Numerous efforts have been made to suppress this vegetable, among which may be reckoned, “Father, dear Father, come home with me now,” Brother GOUGH’S circus, and the parades of the F.M.T.A.B.  Societies.  Maine and Vermont Neal together in the front rank of its opponents.  In Boston they tried to suppress this vegetable, but, if you followed your par to a store and heard him order a cracker, you could smell par’s nip.

Among the mild varieties of this article may be mentioned benzine, camphene and kerosene; the next strongest kind is called Jersey lightning; but, if you desire par’s nips in their most luxuriant form, go to Water street and try the species known as “rot-gut.”

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OUR PORTFOLIO.

Poetry is the exclusive birthright of no age of people.  The dirtiest Hindoo sings to his fetish the songs of the Brahmin muse, with as keen a relish as the most devout Christian does the hymns of Dr. WATTS.  Melody comes of Heaven, and is a gift vouchsafed to all generations, and all kinds of men.  In proof of this, let us adduce a single extract from the great epic of the Hawaiian poet, POPPOOFI, entitled “Ka Nani E!”

  Ka nani e! ka nani e! 
    Alohi puni no
  Mai luna, a mai lalo nei,
    A ma na mea a pau.

We would call the attention of our readers particularly to the sublime sentiment of the second line.  “Alohi puni no,” sings the peerless POPPOOFI, and where, in the pages of that other Oriental HOMER, the Persian HAFI, can be found anything half so magnificent?  There may be critics bigoted enough to think that the last line destroys the effect of the other three; but we don’t.  PUNCHINELLO would much rather discover the good in a thing at any time, than go a-fishing on Sundays.

It is not in the nature of a properly constituted human being to lay his hand upon his heart and chant: 

  “Ka nani e!  Ka nani e!”

in the presence of his mother-in-law, without feeling that life is not so miserable as some people would make it out.  In the words of ALEXANDER SELKIRK’S man FRIDAY:  “Palmam qui meruit ferat.”

* * * * *

THE PLAYS AND SHOWS.

Emmet is a name which has heretofore been associated in the public mind with the Negro Minstrel business.  Certain weird barbaric melodies, which defy all laws of musical composition, but which haunt one like a dream of a lonely night on some wild African river, are said to have been written by “OLD EMMET.”  Is there any such person?  Has any one actually seen “OLD EMMET” in the flesh, and with—­say a high hat and a cotton umbrella?  For my part I disbelieve in the popular theory of the origin of these EMMETIC melodies which stir one so strangely.  They are not the work of any earthly song writer, but are born of some untuned Eolian harp played upon by uncertain breezes, that murmur the memory of tropical