Excerpt from Robert Merry's Museum, Vol. 17 ET us begin at the beginning. It is New Year's Day, and this is the comn'encement of a new volume of the museum. We enter upon our task with a cheerful hope that, in case our life be spared, we may continue to hold communion with our friends as heretofore and that we may be able to tell them some pleasant stories, crack a few pretty good jokes, let off some fireworks. Of fancy, distribute some original and some borrowed bouquets of poetic flowers, impart now and then a useful hint, and occasionally bestow a little useful knowledge. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.