The Sun.
London, England, 1867-03-28 00:00:00

The Lats Artemus Ward.

The following aiticle, written by a personal
friend of the late Aitemus 'Ward's, appeared in the
Anglo- Anievican 7in es:—

In the cruel grave this day we deposited a jewel
of his nation. Artemus Ward is dead. When this
sad news is carried t) his native land there is not a
village or hamlet frail one end of the great Republic
to the other in which a deep sorrow will not
be felt. Tears will unbidden start from the eyes
of thousands and tens of thousands who loved to
hang over the briliant productions of our de -
parted friend. Artemus Ward had grown to be
a necessity in nearly every American home. As
was truly remarked in one of his programmes,
"no family should te without him." His wit was
truly American, net heavy, but sparkling and
transparent; and no writer of this age has commenced
to hit so many vulnerable points in the character
of his countrymen, or understood more thoroughly
human nature as it is found on the other side of the
Atlantic. It is impossible to adequately sketch the
many and varied qualities of that mind, which both
charmed and amused a world—the rich humour,
the clean-cut sentences, the perfect naturalness, and
the genuine purity of all his writings. In him
poetry and philomphy joined hands, and kissed
each other. Some of his essays appear perhaps at
first rough and tncouth, but they are rough dia-
monds, and through the bad spelling and awkward
metaphors they [lash with a brilliancy that only
belongs to GENIUS. In looking over his complete
works, which I hive done to-day, I am surprised at
the variety of tofics on which he has touched. From
New England Puritanism to Utah _Mormonism,
from Julius Cm3ar to Daniel Pratt, from Chaucer
to Tupper, from Christopher Columbus to P. T.
Barnum, he has pricked with his pen nearly every
noted character of ancient or modern times. For
the last ten years he has been to America a sort of
a universal police. Every species of humbug, of
sham patriotism, and popular imposture, has
felt his deadly spear, and the good lie has
thus done is incalculable. No honest man,
no true gentleman, no bona fide enterprise, had ever
anything to fear from Artemus Ward ; but to the
reverse of this he showed uo mercy, and as nearly
every newspaper in America copied with delight
Artemus Ward's " latest" his power had become
simply unmeasurable. And even now, though he
has written nothing on American affairs for nearly
two years, quotations from his writings are found
plentifully sprinkled through the leading articles of
almost all the American newspapers. For instance,
the following extract from a speech of Artemus Ward,
published just at the time when every sensible man
was disgusted at the do-nothing policy of Congress,
and the unheard-of extravagance of the people
had a most telling effect :—" The fact is,
we air gettin' ter'bly extr'vagant, and on-
less we paws in our mad career in less
than two years the Goddess of Liberty will be
seen dodgiu' into a pawnbroker's shop with her
gown done up in a bundle, even if she don't have
to spout the gold stars in her head-band. Let us
all take hold jintly and live and dress centsibly,
like our forefathers who know'd moren we do, if
they wasn't quite so honest ! (Suttle goaketh.)
There air other cheerio' signs. We don't, for in-
stuns, lack great generals, and we certinly don't
lack brave sojers ; but there's one thing I wish we
did lack, and that is our present Congress. Gen-
tlemen of the Senit and of the House, you've sat
and draw'd your pay, and made summed complaint
speeches long enuff. The country at large, incloodin'
the underlined, is disgusted with you. Why don't
you show us a statesman, sumbody who can make a
speech that will hit the pop'lar hart right under the
Great Public Weskit ? Why don't you show us a
statesman who can rise up to the emergency, and
cave in the emergency's head ? Congress, you
won't do. Go home, you mizzerable devils—go
home ! At a special Congressional 'lection in my dis-
trict the other day I delib'rity voted for Henry Clay.
admit that Henry is dead, but inasmuch as we
don't seem to have a live statesman in our National
Congress, let us by all means have a first-class
corpse."

one of the curses arising out of all great wars is
the shoddy people, who accumulate fortunes out of
the blood and bones of the soldiers.

The following chapter was aimed against 'the Shod-
dayites by Artemus, "flow the shaft went home can be
imagined": -
A ROMANCE.-WILLIAM BARKER, THE YOUNG PATRIOT.

"No, William Barker, you cannot have my daughter's
hind in marriage until you are her equal in wealth and
social position."

- -
The speaker was a haughty old man of some sixty years,
and the person whom he addressed was a fine-looking
young man of twenty-five.
With a sad aspect the young man withdrew from the
stately mansion. _ . _

Six months later the young man stood in the presence
of the haughty old man.

"What! you here again ?" angrily cried the old man.
"Ay, old man," proudly exclaimed William Barker, " I
am here, your daughter's equal and yours ?"
The old man's lips curled with scorn. A derisive smile
lit up his cold features; when, casting violently upon the
marble centre-table an enormous roll of greenbacks,
William Barker cried—

"See! Look on this wealth. And I've tenfold more !
Listen, old man ! You spurned me from your door. But
I did not despair. I secured a contract for furnishing the
Army of the - with beef -"

"Yes, yes!" eagerly exclaimed the old man.
"- and I bought up all the disabled cavalry horses
I could find--"

" I see ! I seo !" cried the old man. "And good beef
they make, too."

" They do ! they do ! and the profits are immense."
"I should say so !"
"And now, sir, I elaim your daughter's fair hand !"
" Boy, she is yours. But hold! Look me in the eye.
Throughout all this have you been loyal ?"

" To the core !" cried William Barker.
" And," continued the 91c1 man, in a TOice huiky with