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.

50 VARIETIES OF STRANGERS.
No. III. —FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 1807.
FROM MY ELBOW-CHAIR.
A S I delight in everything novel and eccentric, and would
at any time give an old coat for a new idea, I am particularly attentive to the manners and conversation of strangers, and
scarcely ever a traveller enters this city, whose appearance promises anything original, but by some means or another I form
an acquaintance with him. I must confess I often suffer manifold afflictions from the intimacies thus contracted: my curiosity
is frequently punished by the stupid details of a blockhead, or
the shallow verbosity of a coxcomb. Now I would prefer at
any time to travel with an ox-team through a Carolina sand-flat,
rather than plod through a heavy unmeaning conversation with
the former; and as to the latter, I would sooner hold sweet converse with the wheel of a knife-grinder than endure his monotonous chattering. In fact, the strangers who flock to this most
pleasant of all earthly cities, are generally mere birds of passage
whose plumage is often gay enough, I own, but their notes,
"heaven save the mark," are as unmusical as those of that classic
night bird which the ancients humorously selected as the emblem
of wisdom. Those from the South, it is true, entertain me with
their horses, equipages, and puns; and it is excessively pleasant
to hear a couple of these four-in-hand gentlemen detail their