[Ninety-five in the shade]

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NINETY-FIVE in the shade and nary breath of air. This, as Polonius¹ says, is “good.” It is highly refreshing in itself, but more so from the beautiful traits of human nature which it elicits, or to speak more in accordance with fact, fries out, at the pores. The vendors of ice-cream, of juleps and lager afford an instance in point. They are bland and smiling and comfortable, and while everybody else is grumbling and sweating, they remain perfectly well content with the state of the thermometer and would go into raptures even if the mercury should make a still more frantic progress upward, even unto the “busting” of its boiler. The newspapers also give us a lively proof of what may be accomplished by aspiring sub-editors in the way of advice. They tell us not to drink water because it increases the action of the absorbents and creates more warmth and not to imbibe liquor because it inflames the blood, but above all means, say these sage Mentors “keep cool and preserve an equable frame of mind.” This last bit of humor must have been gotten off by a blood-relation of Bunsby.² In the suburbs on Sunday another truth became self-evident viz: that our people don’t know how to enjoy themselves rationally, and that the Germans do. Even the Bunsbys of the New York papers acknowledge this. No rioting, no drunkenness, no sunstrokes generated by bad brandy among the sons of stout Gambrinus!³ Then again the churches yesterday showed another phase of the effects of caloric on the human corpus. Handkerchiefs and fans fluttered like a host of hovering butterflies. Stout parties were observed to look preternaturally solemn about the middle of Bangbible’s⁴ discourse and tried to convince themselves, half an hour after, that they had not been asleep; and the interesting images of their father were observed to wriggle about as if that portion of their anatomy unusually wanting in winged cherubs were resting upon a pincushion with the pin-points up. The streets have broken out into an eruption of white indispensables and hot weather caput-coverings, and front-stoops and balconies at night present a bewildering sea of crinoline from whose waves here and there emerges a thin-legged cast-a-way, who gazes upon the moon, and, inspired by the day’s miscellaneous “smashes” whispers soft, very soft nonsense in the fair one’s ear. Nothing like 95 in the shade to bring out shades of character! Keep dark!

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