is place in St. Lawrence
county, next summer, and spend a month with him, all of which I promised
to do, if it was possible."

Mr. Quackenbush was congratulated on his good fortune in coming across
that particular species of the elephant, whose nature and
characteristics he had so happily and correctly delineated in his paper.

It was moved by Mr. Dropper that a copy of the contribution be requested
from Quackenbush, to make cigar-lighters of, and that the original be
deposited in the big room of the American Institute, as a specimen of
bad chirography.

Mr. Q. said he would see them blowed first.

Mr. Van Dam next proceeded with his contribution:

"A few evenings since," said he, "as I was passing through one of the
streets of Gotham, I observed a crowd collected near a corner grocery.
Thinking that an opportunity was afforded to see something worth taking
a note of, I ran for the spot in time to see the difficulty. I found
there a man, holding with each hand a boy, and both of the juveniles
making frantic efforts to release themselves from his grasp. The man was
a small, cadaverous-appearing individual, a compound of gamboge and
chalk, the gamboge predominating. There was a tinge of yellow in his
face, he had yellow hair, and he had on a suit of summer clothes, made
of some yellow material. Nature had favored him with a dwarfed
moustache, composed of twenty-eight yellow hairs, and also an incipient
beard, made up of seventy-six yellow hairs, and turned out in the shape
of a triangle, the base of which rested upon the chin, at the point
where it begins to retreat, and the apex of which reached the middle of
his under lip.

"The appearance of the boys would indicate that they were of Irish
birth. One had a squint-eye and a head of hair which the youth of
America are accustomed to designate as 'brick-top.' His snub nose was
ordinarily directed to an imaginary point in the heavens, about
forty-five degrees above the horizon. His garments were not altogether
the style which would be pronounced _au fait_, by a Broadway leader of
the fashion. It would seem that he had only one purpose in view in
jumping into the aforesaid garments, which purpose was, not to create a
sensation, either by the accuracy of their fit, or the newness of the
material, but rather to cover his form, and keep out the cold, at such
times as the clerk of the weather was induced to fetch up "heated terms"
all standing, and give us a specimen of th