ships into which the counties are divided, an outrageously absurd jumble of words has been fastened upon too many of them. It ought to be a crime little short of high treason, to give such names to habitable places; we have Ovids and Milos, Spartas and Hectors, mixed up with Smithvilles, and Stokesvilles, New Palmyras, New Herculaneums, Romes and Carthages, and all these by the dozen; for not content with fixing an absurd name upon one spot, it is most carefully repeated in twenty more, with the aggravating addition of all the points of the compass tacked to it.
We cannot wonder that such gratuitous good-nature in providing a subject of merriment to the Old World should not have been thrown away. The laugh was early raised at our expense. As long ago as 1825, some lines in heroic verse, as a model for the imitation of our native poets, appeared in one of the English Reviews.
| “ | Ye plains where sweet Big-Muddy rolls along, |
| And Teapot, one day to be found in song, | |
| Where Swans on Biscuit, and on Grindstone glide, | |
| And willows wave upon Good-Woman's side!” | |
| ******* | |
| “ | Blest bards who in your amorous verses call |
| On murmuring Pork, and gentle Cannon-Ball, | |
| Split-Rock, and Stick-Lodge, and Two-Thousand-Mile, | |
| White-Lime, and Cupboard, and Bad-Humored Isle.” | |
| ******* | |
| “ | Isis with Rum and Onion must not vie, |
| Cam shall resign the palm to Blowing-Fly, | |
| And Thames and Tagus yield to Great-Big-Little-Dry!” | |
Retaliation is but an indifferent defence, and is seldom needed,
