HANS DONDERBECK'S BASE-BALL GAME. 47

Ten, ven ve coes to badt, I vash te firsdt, unt evrypody hurrahs me, unt says, now Hans, for anoder sky scraber, unt tat tam pichter gifs me a pall vad ish called a tew trop, unt I makes von hart smack ad id, unt id falls town pefore I hitds id. Ten I vash madt, unt I dinks I fules dat pichter, unt I knocks him next pall vay town to Moyamensinck. So te next pall vat he sents me, I yousdt him ash hardt vat I cans, pud I missed id, unt dumbles town on mine nose, unt mosdt bursdt mine hedt open, unt smashes mine nose ash flad ash a penny vistle, unt vash carriet avay for tead, midt te plood runninck town to mine heels yed. I nod pe aples to blay till de lasdt innincks, ven I gids vell.

So tem fellers pe so trunk tat tey could not hardly valk on hims fedt yed; so I dinks tey dake atvantages of me vile I pees mosdt kilt yedt; so I dinks I drinks mine share of te peer, alt vad ish in de keg yed, pefore ve kommences do blay tis lasdt innicks.

Vel, ash I vash poody pad, I dinks nod for do bidch, but leds Kouderink bidch, unt I coes int te left fieldt yed.

Tat vash coot for me, for the firsdt pall vad Kouderink drows de mans vad vash batting on te onder nine, he makes von hardt knocks ad id unt hids id nod, unt te badt flies oud hish handt unt hids Kouderink, unt mosdt preaks his jaw yed; unt vile tey vas shanging pichders I dinks I pe more ash do dired do stand up, unt yousdt lies town, unt by jinks I gids a scleap, unt not vakes up dill te next morninck, unt nod no vare I vas unt I see nottinck of tem fellers pud a muley cow vad yousdt eads mine new straw hadt up, vad I gives one tollar unt a hallop for tat morninck do blay pase ball mid.

So I coes home pare headt, unt finden oudt tem fellers all gids a fittinck, unt Mayor Foxs's bolice loks tem mit de station houses.

Mine

Now vot you tincks? Mine frou she gifs me donner unt blitzen unt say I peen droonk! Yah! vat a fools she pe! Droonk on lager! Nix! Lager peer vill nod make trunk comes. Farder seen a mans, vad seens anuder mans, vad dold hims, he no a mans, vad trinks more ash fife paarels of peer unt it nod makes him trunk neider. Pud de assids vad ish in the stomchak eads de iron hoops off, unt te parrels pustead, kills him stone tead, unt te beoples says him ties of spondanious compustion. Put mine frou she's a vomans, an knows noddincks; put I schspose I pe schoost like some odder mans. I keeps te beace, unt blays pase pall nefer any more. Dats all. Goot day.

Examples of Irish-English are numerous enough. This, however, will well answer our purpose :

PADDY'S VERSION OF "EXCELSIOR."

'Twas growing dark so terrible fasht,

Whin through a town up the mountain there pashed
A broth of a boy, to his neck in the shnow.

As he walked, his shillelah he swung to and fro,
Saying, it's up to the top I'm bound for to go,
Be jabers!

He looked mortial sad, and his eyes were as bright
As a fire of turf on a cowld winther night,
And divil a word that he said could ye tell
As he opened his mouth and let out a yell,

It's up till the top of the mountain I'll go,

Onless covered up with this bothersome shnow,
Be jabers!

Through the windows he saw, as he travelled along,

The light of the candles and fires so warm;

But a big chunck of ice hung over his head.

Wid a shnivel and groan, by St. Patrick, he said,

It's up to the very tip top I will rush,

And then if it falls it's not meself it'll crush,

Be jabers!

Whist a bit! said an owld man, whose head was as white

As the shnow that fell down on that miserable night;

Shure ye'll fall in the wather, me bit of a lad,
For the night is so dark and the walkin' is bad.
Bedad! he'd not lisht to a word that was said,
But he'd go till the top if he wint on his head,

Be jabers!

A bright buxom young girl, such as like to be kissed,
Axed him wadn't he shtop, how could he resist?
So, snapping his fingers and winking his eye,
While shmiling upon her, he made this reply-
Faith I meant to kape on till I got to the top,

But as yer shwate self has axed me I may as well shtop,
Be jabers!

He shtopped all night, and he shtopped all day,
And ye musn't be axing whin he did go away;
But wouldn't he be a bastely gossoon

To be lavin' his darlint in the swate honeymoon?

Whin the owld man has paraties enough and to spare,
Shure he moight as well shtay if he's comfortable there,
Be jabers!

In the commingled French-Irish-English we give this:—

THE IRISH FRENCHMAN.-Franuis S. Smith.

An English ship, by some mischance,
Once foundered on the coast of France;
But all her crew-at least a score
Of stalwart sailors-reached the shore.

At first, of course, they could but fret,

But sailors are a jolly set,

And seldom long will entertain
A grief on either land or main.

Back to his comrades Paddy flew,

And soon around him flocked the crew-
"What luck! What luck, Pat?" cried they all,
"Troth," answered Pat, no luck at all!

"Byes, dear, d'ye see, we've fallen among
Frinchmen who can't shpake their own tongue,

Bedad. to me it seems a riddle,

They say 'long tongs' instead of griddle!"

MORAL.

My moral plainly all can see-
No one should a pretender be;

For mere pretence, when put to test,
Is worse than ignorance confessed.

Among the best of our humorists must be classed Oliver Wendell Holmes. A combination of Sydney Smith, Tom Hood, and Thackeray, he is a rare instance of the laughing philosopher. The following “address" is a happy mixture of argument, satire, and fun.

A PSEUDO-SCIENCE.

(4) (9) (28) (3).—Dr. O. W. Holmes.

A Pseudo-science consists of a nomenclature, with a self-adjusting arrangement, by which all positive evidence, or such as favors its doctrines, is admitted and all negative evidence, or such as tells against it, is excluded. It is invariably connected with some lucrative practical application. Its professors and practitioners are usually shrewd people; they are very serious with the public, but wink and laugh a good deal among themselves. The believing multitude consists of women of both sexes, feeble-minded inquirers, poetical optimists, people who always get cheated in buying horses, philanthropists who insist on hurrying up the millennium, and others of this class, with here and there a clergyman, less frequently a lawyer, very rarely a physician, and almost never a horse-jockey or a member of the detective police. I did not say that Phrenology was one of the Pseudosciences.

A Pseudo-science does not necessarily consist wholly of lies, It may contain many truths, and even valuable ones. The rottenest bank starts with a little specie. It puts out a thousand promises to pay on the strength of a single dollar, but the dollar is very commonly a good one. The practitioners of the Pseudosciences know that common minds, after they have been baited with a real fact or two, will jump at the merest rag of a lie, or even at the bare hook. When we have one fact found us, we are very apt to supply the next out of our own imagination. (How many persons can read Judges xv. 16, correctly the first time?)

The

A PSEUDO-SCIENCE.

51

Pseudo-sciences take advantage of this. I did not say that it was so with Phrenology.

I have rarely met a sensible man who would not allow that there was something in Phrenology. A broad, high forehead, it is commonly agreed, promises intellect; one that is "villanous low" and has a huge hind head back of it, is wont to mark an animal nature. I have as rarely met an unbiased and sensible man who really believed in the bumps. It is observed, however, that persons with what the Phrenologists call "good heads " are more prone than others toward plenary belief in the doctrine.

It is so hard to prove a negative, that, if a man should assert that the moon was in truth a green cheese, formed by the coagulable substance of the Milky Way, and challenge me to prove the contrary, I might be puzzled. But if he offer to sell me a ton of this lunar cheese, I call on him to prove the truth of the caseous nature of our satellite before I purchase.

It is not necessary to prove the falsity of the phrenological statement. It is only necessary to show that its truth is not proved, and cannot be, by the common course of argument. The walls of the head are double, with a great air-chamber between them, over the smallest and most closely crowded "organs." Can you tell how much money there is in a safe, which also has thick double walls, by kneading its knobs with your fingers? So when a man fumbles about my forehead, and talks about the organs of Individuality, Size, etc., I trust him as much as I should if he felt of the outside of my strong-box, and told me that there was a five-dollar or a ten-dollar bill under this or that particular rivet. Perhaps there is: only he doesn't know anything about it.

I proceed to explain the self-adjusting mechanism of Phrenology, which is very similar to that of the Pseudo-sciences. An example will show it most conveniently.

A. is a notorious thief. Messrs. Bumpus and Crane examine him and find a good-sized organ of Acquisitiveness. Positive fact for Phrenology. Casts and drawings of A. are multiplied, and the bump does not lose in the act of copying. I did not say it gained. What do you look so for? (to the audience).

Presently B. turns up, a bigger thief than A. But B. has no bump at all over Acquisitiveness. Negative fact; goes against Phrenology. Not a bit of it. Don't you see how small Conscientiousness is? That's the reason B. stole.

And then comes C., ten times as much a thief as either A. or B.-used to steal before he was weaned, and would pick one of his own pockets and put its contents in another, if he could find no other way of committing petty larceny. Unfortunately, C. has a hollow, instead of a bump, over Acquisitiveness. Ah, but just look and see what a bump of Alimentiveness! Did not C. buy nuts and gingerbread, when a boy, with the money he stole ? Of