At length the old magician -LRB- for I compared the showman to Prospero entertaining his guests with a masque of shadows -RRB- paused that I might give utterance to my wonder . `` What an admirable piece of work is this ! '' exclaimed I , lifting up my hands in astonishment . Indeed , I liked the spectacle and was tickled with the old man 's gravity as he presided at it , for I had none of that foolish wisdom which reproves every occupation that is not useful in this world of vanities . If there be a faculty which I possess more perfectly than most men , it is that of throwing myself mentally into situations foreign to my own and detecting with a cheerful eye the desirable circumstances of each . I could have envied the life of this gray-headed showman , spent as it had been in a course of safe and pleasurable adventure in driving his huge vehicle sometimes through the sands of Cape Cod and sometimes over the rough forest-roads of the north and east , and halting now on the green before a village meeting-house and now in a paved square of the metropolis . How often must his heart have been gladdened by the delight of children as they viewed these animated figures , or his pride indulged by haranguing learnedly to grown men on the mechanical powers which produced such wonderful effects , or his gallantry brought into play -- for this is an attribute which such grave men do not lack -- by the visits of pretty maidens ! And then with how fresh a feeling must he return at intervals to his own peculiar home ! `` I would I were assured of as happy a life as his , '' thought I. Though the showman 's wagon might have accommodated fifteen or twenty spectators , it now contained only himself and me and a third person , at whom I threw a glance on entering . He was a neat and trim young man of two or three and twenty ; his drab hat and green frock-coat with velvet collar were smart , though no longer new , while a pair of green spectacles that seemed needless to his brisk little eyes gave him something of a scholar-like and literary air . After allowing me a sufficient time to inspect the puppets , he advanced with a bow and drew my attention to some books in a corner of the wagon . These he forthwith began to extol with an amazing volubility of well-sounding words and an ingenuity of praise that won him my heart as being myself one of the most merciful of critics . Indeed , his stock required some considerable powers of commendation in the salesman . There were several ancient friends of mine -- the novels of those happy days when my affections wavered between the Scottish Chiefs and Thomas Thumb -- besides a few of later date whose merits had not been acknowledged by the public . I was glad to find that dear little venerable volume the New England Primer , looking as antique as ever , though in its thousandth new edition ; a bundle of superannuated gilt picture-books made such a child of me that , partly for the glittering covers and partly for the fairy-tales within , I bought the whole , and an assortment of ballads and popular theatrical songs drew largely on my purse . To balance these expenditures , I meddled neither with sermons nor science nor morality , though volumes of each were there , nor with a Life of Franklin in the coarsest of paper , but so showily bound that it was emblematical of the doctor himself in the court-dress which he refused to wear at Paris , nor with Webster 's spelling-book , nor some of Byron 's minor poems , nor half a dozen little Testaments at twenty-five cents each . Thus far the collection might have been swept from some great bookstore or picked up at an evening auction-room , but there was one small blue-covered pamphlet which the pedler handed me with so peculiar an air that I purchased it immediately at his own price ; and then for the first time the thought struck me that I had spoken face to face with the veritable author of a printed book . The literary-man now evinced a great kindness for me , and I ventured to inquire which way he was travelling . `` Oh , '' said he , `` I keep company with this old gentlemen here , and we are moving now toward the camp-meeting at Stamford . '' He then explained to me that for the present season he had rented a corner of the wagon as a book-store , which , as he wittily observed , was a true circulating library , since there were few parts of the country where it had not gone its rounds .
I approved of the plan exceedingly , and began to sum up within my mind the many uncommon felicities in the life of a book-pedler , especially when his character resembled that of the individual XXXXX me .
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