Doesticks, What He Says Part 3

The _fortune-tellers_ of the city are these, and they certainly deserve praise for attempting to apply their pretended knowledge to some practical use, instead of dealing entirely with abstractions. In New York these people are numerous, and they pick up as many coppers in quite as honest a way as their fellows in the art of table-tipping notoriety.

Having read the advertis.e.m.e.nt of a Grand street fortune-teller, who advertised herself the "seventh daughter of a seventh daughter," a lineal descendant from some one of the Egyptian magicians who couldn't kill the frogs--I straightway resolved to pay her a visit.

Since that memorable day my destiny is no longer a mystery. I know it all. I know what kind of a woman I'm to marry, how many children we're to have, how many will die of measles, and how many will be choked with the croup, and can calculate to a quart how much castor oil I shall have to lay in for family consumption. I've had my fortune told by a witch.

The witches of modern time do not frequent graves and gibbets at midnight--they hold no nocturnal orgies with dancing skeletons and corpses, brought by the black art back to temporary life--they now-a-days take no pains to conceal their trade, but advertise it in the daily papers.

Their believers are not now the great men and wise women of the earth alone, but chamber-maids and servant girls who want love-powders to win some n.o.ble swain--or some verdant countryman anxious to recover the pilfered eelskin which contained his treasured pennies. They easily satisfy these gullible customers, by promising the first no end of rich, handsome princes, who are to appear some day and carry off their brides in four-horse coaches; and the latter by an extemporaneous description of the thief, and a wish that he may suffer pains in his head, heart, liver, and all other important parts of his body, until the property is restored.

Witchcraft is rife in our midst, and we do not hang or burn the hags and beldames who practice it, or stick them full of needles, or duck them in the horse-ponds, as in the good old days of Salem--more's the pity.

In this day of railroads and three-cent stages, they have no occasion to perform their journeys upon broomsticks; and in our city, where cream is only traditionary, they cannot bewitch their neighbors' churnings, or throw their dire enchantments over the incipient cheese--so the protective horse-shoe is of no avail.

They have robbed the trade of all its mystery and romance; we hear no more of mighty magician, with h.o.a.ry beard and flowing robe, with magic wand and attendant spirits; no more "weird sisters," with talon fingers and sunken eyes; not even romantic wandering gipsies--but ugly women, with unwashed hands, who can't spell.

The calling has degenerated, and the necromantic trade has pa.s.sed into the hands of unworthy successors, who would steal their living, if cheating wasn't easier. And the trade thrives, and the swindling practisers thereof flaunt in silks, while honest virtue staves off dest.i.tution by making "hickory" s.h.i.+rts at eight cents a piece.

Went up town, found the house, rung the bell, and was shown into a shabby room by a stuttering girl, who informed me by instalments that her mistress would see me presently. Examined the furniture--rickety table, ditto chairs, bare floor with knot-holes in it, unctuous mirror, two hair trunks, a clothes basket, and a hat-box.

Enter mistress--minus youth, beauty, hair-pins and clean stockings.

She wore no flowing robe figured with cabalistic signs, she bore no sable wand of magic, but she was clad in a calico dress, and had a bra.s.s candlestick in her hand--she drew no mystic circle, she performed no inscrutable incantations, she spoke in no unknown tongue--but she put the candlestick on the rickety table, sat down in a cane-bottomed chair, and asked me what my name was, and what I wanted.

Told her I wanted to find out who I was going to marry, and wanted her to tell me a lucky number in the lottery, which should draw a prize big enough to support the family--also wanted a description of the man who stole my jack-knife, and a knowledge of the place where I could find the same.

Now she began to work--she did not consult the stars--she did not cast my horoscope--she did not even ask me where I was born, or what my father did for a living--she exhibited no strange paraphernalia of sorcery and conjuration--no obscure language, suggestive of a divination or enchantment, fell from her prophetic lips.

She only asked me if I had any moles on my person, and what I dreamed about last night--then plunging her hand through a slit in the side of her dress, she fished out from some unknown depth a pack of cards.

Greasy were they, and well worn--the knave of spades had his legs torn off, the queen of diamonds had her face scratched with a thimble, two of the aces were stuck together with beeswax, and the king of clubs had evidently been used to skim flies out of the mola.s.ses.

After much shuffling of the royal and plebeian members of the pack, she got them fixed to her satisfaction, and I proceeded to draw therefrom nine cards, which she disposed in three symmetrical piles; then looked them over--bit her lip--stamped her foot; then told me that my knife had been stolen by a squint-eyed Irishman, who had disposed of it to his uncle for a dozen cotton night-caps, sixty cigars and thirty cents ready money, and that if I was anxious to reclaim it, I would find it at No. 1 Round the Corner.

Asked her if I was big enough to lick the Irishman, at which she waxed indignant, and for a moment I half feared she would turn me into some horrible monster; that, like Circe of old, she would exercise her magic power, and qualify me to play a star engagement at the Metropolitan Theatre by transforming me into an elephant, a she-wolf, or a Bengal tiger.

But, as my mouth didn't get any larger, my toe nails grow any longer, or my fingers change to claws; as I felt no growing appet.i.te for blood, and my nose didn't elongate into a trunk, I soon recovered my equanimity.

Then she went on to say that No. 67 would draw me a prize in the lottery, and that I could get it of "Sam"--that I would marry a red-haired woman, who would die and leave me with a nursing baby--that I would then be "jilted" by a widow, and finally wed a lady whose description corresponds exactly with my present washer-woman; our family is to increase to seventeen; my second son is to be President, and my eldest daughter is to run away with the Czar of all the Russias. She wasn't exactly positive about the manner of my death, but from the looks of the jack of clubs, she "judged I should break my neck coming home from a clam-bake."

Gave her a dollar, and left. A month has pa.s.sed--67 seems a promising number--hav'n't got my knife yet, but live in hope--have seen my future wife, hav'n't yet proposed, but have reason to suppose she would not object.

She was in Catharine street, and had a basket on her head full of shrimps.

[Ill.u.s.tration: City Target Excursion.]

X.

City Target Excursion.

In this City, which, even in cholera seasons, is most heroically nasty, when the filth in Broadway gets so deep as to stop the stages and throw the cars off the track, men are sent round by the City to expend an infinity of labor in hoeing it into symmetrical heaps, like miniature fortifications. In fact, if plenitude of mud could avail to protect a town from invading foes, New York might bid the world defiance, for all the allied powers of all the earth could no more reduce our (in that case) impregnable City, than the late chivalrous Lord Forth could take Sebastopol, by lying flat on his back, and calling for his ma to come and take him home. As the City authorities content themselves with _erecting_ these picturesque monuments, and do not trouble themselves to remove the same, but leave them to adorn the landscape, of course the first rain metamorphoses the fragrant ma.s.s from an embryo mountain to a diminutive lake, almost disgusting enough to make a street contractor sick. No lady attempts the perilous navigation of our streets, unless she has been a couple of seasons at Newport or Rockaway, and learned to swim like a mermaid. And any man who would black his boots in the morning, would be taken to the Lunatic Asylum before night. A search for a dry crossing would be a hopeless pilgrimage, and he who would find a get-over-able-without-getting-your-shoes-full-of-mud street in this metropolis, would wear his life out in a fruitless exploration, and be prematurely planted in Greenwood, with his object unattained. In ordinary times the ladies sweep the sidewalks tolerably clean with their trailing skirts, but now they seem to have thrown up their contract.

Coming down town the other day in a stage, our reckless driver tried the depth of one of the above mentioned munic.i.p.al lakes--the wheels stuck fast--the vehicle settled into the hopeless depth--one scream from the ladies--one unanimous curse from the men--one frantic, furious, ineffectual struggle of the horses, and in another instant we were floating a hopeless wreck. Every one for himself. I saw one of the ladies dragged safely out by the hair--men eventually reached the land in safety, but I rejoiced to see a malignant baby, (which during our journey had screamed and kicked one half the time, and the other half persisted in calling me "Daddy," and soiling my s.h.i.+rt-front with its sticky fingers,) go to the bottom amid a universal chorus of thanksgiving from the company. Got ash.o.r.e myself, with my coat spoiled, my hat minus, my boots full of water, and my whole person "dripping from the recent flood," like a he-Venus rising from an odoriferous ocean.

As a consequence of my involuntary bath, I have since been afflicted with a severe toothache, pleading which comfortable and soothing ail, I obtained leave of absence for a day from the popular establishment where I have the honor to sell peanuts and pop-corn to the confiding public, and I resolved to employ the unusual holiday in attending one of the peculiar inst.i.tutions of grown-up New York, denominated a "TARGET SHOOT."

From the incongruous population of the village aforesaid, target companies spring up with the rapidity and profusion of mushrooms in an old pasture. In all other cities they are exotics, and never have a vigorous and healthy existence--here only are they indigenous, and on Manhattan Island do they flourish in native luxuriance.

The materials are varied--the ingredients sometimes curious--a company being sometimes composed entirely of journeymen tailors, blacksmiths'

apprentices, master carpenters, clerks, porters, coalheavers, stagedrivers, candy-peddlers, pop-corn men, or those persevering individuals who roast perpetual chestnuts on the sidewalk in tin pans--fire companies, express companies, policemen, gangs of men from all kinds of mammoth shops--for wherever thirty or forty individuals work in the same house, they form themselves into a military company, and once or twice every year go to Hoboken and shoot for whiskey and other prizes.

When they want to make a full turn-out, the places of any missing members are filled by extemporaneous volunteers. It was in this capacity that I proposed to go. In these companies there are always more officers than men, more epaulettes than muskets--always a big band of music, and two darkies to carry the target. As to their marching, no two ever step together, and they always put a tall man by the side of a short one, so as to have the average length of steps come right. They go forth in the morning in high spirits, and return at night surly, dusty, discontented, dilapidated, and drunk. As the target is always carried in triumph through the streets, and afterward exhibited in the drill-room, the darkey invariably carries an auger with him, with which explosive weapon all the best shots are made. Every member has a whiskey-bottle in his cartridge-box, or a brandy-flask in his knapsack.

As a general thing, they turn their toes in, and are bandy-legged--they carry their guns over their shoulders at all conceivable angles, and so little do they know about fire-arms, that probably, if called to load their muskets in a hurry, two out of three would put their cartridges in their breeches pockets, and stick their percussion caps on the ends of their ramrods.

When they fire salute, and mean to all shoot together, the report is so near simultaneous that a stranger would think they were firing minute guns. They always select for judges of the shooting, the men who will give the most whiskey, and make the shortest speeches.

As these excursions come off just before election, the candidates for office generally pay for the prizes, and bear the expenses of a reporter for the press to puff the company. The judges carry out the rewards in the morning tied up in brown paper, and the soldiers wear them back at night, around their necks. Six or eight men, called pioneers, march in front, with m.u.f.fs on their heads, leather ap.r.o.ns tied around their waists, and theoretical axes in their hands, which could never, by any possibility, be made to cut anything. The officers walk between the platoons, flouris.h.i.+ng their dandy swords--their attention being pretty equally divided between keeping the men in the line, keeping the little boys out of the line, keeping their unaccustomed white cotton gloves on, and trying to keep step with the music. In single file the men march like a flock of geese on their winding way to the mill-pond, and six or eight abreast, they go with the regularity of a crowd of school-boys, effecting a masterly but hurried retreat from somebody's melon-patch. In order to make them form a straight line, it is necessary to back them up against a brick block, or make them stand between the tracks of a railroad.

Such was the company of which I became a member for a brief eventful time. Its cognomen was "The Lager-Bier American Volunteers, and Native Empire City s.h.i.+llelagh Guards," being composed of Irish, Dutch, Spaniards, and Sandwich Islanders--the only Americans in the company being the colored target-bearers, and the undersigned.

Convened in the drill-room at 8 A. M. As I was a new member, and had borrowed my uniform, I had some difficulty in putting it on--buckled my crossbelt round my neck, got my cap on wrong side before, stuck my bayonet through my coat-tail--put my cartridge-box between my shoulders, and my priming-wire where my "pompon" should have been.

Ready at length to start--crossed the ferry--disembarked--proceeded to the ground and prepared to drill.

The captain finding it impossible to get into a straight line in the usual manner, at length ingeniously overcame this geometrical difficulty by ranging us against a board fence--he then proceeded to put us through the exercise: "Shoulder arms!" Got my gun on the wrong shoulder. "Order arms!" Brought it down on the toes of my neighbor. "Shoulder arms!"

again. Got it on the right shoulder this time, but in so doing knocked off the cap of the man next to me, &c. Got through the rest of the drill without any serious mishap, except that in attempting to charge my piece, I bit off the wrong end of the cartridge, and swallowed the ball--spilled the powder on the ground, and loaded the musket with the paper only.

Now came the shooting. n.i.g.g.e.r set the target at twenty paces--four volleys and not a ball in it--moved it up to fifteen--no better luck--moved it again, one ball put in it this time by a clumsy Dutchman, who shut his eyes when he fired, and hit by mistake. Finding that shooting was no use, captain adopted the usual plan--set the target at ten paces, blindfolded the men, and each one charged on it with the auger; where the point happened to hit, he bored a hole, and the one nearest the bull's eye took the prize. I could see a little through a hole in the cloth--consequence: hit the centre and took the first prize, (a plated cake-basket with a pewter handle, bought for silver by the sagacious Committee).

As the brandy had circulated pretty freely, some of the shots were rather wild--several missed the target entirely and knocked their heads against the trees; one bored a deep hole in a sand bank, and the first lieutenant was put under arrest for attempting to tap the captain.

The man who took the second prize did not come so near the mark by an inch and a half as another man, but he had a pretty sister whom one of the judges was in love with, so he took "the spoons." Ready to go home--Muggins, one of the judges, missing. After a long search found him wrapped up in the colors, fast asleep with his head in a hog-trough--stirred him up with a musket, when he called me "Mrs.

Muggins," and swore at me for pulling all the sheet over to my side.

Marched home in as good order as circ.u.mstances would allow--the darkey bearing in proud triumph the perforated target, which had so many hits near the centre, as to excite the admiration of the deluded public, which, as a general rule, in such cases, can't tell a bullet mark from an auger-hole.

XI.

A new Patent Medicine Operation.

As I too desire to have a mansion on the Fifth Avenue, like the Medical Worthy of Sarsaprilla memory, and wished like him to be able to build a patent medicine palace, with a private chapel under the back-stairs, and a conservatory down-cellar, I cast about me for some means whereby the requisite cash might be reputably acc.u.mulated.