Page:The Southern Literary Messenger - Minor.djvu/166

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148
The Southern

two leading journals of St. Louis, A. B. Chambers, of the Republican (Whig), and Shadrack Penn, of the Democrat. The positions of these two papers have become reversed. Mr. Penn was a very heavy man, and a great humorist; so that wherever he was a crowd flocked around him to hear his jokes. The mate kept his weights rolling about from place to place, but could not keep his boat in trim. At length he discovered that Mr. Penn was the cause of it. He politely took charge of that weighty gentleman, placed him where it was desirable and the difficulty was removed.

The editor had in St. Louis an A-l time and made as much as possible of the Western part of his new title. Years afterwards, he renewed most agreeably two of the acquaintances he then formed. Mr. Thomas Allen was once a political editor in the "city of magnificent distances." He once remarked, in St. Louis, that he was holding thirteen presidencies: two of these were of The Iron Mountain R. R. Co. and of the first University Club. He has passed away, highly honored. The other, James E. Yeatman, still lives and is as urbane, upright and cultured as he is venerable. "Richard Carvel" is dedicated to him by its admiring author. In 1845, his mother, then Mrs. John Bell, of Nashville, was visiting him. She would have graced the White House, if Mr.