What o'clock is it?
Old Saying.

   Every body knows, in a general way, that the
finest place in the world is -- or, alas! was -- the
Dutch borough of Vondervotteimittiss. Yet, as it lies
some distance from any of the main roads, being in
a somewhat out of the way situation, there are, per-
haps, very few of my readers who have ever paid it
a visit. For the benefit of those who have not, there-
fore, it will be only proper that I should enter into
some account of it. And this is, indeed, the more
evident, as with the hope of enlisting public sympathy
in behalf of the inhabitants, I design here to give a
history of the calamitous events which have so lately
occurred within the limits. No one who knows me
will doubt that the duty thus self-imposed will be
executed to the best of my ability, with all that rigid
impartiality, all that cautious examination into facts,
and diligent collation of authorities which should ever
distinguish him who aspires to the title of historian.

   By the united aid of medals, manuscripts, and
inscriptions, I am enabled to say positively that the
borough of Vondervotteimittiss has existed, from its

   Touching the derivation of the name Vondervot-
teimittiss, I confess myself, with sorrow, equally at
fault. Among a multitude of opinions upon this deli-
cate point, some acute, some learned, some sufficiently
the reverse, I am able to select nothing which ought
to be considered satisfactory. Perhaps the idea of
Grogswigg, nearly coincident with that of Krouta-
plenttey, is to be cautiously preferred. It runs --
"Vondervotteimittiss: Vonder, lege Donder: Vottei-
mittiss, quasi und Bleitziz -- Bleitziz obsol: pro
Blitzen." This derivation, to say the truth, is still
countenanced by some traces of the electric fluid
evident on the summit of the steeple of the House of
the Town-Council. I do not choose, however, to
commit myself on a theme of such importance, and
must refer the reader desirous of further information
to the "Oratiunculae de Rebus Praeter-Veteris" of
Dundergutz. See, also, Blunderbuzzard "De Deri-
vationibus," pp. 27 to 5010, Folio Gothic edit., Red
and Black character, Catch-word and No Cypher --
wherein consult, also, marginal notes in the autograph
of Stuffundpuff, with the Sub-Commentaries of Grunt-
undguzzell.

   Notwithstanding the obscurity which thus envelops
the date of the foundation of Vondervotteimittiss,
and the derivation of its name, there can be no
doubt, as I said before, that it has always existed as
we find it at this epoch. The oldest man in the
borough can remember not the slightest difference in
the appearance of any portion of it, and, indeed, the
very suggestion of such a possibility is considered an
insult. The site of the village is in a perfectly cir-
cular valley, of about a quarter of a mile in circum-
ference, and entirely surrounded by gentle hills, over
whose summit the people have never yet ventured
to pass. For this they assign the very good reason
that they do not believe there is anything at all on
the other side.

   Round the skirts of the valley, (which is quite
level, and paved throughout with flat tiles,) extends a
continuous row of sixty little houses. These, having
their backs on the hills, must look, of course, to the
centre of the plain, which is just sixty yards from
the front door of each dwelling. Every house has a
small garden before it, with circular paths, a sun-
dial, and twenty-four cabbages. The buildings
themselves are all so precisely alike, that one can in
no manner be distinguished from the other. Owing
to their vast antiquity, the style of architecture is
somewhat odd -- but is not for that reason the less
strikingly picturesque. They are fashioned of hard-
burned little bricks, red, with black ends, so that the
walls look like chess-boards upon a great scale. The
gables are turned to the front, and there are cornices

   The dwellings are as much alike inside as out,
and the furniture is all upon one plan. The floors
are of square tiles, the tables and chairs of black-
looking wood with thin crooked legs and puppy feet.
The mantel-pieces are wide and high, and have not
only time-pieces and cabbages sculptured over the
front, but a real time-piece, which makes a prodi-
gious tickling, on top in the middle, with a flower
pot containing a cabbage standing on each extremity
by way of outrider. Between each cabbage and the
time-piece again, is a little china man having a big
belly, with a great round hole in it, through which is
seen the dial-plate of a watch.

   The fire-places are large and deep, with fierce
crooked-looking fire-dogs. There is constantly a
rousing fire, and a huge pot over it full of sauer-kraut
and pork, to which the good woman of the house is
always busy in attending. She is a little fat old
lady, with blue eyes and a red face, and wears a

   The boys themselves are, all three of them, in the
garden attending the pig. They are each two feet
in height. They have three-cornered cocked hats,
purple waistcoats reaching down to their thighs,
buckskin knee-breeches, red woollen stockings, heavy
shoes with big silver buckles, and long surtout coats
with large buttons of mother-of-pearl. Each, too,
has a pipe in his mouth, and a dumpy little watch in
his right hand. He takes a puff and a look, and
then a look and a puff. The pig, which is corpulent
and lazy, is occupied now in picking up the stray
leaves that fall from the cabbages, and now in giving
a kick behind at the gilt repeater which the urchins
have also tied to his tail, in order to make him look
as handsome as the cat.

   Right at the front door, in a high-backed leather-

   This object is situated in the steeple of the House
of the Town-Council. The Town-Council are all
very little round intelligent men with big saucer eyes
and fat double chins, and have their coats much
longer and their shoe-buckles much bigger than the
ordinary inhabitants of Vondervotteimittiss. Since
my sojourn in the borough they have had several
special meetings, and have adopted the three import-
ant resolutions --

   "That it is wrong to alter the good old course of
things" --

   "That there is nothing tolerable out of Vonder-
votteimittiss

   And "That we will stick by our clocks and our
cabbages."

   Above the session room of the Council is the

   The great clock has seven faces, one in each of
the seven sides of the steeple, so that it can be readily
seen from all quarters. Its faces are large and white,
and its hands heavy and black. There is a belfry-
man whose sole duty is to attend it; but this duty is
the most perfect of sinecures, for the clock of Von-
dervotteimittiss was never yet known to have any-
thing the matter with it. Until lately the bare sup-
position of such a thing was considered heretical.
From the remotest period of antiquity to which the
archives have reference, the hours have been regu-
larly struck by the big bell. And indeed the case is
just the same with all the other clocks and watches in
the borough. Never was such a place for keeping
the true time. When the large clapper thought
proper to say "twelve o'clock!" all its obedient fol-
lowers opened their throats simultaneously, and
responded like a very echo. In short, the good
burghers were fond of their sauer-kraut, but then
they were proud of their clocks.

   All people who hold sinecure offices are held in
more or less respect, and as the belfry-man of Von-
dervotteimittiss has the most perfect of sinecures, he
is the most perfectly respected of any man in the
world. He is the chief dignitary of the borough,

   I have thus painted the happy estate of Vonder-
votteimittiss -- alas! that so fair a picture should
ever experience a reverse!

   There has been long a saying among the wisest
inhabitants that "no good can come from over the
hills," and it really seemed that the words had in
them something of the spirit of prophecy. It wanted
five minutes of noon, on the day before yesterday,
when there appeared a very odd-looking object on
the summit of the ridge to the eastward. Such an
occurrence, of course, attracted universal attention,
and every little old gentleman who sat in a leather-
bottomed arm-chair turned one of his eyes with a
stare of dismay upon the phenomenon, still keeping
the other upon the clock in the steeple.

   By the time that it wanted only three minutes of
noon the droll object in question was clearly per-
ceived to be a very diminutive foreign-looking young
man. He descended the hills at a great rate, so that
every body had soon a good look at him. He was
really the most finnicky little personage that had ever
been seen in Vondervotteimittiss. His countenance
was of a dark snuff colour, and he had a long hooked
nose, pea eyes, a wide mouth, and an excellent set
of teeth, which latter he seemed anxious of display-