The herald and mail. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1873-188?, 1875-04-16
Numerous Objects,

Not only is the susceptibility of hui
NOR different among different nations,
but the humorous objects differ by
reason of different customs and habits.
There is nothing very laughable TO us
in the manner which we at our hotels
and railroad depots gobble down our
food, but even an Arab or a Chinese
would laugh at the operation if We did
not. Yet it is 1udicrous to us to see in
Arab lady pick out the choice tidbits
with which you had loaded your plate,
or roll little ball of hash in her dainty
fingers, and by way of especially honor
ing you, plug your mouth with it unex-
pectedly; or to see a Chinese with his
chOpsticks load himself up with boiled
rice, and ram it down as we would a
wad in gnn It is said that the la
dies under the dominion of the Grand
Lama, when good looking, disfgure
their faces to preserve them from van
ity. have never seen that recorded
of our ladies-Heaven forbid The
idea, however, is as ludicrous as the
Tartar custom of pulling a man by the
ear when they want him to drink, and
keep pulling till he opens his mouth,
when they pour down the liquor. I
know a man whose ea1s do not require
to be pulled.
There is nothing very laughable to an
American in the shaking of hands,
which is everywhere practiced in our
country but foreigners find it much
amusement. Yet nothing can be more
ridiculous to us than the salutation in
Germany, where one may see two big,
burly, hairy men rush to each others
embrace, and kiss with school girl fer
vency. The people of Thibet salute by
lolling out the tongue and scratching
the right ear, and the Esquimaux by
rubbing their noses with their thumb
and describing a comic section in the air
with their fngers-a custom practiced
by miscellaneous urchins in our land. but
not exactly as salutatory grace. It is
now happily honored in the breach. In
Turkey an American travelling with his
unveiled wife, even without the appen-
dages, so usual here, of six small chill
dren and seven large trunks and band.
boxes, is to them funny predicament.
On the other hand what would be funny
with US, among the Turks is quite the
reverse. An American gives US an in
stance in his experience in Syria. He
was about to mount his mule among a
crowd of Oriental visitors, and wished
to give them an exaggerated idea of
American agility. He jumped little
too far, and overshot the mark coming
down on the other side like diver, with
his hands and nose in the mud, his feet
caught in the saddle, and his coat skirts
cleverly rolled over his head to screen
him from what he supposed was a
laughing crowd. Yet not soul smiled,
not a sound was heard save the tender
grunt of sympathy and demure offers
of aid Now, Turk in America, with
baggy breeches and turbaned head,
taking leap over a mule in the streets
of an American city, and getting stuck
upside down, with his probosis in a rut
and his heels in the saddle, would be
saluted with something more than a
grunt of sympathy and demure offers
of aid. We have more humor than
dignity; the Turks more dignity than
humor. There never was an American
who would not sacrifice his courtesy
and sympathy to his fun. He must
have it, however, well seasoned, and
done in a hurry, and it's prevailing
characteristic must be exaggeration.
You saw this illustrated even in the in
ordinate hopes of so calm and sedate
statesman as Mr. Seward, as to the
closing up of our late civil war in sixty
days. That was the huge joke of our
time. There was a court in General
Grants army which sentenced a man to
work ten years on General Buffers
Dutch Gap Canal !; and it was generally
said, if not believed, in the army that,
Palmer, who made the patent limbs,
had purchased two thousand acres of
western land, and planted them with To-
Gust and maple, with a view to econo-
mize in the future in his manufacture
of arms and legs.-HOn. s. S. Cor,
IN Harper'S Magazine.