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violent abuse and the physical strength of several of the hands of the boat, and where he amused himself by pawing steadily, and occasionally backing on the horse directly behind, and thus causing much excitement, bad temper, and coarse language during the entire trip; and fairly on the stone pavements of the city streets.

By this time I had lost all fear, having resigned myself to perfect recklessness, like the man who, after being exposed a thousand times to death, no longer dreads it; and I drove up Thirty-fourth Street, across the tunnel at Fourth Avenue, and into Fifth Avenue, as though there was no such thing as peril in my path. Down our fashionable thoroughfare I proceeded, assuming rather a jaunty and professional

air; I squared my elbows, held my whip in my hand, taking great care not to touch Dandy Jim, however, and looked round at the foot-passengers, as much as to say, "I am not afraid to drive this wild animal; I do it every day." Unfortunately for the triumph of my assumptions, there was a piece of paper lying directly in our path.

Now Dandy Jim has an objection to paper, why I never could discover; but paper, white or brown, newspaper or blank paper, leaves or letters, is to him a thing of horror-his very soul revolts at it. It cer

tainly never could have done him any injury-it is, except as a vehicle of slander, so perfectly harmless -but he seemed to hold it in abject terror. This idiosyncracy was well known to me, but, unfortunately, my mind was so occupied with the effect I was producing that I did not notice the exciting cause. To aggravate the difficulty, just as we approached the objectionable article, and when my peculiar animal might have consented to pass by with a reasonable amount of self-restraint, a sudden gust blew it directly under his feet. If paper was his detestation, moving paper was a monstrosity magnified fifty fold; he reared up on his hind legs, made one bound sideways full thirty feet, and then, stopping suddenly, slipped on the pavement, and fell flat on his side.

Exactly what happened to me I never could determine. I seemed to be flying; next I beheld a splendid coruscation of fire-works; and then I awoke to find myself stretched at full length in the street, with a bloody nose and a scarcity of front teeth. Dandy Jim regained his feet more quickly than myself, ran away, smashed the wagon, as was his wont, and wound up by getting shut in by stages and carts, when he was ignominiously led away captive by a stalwart policeman. I gathered myself up as well as I could, and went home in a dilapidated

state. This led to my selling Dandy Jim and buying a set of false front teeth; the former brought precisely what it cost to pay for the latter.

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Thus it was that I overcame a prejudice that had long beset me against the artificial productions of manufacturing dentistry. This objection exists in the minds of many persons, although nothing can be more unfounded. If there is any thing that is an utterly miserable failure, it is the natural set of teeth.

From almost the hour when we come into the world, until the time when we quit it, or so long as a stump or root remains, our teeth are a source of annoyance to us. They have to be cut, and then pulled out, that they may "cut and come again." As babies, we are "never ourselves" for the cutting of our teeth; when we grow older we wish we were any body else, from the misery they cause us. They ache, and decay, and break; they come out when they should stay in, and stay in when they should come out; they torture and torment us till we only get rid of them with life itself.

On the other hand, the artificial teeth never pain the possessor, rarely break, and, if broken, are easily replaced; are readily cleaned, do not fall out, but can be removed at pleasure. They are infinitely handsomer than their ugly, irregular, uneven, discolored, and dirty prototypes. These exquisite productions of art are made of a delicate, pearly shade of white; they form a perfect row of well-proportioned beauty, undistinguishable from the genuine article, their very gums matching and closely fitting the nat ural flesh beneath them; they never inflict a torturing tooth-ache, driving man crazy with pain, and keeping him sleepless the long, dreary nights; they require no filling-an operation that the unfortunate

possessor of living teeth dreads only less than the rack itself; and they do not have to be pulled out, with an agony comparable to the effect of drawing the entire brain out through the hole at the roots.

From my experience before and since my accident, I should certainly advise my fellow-creatures to have as little to do with real teeth as possible, and to substitute the imitation as soon as they can. There may be a certain amount of suffering in having teeth, and especially sound ones, extracted, but the satisfaction of being finally rid of the troublesome things more than pays for the temporary annoyance. A natural set will become dirty in spite of endless scrubbing with the tooth-brush; some are invariably longer than others; there are projections and depressions; wherever they lap, tartar settles; inside it is impossible to get at them at all, and they compel a half-yearly interview with the dentist, from which one comes away greatly unnerved. Their substitutes are a great improvement to one's personal appearance, and never cause the slightest inconvenience, besides saving hours in cleaning, that, in a long life, amount to an aggregate of years. The new teeth were so far superior to those that they replaced, that they are valued on the credit side of the account at a hundred dollars, showing a clear profit of one hun

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