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INTRODUCTION.

The best parallel to the conduct of the silly ostrich, that thrusts her
head into a thicket, or the sand, and fancies she is thereby hidden
from view, occurred some years since in the village of Catskill. A
printer, who was neither an observer of the Sabbath, nor a member of
the Temperance Society, went to a grocery one Sunday morning for a
bottle of gin. On coming out of the dram-shop, with his decanter of
fire-water, he perceived that the services in the church near by, were
just closed, and the congregation were returning to their homes. Not
having entirely lost his self-respect, and unwilling to be seen in the
public street by the whole village, on such a day, and with such a
burden, he hastily thrust his hand, holding the bottle, behind, for the
purpose of concealing it underneath the skirts of his coat: and in this
way, apparently with the greatest possible unconcern, the disciple of
Faust walked up the street, just in advance of the congregation.
Unfortunately, however, in his haste he had thrust his decanter quite
through between the folds of his coat-skirts, so that his hands and the
neck of the bottle only were concealed; while, to the irresistible
merriment of the people, the object which he wished to hide was ten
times more the subject of observation than it could have been before.
Very much in the same predicament stands the writer of the following
pages. His intention was to publish them anonymously, if at all. But an
unauthorized annunciation of his name, in the Booksellers' Advertiser,
a few weeks since, has rendered the effort as abortive as the trick of
the foolish bird, and the expedient of the printer. The mask, thus
torn, has therefore been entirely doffed.

And now a few words as to the sketches themselves.

Whatever else may be said of the writer, it cannot be predicated of
him, as by Addison of a certain class of biographers of his day, "that
they watched for the death of a great man, like so many undertakers, on
purpose to make a penny by him." The subject of this little volume is
neither a great man, nor, happily, is he yet numbered among the dead.
Should it then be asked, Why write about small men at all, or, in any
event, until after they are dead? The answer is at hand: it is the
fashion of the times in which we live. The present is the age of small
men, whose lives are necessarily written while living, lest, when