The Ashland union. [volume] (Ashland, Ashland County, Ohio) 1854-1868, 1855-12-26
MliseeaantOus.
THE AMERIcAE ALADDIN.

40A AA00AOAM
When we go out on Saturday after
noon to moralize and see new houses,
we usually take u young ones by Al
addin's palace. Aladdin was a Yankee
He started life by swapping j~ackknives
then putting the halves of broken IA
bles together, and passing them off as
whole ones. When he had gathered
some brass, he went to scohol all the sum-
mer to lea n the rule of arithmetic-ad-
dition for himself, and subtraction for
his neighbor.
At an early age, Aladdin was eousid-
cred to be good at a bargain; which
meant that he could always succeed in
changing . worse for a better-always
keeping the blind side of a horse to the
wall when he had to sell it; and the
village said that certainly Aladdin would
succeed. When he left, 'he will be rich,'
said the village, with more approval
than it would say, he will be generous
and true To Aladdin the world was
but a market in which to buy cheap and
sell dear. For him there was no beauty,
no history, no pity, DO heroism. Vainly
the stars shone over him-vainly the
south wind blew, in the wake of the
great ship Argo, in which Jason and his
companions sailed for the Golden Fleece
over the cleaning Mediterranean--where
the ships of Tyre, Rome, and the Crusa-
ders had been before him-through the
pillars of Hercules, through which CO.
lumbus sailed to find fortune. To him
all lands are alike. No Homer sang for
him in the Egean; the only curses the
wind that will not blow him into Odessa.
No syrens sing for him, but he loves
the huge oath of the lively boatswain.
With the Bible in his land and a quid
of tobacco in his mouth, he goes about
the holy places in Jerusalem, and 'cal-
culates' their exact site. He sees the
land,of the Rameses and the Ptolemies;
and the reverend records OF the Lybian
desert, whose echoes have siumbered
since they were trampled over by Alex
ander's army are now awakened by the
shrill whistle of Old Dan Tucker; he
insults the Grand Lama, hobnobs with
the Grand Mcgul, turns his hack upon
emperors, and takes a pinch out of the
Pope's snuf-box He chews with the
Arabs, smokes opium with the Turks
and rides for o bride with the Calmuck
Tartars.
Aladdin comes home again, and the
admiring village points him out to the
younger generation as a successful man:
MY son, look at him; he began with
nothing-now see.' MY SON. does see
and beholds him owning a million o
dollars-of all societies of which he i
president, a director. His name i
good-hc has bought pictures and
statues-he has also bought a Mrs. Al
addin and housed her in luxury; but he
picks his mouth with a silver fork. He
has a home for a poet, but he makes it
his boast hat be reads nothing but his
newspaper. He goes to church twice on
Sundays, and only wakes up when the
preacher denounces the sinner of Sodom
and Gomorrah, and those tough old
Jews of Jerusalem. His head is bald
and shiny with the sermons which have
and glanced off. He clasps his hands
in prayer. but forgets to open them when
the poor box is passed around; and he
goes home like a successful man, thank.
God that he is not as other men arc.
And after dinner be sits before the fire
his easy chair, lights a large cigar,
md looks languidly ct Mrs Aladdin
through the thick smoke.
Finally, old Aladdin dies. The con.
,entional virtues are told over as the
Mourning carriages are called out. The
papers regret they are called upon to
IeploEe the loss of . revered parent,
generous friend, public spirited citizen,
nd pious man and the precious swap.
of jack knives, and the model set up
o the young generation, is laid in the
sust. Above his grave the stars he
ever say now burn with a soft ~Iuster,
'hich no lamps about kings tomb can
mulate and the south wind, for whose
reath upon his brow he was never CRATE
al, strews his lowly bed with anemones
nd v~iolets, that his heel pressed when
wing and we, who are to be formed
pom that model, carelessly remark, as
'e stir u toddies, $50 old Aladdin is
one at last, and by the way, how much
id he leave ?'-Geo. w. Curtis.