THE VILLAGE MUSICIAN.

BY JAMES HALL.

THE reader who has ever been in the pleasant town of Herkimer in New York, may know something of Johnny Vanderbocker, a neat, square built Dutch lad, who was a great favorite among the ladies of that place, a few years back. The reason of his popularity with the fair, I could never exactly learn; for he was the most uncomely youth that a traveller could meet between Albany and Buffalo. Perhaps it might have been in consequence of his expectations; for his father, who was a baker, was said to have several hundreds of silver dollars, locked up in an oaken chest which stood by his bedside; and as he had always permitted John to roam about the village, without paying the least attention to his education or conduct, it seemed very evident, that he intended to make him his heir. Perhaps it might have been owing to his good nature; for to tell the truth, there was not a better tempered lad in the

whole country. Whatever else might be said in disparagement of John, all admitted that he was a well conditioned creature, and had not the least harm in him. He would lie for hours, under the shade of a great willow which stood before his father's door, looking at the sky, or crawl about the grass, hunting for four-leafed clover; and no change in the weather, nor other cross accident, was ever known to disturb his serenity. In this respect he was a fair example of the influence of circumstances; for having been raised -as we say in the West-by a baker, it was naturally to be expected that his heart should be light.

After all, he might owe his favor with the female public to his musical abilities, which were certainly remarkable. When quite small he was an adept at playing on the Jews-harp, and the boys and girls would crowd around him to listen to his melody, as if he had been another Orpheus. As he grew older, he took to the violin, and his services began to be in request. A man may always fiddle his way through this world; no matter whether he play for love or money, whether he is a hired musician, or an amateur, fiddling is a genteel, popular, and profitable employment. Johnny was now a regular and an acceptable visiter at all the tea parties, quiltings, and house raisings, in and around the town, and never

did any human being fill a station with more propriety, than he did the responsible post of fiddler. By nature he was taciturn, a lover of sleep, a healthy eater, and fond of an inspiring beverage; qualifications, which, if they be not proofs of musical genius, may at least be set down as the appropriate accomplishments of a connoisseur in the science of sweet sounds. Seated in an easy chair, for he loved a comfortable position, he would throw back his head, close his eyes, open his huge mouth, and fiddle away for a whole night, without exhibiting the least sign of vitality, except in his elbow and his fingers. Often when a dance was ended, he would continue to play on until admonished that his labors were unnecessary; but when a new set took the floor, it was only requisite to give Johnny a smart jog, and off he went again like a machine set in motion. When refreshments were brought him, he poured into the vast crater which performed the functions of a mouth, whatever was offered, and more than once has he swallowed the contents of an inkstand, smacked his lips over a dose of Peruvian bark, or pronounced a glass of sharp vinegar humming stuff.'

Thus passed the halcyon days of Johnny Vanderbocker, until the completion of his twentyfirst year, when an event occurred which entirely changed the tenor of his life. This was no other than the de

cease of his worthy parent the baker, who was suddenly gathered to his fathers, on a cold winter evening while Johnny was fiddling at a neighbouring fair. The news startled our hero like the snapping of a fiddle-string. He returned with a heavy heart to his paternal mansion, and retired to rest somewhat consoled by the reflection, that although he had lost a parent, he had become master of the rolls. He laid aside his amusements to follow the remains of the honest baker to their last receptacle. For a wonder, he remained wide awake the whole day, and slept quietly in his bed the whole of the ensuing night. On the following morning he unlocked the oaken chest, emptied the contents of several greasy bags on the floor, counted them over eagerly, and then determined to buy a new violin.

In his new situation, many cares pressed upon the attention of our hero. Letters of administration had to be taken out, the stock in trade and the implements of his ancestor to be sold, debts to be collected, and debts to be paid; and before a week elapsed the heir at law acknowledged, that the gifts of fortune are not worth the trouble they bring. His new suit of black imposed an unwonted constraint upon him. He could no longer roll upon the grass, for fear of soiling his clothes, and he was told that it would be wrong to fiddle at the dances while he was in mourning.

When an old man gets into trouble, he is apt to betake himself to the bottle; when a young one becomes perplexed, he generally turns his attention to matrimony. Thus it was with Johnny, who, in those golden and joyous days when he had nothing to do but to sleep and eat and play the fiddle, never dreamt of the silken fetter. But when care and trouble, and leather bags, and silver dollars, and black broadcloth, came upon him, he thought it high time to shift a portion of the burthen of his existence upon some other shoulders.

I must now apprise the reader, that although my hero had never thought of marriage, it was only because he was too single-minded to think of two things at once. He had not reached the mature age of one and twenty, untouched by the arrows of the gentle god. In love he had been, and at the precise point of time to which we have brought this veracious history, the tender passion was blazing in his bosom, as kindly and as cheerfully as a christmas fire. Its object was a beautiful girl of nineteen, who really did great credit to the taste of the enamoured musician. She was the daughter of a widow lady of respectable connexions, but decayed fortune-the damaged relic of a fashionable spendthrift. Lucy Atherton, the young lady in question, had beauty enough to compensate for the absence of wealth, and a sufficient