l venture on a jeer, for I am in dead earnest. A mocking critic
may point to the Bond Street lounger and ask, "What are the net use and
purport of that being's existence? Look at his suffering frame! His
linen stock almost decapitates him, his boots appear to hail from the
chambers of the Inquisition, every garment tends to confine his muscles
and dwarf his bodily powers; yet he chooses to smile in his torments
and pretends to luxuriate in life. Again, what are the net use and
purport of his existence?" I can only deprecate our critic's wrath by
going gravely to first principles. O savage and critical one, that
suffering youth of Bond Street is but exhibiting in flaunting action a
law that has influenced the breed of men since our forefathers dwelt in
caves or trees! Observe the conduct of the innocent and primitive beings
who dwell in sunny archipelagos far away to the South; they suffer in
the cause of fashion as the youth of the city promenade suffers. The
chief longing of the judicious savage is to shave, but the paucity of
metals and sharp instruments prevents him from indulging his longing
very frequently. When the joyous chance does come, the son of the forest
promptly rises to the occasion. No elderly gentleman whose feet are
studded with corns could bear the agony of patent leather boots in a
heated ballroom with grander stoicism than that exhibited by our savage
when he compasses the means of indulging in a thorough uncompromising
shave. The elderly man of the ballroom sees the rosy-fingered dawn
touching the sky into golden fretwork; he thinks of his cool white bed,
and then, by contrast, he thinks of his hot throbbing feet. Shooting
fires dart through his unhappy extremities, yet he smiles on and bears
his pain for his daughters' sake. But the elderly hero cannot be
compared with the ambitious exquisite of the Southern Seas, and we shall
prove this hypothesis. The careless voyager throws a beer-bottle
overboard, and that bottle drifts to the glad shore of a glittering
isle; the overjoyed savage bounds on the prize, and proceeds to announce
his good fortune to his bosom friend. Then the pleased cronies decide
that they will have a good, wholesome, thorough shave, and they will
turn all rivals green with unavailing envy. Solemnly those children of
nature go to a quiet place, and savage number one lies down while his
friend sits on his head; then with a shred of the broken bottle the
operator proceeds to rasp awa