The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1882-11-11
Observation-Disclosures

The Van Nores were present at the
creation of the world. Some people say
they made it, but one really knows bet
ter than that. If it had not been for their
unaccountable belief that the builder of
the ark that rested on Mount Ararat was
Jew, and their unutterable contempt
for the race of Spinoza and Mendelssohn,
of Heine, Amerback and Disraeli they
would not have hesitated to conceive
that the family name of the Patriarch
was Van More.
AT any rate you may understand that
the Van Nores were an immensely an
Gent family, so old as to be really worm
eaten. In the dust of the Van Nores
there were soldiers and statesmen, and
even less regarded author or two; in
this century there was nothing at all to
speak of. If, however, any one says
their family tree was like one of those
old, wide and deep-rooted fir-treeS some
times seen, with but single gnarled and
lichened branch left of all its forest glory,
the best part of it underground, you can
see that the person is no friend of the
Van Nores, but one whose eyes have
been hurt by the dazzle of their splendor,
who has been forgotten at their ban
quets, looked at with a stony glare upon
the street or possibly knocked down and
bruised and ignored by their fast horses.
Being immensely ancient, immensely
distinguished and also immensely
wealthy, it goes without saying that
the Van Nores thought immensely well
of themselves. They never soiled their
garments by contact with the crowd;
they bought their pictures and stat
ues straight from the manufacturers
before they had been profaned by the
vulgar gaze; they would have liked the
gold they spent cast with Van More
device and the die broken. They could
not hope to keep all the knowledge in
the universe to themselves; but they did
not care so much for that-there were
always tutors and chaplains and all that
to be had, after the custom of certain of
the South Sea Island chiefs, who main
tain Fila-oma, or Talking Man of
knowledge. If, once in while, they
allowed themselves to come before the
public in matter of suffrage, it was not
altogether without the sensation of some
wicked scribe who has written the Sacred
Name with unwashed hands, and, being
usually defeated, they relapsed into a
more profound contempt of the people
than before, and talked chilly of the ad-
yantages of a mo archy, although not
without an undercurrent of feeling that
in the event of a monarchy the Van
Nores would be monarchs. They inter-
married, of course, only with families of
pedigree and assumption one degree
less thanh could not be more than, and
could hardly be equal to-the Van Nores.
Judge, then, of the bewildered and
amazed wrath of the Van More family
when the son of the house, the heir Of
the name, the last of the name, the only
male Van More left to 90 down the AGE,
with the weight of the family illustrious
ness upon his shoulders, married a young
girl in the West, unknown, obscure, poo
and Jewess!
More Van More had sister older thai
himself, dark and importing creature
with the Van More nose; he had a siste
younger than himself, pallid, bloodless
with her mothers delicacy of feature
and with nothing about her but he
haughtness to distinguish her from tn
herd of young women; he had one Va,
More cousin, little apple-blossom hardl
comingup to the family requirements; h
had four Van More spinster aunts, who
if they quarreled among themselves lik
birds in wood, presented an unbroke
phalanx of family integrity to the public
and who, with the idea that they had tn
manners of duchesses, really gave som
reason to believe them directly descende