PART I.

ESSAYS, SKETCHES, AND LETTERS.

1.1. One of Mr. Ward's Business Letters.

1.2. On "Forts."

1.3. The Shakers.

1.4. High-handed Outrage at Utica.

1.5. Celebration at Baldinsville.

1.6. Among the Spirits.

1.7. On the Wing.

1.8. The Octoroon.

1.9. Experience as an Editor.

1.10. Oberlin.

1.11. The Showman's Courtship.

1.12. The Crisis.

1.13. Wax Figures vs. Shakespeare.

1.14. Among the Free Lovers.

1.15. A Visit to Brigham Young.

1.16. Scandalous doings at Pittsburg.

1.17. The Census.

1.18. An Honest Living.

1.19. The Press.

1.20. Edwin Forest as Othello.

1.21. The Show Business and Popular Lectures.

1.22. Woman's Rights.

1.23. Would-be Sea Dogs.

1.24. The Prince of Wales.

1.25. Piccolomini.

1.26. Little Patti.

1.27. Ossawatomie Brown.

1.28. Joy in the House of Ward.

1.29. Boston. (A. Ward to his Wife.)

1.30. How Old Abe Received the News of his Nomination.

1.31. Interview with President Lincoln.

1.32. Interview with the Prince Napoleon.

1.33. Agriculture.

1.34. Busts.

1.35. A Hard Case.

1.36. Affairs around the Village Green.

1.37. About Editors.

1.38. Editing.

1.39. Popularity.

1.40. A Little Difficulty in the Way.

1.41. Colored People's Church.

1.42. Spirits.

1.43. Mr. Blowhard.

1.44. Market Morning.

1.45. We See Two Witches.

1.46. From a Homely Man.

1.47. The Elephant.

1.48. How the Napoleon of Sellers was Sold.

1.49. On Autumn.

1.50. Paying for his Provender by Praying.

1.51. Hunting Trouble.

1.52. Dark Doings.

1.53. Reporters.

1.54. He had the Little Voucher In His Pocket.

1.55. The Gentlemanly Conductor.

1.56. Morality and Genius.

1.57. Rough Beginning of the Honeymoon.

1.58. A Colored man of the Name of Jeffries.

1.59. Names.

1.60. He found he Would.

1.61. "Burial in Richmond and Resurrection in Boston."

1.62. A Mayoralty Election.

1.63. Fishing Excursion.

PART II.

WAR.

2.1. The Show is Confiscated.

2.2. Thrilling Scenes in Dixie.

2.3. Fourth of July Oration.

2.4. The War Fever in Baldinsville.

2.5. A War Meeting.

2.6. The Draft in Baldinsville.

2.7. Surrender of Cornwallis.

2.8. Things in New York.

2.9. Touching Letter from a Gory Member.

2.10. In Canada.

2.11. The Noble Red Man.

2.12. Artemus Ward in Richmond.

2.13. Artemus Ward to the Prince of Wales.

PART III.

STORIES AND ROMANCES.

3.1. Moses the Sassy; or, The Disguised Duke.

3.2. Marion: A Romance of the French School.

3.3. William Barker, the Young Patriot.

3.4. A Romance—The Conscript.

3.5. A Romance—Only a Mechanic.

3.6. Roberto the Rover; A Tale of Sea and Shore.

3.7. Red Hand: A Tale of Revenge.

3.8. Pyrotechny: A Romance after the French.

3.9. The Last of the Culkinses.

3.10. A Mormon Romance—Reginald Gloverson.

PART IV.

TO CALIFORNIA AND RETURN.

4.1. On the Steamer.

4.2. The Isthmus.

4.3. Mexico.

4.4. California.

4.5. Washoe.

4.6. Mr. Pepper.

4.7. Horace Greely's Ride to Placerville.

4.8. To Reese River.

4.9. Great Salt Lake City.

4.10. The Mountain Fever.

4.11. "I am Here."

4.12. Brigham Young.

4.13. A Piece is Spoken.

4.14. The Ball.

4.15. Phelp's Almanac.

4.16. Hurrah for the Road.

4.17. Very Much Married.

4.18. The Revelation of Joseph Smith.

PART V.

THE LONDON PUNCH LETTERS.

5.1. Arrival in London.

5.2. Personal Recollections.

5.3. The Green Lion and Oliver Cromwell.

5.4. At the Tomb of Shakespeare.

5.5. Introduction to the Club.

5.6. The Tower of London.

5.7. Science and Natural History.

5.8. A Visit to the British Museum.

PART VI.

ARTEMUS WARD'S PANORAMA.

6.1. Prefatory Note by Melville D. Landon.

6.2. The Egyptian Hall Lecture.

6.3. "The Times" Notice.

6.4. Programme of the Egyptian Hall Lecture.

6.5. Announcement and Programme of the Dodworth Hall Lecture.

PART VII.

MISCELLANEOUS.

7.1. The Cruise of the Polly Ann.

7.2. Artemus Ward's Autobiography.

7.3. The Serenade.

7.4. O'Bourcy's "Arrah-na-Pogue."

7.5. Artemus Ward among the Fenians.

7.6. Artemus Ward in Washington.

7.7. Scenes Outside the Fair Grounds.

7.8. The Wife.

7.9. A Juvenile Composition On the Elephant.

7.10. A Poem by the Same.

7.11. East Side Theatricals.

7.12. Soliloquy of a Low Thief.

7.13. The Negro Question.

7.14. Artemus Ward on Health.

7.15. A Fragment.

7.16. Brigham Young's Wives.

7.17. A. Ward's First Umbrella.

7.18. An Affecting Poem.

7.19. Mormon Bill of Fare.

7.20. "The Babes in the Wood."

7.21. Mr. Ward Attends a Graffick (Soiree.)

7.22. A. Ward Among the Mormons.—Reported by Himself—or Somebody Else.

* * *

PUBLISHERS' PREFACE TO THE NEW (1898) EDITION.

The present edition is of a work which has been for more than thirty years prominently before the public, and which may justly be said to have maintained a standard character. It is issued because of a demand for a BETTER EDITION than has ever been published.

In order to supply this acknowledged want, the publishers have enlarged and perfected this edition by adding some matter not heretofore published in book form.

More than one hundred thousand copies of the work have been printed. The plates had become so worn as to render it unreadable, yet the sale kept on. In preparing this new edition, many of the author's fragmentary pieces, not contained in the old edition, have been added. The earliest of the author's writings, published in periodicals in 1862, are included, together with many additional illustrations, which now, for the first time, make the work complete.

It is universally conceded that no country in the world has ever produced a genius like Artemus Ward. Writers of ACKNOWLEDGED GENIUS are never very numerous. He attained a great and deserved popularity, which will be lasting.

It has been observed that the wit of one generation is rarely appreciated by the next, but this is not true of Artemus Ward. There is a constant demand for his writings, for the reason that his jokes require no appendix for their elucidation. No one who speaks the English language can fail to appreciate his wonderful humor. It will always be funny. There is a fascination about it which can neither be questioned nor resisted. His particular niche in the temple of Fame will not be claimed by another. His intellect was sharp and electric. He saw the humor of anything at a glance, and his manner of relating these laughter-provoking absurdities is original and "fetching."

PRELIMINARY NOTES BY JOHN CAMDEN HOTTEN.

Piccadilly, W. Jan. 30, 1865.

There is a story of two "smart" Yankees, one named Hosea and the other Hezekiah, who met in an oyster shop in Boston. Said Hosea, "As to opening oysters, why nothing's easier if you only know how." "And how's how?" asked Hezekiah. "Scotch snuff," replied Hosea, very gravely—"Scotch snuff. Bring a little of it ever so near their noses, and they'll sneeze their lids off." "I know a man who knows a better plan," observed Hezekiah. "He spreads the bivalves in a circle, seats himself in the centre, reads a chapter of Artemus Ward to them, and goes on until they get interested. One by one they gape with astonishment at A. Ward's whoppers, and as they gape my friend whips 'em out, peppers away, and swallows 'em."

Excellent as all that Artemus Ward writes really is, and exuberantly overflowing with humour as are nearly all his articles, it is too bad to accuse him of telling "whoppers." On the contrary, the old Horatian question of "Who shall forbid me to speak truth in laughter?" seems ever present to his mind. His latest production is the admirable paper "Artemus Ward among the Fenians" which appears in Part 7.

If Artemus has on any occasion really told "whoppers," it has been in his announcements of being about to visit England. From time to time he has stated his intention of visiting this country, and from time to time has he disappointed his English friends.

He was coming to England after his trip to California, when, laden with gold, he could think of no better place to spend it in.

He was on his way to England when he and his companion, Mr. Hingston, encountered the Pi-ute Indians, and narrowly escaped scalping.

He was leaving for England with "Betsy Jane" and the "snaiks" before the American war was ended.

He had unscrewed the head of each of his "wax figgers," and sent each on board in a carpet-bag, labelled "For England," just as Mr Lincoln was assassinated.

He was hastening to England when the news came a few weeks ago that he had been blown up in an oil well!

He has been on his way to England in every newspaper of the American Union for the last two years.

Here is the latest announcement:

"Artemus Ward, in a private letter, states that Doctor Kumming, the famous London seer and profit, having foretold that the end of the world will happen on his own birthday in January 1867, he, Artemus, will not visit England until the latter end of 1866, when the people there will be selling off, and dollars will be plentiful. Mr. Ward says that he shall leave England in the last steamer, in time to see the American eagle spread his wings, and with the stars and stripes in his beek and tallents, sore away to his knativ empyrehum.—" American Paper.

But even this is likely to be a "whopper," for a more reliable private letter from Artemus declares his fixed purpose to leave for England in the steamship City of Boston early in June; and the probabilities are that he will be stepping on English shores just about the time that these pages go to press.

Lest anything should happen to him, and England be for ever deprived of seeing him, the most recent production of his pen, together with two or three of his best things, are here embalmed for preservation, on the principle adopted by the affectionate widow of the bear-trainer of Perpignan. "I have nothing left," said the woman; "I am absolutely without a roof to shelter me and the poor animal." "Animal!" exclaimed the prefect; "you don't mean to say that you keep the bear that devoured your husband?" "Alas!" she replied, "it is all that is left to me of the poor dear man!"

If any other excuse be needed for thus presenting the British public with A. Ward's "last," in addition to the pertinency of the article and its real merit, that excuse may be found in the fact that it is thoroughly new to readers on this side of the Atlantic.

The general public will undoubtedly receive "Artemus Ward among the Fenians" with approving laughter. Should it fall into the hands of a philo-Fenian the effect may be different. To him it would probably have the wrong action of the Yankee bone-picking machine.

"I've got a new machine," said a Yankee pedlar, "for picking bones out of fish. Now, I tell you, it's a leetle bit the darndest thing you ever did see. All you have to do is to set it on a table and turn a crank, and the fish flies right down your throat and the bones right under the grate. Well, there was a country greenhorn got hold of it the other day, and he turned the crank the wrong way; and, I tell you, the way the bones flew down his throat was awful. Why, it stuck that fellow so full of bones, that he could not get his shirt off for a whole week!"

In addition to the paper on the Fenians, two other articles by Artemus Ward are reprinted in the present work. One relates to the city of Washington, and the other to the author's imaginary town of Baldinsville. Both are highly characteristic of the writer and of his quaint spellings—a heterography not more odd than that of the postmaster of Shawnee County, Missouri, who, returning his account to the General Office, wrote, "I hearby sertify that the four going A-Counte is as nere Rite as I now how to make It, if there is any mistake it is not Dun a purpers."

Artemus Ward has created a new model for funny writers; and the fact is noticeable that, in various parts of this country as well as in his own, he has numerous puny imitators, who suppose that by simply adopting his comic spelling they can write quite as well as he can. Perhaps it would be as well if they remembered the joke of poor Thomas Hood, who said that he could write as well as Shakespere if he had the mind to, but the trouble was—he had not got the mind.

* * *

A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH BY MELVILLE D. LANDON.

Charles Farrar Browne, better known to the world as "Artemus Ward," was born at Waterford, Oxford County, Maine, on the twenty-sixth of April, 1834, and died of consumption at Southampton, England, on Wednesday, the sixth of March, 1867.

His father, Levi Browne, was a land surveyor, and Justice of the Peace. His mother, Caroline E. Brown, is still living, and is a descendant from Puritan stock.

Mr. Browne's business manager, Mr. Hingston, once asked him about his Puritanic origin, when he replied: "I think we came from Jerusalem, for my father's name was Levi and we had a Moses and a Nathan in the family, but my poor brother's name was Cyrus; so, perhaps, that makes us Persians."

Charles was partially educated at the Waterford school, when family circumstances induced his parents to apprentice him to learn the rudiments of printing in the office of the "Skowhegan Clarion," published some miles to the north of his native village. Here he passed through the dreadful ordeal to which a printer's "devil" is generally subjected. He always kept his temper; and his eccentric boy jokes are even now told by the residents of Skowhegan.

In the spring, after his fifteenth birthday, Charles Browne bade farewell to the "Skowhegan Clarion;" and we next hear of him in the office of the "Carpet-Bag," edited by B.P. Shillaber ("Mrs. Partington"). Lean, lank, but strangely appreciative, young Browne used to "set up" articles from the pens of Charles G. Halpine ("Miles O'Reilly") and John G. Saxe, the poet. Here he wrote his first contribution in a disguised hand, slyly put it into the editorial box, and the next day disguised his pleasure while setting it up himself. The article was a description of a Fourth of July celebration in Skowhegan. The spectacle of the day was a representation of the battle of Yorktown, with G. Washington and General Horace Cornwallis in character. The article pleased Mr. Shillaber, and Mr. Browne, afterwards speaking of it, said: "I went to the theatre that evening, had a good time of it, and thought I was the greatest man in Boston."

While engaged on the "Carpet-Bag," the subject of our sketch closely studied the theatre and courted the society of actors and actresses. It was in this way that he gained that correct and valuable knowledge of the texts and characters of the drama, which enabled him in after years to burlesque them so successfully. The humorous writings of Seba Smith were his models, and the oddities of "John Phoenix" were his especial admiration.

Being of a roving temper Charles Browne soon left Boston, and, after traveling as a journeyman printer over much of New York and Massachusetts, he turned up in the town of Tiffin, Seneca County, Ohio, where he became reporter and compositor at four dollars per week. After making many friends among the good citizens of Tiffin, by whom he is remembered as a patron of side shows and traveling circuses, our hero suddenly set out for Toledo, on the lake, where he immediately made a reputation as a writer of sarcastic paragraphs in the columns of the Toledo "Commercial." He waged a vigorous newspaper war with the reporters of the Toledo "Blade," but while the "Blade" indulged in violent vituperation, "Artemus" was good-natured and full of humor. His column soon gained a local fame and everybody read it. His fame even traveled away to Cleveland, where, in 1858, when Mr. Browne was twenty-four years of age, Mr. J.W. Gray of the Cleveland "Plaindealer" secured him as local reporter, at a salary of twelve-dollars per week. Here his reputation first began to

assume a national character and it was here that they called him a "fool" when he mentioned the idea of taking the field as a lecturer. Speaking of this circumstance while traveling down the Mississippi with the writer, in 1865, Mr. Browne musingly repeated this colloquy:

WISE MAN:—"Ah! you poor foolish little girl—here is a dollar for you."

FOOLISH LITTLE GIRL:—"Thank you, sir; but I have a sister at home as foolish as I am; can't you give me a dollar for her?"

Charles Browne was not successful as a NEWS reporter, lacking enterprise and energy, but his success lay in writing up in a burlesque manner well-known public affairs like prize-fights, races, spiritual meetings, and political gatherings. His department became wonderfully humorous, and was always a favorite with readers, whether there was any news in it or not. Sometimes he would have a whole column of letters from young ladies in reply to a fancied matrimonial advertisement, and then he would have a column of answers to general correspondents like this:—

VERITAS:—Many make the same error. Mr. Key, who wrote the "Star Spangled Banner," is not the author of Hamlet, a tragedy. He wrote the banner business, and assisted in "The Female Pirate," BUT DID NOT WRITE HAMLET. Hamlet was written by a talented but unscrupulous man named Macbeth, afterwards tried and executed for "murdering sleep."

YOUNG CLERGYMAN:—Two pints of rum, two quarts of hot water, tea- cup of sugar, and a lemon; grate in nutmeg, stir thoroughly and drink while hot.

It was during his engagement on the "Plaindealer" that he wrote, dating from Indiana, his first communication,—the first published letter following this sketch, signed "Artemus Ward" a sobriquet purely incidental, but borne with the "u" changed to an "a" by an American revolutionary general. It was here that Mr. Browne first became, IN WORDS, the possessor of a moral show "consisting of three moral bares, the a kangaroo (a amoozing little rascal; 'twould make you larf yourself to death to see the little kuss jump and squeal), wax figures of G. Washington, &c. &c." Hundreds of newspapers copied this letter, and Charles Browne awoke one morning to find himself famous.

In the "Plaindealer" office, his companion, George Hoyt, writes: "His desk was a rickety table which had been whittled and gashed until it looked as if it had been the victim of lightning. His chair was a fit companion thereto,—a wabbling, unsteady affair, sometimes with four and sometimes with three legs. But Browne saw neither the table, nor the chair, nor any person who might be near, nothing, in fact, but the funny pictures which were tumbling out of his brain. When writing, his gaunt form looked ridiculous enough. One leg hung over the arm of his chair like a great hook, while he would write away, sometimes laughing to himself, and then slapping the table in the excess of his mirth."

While in the office of the "Plaindealer," Mr. Browne first conceived the idea of becoming a lecturer. In attending the various minstrel shows and circuses which came to the city, he would frequently hear repeated some story of his own which the audience would receive with hilarity. His best witticisms came back to him from the lips of another who made a living by quoting a stolen jest. Then the thought came to him to enter the lecture field himself, and become the utterer of his own witticisms—the mouthpiece of his own jests.

On the 10th of November, 1860, Charles Browne, whose fame, traveling in his letters from Boston to San Francisco, had now become national, grasped the hands of his hundreds of New York admirers. Cleveland had throned him the monarch of mirth, and a thousand hearts paid him tributes of adulation as he closed his connection with the Cleveland Press.

Arriving in the Empire City, Mr. Browne soon opened an engagement with "Vanity Fair," a humorous paper after the manner of London "Punch," and ere long he succeeded Mr. Charles G. Leland as editor. Mr. Charles Dawson Shanly says: "After Artemus Ward became sole editor, a position which he held for a brief period, many of his best contributions were given to the public; and, whatever there was of merit in the columns of "Vanity Fair" from the time he assumed the editorial charge, emanated from his pen." Mr. Browne himself wrote to a friend: "Comic copy is what they wanted for "Vanity Fair." I wrote some and it killed it. The poor paper got to be a conundrum, and so I gave it up."