Washington telegraph., 1849-10-31

And will have the bill TO foot,
John Meohoi, my Joe.
The following sketch is from the pen
Of Col. ]. F. H. Claiborne:
SCENE IN AN EDITORS CHAMBER.
SKETCH FOR THE DELTA.
1t was in the dusk of melancholy
evening. An editor sat-not in the spa
cious halls of his fathers-not il. he lux
urious 6oud0a of his mistress-nor the
minstrel's trellised bower-but, alone in
his tomb-like apartment of six feet by
ten. Before him was crazy deal table,
scantily covered with baize; few old
books. and heaps of papers, lay around;
and his inkstand was not of porcelain, nor
ebony, Eor a grotesque bronze, but the
socket-end of the champagne bottle,
whose generous fluid had never sparkled
on his lips! He had quaffed none of its
pearly inspiration. A long narrow WIN
dow sash, filled with two rows OF little
smoked panes, stood hoisted before him,
from which fragment of a curtain. a
faded chintz, faunted lazily in the dying
air, like the draggled skirt of some blowsy
slattern. A threadbare mating was OH
the floor, and dun walls fairly gaped in
their nakedness, save, here, and there, the
eye rested OH some rude penciling-not
the outlines of an artist, nor diagrams of
a mathematical brain, but the memoran-
dunn kept with his wash-woman! His
weekly ledger! There is no poetry in
such a schedule. Alas, the poor scribe!
sadly as he needs change. he often looks
serious a. the approach of his laundress;
sometimes. indeed, he skulls until she
disappears. y ~
Night drew on apace, and the writer
leaned his fevered brow upon his hand,
lost in the gloom or ''bitter fancies." In
vain he summoned philosophy to his sup
port. The apothegms of the lyceum and
the academy grew cold and comfortless.
In vain he looked back TO early enjoy
ments, or forward to a career of distinc-
zion. These brought no bright images
to his soul, but came trooping along like
graveyard shadows, vanishing one by
one, into deep gloom. X n
ing leader. A statesman was to be put
down, whom in his heart he honored, and
one to be lifted up, whose very name
caused his lip to curl in scorn-artful,
mean, deceitful, cowardly-yet the tyrant,
PARTY, exacted for its idol the homage of
his pen, and for its victim, though virtu-
Gus and sincere, those biting sarcasms
that wounded the sensitive heart like a
serpents sting.
His mail had been ransacked. There
was nothing to rouse desponding spirit.
The slogan cry of triumph rang in his
ear-but it was the triumph of his adver-
saries. His political combinations had
dwarfted away, and nine-tenths of his
exchanges were filled with attacks upon
his fame. His fame! His character
The sole property of the editor writing
for bread Other men, of every craft, toll
for wealth and honor-the journalists
alone, strives, literally, for food. No
homestead-no broad-spread-
ing estate, are, in the dim perspective, fo.
him or his! That first sweet prayer
which we learn to lisp on our mothers
knee, "Give us this day our daily bread, -
is truly his prayer, and is breathed every
when rising from his sleep
sleep, o, how seldom visited by glimpses
of sunshine and dreams of JOY. All! if
the world, in its giddy waltz, could pause
to think, the editor would be better
thought Of A broad mantle of charity
would cover his sins. AS things now run
he is the target of every ones malice; the
football of ribald wit; the shallow.pates
sibe; the rich mans contumely.
Darker came on the night. and the wind
sighed fitfully around. The figure at the
table grew more dim until it faded into
mere outline, and became like thee, o,
Poverty. gaunt and spectral. But the
raw of taper fell athwart the chamber,
and gentle footstep was on the stair
The dreamer looked up, and vision of
hope, and beauty, and consolation stood
beside him. There was a fathomless
depth of love in the liquid eye, that beam
ed so tenderly upon him. No smile of
10Y was on his lip, nor jewelled ornament
sparkled on her brow. But there was
Faith-fdith, that triumphs over the
gloom of the grave. and like the moon
beams on the ruins of some ancient abb
bey, sheds soft and soothing light over
the fortunes of the wretched. He gazed
npon the vision, and the warm blood
come back into its forsaken channels
His eye grew bright and his spirit free.
He could breast the surges of the world
with his own stout arm, nor cry "con1e
help me, Cassius, or | sink"
Was this vision an angel? No! crea-
ture Of earth, yet scarcely less sainted-
his first love and his last-the being who
next to our mother, is dearest and hottest
the first that we sigh for in hours of
you;b-:he last that fingers on our dying
lips.