Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1882-10-08
THE MIGHTY WASHER.
Your Lab-de Dab with the Three-Hafred
Mustaehe, who WayIays Women
at Church Doors
And Stares Them Ont of C0untenance
ON the Street and at the
TheAter.
For the Memphis Appeal

For the Memphis Appeal
Somebody in Tuscumbia has been saying
nice things of Mother Goose" among which
is unmerited praise for her "recent attack
upon mashersw Mother Goose" must have
innocently appropriated somebody else's
laurels, for 80 far from having made any
attack, recent or otherwise, upon that unique
efflorescence of the times-the mighty
masher-they, he or it, are, or is, subject
from which she recoils with sense of inability,
the absence of which would GO to prove that
Fools rush in where angels fear to tread"
So far from regarding them, he or it as le-
Ultimate object for scribbler's inky spite,
she regards them or it (for the sake of con-
venience, perhaps il will be best in future TO
discard the neuter pronoun and use one OF
common GENDER with that tender solicitude
and absorbing interest that thrills the breast
of the astronomer or the naturalist when the
heavens above or the earth beneath give to
his startled and delighted vision some hither-
10 undresmed-of wonder OF creation upon
which he gazes with awe too solemn for flip
pant criticism.
The first time this atom of rusticity came
in conts act with the genus "mssher" she was
in that state of natural innocence that has
its only parallel in the story of the prince
whose cynical father had reared him in pro-
found ignorance OF the existence OF the other
sex, and when accident suddenly revealed
women to him he innocently and naturally
asked what they were. On being informed
that they were geese, he was clsmorous In
his demands that some geese should be pur-
chased for his pleasure. The illustration is
rather too extended, for the desire of pos
session did not, in her case, follow upon the
satisfaction of curiosity. 1t was during a
walk along Adams street, on wet, gray Sun
day afternoon, when the universal grayness
WAS suddenly illuminated by rare and
radiant appsrition which impelled her 10
turn eagerly to the companion of her RAM
blings with the swe-s,ruck inquiry, "Wha,
is-thst?" "a masher," was the prompt re-
Spouse. 1t sounded like slang, and an i'll
conditioned person might have pronounced
the apparition with its light, tight trousers,
its mincing gait, the bold efrontery
of its feeble eyes and the killing
poise of the little hat, laid deli
catsly at an angle intended to relieve
the brain (?) from undue pressure, piece
of bifurcated slang, which would have been
displaying shocking ignorance OF the e1-
IRENE fitness of the term masher. Get thee
to dictionary and you will find: MASH,
v. t., TO beat into a confused mass-.o mix
malt and water;" "masb, n, q mixture or
mass of Ingredients beaten or blended to-
gether in promiscuous manner" The Sc
lection OF the derivative "masher," then, is
proven to be an absolute inspiration. Who
will deny the mixture OF malt and water, as
clsssically descriptive of the average mash
er? And who will combat the business of
the descriptive term, CONFUSED mass?'
And, again, if the mixture OF the ingredients
cheek, store-clothes, wsxed mustachios, star
ing eyes, nobby little hats and be-ringed fu-
gers into that promifcuous compound, the
mssher, does not rescue the term from the
realms OF slang, then all this philanthropic
research has been loves labor lost.
The funniest phase of the whole masher
question is the resentful feeling some folks
exhibit touching their existence. There are
women who seem TO regard them potent
for evil, and would seem to tacitly demand
that they should not be allowed to roam at
large unmazzled or unlabeled Dangerous"
seeking whom they may devour. Bur, then,
l have heard of women who were afraid of
black cats, and would climb ten-rail fence
10 walk half a mile around an imbecile-
looking old COW! There is never any ac-
counting for the abject terrors of some females.
Peur moi, regard it as one of the probable
losses TO future generations, that the genus
m asher may become extinct and its unique
identity become matter OF confused guess
work, like that of the negaiherittm, an ex-
tiuet mammiferous to which il is allied
through the family of the sloth Conceive
of some antiquarian of the twenty-frst CEN
fury trying to piece together the bones of an
extinct mashert The peculiar curve of the
spine, the remarkable angle of the arm bones,
the peerless poise of the lower limbs and
The cramped accommodations for the brain
will render it easy for all time to.come to
recognize its natural divisions; but with the
absence of the sdjuncts OF waxed mustachios
and store clothes-the ored
missing links even that partial success
that has been attained in the case of
the mammoth will never be attained. To
guard sgainst this misfortune for our poster
ity, would il not be good idea to pack
few specimens away in pink jewelers. cotton,
where they may "die of a rose leaf in aro-
matte pain" and subsequently, be mummy
lied for the benefit OF future archeologists?
Lift them up tenderlyl MOTHER GOOSE.