HENRY CLAY LUKENS.
The New York Daily News, like all other first-class journals, possesses its paragrapher. In the person of Henry Clay Lukens, the News has for many years had a valuable contributor, and one of the best humorous writers in America. Under the name of Erratic Enrique, he has written early and late, noon, morning, and night, and, in fact, about all the time.
Lukens is of Dutch ancestry. He was born in Germantown, near Philadelphia, on the 18th day of August, 1838. His first newspaper enterprise was a monthly publication issued in his native city, during the winter of 1857. For this paper, George Alfred Townsend wrote some of his first articles. Lukens worked at his journalistic profession for many years in different States in the Union.
In 1874 he went to South America, where he remained as a traveling correspondent for nearly two years. While there he wrote interesting letters to the Danbury News and the St. John (New Brunswick) Torch, under the quaint pseudonym of Erratic Enrique. He also wrote forvarious other American journals under the same name.
It was not until March, 1877, that Henry Clay Lukens settled down to steady work on a daily newspaper. He then associated himself with the sprightly little News, with which paper he has ever since been connected. He originated a column of humor called Pith and Point, which has brought both the paper and himself into prominence. It is said he has not missed a week’s labor since his first day’s connection with the News. He is one of the few hard-worked city journalists.
Early in 1881, he began a series of articles, entitled Sanctum Sketches, in Hubbard’s Advertiser, of New Haven, Connecticut. In this series of articles he produced the biographies of six or eight well known paragraphers. He is also a regular contributor to several weekly and monthly periodicals.
Lukens is quite inclined to poetry, and at times jingles some very clever and witty rhymes. The following is from his pen:
ESPRIT MALIN.
What hideous yell assails my ear?Whose shuffling feet distract my nerves?Insatiate demon, nothing servesTo clinch thy clutch! All day I hear,“More copy!”My brain’s a-whirl, my senses swim—What cares the screeching imp for that?He’s got two words, so tonguey pat,He slits the air with vocal vim,“More copy!”A sapient smirk illumes his phiz—He feels his power, and grinning grips,The ink-wet pages, scissored slips,And cabled specials; that’s his “biz”—“More copy!”Intense disgust has hobbled hate,Else would I slay this vampire scorned.Though neither cloven-toed nor horned,His devilish yawpings ne’er abate—“More copy!”
What hideous yell assails my ear?Whose shuffling feet distract my nerves?Insatiate demon, nothing servesTo clinch thy clutch! All day I hear,“More copy!”My brain’s a-whirl, my senses swim—What cares the screeching imp for that?He’s got two words, so tonguey pat,He slits the air with vocal vim,“More copy!”A sapient smirk illumes his phiz—He feels his power, and grinning grips,The ink-wet pages, scissored slips,And cabled specials; that’s his “biz”—“More copy!”Intense disgust has hobbled hate,Else would I slay this vampire scorned.Though neither cloven-toed nor horned,His devilish yawpings ne’er abate—“More copy!”
What hideous yell assails my ear?Whose shuffling feet distract my nerves?Insatiate demon, nothing servesTo clinch thy clutch! All day I hear,“More copy!”
What hideous yell assails my ear?
Whose shuffling feet distract my nerves?
Insatiate demon, nothing serves
To clinch thy clutch! All day I hear,
“More copy!”
My brain’s a-whirl, my senses swim—What cares the screeching imp for that?He’s got two words, so tonguey pat,He slits the air with vocal vim,“More copy!”
My brain’s a-whirl, my senses swim—
What cares the screeching imp for that?
He’s got two words, so tonguey pat,
He slits the air with vocal vim,
“More copy!”
A sapient smirk illumes his phiz—He feels his power, and grinning grips,The ink-wet pages, scissored slips,And cabled specials; that’s his “biz”—“More copy!”
A sapient smirk illumes his phiz—
He feels his power, and grinning grips,
The ink-wet pages, scissored slips,
And cabled specials; that’s his “biz”—
“More copy!”
Intense disgust has hobbled hate,Else would I slay this vampire scorned.Though neither cloven-toed nor horned,His devilish yawpings ne’er abate—“More copy!”
Intense disgust has hobbled hate,
Else would I slay this vampire scorned.
Though neither cloven-toed nor horned,
His devilish yawpings ne’er abate—
“More copy!”
ERRATICS.It is not so very painful to lose a fortune as it is to hear what your neighbors will say about it afterwards.When the prodigal son comes home they no longer kill the fatted calf for him. They just turn the animal into a vaccine farm and give him the profits.A new serial yarn by Besant and Rice is entitled, All Sorts and Conditions of Men. The plot is probably worked out in the caucus room of a delegates convention.“Man Reading,” a picture by Meissonier, has been sold for $10,000. It was cheap as dirt. The man reading was an editor with a contributionwritten on both sides of the paper, and spontaneously interlined besides.Our agricultural contemporary, the Herald, has a learned and highly interesting article on “Our Codfish Culture.” We trust it may be followed by another, equally able, on “Our Goat Fisheries.” Both are subjects of intense and universal concern.
ERRATICS.
It is not so very painful to lose a fortune as it is to hear what your neighbors will say about it afterwards.
When the prodigal son comes home they no longer kill the fatted calf for him. They just turn the animal into a vaccine farm and give him the profits.
A new serial yarn by Besant and Rice is entitled, All Sorts and Conditions of Men. The plot is probably worked out in the caucus room of a delegates convention.
“Man Reading,” a picture by Meissonier, has been sold for $10,000. It was cheap as dirt. The man reading was an editor with a contributionwritten on both sides of the paper, and spontaneously interlined besides.
Our agricultural contemporary, the Herald, has a learned and highly interesting article on “Our Codfish Culture.” We trust it may be followed by another, equally able, on “Our Goat Fisheries.” Both are subjects of intense and universal concern.