by Poe · Cluster: Satire of Society · Epigram · Satire
Abstract
A mock-scientific satirical essay defining man as ‘an animal that diddles’ and cataloguing petty swindles; a comic anatomy of deception, the trickster, and social satire.
Testo / Text
Parti / Parts
Readability (prose)71.2 Flesch ease7.1 FK grade9.9 Fog10% complex15.3 words/sent
Connections
Topoi: World Upside Down Archetypes: Trickster Motifs: Money and Gold, Concealment Hidden Identity, City Themes & Concepts: Deception, Satire of Society, Appearance vs Reality, Common Man Forms & Genres: Essay, Satire, Nonfiction
Testo integrale / Full text
CONSIDERED AS ONE OF THE EXACT SCIENCES.
Hey, diddle diddle
The cat and the fiddle
Since the world began there have been two Jeremys. The one wrote
a Jeremiad about usury, and was called Jeremy Bentham. He has
been much admired by Mr. John Neal, and was a great man in a
small way. The other gave name to the most important of the Exact
Sciences, and was a great man in a great way—I may say, indeed,
in the very greatest of ways.
Diddling—or the abstract idea conveyed by the verb to diddle—is
sufficiently well understood. Yet the fact, the deed, the thing
_diddling_, is somewhat difficult to define. We may get, however,
at a tolerably distinct conception of the matter in hand, by
defining—not the thing, diddling, in itself—but man, as an animal
that diddles. Had Plato but hit upon this, he would have been
spared the affront of the picked chicken.
Very pertinently it was demanded of Plato, why a picked chicken,
which was clearly “a biped without feathers,” was not, according
to his own definition, a man? But I am not to be bothered by any
similar query. Man is an animal that diddles, and there is no
animal that diddles but man. It will take an entire hen-coop of
picked chickens to get over that.
What constitutes the essence, the nare, the principle of diddling
is, in fact, peculiar to the class of creatures that wear coats
and pantaloons. A crow thieves; a fox cheats; a weasel outwits; a
man diddles. To diddle is his destiny. “Man was made to mourn,”
says the poet. But not so:—he was made to diddle. This is his
aim—his object—his end. And for this reason when a man’s diddled
we say he’s “_done_.”
Diddling, rightly considered, is a compound, of which the
ingredients are minuteness, interest, perseverance, ingenuity,
audacity, _nonchalance_, originality, impertinence, and grin.
_Minuteness:_—Your diddler is minute. His operations are upon a
small scale. His business is retail, for cash, or approved paper
at sight. Should he ever be tempted into magnificent speculation,
he then, at once, loses his distinctive features, and becomes
what we term “financier.” This latter word conveys the diddling
idea in every respect except that of magnitude. A diddler may
thus be regarded as a banker _in petto_—a “financial operation,”
as a diddle at Brobdignag. The one is to the other, as Homer to
“Flaccus”—as a Mastodon to a mouse—as the tail of a comet to that
of a pig.
_Interest:_—Your diddler is guided by self-interest. He scorns to
diddle for the mere _sake_ of the diddle. He has an object in
view—his pocket—and yours. He regards always the main chance. He
looks to Number One. You are Number Two, and must look to
yourself.
_Perseverance:_—Your diddler perseveres. He is not readily
discouraged. Should even the banks break, he cares nothing about
it. He steadily pursues his end, and
‘Ut canis a corio nunquam absterrebitur uncto,’
so he never lets go of his game.
_Ingenuity:_—Your diddler is ingenious. He has constructiveness
large. He understands plot. He invents and circumvents. Were he
not Alexander he would be Diogenes. Were he not a diddler, he
would be a maker of patent rat-traps or an angler for trout.
_Audacity:_—Your diddler is audacious.—He is a bold man. He
carries the war into Africa. He conquers all by assault. He would
not fear the daggers of Frey Herren. With a little more prudence
Dick Turpin would have made a good diddler; with a trifle less
blarney, Daniel O’Connell; with a pound or two more brains,
Charles the Twelfth.
_Nonchalance:_—Your diddler is nonchalant. He is not at all
nervous. He never had any nerves. He is never seduced into a
flurry. He is never put out—unless put out of doors. He is
cool—cool as a cucumber. He is calm—“calm as a smile from Lady
Bury.” He is easy—easy as an old glove, or the damsels of ancient
Baiæ.
_Originality:_—Your diddler is original—conscientiously so. His
thoughts are his own. He would scorn to employ those of another.
A stale trick is his aversion. He would return a purse, I am
sure, upon discovering that he had obtained it by an unoriginal
diddle.
_Impertinence:_—Your diddler is impertinent. He swaggers. He sets
his arms a-kimbo. He thrusts his hands in his trowsers’ pockets.
He sneers in your face. He treads on your corns. He eats your
dinner, he drinks your wine, he borrows your money, he pulls your
nose, he kicks your poodle, and he kisses your wife.
_Grin:_—Your true diddler winds up all with a grin. But this
nobody sees but himself. He grins when his daily work is
done—when his allotted labors are accomplished—at night in his
own closet, and altogether for his own private entertainment. He
goes home. He locks his door. He divests himself of his clothes.
He puts out his candle. He gets into bed. He places his head upon
the pillow. All this done, and your diddler grins. This is no
hypothesis. It is a matter of course. I reason _à priori_, and a
diddle would be no diddle without a grin.
The origin of the diddle is referrable to the infancy of the
Human Race. Perhaps the first diddler was Adam. At all events, we
can trace the science back to a very remote period of antiquity.
The moderns, however, have brought it to a perfection never
dreamed of by our thick-headed progenitors. Without pausing to
speak of the “old saws,” therefore, I shall content myself with a
compendious account of some of the more “modern instances.”
A very good diddle is this. A housekeeper in want of a sofa, for
instance, is seen to go in and out of several cabinet warehouses.
At length she arrives at one offering an excellent variety. She
is accosted, and invited to enter, by a polite and voluble
individual at the door. She finds a sofa well adapted to her
views, and upon inquiring the price, is surprised and delighted
to hear a sum named at least twenty per cent. lower than her
expectations. She hastens to make the purchase, gets a bill and
receipt, leaves her address, with a request that the article be
sent home as speedily as possible, and retires amid a profusion
of bows from the shopkeeper. The night arrives and no sofa. A
servant is sent to make inquiry about the delay. The whole
transaction is denied. No sofa has been sold—no money
received—except by the diddler, who played shop-keeper for the
nonce.
Our cabinet warehouses are left entirely unattended, and thus
afford every facility for a trick of this kind. Visitors enter,
look at furniture, and depart unheeded and unseen. Should any one
wish to purchase, or to inquire the price of an article, a bell
is at hand, and this is considered amply sufficient.
Again, quite a respectable diddle is this. A well-dressed
individual enters a shop, makes a purchase to the value of a
dollar; finds, much to his vexation, that he has left his
pocket-book in another coat pocket; and so says to the
shopkeeper—
“My dear sir, never mind; just oblige me, will you, by sending
the bundle home? But stay! I really believe that I have nothing
less than a five dollar bill, even there. However, you can send
four dollars in change with the bundle, you know.”
“Very good, sir,” replies the shop-keeper, who entertains, at
once, a lofty opinion of the high-mindedness of his customer. “I
know fellows,” he says to himself, “who would just have put the
goods under their arm, and walked off with a promise to call and
pay the dollar as they came by in the afternoon.”
A boy is sent with the parcel and change. On the route, quite
accidentally, he is met by the purchaser, who exclaims:
“Ah! This is my bundle, I see—I thought you had been home with
it, long ago. Well, go on! My wife, Mrs. Trotter, will give you
the five dollars—I left instructions with her to that effect. The
change you might as well give to me—I shall want some silver for
the Post Office. Very good! One, two, is this a good
quarter?—three, four—quite right! Say to Mrs. Trotter that you
met me, and be sure now and do not loiter on the way.”
The boy doesn’t loiter at all—but he is a very long time in
getting back from his errand—for no lady of the precise name of
Mrs. Trotter is to be discovered. He consoles himself, however,
that he has not been such a fool as to leave the goods without
the money, and re-entering his shop with a self-satisfied air,
feels sensibly hurt and indignant when his master asks him what
has become of the change.
A very simple diddle, indeed, is this. The captain of a ship,
which is about to sail, is presented by an official looking
person with an unusually moderate bill of city charges. Glad to
get off so easily, and confused by a hundred duties pressing upon
him all at once, he discharges the claim forthwith. In about
fifteen minutes, another and less reasonable bill is handed him
by one who soon makes it evident that the first collector was a
diddler, and the original collection a diddle.
And here, too, is a somewhat similar thing. A steamboat is
casting loose from the wharf. A traveller, portmanteau in hand,
is discovered running toward the wharf, at full speed. Suddenly,
he makes a dead halt, stoops, and picks up something from the
ground in a very agitated manner. It is a pocket-book, and—“Has
any gentleman lost a pocketbook?” he cries. No one can say that
he has exactly lost a pocket-book; but a great excitement ensues,
when the treasure trove is found to be of value. The boat,
however, must not be detained.
“Time and tide wait for no man,” says the captain.
“For God’s sake, stay only a few minutes,” says the finder of the
book—“the true claimant will presently appear.”
“Can’t wait!” replies the man in authority; “cast off there, d’ye
hear?”
“What _am_ I to do?” asks the finder, in great tribulation. “I am
about to leave the country for some years, and I cannot
conscientiously retain this large amount in my possession. I beg
your pardon, sir,” [here he addresses a gentleman on shore,] “but
you have the air of an honest man. _Will_ you confer upon me the
favor of taking charge of this pocket-book—I _know_ I can trust
you—and of advertising it? The notes, you see, amount to a very
considerable sum. The owner will, no doubt, insist upon rewarding
you for your trouble—”
“_Me!_—no, _you!_—it was you who found the book.”
“Well, if you _must_ have it so—_I_ will take a small reward—just
to satisfy your scruples. Let me see—why these notes are all
hundreds—bless my soul! a hundred is too much to take—fifty would
be quite enough, I am sure—”
“Cast off there!” says the captain.
“But then I have no change for a hundred, and upon the whole,
_you_ had better—”
“Cast off there!” says the captain.
“Never mind!” cries the gentleman on shore, who has been
examining his own pocket-book for the last minute or so—“never
mind! _I_ can fix it—here is a fifty on the Bank of North
America—throw the book.”
And the over-conscientious finder takes the fifty with marked
reluctance, and throws the gentleman the book, as desired, while
the steamboat fumes and fizzes on her way. In about half an hour
after her departure, the “large amount” is seen to be a
“counterfeit presentment,” and the whole thing a capital diddle.
A bold diddle is this. A camp-meeting, or something similar, is
to be held at a certain spot which is accessible only by means of
a free bridge. A diddler stations himself upon this bridge,
respectfully informs all passers by of the new county law, which
establishes a toll of one cent for foot passengers, two for
horses and donkeys, and so forth, and so forth. Some grumble but
all submit, and the diddler goes home a wealthier man by some
fifty or sixty dollars well earned. This taking a toll from a
great crowd of people is an excessively troublesome thing.
A neat diddle is this. A friend holds one of the diddler’s
promises to pay, filled up and signed in due form, upon the
ordinary blanks printed in red ink. The diddler purchases one or
two dozen of these blanks, and every day dips one of them in his
soup, makes his dog jump for it, and finally gives it to him as a
bonne bouche. The note arriving at maturity, the diddler, with
the diddler’s dog, calls upon the friend, and the promise to pay
is made the topic of discussion. The friend produces it from his
escritoire, and is in the act of reaching it to the diddler, when
up jumps the diddler’s dog and devours it forthwith. The diddler
is not only surprised but vexed and incensed at the absurd
behavior of his dog, and expresses his entire readiness to cancel
the obligation at any moment when the evidence of the obligation
shall be forthcoming.
A very mean diddle is this. A lady is insulted in the street by a
diddler’s accomplice. The diddler himself flies to her
assistance, and, giving his friend a comfortable thrashing,
insists upon attending the lady to her own door. He bows, with
his hand upon his heart, and most respectfully bids her adieu.
She entreats him, as her deliverer, to walk in and be introduced
to her big brother and her papa. With a sigh, he declines to do
so. “Is there no way, then, sir,” she murmurs, “in which I may be
permitted to testify my gratitude?”
“Why, yes, madam, there is. Will you be kind enough to lend me a
couple of shillings?”
In the first excitement of the moment the lady decides upon
fainting outright. Upon second thought, however, she opens her
purse-strings and delivers the specie. Now this, I say, is a
diddle minute—for one entire moiety of the sum borrowed has to be
paid to the gentleman who had the trouble of performing the
insult, and who had then to stand still and be thrashed for
performing it.
Rather a small but still a scientific diddle is this. The diddler
approaches the bar of a tavern, and demands a couple of twists of
tobacco. These are handed to him, when, having slightly examined
them, he says:
“I don’t much like this tobacco. Here, take it back, and give me
a glass of brandy and water in its place.” The brandy and water
is furnished and imbibed, and the diddler makes his way to the
door. But the voice of the tavern-keeper arrests him.
“I believe, sir, you have forgotten to pay for your brandy and
water.”
“Pay for my brandy and water!—didn’t I give you the tobacco for
the brandy and water? What more would you have?”
“But, sir, if you please, I don’t remember that you paid me for
the tobacco.”
“What do you mean by that, you scoundrel?—Didn’t I give you back
your tobacco? Isn’t that your tobacco lying there? Do you expect
me to pay for what I did not take?”
“But, sir,” says the publican, now rather at a loss what to say,
“but sir—”
“But me no buts, sir,” interrupts the diddler, apparently in very
high dudgeon, and slamming the door after him, as he makes his
escape.—“But me no buts, sir, and none of your tricks upon
travellers.”
Here again is a very clever diddle, of which the simplicity is
not its least recommendation. A purse, or pocket-book, being
really lost, the loser inserts in one of the daily papers of a
large city a fully descriptive advertisement.
Whereupon our diddler copies the facts of this advertisement,
with a change of heading, of general phraseology and address. The
original, for instance, is long, and verbose, is headed “A
Pocket-Book Lost!” and requires the treasure, when found, to be
left at No. 1 Tom Street. The copy is brief, and being headed
with “Lost” only, indicates No. 2 Dick, or No. 3 Harry Street, as
the locality at which the owner may be seen. Moreover, it is
inserted in at least five or six of the daily papers of the day,
while in point of time, it makes its appearance only a few hours
after the original. Should it be read by the loser of the purse,
he would hardly suspect it to have any reference to his own
misfortune. But, of course, the chances are five or six to one,
that the finder will repair to the address given by the diddler,
rather than to that pointed out by the rightful proprietor. The
former pays the reward, pockets the treasure and decamps.
Quite an analogous diddle is this. A lady of ton has dropped,
some where in the street, a diamond ring of very unusual value.
For its recovery, she offers some forty or fifty dollars
reward—giving, in her advertisement, a very minute description of
the gem, and of its settings, and declaring that, on its
restoration at No. so and so, in such and such Avenue, the reward
would be paid instanter, without a single question being asked.
During the lady’s absence from home, a day or two afterwards, a
ring is heard at the door of No. so and so, in such and such
Avenue; a servant appears; the lady of the house is asked for and
is declared to be out, at which astounding information, the
visitor expresses the most poignant regret. His business is of
importance and concerns the lady herself. In fact, he had the
good fortune to find her diamond ring. But perhaps it would be as
well that he should call again. “By no means!” says the servant;
and “By no means!” says the lady’s sister and the lady’s
sister-in-law, who are summoned forthwith. The ring is
clamorously identified, the reward is paid, and the finder nearly
thrust out of doors. The lady returns and expresses some little
dissatisfaction with her sister and sister-in-law, because they
happen to have paid forty or fifty dollars for a fac-simile of
her diamond ring—a fac-simile made out of real pinch-beck and
unquestionable paste.
But as there is really no end to diddling, so there would be none
to this essay, were I even to hint at half the variations, or
inflections, of which this science is susceptible. I must bring
this paper, perforce, to a conclusion, and this I cannot do
better than by a summary notice of a very decent, but rather
elaborate diddle, of which our own city was made the theatre, not
very long ago, and which was subsequently repeated with success,
in other still more verdant localities of the Union. A
middle-aged gentleman arrives in town from parts unknown. He is
remarkably precise, cautious, staid, and deliberate in his
demeanor. His dress is scrupulously neat, but plain,
unostentatious. He wears a white cravat, an ample waistcoat, made
with an eye to comfort alone; thick-soled cosy-looking shoes, and
pantaloons without straps. He has the whole air, in fact, of your
well-to-do, sober-sided, exact, and respectable “man of
business,” _par excellence_—one of the stern and outwardly hard,
internally soft, sort of people that we see in the crack high
comedies—fellows whose words are so many bonds, and who are noted
for giving away guineas, in charity, with the one hand, while, in
the way of mere bargain, they exact the uttermost fraction of a
farthing with the other.
He makes much ado before he can get suited with a boarding house.
He dislikes children. He has been accustomed to quiet. His habits
are methodical—and then he would prefer getting into a private
and respectable small family, piously inclined. Terms, however,
are no object—only he must insist upon settling his bill on the
first of every month, (it is now the second) and begs his
landlady, when he finally obtains one to his mind, not on any
account to forget his instructions upon this point—but to send in
a bill, and receipt, precisely at ten o’clock, on the first day
of every month, and under no circumstances to put it off to the
second.
These arrangements made, our man of business rents an office in a
reputable rather than a fashionable quarter of the town. There is
nothing he more despises than pretense. “Where there is much
show,” he says, “there is seldom any thing very solid behind”—an
observation which so profoundly impresses his landlady’s fancy,
that she makes a pencil memorandum of it forthwith, in her great
family Bible, on the broad margin of the Proverbs of Solomon.
The next step is to advertise, after some such fashion as this,
in the principal business six-pennies of the city—the pennies are
eschewed as not “respectable”—and as demanding payment for all
advertisements in advance. Our man of business holds it as a
point of his faith that work should never be paid for until done.
“WANTED.—The advertisers, being about to commence extensive
business operations in this city, will require the services of
three or four intelligent and competent clerks, to whom a liberal
salary will be paid. The very best recommendations, not so much
for capacity, as for integrity, will be expected. Indeed, as the
duties to be performed involve high responsibilities, and large
amounts of money must necessarily pass through the hands of those
engaged, it is deemed advisable to demand a deposit of fifty
dollars from each clerk employed. No person need apply,
therefore, who is not prepared to leave this sum in the
possession of the advertisers, and who cannot furnish the most
satisfactory testimonials of morality. Young gentlemen piously
inclined will be preferred. Application should be made between
the hours of ten and eleven A. M., and four and five P. M., of
Messrs.
“Bogs, Hogs, Logs, Frogs & Co.,
“No. 110 Dog Street.”
By the thirty-first day of the month, this advertisement has
brought to the office of Messrs. Bogs, Hogs, Logs, Frogs, and
Company, some fifteen or twenty young gentlemen piously inclined.
But our man of business is in no hurry to conclude a contract
with any—no man of business is ever precipitate—and it is not
until the most rigid catechism in respect to the piety of each
young gentleman’s inclination, that his services are engaged and
his fifty dollars receipted for, just by way of proper
precaution, on the part of the respectable firm of Bogs, Hogs,
Logs, Frogs, and Company. On the morning of the first day of the
next month, the landlady does not present her bill, according to
promise—a piece of neglect for which the comfortable head of the
house ending in ogs would no doubt have chided her severely,
could he have been prevailed upon to remain in town a day or two
for that purpose.
As it is, the constables have had a sad time of it, running
hither and thither, and all they can do is to declare the man of
business most emphatically, a “hen knee high”—by which some
persons imagine them to imply that, in fact, he is n. e. i.—by
which again the very classical phrase _non est inventus_, is
supposed to be understood. In the meantime the young gentlemen,
one and all, are somewhat less piously inclined than before,
while the landlady purchases a shilling’s worth of the Indian
rubber, and very carefully obliterates the pencil memorandum that
some fool has made in her great family Bible, on the broad margin
of the Proverbs of Solomon.