Sharp glanced the driver at Bangs; then said, “What scared me of goin’ was this, d’ye see,— I’d a friend in New York, whose letters I read; And he wrote: In the whole of your country, He ’ad looked the biggest graveyards through, Looked ’em through with uncommon keer, But never ’ad come to a single view Of a cove[10] as wos aged fifty year. “And as this is the case in hevery State, I think there’s nothink on hearth for cure’n A chap hof a fancy to hemigrate Like readin’ of them graveyards of yourn. So I thought I’d rather perlong my breath, Tho’ sometimes here a fellow they hangs”—— “You are right, my friend. Choose your own way of death, _I_ go in for that,” said Professor Bangs. “But I see you have not understood Why no aged person is ever found Among us. We only want _young_ blood On our driving, thriving, Yankee ground. Youth alone has the power to go it; Old men are a drag on putting it through, So we kill them off—and our tombstones show it— Before they arrive at forty-two.” Here the driver gave a long _cher_—_rup_! And gazed at the Yankee, dark and wan, As if he had woke the wrong passenger up While calmly Professor Bangs went on: “In walking up and down Broadway, Large mourning sign-boards at times appear With this inscription in letters grey— ‘_Elderly persons extinguished here_.’ “And they put in your hand a pamphlet small, Adapted to people of different stations, Which cites the law, and exhorts them all _To dismiss in peace_ their old relations. ‘Why let them linger in a vale,’ It states, ‘where often colds they catch? Send them to _us_, and we’ll end the tale With politeness, humanity, and dispatch.’ “‘N.B.—For those who would die by the trigger We’ve a merciful man who’s a practised shot, With an elegant room, and a careful nigger To lay them genteelly out on the spot. Our principal has a chemist of fame, Whom he exclusively employs on Those who set their checks on a different game And like to pass to heaven by poison.’ “’Tis thus the ladies generally choose it; They love to die without pain or pangs By a nice little globule—who could refuse it? None but a man,” said Professor Bangs. “A _saw buck_ extra they always charge For the stylish mode of extinguishing breath. A saw buck’s ten dollars. It’s rather large, But then it ensures you a _cocktail_ death.” “Vot may that be?” said the driver, meekly, In the tone of a greatly altered man. I observed that he seemed to be growing weakly Since the Professor his story began. “A cocktail’s a tipple—America vaunts of it— So flavoured, so foamy, so spiced, and whirled, That he who can get as much as he wants of it Very soon drinks himself out of the world.