Salmagundi; or, The whim-whams and opinions of Launcelot Langstaff, esq. [pseud.] and others. By William Irving, James Kirke Paulding and Washington Irving. Printed from the original ed., with a preface and notes by Evert A. Duyckinck.

RUMOR. 281
"what is the news?" This is a kind of challenge to political
debate; and as no two men think exactly alike,'tis ten to one,
but before they finish, all the polite phrases in the language are
exhausted by way of giving fire and energy to argument. What
renders this talking fever more alarming is, that the people
appear to be in the unhappy state of a patient whose palate
nauseates the medicine best calculated for the cure of his disease,
and seem anxious to continue in the full enjoyment of their chattering epidemic. They alarm each other by direful reports and
fearful apprehensions; like I have seen a lot of old wives in this
country entertain themselves with stories of ghosts and goblins
until their imaginations were in a most agonizing panic. Every
day begets some new tale, big with agitation; and the busy goddess, Rurnor, to speak in the poetic language of the Christians, is
constantly in motion. She mounts her rattling stage-wagon, and
gallops about the country, freighted with a load of " hints," " informations," "extracts of letters from respectable gentlemen,"
"observations of respectable correspondents," and " unquestionable authorities;"-which her high-priests, the slang-whangers,
retail to their sapient followers, with all the solemnity-and all
the authenticity of oracles. True it is the unfortunate slangwhanilers are sometimes at a loss for food, to supply this insatiable appetite for intelligence; and are, not unfrequently, reduced
to the necessity of manufacturing dishes suited to the taste of
tVle times; to be served up as morning and evening repasts to
their disciples.
When the hungry politician is thus full charged with important information, he sallies forth to give due exercise to his
tongue; and tells all he knows, to everybody he meets. Now it
is a thousand to one that every person he meets is just as wise as
himself, charged with the same articles of information, and pos