James Melville Beard

The Author has no Explanations to Offer—Such as it is, it is—The Chief of Two Reasons for Holding it in Esteem—A Whim that has been Gratified—Mischievous Results of Confiding a Secret to One Female Acquaintance instead of Fifty—Can anything be more Ridiculous than to Suppose that there is a Word of Fiction Connected with the foregoing Chapters?—Lakeside Publishers—The Public Invited to Pocket their Scruples and Read History—Finale.

Positively, we must depart from a time-honored custom of the bookmaker, as we confess with blushes that we have no confidences to exchange with the reader, no explanations to offer to the public, and no fine epigrams to repeat concerning that aged word—farewell. Such as it is, it is, and we have no idea of making it better, by any such supra legem performance. If the reader is satisfied, we are; and if he is not, and will signify that remarkable conclusion to the author, he shall have his money back, together with fair wages for such portion of his valuable time as may have been squandered on its pages. We could not think of taking such a mean advantage of any one’s talent for promiscuous reading, and beg to repeat this announcement as a request.If anybody’s party-feeling has been ruffled, it may be taken in some sense as a natural conclusion, for, besides having none ourselves, and treating the subject from all sides, we may have had some such dernier purpose in view. Political tastes are so varied that they can rarely be consulted with success in a literary venture of reasonable magnitude, and where this is true, it can be no more than fair to ignore them.

The work has many imperfections, as all can see—imperfections which cannot be cured, and hence resemble it so much to human nature that we must be pardoned for alleging that circumstance as the chief of two reasons (both disconnected from those philoprogenitive impulsions that we sometimes hear of from mawkish writers) for holding it in esteem. The sun has spots, and we once knew a critic whose grammar was execrable. Lest, however, some persons should officiously infer that we mean to wrong a very excellent class of people, we will state that the analogy between the last-named objects does not cease here.

What we wish to say most in this concluding chapter, is that the work was not written to invite anybody’s pique, nor to avoid it, nor to flatter anybody, nor to parody anybody, but to gratify a whim, and as it has been announced that there would be no explanation, and the completion of the task leaves us in a mood for conundrums, we shall not interfere with the reader’s prerogative of guessing its import. But it was a mere whim, and now that it has been gratified, we feel better—vastly improved, in fact—so much improved that, in order to reach a superlative that will fit our case precisely, we find it necessary to go beyond the dictionary standard, and adopt the beautiful newsboy euphemism, hunky-dory. And then, too, the author has that self gratulation which could not fail to proceed from the knowledge that, from the beginning, a brave effort was maintained to avoid that notoriety which comes of even remote connection with such labor as he has performed,—and which must have succeeded but for his inadvertence in confiding the secret to one female acquaintance instead of fifty. Now that the mischief has been performed, his partiality for the sex leads him to say that he will be more thoughtful in the future.

An old friend, whose sagacity regarding such subjects is approved, has informed us confidentially that the book will sell, and if it sells, can it be anybody’s business whether it is read or not? After revolving this query in our mind, and inducing a fair analogy between what would be just to the outside world and profitable to ourselves, we are left statu quo until such time as the neighborhood debating society can be heard from.

Can anything be more ridiculous than to suppose that there is a word of fiction connected with the foregoing chapters? A half-wit acquaintance, who plumes himself on the accident which enables him to write M. C. after his name, has obtruded this difficulty upon the author, and been handsomely objurgated for his pains. Did we not do right? and why is it that these men are permitted to lounge away from their places of confinement at the most dangerous season of the year?

We here make the announcement, boldly and without fear of successful contradiction (this form of expression is copied from J. Billings, with some amendments in spelling), that nobody’s facetiousness is chargeable with one syllable of these sketches; and if they do not suit the public palate, it is altogether attributable to the fact that that organ is in a badly disordered state, and requires stimulants of a nature which the Lakeside publishers will have no difficulty in supplying at the regulation price for compounded drinks. More than this we do not feel at liberty to divulge at present, but we do sincerely trust that those who compromise their doubts far enough to purchase the book, will pocket their scruples and read history.

THE END.

Footnotes:

[A] The reader’s fancy, aided by the hints supplied in the text, has doubtless informed him that these females had fallen victims to the lust of the flying desperadoes; for, perceiving the hand of fate in the impending catastrophe, and having nothing to hope from the indulgence of their pursuers, they realized that this startling crime could only hasten the denouement, not add to their weight of doom.

[B] An individual of the gowned fraternity, six feet six inches in height, borne upon the shoulders of a comrade, who approximated the latter condition.