I can easily believe it, if he sat opposite the mirror. Why this calumniated fowl should be a byeword for ridicule in our discourse, or an object of abomination at polite tables, is an enigma, which it might puzzle Edipus to solve. Every one knows that the Roman State was saved by the cackling of geese; a hint which has by no means been thrown away upon some of our own short-witted and long-winded Congressmen. Among the Romans, the gander and his spouse were a favorite and a fashionable dish; but learned commentators maintain, that the particular brood to which the commonwealth was so much indebted was preserved, as well as all its immediate descendants, with the utmost care; a circumstance which must have been much deplored by the epicures of that day, since it became impossible to have a Capitol goose for dinner. Then, as now, the little giblets were thought great delicacies, and good livers deemed the livers good, as appears by the following extract from Francis's Horace, b. ii. sat. 8:—

"And a white gander's liver,

Stuff'd fat with figs, bespoke the curious giver."

Whence, also, we may see that their epicurism extended even to the color. A modern white gander is a rara avis. Queen Elizabeth was cutting up a goose, when she learnt that the Spanish armada had been cut up by a Drake. Why, then, should a bird, ennobled by so many historical, and endeared by so many culinary recommendations, be treated with scorn and contumely? If the reader sympathize with the writer in wishing to see some zealous, though tardy reparation, made by a featherless biped to the biped who supplies us with feathers, he will peruse with a kindred complacency and indulgence the following

ODE TO A GOOSE.

Written after dinner on the Feast of St. Michael.

STROPHE I.

O BIRD most rare! although thou art

Uncommon common on a common,

What man or woman

Can in one single term impart

A proper name for thee ?-An ancient Roman
Would answer-"Anser." Sure I am, that no man
Knowing thy various attributes, would choose
To call thee Goose!

ANTISTROPHE I.

No, Goose! thou art no Goose. Well stuff'd with sago
And titillating things, both dead and living,

For ever art thou giving

Solace to man in life's brief pilgrimage.

EPODE I.

Jove's eagle wielding the avenging thunder,
Is but a folio hawk, a bird of plunder.

Minerva's owl,

(Both are foul fowl !)

Shunning the light, should ne'er have been preferr'd

To rank as Wisdom's bird

As for the young and stately swan,

A Scottish lawyer is the man

To sing its praises.

I am no writer to the cygnet-so,

Avoiding further periphrases,

For thee alone, O Goose! my verse shall flow.

STROPHE II.

O bird of Morpheus! half our lives are sped,
(Ay, and the happiest too) upon a bed
Stuff'd with thy feathers. On thy breast
Thou hushest us to rest,

As if we were thy goslings,

Till we forget life's hubble-bubble,
Its toil and trouble,

Its crossings and its jostlings.

And borne in dreams to empyrean latitudes,
Revel in ecstacies and bright beatitudes.

ANTISTROPHE II.

Churls that we are! what snoozing hum

Ascends to thee?-what pæans, what adorings? Our mouths, perchance, are open, but they're dumb: Our soul harangues

Are nasal twangs,

And all our gratitude consists of snorings.

EPODE II.

Bird of Apollo! worthy to pluck grass
On the Parnassian mountain,

Beside the classic fountain

Of Hippocrene, what Muse with thee can class,

To whose inspiring wing we owe

All that the poets past have writ;
From whose ungather'd wings shall flow
All our whole store of future wit?
Well may'st thou strut,

Proud of thy pens uncut,

Which shall cut jokes,

In after times, for unborn folks ;

Well may'st thou plume thyself upon thy plumage-all

Is erudite and intellectual,

Each wing a cyclopædia, fraught

With genius multiform, a word of thought!
Ah! when thou putt'st thy head

Beneath that wing to bed,

In future libraries thou tak'st a nap,

And dream'st of Paternoster Row, mayhap!
What are they dreaming of, that they forget
(The publishing and scribbling set)
To apotheosise thee, Goose!

As the tenth Muse ?

ANTISTROPHE III.

And then the darling driblets,
That constitute thy giblets,
Whether in soup or stew'd,

O! what delectable and dainty food!
Full of my subject, ('twas my dinner dish,)

No wonder that I feel all over goosy,
Fired with what Braham calls entusimusy,

So much so, I could almost wish,

If fate were nothing loath,

To be a Goose instead of man.

"Be doubly happy on thy present plan,"

(Methinks the reader cries,)

"And thank the favoring destinies,
For now thou'rt both!"

The celebrated Colonel McCluny saw through this vulgar prejudice against the goose. "I was once sitting at a dinnertable opposite him; between us was an antediluvian duck, which I was making desperate efforts to disintegrate. I observed the Colonel regarding me with a steady smile, and remarked, 'Colonel, you appear to be amused at my awkwardness.' 'No, sir,' replied he, 'I was thinking why the term duck was used as a word of endearment, and goose one of reproach.""

GOUT-Sometimes the father's sin visited upon the child, but more often the child of our own sins visiting its father.