away—yah, yah ! I'se free
nigger now."—" Well, what's your father and mother's
name ?"—" I'se got none, sah—neber had none. I'se jist
Sam—ain't nobody else."—" Haven't you any brothers and
sisters ?"—" No, sah ; neber had none. No brudder, no
sister, no fadder, no mudder, no massa—nothin' but Sam.
When you see Sam, you see all dere is of us."
Another dialogue, full of fun in its odd way, is
the one here immediately subjoined :
"Bring the prisoner into court!" shouted the red-nosed
judge as he took his seat. " Here lam bound to blaze, as
the spirit of turpentine said when he was all a-fire," said
the prisoner. " We'll take a little fire out of you. How
do you live ?" asked the judge. "I ain't particular, as the
oyster said when they asked him if he'd be roasted or fried.''
"We don't want to know what the oyster said, or the spirits
of turpentine either. What do you follow ?" " Anything
that comes in my way, as the locomotive said when she
run over a little nigger." " Don't care anything about the
locomotive. What is your business ?" " That's various,
as the cat said when she stole the chicken off the table."
"If 1 hear any more absurd comparisons, I'll give you
twelvemonths." "I'm done, as the beefsteak said to the
cook." " Now, sir, your punishment shall depend on the
shortness and correctness of your answers. I suppose you
live by going round the docks." " No, sir ; I can't go
round the docks without a coat, and I ain't got none."
" Answer me, sir ; how do you get your bread ?" " Some-
times at the baker's, and sometimes I eat taters." "No
more of your stupid nonsense. How do you support your-
self ?" " Sometimes on my legs, and sometimes on a chair:,
"How do you keep yourself alive ?" "By breathing, sir.'
" I order you to answer this question correctly—How do
you do ?" " Pretty well, I thank you, judge ; how do you
do ?" "I shall have to commit you." "Well, you've com-
mitted yourself first, that's one consolation."
Altogether this queer little pocket volume of The