The Universal Reciter. Various

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ his cage. Another one of his tormentors walks in. Some one sings out to him, "Have a glass of beer, Billy?"

      "Don't care about any beer," says Billy, "but, Snyder, you may give me one of your best ciga—Ha-a-a! ha! ha! ha! ho! ho! ho! he! he! he! ah-h-h-ha! ha! ha! ha! Why—why—Snyder—who who—ha-ha! ha! what's the matter with that nose?"

      Snyder was absolutely fearful to behold by this time; his face was purple with rage, all except his nose, which glowed like a ball of fire. Leaning his ponderous figure far over the bar, and raising his arm aloft to emphasize his words with it, he fairly roared:

"I peen out fishin' mit ter poys. The sun it pese hot like ash never was. I purnt my nose. Now you no like dose nose, you yust take dose nose unt wr-wr-wr-wring your mean American finger mit 'em. That's the kind of man vot I am!" And Snyder was right.

THE MISER'S FATE.

       Table of Contents

      OSBORNE.

      In the year 1762 a miser, of the name of Foscue, in France, having amassed enormous wealth by habits of extortion and the most sordid parsimony, was requested by the government to advance a sum of money as a loan. The miser demurred, pretending that he was poor. In order to hide his gold effectually, he dug a deep cave in his cellar, the descent to which was by a ladder, and which was entered by means of a trap-door, to which was attached a spring-lock.

      He entered this cave one day to gloat over his gold, when the door fell upon him, and the spring-lock, the key to which he had left on the outside, snapped, and held him a prisoner in the cave, where he perished miserably. Some months afterwards a search was made, and his body was found in the midst of his money-bags, with a candlestick lying beside it on the floor. In the following lines the miser is supposed to have just entered his cave, and to be soliloquizing.

      S

      O, so! all safe! Come forth, my pretty sparklers—

      Come forth, and feast my eyes! Be not afraid!

      No keen-eyed agent of the government

      Can see you here. They wanted me, forsooth,

      To lend you, at the lawful rate of usance,

      For the state's needs. Ha, ha! my shining pets,

      My yellow darlings, my sweet golden circlets!

      Too well I loved you to do that—and so

      I pleaded poverty, and none could prove

      My story was not true.

      Ha! could they see

      These bags of ducats, and that precious pile

      Of ingots, and those bars of solid gold,

      Their eyes, methinks, would water. What a comfort

      Is it to see my moneys in a heap

      All safely lodged under my very roof!

      Here's a fat bag—let me untie the mouth of it.

      What eloquence! What beauty! What expression!

      Could Cicero so plead? Could Helen look

      One-half so charming? [The trap-door falls.]

      Ah! what sound was that?

      The Trap-door fallen—and the spring-lock caught!

      Well, have I not the key? Of course I have.

      'Tis in this pocket. No. In this? No. Then

      I left it at the bottom of the ladder.

      Ha! 'tis not there. Where then? Ah! mercy, Heaven!

      'Tis in the lock outside!

      What's to be done?

      Help, help! Will no one hear? Oh, would that I

      Had not discharged old Simon! but he begged

      Each week for wages—would not give me credit.

      I'll try my strength upon the door. Despair!

      I might as soon uproot the eternal rocks

      As force it open. Am I here a prisoner,

      And no one in the house? no one at hand,

      Or likely soon to be, to hear my cries?

      Am I entombed alive? Horrible fate!

      I sink—I faint beneath the bare conception!

      [Awakes.] Darkness? Where am I? I remember, now,

      This is a bag of ducats—'tis no dream—

      No dream! The trap-door fell, and here am I

      Immured with my dear gold—my candle out—

      All gloom—all silence—all despair! What, ho!

      Friends! Friends? I have no friends. What right have I

      To use the name? These money-bags have been

      The only friends I've cared for—and for these

      I've toiled, and pinched, and screwed—shutting my heart

      To charity, humanity and love!

      Detested traitors! Since I gave you all—

      Aye, gave my very soul—can ye do naught

      For me in this extremity? Ho! Without there!

      A thousand ducats for a loaf of bread!

      Ten thousand ducats for a glass of water!

      A pile of ingots for a helping hand!

      Was that a laugh? Aye, 'twas a fiend that laughed

      To see a miser in the grip of death.

      Offended Heaven, have mercy! I will give

      In alms all this vile rubbish; aid me thou

      In this most dreadful strait! I'll build a church—

      A hospital! Vain, vain! Too late, too late!

      Heaven knows the miser's heart too well to trust him!

      Heaven will not hear! Why should it? What have I

      Done СКАЧАТЬ