Josh Billings on Ice, and Other Things. Billings Josh
Dokter Bonesett:
Thru the politeness ov Mr. John Smith, i cum in possession ov yure valuabel letter, at about 9 o'clock night before last, in which yu offer me 10 dollars for a poultiss.
I hay had a fair chance to use yure pills upon several important occasions, and can sware posatively that they kan beat enny pills ov their size i ever contended with.
Underneath this letter yu will find a poultiss which i think will draw.
If yu see fit to use it, yu kan emit the 10 dollars by mail, at our risk.
In the mean time, bet freely than i am yure humble servant,
Josh Billings.
Barnabass Bonesett, M.D., (mutch dokter,) chuck full ov faith, bloze his horn, and bi these presents duz blo hiz horn about hiz "Lightning Express and Serio-Sensation pills" a cumfert and a joy to man.
Theze pills are of rutes – rutey, and kost the Author 4 years in the wilderness, besides sleepless nights, and anxious days, tew git them down to a spot, without blemish and filled with fun.
These pills will kure deffness, dipthery and dandruff – are good for baldness, bronkreeters and baksliding – are sertin tew heal hedake, hifalutin, and hangnails – will remove warts, windgauls and wens – destroy awl longings, lassitudes, laziness – will soothe the sorrowful, cam the crazy, and kure a common sized fit in 2 minnits.
They are closs packed in little round boxes, and each little box kontains 2 dozen and 2, or no sail.
Each box iz dun up in a trakt, which sez that they are az sure to cure, az lightning iz tew strike what it starts for.
On the top ov the box iz a full sized painting ov the Author, with a grub hoe in one hand, and a whole parsell ov roots in the other – with a napsack on hiz back, and mountains in the distance, tew which he iz pinting with the grub hoe – them iz the mountains whare he gits the rutes.
On the top ov each little round box, iz these words, in a forrin tung, "Hocus pocus, quod constallus," which being biled down means, "purely vegetabels."
For sum more partikulars, cummune with the author.
XVIII.
JOSH IN SARATOGA
Dear Weekly: – Don't think I am going to ruin, don't think i am totaly spilte, bekauze yu happen to hear from me at this grate drinking place. I am here on urgent and melankolly bizzness, looking for mi Newfoundland pup, not quite 5 months old yet, that I lost lately.
Saratogy never appeared tew me so free from white swellings az it duz now. I haint seen a dozen people ov the ballon purswashion, but almost evry one i meets ackts just az tho they had sum good common sense, and had brought enuff along with them to last while they staid.
Shoddy & Petroleus hav gone tew Europe, to astonish Paris with their paste diamonds and fire gilt familys.
Thare is about 4 thousand strangers here just now, and the liberal way that they invest in the katharticks ov the situation iz suggestive.
Yesterday i saw a bride and her new feller at Congress Spring. She waz a rosy and a roomy bride. He waz bilt to run in shallow water, rather a light draft chap, i thought; but he took 9 consekutiff glasses without flinching, and, i think, would have held one more.
He looked a hundred pounds bigger. I waz filled with horror at the sight, but soon had aul mi fears soothed, when i saw almost everybody present wash themsels internally with five or six tumblers full ov this liquid salts and perilash.
Congress Hall iz being rebuilt with bricks on the old ground, and iz at least 15 rods front on Broadway, with 2 wings az menny rods deep, and will cost 400 thousand dollars, and will feed, sleep, and physick one thousand festive sons and daughters at onst.
Evry house here, except the churches, iz a boarding house; aul the femail seminiaries, and akademys of the arts and sciences, fill up their summer vakations with spring-water pupils.
The great tiger ov the place iz the hi rock spring; this now flows over its conical summit, something that it haz not done before for 300 years, and besides being a good artickle ov physick, is probably the greatest natral curiousness this side ov the temple of Solomon, his 500 wives and 300 good-looking collaterals inkluded.
Take the kathartics out ov Saratogy, and thare wouldn't be ennything left ov deep interest, but a pale yeller, sandy sile, that haint got moral strength enuff in it tew hold a fense-post up straight, unless the hole waz well manured first.
But, with some 10 or 15 ov theze mineral springs that will kure ennything, from a broken heart tew the spring halt – water the most sparkling – water that biles and bubbles, without money, and without even stamps, and has biled ever since Cain waz a babe – I say, with such a legacy, Saratogy iz today the surest place on the breast ov the earth to git a good loose drink.
My stay here will necessarily be small; i kant git no track ov mi Newfoundland pup, with one white foot and a star in his forehead; and bizzness before drinking being one ov mi best holts, i shall leave here before long for Montreal or Saint Lewis, in search ov the dogg.
The annual races passed oph with the usual amount ov burglarys, and pocket-book thieveries, but I was told yesterday, by one ov the first citizens, that yu kan leave a roll ov bank bills (since the races) lying on the sidewalk, and noboddy would pick it up for the fust two days.
I haven't tried this myself, nor don't intend to, for fear thare might be just one slippery cuss left in the place, and one man could raize up a rowl ov bills for me, just as eazy az 40 could.
I havn't got munny, nor grit enuff, to indulge in sich moral experiments.
The ground, whare the old United States Hotel stood, remains kivered with the debris ov that melankolly and hot fire, which reduced tew ashes and old bricks, the most popular and fashionable dry goods emporium in the universe ov America.
I have it from Jenkins, (who is here now gitting himself pliable,) that az soon az one or two objectionable partners can be smoked out ov the ring, then the balance ov them will build on the grounds a hotel that will make – Rome howl.
The Union and the Clarendon are the two champions now, and both ov them hav a full stummuk ov clean looking, and very decent ackting passengers.
Thare iz sum very elaborate rigs here; one that I saw yesterday waz quite "uneak." (I don't know whether this word iz just the thing tew use in this spot, but it sounds big, and strange, and that iz awl that I care for.)
The rig consisted ov a yello buggy, with a black bugger driving, clothed in drab broadcloth, with bras buttons, and cockade on a plug hat with a velvet belly band around it, and salmon colored gloves, and a 10 foot whip-stork, with a spotted dogg under the front axletree, and 3 hosses in injun file, two blacks, and the one on the lead the color ov cream.
Jenkins told me, that they were the only shoddy team here, and belonged tew a young fellow from Melankton 4 corners, in the state ov Conneckticut, whose father has raked in 2 millions, by making beeswax out ov a very little mutton tallow, and a good deal ov injun meal.
But it won't do to believe awl that Jenkins sez; he has lied so consekutive for the last 15 years, that hiz front teeth hav awl decayed out.
One ov the perennial feeters ov Sarotogy, iz a drove ov tame injuns, with their squaws, and young porpoises, who cum here each drinking season, from the outlines ov Kanada, laiden with braided baskets, bags ov beads, and harmless bows and arrows.
Theze people might hav bin good injuns onst, but each successive porpoise grows paler, and meaner, and if it want for their nastyness, there aint 3 boarding-school misses in the whole land, with poetry enuff in their bild tew call them "the noble red men ov the forest."
The fact ov it iz, thare iz more truth than poetry in injuns, and the truth iz, that keyenne whiskey, and other kinds ov civilization, has outflanked them.
It requires a grate deal ov good sense tew stand