The hoot of the owl

THE HOOT OF THE OWL

THE HOOT OF THE OWL

BY

H. H. BEHR, M. D.

SAN FRANCISCO
A. M. ROBERTSON

1904

COPYRIGHT, 1904
BY A. M. ROBERTSON

THE MURDOCK PRESS

THIS LITTLE BOOK IS DEDICATED

TO MY FRIEND
DR. GEORGE CHISMORE

CONTENTS.

PAGE

ADDRESS IN RESPONSE TO THE INTRO-
DUCTION AT THE BOHEMIAN CLUB . 9
VIRTUE ...... IJ

ARCHEOLOGY . . . . 1 7

POPULAR SCIENCE .... 25

PROGRESS IN SCIENCE . . . . 29

MUSIC 33

CALIFORNIA . . . . . • 37

THE SKELETON IN ARMOR . . 4!

DARWINISM ...... 47

THE MOSQUITO ..... 53

ON MEDICINE . . . . . 6l

HEROIC DEEDS OF OLD BOHEMIA . 65

THE SHOWMAN . . . . • 73

LAST JINKS ON SACRAMENTO STREET . 77

ON DREAMS . . . . . . 8 1

SCHILLER AND GOETHE AS BOHEMIANS 85

6 CONTENTS.

THE YEAR'S PROGRESS . . . .89

SOME REMARKS ON THE SECRET RELA-
TIONS BETWEEN CHEMISTRY AND POLIT-
ICAL ECONOMY .... 95

ETHNOLOGY ...... IOI

ON COMMERCE ..... IOy

PREHISTORIC RELICS . . . .Ill

IRISH HISTORY . . . . . I IJ

BOTANY . . . . . .119

THE AGE OF IRON . . . .125

ANCIENT BOHEMIANS . . . .129

ON TEMPERANCE .... 135

A NEW PHILOSOPHICAL INSTRUMENT . 141

EDUCATIONAL METHODS . . . 145

IMMORAL PHILOSOPHY . . . • ISI

THE BACHELOR . . . . .157

LOVE . . . . . . .l6l

THANKSGIVING DAY .... 169

ON TRUTH . . . . . .173

LETTER FROM THE BEAR WHO SWAM
ACROSS THE GOLDEN GATE AND LAND-
ED AT THE PRESIDIO . . . 179

CONTENTS. 7

THE MICROSCOPE . . . . .185

IN THE NAME OF THE PROPHET . 19!

THE CHRISTMAS-TREE . . . -195

YULE ...... 199

IDEAL BOHEMIA ..... 205

ON EVOLUTION . . . . . 211

ON GERMS . . . . ' . 215

ADDRESS TO THE MAYOR . . . 219

ON FISHES ...... 221

ON BUTTERFLIES .... 225

ADDRESS IN RESPONSE TO THE

INTRODUCTION AT THE

BOHEMIAN CLUB.

WORSHIPFUL SIRE: I stand here as the
representative of the German Pfeifen Club,
and have to correct a slight error that in-
troduced itself into the address delivered
by your Worship. It is not to announce
the subjugation of the Pfeifen Club that I
appear before you. I am not a hostage; I
am an ambassador of a kindred organiza-
tion. The object of our institutions is the
same; our organizations follow a parallel
course. The object of both is charity. Not
that charity which sends ice-cream to the
Greenlanders and skates to the people on
the sources of old Nile; no, true charity
begins at home. And where are we more
at home than inside our own stomachs?

10 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

It is, therefore, a most wonderful coinci-
dence that both organizations, the Bohe-
mian as well as the Pfeifen Club, struck the
same idea of international charity. Both
found the solution of the social question in
an alcoholic solution.

The solution tendered to me by your
Worship smells very nice, and I pledge
myself in it to my Bohemian friends.

I address you in the name of our vener-
able bird, and thus he speaks to you through
my unworthy mouth:

"My Sons : I am pleased to see the ven-
eration that you have shown to me on so
many occasions. Since the day that my
patron, Minerva, was born out of the head
of Jupiter, which circumstance forever will
be the only case of cerebral pregnancy, I
always had a longing for mental enjoyment,
and I thank you, my sons, for all the exer-
cises in art, literature, pedro, seven-up, and
other sciences which I have witnessed in
the old club-rooms. I also thank you for all
the rats, mice, seagulls, neck-pieces of beef,

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. II

and all the other delicacies of which, on my
behalf, you have deprived yourselves so un-
selfishly. I also thank you for the good
taste you have shown in choosing the noc-
turnal hours for your celebrations, for I
hate matinees. I am a bird of prey of the
sub-family Nocturna, that differ from the
vultures by the strength of their claws,
from the eagles and hawks by the compara-
tive weakness of their bills. But if my bill
is weak, I nevertheless respect large bills
and admire the courage that meets them.
Owing to the weakness of my bill, I am a
bird of few words; as the immortal poet
Bromley sings:

u c There was an owl that lived in an oak,
The more he heard the less he spoke,
The less he spoke the more he heard.
Oh, let us be like this wise bird/

" But I keep my watchful eye on you
every night; in daytime better look out for
yourselves. Like a Haruspex of old, I have
examined with prophetic eye all the neck-
bones of beef which you have sacrificed to

12 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

me, and I see before you a bright sphere of
success and progress.

" Being a bird of prey, I have prayed for
you all the time, and I will do so now in the
words of Sanctus Cremonius: 'May the
Lord love you and not call for you too

soon.'

VIRTUE.

SOCRATES used to say that everybody was
eloquent enough on those matters which he
understood thoroughly. Now, that's ex-
actly my case in regard to virtue. There is
no object in this wide world with which I
am so intimately connected as with virtue.
" Be virtuous and you will be happy." You
have all frequently listened to this admo-
nition, but I suspect there are very few
among those present that have subjected
this axiom to a practical trial. I have, and
I am here to give you the benefit of my
experience.

In my peculiar case, the admonition to be
virtuous and happy came from an aunt of
mine. But as this contemplation will oc-
cupy several hours, I consider it proper to
divide the matter and look at the subject of

14 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

our contemplation under three different
heads :

First — My aunt.

Second — My own experience.

Third and final — Conclusions drawn
from my aunt and good advice given by
myself.

My aunt was an elderly lady, not exactly
prepossessing in her exterior, but shocking-
ly virtuous and as unmarried as possible.
Her favorite beverage was tea of valerian
with a stick in it of sulphuric ether. She
wore green spectacles, always felt miserable
and respectable, and between asafoetida and
valerian led a most unhappy life. Her only
occupation was virtue. In her leisure hours
she made a most interesting collection of
medicine-bottles and pill-boxes, of all shapes
and sizes. So she used to sit near the peace-
ful slope of her favorite pill-box, looking
through her green spectacles at humanity
as it passed her window, and talked virtue
and gossip. It took considerable time be-
fore I could separate the idea of virtue from

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 15

that of green glasses, or distinguish the odor
of sanctity and the smell of a drug-store;
but when I finally succeeded in doing so, I
made up my mind to give virtue a fair
shake.

Gentlemen, I have practiced several vir-
tues,— moderately, of course, for I always
was of temperate habits, — but somehow or
other during the whole time of my experi-
ments I felt dejected and miserable, and the
happiest moment of my life was when I
dropped virtue altogether.

Virtue is a swindle. I have seen people
ruined by one single virtue. How would
they have fared then had they possessed two,
three, or more. On the other hand, I have
a friend, a dear friend, who is in possession
of a complete and well-arranged collection
of all those vices that possibly can be prac-
ticed in this sublunary world, and he is
happy, he is successful, he is at peace with
himself and with the whole world. It is
true I know there are instances where peo-
ple have been ruined by vice; but in such

1 6 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

cases you will observe they always have
been ruined by one vice, never by several at
the same time ; and so it is evident that they
were not ruined by that one vice, but by the
absence of all others.

Alas! vice is no more what it was when I
was young. Vice is growing monotonous;
there is not enough variety in it, and it is a
most melancholy fact that since Sir Walter
Raleigh introduced tobacco no new vice
has been invented. The inventor of a new
one would be a benefactor to humanity.
Now, here is an object worthy of the accu-
mulated energies of the Bohemian congre-
gation.

Let us invent some new vice, and coming
generations will bless our memory.

ARCHEOLOGY.

WHEN I received the order of our most
gracious Sire to appear before him at the
Christmas High Jinks and report on the
progress made in the Archaeological Sec-
tion of the organization, I began imme-
diately my investigations by borrowing
books from all libraries that had not yet
had any sad experiences in my direction.
The message of our most gracious Sire met
me at 5 P. M., at the exact moment when my
thirst for knowledge transforms itself into a
thirst for something else, and I felt highly
honored, but at the same time at a loss how
to respond to a confidence placed in me on
such an important and serious matter.

Modern history of the Bohemian Club
is comparatively well known. The cele-
brated historians, Tommy Newcomb and

1 8 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

Colonel Cremony, the Baron Miinchhausen
of the western hemisphere, have preserved
for posterity the events which led to the
formation of the present shape of this
learned and moral organization. To be
better understood, when I have to dive into
the dark mysteries of post-tertiary times
and previous geological periods, I am to
repeat here the statements of Tommy and
his friend Colonel Cremony, both of them
such enthusiastic lovers of truth that they
kept all of it to themselves.

You will recollect that the organization
of this ancient order had originally the ob-
ject to protect the genius of the reporter
against the want of appreciation by an un-
enlightened public, as well as the narrow-
minded and merely mercenary views of the
newspaper-owners. Originally of a strictly
literary character, the club soon extended
its welcome to sculptors and painters, be-
cause they strive in the same line — they rep-
resent things which are no realities, exactly
as our newspapers palm off novelties which

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 19

are no facts and facts which are no novel-
ties. Then the welcome was extended for
exactly the same reason to lawyers and later
to musicians, as the transitory character of
their productions cannot inflict any serious
harm. Finally some Front-Street mil-
lionaires obtained admission by carefully
concealing the real amount of their for-
tunes.

It is a well-established historical fact that
the Spartan hero Leonidas, by George
Bromley persistently mistaken for General
Barnes, was a prominent member of the
organization. Less known it is that the
greatest physician of antiquity — Hippoc-
rates— belonged to it. The order always
had a great power of attraction for medical
men. It was during the last years of the
reign of Philip of Macedonia, when the
medical profession was suffering from an
intensely healthy year; in fact, it was an
epidemic of health. The professors of the
Polyclinics of Stagira were suffering from
starvation. They had grown so thin and

20 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

diminished in circumference that they
could no more fill their chairs. Hippoc-
rates awoke to the emergency. He saw it
was impossible to reproduce the necessary
rotundity to fill a medical chair by mere
demonstrations a posteriori, so he started a
new medical system, chiefly founded on
fees, and therefore called the physiological
system. He laid great stress on physiology,
and wound up every lecture with the admo-
nition, "Be very particular about fees";
and then he grew excited, stamped his feet,
and swore an oath, which ever since has
been called "the Hippocratic oath," and
which each of the medical fraternity, even
our most gracious Sire, has been compelled
to swear. This oath gives us power over
the life and death of our fellow-citizens.

It was towards the end of the Lias forma-
tion when the citizens of San Francisco
handed in a petition to the Legislature,
meeting just then at Sacramento, for a vol-
cano. They argued that if an effete mon-
archy like Italy can raise two volcanoes,

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 21

this free community of loyal, hard-drinking
taxpayers is at least entitled to one. Black-
stone, who was then a member of the Legis-
lature, said the point was well taken. A
committee was appointed, an appropriation
raised, and Telegraph Hill selected as
a center for the newly created forces. Un-
fortunately, the head engineer, who very
appropriately had been selected from
amongst the most practical sailors of the
Life-Saving Station, had economized with
the material so that locally he only pro-
duced an eruption of the skin; but the mis-
calculated forces caused the Second-Street
cut and a long series of earthquakes, which
interfered greatly with the stability of the
California coast line. It is not quite cer-
tain whether it was Divine Providence or
our Board of Supervisors that restored the
stability of our coast line by placing the
powerful Captain Kenzel on it, whose
soothing influence quieted the disturbed
nervous system of Mother Earth and kept
it in its position ever since. However, the

22 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

powerful Captain would not have suc-
ceeded if he had not found assistance in a
Board of Health whose weight and physi-
cal proportions had grown to an extent that
they spoiled a North-Pole expedition, none
of the scientific staff of the expedition being
able to pass through the Behring Straits.

The disturbance of the post-tertiary era
finally was kept down by our Geological
Survey; a few ice-cream saloons on Kearny
Street being the only remainder of the gla-
cial period; but revolutionary tendencies
crept into society because society had wit-
nessed so many violent geological disturb-
ances and was infected by the bad example
set by Nature herself. This circumstance
was the cause that the powers of our public
officers had to be extended, and was the first
step to the development of the present des-
potic government of the Bohemian Club,
which, although benevolent, is very power-
ful.

Our present Sire, for the sake of his phys-
ical and moral beauty, occupied this post

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 23

of honor once before; so he is not only his
own successor, but also his own ancestor.
By this circumstance he becomes a self-
made man, and as such is the first instance
of a self-made man in the ancient dynasty
that rules the Bohemian Club.

POPULAR SCIENCE.

IT is one of the greatest blessings of this
century that science has become popular-
ized. In bygone ages science was the
monopoly of a caste. The most important
discoveries were kept secret, and, as a nat-
ural consequence of such egotism, the pro-
gress of the human race was retarded.
Champollion, the celebrated scholar of
Egyptian antiquity, has established be-
yond any doubt the fact that the ancient
Egyptians knew the corkscrew. The hiero-
glyphic sign heretofore believed to rep-
resent a snake is in fact the hieratic
representation of a corkscrew slightly out
of shape. But the discovery of this im-
portant instrument was never made publicly
known, notwithstanding the extensive use

26 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

of it at the celebration of their religious
mysteries.

When the Caliph Omar, who was a fan-
atical W. C. T. U. man, destroyed the
library of Alexandria with all its spiritual
treasures, the key to all the spiritual com-
fort was lost with them. Centuries have
gone by and a great amount of valuable
time has been lost in the effort to open
bottles unscientifically by mere brute force.
The great Euclides, when studying the
qualities of the spiral line, did not strike the
idea of the corkscrew, and it was not until
the time that French enterprise perforated
the Isthmus of Suez that the corkscrew of
the ancients was rediscovered. There they
found the venerable antiquity at a depth
of two hundred and seventy-five feet below
the bottom of the Red Sea, in a shaft
perforating the metamorphic formations of
the surface, on a stratum of brown cake
laterally compressed and evidently of vol-
canic origin.

The implement bore an inscription in

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 2J

hieroglyphics, of which I here give the
English translation :

To MOSES,

City and County Assessor of Egypt.
Dear Baron: — We, Pharaoh I, by the
grace of God, King of Egypt, send you this
decoration as a Christmas-box and a token
of our Royal Grace.
Egypt, 26th December,

in the year before Our Lord 1500.

From this moment began a new era in the
history of man. Discovery followed dis-
covery. Steam-power, the telegraph, the
telephone, and the great Dr. Pinchipinchi's
celebrated flea-powder were discovered in
rapid succession, and are at present the in-
alienable property of the human race. For
all these benefits, of course, we are indebted
to our learned organizations, the Micro-
scopic Society, Bohemian Club, Academy
of Sciences, the Society to Promote Cruelty
of Insects to Man, but at the same time to
public lecturers, like Artemus Ward, who
expound science to the many and combine

28 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

the utile cum dulci scientific abstraction
with the sweet strains of the hand-organ.

New disciplines of science will crop out
of such combinations. We have already now
forensic medicine, the compound of medi-
cine and law, but we will soon have surgi-
cal music, obstetrical aesthetics, gynaecolog-
ical astronomy, and other new disciplines
which will prove a benefit to the human
race and consternation to the schoolma'ams.
But the consternation of schoolma'ams is
not the sole object of modern science, whose
concentrated spirit can be absorbed only by
the chosen few; science has to be diluted
and sweetened by music in the same fair
proportions as other mixed drinks, and is
then called "science toddy."

PROGRESS IN SCIENCE.

I AM sorry, but I am unprepared. For-
tunately, I have in my pocket a paper
which I intended to read before our Acad-
emy of Sciences. As the evening is rather
advanced, perhaps you will be kind enough
not to know the difference.

The paper is on the progress that has
been made last year in the sciences. The
progress of unprofitable science and useless
investigation has been unusually rapid, so
that it is impossible to enumerate all the
benefits which the human race has received
by the untiring efforts of devoted scientists.

Let us begin with the heavens — Astron-
omy. A great astronomer has discovered in
the rings of Saturn an inscription which in
a careful translation reads: "Commit no
nuisance"; from which inscription the

30 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

learned professor justly concludes that the
population of the remote region has arrived
at a state of civilization analogous to our
own.

In zoology the distinguishing character-
istics between the green turtle, the mock
turtle, and the mocking-bird have been so
well established that henceforth the mis-
take of putting a green turtle in a cage and
expecting him to sing will not happen any
more.

In regard to eulogies and necrologies for
dead scientists, a marked improvement has
been established. These eulogies are now-
adays written during the lifetime of the
dead scientist and the composition is super-
intended by himself. This circumstance
will serve as another proof of the immor-
tality of the soul, because the most con-
firmed infidel will say to himself: "If that
fellow is made immortal during his life-
time, why shall I not be so after my death?"

You all know that moral philosophy is
my specialty, but it is only a short time ago

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 31

that the real utility of lectures on moral
philosophy has been established. It is my
own discovery that lectures of this kind
produce water; of course, not of a superior
quality, but good enough for irrigation.
Vegetation in its perverted taste and fanati-
cal rejection of fermented liquors does not
deserve any better fluid; and so, my dear
brethren, let us be thankful that we, accord-
ing to our principle of strict intemperance,
do not depend on irrigation by moral phil-
osophy.

MUSIC.

WE have been touched frequently to our
very hearts in these rooms by the musical
performances of our musical brethren. Fre-
quently, roused by the strains of music, the
tears have rushed to our eyes. Do you think
that heaven, which is so far above, is less
sensitive to the charm than we poor mor-
tals? Of course, the quiet quartet of the
amateurs or the soprano in the boudoir
cannot much influence our California sky.
This influence begins with the solitary flute
accompanying the heartrending wails of a
rat terrier addressing the moon; it gains
power with the performance of the wild
Italian organgrinder, and attains its maxi-
mum with the brass band that leads the bold
militia warrior to glory and the destruction
of sandwiches and whisky.

34 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

I recollect a body of heroes wearing rain-
bows instead of regimentals and having
painted on their knapsacks the head of a
tiger in an attitude as if his teeth were in-
spected by a dentist. By the first notes of
their brass band the azure of our California
sky turned into a delicate apple-green, and
it began to rain. Half an hour later we
received a telegram that Sacramento was
under water. Another deluge — and the
destruction of the world — was prevented by
stopping the music.

You may call that a coincidence, but in
this wide world there is not room for a
single coincidence ; everything is immutable
law, the whole universe a network of cause
and effect. You may sing and say we met
by chance, but in reality we did not meet by
chance, but compelled by the Darwinian
law of natural selection. The spheroid
shape of this planet is the cause that we
wear off our boots on one side, by frequently
walking too much in one direction. Why
are the days longer in summer than in

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 3$

winter? It is the consequence of the caloric
law; they are expanded by the heat in sum-
mer and contracted by the cold in winter.

I had a friend, a dear friend in Australia,
who never could go shooting without being
caught in a thunderstorm. The Australian
Legislature, ever attentive to the agricultu-
ral interests of the country, appointed him
Inspector of Thunderstorms. Five months
afterwards he was killed by lightning. Why
have we not a similar institution? It would
be a blessing for this country if every five
months a legislator was killed by lightning,
like that old Roman king and legislator,
Numa Pompilius, who must not be mis-
taken for Paul Neumann, whom I have
known as a legislator, but who is no king,
and, I am happy to say, is not yet killed by
lightning.

CALIFORNIA.

I DIVIDE the existence of California into
two periods: the first, before the foundation
of the Bohemian Club, has to be considered
as prehistoric. Even this period is distin-
guished by a very peculiar character, grad-
ually changing to three different stages or
grades, which I am to illustrate by three
different experiences.

I was but a few days in San Francisco
when a rough-looking individual — a Texas
Ranger, as I afterwards heard — laid his
hand on my shoulder, with the words, " Old
horse, take a drink?" I had presence of
mind enough to take the drink, and had
afterwards several opportunities to get even
with the gentleman in taking drinks as well
as in calling him "old horse."

The second experience was on the day

38 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

when the Territory of California was ad-
mitted as a State. A procession was formed,
in which I participated at the side of a
gentleman to whom I was not introduced.
Silently we walked on, influenced and ab-
sorbed by the significance of the historical
moment, when my companion abruptly re-
marked: "It's a long time that I have not
seen you." I was astonished and answered :
"I never saw you all my lifetime." "And
is not that long enough?" retorted my com-
panion in the most mellifluous accents of
green Erin. That day we got very much
acquainted.

The third experience was in the rooms
of the Vigilance Committee, where we dis-
cussed the case of Mr. Stuart. The meeting
was addressed by Jim Dows, and I recollect
distinctly the words : "Gentlemen, to hang
a man is a temporary and transitory matter,
but the principles which we represent here
are eternal."

After these experiences I considered my-
self sufficiently acclimatized. I became a

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 39

citizen and fervent admirer of Squibob,
whose untimely end I have regretted for
years, until, being introduced into the Bo-
hemian Club by Mr. Bowman and Tommy
Newcomb, I discovered the place where
Squibob's ghost is still walking.

My Bohemian friends, the fight for exist-
ence has not always been to me an easy
matter. We all have had times when care
for material things overpowered us, when
we became disgusted by unprovoked jeal-
ousies. When those cares of the outer mate-
rial world became discouraging I withdrew
to ideal Bohemia. But Bohemia was not
only to me an asylum against material cares ;
it was also a shrine consecrated to literature,
from where new vistas opened into the
realms of the bold, original American humor,
so well represented inside these walls, and
outside by men like Mark Twain, Bill Nye,
and many others of world-wide fame. I
received here new conceptions of many
things; and if I count a few triumphs in
literature, I owe them to Bohemian conver-

40 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

sations, to ideas which I imbibed (with
other things) in the halls of this institution.

THE SKELETON IN ARMOR.

I ALWAYS was touched to my very heart
by the beautiful lines written by Longfel-
low on " The Skeleton in Armor." I felt a
burning desire to know more about the
skeleton. I began to study the Iceland Ed-
das, the Saemundur, and the Snorri Sturle-
son Edda, the most ancient numbers of the
Jolly Giant, and other reliable documents
of history. In the course of this reading I
succeeded in diverting the subject from all
romance and establishing the following his-
torical facts.

Many thousand years ago, when the
giant elk was not fossil, but trod in flesh
and blood the mossy bogs of ancient Ire-
land, when the mastodon and the rhinoceros
tichorrhinus roamed through the majestic
primeval forests of sauerkraut that then

42 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

covered all northern Europe, there, on a
beautiful site, embellished by a meridian
cutting the coast line of the Baltic, lived a
pious knight named Hans Meyer. Like all
the knights of the period, Hans Meyer was
in love, and, according to the enthusiastic
custom of the country, killed off all the dear
relations of his lady love. By an unaccount-
able neglect he omitted to kill his mother-
in-law, and this proved to be the beginning
of a long series of misfortunes.

The Baltic hero grew restless. He
wanted to travel far away from his home
into distant climes where there were no
mothers-in-law. He wanted to emigrate
and settle in the East Indies, where a wise
law ordered widows to be burned, and deci-
mated in this judicious way the contingent
of elderly ladies. The simple-minded but
thoughtful hero foresaw that he might go
around the Cape of Good Hope, or cross
the Isthmus of Suez with the India mail.
Either way he would most necessarily want
funds. To obtain them, he imitated the

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 43

signatures of wealthy fellow-citizens. But
as this style of calligraphics was not consid-
ered lawful, he was sentenced to prison for
life; that is, according to the rules of the
mild patriarchal government of the region,
he was allowed for several months inside
of a penitentiary, to study the charmingly
adapted architecture of the place, and then
was put on board of a vessel bound for
America, under the conditions never to
return and to adopt the name of Pilgrim
Father.

It was then the custom that no foreigner
whatever was admitted on American soil
without his accepting an office. No sooner
heard the first of the Mohicans, who was
then the President of the United States, of
the arrival of another cargo of distinguished
foreigners, than he asked the favor of a
private interview with Hans Meyer. Hans
Meyer found the first of the Mohicans bus-
ily employed smoking his calumet filled
with Amiga s prim era calidad, calle de
Obispo.

44 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

"Hans Meyer," said the first of the Mo-
hicans, "glad to make your acquaintance.
You see, this government is a philanthropic
experiment. We want to make everybody
fit to fill every office, and for that reason we
appoint for each office the man who is least
adapted, for his mind and capacities are
most in need of being developed in that very
direction. There is, viz., Flanagan, a mild
Celt and an enthusiastic admirer of law
and order. We make him Chief of Police.
There is the tribe Levy, with its time-
honored reputation for honesty. We never
elect a City and County Assessor but his
Christian name is Levy. In former times
we used to fill the office of Coroner by some
undertaker, but since we discovered that
these people really understand something
about that business we take a doctor. Now,
my friend, the circumstance of your being
an unsophisticated Northern barbarian
without any education would admirably
adapt you for the office of Superintendent
of Public Education; but some fellow pas-

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 45

sengers of yours have stated that you know
some Latin; that, of course, disqualifies you
forever. Now, I will tell you what I can do.
I will create a new office for your sake and
make you Inspector of Mothers-in-law."

Hearing this, Hans Meyer grew pale,
went to the next blacksmith and ordered a
dress coat, borrowed from a tinman a stove-
pipe and a pair of gloves, took a drink, and
had a building erected on the same thought-
ful style of architecture that he had studied
during his stay at the Baltic penitentiary,
and disappeared from the sight of man.
After some weeks his friends entered the
house and found Hans Meyer stark dead,
in full armor, leaning against a corner.
Some said he died by an abscess of the liver,
others by brandy and water on the brain.
Some contended that during his sleep rattle-
snakes crept into his boots. The Coroner
pronounced it a womb complaint, called af-
fection of the mother-in-law.

His friends passed eleven resolutions, be-
ginning with, "Whereas, it has pleased Di-

46 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

vine Providence in its inscrutable wisdom,"
and the jury gave the verdict: "Killed by
the inscrutable wisdom of Providence."

DARWINISM.

ON a former occasion our most gracious
Sire has proved the descent of the human
race from above; he has defeated the pre-
vailing notion of our descent from the mon-
key, a theory which found its chief support
in the homoeopathic maxim, Simla simili-
bus. He has proved, not only theoretically,
but also practically, with imminent peril of
his life, the descent from the balloon.

One day when I was in these rooms, at an
early hour, when all good Bohemians were
embraced by the arms of Morpheus or were
embracing somebody else, I was wrapt
in a brown study about Darwinism. My
state of mind was caused by a conversation
with our brother Harry Edwards on a pre-
vious day, which resulted in a slight head-
ache. I was absorbed in the contemplation

48 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

of some luminous phenomena and black dots
before my eyes, spectral illusions, to which
I am much subjected on lonely mornings,
and which, perhaps, are the ghosts of the
insects killed by me in the early days of
California, when suddenly my attention was
attracted to the cage of our sacred bird, the
Owl. This at least was no spectral illusion ;
there was a letter directed to me, the same
which I hold here in my hand. I think I
can excuse the indiscretion of divulging the
communication made to me by the Owl, be-
cause it seemed to me as if the father wishes
its publication. It is as follows:

"SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 29, 1874.

"DEAR SIR:

"Before I addressed these lines to you I
hesitated to choose between you and Rev.
Bromley, whose nocturnal habits and per-
sonal appearance are so much like my own ;
but, remembering the great consideration
which you always have shown me by
showing homage to me in entering and

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 49

leaving the room, I consider you the most
worthy for the reception of my confidence
in regard to my ideas on Darwinism.

"Before entering into particulars, I must
state that Darwin's idea of progressive de-
velopment is entirely wrong. This world
has proved a failure from its very begin-
ning. The tops of the mountains are
washed down and fill the lakes and seas,
causing trouble and confusion on all sides.
The sewerage of the planet is bad every-
where, and the whole universe a system of
blunders, a consolidated mass, the product
of a long series of incompetent engineering
of antediluvian Superintendents of Streets.
The grade has been so continuously changed
that you cannot find an alpine height with-
out oyster-shells, sardine-boxes, and other
marine productions, which prove the local-
ity to have been originally the bottom of
the sea; on the other hand, what is now the
bottom of the sea is covered by a post-
tertiary stratum of umbrellas, peanut-shells,
and broken bottles, a proof of its having

50 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

been but a short time ago a popular picnic-
ground for Sunday excursions. These
changes of grade took place chiefly to get
a job for the numerous street contractors, by
whom, at that period, this planet was
mainly inhabited. The constant rotation of
the planetary system prevented all investi-
gation, and it was impossible to locate the
blunders and mistakes and make individ-
uals responsible, as everybody promptly
blamed his predecessor. Mr. Post-tertiary
blamed Mr. Jurassic; Mr. Jurassic, Mr.
Lias; Mr. Lias says it is the fault of Mr.
Eocene; Mr. Eocene says it is the fault of
Sabbath-breaking and a bad kind of whisky.
"One of the most striking failures in cre-
ation is man, who is nearly as mean as a
deadly enemy of my race, the crow, who
persists in persecuting me whenever I ap-
pear in daylight, and flies at me and calls
me names. Just so mankind. Like the
crow, he uses unfair means and has obtained
by them a position for which nature has
never intended him. He is an usurper, a

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 51

pretender. The idea of his innate supe-
riority is quite ridiculous. Look at his
jaws. How insignificant they are compared
to those of the sea-lion. He has no claws,
he has no bill, and when he gets a bill he
leaves it unsettled.

"The only instance of a progressive being
on this planet is the owl.

"The human race is fast degenerating.
Look at the descendant of a Northern sea-
king selling liquor as an Angular Saxon at
a corner grocery. Look at the descendants
of Milesian kings drinking it on credit.

"The cultus of the ancient Aztec, with its
impressive ceremonies of human sacrifices,
has degenerated into the early piety of the
Young Men's Christian Association. Com-
pare the High Priest Huichtlipochtli,
wielding in his right hand the sacred flint
and in his left a bleeding, palpitating heart,
to the Young Men Christian Deacon, with
bald head, blue eye-glasses, a set of false
teeth, and an umbrella instead of the sacri-
ficial flint knife.

52 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

"As to natural selection, the idea is simply
preposterous. It is true that we owls some-
times select our own kind for food, but there
ends the working of that principle. Is it
natural that on the top of the dentist you
always find a photographer, above the
undertaker a dancing-school? Or, explain
why all your friends are more or less given
to drinking.

"Yours truly,

"THE OWL."

THE MOSQUITO.

MOST GRACIOUS SlRE: The letter with
which you have honored me has been to me
a source of great anxiety, in consequence of
its most original style of calligraphics.
Brother Bromley, who always has been my
adviser in spiritual things, but whom I am
also in the habit of consulting in important
worldly matters, took your kind letter in
his hands and, after having turned it from
side to side, addressed me with the follow-
ing words:

"My young friend, this is a Chinese
letter, and as Chinese is not written in lines,
but in columns, you ought to have held it
this way, and you easily would have found
that it is a bill for washing and ironing.
When I represented my country in Tien
Tsin, I received every week a document of

54 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

similar character; in fact, it was the only
official correspondence I indulged in dur-
ing my stay at Tien Tsin. You see here
Hong Kong Shanghai Peking Ironing
Washington, and here in the corner is the
receipt of the bill, 'You tarn fool,' which
means, payment received, and is also the
polite style by which foreigners are ad-
dressed in Tien Tsin."

This explanation did not satisfy me, so I
interviewed Mr. Marshall, who has lent me
several times valuable assistance in deciph-
ering letters of Charley Stoddard and other
Aztec hieroglyphs.

"That lets me out," he said. "The only
advice I can give you is, apply to Charley
Stoddard; he is the highest authority in this
style of calligraphics."

I sent the letter to Charley and promptly
received this answer:

"Yes, I recognize my own handwriting;
but you know very well that I cannot read
any of my manuscripts older than twelve
months."

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 55

Then I did show the letter to Dan O'Con-
nell, who read to me fluently an advertise-
ment of a professor to teach waltzing in
three lessons. " Some unknown friend," he
explained, "has heard about your affliction
by gout and recommends you this new

cure."

Now I have tried the cure, took the three
lessons, but, as you see, without the desired
effect. Nevertheless, I am confident I
would have been cured if I only had learned
to waltz. Finally, thrown on my own re-
sources, I succeeded in rinding out,—

1. That the document was written in
English;

2. That it referred to the High Jinks of
the Bohemian Club;

3. That it referred to something else
whose nature was doubtful. The some-
thing read sometimes like dry goods, other
times more like mosquitoes.

The latter version appeared to me the
more probable, being the more appropriate
one for a student of entomology. Neverthe-

56 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

less, it appeared to me the safest plan to
combine the two versions into one, and so,
by joining the mosquito to dry goods, I ob-
tained the mosquito bar, a liquid body,
which I used to take in Sacramento before
going to sleep. This substance, it is true,
would not protect me against the sting of
the mosquito; but, when taken in sufficient
quantity, would prevent my feeling the
stings — in a similar way as Tommy New-
comb cured temporarily a toothache. It
was in the old rooms of the Club, where one
evening he was suffering, complaining, and
expressing his firm intention to get drunk.
Now, if Tommy had taken that vow, I do
not know a single instance of his not being
true to his word; so he succeeded very well
that night, and when I met him the follow-
ing day at luncheon with a swollen face, I
was afraid that the cure had not taken
effect; but he assured me the remedy was
infallible, and added: "The whole night I
had the most excruciating toothache, but
did n't feel it because I was drunk."

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 57

The mosquito (Tipula pipiens) belongs
to the class of Diptera, which class easily
can be distinguished from the rest of insects
by its species having one pair of wings and
three pairs of legs. Angels also have a pair
of wings, but the mosquito has the advan-
tage in the number of legs. Nevertheless,
most people prefer an angel with a single
pair of well-developed legs, even if the
wings should be wanting, to all the six
legs of the mosquito. Also, they prefer
her kiss to the kiss of the mosquito. The
jaws of the mosquito are so constructed that
he cannot chew, only kiss. But he makes
up for the weakness of his jaws by plenty
of cheek.

In his larval state he lives in the water and
is strictly temperate. During his aquatic
larval state he breathes atmospheric air by a
pair of tubes at his anal end. This, of
course, necessitates his coming at stated
times to the surface of the water and sticking
out his anal end with the respiring tubes
and disrespect of surroundings, which

58 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

movement is very improper. But Nature
sometimes is very improper, and I have fre-
quently to blush for her. Now, this anal
end is analogous to the lower end of the
spinal column of our own species, which in
our own larval state is used for educational
purposes, but never for respiration; and, I
am happy to say, is not ornamented with a
pair of tubes sticking out as in the mos-
quito larva, because these tubes would in-
terfere with the present style of our dress,
and would even prove a serious obstacle to
our sitting down.

The moment the mosquito emerges from
its chrysalis in the water he does not touch
water again. He spreads his wings and
looks for a mate. He can as little compre-
hend the associations of his larval state as we
can comprehend the illusions of our first
love. The male mosquito henceforth has
for its only object to kiss the mosquita, but
the mosquita in her turn is very liberal in
her kisses. She kisses promiscuously; but,
although having a pair of wings, her kisses

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 59

are not those of an angel, and she, there-
fore, frequently comes to grief. The male
mosquito only lives to kiss, but the female
frequently dies for it.

There is a peculiar propensity, a kind of
suicidal mania, in the whole class of dipter-
ous insects. The housefly, for instance, re-
peats suicide so frequently that with her it
becomes a habit. It is the prerogative of
the fly to cultivate suicide as a vice. I once
marked a fly by tying a knot in her left
middle leg and found the same individual
next morning drowning in my eye-opener,
then in my coffee, then in my lunch cocktail,
then in my appetizer. In my pousse cafe
I saw two of her, and when I took my
nightcap I did not pay any more attention
to her.

The mosquito does not commit suicide by
drowning, because he hates water and is
ashamed of his larval existence, breathing
through anal tubes and feeding on animal-
culae not belonging to him, but to another
class; as some specimens of our own spe-

60 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

cies are ashamed of their juvenile depreda-
tions in garden and fields, belonging, who
cares to whom, and of the educational ac-
tion of the rattan on the lower end of their
spinal column.

Now, if we compare the diet of mosquito
larva and his mode of respiration to our own
style of living this night, ought we not to
be thankful?

ON MEDICINE.

THE science of medicine is the science
which enables the student to pass his med-
ical examination. The object of this sci-
ence is to keep out of the dominion of the
News Letter, and if this end has been
obtained we call it the triumph of science.

Medicine branches off into two disci-
plines, which are called the old system and
modern science. The followers of the
latter call the followers of the first "old
fogies"; the followers of the former call
the adherers of modern science " young
men." The oldest system was that of the
Haruspices in ancient Rome. They exam-
ined the bowels of oxen with the naked eye
and predicted out of them what would hap-
pen. Modern science examines the bowels
of fools with the microscope and predicts

62 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

what has happened. Both disciplines agree
on one point: they collect fees, or at least
try to collect them. This is a very essential
part of our science, and the discipline
that treats about collecting fees is called
physiology.

There are many other branches of medi-
cal science, but still there are not enough.
We have forensic medicine, and our most
gracious Sire has created a new science by
proclaiming Dr. Leach doctor of surgical
music. But we want a doctor of obstetrical
aesthetics. There is a secret but intimate
connection between these two apparently
so different branches of human knowledge,
and the connecting link is woman, or, as we
scientists say, "female mankind." It is a
fact already observed by the ancients that
as soon as ladies approach a certain age they
begin to develop in their meetings the most
lively interest for medical matters and med-
ical men. We medical men feel frequently
the powerful influences exercised in their
secret tribunals, called lunch parties, where

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 63

they make and unmake medical reputations.
Now, we think it a delicate compliment,
and well calculated to appease the wrath
of the goddesses, by creating for their
honor a new discipline, called "obstetrical
aesthetics. "

HEROIC DEEDS OF OLD BOHEMIA.

MOST WORTHY SIRE: You will excuse
my gray suit on an evening like this. I
wear it partly because it agrees best with
my complexion, which is also old and gray,
and partly because it is appropriate to the
remarks I have to make on bygone days —
gray antiquity and the heroic deeds of old
Bohemia. These remarks are not entirely
prehistoric; if they were, they would be out
of time, instead of their being at present
only out of place.

I am myself a kind of Bohemian fossil,
and there are moments in which I consider
myself an honorary member of the Lias
formation. I can sympathize with the
plesiosaurus of the Ward collection, of
which a specimen is kept at our Academy
of Sciences, which the Creator himself

66 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

never had dared to imitate. But we will not
enter on this night into the dark mysteries
of a Bohemian Lias formation. Let us
become post-tertiary and remember the an-
cestral heroes that preceded the present gen-
eration.

There is, one of the first, the learned and
energetic Caxton, alias Rhodes, the discov-
erer of the gyascutus, the quadruped with
a short fore-leg and a short hind-leg on the
right side. This animal was especially
created to run around a mountain-side in
Oregon, sufficiently distant to escape imme-
diate investigation.

The more ancient Bohemians will recol-
lect that this discovery led to an equally
interesting discovery of a corresponding
quadruped with a short fore-leg and a short
hind-leg on the left side, and which by Di-
vine Providence was destined to run around
the same mountain from the other side. As
these two animals proved to be of opposite
sexes, this arrangement was evidently in-
tended to introduce them to each other, and

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 67

is another proof of the benevolent although
frequently frustrated intentions of Divine
Providence. The discovery of the second
animal does not belong to our Bohemian
brother Caxton; we owe it to one of the
appropriation scientists who occupies a po-
sition in Berkeley and in the hearts of our
grangers, and who wants only an initiative
to run through a whole series of discove-
ries.

But our learned and ever-watchful
brother Caxton, as many will recollect,
saved on another occasion our country from
a dire calamity. It was in the year A. D.
1868, when a party that had spent the even-
ing at the Cliff House discovered the moon
in the act of approaching the earth at a
rate that, according to exact astronomical
calculations, would have brought that ce-
lestial body in sixteen days, eight hours,
and thirty-five minutes in contact with the
earth. As the clash would take place south
of Market Street, and, as that part of the
city had already previously suffered from

68 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

the Second-Street cut, real estate south of
Market Street was falling rapidly. And
it was not only the giant proportions of the
approaching luminary increasing in mathe-
matical proportion; nay, the member of the
returning party even discovered a second
moon, a satellite of our earth hitherto un-
known to astronomers. The officers of the
Barbary Coast Survey, it is true, had, by
an algebraic formula perfectly known to
themselves, succeeded in influencing the
perigee in a way to make the moon fall on
England; but our esteemed brother Caxton,
with a penstroke and a little printer's ink,
removed the whole danger. Some pretend
that the moon, having spent all her finan-
cial power in railroad tickets, was not able
to reach England and had been precipitated
into the Atlantic Ocean. This probably did
happen to that second moon seen by the
members of the Cliff House party, as this
second moon is missing since that time.
Now, imagine the disturbance of the moon
suddenly arriving in this country with a

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 69

cargo of undesirable immigrants, not one
of them with a letter of introduction to
Frank Pixley!

Thus the great Caxton saved the country;
on another occasion he saved the planet.
You must recollect that in the year A. D.
1865 a chemist had discovered a substance,
otherwise useless, that would ignite the
hydrogen of the ocean. Now, in itself a
burning ocean would prove an assistance to
the McKinley bill, and, by cutting off im-
port, greatly favor home industry; but,
unfortunately, the fire would communicate
to rivers and wells, and thereby prevent
bathing, cleaning of bottles, painting in
water-colors, and prove a great distress
to our Fish Commissioners. Our Bohemian
brother Caxton, whose watchful eye had
espied the danger in time, offered from his
own pocket an amount of millions that
would have astonished even a Californian,
as well as a corner drug-store, to the chemist
to desist from his diabolical plan to set
fire to the ocean; and as this malevolent

70 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

chemist asked for more millions and two
drug-stores, our brother Caxton threw him
from the platform of a railroad-car passing
Cape Horn, which feat he also executed
by a small quantity of printer's ink.

I am sorry to say that our Bohemian
brother Caxton did not succeed in saving
the unfortunate miner who drank the water
contained in a geode and became petrified
and fossilized in a time of twenty minutes.
But his publication of the event has gone
far to warn the public against that most in-
sidious drink — water.

What shall I say in praise of the powerful
McCracken Bungletoe, alias Tommy New-
comb, who, in his great victory of mind
over matter, left Mestayer under the table,
and with one foot on the body of the slain
warrior and the other in the spittoon, asked
for another horn of whisky? Or the great
Apache chief and ancient mariner, Rear-
Admiral Cremony? But the latter has a
worthy successor in nautical lore in the in-
imitable Bromley, under whose flag I dared

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 71

to round Cape Horn so persistently that my
head began to swim.

In regard to tactics on a more or less dry
land, we have General Barnes, who, as the
Leonidas of the nineteenth century, fought
in that terrible Amador war.

Alas! we cannot deny that many of the
old members are no more with us; some
have paid their tribute to nature, some
have reformed their morals. But that well-
organized army of young Bohemia which
I see before me is a guarantee that the future
will be like the past, and that a bright time
is in store for old Bohemia.

THE SHOWMAN.

Now is the time and the opportunity to
see the great Mastodon!

Walk in, gentlemen! Admission, the
nominal amount of twenty-five cents!

The bones of this fossil monster have been
found at a depth of one hundred and twen-
ty-five feet below the green sward of this
beautiful earth.

Now is the time and the opportunity!

It stands twenty-five feet on its legs, is
twenty-five feet long. It has been found
under one hundred and twenty-five degrees
of longitude, which gives to the animal the
enormous length of one hundred and sev-
enty-five feet.

Now is the time !

This picture of the animal is taken after

74 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

a photograph by Bradley & Rulofson. As
you see here, the animal fed exclusively on
boa constrictors. Anybody that has con-
ferred with Montgomery Queen on the
price of boa constrictors will know the
enormous price of such luxury. So the un-
scrupulous wisdom of Divine Providence
has endowed this beatiful creature with an
unlimited capacity to live on credit.

Now is the time !

Professor Huxley, in conjunction with
the Alia California and other bodies of in-
scrutable wisdom with whom we have been
in communication, agrees that this animal
has lived one hundred and twenty-five years
before the Flood. That arrow-head that
looks like a fragment of a broken whisky-
bottle has been found near his left hind-
leg, which circumstance proves that this
animal had sufficient mental power to run
away from its enemies, and proves at the
same time that the San Francisco Society
to Prevent Cruelty to Animals was not then
in existence. One of the enormous tusks

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 75

has a filling, which circumstance proves
the antiquity of dentistry.

Now is the time !

Listen to the Mastodon!

Now I am to lecture !

Recollect, gentlemen, now is the time!

This giant skeleton has been sold to the
British Museum for the moderate sum of
one hundred and twenty-five thousand dol-
lars, and here I am on the road to an inde-
pendent fortune. Now, you will say, If
that man is on the way to an independent
fortune, why does he take all the trouble
to lecture here every night by torchlight on
the sidewalk, without any protection for his
learned head but the canopy of heaven?

Gentlemen, here I stand on the green soil
of this beautiful State of California. I am
proud to be a son of this free country and
to enlighten my fellow-citizens on the sub-
ject of antediluvian creation.

Now is the time !

The youthful hope of the American fu-
ture, only ten cents!

LAST JINKS ON SACRAMENTO STREET.

ILLUSTRIOUS SIRE: I congratulate you
that on this festive occasion you preside
over this enlightened Bohemian body. It
was always considered a high honor to pre-
side on Christmas night, when the strictest
privacy protects the impressive rites and
dark mysteries of Bohemia. But under the
present circumstances, when we are pre-
pared to emigrate from this sacred abode to
the distant shores of Pine Street, to prepare
a new home for the Pilgrim Fathers of
Bohemia, you will not object when I com-
pare you to the Mayflower. This night is
the last night that the sacred rites of High
Jinks are to be celebrated in these rooms.
It is the first time that we celebrate the
last High Jinks. May they turn out to be
everlasting.

78 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

Your name, illustrious Sire, will be
handed down to posterity and will turn out
an eternal botheration to schoolma'ams
when they pass their examination; and both
of us, when, with the assistance of my medi-
cal brethren, we have shed off this mortal
clay, will form a constellation in the sky,
called Major Ursus, or the Bromleyades.

At this moment begins a new era in the
history of man, an epoch that even reverses
some laws of nature heretofore considered
of universal power.

Most illustrious Collega, you will recol-
lect a private conversation once held in this
sacred room when you justly remarked that
we could pay our debts by mental powers.
Colonel Hawes then said that Archimedes,
a Syracusan philosopher, who received his
name from the Archimedean screw, has
established the law that the strongest man
could not lift his own body, and that even
our Collega Beverly Cole, when ship-
wrecked, could not lift himself out of the
ocean by his scalp-lock, but required a boat

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 79

to save his valuable life. You will recall
that important discussion and will feel
proud of this victory, which Tommy New-
comb would call a victory of mind over
matter.

ON DREAMS.

NIGHT-DREAMS are private property, —
they belong to the individual; but day-
dreams are public property, and belong to
the century, or a certain stage of social and
scientific development. The day-dream one
hundred years ago was the philosopher's
stone and the transmutation of metals. It is
a remarkable anachronism that in this en-
lightened age the dream of the transmuta-
tion of metals has been revived in Chile by
Mr. Paraf, who persuaded the unsophisti-
cated natives of that country to buy stock
in an enterprise to transmute copper into
silver. Now, we all know that gold and
silver can be changed, but they cannot be
transmuted. Silver, it is true, is a metal that
dissolves readily in alcoholic fluids and pre-
cipitates out of this solution on the tip of the

82 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

nose in the shape of copper; but this copper
is the product of a vital, not a metallurgical,
process.

The dreams of our own age turn chiefly
upon vital processes. There is another
conundrum which we strive to solve, and
that is the origin of organic life. We look
no more for the transmutation of metals, but
for the transmutation of plants or animals
into other species; but the laws of our
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to
Animals have put a fine on Darwinian ex-
periments. We even suppose ourselves the
victim of some transmutative process from
a rather doubtful ancestry, and some promi-
nent members of the medical fraternity seek
with great care and perseverance for a con-
necting link wherewith to excuse their own
personal appearance. But there exists no
connecting link, for we are entirely distinct
from all other types of creation by one fac-
ulty— that of smoking tobacco. The idea
that the clouds are produced by the angels
smoking tobacco is exploded ; it is in direct

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 83

opposition to the doctrines of modern sci-
ence and the meteorological section of our
Academy of Sciences.

It was one of the day-dreams of our
ancestors that organic life, and even the
human species, could be produced by chem-
ical processes. Goethe, in the second part
of his "Faust," alludes to this day-dream
when he introduces the homunculus, a
human being that was the result of an al-
chymistic process. At present there are
many who believe that organic life may be
produced by certain stages of fermentation.
Fermentation is sin, even when the duty is
paid, and Vinegar Bitters the only refresh-
ment permitted to the faithful. The dis-
ciples of the fermentation theory quote an
experiment by which they produce fleas by
moistening sawdust. I have tried the ex-
periment, but could not raise anything, not
even a self-made man, and only after many
complicated processes I succeeded in raising
a life-insurance agent — and that only after
having added to the sawdust an addled egg.

84 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

Now, my Bohemian brethren, you cannot
derive much satisfaction from such results,
and, I admonish you, if you want to produce
organic life, follow the old, approved
method founded on the Darwinian law of
natural selection and mutual affection.

SCHILLER AND GOETHE AS BOHEMIANS.

THE first traces of Bohemian sympathies
in Schiller we find in his dramatic play
"Die Rauber," in a passage where one of
those interesting highwaymen advises to
withdraw to the Bohemian forests — a deli-
cate allusion to our midsummer celebration.
In Schiller's later career we find two other
and more celebrated plays localized in Bo-
hemia, namely, "Wallenstein's Lager" and
"Wallenstein's Death"; but Wallenstein's
death was not caused by lager, as is erro-
neously supposed by ignorant people.
Schiller had a medical education, but prac-
ticed medicine only for a very short time;
in fact, he has killed considerably more peo-
ple in his dramatical plays than by medical
prescriptions. In this regard he is much my
inferior, but he is a greater poet. In his

86 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

later years he was appointed Professor of
History at the University of Jena. If he
had remained faithful to the science of
medicine, he might have become Professor
of Hysterics at the Toland College, like our
Bohemian brother, Professor Dr. Beverly
Cole.

Let us now investigate the Bohemian
qualities of Goethe and his origin. Goethe's
grandsire was a blacksmith, and, as our
grand Sire is at present a Taylor, Goethe
may consider himself our equal ; and so he
was in reality, for when he studied law he
joined an organization analogous to this. In
his autobiography, headed "Truth and Fic-
tion," he describes accurately the club and
also the untimely end of this benevolent in-
stitution : The club was not careful enough
in selecting its members. They admitted so
many respectable people that the club lost
its bad reputation, and then they dissolved
with such violence that some members re-
mained dissolute ever after. Some people
say that in his book "Werther's Leiden"

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 87

Goethe advocated suicide, but, after all, this
advocation was not without reason. Sui-
cide, when properly directed, could be
made very useful, like the "hara kiri" of
the Japanese. If, for instance, all the mem-
bers of our next Legislature could be in-
duced to commit "hara kiri" before enter-
ing Sacramento, what a blessing it would be
for this country! But as it is generally the
wrong people who commit suicide, a careful
government ought to warn them publicly by
substituting for the antiquated advice, "Go
to Hewston Hastings," the impressive
words, "Commit no suicide." Goethe's
most celebrated play is " Faust." Faust was
a great conjurer who raised the devil and
took a mortgage on his soui. The formula
has since been tried by many people, but
without any satisfactory result, for Old
Iniquity did not appear; from which cir-
cumstance one may infer how much in these
dull times the value of souls has declined.

So, my dear brethren, keep on the path of
righteousness, for you will find in that other

88 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

place no improvement in business matters,
but the same dull times as here.

THE YEAR'S PROGRESS.

MOST GRACIOUS SIRE AND DEARLY BE-
LOVED BRETHREN: During the past year I
have assiduously studied and diligently ob-
served. When formerly the progress of
morals was the object in which my energies
concentrated, it is now progress in general.
To this sole object I have sacrificed my
whole time. I have lived like a hermit. I
have withdrawn from society. I scarcely
know the inside of a saloon or the outside of
a bar, because I have steered my boat out of
the wild breakers of the bar, where sirens
sang to Ulysses, into the quiet port of peace-
ful domestic intoxication. I am here to
offer you the results of my observations
regarding morals, science, art, and things
in general.

It is a well-known fact that moral phil-

90 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

osophy is the only science in which, since
the time of Socrates, no discovery has been
made. It has been reserved for my own in-
vestigations to discover the important axiom
that in a free country no citizen must be
tyrannized by his own principles. In as-
tronomy I have to record the recent discov-
ery of an old split in one of the rings of
Saturn. It is true this split was known be-
fore and was called "Encke's division," or,
according to the reporters of our news-
papers, "Yankee division" ; but the discov-
ery of its exact nature was reserved for our
Bohemian astronomer, Colonel Hawes, who
has spent many nights watching the rings of
Saturn through different glasses, and even
bottles. According to the statements of this
eminent scientist, the split in the ring of
Saturn cannot be mended and is beyond re-
pair. The practical importance of this fact
cannot be overrated, for it is more than
probable that all other rings will follow the
example of Saturn and split; and when all
those rings that at present prevent progress

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 91

in science and art have split, what a bright
future lies then before California!

As to forest culture, we have to record a
most important step. The committee has
empowered a posse of intelligent school-
ma'ams of both sexes to plant trees on the
roadsides. These trees will be exhibited to
all passers-by for a nominal entrance fee as
soon as the last of our forest trees has be-
come extinct.

The insect world has shown through all
the later years a perceptible progress and
enjoyable tendency to copulate and multi-
ply. We have had grasshoppers, codling-
moths, scale-bugs, and our most gracious
Sire has treated successfully, by mercurial
ointment, several cases of phylloxera in per-
sons that had come in too close a contact with
the vineyard of a friend. We are uncertain
whom we have to thank for this revival of
the insect world — our brother Harry Ed-
wards, for his absence, or our State ento-
mologists, for their presence.

The year has been rather dry and our

92 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

farmers found sufficient reason to complain ;
so the inscrutable wisdom of Divine Provi-
dence, whose pet is the California granger,
sent us rain enough to give him cause to
complain about inundation. This dispensa-
tion of Providence is still going on, because
Providence has been long enough in office
to know that as soon as it stops raining the
California granger will growl about un-
usual dryness. So the rain goes on and a
new deluge is fairly started. The more
thoughtful members of our Academy of
Sciences make preparations to transform
their hall into a Noah's ark, in order to save
all those animals in their stuffed state whose
ancestors Noah preserved alive. The citi-
zens of this State are much puzzled about
the cause of the flood. Heaven so far has
always shown patience to their shortcom-
ings. They are not conscious of an unusual
amount of wickedness, nor is there any
California Legislature expected to meet at
Sacramento.

As usual, our authorities have paid no

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 93

attention to the wishes of the people. It is
now twelve years since we have petitioned
them to have Telegraph Hill converted into
a volcano, so that, at appropriate times, we
could have eruptions for the benefit of tour-
ists who write books in Boston about Cali-
fornia dynamiters, and eruptions of the skin
are but poor excuses for a real volcanic
eruption. This community of honest, hard-
drinking taxpayers is entitled to at least one
volcano. We have been frustrated in our
dearest wishes; nevertheless, we have to be
thankful, especially as it would not help to
be otherwise.

SOME REMARKS ON THE SECRET RE-
LATIONS BETWEEN CHEMISTRY
AND POLITICAL ECONOMY.

THERE are but few problems left for the
investigation of the modern scientist. One
of the most interesting problems is the still
insufficiently explained relation between
politics and alcohol. We have spent much
of our own valuable time in the study of
this problem; we have distorted Darwinism
into the most impossible shapes ; we have in-
vented a long series of evolutions; we have
experimented on our own system by expos-
ing it to the action of alcohol heated up to
the production of vapor and then again
brought it in contact with a glacial period
sucked through a straw. Then we have
searched history, ancient and modern, sacred
and profane, but mostly profane. The re-

96 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

suit of these investigations was an enormous
accumulation of collateral facts, and in re-
gard to explanations a new hypothesis.

Homer in his Iliad is one of the first
authors offering instances of the mystic
relation between patriotism and drink.
Wherever this reliable historian describes
a meeting of the enlightened nation of the
Greeks, he never neglects the aithopa-
oinon — the fiery wine. He minutely de-
scribes the depas amphikypellon used by
the venerable Nestor when engaged in
state affairs. Learned philologists explain
the two handles so expressly mentioned by
Homer as means to handle more easily a
cup of proportions unusual even in the he-
roic age; for the inspired poet and historian
states at the same time that ten mortal men
as they are nowadays could not have emp-
tied it. Alas ! the world degenerates, and the
cups of our days are small and have very
thick bottoms. Homer also carefully notes
down that before any decisive step in poli-
tics was taken the heroes took a quantity of

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 97

wine in proportion to the importance of the
case : " Autar epei posios kai edetyos ex eron
hento" A similar custom must have pre-
vailed amongst the Romans. We are not
quite certain, but we think it was Cicero or
somebody else who first pronounced the
axioma : " Vox populi, vox whisky." We
now recollect distinctly the passage is to be
found in Cicero's book "De Officiis," or,
The Surest Way to Get into Office.

Julius Caesar also, when about to cross the
Rubicon, spoke the historical word: "lacta
alea esto," — Let us shake for drinks.

Now, the same phenomenon related by
the ancients is witnessed, and let us say is re-
ligiously observed, by our contemporaneous
generation. But you will see a very mate-
rial change in the system of administering
the alcohol. With Homer it is always the
kings and heroes that do the drinking, and
the people the paying; but during the re-
publican government of ancient Rome the
people do the drinking, and, exactly as it is
in our own country, the wealthy or those that

98 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

want to become so pay for the drinks. You
will observe that all political meetings, may
their principles be as divergent as possible,
agree in one point: after having saved their
country they adjourn into adjacent bar-
rooms, where they mix their public spirit
with kindred spirits. You will say our
Academy of Sciences acts differently, but
you forget, firstly, that our Academy is a
scientific, not a political body, and, second-
ly, that there is no decent barroom in the
vicinity.

Now, this intimate relation between pa-
triotism and alcohol has even entered our
English language in the expression, "A man
of public spirit," by which expression we
infer that this worthy man takes his spirits
publicly with boon companions whom he
treats, but not in the solitude of his domes-
ticity.

This is all very clear and intelligible even
to the unsophisticated mind of a San Fran-
cisco city father, but now comes in the ques-
tion how to account for this phenomenon.

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 99

We have stated before that we have expe-
rienced and investigated and have come
rather near the solution of the problem,
which is a chemical one. Here is our ex-
planation : Political questions have no affin-
ity to water. This is a conclusion a priori,
for we have not tried the water. Neither are
they soluble in fixed oils ; we have tried cas-
tor oil. Now, it requires very little chemi-
cal knowledge to see that alcohol, cold or
heated up to a reasonable degree, is the only
menstruum in which political questions are
soluble.

ETHNOLOGY.

I AM certain you are astonished to hear
me lecture on a subject so unfamiliar to me
as Ethnology. It is the fault of our most
gracious Sire, who ordered me to do so. He
probably meant Entomology, but I under-
stood Ethnology, and as this happened after
six o'clock P. M., I am not quite certain on
whose door I have to lay the cause of the
misunderstanding. In such cases I always
lay it at the door of the other fellow, who in
this instance is our most gracious Sire.

I at first intended to follow the custom of
my fellow-scientists — that is, to compile an
ethnological or entomological paper of
plagiarisms, in which only the errors are my
own; but, on more mature reflection, I
thought, as Alexander von Humboldt is

102 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

dead and Frank Pixley alive, I would not
run the slightest risk to be discovered in
drawing from my own bold and lively im-
agination.

The first stage in the existence of all na-
tions and humanity in general is that of
Midsummer High Jinks, differing from our
present ones only by a large supply of noth-
ing to eat and to drink, but agreeing with it
by a total absence of houses. I am not pre-
pared to state the exact time to which this
state of affairs has lasted, but I am con-
vinced that at the time of Julius Caesar —
the author of several Latin text-books still
in use in our colleges — a change must
already have taken place, because this J.
Caesar wrote a book, "De bello Gallico,"
which, as a member of our Board of Edu-
cation has informed me, means "On the
beautiful Calico." Now, these words would
infer that the state of society had changed
into that of a picnic, if it were not for the
frequent occurrence of the word "castra,"
which word I distinctly recollect means

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 103

"camp," and compels us to look at the ethno-
logical state of Caesar's period more in the
light of a camp-meeting.

The present Midsummer High Jinks are
a decided improvement on the original ar-
ticle, which I have closely studied during
my stay in Australia. By the kind recom-
mendation of Captain Schenck, I received
an invitation from the daughter of an Au-
stralian chief to assist her in arranging a
cabinet of insects, which she carried about
her through all the wanderings of her tribe.
I accepted the invitation, arranged the col-
lection, exchanged specimens, and, as the
office of State Entomologist was already
filled by an intelligent carpenter, I was re-
ceived in the bosom of the tribe, obtained
the right to vote and at the same time differ-
ent degrees of relationship, with all the
privileges otherwise only conceded to Irish
cousins.

Owing to a failure of our crop of kan-
garoos, we had to live chiefly on mission-
aries. Whenever the supply was exhausted

104 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

we took to stealing sheep, which change of
diet at last aroused the British lion. For
weeks I had breakfasted, lunched, dined,
and souped on mutton. My hair, formerly
straight, began to curl and grow crisp by the
constant feeding on the wool-bearing sheep
— as you can see now — when the catastrophe
drew near. The battle was imminent. On
our side, naked bodies, wooden spears, and
the trust in Divine Justice and our swift
feet; on the other side, thoroughbred horses,
Minie rifles, and the untamed courage of
the amateur soldier. The words of our
valiant chief are still ringing in my ears;
" There," he said, "is the enemy of our
homes. Most of them are fat, tender, sleek,
and in splendid condition. They will re-
quire but little cooking to be very nice. At
present they are not nice ; but who would be
afraid to die when the honor and glory of
his country is at stake? It is not hard to die ;
the biggest fool can die, and I have seen
them do so frequently."

Enthused by this speech, we raised the

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 105

war-whoop and then followed the example
of the valorous chief and climbed each a
gum-tree. We gained by this maneuver the
most decided victory, because the horses of
the enemy got frightened and ran away with
the valorous warriors of the home guard,
with the exception of a few bold men whose
horses refused to run and took to kicking.
Those men, after having made us a present
of their horses, tried very hard to join the
corps d'armee. We hoped they would suc-
ceed, and ate their horses. As these horses
refused to talk, it will remain a mystery for-
ever at whose instigation their fellow-horses
ran from battle. I am certain it was no
bribe from our side; perhaps it was a strike
for higher wages.

Alas! those happy days are passed, and
I am the only survivor of that once pow-
erful tribe. The men have been shot by
prejudiced shepherds and cattleherders;
the unprotected females have served as
food to their affectionate neighbors; and
at present I am the only living man that

106 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

knows the grammar and spelling of their
language.

Alexander von Humboldt mentions in his
travels a certain parrot, the parrot of the
Atures, who was the only being that talked
the language of that extinct race. That is
exactly my case. It remains now to draw a
moral for you and administer the customary
admonitions :

First, my dear Bohemian brethren, let us
continue to celebrate this anniversary of the
creation of the world ;

Secondly, let us keep up the difference
between the original Midsummer High
Jinks and our present refined celebration by
always laying in a good stock of good
things ; and

Thirdly, and finally, let us not become ex-
tinct.

ON COMMERCE.

I AM not here to discuss Christmas from
a dogmatic point of view; that has been
done by our most gracious Sire and other
pulpits of this city. I am here to discuss a
new side of the question — the commercial
one. Christmas is the time when we are
expected by the whole world to settle our
bills, instead of running up new ones. A
friend of mine, and at the same time one
of the greatest authorities in Bohemian
financiering, invented a new commercial
system by not paying the old bills and let-
ting the new bills grow old. It is his view
on commerce which I am to develop here.

The word "commerce" is derived from
the Latin merx, genitive mercis, which does
not mean mercy — of which commercial
people show very little to each other.

108 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

Merx means a ware, and mercari to trade.
The Greek verb peirao signifies the same,
but its verbal substantive peirates does not
mean a merchant, and is a proof that the
ancient Greek knew life-insurance com-
panies, syndicates of mines, and similar
institutions as well as we do. There are
several institutions in mysterious connection
with commerce; for instance, the Custom
House. This institution was created for
two different purposes: First, to cause in-
vestigations; secondly, to break the antennae
of the butterflies imported by our most gra-
cious Sire.

As the surface of this planet is divided
into dry land and ocean, so is the commer-
cial community divided into dry-goods
merchants and liquor-dealers; but, accord-
ing to the Bohemian system, they are classi-
fied as such that give credit and others that
give none. There is a close connection
between interest and capital; for instance,
British interest will suffer when the Turkish
capital is lost. But as the true Bohemian

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 109

seldom receives interest, but frequently has
to pay it, he will not be such a fool as to
fight for any interest. And so I hope you
will all join me in the pious wish : " Peace
on earth, good will to men."

PREHISTORIC RELICS.

WHEN Montgomery Avenue was begun,
I expected that the earthwork necessarily
connected with grading and cutting
through would bring to light interesting
documents of prehistoric life on this coast.
My most sanguine expectations were real-
ized, and I succeeded in securing the in-
teresting objects which you see here and
which will form the nucleus of a most valu-
able archaeological collection.

The objects which are before you were
all found on an area extending from the
corner of Montgomery Avenue and Jack-
son Street to a point near Stockton Street,
where an empty lot is crossed by the I45th
meridian. By the ignorant this meridian
has been pronounced a clothes-line, and by
some people has even been used as such.

112 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

But true science knows the well-established
difference between a meridian and a clothes-
line.

There are ample proofs that all this dis-
trict at a remote period has been covered
by the sea — in fact, was the bottom of an
ocean. It probably was not then inhabited
by the human race, and all the objects of
human skill which you see before you date
from a later period. Still an old coast line
must have existed to a comparatively re-
cent time, and is recorded by the term
"Barbary Coast."

But here you see some other
proof. You see the remains of
a bivalve, closely related to a now
living species. And here you see another
example of how the sagacity of the modern
geologist from an apparently insignificant
object draws the most important conclusions
and establishes facts of the highest scientific
interest.

But before entering into the concatena-
tion of circumstances, I have to speak about

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 113

the unit to be used in our calculation. As
the ancient Greeks had their chronology
arranged in accordance to the anniversaries
of the Olympics, where the tribes of this
gifted race assembled and competed for
the crown of the laurel, so the California
geologist arranges his chronology in
correspondence to Legislatures, California
Olympics, where all the talent, the honesty,
the virtue, the wisdom, the beauty of this
country meet and conglomerate into one
enlightened body. Now, if we remember
that it took five California Legislatures to
ruin one geological survey, we easily can
form an idea how long the tertiary period
must have been during which the antedilu-
vian Gryphaea developed up to the intellect
of the now living oyster.

You see here several hollow cylin-
drical bodies of a substance that by our
State Chemist has been pronounced a
silicate of potassa. These bodies have
proved a great puzzle to archaeologists, until,
by my untiring researches, it has been estab-

114 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.
lished beyond a doubt that these bodies were
objects of public worship. The prehistoric
Indian imagined them inhabited by spirits,
powerful but benevolent, to whom he
brought offerings of small pieces of metal.
The silicates are found in a state of more or
less perfect preservation and in great profu-
sion throughout that whole region, and bear
testimony of the most early piety of the red
man. In some excavations they have been
found numerous enough to form strata;
these probably were places of public wor-
ship.

It was in the fourth year of our Bohe-
mian era that it came to pass that a great
prophet arrived from China, who instigated
the people to destroy these idols, and con-
verted a great many to the Five-Gallons
Monotheism. The object of their worship
was the great spirit of red noses, called
"LokAh Lo Pshon."

Here you see some cubic bodies
whose facets are ornamented by
points of different numbers, from

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 1 15

one to six. Their use was till lately a mys-
tery to science, and I am indebted to our
Board of Education for the explanation of
these curious implements. According to
their statement, they were called bones
by the prehistoric Indian, from the Latin
words "bonus bona bon," which means a
bone, for they were made out of the bone
of the untamed mastodon of the plains.
They served for the instruction of children
in arithmetic. They have been tried by the
Board and found very useful in complicated
calculations about spiritual matters.

As you see, the points do not exceed six.
The Indian did not count more than six.
The decimal system was not yet invented,
and the Indian of the period relied on his
sexual system.

This object for a considerable time was
inexplicable, until I succeeded in
restoring it to its original form.

IRISH HISTORY.

OUR Bohemian brother, Dr. Nuttall, has
enlightened us on the subject of Irish
rhetorics. He has quoted specimens pro-
duced by Irish ladies when in a state of
virtuous indignation or otherwise excited.
But what is Irish elocution when compared
to Irish history? Irish history is a history
of itself. It is entirely original; it does not
connect with the history of any other na-
tion, or even with the history of the world;
it is independent from chronology, or even
real facts.

There comes the Fenian, the Milesian,
the Erse. Nobody knows where they come
from, and we only entertain a dark sus-
picion where they go to. They do not con-
nect with collateral history otherwise than
by the name of some great Irishmen that

Il8 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

appear in Greek and Roman history, viz.,
Ovid, Virgil, Terence— the "us" of Ovid-
ius, Virgilius, Terentius, being merely
added partly to accommodate the second
declension, partly as a compliment to the
United States. At the dawn of Irish his-
tory we find Orion, who, in recompense for
the valuable advice which he had given at
the creation of the world, got a position in
the sky, where he still forms a constellation;
and it is a comfort in these turbulent times
to see at least one Irishman keep his posi-
tion, unaffected by the rotation of other
celestial bodies.

BOTANY.

THE first attempt at botanical classifi-
cation was that of Pliny the Younger, who,
after having failed as a stockbroker, was by
the influence of a body of Haruspices in
Rome appointed Professor of Botany in
Pompeii and Herculaneum. He did not
cause the eruption of Vesuvius, as some in-
accurate historians contend, but he perished
in it, and wrote afterwards a very valuable
description of this most interesting catastro-
phe.

This ingenious scientist divided the
whole vegetable kingdom into the follow-
ing classes: Trees, shrubs, vegetables,
chicken-salad, mushrooms, coffee, wines
extra. All plants not belonging to one or
the other of these great classes he lumped

120 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

together and called " weeds," and did not
take any further notice of them.

You will perceive that in this system
there are six classes; the decimal notation
was not yet invented, or there would un-
doubtedly have been ten. The ancients
counted only to six, and as a natural conse-
quence had to rely upon their sexual sys-
tem. This system was afterwards improved
by Linnaeus, who based on the same im-
moral principle his arrangement of twen-
ty-four classes, of which the last, the Cryp-
togamia, is the only decent one and the only
one whose study could be recommended to
the Normal School, if they modestly re-
frained from examining it with the naked
eye. This state of things could not last, and
the Natural System was invented — a sys-
tem which differs chiefly from the Lin-
naean by the male flowers being called
"staminate," the female " pistillate," or
vice versa. There are several natural sys-
tems, all of them more or less important,
and it was left to my own exertions to de-

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 121

vise a botanical system founded on new and
entirely moral principles. I divide the
whole vegetable kingdom into two classes:
Eatabilia and Non-eatabilia.

Let us first discuss the Non-eatabilia,
which class is again divided into several or-
ders. The most important of these are
Smokeabilia, Smellabilia, and Intracta-
bilia. The order Smokeabilia is too well
known to the members of this institution to
require any further discussion. Most of the
Smellabilia belong to the natural order of
flowers, and are used for different purposes ;
for instance, bouquets presented to ladies.
Their color is of great importance. At
marriages we present by preference red
flowers, signifying the blushes of the bride,
which vary in intensity from carnation to
fuchsia, but generally keep to the shade of
rouge, bought at a reliable drug-store. At
funerals the flowers are white and blue, the
white being the symbol of the moral purity
of the deceased, the blue representing the
state of mind of the mourning friends, and

122 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

the green of the foliage the medical inno-
cence of the doctor under whose care the
patient died.

The highest order of this class is known
as Intractabilia, and consists of those plants
which are used for educational purposes.
They are, the hazel, the birch, the rattan,
the bamboo, which is used for tropical im-
provement of the mind, and the lady's
slipper. All these substances act on the
mind by being brought into quickly re-
peated contact with the lower end of the
spinal column. My esteemed collaborator
and college professor, Searby, and myself
owe all our moral excellence to similar
demonstrations a posteriori.

I come to the second class — the Eata-
bilia. It is divided into three orders: i,
those which may be boiled ; 2, those which
may be roasted; 3, those which may be
taken raw. This reminds me of a thrilling
adventure in the bold career of the naval
hero, Captain Schenck. During one of his
perilous voyages on the Pacific Ocean he

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 123

visited his friend Liti-Li-Li-Ho-Ho, the
powerful king of the Cannibal Islands. The
king received his guest with all the pomp
and honor usual in his cannibal empire.
At the feast given in the Captain's honor
the neighboring trees were decorated with
girls bound fast and awaiting the moment
when they should be served at the royal
table. One of the most toothsome was des-
tined for the dinner of the distinguished
guest; and when the Captain was asked in
what style he would have his girl served up,
he astonished his cannibal friends with the
words: "Your Majesty, I'll take mine raw."
Now, my friends, let us continue to lead a
more virtuous life, so that when in our here-
after the question is raised in what style we
shall be served, our guardian angel may
sing out like the Captain, "I'll take mine

raw."

THE AGE OF IRON.

WE have all been charmed by the me-
diaeval love of the great Scotch bard; we
have identified ourselves with the valorous
knight, and have fought his battles, made
love to the Baronet's daughter till the ro-
mance came to an end and we had to return
to stern reality, Latin grammar and the
problem of Euclid.

Our sympathies with the champion of
bygone days is but natural, for we are his
lineal descendants and lawful heirs. The
Bohemian is the knight errant of the nine-
teenth century, only he wields the pen in-
stead of the battle-ax; his enemy is no more
the feudal tyrant, but the modern fool; he
owes his dress-coat to the tailor, not to the
blacksmith. But the romantic instincts of

126 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

the illustrious ancestor live still in the Bo-
hemian heart

How we would enjoy it if suddenly this
room would transform into a feudal hall,
the flames of the gaslight into torch-bearing
serfs! Here we sit at a long table, clad in
steel, the trusty sword on our side. A blast
of a horn pierces the air. It is the signal
of the warden placed on the battlements of
the tower, not the toothorn of the festive
hoodlum. It is not New Year which is ap-
proaching; it is a noble guest who reins
his courser at the portcullis.

Hark the sound I It comes like a distant
earthquake in search of a situation. It
comes nearer. It mounts the staircase like
a walking blacksmith-shop. The door
flings open, and in steps the valiant knight,
Sir Godfrey de Newcomb from Sacra-
mento, He takes off his iron overcoat and
hangs it on the hatstand in the hall ; he puts
his iron umbrella in a corner; he blows his
nose with an iron handkerchief. With
sounding step and clanking armor he strides

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. I2J

into the banquet-hall, gazes around him,
and his proud eye meets the eye of Sir
Walter de Mestayer Sir Godfrey de New-
comb deliberately pulls off one of his iron
gauntlets and flings it on Sir Walter's pet
corn. A wild combat ensues. Sir Godfrey
fells Sir Walter to the ground, he puts his
knee to Sir Walter's chest, his poniard to
his throat, and bids him to acknowledge that
Sir Godfrey de Newcomb's lady love is the
greatest beauty of all ages and countries.
Sir Walter pleads that he has not the ad-
vantage of a personal acquaintance, never
having been introduced; but Sir Godfrey
tickles his throat with the poniard, and Sir
Walter signs the certificate.

Alas! these happy days are gone forever.
The age of iron has passed. It is true we
have in this country considerable brass and
steel — sometimes more than is agreeable to
taxpayers; but essentially this is an age of
flannel and underwear. And still the age of
iron has not passed away entirely; it sur-
vives in one form. Don 't be afraid ; I do not

128 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

refer to the railroad. In our time it is not
the valiant knight who wears the mail-coat
over his garments ; it is the delicate maiden
who wears her garments over concentric
rings of iron, yclept a crinoline. The
knight wore the iron rings to protect his
frame, the maiden wears them to correct
her frame and to expand parts of it into the
proportions required by an age of taste and
refinement.

But not only the body expands in our
century by concentrically and spirally ar-
ranged iron implements ; the mind expands
as well. Look! Here is the iron tool [draw-
ing a crinoline] which makes spiritual com-
fort accessible, at the same time, in its spiral
line, the emblem of all spiritual progress,
which since thousands of years prefers the
spiral to the straight line.

In hoc signo vinces.

ANCIENT BOHEMIANS.

THE wanderer who strives to gain the
glory-clad peaks of Alpine heights turns
round at certain points to view the scenery
of the valleys through which he has passed
on his road to the mountain-side. So do
we Bohemian wanderers. We also have the
wise custom to turn round at the end of a
year and eye the past with the eyes of the
present. Let us then have a retrospect as it
behooves members of the ancient organiza-
tion.

The first traces of Bohemian existence
are lost in the dawn of prehistoric times. It
seems a well-established fact that at the time
of the Lias formation Bohemians did not
exist. The beautiful creatures whose re-
mains we find imbedded in the Jura lime-
stone have been identified by modern scien-
tists as species of pterodactylus, and it was
only the angel-like wings combined with

130 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

bills of enormous proportions that have sug-
gested to the older school the idea of fossil-
ized Bohemians.

The first certain traces of Bohemians we
find in some highly ornamented sculptures
in the Pyramids of Egypt. The artists of
that remote period were Bohemians, and
had the thoughtful custom, when they had to
represent their gods, to take the models from
their Bohemian brethren. Of course, they
always selected for that purpose only mem-
bers of characteristic beauty and purity
of morals. We have here quite a gallery
of well-executed copies from sculptures of
that origin.

Another trace of prehistoric Bohemian-
ism has been found in the lacustrine dwell-
ings of Switzerland that nowadays excite
the curiosity of the archaeologist as much as
the shell-mounds of California. In the re-,
cesses of these ancient habitations, together
with split marrow-bones of the mastodon,
arrow-heads, and other flint implements,
was found a bill for monthly rent of a

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 131

lacustrine cottage, wrapped round a cubic
crystallization of fossil Limburg cheese and
not receipted.

In the same rate that we approach his-
toric times the evidences of Bohemian ex-
istence multiply. You all have a vivid
recollection of the Greek expedition headed
by Jason that started in the year 1690, be-
fore our Christian era, for the gold mines
of Colchis. Most of the Greek heroes of
that period had largely invested in a mine
which so considerably had fleeced them
that ever afterwards it was known by the
name of the " Golden Fleece." Jason, with
the other heroes, chartered a steam-tug,
called the "Argo," and went for ^Eetes, the
superintendent of said mine and father of
a most accomplished daughter, by name
Medea, who was a great astrologer and
fortune-teller. The word "medium" is de-
rived from Medea. Jason tried to get some
points out of her and succeeded but too well.
Each hero made his pile. After having
sold out, they returned in the same craft;

132 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

but the "Argo," overloaded by fortunes
carelessly stowed away, sprung a leak, and at
her arrival at lolkos was condemned by the
naval authorities of that place. So they
sold the old ship to the Government of the
United States for a man-of-war and started
a paper.

One of the most interesting documents
has been unearthed by Mr. Schliemann, so
justly celebrated for his excavations in Asia
Minor. On an excursion into the ancient
kingdom of Bithynia he discovered the mon-
ument that marks the ashes of the unfortu-
nate Carthaginian, Hannibal, who, on his
flight from the Romans, ended his luckless
career by taking poison. Mr. Schliemann
published a translation of this most interest-
ing inscription. It runs thus :

This is to certify that General Hannibal,
a native of Carthago, came to his death by
an overdose of nitrate of strychnia; admin-
istered by himself. Nobody to blame.

Dr. SWAN, Coroner.

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 133

On the reverse of the monument were in
scribed the touching words :

COMMIT NO SUICIDE

As our time is valuable, I have to stop
here, but will read you on another occasion
the second volume of this historic work,
which contains the period from the Roman
King, Numa Pompilius, to the Californian
Senator, Paul Neumann.

ON TEMPERANCE.

OF all the innumerable virtues which I
am constantly practicing, temperance has
always been my pet; and for good reasons.
St. Origen, one of the highest Bohemian au-
thorities, speaks in terms of profound and
just indignation of a sin of such magnitude
that it requires two to commit it. Now this
sociable and otherwise rather agreeable sin
must have a counterpart, or antagonist, in
some double-barreled virtue, or else vice
would have an advantage over virtue and
would be more perfect than virtue, which
is absurd. Looking over the long index of
virtues practiced in this Bohemian congre-
gation, I find temperance the virtue and
counterpart of the social sin condemned by
St. Origen, because we never commit a tem-
perance without inviting a friend. Now,

136 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

my beloved brethren, this is all clear and
intelligible; and, theoretically, temperance
would be all right, if it were not for the
existence of serious obstacles and grievous
mistakes in regard to the practice of the
virtue.

There are some benighted people who
mistake total abstinence for temperance.
Temperance is moderation in all things;
total abstinence is an extreme, and as such
intemperance in its worst form, because it
is unnatural. Temperance is the territory
that separates two extremes. Between arc-
tic ice and the scorching heat of the tropics
stretches the temperate zone. This zone is
inhabited by the most temperate nations —
the Americans, the Irish, the Dutch; and
this is not the only circumstance from
which it received its name; like the tem-
perate zone, temperance is the intermediate
state between total abstinence and total
intoxication.

What says Horace, that great authority
of our Bohemian church? "Medium

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 137

tenuere beati," which, literally translated,
means :

Blessed be they that walk

On a line of chalk

Through a given room diagonally.

There is another even more serious mis-
take interfering in the sacred cause of tem-
perance. There exists in the mind of many
people an erroneous impression that water
is the most temperate beverage, and, I am
sorry to say, there are fanatics who really
use it as such. My dear brethren, water is
really a very useful fluid. It was created
for washing, for bathing at the Midsummer
High Jinks, for the sale of nautical instru-
ments, for painting in water-color, for the
construction of bridges, and last, but not
least, for the cleaning of bottles.

We have here in this town a microscop-
ical society whose members are visible to
the naked eye and derive their name from
the circumstance that they look into glasses
of the microscope. Each member of this
society will state that each drop of water

138 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

swarms with myriads of living beings, each
provided with individuality and actively
engaged in the pursuit of happiness. We
also have here a society to promote cruelty
of insects to man — no, to prevent cruelty to
animals. This society recognizes two rea-
sons which justify the taking of animal life;
but under no circumstances are we permit-
ted to inflict tortures on living beings; and
would it not be a torture for these myriads,
engaged in the pursuit of happiness, to be
exposed to the horrors of our intestinal
tube? Before swallowing these poor aqua-
tics we have to kill them, in as mild and
pleasant a way as is compatible with the
process. This object we obtain by diluting
the water with alcohol, a method agreeable
to both parties and at the same time admin-
istering spiritual comfort. Dr. Swan, who
frequently assisted me in the diluting pro-
cess and aided in my experiments, has seen
through a microscope of 2,675 horse-power
the microbes, during the diluting process,
joyfully clapping their hands and singing

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 139

out: "Death, where is thy sting? Hell,
where is thy victory?" which means, in the
language of microbes, "We won't go home
till morning."

A NEW PHILOSOPHICAL INSTRUMENT.

I WAS very much at a loss by what token
I could show my friendship on such a fes-
tive day. Pondering over this subject, I en-
tered the hall of our Academy of Sciences,
where I am accustomed to take at regular
intervals my semi-monthly nap. From this
I was startled by a lecture given by our
learned Professor of Meteorology, who de-
veloped a new theory of heat produced by
inverted comic action of irradiating ether.
He accounted for the length of day in sum-
mer by expansion. The day is in summer
expanded by heat, and contracts in winter
even beyond its natural volume by the ac-
tion of elasticity. The learned Professor
also produced a philosophical instrument
uniting in itself the merits of thermometer,
barometer, aneroid, theodolite, corkscrew,

142 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

and toothpick — very useful and hereafter
indispensable to the traveling scientist.

You may ask how I came into possession
of this valuable instrument. I borrowed it
for an indefinite space of time. This is my
system, but, I am sorry to say, practiced
by many people without their giving me
credit. Before I hand over to you this valu-
able instrument I have to give you some in-
structions as to its use.

When placed outside doors in a promi-
nent position, this instrument will indicate
every current of air by pointing to the oppo-
site direction. As our temperature is regu-
lated by such currents, the instrument will
act as a thermometer.

You ascertain the amount of atmospheric
water by the circumstance that the instru-
ment gets wet when it rains. By a simple
algebraic formula you will find abundantly
the inches of rain fallen during the season,
and a fraction that perhaps might remain
undissolved you may donate to our gran-
gers, who never get rain enough, or distrib-

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 143

ute it amongst the picnic parties that at
present destroy the peace of mind of Harry
Edwards and other butterfly catchers.

You all know the difference between a
meridian and a clothes-line. This instru-
ment, placed on a meridian on the point
where it crosses a degree of latitude, will
show the exact geographical position of the
locality by remaining in that position.

As to electric tension and the deviations
of the magnetic pole, I leave it to your own
philosophical mind to find out the use of
the instrument.

EDUCATIONAL METHODS.

LITERATURE is the expression of civiliza-
tion; civilization itself the product of edu-
cation, and education the result of certain
demonstrations a posteriori by which the
juvenile mind is propelled on the path of
wisdom and science. According to the ori-
gin of the material which is brought in
contact with the lower end of the spinal
column, we distinguish several different
circles of civilization, which at the same
time serve as types to peculiar forms of liter-
ature. All the material used for educa-
tional development is of vegetable origin,
and in discussing our object we must first
separate material of monocotyledonous
growth from those of dicotyledonous.

The bamboo (Bambusa arundinacea,
L.) is an arborescent grass, and, as such, a

146 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

contradiction in adjecto. It is an antedi-
luvian type nowadays, only to be met with,
together with analogous organisms, in trop-
ical countries and in some sequestered cor-
ners of the southern hemisphere, where this
vegetable anachronism has not found pow-
erful competitors in the battle of life. It
is the true emblem and image of the mon-
strosities and inconsistencies of Chinese
civilization, whose promoter the bamboo
has been for one thousand years.

The rattan (Calamus Rotang) possesses
considerable advantages in its civilizing
power. It is a palm-tree, scarcely an inch
thick, but sometimes more than four hun-
dred feet high, or rather long, leaning on
other trees and supported by brush-wood.
The rattan is the promoter of Hindoo civ-
ilization, and that most extensive epic poem,
the Mahabharata, is the true picture of a
palm-tree four hundred feet long and only
one inch thick.

We will now proceed to the higher types
of civilization produced by a quickly re-

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 147

peated external application of dicotyledon-
ous growth. There are two trees nearly
equally productive of humanitarian prin-
ciples— the hazel and the birch.

The hazel (Corylus avellana, L.) has its
sway in southern and eastern Europe, where
the Mecklenburg government, in its pater-
nal care for the welfare of its subjects, pre-
scribes by law the length and circumference
of the hazel used for civilizing purposes.
Austria employs this medium chiefly for
military education and owes to it most of
its victories. It is the hazel which infuses
patriotism into an army otherwise divided
by race, language, and interest. In hoc
signo vinces is the motto of the Austrian
hazel, and it is under the holy hazel-tree
that Slavonian, Hungarian, Roumanian,
crowd and fight.

The birch is the originator of Anglo-
Saxon civilization and the kindred types of
Scandinavian and German. Its eastern
boundary is the Elbe River, where the
realm of the hazel begins. Being born near

148 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

this river, I have enjoyed the advantages of
both educational systems. I have been laid
low under the hazel and have writhed un-
der the stimulating influences of the birch-
rod. The hazel has its advantages, but for
classical education the birch always has
been preferred. In fact, I consider this
tree indispensable; and, furthermore, I am
convinced that without its demonstrations
a posteriori nobody ever can master the ir-
regular verbs. To me it always was one of
the inexplicable mysteries of ancient history
how, without the assistance of this useful
tree, the Romans ever could have learned
Latin. It is evident, however, that in the
essential points their method of imparting
knowledge did not differ materially from
ours; the name of their celebrated and
still consulted lawbook, Podex J ustinianceus ,
is one of the many proofs of this circum-
stance.

There arises now the question which
plant will be the emblem and promoter of
the civilization springing up from this new

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 149

center on the Pacific, of this literature born
in our midst, whose juvenile pranks and
freaks we are enjoying so frequently in these
rooms, and whose manly strength and
power we like to paint in anticipation. The
coniferous trees of our mountains do not
yield educational material. The ruling
vegetation of our plains is tarweed and wild
mustard. The tarweed is quite out of the
question, for it has no civilizing power. As
to the wild mustard, its substance is too
brittle to produce any impression on the
organs by which we influence the juvenile
mind. It is not the raw material, not the
body of the mustard which acts on the
human mind; no, it is its soul which acts on
the human soul. By careful and judicious
experimenting, the celebrated pedagogue,
McCracken Bungletoe, has demonstrated
how the most beneficial results may be ob-
tained by squeezing the seeds of the mustard
plant, adding warm water, and applying
the mass obtained in this way on the same
region of the human body on which, accord-

150 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

ing to the now obsolete methods, bamboo,
rattan, hazel, and birch were applied.

So a benevolent nature has provided
ample means for the promotion of Califor-
nia literature, and the method to utilize our
vegetable resources has been discovered by
the scientifically trained mind of a true
philosopher.

IMMORAL PHILOSOPHY.

MOST GRACIOUS SIRE AND DEARLY BE-
LOVED BOHEMIAN BRETHREN: Through
the whole year I have looked forward to
this day. I have collected most carefully
every fact connected with Bohemian pro-
gress and goodness, and now I am here to
give you all the important discoveries of our
last year. It is true the new vice so long
sought for is not yet discovered, but that is
not my fault, nor is it owing to the neglect
of any other member of this organization.
On the other hand, we have made the most
astonishing progress in immoral philoso-
phy.

You all recollect the important discovery
made by our brother Daniel O'Connell,
who, having found out that the present sys-
tem by which everybody confesses his own

152 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

sins does not work well, improved the in-
stitution of confession by the amendment
that henceforth everybody confess the sins
of his brother. Especially among the
sisters, this improved form of confession has
worked wonders, and some of the sisters
have not stopped confessing from the mo-
ment when the amendment of our virtu-
ous friend, by Bohemian authority, was
adopted.

I now come to record another great dis-
covery in immoral philosophy made by our
great brother in the interest of Truth.
Having observed that the present system of
questioning witnesses and experts under
oath is a frequent source of that most hei-
nous of crimes, perjury; and having at the
same time discovered by many experiments,
carefully conducted by himself, that in bet-
ting people are universally conscientious
and always bet only on what they, by their
best knowledge, consider true, our Bohe-
mian brother proposes that, instead of tak-
ing the oath, the said witness or expert enters

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 153

a bet at a reasonable amount, sufficient to
protect his veracity. The advantages of this
system are numerous and evident:

1. It protects the sacredness of the oath,
which ought not to be defiled for worldly
considerations. The oath has to be used
partly as a punctuation and partly as an ex-
pletive. In both capacities the oath belongs
to grammar, not to law.

2. Oaths, as we all know, are recorded
in heaven, and our system, by which a
notary public simply enters a note referring
to the bet, saves a world of trouble to the
recording angel, who now, besides his office
duties, may attend to other matters; for in-
stance, may attend lectures on obstetrics, or
study law; so that, in case of a change in
celestial politics he were to lose his office,
he could make his living, without becoming
a terror to the free-lunch system.

3. There will be considerably more so-
lemnity in the proceeding and a powerful
laconism if, instead of the common phrase
"I solemnly swear to speak the truth and

154 THE HOOT OF THE OWL-
nothing but the truth, so help me God four
bits," the Judge simply but emphatically
says, "You bet."

I could mention here a great many other
advantages resulting from this most valu-
able suggestion of our distinguished brother,
Daniel O'Connell, but it would be like
carrying owls to Athens. I only take this
opportunity to point out the folly of import-
ing a Professor of Moral Philosophy from a
far-off land when we have in our own midst
moral philosophers and great minds like
our brother — as you see, without any ap-
propriation. Now, you may imagine what
moral giants we would have raised if a
pure-minded Legislature had voted an ap-
propriation for a public inspector of morals,
a deputy, and county officers of moral phil-
osophy.

It is true our California climate has lately
been injured by too many brass bands in the
streets of San Francisco, but the virgin soil
of California is still capable of producing
any crop desirable to an enlightened com-

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 155

munity. We raise any kind of scientist,
from the practical miner up to the professor
of surgical music or medical ethics, by
simply putting on California soil the
manure of an appropriation. Just as the
mushroom in its natural, uncanned state
springs from the dung left by benevolent
cattle on an otherwise barren field, so by
forming a little dunghill we can raise any
variety of the practical miner and granger
scientist.

Brother Daniel O'Connell at the Low
Jinks will lay before you a petition to our
coming Legislature where you are to sign
your name, each with the mention of a small
sum to be utilized to act on the pure minds
and giant intellects of our legislators.

THE BACHELOR.

THE BACHELOR (Homo Caelebs] is
chiefly found in the temperate zone, but not
always of temperate habits. Most of the
specimens live in clubs and look very much
like the common species (homo pater famil-
ias), from which, in many instances, he can
only be distinguished by his habit of keep-
ing late hours — up to the dawn of morning
—when he tries to make a face as if he had
his coffee and to talk early piety.

In the first stage of his existence it is im-
possible to distinguish the bachelor from the
common species. He spells, studies gram-
mar, crams big words without knowing their
meaning — like ordinary mortals. He fights
indiscriminately with his own species, burns
firecrackers on the Fourth of July, falls in
love; but here is an essential difference —

158 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

he marries not one of his many first loves.
Only when podagra or old age prevents him
from going to the club, and he thus falls into
a state of general demoralization, he flies
sometimes to matrimony; but even then he
does not marry, but is married.

During the time of his full vigor the
bachelor gradually adopts the habits of the
so-called regular life. He is an admirer of
the sunrise, but is not an early riser himself.
He admires the rise of the sun in going
home or in stopping at a lamp-post, in whose
embrace he sometimes apostrophizes the
luminary of the young day, calling him
Helios, Phoebus, and other bad names. The
bachelor takes his coffee in bed; he then
spends some time in arranging his locks in
a peculiar economical way by making a
small number of hairs go very far to
cover a great surface of shining epidermis.
In a later stage of his development this care
is abandoned for the possession of a wig, and
so for the morning hours remains only the
sacred duty to communicate by rubbing the

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 159

skull, by means of a silken handkerchief, to
a higher degree of polish, which neverthe-
less is modestly hidden under the wig when
steps, especially those of a lady, are heard
approaching the sanctum. The rest of the
day is divided into two sections by the din-
ner, which performance is regularly and
religiously attended to by every good
bachelor.

The other sex of the bachelor is not yet
discovered. There exists no female bach-
elor. Some biologists have supposed that
the old maiden is a female bachelor in dis-
guise. This is a dangerous and at the same
time absurd error. There is a law of at-
traction, also called natural selection, per-
vading all sexual creation. But the bach-
elor, instead of being attracted, runs away
from the old maiden; at the same time he
proves by such action that with all her ef-
forts she cannot be his natural mate. It is an
error to consider the old maiden distinct
from the species homo, because she would be
the usual female of the species if she had

160 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

not been prevented to be so by circumstances
over which she had no control ; so her de-
velopment became arrested and she re-
mained in a kind of larval state.

In the later part of his existence the bach-
elor becomes an uncle. There is still some
mystery about the propagation of the bach-
elor. Some scientists pretend that he propa-
gates by eggs, which he lays, like the cuckoo
of Europe, in other birds' nests. Others
have observed that he propagates by a bio-
logical process called generatio tequivoca.
At any rate, may the process take the one
form or the other, his offspring is called
" nephew." Of this commodity he generally
possesses only one, to whom he delivers
moral lectures in the morning and pays the
debts after dinner. And the accomplish-
ment of these two objects is the task which
fills the later part of his existence and for
which he has been especially created,
namely, paying the debts of his nephew and
trying to improve morals which do not
exist.

LOVE.

WHEN our most gracious Sire ordered me
to enlighten you on the subject of love, he
gave another proof of that giant intellect
which is the admiration and astonishment of
all who know him, for there are few people
who have experimented on this subject so
extensively as myself; and, as I have care-
fully concealed my profound knowledge, he
must have learned my secret by that species
of second-sight which belongs to a great
genius.

As love is a matter of great antiquity and
the discussion of it will occupy more than
one evening, I have found it necessary to
arrange it under three heads:

I. Love, from a metaphysical point of
view.

II. Love, from a physical point of view.

1 62 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

III. Love, from the point of moral phil-
osophy, or, to express it in the elegant lan-
guage of a prominent clergyman, "after
jumping from crag to crag to the Alpine
heights of vital existence, taking a bird's-eye
view of moral responsibilities."

When we analyze the idea of love meta-
physically, four possibilities present them-
selves to us: Love may be active, passive, re-
flective, or — and this is the most agreeable —
reciprocal, which latter form is also called
"mutual affection." To love actively and
not to be loved is very distressing, but the
passive without the active — that is, to be
loved without being able to raise a corre-
sponding affection — is even more awk-
ward. The reflective form of love is the
one most frequently found, for everybody
loves himself tenderly and considers him-
self a nice fellow. I can even see in this
congregation some members who rejoice in
the reflection that they are lovely and
charming.

Love also has a present tense and a past.

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 163

Present love is easily explained ; in fact, un-
der most circumstances we cannot under-
stand how it is possible not to be in love.
Past love is just the reverse — we cannot
be made to understand how we ever could
have been in love; and it is one of the most
convincing proofs of the wisdom of an
overruling Providence that, notwithstand-
ing our desperate efforts, we never succeed
in marrying our first love, who is most fre-
quently a circus-rider, a milliner's girl, or
the wax doll in the show-window of a hair-
dresser. If I had been compelled to marry
all my first loves, I would have died by in-
termittent suicide. Past love, if not recip-
rocally past — that is, if the other party
persists in being in love — may become very
inconvenient, but I have found an effectual
remedy, — namely, write to the lady the
following letter: "Miss Brown, Smith, or
Flanagan [never Nettie, Fannie, or Addie;
that spoils the whole effect] : Do not try to
explain; I know all." Now, you under-
stand, there is ahvays something to know,

164 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

and a lady must be very hardened in love
if after such a statement she seeks an inter-
view. I intend to take out a patent on this
prescription, which I call the Palaeroto-
phylaktikon, and collect a royalty from all
those who will use it; none genuine unless
spelled with a K. Do not infringe on the
patent, and beware of imitations.

Love from a physical point of view is not
the exclusive property of mankind; it be-
longs to the whole organic world. Even
plants love, and flowers communicate their
feelings by winds and insects. Linnaeus
founded his system of botany entirely on
the relations between male and female
flowers. Modern scientists have considered
this very improper, and have introduced
instead the words "pistillate" and "stami-
nate," so that even the pistillate Bostonian
may now study the science of flowers with-
out blushing. Old Linne, in his blunt way,
said: "The pollen is carried to the stigma
by the agency of insects visiting for the
sake of the nectar." Modern text-books let

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 165

us down gently, as follows: "The kisses of
the staminate flower are carried to the re-
productive organs of the pistillate flower
on the purple wings of the butterfly, which
for this service is offered a sip of nectar on
the bosom of the latter." This is decidedly
more aesthetic than the old version, but less
intelligible; it is very chaste, but not quite
true. In the animal kingdom we retain as
yet the old expressions for sexual differ-
ences. We have even in regard to our own
species kept the old suggestive pronouns
he and she, and also in regard to animals of
lower grade there is still great room for
improvement. At present we say, for in-
stance, a bull and a cow, and do not call the
bull a staminate cow.

I now come to the third part of my lec-
ture— the moral philosophy of love. The
duties of social life oblige us occasionally
to commit evening calls. On such occa-
sions make it a point to call before eight
o'clock. Scarcely have you touched the
bell-handle, when the door is flung open

1 66 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

and in the entrance stands Bridget, smiling
all over and with arms lifted for an em-
brace; but the smiles disappear, the up-
lifted arms sink down, and a moment later
nothing is visible but a distant view of
Bridget's indignant back, for you are not
one of her numerous relations, and the pis-
tillate Irishman expects a staminate cousin,
not the purple-nosed butterfly which soars
on golden wings to sip nectar and water on
the bosom of the parlor table. Therefore,
if you do not want to wait on the doorstep,
ring the bell while the cousin is still ex-
pected. I consider it my sacred duty to
correct here a dangerous error in regard to
the moral philosophy of love. There exists
a tradition, propagated from generation to
generation, that there is an inverse ratio as
to the callings of the heart and those of the
stomach, or, to speak more plainly, that
love diminishes the appetite. Now, my
Bohemian brethren, there is perhaps not
one amongst us who has not been thrown in
profound admiration at seeing the object

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 167

of his heart's dearest hopes eat through the
whole bill of fare at the Poodle Dog, from
Baltimore oysters to cheese and black
coffee. Love has but little influence over
the organs of digestion. I have observed
in a few cases (in friends) a momentary
reduction in drinks; but whether their
affection was accepted or blighted, the
number of drinks very soon again reached
a reasonable figure.

And now for the moral: Combine the
physics and metaphysics, and never lose
sight of the fact that the object of your af-
fections possesses, besides a loving heart, a
sound and active stomach.

THANKSGIVING DAY.

WHEN I first heard of the celebration of
Thanksgiving Day I was seized with an
irresistible desire to contribute to the fes-
tivities. Pondering over this subject, a
thought struck me that a most appropriate
exercise on such an occasion would be a
botanical lecture; for such a lecture will
not only produce in the time of its duration
that state of somnolence called solemnity,
but when finished give a lively feeling of
satisfaction that can only be compared to
the internal bliss felt by a pointer who has
been whipped through a course of educa-
tion and is conscious of the fact that there
is a vacation of twenty-four hours till the
next spinal irritation.

The object of this botanical lecture is the
pumpkin, and its position, according to the

170 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

natural system, adopted by our most gra-
cious Sire. The lecture will be contained
in two parts. The first will be so scientific
that none of you will understand it; the sec-
ond, which is the most interesting, so pro-
found that it is not understood by myself.

The pumpkin belongs to the natural or-
der of Gucurbitacea, a family of doubtful
affinities. According to the immortal Lin-
naeus, who invented the sexual system (for
before him we all propagated by generatio
cequivoca), the Cucurbitacece belong to the
order Moncecia. This name is derived
from monos, single, and oicos, house, and
means two beds in one house — an arrange-
ment somewhat favorable to matrimonial
bliss.

The pumpkin also belongs to the Phane-
rogams, which propagate, according to a
well-established law, without any mystery
or secret relations. Not so the Crypto-
gams, whose ways are dark, arbitrary, and
without the rule of an established law.
They have different modes. The first of

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 171

them is by division, as, for instance, the
bacteria; that is, an individual splits in
two, each of the halves in a minute's time
being ready for a new division. For ex-
ample, if our most gracious Sire would
adopt this method of propagation, in the
time of five minutes this hall would contain
thirty-two Sires, and in an hour the Pacific
Coast would swarm with Sires, a circum-
stance that would benefit immensely the
Bohemian Club, but would be a serious
calamity to the medical profession.

It is not my intention to mention all the
different methods of cryptogamic propa-
gation, for I always have striven to protect
the morals of our organization. I will only
refer here to the higher Cryptogams, that
are no more a mere compound of cells, but
possess spiral vessels, vessels that open by
a spiral corresponding to the spiral ar-
rangement called by us "corkscrew."
These plants possess alternating genera-
tions, an arrangement called dimorphisms,
from two Greek words — di, double, and

172 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

morphy, which means an Irishman; for all
great scientific discoveries have been made
by the Irish nation, with the sole exception
of the conifers, which were discovered by
the conic section of the Hebrew race. In
regard to the systematical position of the
pumpkin, I think the place assigned to it
by our most gracious Sire is the most hon-
orable it can ever occupy.

ON TRUTH.

THE real Queen of Bohemia is Truth.
She is worshiped by our literati, admired
by our penny-a-liners, imitated by our ar-
tists, and praised by me. Yes, Truth has the
great prerogative to be praised by me, for
my specialty is morals.

On previous occasions I have lectured on
Virtue. My success was greater than de-
sirable. With some friends the progress on
the path of virtue was too rapid, according
to my taste — some short-winded members
of the congregation that wanted to keep up
with the race and could not have seriously
injured their constitutions. But if our
worthy Sire will take all responsibility on
his own venerable head, I am ready to
cause another stampede; only I will use
the precaution to discuss Virtue not in her

174 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

totality, but to divide the object, which
medical men call don refracta, in which
form Virtue is less dangerous.

The object of our present contemplation
is the beauties of Truth. Truth, also called
veracity, in spelling matches sometimes
voracity, which means another virtue, was
called Veritas by the Romans, and was
worshiped in a temple near the Via Appia.
This temple does not front the street.
Truth frequently is hidden. The entrance
to the temple of Truth is through an ad-
jacent saloon, from which circumstance the
Latin saying, In vino veritas, derives its
origin. Once I had to see a friend in this
saloon. By some queer coincidence all my
friends develop a most remarkable thirst
for Truth. On this occasion I was intro-
duced to the high priest of the goddess,
who, after having bestowed his blessing
and distributed spiritual comfort all
around him, invited me to a private re-
vival in the innermost recesses of the sanc-
tuary. Here Truth stood on a pedestal,

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 175

without any other garment but a looking-
glass in her hand. "Is this Carrara
marble?" I asked the holy man. "No," he
said, "it is papier-mache, and hollow inside;
but does she not look like Carrara marble?"
" This statue," the holy man continued,
"has been created at a great expense by the
great Greek sculptor Phidias, after a pho-
tograph taken by our special artist, Bradley
Rulofson. There was but little difficulty
for the sculptor, but a world of trouble for
the photographer. I never have seen a
deity so particular about retouching. This
peculiarity, and the circumstance of her
eyes being so intensely fixed on that look-
ing-glass, is probably the reason why the
Romans consider Truth a female deity. No
male deity could fix his eyes for such a
length of time on a looking-glass, not even
when shaving. It probably has not escaped
your experienced eye that Truth is naked.
Now, to you and me that matters very
little ; many a time we have seen and have
heard naked Truth; but we have to con-

176 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

sider that ladies, although but rarely, wor-
ship in this temple. We therefore every
morning dress Truth after the latest fash-
ion, the garments being made out of the
daily papers. It now devolves upon me to
take your oath that you will never divulge,
always conceal, and never reveal anything
that you have seen or heard in this sanctu-
ary."

With these words the holy man pro-
duced a copy of Baron Miinchhausen's
Travels. I kissed the sacred book and
swore a Custom-House oath that I will re-
member to the end of my days. But, as we
are here amongst friends whose capacity to
keep secrets is proverbial, I will tell you
all about it:

Truth has very little charms ; all my lady
acquaintances are much prettier. Truth is
plain, and, strange to say, she calls herself
frequently plain Truth. But she does not
mean it.

It now devolves upon me to draw some
moral and to admonish this congregation.

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 177

Search for Truth; and when you have
found her, keep her for yourselves. When
compelled to part with her, dress her up
pleasantly and after the day's fashion, and
never throw that pearl to your husbands.

LETTER FROM THE BEAR WHO SWAM

ACROSS THE GOLDEN GATE AND

LANDED AT THE PRESIDIO.

SAN FRANCISCO, June 28, 1884.

MY DEAR COUSIN: Circumstances over
which I had no control have prevented me
from paying you that visit planned and pre-
meditated such a considerable time. The
real cause of the long dilation was an inde-
cision on my part about the method of my
travel. It would have been against my prin-
ciple to travel by railroad, because under no
condition would I encourage the heartless
monopoly of the Central Pacific Railroad;
besides, I have of late constantly been out
of cash and had not the funds necessary to
buy my ticket. So I decided to swim the
Golden Gate, and found, when I landed

180 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

near Fort Point, a military deputation
ready for my reception. They had left
their muskets home, which was very con-
siderate of them. They knew that since my
good grandmother was killed by an acci-
dent with firearms my nervous system has
become very susceptible, and I do not like
to hear shooting.

Unprepared as I was, I was neverthe-
less up to the occasion, and was just begin-
ning a speech, when they retired rather
hastily; probably because they saw that I
was exhausted by the long swim and the
exposure of my system to undiluted water,
and that again was very considerate of
them.

I found the country very much changed
since my last visit. On my way to the city
I met a police force that evidently was not
so friendly disposed as the military depu-
tation who received me when I came out of
the water. They had firearms, and you
know I hate the sight of firearms. Never-
theless I was ready to surrender, for I al-

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. l8l

ways have been a good citizen. Not for
the world would I have resisted an arrest
made by a superior, well-armed force, as
long as I was sober. But I was spared the
ignominy of a public arrest by the inter-
vention of an Italian bootblack. Scarce had
the men of the law seen the bootblack un-
packing his box on the margin of a sand-lot,
when they turned from me and arrested
the Italian for blocking up the sidewalk. I
was very much pleased with the promptness
of this action, for I always liked to see au-
thorities doing their duty, and that boot-
black had no right to be a bootblack. Why
was he not a dry-goods merchant, and he
could have placed as many boxes on the
sidewalk as he thought fit; or that auction-
eer on California Street, about whose fra-
grant audience you complained in your last
letter as blocking up the road to the Acad-
emy of Sciences?

You know that I always longed for a
position in a zoological garden. In looking
round for an institution of this kind to be

1 82 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

whose ornament I would condescend, I
met a troop of men in common citizens'
garb, but each of them walking behind a
rifle pointed at my head. As I was certain
that these men would not fire so long as I
was near, I accosted them and entered into a
conversation. They were very pleasant, but
told me there was neither a zoological nor a
botanical garden in existence, but plenty of
beer-gardens and lunch saloons; there was
somewhere over the water a kind of scien-
tific institution, but I never could be ad-
mitted there, as I was not born in Massa-
chusetts. Soon after I had thanked them
for their kindness and taken leave, I heard
several shots and saw four big holes fired
into nature. In order to avoid an accident,
I withdrew into the chaparral, took a hasty
breakfast at an Italian gardener's, borrowed
a dish of veal from a French stockraiser,
and retired for the sake of my health into
the wilderness around Uncle Tom's Cabin,
where the great number of Sunday hunters
have created a climate so salubrious that

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 183

even quail and snipes grow there to a green
old age. Yours truly,

P. S. There has been a report in the
San Francisco newspapers that I was killed.
Don't believe it. It is an old trick. When
the California Legislature in the year '52
put a price on the head of Joaquin Murieta,
three heads of said Joaquin were handed in
and paid for; and as Joaquin is still alive, it
is impossible to form an idea of how many
heads he could have furnished since then, if
the payment had not been stopped. The old
Californians are not so easily killed.

THE MICROSCOPE.

THE microscope is an implement com-
posed of glass and brass. The brass is used
in two different preparations, — first, in its
purely metallic shape; secondly, in the
shape of a brass band, which serves to make
microscopical demonstrations more intelli-
gible and prevents conversation with a lady
neighbor. Brass was discovered in the age
of bronze by a gentleman named Tubalcain.
Particulars can be found in the sacred rec-
ords of the Patent Office at Washington,
where his name is mentioned in reference
to a new process.

Glass was discovered by a Phoenician
Superintendent of Public Streets, who spent
considerable time in experiments to find for
public improvements a sufficiently destruc-

1 86 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

tible and at the same time expensive sub-
stance. Modern science has provided our
Superintendents of Streets with a series of
more pliable, brittle, and costly bodies; but
still in more sequestered localities traces of
the pavement may be found that was char-
acteristic to the age of brass. The name of
this Superintendent of Streets was Flana-
gan Abu Baker ben Snodgrass, who was
born at Sodom and Gomorrah, under the
reign of the Egyptian king, Pharaoh
Meyer.

It is a most melancholy fact that the great
man after having discovered glass made a
too free use of glasses. The police records
of Tyrus, Sidon, Antiocha, and Damascus
show his name on every page, and the sta-
tion-house of Jerusalem exhibits still his
curious and interesting autograph. On a
stormy night, when he was camping out at
the station-house of Tyrus, rattlesnakes got
in his boots, and when he awoke next morn-
ing he found he was dead. So this man
shared the fate of all discoverers; he bene-

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 187

fited humanity, left an immortal name, but
died himself.

There is no invention that has had the
same influence on spiritual as well as on
material welfare of mankind. Before glass
came into use no looking-glass ornamented
the walls of sleeping apartments. The
consequence was that the ladies could not
dress, for young ladies cannot dress with-
out seeing their faces ; they had to repair in
deep undress — in fact, barefoot to a great
extent — to the next river, lake, brook, or
streamlet, by which act they did hurt sorely
every morning the feelings of all the old
maidens and shocked very much the whole
male population, who, by some unaccount-
able coincidence, collected at the same hour
in the same locality.

But glass is also a bulwark of free insti-
tutions. Some thirty years ago, when I
visited the Continent to barter for an
honorable degree at Giessen, I went out on
a clear night to study astronomy with the
assistance of some glasses obtainable at a

1 88 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

saloon round the corner. Dark shades on
one side of the street, the other side illumi-
nated by the pale spectral light of the full
moon, which stood high over the steeple of
the old Gothic church. Here I stood on a
Miocene formation, surrounded by playful
trilobites, on the very spot where the high-
way of wandering nations is crossed by some
meridian. I sank into deep revery. I saw
the eagle on the helmet of the Gothic chief.
I saw the dark, heavy Burgundian on his
way to Barbary Coast. At this moment my
revery was interrupted by the harmonic
sound of broken windows. The free and
independent descendants of the same Goths
and Vandals manifested their political an-
tipathies by breaking the windows of the
resident officer of the Government, and
they broke the windows of all the inhabi-
tants of the town. By this delicate and ju-
dicious proceeding they promoted at the
same time political progress and domestic
happiness.

The glass also fosters temperance; for,

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 189

if we had no glasses, we would drink out
of the bottle.

Now, after having discussed how much
humanity has been benefited by brass and
glass, the component parts of the micro-
scope, you may judge for yourself how
deeply mankind is indebted to the micro-
scope itself.

IN THE NAME OF THE PROPHET.

THE text of our present contemplation is
found in our sacred book, the Koran, where
it is contained in the impressive words,
"Kullu meskirin haram." As I have ob-
served that some of you have become rather
rusty in your Arabic, I will translate it for
you. It means, All intoxicating things are
forbidden. There are some heretics who
read "hammam" instead of "haram," so
that the passage would be "Kullu meskirin
hammam," which would mean, All intoxi-
cating drinks must be hot. May the here-
after of such heretics be hot!

Now, let us inquire why our holy prophet
Mohammed — blessed be his name! — pro-
nounced these hard and apparently cruel
words. On former occasions I have incul-

192 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

cated into your minds the important truth
that a symmetrical development in vice
leads to a blessed life in the terrestrial ex-
istence as well as in our hereafter. I know
by my own experience how difficult it is
to practice several vices successfully at the
same time. Our great prophet, therefore — •
blessed be his name! — has arranged matters
in a way that we derive almost the same
spiritual benefit by practicing them one
after the other. As I have done on former
occasions, I will give you the benefit of my
own experience.

I began my moral career by stealing
apples. Then I practiced polygamy — or
rather tried to practice it. Then I culti-
vated friendship in an alcoholic solution,
and here I place myself before you and ask,
What next? Now, you will recollect that
the rights of individuals are limited by the
rights of the nation, and, vice versa, the
rights of the nation begin where the privi-
leges of the individual end. This is ex-
actly the case in regard to the order in which

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 193

the different vices have to be practiced; it
begins in the human race where it ends in
the individual. Full of vital vigor, nations
step on the stage of history and ask, What
next? Next they take to strong drink com-
bined with friendship, then they introduce
polygamy, and end where I began — by
stealing apples.

At the time when our great prophet —
blessed be his name! — preached to the na-
tions, all Asia Minor, from the straits of
Bab el Mandeb to the ports of the Cau-
casus, was drunk before ten o'clock in the
morning. What says the great Ibrahim ben
Bamboozel Abu Beker ben Smith? No true
believer is expected to be drunk before
eleven o'clock A. M.

Our great prophet saw immediately that
the next vice was in order, which was, un-
der the circumstances, polygamy. So, my
dear brethren, let us follow the teachings of
our prophet — praised be his name! — let us
stop drinking and let us practice polygamy.
If the laws of the country prevent us from

194 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

doing so simultaneously, let us practice it
consecutively, and let us all join in the pious
exclamation :

Allah il allah we Mohammed resul allah.

THE CHRISTMAS-TREE.

IT was not my original intention to in-
flict this lecture on you. You have to blame
our most gracious Sire for it, who insisted
on my lecturing to-night, and threatened, in
case of disobedience, to take my place, as he
has done at former occasions. To save you
from such a calamity, I have complied with
his wishes, and here I stand a victim of ill-
directed sense of duty.

My Bohemian brethren, if you consider
that the day which we celebrate to-night, or
the night which we celebrate to-day, is its
1 887th anniversary, you must comprehend
the difficulty of saying anything that has not
been said before. It is my custom under
such circumstances to consult my spiritual
adviser — Rev. George Bromley — to whom

196 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

I also confess semi-occasionally the sins of
a brother.

I asked him : "About what shall I speak?"

" You speak about five minutes," the pious
man answered; but noticing the melancholy
expression that imparts a peculiar charm to
my features, he called me back and ad-
dressed to me the following words of wis-
dom:

"You fool,- — that is to say, my son, — read
to us one of the papers which you have read
before at the meetings of the California
Academy of Sciences. Nobody will notice
the difference, and besides you are bound
in justice to do so, as we have well noticed
how frequently, under the disguise of pro-
found science, you have inflicted papers
belonging to this Bohemian forum upon our
unsuspecting sister organization."

These were the words of the pious man,
and I went immediately to the hall where I
keep my manuscripts, took a drink, and
selected from the treatises on trees one on
the Christmas-tree and its botanical and

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 197

diplomatic relations to turkey and cran-
berry jelly.

The Christmas-tree belongs to the coni-
fers,— that is, trees which bear cones. But
it is not always that they bear cones; some
of the members present will convince them-
selves to-night that this wonderful tree has
the power to bear fruit of the most surpris-
ing kind and character. The leaves of the
tree are everlasting, or evergreen, which is
the symbol of persistent innocence, and not
intended as a satire or allusion to the amount
of innocence accumulated by the younger
members. The stem is not green, but never-
theless everlasting, as it will sprout out after
every forest fire, and even escape the dangers
of the "State Commission for the Preserva-
tion of Forests."

After the new year the tree can no more
be used, for then the season approaches
when our forests are vaccinated, to protect
them against phylloxera and rinderpest. In
spring it produces flowers, in summer pic-
nics, and ripens its fruit at Christmas.

198 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

Its chief occupation is to attend at forest
fires. In its leisure hours it protects the
springs whose waters we dilute with
whisky; it also shades the tributaries of our
water-works, whose contents assist and con-
tribute so largely to our collection of mi-
croscopic animals. The same tree protects
at our Midsummer High Jinks the wise and
venerable head of the old Bohemian and
imparts a beautiful green bloom of persist-
ent innocence to the intelligent face of the
Bohemian neophyte.

So, dear Bohemian brethren, let us do
homage and bow to-night reverently before
the tree that shelters our midsummer ser-
vices and enlightens and illuminates the
present celebration.

YULE.

A CELEBRATION like that of to-day has
always a tendency to recall the past. It
makes us look back into our own bygone
days and also into the past ages of our race.
So let us then date back the present night for
a millennium and a half, and let us imagine
that we live at the time when Constantine
the Great ruled at Byzantium. We are not
Bohemians to-night; we are northern barba-
rians— Waraegians that fight as mercenary
soldiers for the Roman Emperor, Danes that
plunder the northern coasts, Normans that
invade the Mediterranean — and led by our
chieftains Hengist and Horsa, Angular Sax-
ons, who found corner groceries.

The banquet of to-day is not called
Christmas; its name is Yule. On the fire-
place flames the yule-log, the sacred em-
blem of the god Balder's death. Champions

200 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

and warriors, seated on benches, occupy two
sides of a long table. On an elevated seat
at the head of the table presides the bold
Jarl. The whole resembles a low jinks. On
the walls lean torch-bearing serfs, instead
of gas flames measured by cubic feet.
Horns of the Urus filled with mead go from
hand to hand, and the heroes walk up where
the head of a wild boar is placed before the
throne of the powerful Jarl.

This hall forms part of an ancient tower
rising on a cliff that overhangs the wild
waves of the German Ocean, not the Cali-
fornia Market. Looking down from the
stormy height, you witness the eternal war-
fare waged between rock and wave. The
foot of the cliff is surrounded by phospho-
rescent breakers like this block by the fiery
brokers. On the head of the wild boar the
warriors lay their hands and pronounce
vows according to ancient rites. In solemn
chorus they sing:

u No, no, we will never get drunk any more !
No, no," etc., etc.

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 2OI

The impressive ceremony is interrupted
by the discordant sound of a horn. "Is that
the Gjallarhorn," exclaims the bold Jarl,
"that invited us to Valhalla? Or is it the
toothorn of the festive hoodlum?" The door
of the hall is flung open, an icy blast of the
snowstorm enters.

" In Balder's name, shut that door,"
orders the Jarl; "even the San Francisco
Morning Call would declare that weather
more than partly cloudy. It is enough to
give rheumatism to a rhinoceros, and at
present I am oscillating between the regu-
lar school and homoeopathy, since I found
out that the same liquid that cures the bite
of the rattlesnake has the power to produce
the same reptile in the boots, as I am con-
vinced by my own experience."

Then a rumbling and clanking noise is
heard as if a tinshop was tumbling down
a flight of stairs, and in steps Viking Brom-
ley the Terrible in full armor.

" May Odin, Thor, and Balder protect
thee, valiant Viking Bromley," exclaims

202 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

the Jarl. "Sit down and have a horn of
our mead."

"The bold Jarl will excuse me. I took
a vessel near the Straits of Gibraltar loaded
with wine from the island of Cyprus. My
men are bringing the casks."

Hearing these words, Hero Damm spits
his mead secretly on the floor, Burke Thirs-
tenson empties his horn hastily into his
throat; both are ready for Cyprus.

"And what do you bring besides?" asked
the bold Jarl.

"The China mail and two beautiful
Greek maidens," was the answer.

"Let them enter to gladden the hearts of
my warriors by song and dance."

And a pair of Greek maidens, fair as the
day, dance gracefully into the hall, wreaths
in their hair and garlands in their hands.
They look very much like brothers Belknap
and Swan. Standing on one leg, they
spread gracefully their arms and sing an
ode of Anacreon on forensic medicine.

"Where is the scald that sings the gallant

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 203

deeds of our own sword and those of our
gallant warriors?" asked the bold Jarl.

And Bear the Virtuous, well versed in
ancient lore and of venerable appearance,
walks up to the elevated seat and sings be-
fore the Jarl a beautiful song of Hagbart
and fair Signe, and how Signe followed her
lord and master to the funeral pyre, where
she was burned with all her treasures and
the gold of her teeth, filled by Dr. Younger,
and her library of dry-goods bills ; and then
he sings into the golden strings of his harp
of ancient times, and how Christmas was
celebrated with our glorious ancestors ; and
then he puts his harp into his coat pocket,
walks gracefully up to the Jarl, and asks for
a drink.

IDEAL BOHEMIA.

WHEN I received a notice from our most
gracious Sire that he expected me to make
some appropriate remarks on Ideal Bo-
hemia, I immediately began to ponder on
the beauties of Bohemia, the high objects of
its organization, and the inscrutable wis-
dom of our most gracious Sire in having
appointed me to lecture on such an exalted
subject. From pondering over this subject,
my mind soon fell to wandering, a habit to
which I incline more or less after nine
o'clock P. M., and roamed through the vast
realms of other memorable things. I made
some exceedingly valuable discoveries. Ex-
perience has shown me the lamentable fate
of all my discoveries made after nine
o'clock P. M. — I do not recollect them the

206 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

following morning. Therefore, this time I
reduced the result of my philosophical re-
searches to writing, and I am here to en-
lighten you on inscrutable things in general
and the different species of inscrutable wis-
dom in particular.

Amongst inscrutable things there are
three that have occupied the human mind
in all ages. It is immensity of time, also
called "Eternity"; immensity of space, or
the "Universe" ; and, thirdly, the boundary
line between necessity and free will.

Of the immensity of time anybody can
form an idea who enters a dentist's office
and finds there a notice: "Doctor back in
five minutes." These five minutes are an
immensity of time.

As to immensity of space, a San Fran-
cisco horse-car is a good illustration — a uni-
verse that has room for another universe
and plenty of room on the top.

As to the boundary-line between capacity
and free drinks, its limitation is found by
multiplying capacity by the figure of ready

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 207

cash, and then adding the credit strained to
its utmost extent in regard to time and place.
The most useful of inscrutable things is
the inscrutable wisdom of Divine Provi-
dence, which is indispensable to the daily
press. For example: It has pleased the
inscrutable wisdom of Divine Providence
to take from our midst our dearly beloved
mother-in-law, Barbara Scoldum. Now,
there is something incomprehensible at first
look in this action of inscrutable wisdom.
Divine Providence in taking that particular
mother-in-law will soon find that he has
caught a tartar. But, in carefully studying
up the case, we will find that inscrutable
wisdom keeps a place in some distant part
of its premises where all the good mothers-
in-law go, which place will be considerably
warmed up immediately after the arrival of
mothers-in-law. There is an arrangement
that as soon as the thermometer of that
place sinks below the temperature of Fort
Yuma a mother-in-law is introduced to save
fuel. The natural philosopher calls this ar-

208 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

rangement economy of nature. The heated
term by which we were visited a fortnight
ago was caused by an accumulation of
mothers-in-law who had to remain in the
sphere of our planet until accommodations
would be provided for them in the place of
their destination.

Sometimes it is a difficult task to investi-
gate the intentions of inscrutable wisdom;
for instance, the use of the heads of some
of our City Fathers. Their heads are
neither useful nor ornamental; they are not
made for brainwork. We can prove, by a
post mortem, to their owners7 own satisfac-
tion that their heads are empty. But they
serve a higher purpose ; they keep the neck-
tie in its proper position.

The coast of California has passed
through violent convulsions and cataclysms.
Since the glacial period the coast has been
submerged and raised to Alpine elevations.
There is no mining stock that has passed
through such vicissitudes of ups and downs
as the hills and plains of California. Bi-

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 209

valves and remains of marine crustaceans
have been found on the tops of the Sierras,
and an empty sardine-box has been discov-
ered by me in the picturesque wildernesses
of Second-Street cut, which may be in-
spected at the rooms of our Academy of
Sciences.

To protect us against further disturb-
ances of level, against tidal waves and
sudden upheavals, inscrutable wisdom of
Divine Providence has created Captain
Kenzel, who keeps the coast line of the
Pacific in its present position.

Now, everything would be smooth and
Divine Providence all right if it were not
for the California Legislature that runs a
biennial opposition line to inscrutable
wisdom. But even with this defect, this
world is a good world, and even our most
gracious Sire, with the assistance of all the
members of the Sideboard Committee, could
not have created a better one.

ON EVOLUTION.

THE source of all organic life is the cell.
From the simple cell, which constitutes the
monad in the animal kingdom and the
bacillus in the series of vegetable develop-
ments, branch off innumerable evolutionary
series of types.

The system of cellular development may
be brought under three heads:

i st. The development in one line: <«xoro
In this manner originates the necklace,
bracelet, and the watch-chain.

2d. The cellular development in a plain
£§§8o In this way is formed the caviar
sandwich.

All other organisms are the product of
cubic development.

The enormous variety of organic types
is not the product of a short period; it is

212 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

the result of ages spent in natural selection
and other rational enjoyments.

The change of types which I am here to
demonstrate begins in the post-pliocene age.
The post-pliocene age we divide first in the
age of stone implements, which is followed
by the age of brass. In this age mankind
got very degenerate in morals, so that, for
the sake of their transgressions, a Board of
Supervisors was set over them. No sooner
was this board in power, when an extension
was proposed of the Libyan and Arabian
desert and passed. Then the Mississippi
River was forced to run through the Fifth-
Street sewer, which sewer was repaired in
the middle of the rainy season. This caused
a great flood, and the term antediluvian,
which we use in the Academy of Sciences,
refers to the time before that event. The
flood caused the age of brass, after which
followed the age of iron, and at present we
are in the middle of the age of steel.

After this explanation, the changes which
have taken place in the structure of some

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 213

organisms during these long periods can
easily be followed from the gray dawn of
antediluvian existence up to their present
perfect organization.

When we, for instance, remember the
well-known fact of a post-pliocene grass-
hopper developing by natural selection in
the course of ages into a race-horse, we will
no longer be astonished when by popular
election a clodhopper develops into a
regent of a university. A prominent
clergyman, combining by natural selection
Darwinism and sacred history, has called
this law, in a popular lecture, " inverted
comic action" — or was it conic action? — "of
irradiating ether." Here are a few ex-
amples :

You see how an antediluvian snail has
been transformed into the inkstand of the
present age, a circumstance which accounts,
perhaps, for the extraordinary laziness of

214 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

certain members of the daily press and this
Bohemian Club.

Here you see a dinotherium :

He looks very much like the African
hippopotamus, but his African sympathies
are not real. In his present stage of de-
velopment he is born in the north, but feeds
in the south.

Now, reflecting on these facts and looking
forward into the past of antediluvian times,
we find everywhere the footprints of the
finger of a mighty creative power.

ON GERMS.

ONE of the most powerful inventions of
the nineteenth century is the germ theory.
The germ, also called microbe, leads in its
wild state a migratory life, — that is, he is
always found where he ought not to be;
afterwards he takes to different liquids and
becomes cultivated. In this circumstance
the microbe resembles some young men
who are shiftless and spend their school
hours by being found where they ought not
to be, and then take different liquors. Such
young men never will pass their examina-
tion and they will not graduate, but become
members of the Board of Education or book
agents, and will have to recite in their old
age lessons on the germ theory.

2l6 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

According to the custom of this college,
we will now look on the microbe under
three heads :

i st. The microbe as an organism.

2d. The microbe as a fellow-citizen.

3d. The microbe in his or her matri-
monial relations.

First, the microbe as an organism appears
in different forms, which have received dif-
ferent names: bacterium, bacillus, vibrio,
spirillum, and many others ; all of which I
knew this morning, and with which Miss
Allbustle, who is our principal, is perfectly
acquainted and on terms of intimacy. All
these organisms agree on one point — they
gobble up all oxygen on which they can lay
hand and make it hot for the neighborhood
which Miss Allbustle calls "Surrounding
medium." By this process, in a way per-
fectly known to Miss Allbustle, they cause
fermentation and inflict incalculable misery
on the human race; because, if there were
no fermentation, there would not be intoxi-
cating drinks ; if there were no intoxicating

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 217

drinks, there would be no transgression ; if
there were no transgression, there would not
be sin.

I now come to the microbe as a fellow-
citizen. As such the microbe is exceedingly
useful to the medical profession, the drug-
store, and the sale of microscopes. He can
raise an epidemic on a moment's notice, and
is cultivated for this purpose either in gela-
tine or beef-tea. Whenever the state of a
community becomes melancholily healthy,
the same cultivated and well-trained bac-
teria are let loose on the community, and
our doctors and the sister of Miss Allbustle,
who is a female medical man, have more
business on hand than they can attend to.
Formerly, before the microbe became edu-
cated and cultivated, and was examined, and
had to graduate as a microbe, the doctors
had to go to the mountains to lasso some
wild bacteria, which is a dangerous enter-
prise. Some bacteria have a spiral shape,
somewhat like a snake or a corkscrew. They
derive their name, "spirillum," either from

21 8 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

spiral or spirits, and are the cause of an
affection called "Filtririum clemens."

Thirdly, the microbe in his or her matri-
monial relations : The microbe is not very
affectionate. He can be tamed and made to
follow his master, but he never, never will
love you. He propagates by separation
pretty much as they do in Indiana. So he
multiplies by division, and in producing
several individuals he loses his own indi-
viduality.

Now, if we consider all these losses and
difficulties, ought we not to be thankful?

ADDRESS TO THE MAYOR.

THIS time I am not taken by surprise. I
know I am always called for late at night,
like the loose troops that cover the retreat of
the really valuable army; and as it is a
great strain on my nerves to keep sober a
whole evening, I have committed my ideas
to paper, and this is my extempore speech.

Brother Phelan, I am here not only to
congratulate you, because a man who has
been found worthy to govern the Bohemian
Club can derive but little satisfaction from
the dignity of being Mayor of San Fran-
cisco, but I am here to give you advice.
This city, inhabited by honest, hard-drink-
ing men, has many grievances. Our pave-
ment, for instance, is of great importance.
Climate and habits dispose us to gout. You
recollect Dr. Arthur Stout, the inveterate

220 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

punster of this organization. He frequently
said, "Chaqu'un a son gout." Pavement is
of great consequence to elderly gentlemen.
It always touches my heart to see a friend,
when crossing the street, how carefully he
treats the cobblestones of our pavements.
Public property must be treated with con-
sideration.

Now, there is a place whose access is
paved by good intentions. Why not use the
same material for paving this good city? I
own the material is rather friable, but there
is such a supply of it, and our City Fathers
are on such excellent terms with the owner
of that place, that they may get the material
at a nominal expense.

In the hope that you will follow this dis-
interested suggestion, I am convinced that a
man who has filled the presidential chair of
this important organization will find it an
easy task to rule an insignificant city like
San Francisco.

ON FISHES.

My remarks on FISHES will be dis-
tributed under three heads :

i st. The definition: What is a FlSH?

ad. Classification of FISHES.

3d. Spiritual advice.

According to the generally adopted defi-
nition, a fish is a vertebrate animal that
breathes through gills. Everybody sees
that this is a very superficial definition ; for
we have not time always to look for a
spinal column, and as for the gills, they are
generally removed by the cook.

My definition is : A fish is an aquatic ani-
mal without feet and without hair. Some-
body might say this definition will embrace
also the snake ; but the snake is amphibious,
— he can live both in the water and in the
boots.

222 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

The fish is essentially without hair.
Fish's hair-oil has been tried at different
times by several members of our Academy
of Sciences on their own heads, without pro-
ducing anything like the desired effect.

The fish has no feet, which circumstance
saves him a world of trouble; having no
feet, he has no big toe; having no big toe,
he has no gout; having no gout, he is not
suffering from the pavements of this good
city.

I had invited a good friend to assist at
this symposium; I am sorry to say that he
was prevented by an attack of his old enemy,
the gout.

This good friend has suggested at differ-
ent times a method how to improve the
pavement of San Francisco for the benefit
of the gouty members of this community,
who represent a considerable proportion,
and at the same time to settle that most
vexing question about asphalt, basalt, and
Nicholson.

My friend refers to a well-known place

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 223

paved by good intentions. As our public
officers always have been on excellent terms
with the owner of that place, they easily
could obtain the material at a nominal
price.

We all know with what facility the mate-
rial is to be manipulated; it is true it has no
great power of resistance and will want fre-
quent repairs, but then there is such an
enormous supply of it.

In regard to the classification of fishes:
We have an artificial system and a natural
system. The artificial system takes up a
single character for classification, but the
natural system compares carefully all the
characters, and judges from the totality in
which style the fish ought to be served.
Aquatic as their habits may be, all good
fishes when cooked are served with white
wine, and this is in the animal kingdom the
first instance of the better hereafter that
awaits us.

According to the artificial system, fishes
are divided into those with a bony skeleton

224 THE HOOT OF THE OWL-

and those with a cartilaginous skeleton. In
the first group belongs the eel, which is the
only hermaphrodite amongst vertebrates. I
know this is very immoral, but it is arranged
so by Nature, and I am ashamed of Nature.
Not so the eel ; he leads a life of permanent
matrimonial bliss, interrupted only by an
annual marriage trip to the sea coast, where,
after having propagated, he leaves his off-
spring to the benevolent attentions of sharks
and other fishes. At a moment's notice he
withdraws to places inaccessible to his
creditors. Amongst the fishes with a carti-
laginous skeleton, the most remarkable is
the sturgeon, whose eggs are called caviar,
and here comes my spiritual advice.
Never! never mistake caviar for blackberry
jam!

ON BUTTERFLIES.

IT is impossible for me to tell anything
new to this enlightened body of Bohemians,
because everything that was in me has been
brought out on former occasions, and what
little brain is left I want for myself. But
noticing here the presence of Dr. Swan and
Judge Boalt, my old rivals in science, I am
afraid they will trespass on the sacred
ground of entomology, as they have done
before ; and so, for the protection of science,
I will sacrifice myself, as I have done
before, and occupy your valuable time with
a lecture on butterflies.

The butterfly lays eggs like the hen, but
differs from the hen by laying her eggs but
once in her lifetime. From the egg comes a
caterpillar, or, as Judge Boalt justly ob-
served, a worm. The whole occupation of

226 THE HOOT OF THE OWL.

this worm consists in eating. His whole ex-
istence is a prolonged dinner-party. Sev-
eral times he changes his dress by bursting
it on his back and throwing it off, a new,
well-fitting, unpaid dress being already un-
derneath. When entirely satisfied he goes
to sleep, calls himself a chrysalis, and awakes
as a butterfly. This new existence begins
with making love all around and gaining
the mutual admiration of both sexes. Then
he takes to morals, matrimony, and a wed-
ding trip ; after which he dies, before mak-
ing the acquaintance of his mother-in-law.
In the stage of butterfly he dispenses en-
tirely with solid food and relies altogether
on liquid substances, which he calls nectar
and we call drink. Now, you see his first
stage of existence is a continuous dinner-
party; then comes a period of digestion and
rest, after which a system of free love and
drink all around; but in no stage work, if
he can help it.

In this latter peculiarity the butterfly re-
sembles the oyster, from which, in other re-

THE HOOT OF THE OWL. 227

spects, it is not difficult to distinguish him.
The butterfly leads an aerial life ; the oyster
lives on the bosom of the ocean, in localities
inaccessible to his creditors. Most species
of the oyster are hermaphroditic — they pos-
sess both kinds of sexual organs. Therefore,
the oyster enjoys the rapture of the lover and
of the beloved, and thus on the bosom of the
ocean (which is at the same time the bottom
of the ocean) he enjoys a life of uninter-
rupted matrimonial bliss. But, besides this
blessing, the oyster is entitled to the proud
distinction of being present at all banquets
given by the Bohemian Club; and I am
charged by the oyster to express on this oc-
casion his thanks for the honor of his invi-
tation and his wish that such invitation may
be extended to him at all further celebra-
tions, and especially our Golden Anni-
versary, when, twenty-five years hence, he
hopes to meet you all again.

"~

LOAN DEPT.

LD 2lA-50m-8 '57
(C8481slO)476B