Sketches New and Old


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THE END  
The Capitoline Venus is still in the Capitol at Rome, and is still the  
most charming and most illustrious work of ancient art the world can  
boast of. But if ever it shall be your fortune to stand before it and go  
into the customary ecstasies over it, don't permit this true and secret  
history of its origin to mar your bliss--and when you read about a  
gigantic Petrified man being dug up near Syracuse, in the State of New  
York, or near any other place, keep your own counsel--and if the Barnum  
that buried him there offers to sell to you at an enormous sum, don't you buy.  
Send him to the Pope!  
[
NOTE.--The above sketch was written at the time the famous swindle of  
the "Petrified Giant" was the sensation of the day in the United States]  
SPEECH ON ACCIDENT INSURANCE  
287  


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