Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1873-02-19
All Wen Borrowers.

Well now, the very choice of phrases be-
trays a confession of inferiority, and you
see it again creeps out in the amount we
borrow. Take the whole range of imagin-
ative literature and we are all wholesale
borrowers La every matter that relates to
invention-to use. or beauty, or form-we
are borrwers
You may glance around the furniture of
the palaces in Europe, and you may gather
you have fixed the shape and forms in your
mind, | will take you into the museum of
Naples, which gathers all remains of the
domestic life Of the Romans, and you shall
not fud single one of these modern
forms of art or beauty or use, that was not
anticipated there. We have hardly added
one single line or sweep Of beauty to the
antique,
Take the stories of Shakespeare, who
has, perhaps, written his forty odd plays
Some are historical The rest, two thirds
of them, he did not stop to invent, but he
found them. These he clutched, ready
made to his hand, from the Italian nov
elists, who had taken them before from
the east Cinderella and her slipper is older
than all history, like half dozen other
happy legends The annals of the world
do not 90 back far enough to tell US from
where they first came.
All the boys plays, like everything that
ic Rawlinson will show how that one
came. somewhere from the banks of the
Ganges or the suburbs of Damascus, Bull
wer borrowed the incidents Of his Roman
stories from legends Of thousand years
before. Indeed, Dunloch, who has grouped
the history Of the novels of all Europe
into one essay, says that In the nations OF
modern Europe there have been 25O or
800 distinct stories.
He says at least 200 of these may be
traced, before Cbristia nifty, to the other
side of the Black Sea. If this were my
topic, which 1t is not, | might tell you
that even our newspaper jokes are enjoy
ing a very respectable old age. Take
Maria Edgeworth's essay on Irish bulls
and the aughable mistakes Of the Irish.
Even the tale which either Maria Edge
worth or her father thought the best is
that famous story OF man writing let
ter as follows:
MY DEAR FRIENDS: L would write
you more in detail, more minutcly, if there
was not an impudent fellow looking over
my shoulder re ding every word" e. No
YOU lie-I've not read word you have
wrtten'0
This is an Irish bull, still it, is very old
one. 1t is only $50 years older than the
New Testament, Horace Walpole dissent
ed from Richard Lowell Edgeworth and
thought the other Irish bull was the bes
of the man who said " | would have
been a very handsome man but they
changed me in the cradle"
That came from Don Quixote, and is
Spanish, but Cervantes borrowed it from
the Greek in the fourth century, and the
Greek stole it from the Egyptians hun
dreds of years back.
There is one story which it is sale
WASHINGTON has related of man wht
went il to an inn and asked for glass O
drink from the landlord, who pushed for
ward wneglass about half the usual siz'
the tea cups also in that day were no
half the present size.
The landlord said, " That glass out o
) which you are drinking is 40 years old.
f :" Well,'' said the thirsty traveller, contem
plating its diminutive proportions, g ]
think it is the smallest thing [ ever saw
f That story as told is given as story O
Athens 375 years before Christ was born
Why. all these Irish bulls are Greek
: every one Of them!
Take the 1rishman who carried arount
, brick as specimen of the house he hat
, to sell, take the Irishman who shu
? his eyes and looked into the glass t.
, see how he would look when he was dea
renewed laughterl take the Irishma1
5 who bought crow, alleging that crow
t were reported to live 200 years, and h
: meant to set out and try it..
: Take the lrishman that met frien
!, who said to MIN, Why, sir, heard yo
!. were dead" WE'LL" says the man, &c
S suppose you see I'm not. "Oh no" say
:. he, " | would believe the man who told m
y good deal quicker than l would you.
s Well those are all Greek. A score G
S more of them of the parallel character
S come from Athens,
e Our old Boston patriots felt that tarrin
It and feathering Troy was genuine p;
B. tent Yankee frebrand-Y ankeeism. The