The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 48 pages of information about The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction.

The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 48 pages of information about The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction.

  “Farewell to the freaks of the jovial spark,
    Who rejoiced in a gentle riot,—­
  To the midnight spree, and the morning lark,
  There’ll never more be any fun after dark,
    And people will sleep in quiet.

  “No more shall a Tom or a Jerry now
    Engaging in fisty battle,
  Break many heads and the peace;—­for how,
  I should like to know, can there be a row,
    When there is ne’er a rattle?

  “One cry no more on the ear shall grate,
    Convivial friends alarming,
  Who straightway start and separate,
  Blessing themselves that it is so late;—­
    To break up a party is charming!

  “But our ruthless foe wilt be punish’d anon;—­
     Bundled out without pity or parley,
  His office and occupation gone,
  Lost, disgraced, despised, undone,
    Oh! then he’ll remember the Charley.”

  Just then I beheld a Jarvey near,
    Which on the spot presenting,
  I scrambled in like one in fear
  With a ghost at his heels, or a flea in his ear,
    And he was left lamenting!

Blackwood’s Magazine.

* * * * *

GOOD AND BAD STYLES OF LIVING.

Good style of living consists in having a mansion exquisitely fitted up with all the expensive bijouterie compatible with true elegance, yet avoiding the lavish superabundance of gimcrackery which borders on vulgarity; comely serving men in suitable liveries, all so well initiated into the mysteries of their respective duties, that a guest could imagine himself in a fairy palace, where plates vanish without the contamination of a mortal finger and thumb, and glasses move without a jingle:  then the feast is exquisitely cooked and exquisitely served; the table groans not, the hostess carves not; but one delicious dainty is followed by another, and each remove brings forth a dish more piquante than the last:  every thing is delightful, but there must appear to be an abundance of nothing; two spoonsful alone of each delicious viand should repose under its silver cover; and he who dared ask to be helped a second time to any thing, ought to be sentenced to eternal transportation from the regions of haut ton.

Bad style of living—­Shocking even to describe!  A large house in streets or squares unknown; hot, ugly men servants, stumbling over one another in their uncouth eagerness to admit you; your name mispronounced, and shouted at the drawing-room door; your host and hostess in a fuss, apologizing, asking questions, and boring you to death; dinner at length announced, but no chance of extrication from the dull drawing-room, because the etiquette of precedence is not rightly understood, and nobody knows who ought to be led out first; all the way down stairs a dead silence, and then the difficulty of distributing the company almost equals the previous dilemma of the drawing-room: 

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The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.