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A Parallel.

In one of the reports of the Coroner’s investigation of the Twenty-third street murder, it was mentioned that “Several ladies and some young children occupied chairs within the railing.”

When REAL was hanged, it was noticeable that a great number of women appeared in the morbid crowd that surrounded the Tombs, many of them with small children in their arms.

Fifth Avenue and Five Points!  Six of one and half-a-dozen of the other!  Blood will tell!

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[Illustration:  THE HAZARD OF THE HORSE-CARS.

THIS IS STUBBS, (an incorrigible old bachelor,) WHO TAKES AN OPEN CAB,
FOR GREENWOOD, AND IS COMPELLED TO DO THE WHOLE DISTANCE SO.

Illustration:  AND THIS IS THE WAY IN WHICH DOBBS, WHO WOULD HAVE BEEN DELIGHTED WITH STUBB’S LUCK, IS MADE TO SUFFER MARTYRDOM ON his LITTLE EXCURSION]

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THE POEMS OF THE CRADLE.

CANTO V.

    “Let’s go to bed,” says Sleepy Head,
    “Tarry awhile,” says Slow;
    “Put on the pot,” says Greedy Gut,
    “We’ll sup before we go.”

These lines the observant student of nursery literature will perceive are satirical.  Was there ever a poet who was not satirical?  How could he be a genius and not be able to point out the folly he sees around him and comment upon it.  In this case, the poor poet,—­who lived in a roseate cloud-land of his own, not desiring such mundane things as sleep and food, was undoubtedly troubled and plagued to death by having brothers and sisters who were of the earth, earthy; and who never neglected on opportunity to laugh at his poems; to squirt water on him when in the heavenly mood, his eyes in frenzy rolling; to put spiders down his back; to stick pins in his elbows when writing; or upset his inkstand.

Fine natures always have a deal to bear, in this world, from the coarse, unfeeling natures that cannot appreciate their delicacy; and this one had more than his share.

Many a time has he been goaded to frenzy by the cruel sneers and jokes of those who should have been proud of his talents; and rushed with wild-eyed eagerness down to the gentle frog pond, intending there to bury his sorrows beneath its glassy surface.  He saw in imagination the grief-stricken faces of those cruel ones as they gazed upon his cold corpus, with his damp locks clinging to his noble brow, the green slimy weeds clasped in his pale hands, and the mud oozing from his pockets and the legs of his pants; and he gloried in the remorse and anguish they would feel when they knew that the Poet of the family was gone forever.

All this he pictured as he stood on the bank, and, while thinking, the desire to plunge in grew smaller by degrees and beautifully less, till at last it vanished entirely, and he concluded he had better go home, finish his book first and drown himself afterwards, if necessary.  It would make much more stir in the world, and his name and works might live forever.