Such ferocity should not sully this fair May morning, when there are sounds only of carpet-beating, the tinkle of the man who is out to grind your knives and the recurrent melody of the connoisseur of rags and bottles who stands in his cart as he drives his lean and pointed horse. At the cry of this perfumed Brummel--if you be not gone in years too far--as often as he prepares to shout the purpose of his quest, you'll put a question to him, "Hey, there, what do you feed your wife on?" And then his answer will come pat to your expectation, "Pa-a-a-per Ra-a-a-gs, Pa-a-a-per Ra-a-a-gs!" If the persistence of youth be in you and the belief that a jest becomes better with repetition--like beans nine days cold within the pot--you will shout your question until he turns the corner and his answer is lost in the noises of the street. "Adieu! Adieu! thy plaintive anthem fades--"
To this day I think of a rag-picker's wife as dining sparingly out of a bag--not with her head inside like a horse, but thrusting her scrawny arm elbow deep to stir the pottage, and sprinkling salt and pepper on for nicer flavor. Following such preparation she will fork it out like macaroni, with her head thrown back to present the wider orifice. If her husband's route lies along the richer streets she will have by way of tidbit for dessert a piece of chewy velvet, sugared and buttered to a tenderness.
But what is this jingling racket that comes upon the street? Bless us, it's a hurdy-gurdy. The hurdy-gurdy, I need hardly tell you, belongs to the organ family. This family is one of the very oldest and claims descent, I believe, from the god Pan. However, it accepted Christianity early and has sent many a son within the church to pipe divinity. But the hurdy-gurdy--a younger son, wild, and a bit of a pagan like its progenitor--took to the streets. In its life there it has acquired, among much rascality, certain charming vices that are beyond the capacity of its brother in the loft, however much we may admire the deep rumble of his Sabbath utterance.
The world has denied that chanticleer proclaims the day. But as far as I know no one has had the insolence to deny the street-organ as the proper herald of the spring. Without it the seasons would halt. Though science lay me by the heels, I'll assert that the crocus, which is a pioneer on the windy borderland of March, would not show its head except on the sounding of the hurdy-gurdy. I'll not deny that flowers pop up their heads afield without such call, that the jack-in-the-pulpit speaks its maiden sermon on some other beckoning of nature. But in the city it is the hurdy-gurdy that gives notice of the turning of the seasons. On its sudden blare I've seen the green stalk of the daffodil jiggle. If the tune be of sufficient rattle and prolonged to the giving of the third nickel, before the end is reached there will be seen a touch of yellow.