You can get a
      music-mill for a mere song, and to put it in order, you have but
      to open the works, and give them three or four smart raps with a
      hammer. It improves the tone of the thing, for business purposes,
      more than you can imagine. This done, you have only to stroll
      along, with the mill on your back, until you see tanbark in the
      street, and a knocker wrapped up in buckskin. Then you stop and
      grind; looking as if you meant to stop and grind till doomsday. Presently a window opens, and somebody pitches you a sixpence,
      with a request to “Hush up and go on,” etc. I am aware that some
      grinders have actually afforded to “go on” for this sum; but for
      my part, I found the necessary outlay of capital too great to
      permit of my “going on” under a shilling. At this occupation I did a good deal; but, somehow, I was not
      quite satisfied, and so finally abandoned it. The truth is, I
      labored under the disadvantage of having no monkey—and American
      streets are so muddy, and a Democratic rabble is so obstrusive,
      and so full of demnition mischievous little boys. I was now out of employment for some months, but at length
      succeeded, by dint of great interest, in procuring a situation in
      the Sham-Post. The duties, here, are simple, and not altogether
      unprofitable. For example:—very early in the morning I had to
      make up my packet of sham letters. Upon the inside of each of
      these I had to scrawl a few lines on any subject which occurred
      to me as sufficiently mysterious—signing all the epistles Tom
      Dobson, or Bobby Tompkins, or anything in that way. Having folded
      and sealed all, and stamped them with sham postmarks—New Orleans,
      Bengal, Botany Bay, or any other place a great way off—I set out,
      forthwith, upon my daily route, as if in a very great hurry. I
      always called at the big houses to deliver the letters, and
      receive the postage. Nobody hesitates at paying for a
      letter—especially for a double one—people are such fools—and it
      was no trouble to get round a corner before there was time to
      open the epistles. The worst of this profession was, that I had
      to walk so much and so fast; and so frequently to vary my route. Besides, I had serious scruples of conscience. I can’t bear to
      hear innocent individuals abused—and the way the whole town took
      to cursing Tom Dobson and Bobby Tompkins was really awful to
      hear. I washed my hands of the matter in disgust. My eighth and last speculation has been in the Cat-Growing way. I
      have found that a most pleasant and lucrative business, and,
      really, no trouble at all. The country, it is well known, has
      become infested with cats—so much so of late, that a petition for
      relief, most numerously and respectably signed, was brought
      before the Legislature at its late memorable session. The
      Assembly, at this epoch, was unusually well-informed, and, having
      passed many other wise and wholesome enactments, it crowned all
      with the Cat-Act. In its original form, this law offered a
      premium for cat-heads (fourpence a-piece), but the Senate
      succeeded in amending the main clause, so as to substitute the
      word “tails” for “heads.” This amendment was so obviously proper,
      that the House concurred in it nem. con. As soon as the governor had signed the bill, I invested my whole
      estate in the purchase of Toms and Tabbies. At first I could only
      afford to feed them upon mice (which are cheap), but they
      fulfilled the scriptural injunction at so marvellous a rate, that
      I at length considered it my best policy to be liberal, and so
      indulged them in oysters and turtle. Their tails, at a
      legislative price, now bring me in a good income; for I have
      discovered a way, in which, by means of Macassar oil, I can force
      three crops in a year. It delights me to find, too, that the
      animals soon get accustomed to the thing, and would rather have
      the appendages cut off than otherwise. I consider myself,
      therefore, a made man, and am bargaining for a country-seat on
      the Hudson. THE LANDSCAPE GARDEN


     The garden like a lady fair was cut
         That lay as if she slumbered in delight,
     And to the open skies her eyes did shut;
         The azure fields of heaven were ’sembled right
         In a large round set with flow’rs of light:
     The flowers de luce and the round sparks of dew
     That hung upon their azure leaves, did show
     Like twinkling stars that sparkle in the ev’ning blue. —GILES FLETCHER

      No more remarkable man ever lived than my friend, the young
      Ellison. He was remarkable in the entire and continuous profusion
      of good gifts ever lavished upon him by fortune. From his cradle
      to his grave, a gale of the blandest prosperity bore him along. Nor do I use the word Prosperity in its mere wordly or external
      sense. I mean it as synonymous with happiness. The person of whom
      I speak, seemed born for the purpose of foreshadowing the wild
      doctrines of Turgot, Price, Priestley, and Condorcet—of
      exemplifying, by individual instance, what has been deemed the
      mere chimera of the perfectionists. In the brief existence of
      Ellison, I fancy, that I have seen refuted the dogma—that in
      man’s physical and spiritual nature, lies some hidden principle,
      the antagonist of Bliss. An intimate and anxious examination of
      his career, has taught me to understand that, in general, from
      the violation of a few simple laws of Humanity, arises the
      Wretchedness of mankind; that, as a species, we have in our
      possession the as yet unwrought elements of Content,—and that
      even now, in the present blindness and darkness of all idea on
      the great question of the Social Condition, it is not impossible
      that Man, the individual, under certain unusual and highly
      fortuitous conditions, may be happy. With opinions such as these was my young friend fully imbued; and
      thus is it especially worthy of observation that the
      uninterrupted enjoyment which distinguished his life was in great
      part the result of preconcert. It is, indeed evident, that with
      less of the instinctive philosophy which, now and then, stands so
      well in the stead of experience, Mr. Ellison would have found
      himself precipitated, by the very extraordinary successes of his
      life, into the common vortex of Unhappiness which yawns for those
      of preeminent endowments. But it is by no means my present object
      to pen an essay on Happiness. The ideas of my friend may be
      summed up in a few words. He admitted but four unvarying laws, or
      rather elementary principles, of Bliss. That which he considered
      chief, was (strange to say!)