The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1899-02-12

poets of his day by explaining how his
host paid for their entertainment after
! breakfast. He says: I'VE departed
with all those grimaces which are here
the testimonials of affection. My de-
mon-"aS he calls his conductor"-pay-
ing my host with a piece of paper,
asked him if that was an acknowledge
ment for our reckoning. He answered
Yes. That he no longer owed him
anything, for those were verses
whereby he acquitted himself of any
debt. How, verses?' answered l, ARE
your tavernkeepers here so curious in
rhymes?'
SONNETS USED AS CURRENT COIN
ct is the current coin of the coun-
try said he. and our score amounts
to stanza of six lines, which you saw
me pay. We need not live here much
within bounds sonnet will pay for
seven or eight days banqueting; |
have four about me now, with two cpl
grams, two odes, and an elegy. 'Ah.'
says l, would to heaven that verse
would pass for payment in our coun-
try; many an honest poet that now
dies for hunger would then easily sat-
isfy his creditors
Il asked him if the same lines would
pass always provided they were trans
cribed anew. He answered in the mega
tive For an author, said he carries
his compositions as soon as finished to
the mint, and the kings sworn poets
prove, stamp and tax them according
to the value of each piece; so that a
sonnet does not always pass for SON.
net; and if a man dies for want he
must certainly be blockhead, for peo-
pie of true wit always know how to live
well here. l was in raptureS at the
judiciouS policy of the place.
TICKLED TO SLEEP.
The earth travellers odd experiences
were not to cease with his banqueting.
At bed time I'VE went to our cham
bers. A man presented himself at the
top of the staircase, who, having re-
garded me attentively, led me TO
closet, the floor of which was covered
at least three feet deep with orange
flowers, and my demon to another
srrewed with Dinks and jassamine. lie
removed the admiration which he saw
this magnificence excited in me, by
telling me those were the common beds
of the place. When L was stretched at
my rest, l preceived, by the glimmer-
ing of thirty glow worms shut uD in
crystal-for they have no sort of
candles in this country, the three or
four young boys who had undressed me
at supper, one of which tickled my
sides, another my arms, and third
my feet, with a thousand other little
tricks. which soon rocked me to sleep"
In this world of the moon all the
Inhabitants walked on four feet in
stead of two, and they were more than
ten times the size of the earth traveller,
so that they threw him easily over their
shoulders and carried him about. He
was regarded at first as one of the
lower animals, and they shut him up
in a cage together with another earth
wanderer, a SDaniard, whom they had
he says, naively for
because they happen to dress
their monkeys in the Spanish fashion"
These moon men talked by the use of
either singing or playing on
the lutte, so that they conveyed their
ideas exactly by musical notes, also
acting out their motions by curious
of the body.
The queen of the moon and the en-
tire court began a fierce discussion as
to what kind Of an animal the earth
traveller Was-whether a monkey or a
bird LAS 1 had but two feet" he says,
they chose to rank me under the
species of bird, and the queens bird
catcher took charge of me, teaching
NE, among many other things, to whis-
tle" In this predicament he remained
in the care of the bird catcher for
some time, until he learned to talk
the language of the country. and then
there ensued long discussion as TO
whether he could have any claim TO
being = man.
Following this controversy the tTav-
aler becomes involved in a number of
philosophical discussions
with the wise men OF the moon, in the
course of which Cyrano takes pains TO
use his best wit in ridiculing the doc
.rines of some of the wise men of this
line. For quaint reasoning and curl
,us conclusions these sallies are inimit-
able. One of them deals with the theory
If the universe.
SEDENTARY HOUSES. !
Residents of the moon have, accord |
ng to this author, a most convenient |
way of keeping warm III winter and
DOL in summer. He divides their