A PRACTICAL JOKE.

A CONFIRMED wag it was who startled every body on the deck of the "John Mason" steamer the other day, on her way from Albany to Troy, with the inquiry, in a loud nasal tone: "Hear of that dreadful accident to-day aboard the Greenbush hoss-boat?" "No!" exclaimed half-a-dozen bystanders at once; "no!-what was it?". "Wal, they was tellin' of it down to the dee-pot; and nigh as I can cal'late, the hoss-boat had got within abeout two rod of the wharf, when the larboardhoss bu'st a flue; carryin' away her stern, unshippin' her rudder, and scaldin' more 'n a dozen passengers! I do n't know as there is any truth into it; praps 't aint so; but any way, that's the story." The narrator was less successful, according to his own account, with a rather practical joke which he undertook to play upon a Yankee townsman of his, a week or two before, in New York. "He never liked me much, 'xpect," said he, "nor I did n't him, nuther. And I was a-walkin' along Pearlstreet in York, sellin' some o' those little notions 'at you see here (a 'buckwheat fanning-mill,' a rotarysieve' to sift apple-saäce,' etc.,) when I see him abuyin' some counter goods in a store. So I went in and hail'd him. Says I, right off, jest as if I'd seen him a-doin the same thing a dozen times afore that mornin', says I, "Won't they trust you here, nuther?" Thunder! you never see a man so riled. He looked right straight at me, and was 'een-most white, he was so mad. The clerks laafed, they did -but he did n't, I guess. 'I want to see you a minute!' says he, pooty solemn, and comin toward the door, I went; and just as soon as I got on to the gridiron steps, he kicked me! I did n't carenot much then; but if his geese do n't have the Shatick cholera when I get home, 'you can take my hat,' as they say in York. I was doin' the

merchant; he was tryin' to buy calicoes on a good turn, any how; for I 'xpect he was going to get 'em on trust, and I know'd he was an all-mighty shirk. I rather guess he did n't get 'em, but I don't know-not sartain."

SCULPIN.

By-the-bye, it may not be amiss to remark, in passing, that it was the identical "Greek slave" concerning which the ensuing coloquy took place, between the sculptor himself and a successful Yankee speculator, who had "come over to see Ew-rope." Scene, Powers's studio at Florence. Enter stranger, spitting, and wiping his lips with his hand: "Be yeou Mr. Powers, the skulpture ?" "I am a sculptor, and my name is Powers." Y-e-a-s; well, I s'pected so; they tell'd me you was-y-e-a-s. Look here-drivin' a pretty stiff business, eh?" "Sir?" "I say, plenty to du, eh? What d's one o' them fetch ?" "Sir?" "I ask't ye what's the price of one of them, sech as yeou're peckin' at neöw." "I am to have three thousand dollars for this when it is completed." "W-h-a-t!!-heow much?" "Three thousand dollars." "T-h-r-e-e t-h-e-o-u-s-a-n-d d-o-l-l-a-r-s! Hant statewary riz lately! I was cal'latin' to buy some; but it's tew high. How's paintin's? 'Guess I must git some paintin's. T-h-r-e-e t-h-e-o-u-s-a-n-d d-o-l-la-r-s! Well, it is a trade, skulpin is; that's sartain. What do they make yeou pay for your tools and stuff? S'pect my oldest boy, Cephas, could skulp; 'fact, I know he could. He is always whittlin' reöund, and cuttin' away at things. I wish you'd 'gree to take him prentice, and let him go at it full chisel. D'you know where I'd be liable to put him eöut? He'd cut stun a'ter a while with the best of ye, he would; and make money, tew, at them prices. T-h-r-e-e t-h-e-o-u-s-a-n-d d-o-l-l-a-r-sm And the

"anxious inquirer" left the presence. He now exhibits a "lot" of "fust-rate paintin's" to his friends.

A RAILROAD "RECUSSANT."

A friend of ours, sojourning during the past summer in one of the far-off "shore-towns" of Massachusetts Bay, was not a little amused one day at the querulous complainings of one of the "oldest inhabitants" against railroads; his experience in which consisted in having seen the end of one laid out, and at length the cars running upon it. Taking out his old pipe, on a pleasant summer afternoon, and looking off upon the ocean, and the ships far off and out at sea, with the sun upon their sails, he said: "I don't think much o' railroads: they aint no kind o' justice into 'em. Neouw what kind o' justice is it, when railroads take one man's upland and carts it over in wheel-barrers onto another man's ma'sh? What kind o' 'commodation be they? You can't go when you want to go; you got to go when the bell rings, or the blasted noisy whistle blows. I tell yeow it 's payin' tew much for the whistle. Ef you live a leetle ways off the dee-pot, you got to pay to git to the railroad; and ef you want to go any wheres else 'cept just to the eend on it, you got to pay a'ter you git there. What kind o' 'commodation is that? Goin' round the country, tew, murderin' folks, runnin' over cattle, sheep, and hogs, and settin' fire to bridges, and every now and then burnin' up the woods. Mrs. Robbins, down to Codp'int, says, and she ought to know, for she is a pious woman, and belongs to the lower church-she said to me, no longer ago than day-'fore yesterday, that she'd be cuss'd if she didn't know that they sometimes run over critters a-purpose-they did a likely shoat o' hern, and never paid for't, 'cause they was a corporation,' they said. What kind o' 'commodation is that? Besides, now I've lived here, clus to the dee-pot, ever sence the road started to run, and seen 'em go out and come in; but I never could see that they went so dd fast, nuther!"

ACEPHALOUS: A NEW DEFINITION.

There is in Webster's old spelling-book a spelling and defining lesson of words of four syllables. A friend mentions a ludicrous mistake made by a district school-boy in the country, in the exercises of this lesson. One of the words happened to be "Acephalous: without a head." It was divided, as usual, into its separate syllables, connected by a hyphen (which "joins words or syllables, as seawater!") which probably led the boy to give a new word and a new definition: "Ikun spell it and d'fine it ?" said a lad, after the boy above him had tried and missed; "Ikun do it," and he did; A-c-e-p-h, cef, ACEPH-a louse without a head !" "'Most all of 'em laughed," our informant says, "when the boy said that!"

AN EMERGENCY.

We heard a pleasant illustration an evening or two ago, of a peculiarity of western life. A man in one of the hotels of a south-western city was observed, by a northerner, to be very moody, and to regard the stranger with looks particularly sad, and, as our informant thought, somewhat savage. By and by he approached him, and said: "Can I see you outside the door for a few minutes?" "Certainly, sir," said the northener, but not without some misgivings. The moment the door had closed behind them, the moody man reached over his hand between his shoulders, and drew from a pocket a tremendous bowie-knife, bigger than a French carver, and, as its broad blade flashed in the moonlight, the stranger thought his time had come. "Put up your scythe," said he, "and tell me what I've done to provoke your hostility?" "Done, stranger?-you haven't done any thing. Nor I han't any hostility to you; but I want to pawn this knife with you. It cost me twenty dollars in New Orleans. I lost my whole pile' at 'old sledge' coming down the river, and I ha'nt got a red cent. Lend me ten dollars on it, stranger. I'll win it back for you in less than an hour." The money

was loaned; and, sure enough, in less than the time mentioned, the knife was redeemed, and the incorrigible "sporting-man" had a surplus of some thirty dollars, which he probably lost the very next hour.

"GREAT SHAKES" OF A DOG.

"I say square, what'll yeōu take for that 'are dog o' yourn?" said a Yankee peddler to an old Dutch farmer, in the neighborhood of Lancaster, Pennsylvania; "what'll yeou take for him? He ain't a very good-lookin' dog; but what was you cal'latin' maybe he'd fetch ?" Ah," responded the Dutch

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man, "dat dog ishn't wort' not'ing, 'most; he ishn't wort' you to buy 'um." "Guess tew dollars abeout would git him, wouldn't it? I'll give you that for him." Yaäs; he isn't wort' dat." 66 'Wall, I'll take him," said the peddler. "Sh'stop!" said the Dutchman; "dere's one t'ing about dat dog I gan't sell." "Oh, take off his collar; I don't want that,' suggested the peddler. ""Taint dat," replied Mynheer "he's a boor dog, but I gan't sell de wag of his dail when I comes home!" There is some good honest Dutch poetry of feeling in that reply, reader, if you will but think of it for a moment.

NEW YORK, April.

MY DEAR CAROLINE,-Lent came so frightfully early this year, that I was very much afraid my new bonnet à l'Impératrice would not be out from Paris soon enough. But fortunately it arrived just in time, and I had the satisfaction of taking down the pride of Mrs. Croesus, who fancied hers would be the only stylish hat in church the first Sunday. She could not keep her eyes away from me, and I sat so unmoved, and so calmly looking at the Doctor, that she was quite vexed. But, whenever she turned away, I ran my eyes over the whole congregation, and would you believe that, almost without exception, people had their old things? However, I suppose they forgot how soon Lent was coming. As was passing out of church, Mrs. Croesus brushed by me:

"Ah!" said she, "good morning. Why, bless me! you've got that pretty hat I saw at Lawson's. Well, now, it's really quite pretty; Lawson has some taste left yet;-what a lovely sermon the Doctor gave us. By the by, did you know that Mrs. Gnu has actually bought the blue velvet? It's too bad, because I wanted to cover my prayer-book with blue, and she sits so near, the effect of my book will be quite spoiled. Dear me! there she is beckoning to me: good-bye, do come and see us; Tuesdays, you know. Well, Lawson really does very well."

I was so mad with the old thing, that I could not help catching her by her mantle and holding on while I whispered loud enough for everybody to hear:

"Mrs. Croesus, you see I have just got my bonnet from Paris. It's made after the Empress's. If you would like to have yours made over in the fashion, dear Mrs. Crœsus, I shall be so glad to lend you mine."

'No, thank you, dear," said she, "Lawson won't do for me. Bye-bye."

And so she slipped out, and, I've no doubt, told Mrs. Gnu that she had seen my bonnet at Lawson's. Isn't it too bad? Then she is so abominably cool. Somehow, when I'm talking with Mrs. Croesus, who has all her own things made at home, I don't feel as if mine came from Paris at all. She has such a way of looking at you, that it's quite dreadful. She seems to be saying in her mind, "La! now, well done, little dear." And I think that kind of mental reservation (I think that's what they call it) is an

insupportable impertinence. However, I don't care, do you?

I've so many things to tell you that I hardly know where to begin. The great thing is the livery, but I want to come regularly up to that, and forget nothing by the way. I was uncertain for a long time how to have my prayer-book bound. Finally, after thinking about it a great deal, I concluded to have it done in pale blue velvet with gold clasps, and a gold cross upon the side. To be sure, it's nothing very new. But what is new now-a-days? Sally Shrimp has had hers done in emerald, and I know Mrs. Croesus will have crimson for hers, and those people who sit next us in church (I wonder who they are; it's very unpleasant to sit next to people you don't know: and, positively, that girl, the darkhaired one with large eyes, carries the same muff she did last year; it's big enough for a family) have a kind of brown morocco binding. I must tell you one reason why I fixed upon the pale blue. You know that aristocratic-looking young man, in white cravat and black pantaloons and waistcoat, whom we saw at Saratoga a year ago, and who always had such a beautiful sanctimonious look, and such small white hands; well, he is a minister, as we supposed,

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an unworthy candidate, an unprofitable husbandman," as he calls himself in that delicious voice of his. He has been quite taken up among us. has been asked a good deal to dinner, and there was hope of his being settled as colleague to the Doctor, only Mr. Potiphar (who can be stubborn, you know) insisted that the Rev. Cream Cheese, though a very good young man, he didn't doubt, was addicted to candlesticks. I suppose that's something awful. But, could you believe any thing awful of him? I asked Mr. Potiphar what he meant by saying such things.

"I mean," said he, "that he's a Puseyite, and I've no idea of being tied to the apron-strings of the Scarlet Woman."

Dear Caroline, who is the Scarlet Woman? Dearest, tell me, upon your honor, if you have ever heard any scandal of Mr. Potiphar.

"What is it about candlesticks ?" said I to Mr. Potiphar. "Perhaps Mr. Cheese finds gas too bright for his eyes; and that's his misfortune, not his fault."

"Polly," said Mr. Potiphar, who will call me Polly, although it sounds so very vulgar, "please not to meddle with things you don't understand.