rave without limit against Mormons. These uncomfortable
Christians do not like humor. They dread it as a certain
personage is said to dread holy water, and for the same
reason that thieves fear policemen--it finds them out. When
these good idiots heard Artemus offer if they did not like
the lecture in Piccadilly, to give them free tickets for the
same lecture in California, when he next visited that
country, they turned to each other indignantly, and said,
"What use are tickets for California to US? WE are not
going to California. No! we are too good, too respectable
to go so far from home. The man is a fool!" One of these
vestrymen complained to the doorkeeper, and denounced the
lecturer as an impostor--"and," said the wealthy
parishioner, "as for the panorama, it is the worst painted
thing I ever saw."

During the lecture Artemus was always as solemn as the
grave. Sometimes he would seem to forget his audience, and
stand for several seconds gazing intently at his panorama.
Then he would start up and remark apologetically, "I am very
fond of looking at my pictures." His dress was always the
same--evening toilet. His manners were polished, and his
voice gentle and hesitating. Many who had read of the man
who spelled joke with a "g," looked for a smart old man with
a shrewd cock eye, dressed in vulgar velvet and gold, and
they were hardly prepared to see the accomplished gentleman
with slim physique and delicate white hands.

The letters of Artemus Ward in "Punch" from the tomb of
Shakspeare and the London Tower, had made him famous in