It is the lamentable fact that in this day and generation poets are not held in that high esteem which is their due.
We have unfortunately had a number of them in this vicinity of late years who have not been any too particular about paying their board bills, and whether their troth has been plighted to our confiding maidens, or to our trustful tailors, the result has been the same--they have not been conspicuously present at the date of maturity of their promises.

One very distinguished looking old gentleman in particular, who registered from Greece, came here several centuries ago and secured five hundred subscriptions to his book of verses, collected the first instalment, and then faded from the scene and neither he nor his verses have been heard from since.

The consequence has been that when any of the young of this community show the slightest signs of poetic genius their parents behave as though the measles had broken out in the family, and do all they can spiritually and physically to stamp out the symptoms.

My cousin Aminidab indeed went so far while he was in the Legislature here, to introduce a bill making the writing of poetry a misdemeanor, and ordering the police immediately to arrest all persons caught giving way in public or private to an inspiration.

The bill only failed to become a law by the expiration of the session before it had reached its final reading.