M^k^L^L ■.■■^•v.;ri'i'!v;^=v^ .'^v Oiininmzni ^ s. mw tm i m ¥^ t - •- , ,■■ 'm^^\:mr.^m:.«jr»?JW?c«r. ► • ^ » "Have you never seen a village country belle, starting on a traveling trip, dressed in more colors than you can crowd into a chromo, enter a railroad car, with head up and plumes flying, expecting to set every woman in that car wild with envy as she walks down the aisle ?" — See page 100. By ROBERT J. BURDETTE, [THE "BURLLNGTCN KAWKSYE » I/IAN.] ^. XEW YORK ; G, l^V, Carletoii & Co., Publishers^ MADISON SQUARE. MDCCCLXXX. COPYRIGHT, 1879, BY «. W. CAKLETON & CO. Samuel Stoddeb, Tro-w Stereotyper, Frinting a>-d Book Binding Co. SO AiiN Street, N. Y. N. Y. PREFACE. Will the coining man drink ? Will the coming man smoke? Will the coming humorist require a creface for his book ? These are the paramount problems of the time, pedestrian matches aside, and, between you and me, esteemed reader, I should like to know what you are going to do about it, anyway ? There are books and books, and, if my publisher is to be believed, this tome is to consume at least eight cords of tinted calendered paper, and six million yards of that extraordinary fabric, known as muslin to the initiated. Well, it ought — if the quantity of yards of muslin bears any reasonable proportion to the number of lamps of midnight oil the author has consumed in rescuing from the ruthless hands of the provincial press the children of his brain and pen. It's a wise child that knows his own father, and it's a wiser paragraph that knows its own author, after it has flitted from Burlington to Boston and back, through the media of the exchanges, to say nothing VI PREFACE. of the "outsides." It hns long been the writer's intention to present, in ii popular form, a compilatioa of his sketches ; and, at last, here they are, arranged like a table cVIiote dinner, in courses ! The bill of fare, if not extensive or very varied, offers, il is to be hoped, that variety of contrast that a well-considered repast should afford. When wearied of the soup of " Sketches," the reader, if not already sated, mav find a mo'ie substantial course in our "Whims ;" and by way of an entree we have sand- wiched in " Information and Gossip," for the possible delectation of the casual reader. The dessert es- pecially celebrates the classics ; and, if Homer were alive now, aiul running for foreign minister, like the other " d — d literary fellars," as Simon would put it, we feel he would pledge us at least one " go " of nec- tar on our fourth' course. But, after all, a book of humor is not a dinner. Rather, it is like a Japanese play, to be consummated only at many leisure sittings, not surrounded in fifteen minutes, after the manner of the American maw. We guess we'll call our book a play, and don't — if you will permit us to make a suggestion, for we know how it is ourselves — don't take more than an act a day, as it were. Give the Simon Pure a chance. B. IIAWKEYE. CONTEXTS. SCEXES FROM REAL LIFE. TAGS My Givi^if*th.,r's Cl^ck 13 Tiiirty Minutes of Agony 17 Sitting Bull's Joke 28 Another Broken Engagement 29 The Picnic Man 34 After Election Day 37 A Sunday Afternoon Institute 38 The Read and Unread Leaves 47 An Object of Interest 51 Spell " Cud " 52 Tit for Tat 54 Raising a Church Debt 55 The Ethics of Bung-holes 59 The Compositor Fiend 60 The Lege.nd of the Drummuh 62 A Legend of Araby 66 What are we Here For ? 69 The Boys and the Apples 70 Rules for Poultry Novices 75 Lines to a Hen 78 [vii] Viii CONTENTS. PAGB Getting my Hair Trimmed SO Mr. ]\Iarchemont's Experience ^'^ Cleaning House ^^ The Chinese Question S^ A True Fable ^^ Sticking to It ^1 Fiat Money ^^ ON THE RAIL.— THE WHIMS OF TRAVEL. Rhymes on the Wing 93 Preaching v. Practice 94 The Start 95 " Rogers and I " 97 A Minnesota Poet 103 The Traveling '* Sick Man " 104 A Nice Dubuque Man lOG The Man who had Letters for his Dog 107 A Twilight Idyl 112 A Curious Stranger 113 Archaeological Wonder 117 Stuffing a Stranger 118 " I would Say You Lied " .122 The Relentless Baggage-man 123 ^ons 125 Railroading Down East 126 The Metric System 1 29 The Troubles of the Tall Man 130 CONTENTS. IX PAGB What is Milk ? 132 Too Late for a Ticket 133 Railroad Sleepers 1 35 A Disappointed Etymologist , 138 Cards v. Croquet 130 " Why Is It ?" 140 The Passing of the Train Boy 141 Hamlet 142 Lost His Pocket-book 143 A Base Flatterer , 147 Beautiful Snow (a new and revised edition) 143 Forebodings 150 Threnody 151 " PollywoUa Kowackwah " 152 The Ventilation Fiend 153 Corn-color 154 Eating on the Fly 155 A New Name for it 156 Railway Criticism 157 Uses of Rope 159 Squatter Sovereignty IGO Two Kinds of Sugar 1G4 Envoi 105 The First Button Man 1C6 Pa and the Baby 1G7 The Quiet of the Tomb 170 When He Swore 171 The Champion Dog 172 Train Manners 173 X CONTENTS. PAGB The Zephyrs of Maine ISO The Rishig Generation 181 The Amenities of Travel 183 Naming the Baby 184 A Sad Case of Whooping Cough 185 Woman Suffrage 193 Invading Missouri 193 Political Kenunciation 19G She Thought She had 'Em 197 The Advertisedest Road in the South 198 Precise Lady Teacher 199 The Romance of a Sleeping-car 200 Breaking the Tec 20-4 Privileges of Literature 203 Chiropodiau 211 A Slight Misunderstanding 212 A Vegetarian Problem 218 A Harrowing Tale 219 Shaving Against Time 223 A Feeling Feat 229 A Nocturnal Diary 230 The Shah of Persia's Debts 236 Two Daring Men 237 A Practical Man 240 A Mysterious Accident 2-46 Science v. Impulse 249 Missed His Count 05Q CONTEXTS. XI INrOR]^IATIOX, GOSSIP AND PHILOSOPHY. (In Crumbs.) PAOB The Story of Innach Garden 2o I The Merry. Merry Springtime 25G Agricultural Afflictions 259 A Blighted Census Taker 265 Poking Fun at the Native 206 Answers to Correspondents 207 The Trouble with Moody 272 Berghizing a Cat 273 The Phonograph 274 A Remarkable Cure 275 Catching the Horse-car ^ 270 Something to Boot 277 A Dire Catastrophe 278 A Tribute to " Culchaw " 279 Rules of Conduct 280 Sound and Sense 282 Romance and Reality 283 The Art of Dressing 284 The Climate of Peru 285 The Slave of Habit 285 Why Is It ? 286 Didn't Know it was Loaded 2S0 The Snow-ball Mystery 287 Paper Teeth 287 Heaven and Earth 288 XU CONTENl^. PAGB Advantages of a Free Country 288 " When Shall We Eat ?" 288 The Reason Why 289 Two Brothers 289 The Raven 289 The Phonograph, in German 290 Baggy Knees 2C0 Her Eyes 290 LITTLE CLASSICS. Historic Remh^iscences of the Eaelier Time. r^r PROSE a:sd teese. A Day at Troy 291 Nocturne 292 Recreations in Thcban Literature 294 Too Particular 296 A Grecian Circular 297 The Skirmishing Fund 298 A Miss, but a Good Line Shot 299 Recreations in Mythology 302 Insurance on the Tiber 305 The Odd I See 307 Egyptian Philosophy 309 Studies of the Antique 310 Home Life of the Ancients 312 Roman Domestic Life 313 The Pupils of Socrates 315 Hector's Last 317 SCENES FROM REAL LIFE. d' My grandfather's clock was too high for the shelf, And it reached forty feet below the floor ; And he used to take a linrhtnin;:c-rod to wind it himself, While he stood on the top of the door. It ran like a quarter horse long years 'ere he was born ; When he died it ran faster than b& fore, 13 14 • '•* • 3i^ 'gR^XDF^TII^r' S CL^CK. Adci ev, ery ; ■ time-tbat-he-beard-the tune, Tbe old — man — swore. Chorus, by tbe entire congregation : About 459,000 years witbout slumbering, Tick, tock ; tick, tock, turn, tum-tum ; turn, tura- tum ; oora-pab, oom-pab, bra-a-a-a ! "Whistling and roaring and sbrieking and thundering ! Tick, tock ; tick, tock, toot, doot, toot, de doot, tra la, la ha ha ! Ah ! Scree-ee-ee ! Whoop ! Whoop ! Wa-ba- ha-ha-ha-ba-a-a-a ! It went ! Faster ! than-ever-it-went-before, When tbe old — man — died ! Tbe man who lived down at tbe corner of tbe block, With a voice like a broad guage bassoon ; He made a bass solo of " My Grandfather's Clock," And be never sang any other tune. He sang it every morning and be sang it in tbe night. And he sang it while the congregation cried : But bis neck ; tie ; fitted-bis-neck-too tight, On the day — be — died. Chorus, by people who whistle, but can't sing, with a lingering, suspicious inflection on tbe " neck-tie " as though circumstances indicated that several men bad helped the musician to put it on : :M^ Gn^XDF^Tn^pJs CL^CK. 15 Forty-nine hours a day without slumbering, Toodle de doo, too de doo, toodle de doo tooty toot ! The multitudinous notes of the crickets outnumbering ; Toot ! Doot ! Toot ! Doot ! Toot ! ! But his neck ; tie ; wasn't-adjusted-right, On the day — he — died ! And the handsome young man who sang tenor in the choir, Was also addicted to the tune ; He used to pitch the air about twenty octaves higher Than the key-note of the man in the moon. ITis cracked notes pierced through the azure fields above. Till Olympus couldn't sleep if it tried ; But great ; Jove ; gave-one-of-his-bolts a shove. And the young — man — died ! Choeus, for first tenor voices, with a shivering kind of an intonation on the thunder, indicative of the feelings of a young man when he is struck by light- ning. Xow, then, all together I Up to high C without stumbling, Squack, squack I squack, squack ! Squack without any quavering or straining or mum- bling, Squack, squack I squack, squack ! 16 M^ G%Tq^DF^TH^R'S CLOCK. Squack-but-tbe-thun ; der ! got-migbty-close-to-tbe gronnd, On tbe da-ay — be died ! Tbere were forty million people in tbe land of our birtb, Witb voices from a squeak to a roar, And they warbled tbat tnne through the ends of tbe earth, In the church, in the car, and the store. Till the old man's ghost re-sought the glimpses of tbe moon. And be tore at bis silver flowing bair, And the old ; man ! wbenever-he-beard tbat tune, Would cavort — and — swear ! Chorus, softly, by any person of tbe company who knows the words, with old man obligato : "Ninety years without slumbering" — ? » ? f t f f ? t f t f t t » His life seconds numberin g- ! I J I I » I II I ! ! ! ! ! *'But it stopped short" ! ! f f t I f ! f I t f f f f ? THIRTY MINUTES OF AGONY. 17 THIRTY MINUTES OF AGOXY. Yesterday afternoon Mr. Jasper Thumble- dirk, who is forty-three years old and unmar- ried, dashed into our sanctum and evolved a remark, the intensity of which fairly made our blood curdle. And when he completed the re- mark, which was neither very long nor remark- ably complicated, he picked up a dictionary, hurled it at the proof-reader with great asperity, and before that good-natured and greatly-abused angel of the editorial staff could recover from his emotion and load his umbrella Mr. Thum- bledirk was gone. He dashed out of the door, missed the stairway, and stej^ped down the elevator well, falling a distance of three stories, but he was too mad and excited to get hurt, and we heard him rushing away down the alley, yelling and swearing till he was out of sight and hearing. As he is usually a very severe man, of habitual reserve, very particular and guarded in his language, we were amazed not only at his actions, but his words, for which his excited manner afforded not the slightest ex- 18 THIRTY MIXUTES OF AGOXY. planation. During the clay, however, we be- came possessed of certain facts which may give the reader some clue to the causes of this worthy and respectable citizen's violent and disrespect- ful manner and language. It appears that about two o'clock in the after- noon Mr. Thumbledirk dropped in at the Union depot, to ask some questions relative to the arrival and departure of trains, and while pass- ing through the ladies' waiting-room, he was accosted by a lady acquaintance who was going east on the T. P. & W. at half-past two. She wished to go up town to make some little pur- chases, but didn't want to take her baby out in the rain. Would Mr. Thumbledirk please hold it for her until she came back ? She wouldn't be gone more than ftve minutes, and little Ernest was just as good as an angel, and besides, he was sound asleep. Mr. Thumbledirk, with a strange flutter of his feelings, lied, and said he would be only too delighted. Then he took the baby, and the ticket-agent, who has two, knew by the manner in which the man took the baby, and looked anxiously from one end of it to the other to see which end the head was on, that he had never THIRTY :mixutes of agoxy. 19 »«fi»i5Kr handled a liiiman baby before in all his life, and promptly closed his windows to shnt out the trouble that he knew was on the eve of an erui)tion. Mr. Thumbledirk is a very tall, dignified man. He was rather annoyed, as the mother disappeared through the door, to observe that all the women in the waiting-room were intentl}^ regarding him with various expres- sions, curiosity pre- dominating. He sat down and bent his arms at the elbows until they resembled in shape two letter Y's, with the baby ly- ing neck and heels in the angle at the elbows, and he looked, and felt that he looked, like the hideous pictures of Moloch, in the old Sunday-school books. Mr. Thumbledirk felt keenly that he was an object of curiosity and illy -repressed mirth to the women around him. Now, a dignified man A TRYING SITUATION. 20 THIRTY MINUTES OF AGONY. does not enjoy being a langliing-stock for any- body, and it is especially humiliating for him to feel that he appears ridiculous in the eyes of ^ women. This feeling is intensified when the man is a bachelor, and knows he is a little awkward and ill at ease in the presence of women, anyhow, So, as he gazed upon the face of the quiet sleeping infant, he made an insane effort to appear perfectly easy, and, to create the impression that he was an old mar- ried man and the father of twenty-six children, he disengaged one arm, and chucked the baby under the chin. About such a chuck as you always feel like giving a boy with a "putty blower" or a " pea shooter." It knocked the little rosebud of a mouth shut so quick and close the baby couldn't catch its breath for three minutes, and Mr. Thumbledirk thought, with a strange, terrible sinking of the heart, that it was just possible he might have overdone the thing. A short young woman in a kilt skirt and a pretty face, sitting directly opposite him, said, " Oh !" in a mild kind of a shriek, and then giggled ; a tall, thin woman in a black bombazine dress and a gray shawl, and an angular woman in a calico THIRTY MINUTES OF AGONY. 21 dress and a sun-bonnet, gasped, "Why ?" in a startled duet ; a fat \s'oinan with a small herd of children and a market-basket shouted "Well !" and then immediately clapped her plump hands over her mouth as though the exclama- tion had been startled from her, and a tall, raw-boned woman who wore horn spectacles and talked bass, said "The poor Iambi" in such sepulchral tones that everybody else laughed, and Mr. Thumbledirk, who didu t just exactly know whether she meant him or the baby, blushed scarlet, and felt his face grow so hot he could smell his hair. And his soul was filled with such gloomy forebodings that all the future looked dark to him. The baby opened its blue eyes wider than any man who never owned a baby would have believed it i^ossible, and stared at Mr. Thum- bledirk with an expression of alarm, and a general lack of contidence, that boded a dis- tressing want of harmony in all further pro- ceedings. Mr. Thumbledirk, viewing these signs of restlessness with inward alarm, con- ceived the happy idea that the baby needed a change of iDosition. So he stood it ux)on its feet. 22 THIRTY MINUTES OF AGONY. It is unnecessary to tell any mother of a family that by the execution of this apparently very simple movement, the unhappy man had every thread of that baby's clothes under its arms and around its neck in an instant. A general but suppressed giggle went around tlie room. Mr. Thumbledirk blushed, redder and hotter than ever, and the astonished baby, after one horrified look at its strange guardian, v/him- pered uneasily. Mr. Thumbledirk, not daring to risk the sound of his own voice, would have danced the baby up and down, but its little legs bent them- selves into such aiipalling crescents the first time he let the cherub's weight upon them, that the wretched man knew in his heart of hearts tliat he had forever and eternally most hopelessly "bowed" them, and felt that he could never again look a bow-legged man in the face without a spasm of remorse. As for meeting the father of this beautiful boy, whose life he had blighted with a pair of crooked legs — never, he would face death itself first. And iu coming years, whenever he met this boy waddling to school on a pair of legs like ice- THIRTY ^IINUTES OF AGONY. 23 tongs, be would gaze upon them as liis own guilty work, and would tremble lest the v/ratli of the avenging gods should fall upon him. Alarmed at the gloomy shadows which these distressing thoughts cast over Mr. Thumbledirk's face, the baby drew itself up into a knot and wailed. Mr. Thumbledirk balanced it carefully on his hands and dandled it, for all the world as he would "heft"' a watermelon. Instantly the baby straightened itself out with such alarming celerity that the tortured dry nurse caught it by the heels just in time to save it from falling to the floor. ''He'll kill that child yet," said the gloomy woman who talked bass, and Mr. Thumbledirk felt the blood curdle in cold waves in his veins. By this time the baby was screaming like a calliope, and the noise added inexpressibly to Mr. Thumbledirk' s confusion and distress. He would have trotted the baby on his knee, but the attempt occasioned too much comment. The fat woman ^vith the market-basket said : "Oh-h, the little dear!" And the short, pretty woman snapped her eyes, and said : " Oh h-h I how cruel I" 24 THIRTY MIjS'UTES OF AGOXY. And the woman in the black bombazine, and the woman in the sun-bonnet said : ^' Oh-h-h ! just look at him !" And the woman who tallved bass said, in her most sepulchral and jpenetrating accents : "The man's a fool." And the baby itself, utterly ignoring the fact that Mr. Thumbledirk was laboring in its own interests, threw all the obstruction it could in the way of further proceedings by alter- nately^ straightening itself out into an abnormal condition of such appalling rigidity, that Mr. Thumbledirk was obliged to hold its head tightly in one hand and its heels in the other, and then suddenly doubling itself up into so small a knot that the ix)or man had to hold his two hands close together, like a bowl, and hold the baby as he would hold a pint of sand ; and these transitions from the one extreme to the other were made with such startling rapidity and appalling suddenness, that Mr. Tliumbledirk had to be constantly on the alert ; and his arms ached so, and he exhibited such signs of fatigue and distress that the depot policeman looked in to say to hira that if he was tired out, he would THIRTY MIXUTE3 OF AGOXY. 25 send in a section hand or the steam shovel to give him a spell. It seemed to Mr. Thumbledirk that he never heard so much noise come from so small a baby in his life. The more he turned it around and tossed it about the more its cloak, and dress, and skirts and things became entangled around its neck, and now and then the mass of drapery would get over the baby's face and stifle its cries for a second, but the noise would come out stronger than ever when the tossing little hands would tear away the obstruction. And the louder the baby screamed the faster the vig- orous, fat legs flew, kicking in every direction, like crazy fly-wheels with the rim off. Some- times Mr. Thumbledirk made as high as a hun- dred and eighty grabs a minute at those legs and never touched one of them. He was hot and blind and wild with terror and confusion. Once he tried to sing to the baby, but when he quavered out a "Hootchy, pootchy, puddin' and pie," the women laughed, all but the gloomy woman who talked bass— she sniffled, and he stopped. He gave the baby his pearl- handled knife, and the innocent threw it into the stove. He gave it his gold watch, and it 26 THIRTY MINUTES OF AGONY. dashed it on the floor. He gave it his emerald scarf-pin, and the baby put it into its mouth. The pretty woman screamed. The sad woman in the bombazine shrieked. The angular woman in the sun-bonnet yelled, *'0h, mercy on us !" The fat woman with the market-basket called wildly for a doctor. The gloomy woman who talked bass shouted hoarsely, ''He's killed it!" And Mr. Thumbledirk hooked his finger into that child's mouth and choked it until its face was purple and black, trying to find that x>in. And Mr. Thumbledirk couldn't hear even the chattering women. It beat the air with its clenched fists, and thrashed and kicked with its fat bare legs, and wailed, and howled, and choked, and screamed, and doubled up and straightened out until Mr. Thumbledirk, steel- ing his nerves to the awiul effort, clasped the screaming baby in his arms and rose to his feet. He was going to go out and throw himself and the baby under the first train that came along. THIRTY MINUTES OF AGONY. 27 The baby's mother sprang in through the door like an angel of mercy. She took the baby in her arms and with one slight motion of one hand had its raiment straightened oat so exquisitely smooth there wasn' t a wrinkle in it. The baby lay in her arms as placid, quiet, flexible, graceful and contented as a dream of Paradise. The mother thanked Mr. Thumbledirk for the agony and torture he had endured so pa- tiently for her — this was the way she thanked him. She did not look at him. She looked straight out of the window with a stony glare, and said, in tones that made the thermometer shiver : '* Mr. Thumbledirk isn't a very good nurse, is he, baby f All the women smiled, except the gloomy woman who talked bass. She nodded approv- ingly. The baby looked up into Mr. Thumbledirk' s face and laughed aloud. What Mr. Thumbledirk said when he dashed in at the sanctum last evening was this : "By the avenging daughters of Night, the 28 SITTING bull's JOKE. everlasting, snake-haired Erynnes, the terror- haunted shades never knew the horrors that haunt the soul of a sensible single man that tries to take care of some other fool's howling, squalling, squirming baby 1" SITTIXG BULL'S JOKE. Sitting Bull never perpetrated but one joke. That was one day last autumn, when he sat down on a cluster of clover, in which there lingered the bumble bee of all bumble bees. The petulant insect prodded the warrior with a sting that marked one hundred and ninety de- grees in the coolest x)lace, and with a mighty howl the chieftain rose up in the air and felt around for his tormentor. '' Now is the winter of our discontent,-' he said, holding the writh- ing bee up in his thumb and finger, " this is the Indian s hummer.*' And no one laughed and no one said anything, nor asked him to say it again and say it real slow, and the forest mon- arch withdrew his card from the paragraphers' association, and never joked again. ANOTHER BROKEN ENGAGEMENT. 29 ANOTHER BROKEN ENGAGEMENT. Not that Mr. Jasman was particularly bash- ful, for a young man. On the other hand, he rather prided himself on his natural, unspoiled, inartificial manner. But he lacked presence of mind. He was easy and free in his manner so long as everything went off well, but any little incident out of the ordinary run of events upset him, and left him helplessly floundering in a slough of unutterable, because not proper to be uttered, thoughts and sentiments. Last Sunday afternoon Mr. Jasman strolled out to enjoy the air, and for the further pur- pose of making a short call on Miss Whazzer- naim, who lives out on Columbia street. The day was too lovely to be mocked b}^ an overcoat even of the spring variety, and Mr. Jasman, as he sauntered up Third street, looked perfectly lovely in a jjair of lean lilac pants, short coat and helmet hat. He also wore, as is the custom with our best young men, a large yellow cane, weighing seven pounds, which tended to give him the appearance of a commercial traveler for a wood- yard, selling cord- wood by samx)le. 30 ANOTHER BPwOKEN ENGAGEMENT. He found the family all at home. They were sitting on the front stoop, taking the air, just for the novelty of sitting out-doors in De- cember. The old gentleman soon blew his hat off with a sneeze that threatened to dislocate his neck, and went in ; the old lady, in an effort that was just like it, went off into a paroxysm that sounded like the name of a Russian general in a fit, and she went in, declaring to goodness that she never, in all her born days, did. And then Mr. Jasman went up and sat down on the top stair, right at Miss AYhazzernaim's lovely number IH feet. ''Be careful where you sit, Mr. Jasman," she said, in tones whose liquid sweetness ran into Mr. Jasman' s ears and penetrated every fiber of his being like snow water gliding into a last summer shoe. But his heart sank as her remark came to a close. Like the chicken the Irishman swallowed, she had spoken too late. "The children," she said, "had been eating pears, and had scattered bits of the frait around everywhere." Mr. Jasman, as he sank upon the step, had been made aware that he sat down on some- thing. Something his heart and the sense of feel- ANOTHER BROKEX ENGAGEMENT. 31 ing told him was a soft, mellow pear. He felt it yielding to the j)ressure of his weight. He felt it spread out on the cold step until it was as big as half a water-melon. His terrors even mag- nified and distorted the dreadful reality. He knew that if he rose to his feet he would pre- sent the horrible spectacle of a man who had sat down upon a mustard plaster. He felt dreadfully. He could not speak. He dared not rise to his feet. He thought dismally of the short coat, that looked so nobby, but was such a hollow mockery at a time like this ; a coat that shone resplendent upon dress parade, but was an abhorrent, disgraceful "no account*' for active service. And he inwardly gnashed his teeth, and smote upon his breast, and de- nounced himself for a vain, conceited, primordial fool, for coming away without his overcoat. And all the time Miss Whazzernaim kept cliat- tering away to him, trying to make him talk and wondering what made him so stupid and shy. The fact is, he was trying to die, but couldn't. She spoke of the beautiful sunset that was just coming on. He spake never a word, but 32 AXOxnER BROKEx exgage:\iext. dismally wondered what she would say if she . should see the picture of a winter sunset, exe- cuted in California pear on light cassimere. lie writhed in mental agony, and he felt the liendish j^ear spread out wider and thinner than ever. Miss Whazzernaim said it was growing colder. He silently thought if she wanted to feel something so cold that it could stand at an iceberg and warm its hands, she could lay her hand at his heart. She said she was actually shivering. And he thought if she knew what a wild tremor of agitatioil his quivering nerves were in, she would never think of shivering again. She said if they were going to sit out there any — at-chew ! longer, she must realh' — • at-chee ! go in and get a wrap. Then he found voice. He rose, and facing her, while tears filled his eyes and choked his utterances as he thought what a demomlized facade his rear elevation must present to the passers-by in the street, shouted : "I'd like to rap the icy-hearted son of a gos- ling that left that pear on the step, over the head with a club, dad burn the " She rose like a creature of marble, and gazed A^^OT^ER BROKEN EXGAGE:iIE:;T. H3 CRUSKED HOrES. at him in indignant, voiceless rebuke. He backed slowly down the stairs. _^ She turned, and with ^^y one glance of indignant, unforgiving scorn, went into the house. With a superhuman effort he conquered his fears, and looked at the step to gather a faint idea of the counterpart picture which he had lithographed upon his raiment, from the cold freestone. His fearful glance fell upon an 'innocent, flattened, but perfectly- innocuous rubber doll, the property of the youngest Whazzernaim. He looked at the cold, forbidden door of the mansion. He thought of the unforgiving glance that had betokened his dismissal. He thought of the suffering he had so innocently and un- justly undergone. He thought a thousand things that he couldn't be hired to say, and the sun w^ent down behind the isomorphous furnace on West Hill, and left the world and Mr. Jas- man's heart in starless gloom. The match is off. 3 34 THE PICNIC MAN. Jasman now spends his days at Sunday- school picnics, which he is wont to immortalize in verse : — THE PICNIC MAN. Under the shell-bark hickory tree The picnic man he stands ; A woeful-looking man is he, With bruised and grimy hands ; And the soil that sticks to his trouser's knee, Is the soil of several lands. His hair is mussed, his hat is torn, His clothes are like the ground ; He wishes he had ne'er been born, Or being born, ne'er found. He glares and scowls in wrathful scorn As oft he looks around. At early morn, in suit of white, He sought the picnic park ; His face was clean, his heart was light. His loud song mocked the lark. But now, although the day is bright, His world, alas, is dark ! In joyous mood, at early morn, He sat upon the stump. THE PICNIC MAN. 35 But soon, as though upon a thorn He sat, with mighty jump He leaped aloft, and all forlorn In haste he did erump. TRIALS OF A PICNIC MAN. For lo, in hordes, the big black ants, With nippers long and slim, Went swiftly crawling up his pants, And made it warm for him ; And through the woods they make him dance. With gasp, and groan, and vim. 36 THE TlC^ilC MAN. And when the rustic feast is spread. And she is sitting by, His wild wood garland on her head. The love-light in her eye, He woe, oh woe ! would he were dead Sits in the custard pie. And now they send him up the tree To fix the picnic swing, And up the shell-bark's scraggy side. They laugh to see him cling : They cannot hear the words he cried, " Dad fetch ! dog gone ! dad bing 1*' And now he wisheth he were down. And yet he cannot see Just how the giggle, stare and frown Escaped by him may be ; He knows he cannot scramble down With his back against the tree. Sobbing, and sidling, and wailing. Homeward alone he goes ; Clay, pie, and grass-stains on his pants, More and more plainly shows ; And he vows that to any more picnics. He never will go, he knows. AFTER ELECTION DAY. 37 But the morrow comes, and its rising sun, Brings balm to his tattered breeks, He thinks, after all, he had lots of fun, And hopefully, gayly he speaks. And he goes to picnics, one by one, Kine times in the next five weeks. AFTER ELECTION DAY. It is absolutely mournful to notice how full of strangers the city has been ever since elec- tion. We know a man who six weeks ago couldn't walk across the street without stop- ping to shake hands with eighty-five men whom he had known ever since they were boys, who now walks from his home to the post-office, dis- tance a mile and a half, and never takes his hands out of his pockets the whole distance. (He was left by about 2,842 minority.) 38 A SUNDAY ArTERNOO:S" INSTITUTE. A SUNDAY AFTERNOON INSTITUTE. I WAS pleased when my brother Harold and his wife asked me to amuse their little daughter Beth one Sunday afternoon. I loved my bright, restless, inquisitive, impetuous little niece most devotedly. I w^as glad to have her a whole af- ternoon to myself. I w^as delighted at the op- portunity of putting into practice my untried but perfect theories in regard to the training of children. I had great confidence in my ability to entertain children ; I considered myself quite an excellent story-teller ; I had often heard my brother's wife say that you might as well try to keep a wild colt quiet and attentive, and sensible of the reverence due sacred things, as Beth, but then I never had any too much confidence in her method of managing children. And as of- ten as I maintained that I could make a good model child of Beth, I wondered what my brother Harold married my sister-in-law for. When Beth and I were left alone in the house, I called the child to me and said : *'Now, Beth, this is the Sabbath day, and " A SUNDAY AFTEENOON INSTITUTE. 39 '' How d'you know it is f ' she asked, drop- ping the question into my opening sentence like a plummet. I was first annoyed, then I was puz- zled, and finally I was completely nonplussed. How did I know, to be sure ? I thought of all the tough old theological dissensions on this very point, and for a moment I was dumb. Then, like many other great people, I quietly ignored the question I could not answer, and went on : " It is wrong to play to-day, Beth " *' Wrong to x>lay what f she demanded. "Anything," I said. "'Tain't wrong to play Sunday-school," pro- tested this terrible logician, and I began to wish somebody was near that could help me. I pur- sued after Beth, who had made a little diversion by breaking away from me and chasing the dog around the front yard. I whipped the dog, and mildly reproved Beth, who looked archly up into my face, and said : "Didn't you wisht'at Carlo was me when you was whippin' him, Aunt Dora ?" I couldn't tell the child an untruth, so I 40 A SUNDAY AFTERN'OOX INSTITUTE. didn't say anything. But I got her into my lap, and before she had time to slide down, I said if she would be a real good girl and keep quiet, I would tell her a beautiful story, the tender story of Joseph. ^' Josejjh who '^" she asked. I explained, as well as I could, why he had no other name, and Beth sighed and said : "Well, dat's funny." *' Joseph," I said, "was the son of a good old man, named Jacob " "I knows him," shouted Beth, "he saw3 our wood, an' he's dot a wooden leg !" I endeavored to explain that this was quite another Jacob, but Beth was incredulous. "What was his last name ?" she demanded ; and again I was hopelessly involved. "Well," she declared at last, with an ex- pression that settled the controversy, "dat's ze same man. Our Jacob, he ain't dot no ozzer name, either ; des Jacob, old Jacob." "This good old man," I resumed, "had twelve sons." " Any little dirls ?" " Only one." "Huh!" exclaimed Beth, in a tone of good A SUNDAY AFTERNOON' INSTIXrXE. 41 contempt, "I dess she was miglit,v sorrv wiz SQch a houseful of boys an' no little sister." ''Well," I continued, ''Jacob loved this son very much " " How much r* '' Oh, ever so much ; more than he could tell." ''Ten hundred thousand bushels ?" "Yes, and more than that. He bought him a new coat " "May Crawford's dot a new dress," Beth shouted, '"dray an' blue, an' pearl buttons on it, an a new parasol, an' I'm doin' to have some new button shoes as twick as I can kick zese ones out." And the young lady held up a foot for my inspection, the appearance of which indicated that the requisition for the new shoes would be sent in after one more race with the dog. '' His father bought him a new coat, a beau- tiful coat of many colors " "Oh, ho !" shrieked Beth, "dest like a bed quilt." "And Joseph was very proud of this pretty coat " "Huh I I bet you the boys frowed stones an' hollered at him if he wored it to school 1'^ 42 A SUNDAY AFTERXOOX INSTITUTE. ''But his brothers, all his older brothers, who " " Did he wear it to school, Aunt Dora ?" f I said no, I didn' t think he did. '^I dess he was afraid," she said, "an' kept it for a Sunday coat. Did he wear it to Sunday- school?" I tried to explain the non-existence of Sun- day-schools in those days. "Den he was a heathen," she said in a sat- isfied tone. " No, Joseph wasn't a heathen." "Den he was a bad boy." "No, indeed ; Joseph was a good boy " "Den why didn't he go to Sunday-school?" I got over this stumbling-block as well as I could, and proceeded : " But all his brothers hated him because his father loved him the best and " "I 'spect he always dot the biggest piece of pie," my niece said, musingly. " And so they wanted to get rid of him, be- cause ' ' "Den why didn't zey send him out in de kitchen to talk wiz Jenny? Dat's what my mamma does." A SUNDAY AFTERNOON INSTITUTE. 43 " And they hated him all the more because one night, Joseph had a dream '' "Oo-oo! I dreamed dat ze big Bible on ze parlor table had live long legs and a big mouf, full of sharp teeth, and it climbed onto my bed an' drowled at me 'cause I bit ze wax apple an' tied gran' pa's wig onto Carlo's head last Sun- day ! Oh, I was so scared an' I hollered an' mamma said she dessed I had ze nightmare." After the narration of this thrilling appari- tion, with its direct interpretation and moral application, Joseph's dream appeared a very poor, commonplace, far-fetched sort of a vision, and my audience lijstened to it in contemptuous silence. *' One day Joseph's father sent him away to see how his brothers were getting along " "Why didn t he write 'em a letter T' "And when they saw Joseph coming they said " " Did he ride in ze cars 1" "No, he walked. And when his brothers saw him coming " " I dess they fought he was a tramp. I bet you Carlo would have bited his legs if he'd been zere." 44 A SUNDAY AFTEKNOOX INSTITUTE. *'No, they knew who he was, but they were bad, cruel, wicked men, and they took poor Joseph, who was so good, and who loved them all so well " " I see a boy climbin' our fence ; I dess he's goin' to steal our ajjples. Let's go sick Carlo on him." ''Poor Joseph, who was only a boy, just a little boy, who never did any one any harm ; these great rough men seized him with lierce looks and angry words, and they were going to kill the frightened, helpless little youth, who cried and begged them so piteously not to hurt him ; going to kill their own little brother " " j^ellie Taylor has a little brother Jim, an' . she says she wishes somebody would kill him when he tears off her dolFs legs an' frows her kitten in ze cistern." "But Joseph's oldest brother pitied the little boy when he cried " " I dess he wanted some cake ; I cry when I want cake, an' mamma dives me some." "And so he wouldn't let them kill him, but they found a pit " "I like peach pits," Beth shouted raptur- A SUNDAY AFTERNOON INSTITUTE. 45 ously, "an' I know where I can find a great lot of 'em now. Come along !" ^'No, let's finish the story first. These bad men pat Joseph into the pit " "Why— Aunt— Dora! what is you talkin' about?" "About these cruel men who put Joseph into the pit " "I dess you mean zay put ze pit into Joseph." I explained the nature of the pit into which Joseph was lowered, and went on. "So there the poor little boy was, all alone in this deep, dark hole " " Why didn't he climb out f " Because he couldn't. The sides of the pit were rough, and it was very deep, deep as a well " " Ding-dong-dell, cat's in 'e well ; oh auntie, I know a nice story, about a boy that felled into a cistern and climbed out on a ladder." " Poor Joseph was sitting in this pit " "Did he have a chair ?" "No, he was sitting on the ground, wish- I wish I was a bumble bee an' could stand 46 A SUNDAY AFTERNOON INSTITUTE. on my head like a boy, an' have all ze honey I ^ could eat." ' ''But while Joseph was in the dark pit, frightened and crying, and all alone " " I bet he was aftraid of ghosts !" '' While he was wondering if his cruel broth- ers were going to leave him in the dark pit, some merchants came along and Joseph's broth- ers took him up out of the pit and sold him for a slave. Just think of it. Sold their little brother to be a slave in a country away off from his home, where he would have to work hard and where his cruel master would beat him ; where ' ' " What did zey get for him, Aunt Dora ?" ''Twenty pieces of silver," I said, "and " Hump," said Beth, " dat was pitty cheap, but," she added, musingly, "I spec' it w^as all that he was worth." Beth has grown to be a woman now, and to some purpose, say the Burlington chronicles. Some native bard has immortalized her as fol- lows : — THE READ AXD UNREAD LEAVES. 47 THE READ AXD UNREAD LEAVES. T was a man of Burlington, Full learned and wise was he ; Full oft he read in the magazines And the encyclopedias. And often times when the ; day was done, He'd hasten him home from the store, And over his volumes, one by one. He'd ponder, and study, and snore. When the nights grew long as the year wore on, He'd study and ponder the more. One night in sere October, He hastened to his den, And ye book he read to annotate, He seized his ready pen, But his good wife cried as ye book she spied, " Now hearken to me, good liege. An' thou open that book, if I'm not mistook, Thou'lt be in a state of siege." 48 THE EEAD AND UNREAD LEAVES. Then q lickly spoke the master, " Woman, thy wits are daft, This is no book of idle tales, Wh'.reat ye have weepit and laughed ; Never Jiis tome ye have looked into, Th his lips curled scornfully as this Undeniable thing he said, Vhich he ne'er had spoken if he had been Less bookish, and better bred. "Now listen to me, thou man of brains," And in mocking tones spake she, *' It's little I reck of the books that load The shelves of your librarie ; But this I trow, that within that book Of which I have heard you speak, I have more red leaves in an hour this morn. Than ye have read leaves in a week." And she folded her hands and looked at her man, In a manner exceedingly meek, And she had her own way, in her womanly sway, Though she knew neither Latin nor (Treek. Back on the shelf he laid it. The book he had taken down : THE READ AND UXREAD LEAVES. 49 And a wry grimace that wrinkled his face Chased off the gathering frown. " This book," he said, " I calculate, Is safe, among my legions ;" And he laid his hand on " ^fan and Xat- Ure, in the Arctic Regions," But his good wife shrieked as though she were Chased by the hostile Fijans. He sighed, and took down " Life and Death In the Tropics," by Commodore Staples ; But she stayed his hand, " It's full," quoth she, "Of gold and crimson maples." "This I will read," he said, and took Down " Emory's Compendium," But she spoke, " I filled that little book, With rhus toxicodendron." And she blushed, for her Latin accent was A subject she was tender on. " Then I will con," he muttered. The " Institutes of Coke ;" But from its pages fluttered. Bright leaves of the poison oak. Then he said, " I will cram on the Zodiac," And he opened the book at " Libra," And the floor was strewn with the yellow leaves Of the Qommou juglans nigra. 4 60 THE READ AND UNREAD LEAVES. Pie frowned and scowled, that book-worra, As he opened the " Mill on the Floss," And over his lap and into his sleeves Fell three or four kinds of moss. Three or four volumes of Dickens, And every page of Burns, Were peopled with tinted boxberry leaves, And graceful fingers of ferns ; Into whatever book he may chance to look. New botany be discerns. "Now heaven have mercy," he cried at last. When he could find voice to speak, "Is there aught on my shelves that I yet may read, In my volumes of classic Greek ?" But his good wife said, as she shook her head, And answered, in accents meek, " The leaves must have rest until they be pressed. Which will be about Christmas week." Then up arose the good man, And stifled his rising groans ; He strove to smile, and once in a while He laughed in mocking tones. And he buried himself in the newspaper, And he read of murders dire ; Of factories stopped, of stocks that dropped, Of losses by storm and fire j AX OBJFXT OF INTEREST. '51 How banks were robbed ; how people were drowned, How men from trouble were mad, How some men lied, bow women cried. And much more that was awful and sad, TjU it turned his head, and the man, it is said, Became irreclaimably bad. MORAL. The moral is obvious. AN OBJECT OF IXTEREST. ^'Have you any objects of interest in the vicinity?'' the tourist asked the Burlington man. "I have, I have!" eagerly replied the other, ''but I can't get at it to show it you. It's a ninety days' note, and it's down in the bank now, drawing interest like a horse race or a mustard plaster." The traveler smiled as though an angel had kissed him. But it hadnH. 52 SPELL SPELL "CUD." The other day the office boy came up into The Hawkey e sanctum with an expression of grave concern on his face. He gazed thought- fully around the room for a moment and then asked : " How do you spell ' cud V " "What kind of cud?" somebody asked, in a careless, uninterested manner. " Why," the boy replied, " the kind that a cow chews. Cud ; how do you spell it V The city editor looked up, paused, and glancing anxiously over toward the managing editor, *'That isn't local, is it, Mr. Waite?" he asked. " Yes," was the reply, and the city man, af- ter a little hesitation, rem.arked that he had never seen the word in print, but he believed it was spelled "cudd." A long silence ensued, and the managing ed- itor, feeling that the question had not been an- swered to the general satisfaction, and feeling that all eyes were upon him, said that he believed 53 it was generally mispronounced, and that he be- lieved that the proper orthography was •' cood.'' The congregation then looked toward the proof-reader, who said he was quite conhdent that it was spelled " gwud.'' The manager was summoned from the count- ing-room, and said he was of the opinion that the word was of Latin derivation and was spelled " cuid." A telegram was sent to the funny man, who was up in Beloit, Wisconsin, but he thinly vailed his awful ignorance by replying that *'you didn't spell it at all ; you chewed it." The foreman was sent for, and on his arrival in the cc unci" -chamber, he said x):omptly that it was spelled ''culd." In answer to the telegram sent to him, the editor-in-chief replied from the capital that it was spelled with a lower-case c. The pressman came up in response to a sub- poena, and said that his father kept a stock farm, and he knew you spelled it '* kud.'' The investigation closed with the testimony of this last witness, and the office boy went down stairs and resumed the duties of his hon- orable and responsible office. 54 TIT FOR TAT. But he couldn't clearly make out whether he had or had not learned how to spell " cud." TIT FOR TAT. *' Does that hurt ?" kindly asked the dentist, holding the young man's head back, and jab- bing a steel probe with back set teeth clear down through his aching tooth and into the gum; "Does that hurt?" he asked with evi- dent feeling, "Oh, no," replied the young man, in a voice suffused with emotion and sen- timent ; " oh, no," he said tenderly, rising from the chair and holding the dentist's head in the stove while he dragged his lungs out of his ears with a cork-screw. " Oh, no," he said, "not at all ; does that ?" But the dentist had the better of the young man after all, for he charged him fifty cents and didn't iniYl the tooth then. But by that time the astonished tooth had forgot its aching. RAISING A CHURCH DEBT. 55: RAISING A CHURCH DEBT. Not long ago Brother Kimball found a small church in central Iowa that was staggering along under a comfortable debt, and it looked to him as though it would just be recreation for him to lift a little country church out of the depths, after his experience and success with the big churches in the great cities, with their overwhelming indebtedness. So he tackled the quiet little rustic Ebenezer, and shook it out of all the debt he knew of in about ten hours, and the building was clear of in- cumbrance. Then before the benediction was pronounced the senior deacon arose and stated that there had never been but one payment made on the organ, and that the accrued interest on the deferred payments now amounted to about double the principal. Well, they raised this amount, and Brother Kimball was on the point of picking up his hat when the sexton rose and remarked that the man was around last week and said if the fur- nace wasn't paid for, the notes having run a year 56 EAISIXG A CHURCH ITEBT. over their time, he would take it out before I next Sunday. Mr. Kimball laid down his hat, took off his coat, and the furnace debt was lifted. He got one arm into his coat-sleeve and nodded to the pastor to dismiss the congrega- tion, when the president of the woman's aid society said she wished to remark that the society had been unable to fulfill their pledge to pay for the pew cushions, and the upholsterer had, several times during the past year, served notice on them, and she believed suit would be commenced next week. Brother Kimball groaned, slid his arm out of the coat-sleeve, headed the subscription in his usual generous manner, and soon cleared the cushions, throwing his coat over his arm and starting for the door on the run as soon as this was accomplished. But the chorister called out that he would like their dear Brother Kimball to remain and assist them in an effort to pay for the hymn books, and also for having the organ tuned. The '* dear brother " groaned, stopped and as- sisted. Once more he started for the door. But RAISING A CHURCH DEBT. 57 Deacon Opliiltree said he believed, while they were trying to clear off the church debt, it would be well for them to remember that the sexton had not been paid anything since 1871, and that the interest was running up on his back pay all the time. So Mr. Kimball halted once more, and struggled along until the sexton was made happy. Then he got to the door, but some one had locked it, and while he was hunting for the key a good sister arose and stated that the baptis- mal robes had never been paid for, and the woman who made them wanted her monej^ In- quiry on this subject re- vealed the startling fact that the robes had all been loaned to neighbor- ing churches and lost, long ago, but they had to be paid for, all the same. The money was raised, and Mr. Kimball was trying to climb out of a window when he was pulled back and informed that there was an old BILLS. 58 RAISING A CHURCH DEBT. tax title on the lot when they bought it, that had never been cleared off. Mr. Kimball got this little flaw cleared np with neatness and dispatch, and was running briskly down the aisle when he was collared by a trustee, and informed that the man v;ho grained the pulpit and kalsomined the ceiling last win- ter, was there and wanted his money. He was paid, and good Brother Kimball was half way out of the door before he learned that the chandelier must be paid for that week, or they would sit in outer darkness Sunday night. So he went back and brightened up the chan- delier. He ran out so quickly then that he didn't hear the man who repaired the front fence pre- sent his bill, but while he was walking down to the depot with the senior deacon, that official suddenly halted, while a look of grave concern overspread his face. *' Well, well, well!" he said, '4f that isn't too bad." ^'What is it?" nervously inquired Brother Kimball. '' Why," responded the deacon, dolefully, *'we forgot all about the pastors salary; he THE ETHICS OF BUXa-HOLES. 59 only gets $700 a year, and we ain't paid him nothing but two donation parties since a year and a half ago.'' And when Brother Kimball climbed on the train he resolved that the next time he tackled a strange church he would demand a certiiied statement before he took off his coat. THE ETHICS OF BUXG HOLES. Young Mr. Tarantret, just returned from college, was taking some of his friends into a cooper shop, desiring to show off the principal manufactories of Burlington. He hadn't been in a cooper shop so very many times himself. He x^aused at a new-laid barrel and rested his cane in the bung-hole. "Here," he said, with the tone of a guide, "is where they begin to make the barrel ; or rather," he added quickly, observing a smile that he couldn't exactly un- derstand play over the countenances of his friends, "or rather, this is where they quit; this is the finish of it." And then the smile deepened so that for ten minutes you couldn't hear the noise of hammer and adze in the shop. 60 THE COMPUSITOR FIEND. THE COMPOSITOK FIEND. The night is waning, and the hush of inspira- tion makes the sanctum solemn. The news editor has just written himself a New York dis- patch, telling all about the sea serpent. The political editor is just closing a crusher full of blood and thunder, and winding up with a ter- rific exposure. The proof reader is opening a new case of pencils for the purpose of marking all the errors in six lines of proof. The funny man, from the tearful expression of his sorrow- ful countenance, is known to be in the throes of a joke. The joke is born, and this is its name : "A man died in Atchison, Kansas, last week, from eating diseased buifalo meat. A clear case of suicide — death from cold bison." Enter the intelligent compositor. ''This At- chison item, what is this last word?" To him, the funny man. "Bison." Intelligent compositor. " B,-i,-s,-o,-n. 1" Funnyman. "Yes." The intelligent compositor demands to be THE COMPOSITOR FIEXD. 61 informed what it means, and the painstaking funny man, with many tears, explains the joke, and with great elaboration shows forth how it is a play on "cold pisen." "Oh, yes," says the intelligent compositor, and retires. Sets it up " cold poison." Funny man groans, takes the proof, seeks the intelligent compositor, and explains that he wishes not only to make a play on the word "pisen" but also on the word "bison." "And what is that?" asks the intelligent compositor. The funny man patiently explains that it means "buffalo." "Oh, yes .^" shouts the intelligent composi- tor, '''' JSow I understand." Mortified funny man retires, and goes home in tranquil confidence and growing fame. Paper comes out in the morning; "cold buffalo." Tableau. Red fire and slow curtain. 62 THE LEGEND OF THE DRUMMLTH. THE LEGEND OF THE DRUMMUH. It was during the reign of the good Caliph, when Abou Tamerlik came to the city of Bag- dad, threw his gripsack on the counter, and, aa he registered, spake cheerfully unto the clerk, saying :— ^' A sample room on the first floor, and send my keyster up right away, and call me for the 6.28 train east, in the morning." And Easier el Jab, the clerk, looked at him, but went away to the mirror and gazed at his new diamond. And Abou Tamerlik hied him forth and went into the booths and bazars, and laid hold upon the merchants and enticed them into his room and spread out his samples and besought them to buy. And when night was come he slept. Because, he said, it is a dead town and there is no place to go. And before the second watch of the night, Rhumul em Uhp, the porter, smote on the panels of his door and cried aloud : '' Oh, Abou Tamerlik, arise and dress, for it is train time." THE LEGEND OF THE DRUMMUH. 63 And Aboil arose and girt his raiment about liim and hastened down stairs and crept into the 'bus. And he marveled that he was so sleepy, be- cause he knew he went to bed exceedingly early and marvelously sober. And when they got to the depot, lo, it was the mail west, and it was 10.25 p. :m. And Abou Tamerlik swore and reached for the porter, that he might smite him, and he said unto him : *' Carry me back to my own room and see that thou call me at 6.28 a. m., or thou diest." And ere he had been asleep even until the midnight watch, Rhumul em Uhp smote again upon the panels of his door, and cried aloud : ''Awake, Abou Tamerlik, for the time waneth, and the train stayeth for no man. Awake and haste, for slumber overtook thy servant, and the way is long and the 'bus gone !" And Abou Tamerlik arose and dressed, and girded up his loins, and set forth with great speed, for his heart was anxious. K"everthe- 64 THE LEGEND OF THE DRUMMUH. less, he gave Rhumul em Uhp a quarter and made him carry his grip, and he cursed him for a driveling laggard. And when they were come to the train it was 11.46 p. M., and it was a way freight going south. And Abou Tamer- lik fell upon Rliumul em Uhpand smote him and treated him rough- ly, and said : "Oh, pale gray ass THE VENGEFUL DRUMMUH. ^^ ^jj ^^^^^^ ^^^^ ^^^^^^^^, et pity thee if thou callest me once more be- fore the 6.28 A. M. east." And he gat him into his bed. Now, when sleep fell heavily upon Abou Tamerlik, for he was sore discouraged, Ehumul em Uhp kicked fiercely against the panels of his door, and said : " Oh, Abou Tamerlik the drummuh, awake and dress with all speed. It is night in the val- leys, but the day-star shines on the mountains. Truly the train is even now due at the depot, but the 'bus is indeed gone." THE LEGEND OF THE DEUMMUH. 65 And Abou Tamerlik the drammuh swore himself awake, and put on his robes and hast- ened to the depot, while Khumul em Uhp, the porter, went before w^ith a lantern. For it was pitch dark and raining like a house a-fire. And when they reached the depot it was a gravel train, going west, and the clock in the steeple tolled 2 a. :5r. And Abou Tamerlik fell upon Rhumul em Uhp, the porter, and beat him all the way home, and pelted him with mud, and broke his lantern and cursed him. And he got him to bed and slept. Now, when Abou Tamerlik awoke the sun was high and the noise of the street car rattled in the street. And his heart smote him ; and he went down stairs and the clerk said to him : "Oh, Abou Tamerlik, live in peace. It is too late for breakfast and too early for dinner, nevertheless, it won't make any difference in the bill." And Abou Tamerlik the drummuh sought Rhumul em Uhp, the porter, and caught him by the beard, and said unto him : 6 DO THE LEGEND OF THE DF.UMMUH. *' Oh, chuck el edded pup ! (which is, ^Thou that sleepest at train time,') why hast thou for- gotten me?" And Rhumul em Uhp was angry, and said : " Oh, Abou Tamerlik the drummuh, hasty in speech and slow to think ; wherefore shouldst thou get up at daybreak, when there is another train goes the same way to-morrow morning." But Abou Tamerlik would not hearken unto him, but paid his bill and hired a team and a man to take him to the next town. And he hired the team at the livery stable, and he cursed the house that he put up at. Now, the livery stable belonged to the land- lord, all the same. Bat Abou Tamerlik, the drummuh, wist not that it was so, and while he rolled painfully along the stony highway, he mused as he rode, and, musing, sang to these words : A LEGEND OF ARABY. 'TwAS even, and Fatima, old and gray, Stood at her door to hear the khadoof sing ; And as the tarboosh tolled the close of day, She heard her faithful Bali-wow whimpering, *' Kooftah ; the dog is hungering," she said, " And too stuck up, I reckon, to eat bread." A LEGEND OF ARABY. 6T Straightway she oped the ke-yew-ubbahrd door For the dim relic of the soup — a bone ; While Bah-wow sat expectant on the floor, And pounded with his tail in monotone, But she put on her khalfadon, and said, "There is no meat ; by-jhings ; you must eat bread.'* She took the Wady Hadjr in her hand. And songht the Beled Yemen down the street ; While the low sun across the desert's sand Touched with the hadramaut Akaba's feet, To speak her hunger, quick she touched her throat, " Yokoob el Hafed, haben sie auch brod ?" 68 A LEGEND OF ARABY. Then raised her finger in the air and smiled, *' Uoop-la I" she said, " just put it on the slate," And homeward fled, while Hafed, somewhat riledj, Marked on her score twelve cents instead of eight. But when Fatiraa reached her rancho, — zounds ! Bah-wow had sought the happy-hunting-grounds. In speecliless grief she dashed upon the floor The loaf, for lack of which the dog went dead. She paused one moment, at the open door ; " No, he's too thin for sausages," she said, "Sihoud, mehanna di-ahy jab el wog gin I" (Give me a cracker-box to put my dog in.) But at the door she stops and gives a shriek That can be heard at Nedjed, fourteen miles, For the dead Bah-wow, placid, happy, sleek. Sits up alive, looks in her face, and smiles, *' Islam Abdallah ! Nassir-el-wahed matchet I" Which means, "Just wait a minute, and you'll catch it!" She sought the bazar of the shoostorman, And cried, "Ahl Wilkin, I would buy a boot, Strong as a derrick, that will boost a man High as the price of early northern fruit." She put it on, and found her dog, the brute, At the front window, playing of the flute. WHAT ARE WE HERE FOR. 69 Then she was mad. "By Ibrahim's beard," she yelled, " I'd rather hear a double-barreled bassoon !" She raised her foot ; with rage her bosom swelled, And then she lifted Bah-wow to the moon, *' Wadji iouarick ! Ghattee !" he ki-yi'd, Which means, " I wish I'd stayed dead when I died." Slow sinks the sun ; the tarboosh on the jeld By the kafusha's marabout is thrust ; And scarce a mourzouk in the nagah held, Breathes in the haunted bustchufullah's crust, While the gafallah sings the Badween chants Likewise his sistahs, cuzzhans, and hysahntts. WHAT ARE WE HERE FOR? *' What are we here for," asked Goethe, '4f not to make transitory things lasting?'' Oh, matchless poet, that's what we think and that's what we are trying to do ; but when a fellow has worn the same ulster three winters and two summers, the dawn of its third cycle as a duster finds its transitoriness outvoting its lastingness eight to seven, and what is courage, ambition, or genius going to do about it ? 70 THE BOYS AXD THE APPLES. THE BOYS AND THE APPLES. Now when the antunm was come it was so that the land of Burlington and the country round about abounded with much apples, so that the sound of the cider press ceased not from morning even unto the night. And in the moi'ning the husbandman arose, and he said, Go to, apples is not worth much, but so much as they will fetch I will have. And he laded up his wagon, and lilled its bed even to overflowing with bell-flowers, and seek- no-farthers, and duchesses, and spitzbergens, and snow apples and russets, each after his kind. And when he was come nigh to the town, lo, three town boys met him and spoke unto him delicately, and said. Give us a napple. And his heart was moved with good nature, and he hearkened unto their words, and said unto them, Yea, climb in, and eat your fill. And as he journeyed on he met yet two other boys. And they waxed bold when they i saw the first three riding and eating apples, and they cried aloud : Give us snapple. And THE BOYS AND THE APPLES. 71 the man spake unto them and said Yea. And they dome in. And they spake not one to another, neither did they cease to eat apples, save when they paused that they might take breath. And the husbandman made merry and FREE LUNCH i LA CART. laughed with himself to see them eat, and he said : Ho, ho ; Ho, ho ! But the lads laughed not, for they were busy. Now the eldest of the lads was thirteen years 72 THE BOYS AND THE APPLES. old, and the youngest thereof was in his ninth year. And they were exceeding lean and ill- favored And when the husbandman was entered into the city he drave along the streets, and lifted up his voice and shouted aloud, Ap-pulls ! Ap-pulls ! Here's yer nighseatinnapples ! Ap- pulls, Ap-pulls! And the women of the city leaned over the fences and said, one to another, Lo, another rapple wagin. And they spake unto the man and say, Hast thou of a verity good eatinnapples? And he said, Of a verity I have. Come forth. And when they were come forth they looked into his wagon, and they were wroth and cried out against him. And they said. Thou hast mocked us and thou has deceived thine hand- maidens with the words of thy mouth. Verily thou hast naught ; wherefore then dost thou drive through the city crying, Ap-pulls ? And when he had turned him around and looked he was speechless. And the women of the city cried, Go to ; are not thy words altogether lighter than vanity ? THE BOYS AXD THE APPLES. 73 And he smote upon his breast and sware unto them, saying, I am a truthful man and the son of a truthful man. When thy servant left home this morning there was even thirty-' seven bushels of apples in the wagon bed. Now there was in the waa:on nau2:ht save the five boys. Neither was there so much as one small apple. And the husbandman necked the lads, and entreated them roughly, for he said, What is it that ye have done i For ye have cast my ap- ples into the street. But the lads wept bitterly and said, Nay, not so. Are thy servants pigs that they should do such a thing ? And he said. Declare unto me, then, what thou hast done with my apples. And the lads pointed at each other, even each one at his fellow, and they wept and exclaimed with one accord, He eat 'em. And the husbandman was wroth and would not believe them. For he wist not that the town boj^ was hollow clear into the ground. But the women of the city cried unto him and said, How far is it the lads have ridden 74 THE BOYS AND THE APPLES. with thee ? And he said, Even as far as a mile and a half. And the women laughed and made merry 'and said, Of a surety it is even so as the lads have said. They have eaten up all the apples. And they made light of it, as though it had been a very small thing for the lads to do. And the husbandman marveled greatly within himself, for the live lads did not fill one small end of the wagon. And it was so that it was beyond his finding out, where the thirty- seven bushels of apples had stowed themselves. So he turned him about and dravehome, and he commanded the lads that they follow him not. And they hooted at him and cast stones after him even unto the city gates, for such is the custom and manner of the town boy. But the husbandman spake not unto tliem, neither reproved he tliem, for his mind was heavy with thinking of this wonderful thing he had seen. RULES FOR POULTRY NOVICES. 7d RULES FOR POULTRY XO VICES. 1. Wait until the moon goes down before purchasing your chickens. Pullets are always cheaper in the dusky hours that precede the dawn. 2. If you buy fancy eggs for hatching, do not buy any that were picked last fall. "Hope springs eternal in the human breast," but an e^^ stavs right bv the date of its birth, and is twenty-four hours older and poorer at each suc- ceeding sunset. 3. Always consult the hen's convenience in the matter of setting. Do not insist on her breaking any other engagements or putting off baking or ironing day for the purpose of taking charge of thirteen eggs, of unknown sex or quality. Better, far better, that you should give up society and set on those eggs yourself, rather than intrust them to a reluctant and dissembling hen. You might break the eggs, but the fickle hen would break for the verbena bed the first thing in the morning. 4. Build your nests wide enough for a cow to turn around in. If the nest has an all-out- 76 EULES FOR POULTRY NOVICES. door, illimitable waste kind of look to it, where one hen will feel so lonesome and lost that she will wail and squawk with terror ever}^* time slie looks around and feels the burden of her loneliness upon her, all the wealth of the Incas couldn't induce another hen to go in and keep her company or gossip with her until bed time. But if you make a nest just big enough for one lean hen to squeeze into with- out breathing, the nine biggest hens in your flock will fight for that nest and all crowd into it at the same time, flatten out all the eggs, and then, with gloomy but patient countenances, and their several heads turned in nine different directions, they will sit on the cold ashes of shattered ambition and wrecked dreams for the next four months. 5. Sprinkle sulphur in the nests before the hen is allowed to enter upon the performance of her incubation contract. The smell of the sulphur will prevent the hen from imbibing the pernicious doctrines of atheism, and will keep her from assuming too much, under the impres- sion that a hen that can produce a diurnal egg, and from that evolve a living, breathing, scratching chicken, could, if she would give her RULES FOR POULTRY NOVICES. 77 Hiind to it, create a universe and peoj)le its plan- ets with races of lying, thieving, swearing men. 6. Boost the hen off the nest once a day for exercise. Too much sentiment and reHection and an excess of self-communion is apt to make the hen moody and low-spirited. Point her to the dreadful effects of too long continued and unbroken exertion of the brain, as shown in the sad fate of Sergeant Bates and Denis Kearney. 7. About the time the chicks are A HINT TO THE WISE. coming out, borrow a shotgun and tell your neighbor some scoun- drel is shooting cats, and last night he killed a cat that belonged to your wife, that you wouldn't have taken fifty dollars for. This will pave the way for future develoj^ments. A successful hennery is fatal to a cat. 10. When you catch a sentimental-looking Boston fowl alone in the gloaming, don't dis- turb love's young dream wdthin lit3r swelling breast, by shooing her. It will be one hen in 78 LINES TO A HEX. your game-bag if you just sit down near her and whisper something like this into her cul- tured ear : — LINES TO A HEX. All the day long, in the haze of October, Restless old hen ; Wand'ring disconsolate, moody and sober,* Where hast thou been ? f Gone are the joys of the onion bed, Summer's sweet scratching grounds have sped ; "What does it count ? You still are fed. Thankless old hen. Art thou of the Springtime's budding day Dreaming, old hen? Brace up, November is shorter than May, By one day, hen. And what then, cackler ? After a while Border and mound your claws will spoil ; I * A prominent clergyman offered us a chromo and a meer- schaum pipe to print that word "Sankey"for the sake of the joke, but we refused. It would be irreverent, and spoil the rhyme. t Pronounced "ben." ; Pronounced "spile.'' LINES TO A HEN". 79 Women may weep, but you will smile Gayly, oh hen. Now, by the cloud on your puzzled brow, Coming again, Surely you're thinking and wondering how Patiently, hen, All hot July, in an old nail keg. You sot* without stirring a wing or peg, Ou a bureau-knob and a porcelain e^gy Fruitlessly, hen. Banish your gloom I 'Tis the world's hard way, Bow to it, then ; Labor and wait, for a brighter day Dawns on you, hen. I, too, have wrought in defeat's harsh school ; I, too, have — " ka-wah-kwah ["—conned this rule— '*C'k't c't ka-dah cut ! kwah ! !" What a fool Thing you are, hen. * Sometimes written "sat." 80 GETTING MY IIAIE TRIMMED. GETTIXG MY HAIR TRIMMED. The wild, ungovernable passion a barber has for trimming your hair! On the fourth of December I was in Boston, thinking about a lecture I was expected to deliver in the evening, and so badly scared that I couldn't remember the subject nor what it was about. I went into a Tremont street ''Institute of Facial Manipu- lation and Tonsorial Decoration," and inquired for the professor who occupied the chair of Mediaeval Shaving and Nineteenth Century Shampoo. One of the junior members of the faculty, who was brushing an under-graduate's coat, pointed me to a chair, and I climbed in. When the performance was about conchuled, the barber said to me : *'Have your hair trimmed, sir?" I believed not. ''Needs it very badly, sir ;'' he said, ''looks very ragged." I never argue with a barber. I said, " All right, trim it a little, but don t make it any shorter." He immediately trimmed all the curl out of GETTING MY UAIR TRIMMED. 81 it, and m}^ hair naturally, you know, lias a very graceful curl to it. I never discovered this myself until a few months ago, and then I was very much surprised. I discovered it by look- ing at my lithograph. Well, anyhow, he trimmed it. On the sixth of December I was at Bath, Maine. Again I was shaved, and again the barber implored me to let him trim my hair. When I answered him that it had been trimmed only two days before, he spitefully asked where it was done. I told him, and he gave expres- sion to a burst of sarcastic laughter. ''Well, well, well!" he said at last, "so you let them trim your hair in Boston ? AVell, well ! Now, you look like a man who has been around the world enough to know better than that." Then he affected to examine a lock or two very particularly, and sighed heavily. "Dear, dear," he said, "I dont know, really, as I could do anything with that hair or J not ; it's too bad." Well, his manner frightened me, and I told him to go ahead and trim it, but please not make it any shorter. 82 GETTING MY HAIR TRIMMED. "No," he said, " oh, no, it wasn't necessary to cut it any shorter, it was really too short now, but it did need trimming." So he "trimmed" it, and when I faced the Rockland audience that night, I looked like a prize-fighter. In four days from that time I was sitting in the chair of a barber down in New York State. He shaved me in grateful silence, and then thoughtfully run his fingers over my lonely hair. "Trim this hair a little, sir?" he said, " straighten it up about the edges f I meekly told him I had it trimmed twice during the preceding week, and I was afraid it was getting too short for winter wear. "Yes," he said, " he didn't know but what it was pretty short, but you didn t need to cut it any shorter to trim it. It was in very bad, ragged shape at the ends." I remained silent and obstinate, and he asked me where I had it trimmed last. I told him, and he burst into a shout of laughter that made the windows rattle. "What's the matter, Jim?" inquired an assistant partner down the room, holding his patient in the chair by the nose. GETTIXG MY HAIR TRIMMED. S3 Jim Stifled his laughter, and replied : ''This gentleman had his hair trimmed down in Maine.'' There was a general burst of merriment all over the shoi^, and the apprentice laid down the brush he was washing, and came over to look at the Maine cut, that he might never forget it. I surrendered. "Trim it a little, then,"' 1 groaned, ''but in the name of humanit}', don't cut it any shorter." " ]So," the barber said, "he wouldn't make it a hair's breadth shorter." When I left that shop, if it hadn't been for my ears, my hat would have fallen down clear on my shoulders. When I reached the hotel, everybody started, and a couple of men got up and read a hand-bill on the wall, descriptive of a convict who had recentl}' escaped from Sing Sing, and looked from the bill to myself very intently. That night several of the audience drew revolvers as I came out on the platform. Then I went to Amsterdam, Xew York. The barber of that sleepy village, who, in the interval of his other duties acts as mayor of the town and edits the local papers, undertook to shave me wiili a piece of hoop iron he pulled 84 GETTING MY HAIR TRIMMED. out of bis boot leg. When I resisted, he went out into the kitchen and came back with a kitchen knife and a can opener, and offered me my choice. I selected the can opener, and he began the massacre, remarking incidentally that he used to keep a good sharp spoke-shave for his particuUir customers, but he had lost it. Then he said my hair needed trimming, very badly. I protested that it was impossible, it had been trimmed three times within ten days, and was as short now as a business man on the first of January. *'0h," he said, "it wasn't too short, and besides, there was no style about it at all." He could give it some shape, however, he said, without making it any shorter. So I surrendered and told him to shape it up. And if that fore doomed, abandoned, Amster- dam son of an oakum-picker didn't go out into the woodshed and come back with a rusty old horse-rasp, and begin to file away Avhat little hair I had left. He allowed a few shreds and patches to remain, however, clinging here and there to my scalp in ghostly loneliness. I rather feared that my appearance that evening would create a panic, but it did not. I ob- GETTING MY HAIR TRIMMED. 85 served that the majority of the audience had their heads "shaped up" after the same manner, and were rather pleased with my con- formity to the local custom and style. Well, I got along to Corry, Pennsylvania, and rushed in for a shave and got it, in one time and two motions. "Hair trimmed, sirT' the barber said. I supposed he was speaking sarcastically, and so I laughed, but very feebly, for I was getting to be a little sensitive on the subject of my hair, or rather, my late hair. But he re- peated his question, and said that it needed trimming very badly. I told him that w^as what ailed it, it had been trimmed to death ; why, I said, my hair had been trimmed live times during the past thirteen days. And I was afraid it wouldn't last much longer. "Well," he said, "it was hardly the thing for a man of my impressive appearance, who would naturally attract attention the moment I entered a room (I have to stand on my tiptoes and hold on with both hands to look over the back of a car seat), to go around wuth such a head of hair, when he could straighten it out for me in a minute." 86 GETTING MY HAIR TRIMMED. I told him to go ahead, and closed my eyes and wondered what would come next. That fellow took a pair of dentist's forceps and '' pulled " every lock of hair I had left. '' There," he said proudly, " now, when your hair grows out it will grow out even." I was a little dis- mayed at first when I looked at my glistening poll, but after all it was a relief to know that the end was reached, and nobody could torment me again to have my hair trimmed for several weeks. But when I got shaved at Ashtabula, the barber insisted on puttying up the holes and giving my head a coat of shellac. 1 yielded, and my head looked like a varnished globe with the maps left off. Two days afterward, I sat in a barber's chair at Mansfield. The barber shaved me silently. Then he paused, with a bottle poised in his hand, and said : ^' Shampoo r' TONSORIAL TROUBLES. 87 I answered him with a look. Then he oiled my hairless globe and bent over it for a moment with a hairbrush. Then he said : *'0n which side do you part your hair ?" Mr. Earnest Marchemo:n-t, of West Hill, is not a very experienced sportsman, but he set a trap, all the same, for a fox or some other animal that was decimating his hen-roosts. The next morning there was something stirring about in the trap. Mr. Marchemont got down on his knees and looked in. "It looks like a rabbit," he said, and he opened the trap. "But it doesn't smell exactly like one," he added sadly ; and when he went to the house Mrs. Marchemont made him stand in the back yard while she stopped her nose up with blue clay and undressed him with the cistern-pole. "Each heart knows its own bitterness best," Mr. Marchemont said, when his tailor wondered what he wanted another fall suit already for. 88 CLEAXI^^G HOUSE. CLEAXIXG HOUSE. It didn't occur to the Bashful Bazouk of South Hill, when he went to see the only pretty girl in Burlington last AVednesday evening, that her folks had been cleaning house that daj\ and that she was naturally a little tired and fretful. He thought for a long time for something to say, and finally remarked : *'I see your father's bug " *' Sir !" she said, with a chilling intonation, opening her blue eyes upon him with a glare that curdled his life blood. *'Isee," he said, in a tumult of terror, "or rather, I saw your father's old buggy " " Sir !" she screamed, rising before him like an inspired sibyl, *'sir I" His hair stood on end. He also rose, picked up his glossy silk hat, put it down in the chair, and sat down upon it ; got up and picked it up, and stared at it ; turned red and white by turns, and felt himself growing hot all over, and generally uncomfortable. "AYhy," he stammered, ''I said I saw your father's old buggy bed- " THE CHINESE QUESTION. 89 *'Sir!" she shrieked, in a thorough bass voice, and turning an icy, marble face upon him, turned to the door. He went out of the door like a man who was going to be hanged. '' By jocks," he said to himself, on the way home, while he tried in vain to smooth out the wrinkles in his corrugated hat, "I just tried to tell her that I saw her father's old buggy bed getting new cushions and lining fixed in it, and the dash-board mended, down at Jenkins' car- riage shop, and she got mad, and acted like a crazy woman. Plague on the old buggy, I don't care if it never gets fixed." THE CHINESE QUESTION. And now^ the Chinese claim that the tele- phone is nearly two thousand years old, having been in use about that time in their country. Oh, pagans with the almond eyes, there is some- thing that is older than the telephone ! Lying ! It is older than the great Chinese wall. It is older than the city of Pekin. It is as old as the first Chinese historian— and about as reliable. 90 A TRUE FABLE. A TRUE FABLE. A Kansas mule, of the brindle denomina- tion, was standing in a pasture lield, backed up uncomfortably close to a mild-eyed steer. The mule was not feeling in a very good humor. He had lost his railroad ticket, or had a note to lift, or somebody had kicked his dog or some- thing. Anyhow, he was cross, and feeling just ready to do something mean the first chance he got. By and by a careless swish of the Texan's tail gave him the longed-for provocation, and before the mule got his heels back to the ground, the Texan thought somebody had shot him with a double-barreled cannon. And then the steer slowly turned his head, and opened wide his clear, pensive eyes, and without swear- ing or catching his breath or saying a word, he just lifted one of his hind legs about eight feet from the ground, and tapped the astonished mule, with his cloven hoof, right where he lived. And the mule curled up in a knot for a second and just gasped, "Oh, bleeding heart !" And then he leaned up against a tree to catch his breath, and sat down on the ground and STICKIXG TO IT. 91 opened his moiith to get air, and finally he lay- down and held his legs up in the air and said, in a husky whisper, that if he could only die and be over with it, he would be glad. But he got over it a little, after awhile, and as he was limping sadly towards the fence, trying to think just how it happened, and wondering just where he was hit, he met his mother, who noticed his rueful countenance and his painful locomotion. ''Well," she said, "and what's the matter with you ?" "Nothing," the mule said faintly, "oh, nothing. I have just kicked an insurance agent." STICKING TO IT. "Stick to one thing," says the New York Herald^ " until it is done, and well done." The man who wrote that must have been inspired by watching the tenacity of purpose which in- spires a spoonful of tar on a pine board, doing its level best to overshadow the bright pros- perity of the after-guard of an unwary pair of linen pantaloons. 92 FIAT MOXEY. FIAT MOXEY. The other day Mr. Middleiib stopped ar a gro- cery and bought some onions, giving the grocer a two -dollar bill. Among the change handed back to the customer was an old one-dollar bill. It had been in that morning for kerosene oil, and there was just a dash of the oil on it, that had been spilled in the morning. Then the grocer had laid it down on a pile of codfish while he fixed the stopper in the oil-can. Then he had it on his fingers while he cut off a couple of pieces of cheese, and tlie cheese on the bill struggled with the codli^h and kerosene for pre- eminence. Then it got a little touch of mack- erel and a little tincture of stale egg on it, and at last the grocer stuffed it into his pocket along with a plug of tobacco, and finally, when Mr. Middlerib got it with his onions, he held it to his nose once or twice, sniffed it with an investi- gating air, and at last walked out of the store with a cheerful countenance, saying, "By George, we're all right now. Good times are here again, and the government is paying one hundred scents on the dollar." ON THE RAIL. THE WHIMS OF TRAVEL. !•« ~ RHYMES OX THE WIXG. -There was a young man of Coboes, Wore tar on the end of liis nose ; Wlien asked why he done it, lit' said for the fun it Afforded the men of Cohoes. -There was a young maid of Lancaster, Who said, " I will wear a corn-plaster," But instead of her foot The plaster she put On her nose, and the street Arabs sassed her. -There was a young fellow of Canton Much given to ravin' and rantin'; With his clamorous riot He murdered the quiet That hallowed the city of Canton. [93] 94 PREACHING VS. PRACTICE. THE " COUr.SE OF TRUE LOVE." -There was a young man of Palmyra, Sat down alongside of liis ISIyra ; Tlicy had just doused the glina, When her parent came in, And the young man achieved his Ilegira, PREACIIIXG V. PRACTICE. A Sea Cliff, L. I., audience was dreadfully shocked last Sunday night. Just as a local temperance leader was about to begin his address, he leaned too closely over the candle and his breath caught fire. lie afterward ex- plained, however, that he had been using cam- phor for the toothache. The amendment was accepted and the talk went on. THE START. 95 THE STAET. ^VIIEX you go to a railway station at 11 o'clock p. :m., and your train leaves at 11:15 p. 31., and you look into the telegraph office and see the operator lying down with his ear at the instrument, reading a book — I do not mean that bis ear is reading a book, but that the operator is ; and then you see a bus driver stretched out on a table sound asleep, and the baggage man spread out on the desk, trying to go to sleep, then you can make up your mind that the train is an honr and seventy-three minutes late. When you see a train about three hundred and twenty yards down the track, with the rear end of the train pointed toward the station, and you also see a man on the platform with a valise in one hand and a ticket in the other, waving his burdened arms furiously, and incumberins: the pure air with rude, ungrammatical, but evi- dently earnest expressions, you may depend upon it, that that man and that train desire to effect a junction, no matter whether you can understand a word the man says or not. That is, the man wants to get to the train pretty 96 THE START. seriously. The train doesn't appear to care very much about getting to the man. It it did, it would reverse its motion. It is this cool, stolid, haughty indifference of the train to the man's anguish and his agonized appeals, that is so maddening to the man. That is the gall of being left. You wouldn't really mind being left, so much, if the train went away from you rather regretfully, like. If it seemed to look back at you longingly, as you stand wildly gesticulating and howling on the platform, if it seemed to be tearing the fibers of its heart to go away from you, you might endure it. But to have it get up and dust, as it always does, to turn its back right squarely in your face, and go off coughing and barking down the track, just as completely and sublimely unconcerned about you as if you had no existence— this is what makes you rave. And this, also, is what pleases the rest of the people on the platform. ** ROGERS AND I.'' 97 ** ROGERS AXD I." I THINK the Adjuster is the most observant man I ever met on a train. He sees everj'thing, and notes the peculiarities of the people he meets before he has seen them. We sat in a car together up in Wisconsin one day, and he said, "Don't you always notice, in every car in which you ride, the fool that always sits directly before you, and always opens the window every time the engine whistles, and sticks his head and shoulders out to see what they are doing at the station, and never closes the window till the station is out of sight?" "Yes, I had ; and he never saw any body he knew at any station V " Xever," said the Adjuster, " and he never sees anything any body is doing at the station, and can t tell the name of the station while he is in it." "And always scrapes the back of his head against the sharp edge of the window sash when he pulls it in," I said, "and then dismally rubs his head while he turns around and looks 98 suspiciously at you, as though he believes you did it, and did it on purpose." "And the man who is waiting at the station to see the train come in?" continued the Ad- juster ; " the man with butternut overalls tucked into his boots, tawn^^ beard, arms crammed into liis pockets up to the elbows, mouth wide open — you never miss him ; when you go down, he is standing there at sunset ; when you come back at sunrise, he is waiting for you ; never sees anybody he knows get off the train, never sees anybody he knows get on ; never expects to ; would be astonished to death if he should happen to see an acquaintance come or go ; isn't paid for it, but it's his business. Has nothing else in the world to do. Is always there. If the train comes in lifteen minutes ahead of time, he has made allowance for it and has been there twenty minutes ; if the train is four hours late, he waits for it. You see him at nearly every station." " Never speaks to anybody," I said. "Never," said the Adjuster, "and if any- body speaks to him, he says 'Dunno.' If the baggageman runs over him with a truck, he says ' Huh ! ' and shrinks up a little closer 99 against the station, but lie never gets out of the way/' " And do you remember the man who sits behind you and whistles ? " I asked. '^And when he gets tired of whistling in your ear, sings bass?'' suggested the Adjuster. '^ And never whistles or sings anything that you know." ''Or that he knows." "And the 'masher,' whose breath is nearly as bad as his morals, who wants to tell you all about the daughter of a wealthy merchant who was 'just dead gone' on him the last time he went over this road ?" "And the man behind you who bites off half an apple at one bite, and then, while crunching it, puts his chin on your shoulder and tries to talk to you about the weather and crops?" "And the man who comes into the car at the front door, walks clear back and out on the rear platform, looking at each one of a dozen empty seats, hunting for a good one, and then turns back to lind every last seat taken by the people who came in after him f " And have you never seen the girl get on at 100 some country station," said the Adjuster, *' fixed up mighty nice for that town, the belle of the village, dressed in more colors than you * can crowd into a chronio, half the toAvn down at the station to see her off ; she walks across the plat- form, feeling just a little too rich to look at, comes into the car with her head up and plumes flying, ex- pecting to set every woman in that car wild with envy as she walks down the aisle ; she opens the door and sees a car full of Chicago girls, dressed in the rich, quiet ele- gance of city girls in their traveling costumes, and see how she drops like a shot into the first seat, the one nearest the stove, and looks straight out of the win- dow and never looks anywhere else, and never THE CirN'OSURE OF ALL EYES. 101 shakes her plumes again while she stays in the car?" ''And the man who wants to talk," I said ; ''the man who would probably die if he couldn' t talk five minutes to every one he rides with ; who glares hungrily around the car until his glance resfs on the man whom he thinks is too feeble to resist him, and then pounces down on him and opens the intellectual feast by ask- ing him how the weather is, down his way ; the man who is always most determined to talk when you are the sleepiest, or when you want to read, or to think, or just sit and look out of the car window, and enjoy your own idle, pleas- ant, vagrant day-dreams?" "And the man," said Rogers, "who gets on the train and stares at every man in the car before he sits down, and stands and holds the door open while he stares ; who always carries an old-fashioned, oil-cloth carj^et-bag with him, as wide and deep as a fire screen, and before he sits down, he takes that carpet bag by the bottom, rolls it up into a close roll, and puts it in the rack ? It is always dead empty. When he leaves home, he never jouts a rag or a thread or a button in it. When he comes back it is 102 ^'kogeks and I." emptier than it was when he went away. It never had anything in it, that he knows of, since it was owned in his family, but lie will never travel without it." *'And the other man," I said, "who carries nothing in his carpet-bag bnt lunch, and eats all the way from Chicago to Cairo?" "And the man," he said, "who rides on a pass, and stands on familiar terms with the company, and calls the brakeman Johnny?" "And the man," I said, "who is riding on a pass for the first time, and stands up and holds his hat in his hand when he sees the con- ductor approaching, and says 'sir' to him as lie answers the official's questions, and is gen- erally more respectful to him than he is ever going to be again ?" "And the man," he said, "who walks through the entire length of an empty coach looking for a seat, and then goes back and sits down in the first one, nearest the door?" "And the man," I said, "who always gets left?" "And the man," he said, "who loses bis ticket ?" A. MIX^'ESOTA POET. 103 And thus, with pleasant comments on our fellow passengers, did we beguile the weary hours. A MixxEsoTA poet tunes his sounding lyre to harvest notes, and sings :— There's music in the sough of the wind, There's grace in the waving grain ; Broad acres a-tint with the day-god's gold, In their ri[)ening oriflanime. Now, why couldn't he go right on, without racking his brain for new rhymes, and sing : — Ready the reaper stands ; he lists To the thresher's clattering hum ; And he waves aloft in his brawny fists The harvest's oriflura. Here and there in the reckless world Stocks go up and stocks go down. But care from his happy heart is hurled By the sight of the orifloun. And when at eve, at the set of sun, Swiftly he hastens to his home. His day is spent, his work is done. And he has no use for an oriflome. 104 THE TKAVELIXG '' SICK MAN." THE TRAVELING "SICK MAN." Do you know, a man likes to be ill? Likes to have a wasting fever, a terrible headache, or a thoroughbred agne-chill, with parent vi- brator attachment. I don't think he likes it pretty much at the time; the circus isn't so interesting while the play is on, but he does enjoy it after it is all over, and he can torture his friends with the doleful narrative of his sufferings. How some men do love to talk about their physical ailments ! The young man sitting just in front of me has been ill. He lay, as I learn from the narrative he is pouring into the ears of his weary-looking friend, like Peters wife's mother, sick of a fever. It was no ordinary fever, either. It came upon him, he tells his friends, as a low type of typhoid, but soon developed into a malignant typhus, and then the struggle for life began. For twenty-two days and nights his friends and watchers never left his bedside. The point of the most intense pain was located right above the left eye. The young man points it out with his finger, and THE TRAVELING '' SICK MAX." 105 his friend looks at the place curiously, as though he expected to find a label on it. The young man is growing rapidly worse. He has got into the medicines. He is taking a drop of digitalis ; now he is taking three drops ; now he. has just taken six. He will never get well, I know. His pulse is 103, and the temperature of his body is 128 degrees. Xow he is talking medical latin. How a man does love to dabble in the lore of the physician. His pulse is coming up, and has reached 118. I know he will die. The pain over his left eye is increas- ing in severity, and shooting pains are tearing up and down his back. Now a new pain has set in, in both knees. Xow his feet are cold, and his dose of digitalis is increased to ten drops, and he is taking two doses every three minutes. The temperature of his body sud- denly falls to 107. His physician, standing at the bedside with an American hunting-case, cylinder escapement, full-jeweled, low-pressure silver watch in his hand, tells him that if the temperature of the body goes down to 105, and stays there, he will die. Xow his pulse reaches 120. The temperature of his body has gone down to 105K. The pain over his left eye has 106 THE TRAVELIXG received reinforcements, and is pounding away like a trip-hammer. He is suffocating with a dull, heavy heat, but cannot "prespiah." More watches are sent for. He counts up his insurance. It amounts to 87,000. Two more drops are added to his dose of digitalis, which he now takes every time the clock ticks. His hair is beginning to fall off ; his eyes are heavy ; the end of his nose turns cold, his pulse falls, he gasps for breath, he d No, by St. George, he doesn't! Suddenly, right in the pain over the left eyebrow, he "prespires." He is saved. The perspiration spreads all over him. He lives. Merciful heavens ! Can it be ? Yes, the truth must be told. It is his friend, his weary, uncomplaining, listening friend, who dies. A NICE Dubuqie man, having occasion to use the expression, ''bowels of compassion," hesitated, hemmed and hawed, and finally sub- stituted "intestines," and then wondered what everybody was grinning at. THE MAN WHO UAD LETTER3 FOR HIS DOG. 107 THE MAIS' WHO HAD LETTERS FOR HIS DOG. When a man has once fallen a slave to the dog habit, when he has become addicted to a dog, when he drags a dog around after him, into cars, into omnibuses, into society, all the Murphy movements in the world cannot reform that man. And there are such men. Oh, mil- lions of 'em. One night, when I was coming West from New York, a bridal party boarded the train at Elizabeth, New Jersey. I heard laughter and weeping, and I knew that laughter and weep- ing never went well together, except at wed- dings. So I said, speaking to myself — the only man who never contradicts me when I tell lies — *'Iwill have a look at the young people." I went out and looked. I saw the bridegroom, happy, laughing, fussy as an old hen with her last lone chicken, holding a black and tan dog tenderly in his arms, and clutching his bride by the elbow, to help her on the car. The brakeman shouted : " Hold on ; take that dog to the baggage car." 108 THE MAX WHO HAD LETTERS FOR HIS DOG. Dismay, consternation, terror, came out and sat all over that young man's face, but it brightened up again with a happy thought. He dropped his bride's arm, and folded both arms about the dog of his heart. " Xo, you don't I" he shouted; "no, you don't. I've got letters for that dog. Fve got a letter for that dog from the superintendent of the division. This dog goes with me I" And he danced up and down the platform with excitement, while the brakeman helped his bride on the train, and then the young hus- band followed, clinging to that precious dog. Now, do you know I wanted to take that girl's hands (having previously sent a postal card home for permission), and say to her : "Dear young woman, confide in me. Allow me to collar your husband. Then do you brace yourself against the side of the car, and kick him so high that all the dogs in America will have starved to death before he comes down." But I didn't say anything. But when the party came back into the sleeper, then there was a scene. The porter looked at the dog uneasily, and said he " allowed it was kind of onregular, totin' dogs into de parlor cars." And whatever THE MAX WHO HAD LETTERS EOR HIS DOG. 109 misgivings he may have had on the subject were speedily cleared by a passenger — a testy old gentleman with a back as broad as a county atlas, and a breath so short that he breathed three times in speaking a word of two syllables — an old gentleman with the baldest head that ever mocked hair oil, a head with a fringe of upright, bristly hair all round it. He stood in the aisle, as he heard the dog mentioned, step- ping out from behind the curtains in the attire of a man who is not going into society, immediately. His bare feet spread out on the floor, his suspenders dangled down behind him, his fat face glowed with rage, and he roared out to the porter : "Out with that dog. No dogs sleep where I do. I ain't used to it and I won't have it. Trundle him out. THE DOG OF HIS HEART. "Hold on there," cried the confident hus- 110 THE MAX WHO HAD LETTERS FOR HIS DOG. band, "that dog's all right. Tve got let- ters ' ' "Blast your letters," roared the old party. "The whole United States post-office depart- ment can't crowd a dog in on us. Tell you, young man, it ain't right ; it ain't decent, and by gum, it ain't safe. Body of a man in the ba2:i?ai]:e-car now, on this verv train, that was bit by a lap-dog two weeks ago while he was asleep, and died just eleven days afterward. Country's full of mad dogs." This was a lie, about the dead man, but it woke everybody in the car, set all the women to screaming, and armed i:)ublic sentiment against the dog. "But I tell you the dog isn't mad," per- sisted the owner, "and he'll have to stay in here. I have letters from the superintendent of the division " "Blast the superintendent!" roared the asthmatic passenger, triumphantly, "he's got nothing to do with the sleeping car. Take the dog into a day coach and shut him up in a wood-box. Throw him overboard. I don't care what you do with him, but he can't stay here." THE MAX WHO HAD LETTERS FOR HIS DOG. Ill "But, my dear sir," pleaded the young man. *' Don't want to hear nothing!" yelled the fat passenger, " I don't travel with a menagerie. Nobody wants your dog in here !" " Xo ! Xobody ! Xobody wants him!" came in heart\^, fearless chorus from the other berths, the chorus carefully and modestly keep- ing itself out of sight, so as not to detract from the power of the solo, who was gasping out the most terrific denunciations of all dogs in gen- eral, and especially this one particular dog. ''But my dog '' the young man pleaded. "Devil take your dog, sir," the old passen- ger would gasp, "what is your dog or any man's dog to my comfort ? I say I shan't sleep with him in this car. He can't stay here.'' Well, the upshot of it was, the dog had to emigrate into a day coach, and it is a gospel fact that that man, just married, with the prettiest bride that has been seen in this coun- try (since eight years ago) didn't know whether to sit in the day coach and hold his dog all night, or stay back in the sleeper with his wife. He trotted in and out, and every time he came in, the glistening head of the fat passenger 112 A TWILIGHT IDYL. would poke out from between the curtains, and he would meet the reproachful glances of the bereaved young man with a stonj^ glare that would have detected the presence of that dog Lad the young man even attempted to smuggle him into the car by shutting him up in a watch- case. A TWILIGHT IDYL. They were sitting on the front porch enjoy- ing the evening air, and gazing at the canopy of heaven thickly studded with glittering stars. "IIow incomprehensible,'' exclaimed Mr. Posonby, "is the vastness of nature! Each glittering orb of the myriads we now behold is a sun, more glorious than our own, and the center of a grand planetary system, and their centers, in their turn, revolve around other cen- ters still more magnificent. How wonderful are the eternal laws which hold this universe of worlds in their unchanging orbits, and " ''Yes," said Mrs. Posonby, "and the man didn't bring up half enough ice to-day, and I'm just certain that cold corn beef will spoil before morning. Did you order those salt cod-fish to-day ?" A CURIOUS STRANGER. 113 A CURIOUS STRANGER. When the delegate from the Hawkey e was traveling in the East, reaping the winter harvest of shekels that the cultured people of that sec- tion of the country are wont to shower upon the Western lecturer, brimful of information— and asthma, if he travels much in Maine— he met a good many curious persons, who were not abso- lutely hedged in and hermetically sealed by the shell of reserve which inclosed the good people of Boston, when the stranger approached them ; a reserve that, as to Bostonians, only mantles a wealth of good fellowship : delightful com- panionship, warm, broad-hearted humanity un- derlies this reserve, when a closer acquaintance has worn it through, and this rather repellent reserve, which the stranger is almost always apt to misunderstand and misconstrue, is the characteristic of all Eastern people. Once in awhile, however, you meet an Eastern man who is as charmingly free from any cold, unsociable reserve as you could wish. While on my way to Bath, a ship-carpenter got on the train at Portland and sat down 8 114 A CUrwIOUS STRAXGER. beside me. Pretty soon, after an off-hand re- mark about the weather, he said : "Does this car run right through to Bath'i'' I said I didn't know, I believed it did, but I never was on this road before. Then " the s:ranger" stood revealed in his accent and his confession of ignorance, and the ship-carpenter cast off all reserve, put on the pumps and immediately applied the suction. *'Had I never been in this country before?" *' Never; I had never been in New England until a week ago." Then he "wanted to know." I made no objection. Then he reckoned I was going to Brunswick or Bath? "Yes," I said, "I was." *' Which one ?" he asked. "Bath." It was none of his business, he said, but he reckoned I was going to Bath on some kind of speculation ? "No," I said, "no speculation ; I was going there on a legitimate deal." "How?" he asked. "On regular business," I said. A GUEIOUS STKAXGER. 115 It was none of his business again, but what w: s my business at Bath ? I was going there to talk. Yes ; and who was I going to talk to 1 To anybody who would listen to me. Oh, yes ; I had something to sell them ? I might sell an audience, I said ; I had done such a thing. Yes; well, of course if I didn't want to tell my business it was all right. There wan't no harm in asking. Was I from Boston 1 No. It wan't none of his business again, but I might be from New Y^ork ? No. If it wan' t a secret where was I from ? Burlington. Oh, yes ; up in Vermont. No. ^ * No ?" A long pause. ' ' Didn' 1 1 say Bur- lington?" Y^es. *'But it wan't Burlington, Vermont 1" No. '' Ha ; there was another Burlington, then?" Yes. 116 A CUEIOUS STRANGER. Where \ *'In Nebraska." Eagerly, ''And I was from Burlington, Ne- braska, then?" Oh, no. Dejectedly, ''Then there was a Burlington somewhere else still ^" Yes. *' Where?" AVisconsin. " What jjart of Wisconsin ?" Southern, not far from Elkhorn. Cautiously, "And was that the Burlington I was from ?" Oh, no. *' Ha ; what Burlington might I be from ?" Burlington, Iowa. "That was my home ?" Yes. " What did I do when I was home ?" Played with the baby. " Yes, but what was my business ?" Wrote for the newspapers. " What newspapers ?" Hawkeye. ARCII^OLOGICAL WOXDER. 117 "Ha ; then I was the man that was going to lecture in Bath to-night T' Yes. Then he "wanted to know," but without saying what, went into another seat, curled up and went to sleep, and I drew on my lap folio a pen-picture of my inquisitor, that was to serve as a fateful warning to the next Eastern in- quisitor who dared to dead-head an Iowa lec- turer out of twenty-five cents' worth of valuable occidental information. The other day a Burlington man, while digging a well, found a carving fork, sixty-three feet below the surface of the ground. The fork was very much the same style as those of modern make, and was very little marred or damaged, beyond a crack in the fore handle. The question is, how did it ever come so far below the ground? Answer: the man's wife threw it at him when he went down to dig, because he refused to buy her a new hat to wear to the circus. 118 STUFFING A STRANGER. STUFFI^'G A STRANGER. A GENTLEMAN lias just sat clown beside me, and as he measures four and a half feet from tip to tip of the elbows, he has to lay one elbow in the pliant hollow of my arm. It is not easy to write and hold a man's elbow at the same time, and I will not continue the effort. In this instance the labor is rendered doubly diffi- cult by the burning anxiety which the gentle- man feels, to know what I am writing about. And every time he leans forward to see, he bores into my anguish-stricken ribs with his elbow. When I put away this manuscript he is going to ask me questions. Then I will take my revenge upon him. I will lie to him. Man of the elbow, stranger of the anx- ious mind, prepare to be misled and deceived, prepare to be stuffed plumb full. Well, I stuffed him ! ^' Much of a place, your town V' he asked. *'0h, yes," I said, with the matter-of-course carelessness of a citizen of the great western me- tropolis, ''about forty-five thousand, I guess." The man eyed me with keen, awakening in- terest. ''So big as that V he said. STUFFING A. STRANGER. 119 I nodded, and he present!}^ said, " Well, I had no idea there was such a large city in Iowa. State must be pretty well settled up, I reckon V ' I said, "Yes, it was. Some portions of it pretty wild, though." "Any large game in the State?" "Herds of it," I said. " I killed deer last winter not two miles from the Burlington court house." I pacified my conscience for this lie by ex- plaining to that rebellious and vociferous mon- itor that there was no Burlington court house, that it was burned down seven years ago, and the county was waiting until it could buy a second-hand court house for $1.75, before re- placing it. Tiierefore I could truthfully say that I killed all the deer that came within two miles of our court house. "I want to know!" the native exclaimed. "Do you, though ?" thought I, " then Til tell you." And so I went on, "Why, the wolves, only two years ago, made a raid right into Burlington and killed all the chickens on South Hill." Conscience raised a terrible protest at this, 120 STUFFING A STRANGER. but I hushed it up too quick, by citing the well- known case of Meigs Schenck's wolf that got loose and in one single summer night ate up everything on South Hill that wore feathers. The native looked astonished and doubly interested. "Any Indians?" he said. "Land, yes,'' I told him, yawning wearily, as one who SITTING Bui.L FINISH- tallvS of old. Stale things. INQ niS EDUCATION. • -r^ i , -, -, "Sitting Bull was educated at the Baptist Collegiate Institute, in Burl- ington, and was expelled for trying to scalp Professor Wortman with a horse-shoe magnet." "You don't tell me !'' exclaimed the native, in wild amazement. By this time I was per- fectly reckless, and told conscience to keep its mouth shut and give me a chance. "Oh, yes," I said. "Yellow Wolf's old med- icine lodge is still standing, right out on West Hill. The Indians come into the city very fre- quently, tearing through the streets on their wiry little ponies." "Ever have any trouble with them?" the man asked. " Oh, no," I said, carelessly, " the citizens sel- STUFFING A STRANGER. 121 dom do. The cow-boys, who come up from Texas with cattle, hate them terribly, and oc- casionally drop one of them in the streets Just for revolver practice. But nobody else inter- feres in their fights." *'I suppose," the man said, "you all carry revolvers strapped around you, out there?" "Oh, yes," I replied, "of course. We have to ; a man never knows when he is going to have trouble with somebody, and in case of any little misunderstanding, it wouldn't do for a fellow not to be heeled." I think the man shuddered a little. Then, fearing he might ask to look at my revolver, I casually remarked that I never carried my barkers when I came East. He said no, he supposed not. Tlien he looked out of the window a long time and said nothing. Finally I asked him in what part of Maine he made his home. He looked up at me in surprise. "Me?" he said, "Lord, I don't live in this rock patch. I'm only on here visiting some relatives." In a feeble voice I asked him where did he live, then? 122 "l WOULD SAY YOU LIED." The man yawned, and again looked listlessly out of the window. *'0h," he said, "I live on a farm just out by Leffler's ; about six miles out of Burling- ton. I wish I was back there now." So did I. So did I. I wished he had never left there. We didn't talk together any longer. Short- ly after that the weather changed, the car grew very cold, and I went into the smoking car to look for a fire. *' Suppose," said a brow-beating Clarinda lawyer to a witness he was trying to badger, ** suppose I should tell you I could bring a dozen men of your town to this court room w^ho would say they would not believe you on oath, what would you say?" And calmly the witness made him reply, "I would say you lied." A gentle smile diffused itself all over the court room, like a lump of butter on a hot cake, and the unruffled witness stepped down. THE EELEXTLESS BAGGAGE-ilAN. 123 THE RELEXTLESS BAGGAGE-MAX. Aftp:r lecturing there, I left Lancaster at midnight to hurry through to Xorth Attleboro, Massachusetts, by the next night. I checked my valises. They had to be re-checked at Xew York. And they were re-checked. And right here permit me to make a statement. The baggage-man who was on duty at the Xew York, Xew Haven & Hartford baggage- room at eight o'clock on the morning of Satur- day, December 21, 1878, will deceive passengers. He lied to me. I saw my baggage re-checked, and got the checks in my hand. Then I said : '' You'll get it on this 8:05 train ?" *'Xo," the baggage-man said, "I can't." *'Then," I wailed, ^'give it to me ; I can carry it, and I must have it on this train." For it was only heavy hand baggage. But the baggage-man would not. He only said incredulously : **Xo, if you can get on that train, your baggage will be on before you are." "Sure?" I asked anxiously, for I had my misgivings. 124 THE KELEXTLESS BAGGAGE-MAN. *'Yes," he insisted, "lean get the baggage on before you can get on." "All right," I shouted, "don't fail me, j now." I got on the train and sat down. I got up and went out on the platform and looked for the baggage-man. Over all the wide expanse of platform he was not visible. I thought he was either terribly slow or had been marvel- ously rapid. The train pulled out. That baggage-man, after I left him, sat down and played a couple of games of checkers on a trunk. Then I think he went to sleep. Then, I believe, he awoke, rubbed his eyes, looked at my valises, kicked them to see if there was anything in them that would break, and said, dreamily and Richard Grant Whitely, "There's that feller's baggage that wanted 'em to go to Providence on the 8:05." Measureless liar! by his wicked deceit he sent me to North Attleboro with just about as much of a wardrobe as a tramp. And I never got my baggage till the Monday morning fol- lowing. Why did he lie to me? Why didn't lie give me my baggage, when he knew in his vicious, depraved, prevaricating heart that he ^oxs. 125 wasn't going to try to get my baggage on that train ? We do these things better in the West. Wliy, on the old reliable Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad, from the time the first spike was driven, there never was a piece of baggage lost or left, there was never a passenger misled or deceived, there never was a train reached a station off schedule time but one, and it came in ten seconds ahead, and siuce Potter has been superintendent, a man s baggage always gets to the hotel thirty minutes ahead of him and sxDreads out his clean linen to air for him. Some Indian mounds, supposed to be three or four thousand years old or so, were recently opened near Beloit, Wisconsin, and the first thing the excavators dug out were a couple of railroad passes and an autograph album. Thus we see the early dawn of remote civilization mingles with the gray shadows of the seons that — of the aeons — the seons — the gray shadows of the aeons, ^ons. Gray shadows of the aeons. 126 RAILROADING DOWN EAST. KAILROADIXG DOWN EAST. Railroading is exciting business in this country. On most of the New England roads trains run both ways every fifteen seconds. On busy days they put on a few extras, and the freights never count for anything. When you come from Providence to Foxboro\ not ''east" or "west" or "north" or "south" or "mid- dle" or "upper" or "lower" or "old" or "new" Foxboro', but just plain, raw, unvar- nished and untitled Foxboro', you have your choice of coming straight through or taking a train by which you must change cars at Mans- field. If you have to change cars, you get off at Mansfield, and find three or four trains, all headed in different directions, all impatient to jump away like rockets, and you climb into one and sail away, and the conductor comes along, looks at your ticket and says, "wrong train," and holds out his hand for ten cents. When do you get a train back ? Eleven and one-half seconds. Back you go clear through ; " this train doesn' t stop at Mansfield. ' ' When can y oa get a train that does ? Three minutes. Up you RAILEOADIJJ'G D0\7N EAST. 127 go again. That train doesn't stop at Foxboro'. In four minutes after you have passed through the town, you strike the train that possesses the happy qualifications of going in the right direction and stopping at the proper place, and you are at Foxboro'. You have traveled on five different railroads, in eleven different direc- tions, have gone one hundred and twenty-three miles, and get to Foxboro' in eighteen minutes. It is no off-hand thing for the guileless, un- tutored child of the West to go anywhere in the barbaric orient. Y'ou say to the man at the ticket office : " I want to go to North Haddock." *' Yes," he says, "which way do you want to go?" And you learn there are five ways to go ; via all sorts of -fords and -tons and -dams and junctions. "Well," you say, "I want to go by the shortest route. '\ And he tells you that so far as time is con- cerned, by which all railroad men measure distance, they are all about alike ; you'll get there at just about the same time. You are puzzled, but suddenly think of a 128 EAILROADIXG DOWN EAST. way by which your choice can be made You iSay, ' ''All right, give me a ticket by the route with the fewest changes." "Oh, well," the man says, "it doesn't make any difference so far as that goes. You don' t have to change ; you get into a through car whichever route you take." There is something beautiful about that, as sure as you're born. You immediately select your route at random, go the longest way around, and get there first. It is a lovely country for travelers. And such roads. Look at this manuscript. Thirty-five miles an Lour and not a jog in it. Or if there is, the composi- tor put it in, and it is a typographical error. And then they always offer you a choice of tickets. One that sends you right through on the jump, and won't let you stop a minute, and another kind that will permit you to loiter along the way for a month. THE METRIC SYSTEM. J29 THE METRIC SYSTEM. The railway stations in New England arft measled with the charts of the metric system. By the time a man has waited for trains at two or three junctions, he has learned as much about the metric system as he can forget in ten minutes. I studied a chart in the station at Mansfield, while waiting for a train to Foxboro', and it has puzzled me ever since to know why a polymeter of water should equal a centipede of cloth, or why the measure of two kilometers of wood should be identical with a decimeter of oats. People who know assure me that it is the finest, most convenient and most perfect system in the world. If that is so, there is something wrong about that chart at Mansfield, because, just after I had figured out that a duckometer was exactly a mile and three-quar- ters long, I read a foot-note stating that a duckometer was the "minim" of apothecaries' measure. There certainly is something weird about it. 9 130 THE TROUBLES OF THE TALL MAN. THE TROUBLES OF THE TALL MAN. Just after I left Foxboro', a tall man sat down in the seat in front of me. I had noticed him standing wearily abont on the platform, and I pitied him. My heart was full of sym- pathy for him. I am always sorry for a tall man. Sometimes, when I get before an audi- ence, and have to stand on my tip-toes to look over the foot -lights, I wish I was a trifle taller than I am. But this longing is only moment- ary. It passes away as soon as I see an unusu- ally tall man. You see, a very tall man is always pursued, haunted, by one unvarying joke. Every short or ordinary-sized man that approaches him throws back his head, affects to gaze up into the heavens with a painful effort, and asks, " Isn't it pretty cold up where you are ?" Just watch the next short man you see meet a tall one, and see if this conundrum doesn't follow the first greeting. Just watch and see if you do not ask it yourself. And this must be dreadfully wearing on the tall man. I have observed that as a rule big men, tall men, are good-natured. It is we little fellows THE TROUBLES OF THE TALL MAX. 131 who have waspish tempers. So the tall man never resents this venerable joke by sitting down on the man who gets it off. He smiles drearily, and with a weary effort to appear in- terested, and tries to look as though he had never heard it before. It must be a perfect torture for the tall man to hear this question fifty times a day for thirty or forty years. Sometimes, when I hear a dozen men ask a tall man of my acquaintance this question, in direct succession, and see him endure it so patiently, I wish I was the Colossus of Rhodes, and a little man, four feet eleven and a half, would come np to me some day when I felt right good, and stare up at me with a grin longer than his body, and ask me '*if it wasn't pretty cold up there f' A COLOSSAL KICK. 132 EXAMINATION. and I would hold him up by the neck, and I would swing my brazen leg until it got the motion and the impetus of a walking-beam, and then I would kick the little fellow so high that he could read the names of the streets on the street lamps in Uranus, and I would sarcas- tically shout after him, " Xo, it's red hot !" Have tall men no rights that we, who live eight or ten inches nearer the earth, are bound to respect ? *' Of what is milk composed ?" asked the professor. And the smart bad boy who has to study through vacation, replied, "one part oxygen to two of hydrogen." The professor looked incredulous. "Well, not quite so bad as that," he said; "anything else?" "Some- times," said the smart bad boy, " a little tinc- ture of lactic acid or some caseous matter." The professor sent him to his room and told him the next time he wanted to analyze milk he mustn't buy it so near the river. TOO LATE FOR A TICKET. 133 TOO LATE FOR A TICKET The happiest traveling companion I have met this winter was Rev. Henry Ward Beecher, whom I met on a train somewhere in Central New York. Off the platform, and I expect on the platform as well, he is as happy and care- free as a boy fourteen years old. He is running over with fun, and stories, and reminiscences, and I think the fifty miles I rode with him were the shortest and happiest of my pilgrimage. A grand, a thoroughly grand man ! One time, he went down to Boston to lec- ture. In the afternoon he went into a barber shop of great tone and refinement, in Tremont Place, to be shaved. The barber was a garru- lous fellow, a Polish Count, judged from his manner— perhaps the Count Bozenta Modjeska, who knows ? — who entertained Mr. Beecher, while he lathered his face, with intellectual con- versation. He asked, "Are you going to the lecture this evening ? Going to the lecture ?" "Oh," Mr. Beecher replied wearily, as a man who didn't take much stock in lectures, "I don't know ; who's going to lecture f 134 TOO LATE FOR A TICKET. *'Why," the amazed barber exclaimed, **Rev. Henry Ward Beecher ; Rev. Henry Ward Beecher, of Brooklyn. Going to lecture to-night, in Music Hall." Mr. Beecher roused up a little with an air of indifferent interest. "Oh, well," he said, "if he is going to lecture, I guess I'll have to go." "Got your tickets?" the barber rattled on. " Got your tickets ? Got your ticket ?" "No," Mr. Beecher replied, "I have no ticket." The barber laughed merrily, "Ha, ha, ha!" he shouted. " You'll have to stand up ; you'll have to stand up ! Seats all gone two days ago ; you'll have to stand up." "Well, now," said Mr. Beecher, with an air of grave vexation, "do you know, that is just my lack 1 I was in Brooklyn last Sunday, and went over to Plymouth Church twice, to hear that fellow preach, morning and evening, and both times I had to stand up all through the sermon." And as he went away, the still unenlight- ened barber laughed at the man who would "have to stand up" at Mr. Beecher's lecture. EAILEOAD SLEEPERS. 135 RAILROAD SLEEPERS. Tjius far, I have passed the greater part of the winter of 1S78 in getting up at 2 o'clock in the morning to catch trains. Early rising may be very beneficial as a health-promoting habit, but it isn't the sweetest thing on earth as an amuse- ment, or a simple means of killing time. And then, if you ride on the cars all that day, you get sleepy. And you sleep a little. Now, you can' t sleep when you first get on the car. You are wide awake. The car is FIFTY CENTS WORTH. always cold at that unearthly and unchristian hour. And you have to either sit on the Avood- box or have a timid quarrel with some man 136 RAILROAD SLEEPERS. traveling on a pass or a half-fare ticket to make him let you have a small fractional jjart of one of the four seats he has spread himself out over. If you don't weigh any more than myself, you do as I do — pick out the crossest-looking brake- man on the train, call him ''conductor," and give him half a dollar to get you a seat. And it just makes the immortal gods lie down on the grass and hold their ambrosia- scented breath to see him waltz in and stir up the menagerie. But along about ten o'clock you begin to grow most intolerably sleepy. This is partly owing to the fact that the car is now delight- fully warm and comfortable, but it is chieHy because the car is at this time about as full of passengers as it is going to be, and about two- thirds of the number are women. It is a supremely comfortable feeling that comes creeping over a man, just as he sinks into profound slumber. But it is extremely morti- fying for him to awake very suddenly, with the scalding consciousness that he has been sleep- ing for nearly eighteen miles in the regularly ordained day-coach fashion, with his head hanging down over the back of the seat, his RVILROAD SLEEPERS. 137 mouth open so wide nobody could see liis face. and the first thing he sees when he opens his eyes is five girls, looking straight at him. It annoys him. It makes him feel that he appears at great disadvantage with the rest of the pas- sengers who are and have been wide awake. Even a married man, the marriedest man in the United States, old and out of the market, doesn't like to afford amusement in that way to the only pretty passengers on the train. Even a man with the best wife and the only boy worth having in America, feels that he has lost dignity under such circumstances. I am going to quit it. I shall cancel, without further pro- vocation, the next lecture engagement that is implicated with a peep o' day train. I am going to shut down on this early ris- ing. Somebody will get killed with this fool- ishness yet. Congress ought to pass a law, making early rising a capital offense. By the time one or two men were hanged for getting up at three o'clock, people would quit it. If it isn't stopped, some man will get his eye put out with it. If — I mean when, I am president, I shall issue a proclamation compelling all railway 138 A DISAPPOINTED ETYMOLOGIST. trains to start from all stations at 9 o'clock, A. M.— that's a good hour— and to arrive at all stations at not later than 5:30 p. m. I think I have about the correct views on railway legisla- tion. A DISAPPOIXTED ETYMOLOGIST. *' Let me look at your dictionary a minute," a polite, well-dressed stranger asked, bowing into the sanctum in some haste yesterday morn- ing. "Certainly," and we shoved Noah W.'s charming novelette, unexpunged edition, over to his side of the table. Long and earnestly looked the man. Then a dark ivown settled down on his brow like a winter cloud. He banged the book down on the floor and kicked it. "Blame such a dictionary," he roared, "I wouldn't give a cent a thousand for such a book! It's got Independence, and Homestead, and Crescent, and Pilot, and Sandwich, and a whole host of them little towns in it, and never a mention of Burlington, or Keokuk, or Des Moines, or Chicago, or any big town in the whole book !" And he gave it a parting kick and was gone. CARDS VS. CROQUET. 139 CARDS vs. CROQUET. From the car window, I saw to-day the first game of croquet of the season. The game pos- sesses a singular interest for me. One time, I rode more than fifty miles in a railway car, seated behind four men who were playing with those awful playthings of the devil — cards. They played euchre until they were tired of it ; they played a little seven-up, pedro, and oc- casionally a trilie of poker. 1 never heard a dispute. Their frequent bursts of merriment at some unexpected play repeatedly drew my eyes from my book. They never quarreled, and never once called names. When I got out at the station I sat at my window and watched a party of young men and maidens play cro- quet. In fifteen min- utes I saw two persons cheat successfully. I heard the one player who did not cheat accused of cheating five times. I heard four distinct, bitter quarrels. A SOOTHING PASTIME. 140 ''WHY IS IT?" I heard a beautiful young girl tell two lies, and a meek-looking young man three, and finally 1 saw the young girl throw her mallet against a fence so hard that it frightened a horse ; the other young girl pounded her mallet so hard on the ground that it knocked the buds off an apple tree. They both banged into the house at different doors, and the two young men looked sheepish and went off after a drink. Now, why is ttiis ? Isn't croquet a good moral game? *•» A WOMAN writes to find out what evil genius it is that always leads a man into the parlor to Wack his boots on the best ottoman, rather than on the more convenient w^ood-box in the kitchen ? And why a man always starts to walk away from the washstand w^hen he begins to wipe his face, and drops the towel half-way down the stairs, or out in the front yard, or wherever he may be when his face is dried ? Good land, woman, do we know the unfathom- able ? We suppose its the same impulse that always makes a woman stand before the glass to comb her back hair or button the back of her polonaise. THE PASSING OF THE TRAIN BOY. 141 THE PASSING OF THE TRAIX BOY. In the West the day was dying ; Wintry cloud ships near the sun, In a sea of crimson lying, Told the day was almost done. On his couch of pain and weakness, Pale and still the train boy lies ; Beams his face with placid meekness, Glow with softened light his eyes. " Comrades, on both sides surround me j" And he brightens with a smile ; "In two long lines stand around me, Make my couch the Pullman aisle." Even as the wish he utters Round they stand with wond'ring stares, While in husky tones he mutters, " Pears ? Fresh California pears ?" Then they tumble to his fancies And at passengers they play. While they snarl with surly glances, " Xaw I" " Don't want no pears !" " Go 'way !" Then they closer stand around him, Bendinc( low to hear him say. 142 HAMLET. As though in the car they found him — • " Peanuts ? Roasted, fresh to-day !" Then they lioot in wild derision, And in answer to their scorn. Loud he cries, with kindling vision, " English walnuts ? Fresh pop-corn ? All the latest and the best books ? Morning papers? Journal? Times? Dally Jlaickeye? Roasted chestnuts? Don't be stingy with your dimes. "New-laid figs ? The best imported Hand-made Abyssinian dates ? Train stops while you eat one ; sorted For the trade, in canvas crates." Thus his strength comes back with chaffing, And his comrades dry their tears ; From death's jaws he leaps, and laughing, Runs the train for fifty years. When Hamlet said, ''Seams, madam? Nay, I know not seams," lie wasn't talking poetry, but had just killed a sewing-macliine agent in the front hall. LOST niS POCKET-BOOK. 143 LOST HIS POCKET-BOOK. My troubles in getting from Summit, New Jersey, to Herkimer, New York, in a snow- storm, began at the Hoboken ferries. There was enough ice in the river to start a new Greenland. Then, when at last I got across the river and up to the Grand Central depot, I found I had just time to make the train if I flew around, and I couldn't find my pocket-book. I knew I hadn't lost it, or given it away, so 1 hunted for it. I have often laughed at a nervous, belated traveler searching for his pocket-book, while the jangling bells and hissing cylinder cocks out on the tracks drove him wild with nerv- ousness and terror. I will never laugh at him again. Believe me, there is nothing funny about it, nothing. "You'll have time to get the train if you hurry," the ticket-agent said. I felt in my hip pocket. No pocket-book there. I felt in my other hip pocket. A watch 144 LOST HIS POCKET-BOOK. k8\^ a chestnut, fiv^e newspaper clippings, two letters and a piece of string. No pocket- book. I went down into my inside vest pocket. No indication of a national bank in that vicinity. I dived into my outside vest- pockets, and the sounding apparatus brought up handfuls of lint, broken matches, fragments of wooden tooth-picks, hotel cards, eyeless but- tons, and bits of lead-pencils. I plunged madly into the pockets of my coat. I brought up handkerchiefs, a pocket-comb, some visiting cards, a conductor's check — how did I manage to keep that ? I wondered ; a calendar for 1879, a reporter's note-book, a hotel key — for heaven's sake when and from where did I carry that off ? — a pair of gloves, two time cards, and a pocket-map of Nev/ England, but nothing with which I could buy a ticket to Utica. My hands moved faster than the days on a prom- issory note. The people in the depot laughed a great deal and pitied a little. The case was growing desperate. The man at the gate chanted, "All aboard for Albany and the West, " and I went fairly wild with excite- ment. I inaugurated a sweeping investigation into the condition and contents of my overcoat LOST HIS POCKET-BOOK. 145 pockets, and as I dragged tlie things out, I piled them up on the floor. Newspapers of various dates ; an "Official railway guide," with all the time-tables wrong and the ticket fares set down in the population columns ; a map of New York and Pennsylvania, a pair of mittens, a pocket knife — how did that come out there ? a lot of visiting cards, a memorandum book, a quart of letters, a package of stamped envel- opes, a pocket-handkerchief, a vest buckle, a cop3' of Puck, and a late Graphic, two grains of corn, a hat full of lint, some string, a round stone, a black neck-tie, and a lump of chalk. How the people in the depot enjoyed it and took it all in. Only one man sincerely pitied me. He came up and watched me, while with feverish eagerness and frenzied haste I emptied those cisterns of pockets, and by and by he said : " How fur ye going, mister?" ''Utica," I gasped; " Utica, if I go any- where." He looked at me pityingly for a moment, while I went on wildly strewing the floor of the Grand Central depot with the chaos of things evolved from my pockets. 10 146 LOST HIS POCKET-BOOK. ^' By gaul," he said, "I've a good mind to lend you the money." But just then, clear down at the bottom of an outside pocket, my missing national bank turned up. I got on the train without even time to thank the tender-hearted New- Yorker, and started on my wiiy toward a snow-drift as big as the side of Pike's Peak. And when I got down to Herki- mer this afternoon, I rode down in a train consisting of three _. _ coaches and three en- A piTTTNQ sTRAjs-GER. Englucs are no ob- ject to the railroaders of this country where there is snow on the air. Last night you hear the air go into convul- sions with the most terrific coughing and puSf ing that ever startled the night. The earth trembles and quakes under the straining, pant- Here she comes. One locomotive A BASE FLATTERER. 147 passes you ; two ; three ; four ; five ; six engines go straining and panting by. Now for the train. You look to see a train tliat reaches from there to Rochester. There is one smoking-car ! A BASE FLATTERER. JoxESBURG, Missouri. A touching incident has just obtruded itself upon the attention of the passengers. A gentleman, it may be Mr. Jones himself for aught I know, has just got off the train very abruptly. He missed the two lower steps on the car entirely, but he hit the platform plumb center, breaking his fall by dropping on a bird-cage he was carrying. As a buffer a bird-cage is not a success. It is yield- ing enough, but does not possess a sufficient degree of elasticity. I am happy to state that although the once beautiful bird-c.ige, as the gentleman angrily holds it up to examine it, now looks like a gilded wire gridiron, the canary is not dead. But it is cooped up in the narrowest corner that a terrified canary ever cramped its legs in. 148 BEAUTIFUL SNOW. BEAUTIFUL SXOW. A ^'E^V AXD EEVISED EDITION. Y visions of spring have taken the T\-ing, and are off with the flight of the stork, and the climate to- day, in a mild sort of way, re- minds me of Central New York. For the beautiful snow, as you probably know, has taken this country by storm ; and with wonderful thrift it piles drift upon drift, in the very worst kind of bad form. The trains are de- layed, and my lecture played, for it's thir- teen long miles to Carlisle ; and the way it is snowing, and drifting and blowing, thirty rods makes a pretty long mile. POETRY OF WIXTER TRAVEL BEAUTIFUL SNOW. 149 So despairing I wait till the storm shall abate, and some kind of a train comes along, when, shorter and fleeter than any short meter, ril cut off the rest of my song. But with portent most dire, still higher and higher, still pile up the drifts at the winder ; with the roar of a gong^ the storm sweeps along, and no one seems able to hinder. It's provoking, oh, very ; I thought Febru- ary a season devoted to thaw ; but the ground hog — I guess 'at hef, just like necessity, knows neither season nor law. For the flakes whirling down I can't see the town; I can't tell the South from the Bend; for all I can see, all the world except me, has suddenly come to an end. It's just my blessed luck, in a drift to get stuck, and I think if I sought the equator, that a snow storm would foUer and till every holler, with the drifts of a 'seventy-eighter. * It doesn't really sound very much like a gong, but I couldn't think of anything else to rhyme with song. + Accent heavy on the first syllable of this clause. Ex- planations of this line will be sent to every person who sends in a year's subscription for The Hawkeye. 150 FOREBODINGS. FOREBODIXGS. " Blow, blow, thou winter wynd, Thou art not so unky-ind As man's ingrat-cbi-chude ;" The folk at New Carlisle, With unbecoming smile, Will say, "He might have got here if he wude." But how can a feller get anywhere, When the drifting snowflakes fill the air, And the trains are all behind ? When he can't do nothing but stand and stare At the useless time cards, here and there, That grimly answer his anxious stare By asking him " what he can find ?'* When the best he can do is to sulk and mope, And vainly hope against hopeless hope. And vaguely into philosophy grope And endeavor to feel resigned ? While he knows, as certain as he can see, How awfully mad the committee will be. The much-abused, patient committee, With the hall man claiming his rent or he'll sue, And a bill for dodgers and posters due. And nothing to straddle the blind ?* * This expression, the exact meaning of which I do not THREXODY. 151 THREXODY.* I've a letter from thy sire, Mary Ann, Mary Ann ; And he's just as mad as fire, Mary Ann, Mary Ann ! And he says if I come nigher, That he'll raise me ten times liigher, Than the German Methodist spire, ^fary Ann, 3Iary Ann ! If to win thee I aspire, Mary Ann ! Oh, I dread to see his fa-hace, Mary Ann, Mary Ann ; know, is something I once heard down in southwestern Missouri. I think it is the pass-word to some sort of secret society. * It may strike the critical reader that the threnody hasn't much to do with the snow storm. I will admit that I was impressed with the same idea, but I couldn't see, as I went along, just how I could work the snow storm in, so I just let the thing take its own course, hoping that it would come around to the snow storm after awliile, some way or other; instead of which it just seemed to get threnodier and threno- dier, and connoisseurs think the climax is reached in the third stanza, which is pronounced by the supreme court of the United States, admitted to be the best judges, to be the threnodiest of the lot. 152 THRENODY. For I know he'll give me clia-hase, Mary Ann, Mary Ann ! He will waltz me round the room ; He will fan me with the broom ; Yes, I safely may assume, Mary Ann, Mary Ann, That he'll fire me out the roo-hoom, Mary Ann ! I'm 80 scared I cannot slee-heep, Mary Ann, Mary Ann ; For I'm struck all of a hee-heap, Mary Ann, Mary Ann ! He is coming after me ! Blood in both his eyes I see, Oh, wherever shall I flee-hee? Mary Ann, Mary Ann ; He will make it hot for me-he, Mary Ann ! Theee is a parrot in Marshalltown, Iowa, that is fifty years old, but it can say "Polly- wolla kowackwah" just as plainly and just as many hundred thousand times a day, as it could when Iowa was a howling wilderness. THE VEXTILATIOX FIEND. 153 THE YEXTILATIOX FIEXD. At Lyons Falls the ventilation fiend gets on the train. She is a woman this time. Would I open the ^\indow for her \ I would and did. Did it annoy me ? Oh, no ; I rather liked to have the snow blow in and beat down my neck and back. It soothed me and braced me. as it were, up. She was fading away, she told me, with con- sumption. I didn't doubt it. She was five inches taller than myself, and weighed about one hundred and eio^htv-nine. Ever\' time she couizhed it knocked the stove down. The woman said to me that she knew it was her fate. Her mother passed away with the same fell scourge ; her mother's father and his mother before him died by the same disease ; all of her brothers and sisters, too, had thus 1 passed away. She was the last of seven, she said, sadly. Was my life, she asked, under the dark shadow of any hereditary taint ? Oh, no, I said, as cheerfully as I could under 151 CORX-COLOR. the circumstances. Oh, no, there had never been any such depressing monotony in our family in its taking off. We never had any particular or favorite style of dying. When the time come we never delayed things waiting for the family complaint. We just laid down and died of anything that happened to come along. Anything that was handy at the time suited us. The other day such a beautiful young lady, eyes like midnight, hair like the raven's wing, brow like alabaster, lips like coral, purse like an overland mail pouch, went into a Jefferson street dry-goods store, and asked to see some corn-colored silk. The youngest clerk limped painfully behind the counter and handed her down a piece of scarlet. '*I said corn-color," she murmured. The young salesman hesitated and fidgeted. " Well, by dad," he exclaimed, ''that's the prevailing color of all my corns." And by the time the proprietor could hurry over to ask what was tbe matter, she was out of the door, and half a block away. EATING ON THE FLY. 155 EATING ON THE FLY. LowviLLE— Ten minutes for refreshments. The sandwich of the raih'oad ; the custard pie three inches thick ; the ham sandwich with the TEN MINUTES FOR REFRESHMENTS. ham left out ; the biscuit that was cast at the iron foundry ; the coffee that ought to be named Macbeth, because it murders sleep ; ten minutes for refreshments. Bolt 'em down. Castor Land, the next station, only eight miles further on. What an appropriate name 156 A NEW NAME FOR IT. to follow the dining station ! Castor Land ; ])ity it wasn't an island, then they could call it Castor isle. Castor Land. I suppose the happy beings who live here are known as Castor beins. It is snowing so hard as we pass through this station that you can t tell the land from the Castor. A NEW NAME FOR IT. "King Humbert," old Mr. Throstlewaite read from his pax)er, ' • is said to be very fond of Garibaldi." "And it's none to his credit," sputtered Mrs. Throstlewaite, " that he is. The king of Italy might have better tastes than to be a-sitting on his royal throne guzzling and swilling spirituous liquors with funny names wdiile his people demand all his attention. If he's fond of it now, where will his appetite carry him by the time he's forty-five? His fancy drinks won't be strong enough for him then, and he'll be a common raw whisky drunk- ard." And she went on to tell of a young man she knew down at New Bedford, who was passionately fond of Tommanjerry, and drank himself into the grave in 23 years. RAILWAY ckiticism:. 157 RAILWAY CRITICISM. Friday morning, as the Utica and Black River train goes out of ^Vatertown, two intelli- gent citizens sitting behind me enter into con- versation. The first intelligent citizen, whose face is fringed with a gray beard, and whose mouth looks as though it had been used to hang him up by when he was young, wanted to know of the second intelligent citizen what the lecture was about. The second intelligent citizen, a tall, brown-bearded man, who wrinkles his forehead to the roots of his hair in an ap- parently agonized effort to keep his eyes open, while he stares feebly out at the world through a pair of eye-glasses, and who tucks his long hair under at the ends until he looks like a blood relation of the jack of clubs, says, '-it wan't much account ; it was abeout a man — some man he knew — a kind of a boy — boy — sort of a kind of a boy — or a man— man died, he be- lieved ; boy shaved himself— some boy ; it wan't much acceount ; wan't worth listening to." I am greatly pleased, but I have my revenge. 158 RAILWAY CRITICISM, I draw, on my paper block, pictures of the ''jack of clubs," and make his nose enormously long. There is a look of a school teacher about • the "jack" that reminds me of my school days, and I never yet saw the time, when I wore jackets, that I could not wreak a terrible and all-satisfying vengeance upon a teacher for any insult or indignity, by drawing pictures of him on my old slate. I can make better, that is, worse, pictures now than I could then, and my revenge is correspondingly more terrible and satisfying. The "jack of clubs" gets of! at Carthage. I am so far quieted and reconciled by my revenge that I sadly tear up my ugly pictures and look regretfully at the tall figure and the long hair as they go plodding off through the snow, and I wish I hadn't made the nose so long nor the eyes so " poppy." Poor old " left bower," I take it all back, and I will never be so mean again. But then a fellow shouldn't rattle a fellow by sitting down right behind a fellow and run- ning down a fellow's lecture. This reminds me of a story they tell of Josh Billings, one of the best of the multitude of USES OF ROPE. 159 good things BilliDgs says. Some one asked him if he ever stood at the door of the hall and lis- tened to his audience comment on his lecture as they passed out. "I did — once," the philosopher replied, very solemnly, "but," he added, after a long and impressive pause, " I will never do it again." USES OF ROPE. Whex a guest at a hotel sees the porter car- rying a coil of rope three hundred feet long into his room, a feeling of tranquil security comes over him, and he lies down to sleep without a thought of fear. But when a boy sees his father coming up-stairs to his room with only the little end of a rope, not more than two feet long, with a knot at one end, it kindles a con- flagration of wild apprehension and terror in his soul that all the waters of the Mississippi valley cannot quench. 160 SQUATTER SOVEREIGNTY. SQUATTER SOVEREIGNTY. We have left Chicago, and on the best road in the world we are whirling along toward Bur- lington. I go out into the dining car to eat. I come back, and lo, a family has " sqnatted " in my seat. The patriarch and matriarch, two chil- dren and a short ton of baggage. I am inclined to get mad, and I think, indeed, I do make a pretty good start at it. I jerk my overcoat angrily away from the recumbent shoulders of the honest, but not stylish, agriculturist who has made a mattress of it, and glare savagely down at a little bundle of blue and white bag- gage that these people have piled up on my seat. And lo, while I glare, a tiny, dimpled hand peeps out of the folds of the blue cloak, with dainty nails, tinted like a shell ; a flossy little halo of silky hair, white lids closed over the blue eyes, long lashes that fringe the white lids — ah, the baby is welcome to all the seat. Who can keep cross at the baby ? Poor little dot, it will have to fight for its privileges after awhile. Instead of spreading out over a whole SQUATTER SOVEREIGNTY. 161 seat that belongs to somebody else, it will be happy if it is strong enough to capture and hold one half of the wood box. So I hunt for another seat, and I really feel glad to let the baby have mine. It is all I am going to subscribe, though, you bet. I take another seat, and a sweet-voiced, truthful-looking woman tells me it belongs to her little boy. Well, I say, he can sit with me. But, she says, there are two of them. They are not visible, however, and they do not jjppear all the rest of the trip. I am con- vinced that those boys are not yet born. Another boy belonging to the family that took my seat turns up in a few minutes and disputes possession of the seat I finally occupy. But the line has to be drawn somewhere, and I draw it at the baby. A boy loses a powerful sight of beauty between eleven months and eleven years. So I am not moved by any ten- der emotion toward the boy. I give him the end of the seat next the win- dow, however, because it is mean, it is dirt mean, to make a boy on his travels sit away from the car window. 11 102 SQUATTER SOVEREIGNTY. Then, the window is broken and there is a strong draft blowing in, which will not hurt the boy, while I must take care of myself. Mr. Tilden's health is failing. General Grant is reported insane, and there must be somebody saved to be president of this unhappy coun- try. There is a woman behind me who talks bass. Just now she asked the train boy the price of his apples, and I thought it was a man talking under the car. She is a large woman. If she wasn t, it would tear her to pieces every time she said "good morning." We stopped at Buda and a young man who wants to get off has to ask a i)ortion of the family that "squatted" in my seat, to get off his overcoat, and to take their feet off his valise. I really cannot express a feeling of resentment at this excessively diffusive family. It seems to have jumped all the claims in the car while the rest of us w^ere out at dinner. I don't mind the baby ; not a bit of it. The baby is more than welcome to my seat, and it can have my watch to play with, if it wants it ; but I do i)ro- test against the colonizing tendencies of the rest of his family. They seem to sit on everybody's SQUATTER SOVEREIGNTY. 163 things except their own, and their numerous feet are on all the valises in the car. They are too awfully diffusive. There now, I knew there was something ailed me. I needed vent. I was carrying too much steam. Bat I feel better now, and unless this family should develop a new column in some unexpected direction — but no, the woman who talks bass is at it again, and the Swede baby that has been crying in the forward part of the car for the past sixty-eight miles, is awed into wondering silence. A SOULLESS MOlN'OrOLY The man with the family has just got up and gone into the seat of a commercial traveler who 164 TWO KIXDS OF SUGAR. just this minute went into tlie smoking car. The man is now curling up for a nap. I can write no more. There is a limit to human patience, and the contemplation of this man's repeated invasions and steady acquisition of territory, maddens. There are only seven of his family, but they now occupy thirteen whole seats, and from his vantage ground in the drummer's seat, the head of the family is look- ing out for more. TWO KINDS OF SUGAR. ^'TiiE first Napoleon," remarked Mr. Mid- dlerib, "introduced into France the manufac- ture of beet sugar, and it is to-day an important industry in our own country." "Yes," said Master Middlerib, in a subdued tone of coun- tenance, "I tasted some of it to-day." " Tasted some of what?" inquired his father, sharply. "Beech sugar," said the boy wearily, and then he drew closer to the table and sat more specifi- cally on the edge of his chair. And silence fell on the family like a fog. ENVOI. 165 EXYOI. Over tlie land where the hoop poles grow, (*Benjamin, Benjamin, draw it mild ,) Daintily drifted the beautiful snow, Whirling and eddying, free and wild. Nobody knew what it came there for, Kobody wanted it, every one swore. But it drifted and eddied just all the more, Till up to the chimney tops it piled. Oh, somehow or other I want to be — (Lay him to rest with his ulster on ;) "Where never a flake of snow I'll see. While the changing seasons come and gone.f I'd like to get up in the voiceless night, And wing my rapid, unwearied flight, To some sunny clime of pure delight. Where never a snowflake flecks the dawn. Come with your perfumed robes, winds of May, (Pull her wide open and give her sand ;) * The question may be asked, " TThat has this line to do with it ?" In reply to this piece of unwarranted imperti- nence, I have simply to ask the reader, " What is that your business ?" t This should be "come and go," but "go"' wouldn't rh3"me. 166 THE FIRST BUTTON MAN. Wrapped in your tender arms, bear nie away Into some faii'v, enchanted land, Where the slumbering winter can never awake, Where the snow clouds never loom up and break, Where there ain't* enough winter to frost a cake, Give me a ticket to that fair land. THE FIRST BUTTON MAN; Samuel Willistox, the first inaniifacturer of buttons in the United States, is seventy-three years old, and worth six million dollars. He has made half the buttons nsed in the world, and has never yet made a snspender button that would hold its grip and not lly off and rattle across the floor every time a man stooped to x^ick up his hat in church. He was the first man who manufactured a tin button that looked enough like a silver five-cent piece to fool a short-sighted deacon with a contribution basket. * "Isn't " would be more grammatical, but it wouldnl fit in half so well. PA AXD THE BABY. 167 PA AXD THE BABY. After we left Vincennes this afternoon, a man got on with his wife and two children. One of the little ones, a boy three years old or over, was fretful and weej^ful, and the father did his best, and in the tenderest, patientesfc manner, to quiet the child and put him to sleep. How the little fellow did cry and kick, and throw things around. He had been crying that way, the man said, all daylong, and he couldn't imagine what ailed him. He "allowed he might have the earache." The passengers were full of sympathy, for which, as they strove to express it in various ways, the father appeared unspeakably grateful for, and the boy indig- nantly repelled. One man gave him an orange ; the boy hurled it spitefully into the face of his baby sister, sleeping in the mother's lap, and the terrified young lady added her wail of fright and pain to the general chorus. A lady gave him her handsome smelling-bottle ; he dashed it on the floor and howled more fiercely than ever. I handed the poor little innocent my pocket knife ; away it went out of the car win- 168 PA AND THE BABY. do^y and the urchin wailed more indignantly than ever. All the time the father never got cross or grew impatient, but " allowed he could hush him off to sleep after a bit." And by and by, sure enough, the pain and impatience yielded to the father's patient sooth- ing, the little head dropped over on the father s shoulder, the broken sobs became less and less frequent, and finally died away, and the poor little fellow just began to forget his troubles in sleep as the train slowed up to a station, when suddenly the father, walking up and down the aisle with him, darted a glance out of the win- dow, stooped down and looked again, and shouted : " What's the matter with that man ?" " Hello !" he shouted. " Here, Emily, take him — watch him — here! I can't wait! Don't let him roll off ! Watch him !" With a hasty motion he tossed the baby into the seat behind his wife, getting him just about half-way on. He gave a hurried jab at the boy with his extended fingers, to push him further on the seat, but missed him, and darted off to the door of the car, shot out of it and was down on the platform in a flash. The mother quickly PA AXD THE BABY. 169 l^nt down the smaller child and turned to attend to the boy, two or three passengers at the same time sjjrang forward with the same purpose — all too late; before the father was w^ell out of the door, the boy toppled off the seat, came to the floor with a thump and a howl of real pain and fright, and w^hen the father, looking sheepish and cheap, came back into the car, the poor little fellow, wide awake to all his old miseries and the one crowning, insulted new one, was screaming away at a rate that fairly made the windows rattle, and he kept it up until we got to Terre Haute, and I don't know how long after that. And all this time nobody else had been able to see anything to excite the father to such a remarkable degree, and he saw our wonder in our countenances. ''The man was a coal miner," he explained, as he took the screaming boy, "and I reckon he'd been loadin' a car of coal and got his face smutty." Our amazement looked out of our eyes greater than ever. "An' I thought," continued the father, nervously patting the boy's back, and seeing that some further explanation was necessary 170 THE QUIET OF THE TOMB. and expected, "I thougLt his eye was blacked, an' I -lowed maybe there' d ben a fight." MOEAL. The profound silence, excepting the boy's wailing, which didn't count, which followed this explanation, was broken at last by the man from Sullivan, who was sitting back by the stove, and remarked in solemn and impressive tones : " What shadders we are and what shadders we pursue." THE QUIET OF THE TOMB. " Algeexon " sends us a poem in which he declares, "There is rest forme in the silent tomb." Oh, there is, is there ? Yes, there is ; lots of it. You try it. You'll find out how much rest there is in the silent tomb with half a dozen medical students digging in after you and fighting over you. You crawl into the tomb for a little quiet time, if you want to, Algernon, but you just take your revolver with you, all the same. AVJIEX HE SVv'OKE. 171 WHEX HE SWOEE. THE SCENE OF GEORGE S PROFANITY. (rnOJl A SKETCH BT OUR SPECIAl, ARTIST ON THE SPOT.; Shortly after the battle of ]\I o n m o u t h , Washington, his brow contracted with thought and shadowed with gloom, stood out in the back yard. It was midnight, and the sinking moon cast a strange, weird pallor over the darkening land- scape. The Father of his Country held a shot-gun in his hands, the smoke still wreath- ing slowly above his head. It was evident 172 THE ClIAMPIOX DOG. that liis slumbers had been disturbed. "I feel/' he said, passing his hand across his throbbing brow, ' ' I feel like one who, from a ■* lofty height, looks down upon the mighty tor- rent of resistless Niagara." And then, with one last glance at the cat he wrecked, he turned . toward the house and tried to tell his staff what he had said ; but alas, he conldn t remember it, and when they tried to laugh out of courtesy, the sleepy cackle betrayed the hollowness of the effort. It was then that Washington swore. THE CHAMPIOX DOG. A MAX up on Xorth Hill is just the maddest man. He went to Philadelphia and paid 8320 for a pure blood bird dog, with a pedigree longer than the chronological table of the kings of England, and the dog hadn't been home two days before the next door neighbor killed him with a brick in his hen house, where the thor- oughbred was sucking eggs. Blood is as uncer- tain and rare in a dog as it is in a South Amer- ican battle. TRAIN MANNERS. 173 TRAIN MAXXERS. Genesee. — A woman with three bird-cages and a little girl has just got on the train. She arranges the three bird-cages on a seat, and then she and the little girl stand up in the aisle, and she glares around upon the ungallant men who remain glued to their seats, and look dreamily out of the window. I bend my face down to the tablet and write furiously, for I feel her eyes fastened upon me. Somehow or other, I am always the victim in cases of this delicate nature. Just as I expected. She speaks, fastening her commanding gaze upon me : "Sir, would it be asking too much if I begged you to let myself and my little girl have that seat ? A gentleman can always find a seat so much more easily than a lady." And she smiled. Xot the charmingest kind of a smile. It was too triumphant to be very pleasing. Of course I surrendered. I said : "Oh, certainly, certainly. I could find an- other seat without any trouble." She thanked me, and I crawled out of my 174 TRAIN MANNEKS. comfortable seat, and gathered np my overcoat, my manuscript, my shawl-strap package, my valise, and my overshoes, and she and the little girl went into the vacant premises as soon as the writ of ejectment had been served, and they looked happy and comfortable. Then I stepped across the aisle ; I took up those bird-cages and set them along on top of the coal box, and sat down in the seat thus Tacated. I apologetically remarked to the woman, who was gazing at me with an expres- sion that boded trouble, that "it was much warmer for the canaries up by the stove." She didn't say anything, but she gave me a look that made it much warmer for me, for about five minutes, than the stove can make it for the canaries. Belvidere. — A woman has just gone out of the car and left the door wide, wide open, and the wind is blowing through the coach a hun- dred miles a minute. Why is it that a woman never shuts a car door ? Also, why does a man always leave it open ? And, indeed, why no- body ever shuts it except the brakeman, and he only closes it for the sake of the noise he can make with it. TRAIN MAXXERS. 175 Yesterday morning, I saw a man go ont of a car, and shut the door after him. I have trav- eled very constantly for nearly three years, and this was the first man I ever saw shut the car door after him as he went ont. And he only shut it because I was right be- hind him, trying to get out, with a big valise in each hand. When I set down my valises to open the door, I made a few remarks on tlie general subject of people who would get up in the night to do the wrong thing at the wrong time, but the man was out on the platform, and failed to catch the drift of my remark. I was not sorry for this, because the other passengers seemed to enjoy it quite as well by themselves, and the man whose action called forth this impromptu address was a forbidding looking man, as big as a hay wagon, and looked as though he would have banged me clear through the side of a box car if he had heard what I said. I suppose these people who invariably do the wrong things at the wrong time are neces- sary, but they are awfully unpleasant. Cuba. — A woman gets on the train and says a very warm-hearted good-by to a great cub of 176 TRAIX MAXXERS. a sixteen-year-old boy who sets down lier bnn- .dles and turns to leave the car with a <2:rulf grunt that may mean good-by or anything else. There is a little quiver on her lip as she calls after him, "Be a good boy, write to me often, and do as I tell you." He never looks around as he leaves the car. He looks just like the kind of a boy who will do just as she tells him, but she must be careful to tell him to do just as he wants to. I have one bright spark of consolation as the train moves on and I see that boy performing a clumsy satire on a clog dance, on the platform. Some of these days he will treat some man as gruffly and rudely as he treats his mother. Then the man will climb onto him and lick him ; pound the very saw^lust out of him. Then the world will feel better and happier for the licking he gets. It may be long deferred, but it will come at last. I almost wish I had pounded him myself, while he is young and I felt able to do it. He may grow up into a very discouragingly rugged man, extremely difficult to lick, and the world may have to wait a very long time for this act of justice. It frequently happens that these bad boys grow up into distressingly " bad " men. TRAIN MAXXERS. l7t "We have got as far as Hinsdale, and here we Lave ceased to progress. The experienced pas- sengers sit as patiently as the train itself. The inexperienced ones fly around and tramp in and out and leave the door open, and ply the train men and the operator with numerous questions. Sometimes the train men answer their questions, and then sometimes they do not answer them. When they do reply to the eager conundrums, somehow or other the passenger always feels as though he knew a little less than he did before. It is a cruel, deceitful old world, in snow^ time. A man has gone to the front seat, and is warming his feet by planting the soles of his boots against the side of the stove. As he wears India rubber boots, the effect is marked, but not pleasant. As usual, the drinking boy is on the car. He has laid regular siege to the water tank, and I think will empty it before we get to Sala- manca. I wish to call the attention of the tem- perance societies to this class of intemperates. There should be a pledge drawn up and some color of ribbon — a bit of w^atered silk would be appropriate, I suppose — for boys of six and seven years, who are addicted to drinking water 12 178 • TRAIN MANXERS. at the rate of eigliteen tin-cupfals a minute. Ten or twelve boys of this class can drink a creek dry when they are feeling comfortably thirsty. A friendly passenger wants to talk. I am not feeling particularly sociable this morning, and consequently I do not propose to talk to anybody. He asks how I like this kind of weather, and I say, "Splendidly." He laughs feebly, but encouragingly, and says there has been a little too much snow. I say, "Xot for health, it was just what we needed.'' He asks if I heard of the accident on the Central Railroad, and I say, "Yes." Then he asks me how it was, and I tell him, "I don't know^ ; didn't read it." He wants to know what I think of Hayes, and I say, " I think he made a very good con- stable." " Constable r' he says, "I mean President Hayes." I say I thought he meant Dennis Hays, of Peoria. Then he asks if I "am going far ?" I say, "Xo." TEAiN man:ners. 179 *'How far?" he asks. •'Fourteen hundred miles," I say, unblush- ingly. He thinks that is what he would call " far," and I make no response. Two babies in the car are rehearsing a little and in rather faulty time, but with fine expression. And the man, with one or two "dashes," asks if it doesn't bother me to write with a lot of "brats squalling around ?" I looked up at him very severely, for it always makes me angrj^ to hear a man call a baby a "brat," and I say to him, in a slow, impressive manner, that " I would rather listen to a baby cry than hear a man swear." This eminentlj^ proper and highly moral rebuke has its effect. The man forsakes me, and he is now wreaking a cheap, miserable revenge on the smiling passengers by whistling " My Grandfather's Clock," accompanying himself by drumming on the window with his fingers. 180 THE ZEPHYRS OF MAINE. THE ZEPHYRS OF MAIXE. There is only one drawback to the glorious old State of Maine, and that is not a natural obstacle. It is an error of education, and is not a general error either. It is confined to the railroad men. They have received the impres- sion, from what sources and through what teaching I know not, that a passenger coach is comfortably warm at zero, is rather sultry at ten degrees above, and is positively destructive to human life at twenty-five degrees. When the trains stop at a station it is pitiful to see the passengers rush out of the car and stand on the platform to get warm. When you ask a brakeman on the Maine Central to put another stick of wood in the stove, he stares at you in amazement for a moment and then reaches up and opens a ventilator. If you should say it again, I believe he would kick out the end of the car. The stove doors on these cars are kept locked, so the passengers cannot manii:>ulate the fires. If this were not the case, I am afraid the six sticks of wood brought into the car at Bath would not have lasted more than half way to Boston. As it w^as, under the economical THE RISING GENERATION. 181 administration of the brakeman they lasted all the way to Boston and part of the way back. THE RISING GENERATION. An intellectual young man, a promising student just back from Brown University, was met at the Union depot by an elderly man, who made a grasp at the young man's hands, and even essayed to clasp him in his arms. The young man shook hands with the enthusiastic native in a non-commital sort of way, and said, in not unfriendly tones, "Well, indeed, my dear fellah— I really — your face is rather famil- iar ; it seems to me I have met you somewhere, and yet I can't exactly place you." And as the father gazed at his distinguished son in dumb amazement, and thought how onh^ live years ago he had distributed thoroughbred welts and orthodox blisters all around his youthful back with a piece of lath, for taking the old man's razor to trim off a shinny club, he sighed, and went back to the office with an un- alterable determination to bind out his other sons to shoemakers and blacksmiths. 182 THE AMENITIES OF TRAVEL. THE AMEXITIES OF TRAVEL. How hot and dusty it is I How dirty and grimy everybody looks ! How cross and un- obliging and disgraceful everybody feels ! The cars are crowded, and everybody is wishing everybody else was out of the way. The wo- man in front of me has dropped her shawl on the floor. She is not young or handsome, but she is a woman. Her face has a harsh, for- bidding expression, but withal, I think I can see tender lines about the mouth. It is a face that has seen trouble. Poor woman ! Perhaps she has raised eleven children, and now she has them all, with their husbands and wives, to sup- port. No wonder she looks tired and worn and repellent. If she was young and pretty, as she was thirty years ago, a dozen men would spring forward to snatch her shawl from the dusty floor, and bow themselves crooked handing it to her. Now we look at it, and feel too dusty even to tell her where it is. A commercial traveler walks down the aisle, and steps care- fully over it. A woman goes down the other way and thoughtlessly steps on it. I feel THE AMENITIES OF TRAVEL. 183 ashamed of myself, and pity the poor, homely woman. With an effort I rise from my seat, I stoop to pick up the neglected shawl, " Madam," I say, and — oh, if my son's mother could see that smile, — "Madam, per- mit me ; your shawl " I stopped right there. For as I picked up the neglected shawl, out of its voluminous folds fell thumping and rattling to the floor a paper bag, badly fractured, full of crackers, a tin can, some remnants of an ancient lunch, a six- inch bologna bit off at one end, and a bottle of milk, the latter un- corking itself as it fell. The poor neg- lected woman did not seem to be transported with gratitude for my attention. She snatched the shawl away from me and said, with apparent KI^-D.xE8s kewarded. vexation : " There now, drat ye, looky at ye, what 184 NAMING THE BAEY. you've done. Why can't ye mind yer own bus- iness and leave other people's things alone ? " A ripple of subdued hilarity passed through the car, and I resumed my seat, fully resolved that if the most extravagantly lovely and lov- ing girl that ever blessed this world of ugly men should come into that car, and her head should fall off her shoulders and drop into my lap, I would kick it savagely out of the window and snarl, " Keei:> your lumpy old woodeny punkin head out of the way, if you don't want it tromped onto. " KAMIXG THE BABY. A lovixct couple on West Hill had promised an old bachelor friend to name their first baby after him. They wanted to keep their pledge, but after debating and planning and contriv- ing until the baby was sixteen days old, Thom- asetta Jacobina was the nearest they could come to it. A SAD CASE OF WIIOOPIXG COUGH. 185 A SAD CASE OF WHOOPIXG COUGH. The evening I went down to Abingdon the train on the Qaincy division of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincj^ was crowded, of course. It always is that way. The more extra cars they put on at Galesburg the more people would make up their minds to go on that train. So, as usual, seats were at a premium. I man- aged to get a whole seat all to myself and tried to look pleasant and inviting at people at a dis- tance, and cold and repelling when they came up close. By these hoggish tactics I hoped to have a comfortable, roomy ride. Just on the other side of the aisle a forlorn-looking man had two seats turned, and was seated in the midst of his five children, every one of the juvenile quintette appearing to be about nine or eleven years old, all white headed, and wild- looking, all very quiet, and apparently awed by the crowd and commotion on board and the swift motion of the train. While I was studying the odd-looking family group a woman, the womanliest kind of a ma- tronly-looking mother woman, came down the 186 A SAD CASE OF WIIOOPIXG COUGH. aisle leading a little five-year-old, and she smiled and inquiringly asked me, might her little girl occupy the vacant seat beside me? "Oh, to be sure" (smiling sweetly, as I knovr how to smile); " 1 would be charmed," I said, showing my fangs clear back to the palate, " to take care of the little Blossom as far as I went." "And how far was I going?" with a smile, responsive in sweetness to my own (the carrier is requested not to leave a copy of this issue of The Hawkeye out on Barnes street), but de- ficient in responsive size about seventeen inches. "To Qnincy," I said, increasing my smile till my cheeks cracked. I was only going to Abingdon, 350 miles this side of Quincy, but it is so hard to tell the truth wiien anybody asks you a question on the train. You get so used to h^ing to the conductor about losing your ticket and one thing and another. AVell, she went away, and I put away my pleasant book, and prepared to bore myself to death entertaining a strange child that was already beginning to cry with terror at my looks before 1 said a word, when suddenly the mother came swooping down the aisle like a A SAD CASE OF WIIOOPIXG COUGH. 187 tornado, lightning in lier eje^ and her hands fairly clenched. I was afraid she thought, from the poor child's agonized expression, that I had been sticking pins into the poor innocent. So I ducked my head and threw up my arms. "I never touched her!" I shrieked, as the excited woman drew up along side. To my great relief she never paid a bit of attention to me. She caught up her little one and turned savagely upon the man with a family, opposite me. ''I understand," she gasped, "your chil- dren have the whooping cough ?" It took the man a long time to answer her. At last he seemed to comprehend the question, and said, very deliberately : " Wal, yes ; fact is, they did hev it, right smart, but I don't reckon as they's much danger " The mother was gone, up the aisle, through the door, into the fumigated atmosphere of the smoking car, and the man with a family stopped speaking. In a moment or two came a fond father with a four-year-old boy in his arms. He sought out the vacant seat. He "didn't want tc 188 A SAD CASE OF WHOOPING COUGIL sit down himself," lie said, apologetically, "but," with great urbanity, "might his little boy " "Oh, surely," I said, j^romptly, "I should be onl}^ too glad to " "Thank you, thank you," said the grateful father ; the boy was deposited under my gra- cious and fatherly wing, the father went into the smoking car to see a man, and by way of opening an easy conversation with the boy, I asked him : "Do you not find that traveling, at this uncertain and un- changeable sea- son of the year, with its sudden climatic and atmospheric changes, and the o V e r-c r o w d e d condition of the cars, is extremely uncomfortable ?" HE DONE IT The boy began to cry. "Son," I said, sternly, or rU bust your crust." cheese that sniffle A SAD CASE OF WUOOPING COUG FT. ISO The child broke out into an agonizing howl, and just then I saw his father dash into the door and come galloping down the aisle like a man chasing a chromo agent. I instinctively threw up my guard again, ducked my head, and cried out, without indicating any particular man, and with that lofty disregard of grammar that comes upon us in moments of intense l>eril : '• Ee done it !" Again I had thrown out cautionary signals when there was no danger. The frenzied father merely wheeled around with his boy in his arms and faced the man with a family. ''Sir I" he exclaimed, "do you know you have no right to bring your children on the cars when they have the whooping cough V The man with a family looked up at his questioner, clawed his tawny, unkempt beard in an absent manner, and finally said : " Wal, ye see they did have it right i>eart, but I allowed they wa nt much danger in " But the father Hed without waiting for explanations, leaving a train of maledictions trailing behind him as he went. The man and his family never said a word to each other and 190 A SAD CASE OF WIIOOPIXG COUGH. 1 began to pitj^ them, as they huddled together and looked as though they hadn't a friend in the world. '•Dog gone it," I exclaimed confidentially to the boy of the party, " this is a free country. If you've got the whooping cough, wliy whoop her up ! Whoop thunder out of the old thing I'' The boy looked up at his fatlier timidly, and the man with a family stared at me for a moment and said : " Wal, ye see, he did hev it right oncom- mon, along o' the rest of 'em, but I don't allow- as how " But at this point he was interrupted again, this time by a little woman with a baby — a fat, crowing, laughing baby. An emphatic little wom.an, who measled her remarks with more italics than you'll find in a society novel: Would it discommode me too much if she and baby begged for that vacant seat ? " Oh, cer-tainly not,'' I echoed, sliding over to the window with great alacrity, ^'in-deed no, I was only too glad to be of any service." "Oh, tlieiiik you, thank you eter so much. It was so disagreeable riding in such crowded A SAD CASE OF WIIOOPIXG COCGII. 191 ''Oil, dread-ful, dread-iuI,*' I ejaculated, J and then baby crowed and the emphatic little woman laughed, a merry, mellow, rippling laugh that made baby's eyes dance with joy. I laughed a great rasping guffaw that sounded like a crow with the bronchitis, and frightened the baby into a fit of weeping. I felt awk- wardly enough, but just then my attention was attracted to the conductor, who was talking to the man with a family. ''You know," said the conductor, "that other people travel with children, and when your children have the whooping cough, The little woman sprang into the aisle as though she were shot. ''Whatf she screamed. The man with a family looked at the con- ductor, clawed his beard, looked at the excited little woman, and finally said, in tones of real distress at the annoyance his innocent family was causing : " Wal, ye see, they did hev it a right smart, but I didn't reckon thet " The little woman was gone, but the con- ductor remained. I wanted to hear that sen- 192 WOMAN SUFFRAGE. tence completed if I had to run past Abing- don. " How long ago did your children have the whooping cough ?'' asked the conductor. *' Wal," the man with the family said, *'the fust one hed it back in Tennessee, nine year ago, and the last un had it down in Nodoway county, nigh onto four year ago, an' I don't allow they's no danger of ketclk3n it from any on 'em now." " Abing-DON !" yelled the brakeman, and I never was able to learn how many more panics the man with the family created before he got through to Nodoway county. WOMAN SUFFRAGE. The women in Kansas vote at the school elections. At a recent election at Osage City one woman went up to vote, but before she got through telling the judges what a time her AVillie had with the scarlet fever when he was only two years old, it was time to close the polls and she had forgotten to deposit her ballot. INVADING MISSOURI. 193 mVADr^TG MISSOURI. I HAD a very pleasant trip from Burlington to St. Louis. I boarded the C, B. & Q. sleeper for St. Louis, just in time to crawl into the last vacant berth, thanks to the supreme goodness of a sleeping-car conductor, who ought to have the rank and pay of a major-general in the United States army. Do you know how much pleasanter and more comfortable it makes a berth in a sleeping car, to hear two or three disappointed, tired A MATITTTNAL BALLET. I men standing in the aisle, growling and sw^ear- ing becaTise they can't get any ? It is a mean feeling, I will admit, a mean, hateful, unmanly 194 INVADING MISSOURI. feeling, but it is powerful comforting. 1 try to break myself of it, but at the same time I am willing to admit that I would rather lie in the berth, and enjoy the mean, sellish gratification, than stand up in the aisle and indulge in an honest, frank, manly swear at the supreme sel- fishness curled up in the berth, making the air vocal with simulated snores. Moral : Such is the Sad Perversity of our Fallen Nature. No other events transpired during the jour- ney until seven o'clock this morning. Then the porter said " St. Louis," and the grand spec- tacular sleeping-car feat of standing on one leg and pulling on a pair of tr**s^rs was performed by the whole strength of the entire ballet. A great big trunk is wheeled across the plat- form toward the baggage room. On the end is painted, in large black letters, the owner's name, *' P. F. W. Shope." '^ Hullo," shouts a C, B. & Q. bmkeman, staring at the trunk and its name, ''Hullo, when did they move the * Pittsburg and Fort Wayne shops ' to St. Louis?" St. Charles, Missouri. — The city looks state- ly as a queen, throned in beauty on her hills INVADING MISSOUEI. 195 by the river side. It is a lovely city. St. Charles ! Where have I seen it before i Ten, twelve, it must be fourteen years ago, when A. J. Smithes detachment of the sixteenth army corps, "Smith's guerrillas," were going up to the river seeking whom they might devour good old, '^ Pap Price "' up. And here at St. Charles, when the boats landed, Sherman's orders took the bravest man and the best tighter in the United Slates array away from the corps, to go wath him across to the sea, and left the first di- vision wondering what was going to become of it without '• Old Joe." It was a long distance from a private gentleman of the escort up to a general of division, and in addition to the dif- ference of rank, it was a long ways physically from me up to General J. A. Mower, for he was a magnificent specimen of physical man- hood, and when I was in the saddle I looked like a patent clothes-pin in uniform ; but we all made a demi-god of Mower, and when he held my hand when I went up to say good-by, and gave me a dozen words of parting advice, 1 wouldn't have exchanged places with the general of the army. Proud ? I wouldn t give up the recollection now, to be president. 196 POLITICAL RENUNCIATION, POLITICAL REXUXCIATIOX. I wouldn't be president anyhow. I won't be president, under any circumstances. AVliat's the use of being president, anyhow? And have the stalwarts scalp you on one side and the conservatives kick you on the other, and every man that doesn't get a post-office call you an ''accident.'' Take away your presi- dency. And yet, it wouldn't be a bad advertisement for the next lecture season. I don't really know but if the people of the United States insist upon it, that I may be induced a man's duty to his country, you know, should always override his personal wishes. The more I think of it, the more desirable the scheme appears. I could stay in Washing- ton, you know, during the summer, when everybody else is out of town, and have a nice quiet time to write my lecture ; then, just about the time congress assembles the lecture season opens, and I could skip out and lecture all winter, and thus dodge all the cabinet meetings and evade all the sessions, and get back in time SHE THOUGHT SHE HAD 'eM. 197 to sign all the bills. I wish the people of the several States, in selecting their delegates for the republican national convention in 1880, would just think of this. SHE THOUGHT SHE HAD 'EM. The other day a West Hill woman found a large, dark bottle, worth about a pint, in the closet, and she immediately took it down and jerked out the cork to see what there was in it. She smelt it vigorously for a second, and then, unable to determine just what it was, she tipped the bottle very cautiously, but before it was more than half turned over, the little green snake that her son had stowed away in that bottle shot out and dropped into her extended hand, and the curtain went down on a most magnificent transformation scene, red lights burning on one side and green at the other, grand overture by the orchestic, trumpets sounding the flourish behind the scenes, and the full force of the entire ballet before the foot- lights. Long before the police could break in the front door, the snake got away. 198 THE ADVERTISEDEST ROAD IN THE SOUTH. THE ADVERTISEDEST HOAD IX THE SOUTH. Ex EOUTE for Hannibal. And at last I have reached the realization of my heart's desire. I am riding on the *' M., K. & T.'' railway. I am passing through the beautiful Indian territory. At least, I suppose I am passing through it. It is down on the bill, in red, and yellow, and purple, and green, that all passengers on the M., K. & T. do pass through the beautiful Indian territory, and I hold a lirst-class ticket. I see the beautiful Indian leaning up against the fence, calmly surveying his territory. And I am free to admit that the territory is a power- ful sight more beautiful than the Indian. The Indian is chewing tobacco and swearing at a mule. He is six feet high, the Indian is, and his tail is full of burs, the mule's is. He wears butternut jeans, and a fur cap, the Indian does, and you can hear him bray clear into the car, the mule, that is. He has a bushy head of hair and shocky whiskers, tanned out by the sun, has the Indian ; and he wears more flat leather harness than he has hair, the mule does. He THE ADVERTISEDEST ROAD IN THE SOUTH. 199 frames a blacksnake whip, the Indian does, and as he swears, he larrups it over his hunkers, the mule's hunkers. And every time he, the THRILLIN& SCENES IN THE INDI-^ TERRITOTIY. Indian, fetches him, the mule, one, he, the mule, kicks down a whole panel of fence. I trust I have made this clear enough. But the train flies on. The air is balmy with the breath of May. This is February, but the bill says May, and the M., K. & T. doesn't care for the almanac. <'The class will rise," remarked the precise lady teacher in the grammar department, "the class will rise, and remain rising." 200 THE ROAIA>'CE OJ A 8LEEPING-CAR. THE EOMA^XE OF A SLEEPIXG-CAR. It was in the Burlington, Cedar Rapids and Northern sleeper. Outside, it was dark as the inside of an ink-bottle. In the sleeping car, people slept. Or tried it. Some of them slept, like Christian men and women, peacefully and sweetly and quietly. Others slept like demons, malignantly, hid- eously, fiendishly, as though it was their mis- sion to keep everybody else awake. Of these, the man in lower number three was the ''boss." When it came to a square snore with variations, you wanted to count " lower three" in, with a full hand and a pocket full of rocks. We never heard anything snore like him. It was the most systematic snoring that was ever done, even on one of those tournaments of snoring, a sleeping car. He didn't begin as soon as the lamps were turned down and every- body was in bed. Oh, no ! There was more cold- blooded diabolism in his system than that. He waited until everybody had had a little taste of THE EOMANCE OF A SLEEPIXG-CAR. 201 sleep, just to see how good and pleasant it was, and then he broke in on their slumbers like a winged, breathing demon, and they never knew what peace was again that night. He started out with a terrific "Gn-r-r-r-t!" That opened every eye in the car. We all hoped it was an accident, however, and trusting that he wouldn't do it again, we all forgave him. Then he blasted our hopes and curdled the sweet serenity of our forgiveness by a long drawn ^'Gw-a-h-h-h-hah!" That sounded too much like business to be accidental. Then every head in that sleepless sleeper was held off the pillow for a minute, waiting, in breathless suspense, to hear the w^orst, and the sleeper in ''lower three'' went on, in long-drawn, regular cadences that indi- cated good staying qualities : ' ' Gwa-a-a-h ! Gwa-a-a-h ! Gahwahwah ! Gah- wahwah ! Gahwa a-a-ah !" Evidently it was going to last all night, and the weary heads dropped back on the sleepless pillows, and the swearing began. It mumbled along in low, muttering tones, like the distant 202 THE ROMANCE OF A SLEEPING CAR. echoes of a profane thunder-storm. Pretty soon ''lower three" gave us a little variation. He shot off a spiteful ''Gnwock! !" Which sounded as though his nose had got mad at him and was going to strike. Then there was a pause, and we began to hope he had either awakened from sleep or strangled to death, nobody cared very particularly which. But he disappointed everybody with a guttural "Gnrooch!" Then he paused again for breath, and when he had accumulated enough for his purposes, he resumed business with a stertorous ''Kowpf!" That nearly shot the roof off the car. Then he went on playing such fantastic tricks with his nose and breathing things that would make the immortal gods weep, if they did but hear them. It seemed a matter incredible, it seemed an utter, preposterous impossibility that any human being could make the monstrous, hideous noises with its breathing machine that the fel- low in "lower three" was making with his. He ran through all the ranges of the nasal gamut, he went up and down a very chromatic THE ROMANCE OF A SLEEPIXG-CAR. 203 scale of snores, he ran through intricate and fearful variations until it seemed that his nose must be out of joint in a thousand places. All the night and all night through he told his story. A LADY IN THE CASE I '^Gawah ; gnrrrh ! gn-r-r-r ! Kowpff ! ! Ga- wawwah ! gawah-hah I gwock ! gnarrrt ! gwah- h-h-h! whoof !" Just as the other passengers had consulted 204 BREAKING THE ICE. together how they might slay him, morning dawned, and *' lower number three" awoke. Ever34~)ody watched the curtains to see what manner of man it was that had made that beau- tiful sleeping-car a pandemonium. Presently the toilet was completed, the curtains parted, and "lower number three" stood revealed. Great heavens ! It was a fair young girl, with golden hair, and timid, pleading eyes, like a hunted fawn's ! BREAKI^T> THE ICE. The New York Commercial Advertiser says more than one hundred handsome American girls broke through the ice last winter, were rescued, and married their rescuers. Yes, and we know one American girl, good as gold, and homely enough to scare rats, who has broken through the ice every winter since 1844, and has had to scramble out by herself every time, and is the confirmedest kind of an old maid yet. PEIYILEGES OF LITERATURE. 205 PRIVILEGES OF LITERATURE. Do you know, I've gone to railroading ? Yea indeedy. Haven't quit lecturing, but I brake on freight trains and camp out on side-tracks in the intervals. It takes a longer time to spend nine hours on a siding than it does to deliver a popular lecture, but it doesn't pay so well. I know every switch, side-track and Y in the State of Iowa by name, sight, and reputation. If I were dropped out of the clouds in the darkest midnight that ever frowned, and should light upon a side-track I could tell right where I was. Try me sometime. One night last December I was going from Grinnell up north. According to the custom of James T. Fields, and other bucolic lecturers, I was riding in a caboose, jamming along behind a freight train as long as a kite string. I was stretched out on a long seat at my full length, which isn' t much longer than a piece of cord wood. I was trying to sleep. I was wooing the drowsy god by pounding my ear on the cushion till the dust flew. 206 PRIVILEGES OF LITERATURE. The drowsy god was not on that train, how- ever. He was back in Grinnell, waiting for the sleeping-car. Pretty soon the train stopped, about a mile north of Grinnell. It was very restful to the one lone passenger in the caboose. It was soothing to his swollen ear. It was easy on the cushion. I felt that sleep was just about to settle down upon the subscriber and knit up the raveled sleeve of care, so long as the absence of motion rendered the ceremony of knitting possible. The conductor came in. Gloom sate en- throned upon his brow, and his lowering frowns made the car look dark. He opened a window and let in a wandering zephyr that froze the flames in the stove into icicles. It's a way freight conductors have. He brought his head in after awhile, and from the way he acted I judge he was moved. He seemed to be deeply affected over some- thing. I had a dim suspicion that he might have been irritated. He slammed down his lamp, and he kicked the stove. Then he jerked down another lantern, and snatched up an oil- can and slammed the stove door shut, and said PRIVILEGES OF LITERATURE. 207 he hoped he might be dad essentially criminy jeminy teetotally gol twisted to jude. I arose, with the intention of leaving the car if such language was repeated. I was spared the trial. It was not rejjeated. The next time he said it, he made it worse, a thousandfold. ; But I was used to it by that time, and endured it with a fortitude and resignation that astonished even myself. I asked him : " Are we waiting for a train to pass us ?" " Yes !" he roared, " waiting for a train to pass right through us." I sighed and rolled upon the bench and once more essayed to sleep. Pretty soon, when the conductor had the second lantern trimmed and burning, he came and stood beside my vir- tuous couch. He said, "Here, young fellow; get up out of this. Take this lamp and trot down the track about seventy yards, and stay there till I send for you. Swing the lamp this way if you see a train coming." I asked him, "And what does this feature of the pro- gramme mean ?" He said that it meant that the engine and half 208 PRIVILEGES OF LITERATURE. our train and all the brakesmen had broken loose from us and gone on to the next station, he reckoned, and when they discovered we were left, w^ould come back for us. He had to flag one end of the train against the returning half, and I must go down the track and do duty against a passenger, and a possible freight or two that might otherwise wander into us. He w^as correct. Moreover, he was very firm about it. He seemed to be a man of convic- tions, so I yielded to his earnest solicitations and girded up my loins and sallied forth. I halted at a cattle guard. Great heavens ! but the night w^as cold — colder than a Beacon street Boston man, to whom the misguided stranger has spoken without an introduction. I could have warmed my feet in the bosom of a snow man. The wind flew about 1,000 miles a minute, and everything it touched turned to ice or stone, just as it happened. I got doTvn in the ditch to get out of the wind, but it was so much colder dowm there that the wind felt warm. Then I got out on the track, and the wind had got so much colder than the ditch, that I was afraid to step back into the ditch again lest I should be sunstruck. My PEIVILEGES OF LITERATURE. 209 teeth chattered so that I couldn't have heard a train if it had run up my trowsers leg. It was a terrible situation. Alone, in the wild, wild night, with no human ear to hear my cries if danger assailed me, no human arms to protect me; suddenly the fearful thought flashed across my mind : What if, in that hour of darkness, in that wild, lonely place, some woman should come ^^ ^^^^^ ^^ kailboadh^g. along, kick over my lantern, stitie me with chloroform and kiss me ? [ am a married man. I felt that my duty 14 210 PRIVILEGES OF LITERATURE. to my family demanded prompt action, and I left that warning lamp sitting by the cattle guard, while I trotted back to the caboose and kept np the fire. In about two hours the advance guard of our train came feeling its way back after us and picked us up. The conductor came in, so cold he couldn't shut his eyes, and saw me, just rousing up from a dream of peace. "How long have you been in here?" he demanded. I said I didn' t know ; I had been in so long my watch had run down. "How long did you stay at where I sent you?" he asked. I told him, " About five minutes." The conductor was a man of wonderful pres- ence of mind. He didn't try to say anything just then. He was too cold. He made me go out and bring in my lamp. I brought it in and turned it over to the company and resigned my position on the spot. But I wasn't allowed to get out of the service of the company so easily. The conductor waited until he was suffi- ciently thawed out to orate fluently and rax^idly, and then he let me have it. It was in vain that CHIROPODIAN. 211 I pleaded, in extenuation of my fault, that I would rather have a freight train run into and over me, than freeze to death ; that when I had to die, I wanted to die warm. Excuses availed me nothing. The conductor gave me the most refined, eloquent, polished, scholarly, classical, and vigorous "cussing" that was ever admin- istered to a free-born American lecturer. If the audiences whom I have stricken could have been present at that matinee, they would have felt avenged, they would have pitied me. I couldn't help thinking, while the orator was laying it on, what a scathing dramatic critic he would make. I survived the blessing and got into Mar- shalltown just six minutes ahead of the pas- senger train I was afraid to wait for. That is how you make time by taking freight trains. All the vaunted skill of the chiropodist cannot keep the ache out of the feet of a young man whose boots are smaller than his socks, Chiropod the chiropodist never so chiropodly. !Now say that real fast, and see if you are sober. 212 A SLIGHT MISUNDERSTANDING. A SLIGHT MISUNDERSTANDING. The last time I ran home, over the Chicago, Burlington and Qiiincy, we had a very small, but select and entertaining party on the train. It was a warm day, and everybody was tired with the long ride and oppressed by the heat. The precise woman, with her hat swathed in an immense blue vail, who always i^arsed her sen- tences before she uttered them, utterly worn out and thoroughly lonesome, was glad to respond to the pleasant nod of the big rough man who got on at Monmouth, and didn't know enough grammar to ask for the mustard so that you could tell whether he wanted you to pass it to him or |>our it on his hair. The thin, troubled-looking man with the sandy goatee, who stammered so dreadfully that he always forgot what he wanted to say before he got through wrestling with any word with a " W '' in it, lit up with a tremulous, hesitating smile as he noticed this indication of sociability, for, like most men who find it extremely difficult to talk at all, he wanted to talk all the time. And the fat old gentleman sitting opposite him, who A SLIGHT MISUXDEESTAXDIXG. 213 was so deaf he couldn't hear the cars rattle, and always awed and bothered the stammerer into silence by saying "Hey ?" in a very imperative tone, every time he got in the middle of a hard word, cocked his irascible head on one side as he saw this smile, and after listening intently to dead silence for a minute, suddenly broke out with such an emj^hatic, impatient. "HEY?" *'Heyr' That everybody in the car started up and shouted, nervously and ungrammatically ; " I didn't say nothing !" With the excei^tion of the woman with the blue vail, who said : "I said notJiing." The fat old gentleman was a little annoyed 214 A SLIGHT MISUNDERSTANDING. and startled by such a chorus of responses, and 1 fixing his gaze still more intently upon the thin man, said, defiantly : *'Wha' sayr' *'I-I-I I w-w-wuh-wuh-wuh-wasn'-wasn' I wasn' s-s-sp — speak " ^' Hey ?" roared the fat man. *'He wa'n'tsayin' nauthin', '' shouted the big rough man, nodding friendly encourage- ment to the thin man; "he hain't opened his mouth!" "Soap in the south?" queried the fat old man, impatiently. " Wha' for?" "Mouth, mouth;" explained the precise woman, with impressive nicety. "He said * opened his mouth.' The gentleman seated directly opposite you was " " 'Offers to chew' what?" cried the fat old gentleman, in amazement. "Sir," said the precise woman, "I made no reference whatever to chewing. You cer- tainly misunderstood me." The thin man took courage from so many reinforcements, and broke in : " I-I-I-I d-d-d-d-dud-d ad-dud-don' t-don't, Idon'tch-ch-ch " A SLIGHT MISUNDEKSTANDIN^G. 215 ** Hey ?" shouted tlie fat gentleman, i "He don't chaw nauthin' !" roared the big rough man, in a voice that made the car win- dows rattle. "He wa'nt a talkin' when you shofc off at him!" "Who got off?" exclaimed the fat old gentleman, " wha' d' he get off for?" "You do not appear to comprehend clearly what he stated," shrieked the precise woman, "no person has left the train !" " Then wha' d' he say so for ?" shouted the fat man. "Oh!" said the thin man, in a surprising burst of fluency, "He-he-he d-d-did-did " "Who did?" queried the fat man, talking louder than any one else. " Xum-num-num-num-n--no-nobody, nobody. He he d-d-d-dud-didn't didn' didn't s " " Then wha' made you say he did ?" howled the deaf man. " You misunderstand him," interrupted the precise woman; "he was probably about to remark that no reference whatever had been intentionally made to the departure of any person from the train, when you interrupted him in the midst of an unfinished sentence, 216 A SLIGHT MISUNDERSTANDING. and lience obtained an erroneous impression of the tenor of his remarks. He meant no offense " "Know a fence!'' roared the fat man, "of course I know a fence !" "He hain't got middlin' good hearin'," yelled the big rough man, as apologetically as a steam whistle could have shrieked it ; "y'ears kind of stuffed up I'' "Time to brush up!'' cried the fat man; "wha' for?" "No," shrieked the precise woman; "he remarked to the other gentleman that your hearing appeared to be rather defective !" "His father a detective!" hooted the fat gentleman in amazement. "N-n-n-n-nun-nun-no !" broke in the thin man ; " h-h-h-h-huh-huh-he s-s-sasa-said-said you w-w-w-wuh-was a little dud dud— was a little deaf !" " Said I was a thief !" howled the fat man, a scarlet tornado of wrath, " said I was a thief! Wha' d'ye mean? Show him to me! Who says I'm a thief i Who says so ?" "Now," shouted the big rough man, " no- bodv don't say ve ain't no thief. I jest sayed A SLIGHT MISCXDEESTAXDIXG. 217 as how we didn't git along very well. Ye see he," nodding to the thin man, "he can't talk very well an' ' ' " Wh-v/h-wh-why c-c-can't he t-t-t-tut-tut- tut-talkT' broke in the thin man, white with rage. "I-I-I-I'd like t-t-to know wh-wh-wh- what's the reason I c-c-c-can't tut-tut-talk as w-w-w-w-well as any bab-bub-body that's bub- bub-bub-been tut-tut-talking on this ear ever s-s-s-since the tut-tut-tut " " Hey f roared the fat man, in an explosion of indignant suspicion. " I was sayin'," howled the big rough man, " as how he didn't talk middlin' well " "Should say so," growled the fat man, in tones of intense satisfaction. " And," the big rough man went on, j^elling with delight at having made the old party hear something, "and you can't hear only tolla- ble " " Can't hear I" the fat old gentleman broke out in a resonant roar, "cant hear I Like to know why I can't hear? why can't I? If I couldn't hear better than half the people on this train, I'd cut off my ears ! Can't hear ? It's news to me if I can' t. I'd like to know who " 218 A YEGETAEIAX PROBLEM. ' ' BuvYmgloji P ' yelled the brakeman. ' ' Chag car f r Keokuk, Ceed Rap's, an' For' Mad' son ! This car fr Omaha! Twen' mints f supper!" And but I'or this timely interruption, I don't think our pleasant little party would have got out of that snarl this side of San Francisco. A YEGETAKIAN PROBLEM. ^' Spell parsnips," said a South Hill teacher. *' G-i-n, gin," howled the biggest boy in the class, "there's j'our gin, n-a-n, nan, there's your nan, there's your ginnan, s-h-u-g, shug, there's your shug, there's your nanshug, there's your ginnanshug, g-e-r, ger, there's your ger, there's your shugger, there's your nanshugger, there's your ginnanshugger — " " For mercy's sake," exclaimed the horrified teacher, as soon as she could catch her breath, "what are you doing?" "Spelling par's nips," said the boy, "an' that's only one of 'em, but he says it's the boss." She told him he needn't spell the others, and he said he'd have the old man write 'em on a postal card and send 'em to her. A nARROWIXG TALE. 219 A HARROAYIXG TALE. I AM running East on the Toledo, Peoria and Vv'arsaw, and am busy. I am scribbling as fast as I can to get a letter ready to send back to Burlington when we meet the other train, and my writing excites the curiositj' of an inquisi- tive-looking old lady sitting just opposite me. I know she is going to speak. She stands it as long as she can, and then opens out with : Where did I come from i Black Hills. No ? Well, I didn t look like it. I explain that I have not been out there mining or roughing it, but went out to get the body of my brother, who was a miner, and had been shot by the Indians. Oh-h-h ! with a wailing inflection of sympa- thy that makes me ashamed of myself. But curiosity soon conquers pity, and the old lady goes on probing my lacerated heart. '•Did you git him T' '•Yes, ma'am," very solemnly, "I have him in the baggage car." A long pause, for mournful reflection, I sup- 220 A HARROWING TALE. pose, and to give me a chance to nerve up and prepare for the next question. ''Was he scalped?" * "Yes," I say, with a sigh, ''scalped, shot through the body with arrows, all his lingers chopped off, )iis eyes gouged out, and his ears bored." The old girl's cup of horrors is full. She leans back in her seat with a sigh of grim satis- faction, and questions me no more. Was it wrong to lie to the old lady in this heartless and scandalous manner? Yes, I think it was not. On general principles, it is not just the cheese to tell lies, unless you have some object in telling them. In thus innocently stuffing my traveling acquaintance with a fable about a country I had never seen, a brother I had never had, and Indians that never were, I wrote for the old lady a thrilling chapter in her quiet life. She would go to her quiet little home, and brighten its humdrum life by telling her j)eople how she met and talked with a man who was going home with the body of his brother, mangled in the manner described. Then, in the course of time, after many rep- etitions of this narrative, she would involun- A HAEROWING TALE. 221 tarily and innocently glide into the statement that she went into the baggage car with me and I showed her the mangled, tortured body, and she would mangle it more and more as the nar- rative grew upon her. Then she would, after a little while, declare, and in all innocence and truthfulness and belief in her own statement, that she was on the train when it came through the Black Hills, and from the car window saw the Indians chasing the doomed man and per- forating his body with arrows, and dancing around him in fiendish glee, while she begged the conductor to get off and stop them, and how he declined, on the flimsy ground that he had a wife and nine chil- dren to supx)ort, and no insurance either on the top of his head or his life. Then, after a few more rehearsals, arrows would fly right in at the win- dow where she was sitting, and one or more pas- FAMILY EEASONS. 222 A HAREOWIXG TALE. sengers would be killed. One arrow would pass through her bonnet. The train would be a scene of the wildest confusion and carnage. And at last, after the old lady had been gathered to her mothers, her grandchildren would tell their grandchildren about their noble old grand- mother and their brave, gallant grandfather, who both fell by the hand of outnumbering savages, while defending a railway train from the attack of a band of Sioux Indians, under the command of Sitting Bull, whom their grandfather, just before he died, killed with his own hand. And thus a grand, thrilling page of family history will grow out of my unaffected little romance to the inquisitive old lady. I will not get anything for it, it is true. The family will never thank me ; the old lady will not leave me a cent, although I am the founder of the one page of greatness in their family history. But why should we be sordid and grasping and selfish ? Is it not our dut}" to do all the good we can in this world ? It is, and I will not shrink from the performance of any duty that may come to my hands, although the accomplishment of this pledge should compel me to lie to half the people I meet on the train. SHAVIXG AGAINST TIME. 223 SHAYIXG AGAIXST TIME. I HAD an hour to wait in St. Joseph, and I improved my time in the busy, solid old city by cleaning up. I came out of the bath, look- ing like Venus rising from the sea foam. Indeed, I think I "Looked a sea Cybele, fresh from ocean;" I never saw a sea Cybele, but I think I looked like one. And I never heard of a sea Cybele waiting in a St. Joe barber shop to get shaved, either. And I don' t believe there ever was a sea Cybele who lived long enough to wait, either. I waited. I saw the barber lather the face of the man in the chair. It was five o'clock, and my train started at o:47. Good ; there was plenty of time. I waited. The man in the chair went to sleep, and the bar- ber lathered his face and washed it, and washed it and lathered it. He laved it with warm water and dried it with towels. He critically exam- ined the cheeks and investigated the chin. He fingered the man's bristly mustache and ran his fingers meditatively through the sitters' 224 SIIAVIXG AGAIXST TIME. hair. Then he strapped a razor and gazed ont cf tlie window witli a far awa\', dreamy look, and I saw that his soul was dwelling in the shadowy aisles of the Long Ago, and I had not the heart to call him back, although it was fifteen minutes past five, and the sleeping man's face had not been touched by the razor yet. Presently the barber sighed, and turning to the patient, rubbed his sleeping cheek with his fingers, and appeared to be on the point of ask- ing him who he was, what he was doing there, and what he wanted. But then he looked down at his razor in an absent kind of way as though it was something he never saw before ; a gleam of living intelligence lightened his face, and he came back into the land of activity and life ; he turned the razor over once or twice as though he wasn't quite certain whether to shave the m,an with the edge or the back, and then he touched the cheek of the sleeper so lightly that it never disturbed him. Tempus fugits a thousand miles a minute I fidgeted and looked nervously at the clock. " Time," said the barber, with his silent, delib- erate hand, ^'is for slaves." He went over that man's face as though he was shaving the queen SHAVIXG AGAINST Ti:^E. 225 of England. Bristle by bristle he mowed the ^ stubble field of that man*s illimitable cheek. It was twenty-five minutes after five, and the shaver was just making his first swath on the man's chin. I said, in tones suffused with waiting anguish : *' When does that train go north on the K. C. &C. B.?" The barber nursed his way around a pimple on the man's chin as carefully as though it was the end of the jugular vein sticking out, and stepped back to admire his work. Presently he looked up at the clock and then he looked at me and then he said : '• Which train i" I told him, "On the K. C, St. J. & C. B.; passenger ; going north.'' He turned the man's face over to the other side, washed off the lather with a sponge, laid on some more, washed it off, dried the man's face, washed it, lathered it, strapped the razor a little, made an offer at the man's cheek, drew ^ back, looked at the razor, glanced at the clock, put down the razor and took a chew of tobacco, picked up the razor, laid one hand on the man's head and was on the point of beginning, when 15 226 SHAVING AGAINST TIME. he poised the razor in the air, nodded to some one across the street, looked at me, and said : " One that goes to the Blnffs V I said, " No, the Hopkins branch." The barber began shaving the man. Then he stopped, looked at the clock, turned his head and looked out of the window, then he glanced at me in a fixed manner, and said : ''I don't know." He resumed his study of that man's face and went over it like an anatomist. He shaved it in three different directions. He went back at it three times after he was through and shaved some neglected spots. He laved and stroked and dried and perfumed and powdered that man's face until the clock said it was thirty-nine minutes after five, and I felt the premonitory symptoms of convulsions and nervous insanity creeping over my quivering limbs. Too late I staid — oh, monstrous crime, I cursed the barber's whistles ; How noiseless falls the foot of time That only treads on bristles. He passed over the man's hair until I felt that time had given place to eternity. He SIIAVIXG AGAINST TIME. 227 rubbed it and dusted it ; he jDarted it four times before he got it to suit him. He combed it and brushed it down so slick, that an early fly, trying to climb to the crown of the man's head, slid off and broke his neck. At four minutes of train time, the man, who was now wide awake, made an effort to rise and get out of the chair, and my heart swelled with hope. The barber pushed him back. Shadow of eternity I he began to wax the patient's mustache. " It lacked two and one-half minutes to train time when the chair was empty. I shrieked at the patient barber in 2:)rofane accents, and told him I had to be at the depot at that time. "Well, what do you want done T' this terrible man asked me. "Shave!" I howled, with some variations not in the text. "Oh, well," he said, quietly, "climb into the chair." "You won't make me miss that train?" I yelled, in a fever of nervous anxiety. He shook his head. "You can walk down there in a minute," he said. It was wonderful, the degree of confidence I 228 SHAVING AGAINST TIME. felt in that man's latent abilities, after I lu.d just seen him take forty four long, solid, drag- ging minutes to shave a man with less beard than a nun. "Go ahead," I said, with forced calmness. He tucked a towel around my neck in one time and two motions. " Swosh !" there was an avalanche of lather from my right ear to the middle of mv chin, extending laterally from the neck into the eye, nostrils, and one corner of my mouth. "Slosh!" a corresj)onding freshet inundated the other side of my face and closed the left eye, and lay on the other corner of my mouth like the foam from a Buffalo schooner. I felt the barber s left hand grasp my hair. "Swoop!" one side of my face was shaved, down to the chin. " Swoop !" the other cheek -was clean. " Scrawtch ; scrawtch !" my chin was smooth. " Rake, rake !" my hair was combed. "Fifteen cents ; there's your train now, sir. Next !" said the barber. I caught the train and had thirty-two seconds to spare. A FEELING FEAT. 229 A FEELING FEAT. " Sing me, my own," he whispered lovingly, as they both sat down on the one piano stool, " sing me ' Oh whisper what thou feelest.' " "I will, young man, I will," said the tremulous tones of her papa, from the di- rection of the door. " We will sing it as a duet, you and I ; I will feel, and you can whisper what it is." And then he felt for the boy with his foot, and went on, with unfeeling indifference. " And you needn't confine yourself to a whisper, necessarily, in telling what you feel, and what it feels like. Give it voice, young man, give it voice." i TWO SOULS WITH BUT A SINGLE PIA>0 STOOL. ''I AM going to Colorado for my health," said young Keepitup to old Boby shell, the other day. *' Ah I" replied the old man, " and when did you leave your health there ?" 230 A NOCTURNAL DIARY. A NOCTURNAL DIARY. I LIKE to keep the diary of a journal by night. It usually consists of one short entry, made the following morning, as follows ; to- wit ; viz.: *'Paid the porter a quarter." The entry is varied, occasionally. In one instance, I find it made in my diary, in the fol- lowing expressive language : '' Told the porter Fd j)ay him a quarter next time I came that way." And a foot-note, on the same page, of a much later date, and referring, apparently, to the same entry, says : '* Xever went that way again." But a reference mark on the foot-note again carries me over the score or more of pages, to a still later day, where I find the equally signiti- cant entry : '•Met the prowling, dark Xemesis on another train." This careless, loose-jointed system of trans- ferring the Pullman employees is iniquitous in the extreme, distressing to the employees, and A XOCTURXAL DIARY. 231 annoying to the traveling public. Congress ought to put a stop to it. When the train on the St. Joseph & Denver City Railway leaves the hrst-named station, two hundred and thirty passengers try to cro^vd into one hundred and twenty seats. This jHits us on the best possible terms with each other. I am assigned to a seat already occupied by a young gentleman with legs as long as cotton- wood trees, and two valises. I wonder where he is going to put his feet. The question doesn't seem to bother him a bit. He solves it without a struggle. He puts them in my lai). I am pleased. But I do not say so. Neither do I look very much like it. But while I am pleased and proud to nurse his feet, I resist his efforts at familiar conversa- tion. I do not aj)prove of encouraging familiar- ity in strangers. He says : '' What mout land be wuth around here T' I feel myself turn pale, for I recognize accents that I once heard, earlier in the season, down in Maine. I tell him that I don't know ; that nobody really knows ; that the worth of land, its actual, absolute worth, and its market 232 A XOCTURXAL DIAKY. value, are, indissolubly and indiscriminately, per se, and in the very nature of things, two very distinct considerations. " Howf he says. *' Readily enough," I tell him; "the very hypotheses which underlie the stability of all {government, the binocular theories which con- taminate the indigenous type of all marsupial and otherwise indeterminate forms, affect each other, neither more or less, but rather approx- imateh\" He " 'lowed that mout be so, but he couldn't see what it lied to dew with price of land.'' I said very coldly, that if he tried to buy land in Kansas he'd mighty soon find out what it had to do with it. Then I rudely pushed away his feet, and he put them affectionately upon the shoulders of a jiatient man sitting just before him. We pass Hiawatha. I don' t know why the town is so named. A distant creek is apparent, and I suppose there is Hiawatha in the spring than there is in the summer. Now don' t swear and act like a three-ply idiot. I don't often do anything of that kind, and you don't need to read this unless you want to. A XOCTURXAL DIAEY. 233 At Sabetha, the train is halted alongside of a cattle train, while the other cattle, those in the passenger car, go up town and get dinner. After dinner the passengers solemnly contem- plate the cattle, packed in at the rate of about three or four to the square inch. ''How on earth,'' asks a young lady, a very- pretty young lady, who gets off at Seneca, '* how on earth do they pack them in so close f '-Why." asks a mild-looking young man, with tender blonde whiskers and wistful blue eyes — he is an escaped divinity student, just going out to take charge of a Baptist church in western Kansas— '* Why," he says, '^did you never see them load cattle into a car T' ''Xo," said the pretty Seneca girl, with a quick look of interest, ** I never did ; how do they doit r' "Why,'' the divinity student remarked, slowly and very earnestly, "they drive them all in except one, a big fellow, with thin shoulders and broad quarters ; they save him for a wedge, and drive him in with a hammer.'' Somehow or other it didn't look hardly fair to me ; nobody protested against its admission, however, so it went on record, but the conver- 234 A XOCTURXAL DIARY. sation went into utter bankruiitcy right there, and the theological-looking young man was the only person in the car who looked supremely satisfied with himself. All the way from Burlington to Hopkins I peacefully snored in an upper berth. I never get any other. I always reach the conductor just in time to learn that he'll ''have to give me an upper berth." All this winter I have lived on the road, and never got a lower berth but once. That was on the St. Louis sleeper of the C, B. & Q. road, which has no upper berths. And when I went to get into my lowly couch that night, I was so accustomed to climb- ing into my lofty berch from stejo-ladders and porters' boxes, that I didn't know how to get into a low one, and the porter boosted me uj) to the curtain rod, which I scrambled over, and tumbled down inside. Why, about one-fifth of my life, this winter, has been spent dangling between heaven and eartli, clinging to the edge of an upper berth, feeling for the floor with my feet. There is some mistake about this. Mature never intended me to sleep in an upper berth, else she had given me legs with tubular joints, that would slide in and out, like a spy -glass. A XOCTURXAL DIARY. 235 I am glad I am not fat. since this relentless fate has assigned me forever to the doom of the upper berths. If there is anything that ^yould make a snake laugh, it would be the spectacle of a fat man, a little along in years, with a head rather of the bald baldy, and wide suspenders flapping and dangling down his legs, puffing, squirming and kicking over the edge of an upper berth, trying to get in, grabbing at the yielding, unhelpful pillows, balancing himself on his stomach while he tears his bed to pieces with frantic snatches, and at the same time kicks the immortal breath out of the man in the opposite berth, and at last, with a hollow groan, comes slid- ing down, landing astride of the neck of the man who is sitting on the edge of the lower berth, unbuttoning his shoes. It usually winds up by his giving some man a dollar and lifty cents to trade berths with him. It is unnecessary to say that the old fat man is very sensitive on this subject, and doesn't like to be joked about it. One night, after I had laughed myself blind at just DOWNFALL OF GEEATXESS. 236 A NOCTURNAL DIARY. such a scene as I have described, I heard the fat man ask, with great sadness of voice, if any- body wouldn't like to exchange berths with him. Moved with pity I said, ** I would." "All right," said the perspiring fat man, ''mine's upper five, but you'll have to get the porter to make it up again before you get it. It's kind of tore all to pieces," he added, rather apologetically. And he was correct, for I could see it lying all over the floor of the car. "Which is your berth ^" he asked, as, with a grateful glow on his face, he prepared to drop into it. "Upper seven," I said, "next one to yours." And I don't think I was ever called quite so many names in five minutes, all different and none complimentary, in all my life, as I was then. I will never again try to be accommodat- ing in a sleeping car. The Shah of Persia does not pay his debts. Shake! old Xasser-ud-deen ; what do you do with yourself about the first of the month ? TWO DARING MEN. 237 TWO DARING MEN. Ox the way from Terre Haute — whicli is indifferently pronounced Ter Hut, Terry Hawt, Terry Hot. and Terra Hote— down to Princeton we passed tlirougb a station called Sullivan, where two men got on the train in a state, or ratlier in two states, of the wildest excitement. Only about fifteen minutes before the train reached the town, a terrible explosion had occurred in a coal mine ; a column of smoke and slate and broken timbers and flame had shot up into the air from the mouth of the shaft, like a volcano ; the debris had choked up the shaft, and thirty men were imprisoned in the mine. And nothing, these two passengers declared, was being done. People were stand- ing around horror-stricken, they said ; nobody would go down ; nobody would do anything. "Oh," they shouted, while the people in the car looked at them with undisguised admira- tion, "oh, if they only had had time, they would have headed a rescue party and brought those suffering miners to light and safety." " I would have gone down into that shaft," 238 TWO DA KING MEX. said the fir>t noble passenger, "if I knew I would never come out alive." "I would not hold my life worth that," shouted the second noble passenger, snapping his fingers, "when the thought of those poor fellows suffering untold and unknown horrors and agony down in the burning mine." "If the train had only been an hour later," cried the first noble passenger, "it woukl have found me do\^Ti in that mine when it came along." "If I had thouc:ht the conductor would have waited for me," exclaimed the second noble passenger, "I would have gone down anyhow." And the passengers could not repress a mur- mur of admiration. An old man, who was chewing cardamon seeds for his catarrh, said : " There is another train comes down in about three hours." But nobody paid any attention to him ex- cept to frown at him, and then they turned again to look at the two noble, daring passen- gers, and shudder at the thought of their reck- lessness. "Oh," the two noble passengers cried in TWO DARIXG MEX. 239 unison, '' we couldn't get anybody to go down J that shaft. We begged, and. commanded, and did all that mortal men could do, but we couldn't get anybody to go down." I rather expected this was true. I have no doubt of it. "I wonder," said the first noble passenger, "if the conductor wouldn't run the train back and wait for us?" "1 wonder?" shouted the second noble pas- senger, enthusiastically, "let's ask him !" And the burst of admiration from the other passengers was so strong that I thought they were going to raise a purse for the rescuers on the spot. But the train passed on, while the two rescuers kept declaring they had a good mind to get off and walk back, because nobody up at Sullivan would do anything. And, finally, they did get off at a little station about thirteen miles down the road ; and what do you suppose was the important business that had dragged them away from the rescue of twenty or thirty perishing men ? There was a man down there they heard had a cow to sell, and when they got off the train they learned that he had sold her two days before. 240 A PRACTICAL MAX. A PRACTICAL MAN. SoMETiiixG about the engineer, his face or his manner, or possibly his clothes, attracted my attention. Anyhow, I wanted to talk to him and hear him talk about his engine. There is always a wonderful fascination about railway engineers and locomotives and railroad men generally, for all people, and I am and have always been especially susceptible to this fasci- nation. Were you ever at Creston, Iowa ? And did you ever stop at the old Creston House ? I have sat, quiet and motionless, in its sitting- room, by the hour, listening to the clatter of the train men about me. Creston is the Hornellsville of Iowa. ''By thunder I*' one man would be shouting, "I looked out of the way-car window and saw old Flanigan comin' down the main line lickety split, thirty miles an hour if he was makiu' a mile, and I '' " switch open and two coaches on the siding," says an engi- neer, "and I squealed for brakes an' throwed her clear over, and you should see the fire fly out of them rails, and before *' " Well, sir," somebody else from some other run chimes A PRACTICAL MAX. 241 in, ''I twisted that blamed old brake till I thought I'd twist it off; hold nothing, you couldn't hold " "Aw^, she is though; she's the prettiest piece of iron on this division ; she's quick as a " "Who Avent out on No. 37 last night?" And so on through a charming confusion of throttle and lever and lamp and draw-bar, fire-box, cylinder-cocks, way-cars, frogs, switches, trucks, tanks, claw- bars, cattle-guard, platform-cars, chairs, cross- frogs, signals, flags, and a thousand things that I didn't know anything about. I rather liked it. But before I could get to this engineer I was speaking of, who had a passenger engine on the Indianapolis, Bloomington & Western, another had already engaged him in conversa- tion. I am always willing to let anybody else make a fool of himself and ask the questions, just so I get the benefit of the answers, so I let him talk while I hung around and listened. This ma5 wasn't like an}^ engineer I had ever made friends with before. He was an awfully practical fellow, the passenger said. " Yours is a very exciting life." "Is it?" said the engineer, with an air of interest. 16 242 A PRACTICAL MAN. *' Well," said the passenger, quieted a little bit, "I meant, isn't itf' " Oh," was the reply, with a satisfied accent. Then, after a pause, "Well, I don't know; do you see anything very exciting about this T' He was lazily stretched out on his cushion, dividing up his pajjerof fine cut, putting all but one "chew" of it into his vest pocket, and put- ting the one " chew" into his tobacco-pouch, so that he could show the fireman that was all he had, when that useful official should ask for it. The passenger fidgeted a little, but didn't seem to want to give it up. I didn't know how to feel glad enough that I hadn't gone into the catechism business with the quiet man. "Well," said the passenger, after a little while, "are we pretty near ready to pull out f ' " Pull what out f asked the engineer. " Why, the train." " Train isn t in anything. Train's all right." "Well," said the passenger, " I mean, are we nearl\^ ready to go ?" " I am,'' quietly remarked the engineer, "are your' " You have a splendid engine there," said the passenger. A PRACTICAL MAX. 243 **Tain't mine,'' replied the sphinx, "it be- longs to the company." " How much can yoii get out of lier ?" asked the passenger. The engineer looked surprised. '• Can't get a cent out of it," he said ; " can't get anything out of anybody except the paymaster." " Well, but I mean," persisted the passen- ger, "what can she do, on a good road, easy grade, and you cracking on every pound of steam she can carry ?" "It can pull the train," he said; "what would you expect it to do ?" "Well, but how fast?" " Schedule time," was the reply, " that's all we're allowed to make ; must make our time between all stations. That's imperative orders on the L, B. & W." "Well, but couldn't you pull her wide open and ' ' " Pull who wide open ?" "Why, her— 3-our engine, and give her sand and " " Why should I give it sand ?" " To make her run faster." 244 A PRACTICAL MAN. *^Sand does not increase the speed of an engine, steam is the only motive power." ''But you give her sand on a heavy grade and ' ' "Excuse me, I never give an engine sand. The sand is poured on the rail." "Oh, well, you know what I mean. You give her steam, you know, and " "Xo," he said, "I do not, I merely move the throttle lever, thus opening the regulator valve, and the steam is introduced to the proper portions of the machinery in simple obedience to the laws of physics. I have no control over it, beyond regulating the supply." "Did you ever," said the despairing passen- ger, ''come so near a collision that you had to throw her clear over and " "No," the man said very gravely, "and I never expect to. It couldn't be done. Xo one man could throw this engine clear over. It weighs thirty -five tons." "I suppose," the passenger obstinately per- sisted, "that when you start out with a heavy train you have to hold her awfully close to the rails r' "I have nothing to do with that," he said, A PRACTICAL MAX. 245 " the laws of gravitation and friction control all that. I presume my weight on the engine adds somewhat to its pressure on the rail, although of course that amounts to very little in com- parison with the weight of the engine." The passenger wiped the beaded perspiration from his brow. "Well," he said, "how do you like life on the foot-board, anyhow T' "I don't live on the foot-board," the en- gineer said, " I live at home." "Well, how do you like running on the road, then <" "I don't run ; I ride." The conductor came along just here and handed the man in the cab a bit of yellow paper, and then shouted "All aboard." The passenger, with a grateful expression of counte- nance, said, " Thank heaven !" as he went back and climbed on the rear platform of the last car, as far away from the engine as he could get, and I heard the engineer, as I turned away, growling about people who "always wanted to talk shop." It was a terribly narrow escape for me, but I made it, and I rather enjoyed it. Provi- dence always does take care of the truly good. 246 A MYSTERIOUS ACCIDENT. A MYSTERIOUS ACCIDENT. OxE bright morning, early in October, I was on Dave Blackburn's train on the Keokuk divi- sion of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy railroad. We were running so fast that the noise of the wheels was rattling along about two hundred yards behind the train, doing its level best to keep in sight, but losing ground every jump. Suddenly the train stopped. Away out between stations, no cattle on the track, no water tank in sight, nothing appar- ently to stop for. She pulled up so close to an orchard that the farmer came out and sat on the fence with a gun in his hand, and a couple of bold, bad dogs, looking deceitfully pleasant, tagging along at his heels. He evidently didn't care about setting up the apples. The passen- gers were alarmed, not at the determined neu- trality of the farmer, but at the sudden stop- page of the train. They knew something serious had happened. Presently the fireman came walking down along the side of the track, looking carefully, as though he had dropjjed liis diamond out of the cab window. A MYSTERIOUS ACCIDEXT. 247 *' What is it ?" asked the iirst passenger. *'What is the matter T' asked the second passenger. *' What has happened Y' asked the third pas- senger. " AVhat broke ?" asked the fourth passenger. ^'Why did we stopT' asked the iifth x)as- senger. " What's up V asked the sixth passenger. "What's broke loose '^'' asked the seventh passenger. " What done it ?'' asked the eighth passen- ger. "Broke a spring -hanger,'' gravely replied the fireman, and passed on, and all the ques- tioning passengers drew their heads back and closed their windows, and with great gravity was repeated the fireman's statement to the other passengers who had not been able to get to a window in time to ask the fireman anything : " Broke a spring-hammer." " Broke a sling-hainer." "Brolve a screen-hanger." " Broke a string-hammer." "Broke a string-ander." "Broke a scene-hanner.*' 248 A MYSTEKIOUS ACCIDENT. *' Broke a steam-hammer." " Broke a swing-hanger." " Broke a bean spanker. '* "Broke a hair-banger." And if Benjamin Franklin and George Washington and Christopher Columbus had been in that coach, they couldn' t have looked wiser nor been more thoroughly ignorant of the nature of the accident, than the awe-struck i)as- sengers who imparted and received this infor- mation and tried to look as though they weren't w^ondering what it was. There should be a law compelling railroad people to speak United States when imparting information relative to the nature of accidents, to the inquiring pas- sengers. There wasn' t a passenger in that coach that ever expected to see good Dave Blackburn or the engineer alive again. AVe all supposed that when a spring-hanger broke, it just tore the engine all to pieces, stood it on end and rammed it into the ground, and then ran on ahead, tore up the track, set lire to a bridge and blew up a culvert. The average passenger has an idea that a spring-hanger owns about the whole engine, that it is one of those things that can even swear at a brakeman and walk up SCIENCE VS. IMPULSE. 249 to a baggageman and call him a ''wooden- headed, flat-backed, trunk-liftin' hnrricane of wrath," and consequently when a passenger is told that the spring-hanger is broke, he has an impression that it will take every last dollar there is on the train to set the old thing up again. SCIENCE vs. IMPULSE. It is very easy to write long articles, pro- found with medical learning and wisdom ad- vising people, as they value health and life, to avoid "hurrying" and excitement" during the heated term ; but when a man is only ten feet away from a petulant gentleman cow, and sixty- five feet away from the nearest point in the pasture fence which they are both heading for with all the intensity of purpose that can actuate living creatures, who is going to stop and feel his pulse to see whether he is in more ^ of a hurry than is warranted by the laws of hygiene ? 250 MISSED HIS COUNT. MISSED HIS COUNT. The neighbor's cat had clawed the baby, and the man was going out to the wood- pile, with his ax over his shoulder and the cat under his arm. "Carom me back to the house,'- said the cat, who appeared to be chalk full of emotion, ''that ought not to count, it was only a scratch.'' The man took his cue, and looked thoughtful. "True," he said, "and this is only an accident." And he laid the feline across the block and held it down with his foot, and swinging the ax above his head, brought it down with dreadful force. There was a moment of dreadful silence, and then, while the cat, from her high seat on the neigh- bor's shed, sang, "Oh, wauly, wauly, up the bank," the man scraped around in the chips to find his three toes, and carried them in to his w^ife, and asked her if she supposed the doctor could sew them on when he came. INFORMATION, GOSSIP AND PHILOSOPHY. (IN CROIBS.*) THE STORY OF IXNACH GARDEN. " Arma. virumque cano ;" The man with two arms and a hoe, I sing. The spring Saw him with spade and hoe and rake, AVitli back and arms that burn and ache, Dig and swear At the hard earth, where Over the adamantine sod All winter long the family trod. * "We would have served this chapter on the half-shell, but we edited the book in August, and couldn't extract an "r" out of the shell anyway. You can only get it in " crumbs " out of season. [251] 252 THE STORY OF INNACII GARDEN. All day long like a slave he wrought ; The spade was dull and the day was hot ; When a cooler or softer place he sought, Sunstrokes and brick-bats filled the spot. From rosy dawn, Till the day was gone, AVith tears and groans he labored on. By Luna's liglit the lettuce bed "With seeds of lactuca sativa were fed ; Where the onion wept at its breathful taste The bulbs of the allium cepa he placed ; And you never have seen a More charming verbena Than those he put in the oblong mound With viola tncolor bordered round ; And on each side of the Avalk from the gate a Row of the reseda odorata ; Back in the kitchen-garden bed, Maphamis Sativiis, white and red ; Where the tall poles burden the haunted air, is The place where he ^]ants phaseolus vulgaris ; All of the seeds that the grocer had, Lots of things good, and some things bad ; Things that he didn't know how to spell ; Roots that bite and bulbs that smell ; Unknown vines of suspicious breeds ; Sprouts that come up and turn to weeds ; THE STORY OF IXXACH GARDEN. 253 Things it would poison the children to pull — Every inch of his garden filled it full. Daybreak came, and its earliest ray Smiled on the garden just as it lay. Eight o'clock, and the man went down To his office desk in the busy town. Kine, and his family flitted away "With a rich relation to spend the day. Then, Just as the whistles were tolling ten, A hen. Pride of the flock that lived next door (Xumbering a hundred and seventy-four), Peeped through a crack of the neighbor's fence, And said to her comrades : "Lettuce, hens !" Hens ! They came by ones, by scores, by tens ; Gallus old birds, a clarion crew, Came with the crowd, as they always do ; Bantams, hardly as big as a match. But worse than a snow-plow on the scratch ; Dorking fowls that make things whirr When they dig up the ground with their extra spur ; Malays and Hamburgs, spangled and plain, White-checked chickens that hail from Spain ; 254 TnE STORY OF IXNACII GARDEN". Fighting game-chickens, Polands black, Guinea hens, with eternal " squack ;" liens with chicks that weetled and cried, Hens bereaved, whose weetles had died ; Giddy young hens that never had set, .^^^.JF- ^ " RAISING " A GARDEN. Grave old hens that were at it yet ; Portly old roosters solemn and stout ; Old-time bruisers with one eye out ; Hens, with broods of awkward ducks. That gave no heed to their anxious clucks, And never regarding their worried looks. Plunged into gutters and ponds and brooks ; Mortified roosters, with tail feathers lost ; THE STORY OF LXXACH GARDEN. 253 Fowls whose claws were nipped by the frost ; Business-like birds, with no ear for fun ; Pullets whose troubles were just begun ; Tough old fowls, for the boarders' collation ; Yellow-legged hens of the Western persuasion, Bright geras in the circuit rider's vacation ; Baptist-like ducks, with their awkward totter, Hunting around for some waist-deep water ; Blue-looking turkeys, scratching a living, Fore-ordained to die next Thanksgiving, And here in the mob was a solemn passel Of geese, with tremendous feet for a wrastle, Not much on the scratch, but 'twas easily seen They were worse on grass than a mowing-machine. "Where they all came from nobody knew, But over the fence in clouds they flew ; And into the garden for life or death, They scratched till they panted, out of breath ; Ko pause, no stop, no stay for rest, Till the sun went down in the crimson West ; Till the man came home from his work and found The yawning clefts in the riven ground. And he gazed for a space, with a fearful start, . While the deep sobs broke from his grateful heart ; And he clasped in bis arms his babes and spouse, " Thank Heaven, the earthquake spared my house I" 25d THE MERRY, MERRY SPRINGTIME. THE MERKY, MERRY SPRINGTIME. HE month of April is the seventh month of the year. It was origi- nally the thirteenth, but in 1302, Augustus CsDsar changed the calendar, because he had a note to meet in the middle of the month,- and didn t "BABY MINE." have a cent to pay it with, and so he dropped that month out en- tirely, and April thus became the third month, as it now is. It was named after Aprilis, the god of spring, who used to get up on the last day of March, and taking a paint-pot and a marking brush, go around the country painting Latin mottoes and moral precepts and bursts of poetry on the rocks and trees, among others, the following gems which have come down to our own day : *' Takibus liverimus correctore for the Blood- ibus." THE MERRY, MERRY SPRINGTIME. 257 *^Dulce et ducoram est to take 'rye and rock' in the "Honey, tar, rumque cano, for colds and coughs." " xsox populi pro Bolus's corn pilaster est." " Gissipius W. Achates, ear and lung doc- tor." ''Chew only optimus nave plug, ten cents a hunc." "In hoc cough syrup vinces. Sign of the big mortar." "Try Brown's magic lotion for freskles." Now, thousands of people used to read these things, and they actually believed them and tried them on. They all died miserably, and were called among men, '* April's fools." This is the origin of a custom that has lasted even unto our time. The cussed 'em is most vigor- ously observed by the man who kicks the hat full of bricks. The motto of April is "Dum eripuit, erump," which means, "Do not go out of the house without an ulster, a duster, a chest-jirotector and a palm-leaf fan." It is a month devoted to. and by the immor- tal gods set apart for weather, and sometimes, 17 258 THE MERRY, MERRY SPRINGTIBIE. in a good April, that understands its business and can get uji and bristle around, there are eight kinds of climate in one day. The jewel of April is the sardonyx, and it is said by people who have studied meteorology ever since the time of Augustus to be the sar- donickest month in the whole lot. The Fourth of July used to be April, but after they tried it a few years it had to be changed, on account of the weather. Perhaps, however, in the whole liistory of the month, the best thing that ever happened in April happened in our house. It is just two j^ears old this week, and can create a panic at his ^'pa's" desk among the manuscript and papers, that can't be excelled by the best efforts of his natal month upon the dinner-table of a premature jTicnic. There maybe some apparent discrepancies in the opening portion of the historical part of this sketch of April. It is, however, a sufficient answer to any objections that may be raised, to say that we believe wdiat we have written con- cerning this month, its history and traditions, and if we believe it, anybody can. AGEICULTURAL AFFLICTIONS. 259 AGRICULTURAL AFFLICTIONS. Fro:m Angnsta to Macomb, Illinois, every field is full of plows and patient farmers. Dear, patient, good-natured, grumbling agriculturist. Where the farmer gets his good nature from is a mystery to me every time I look at him. I watched him to-day from the car window, plodding along at the tail of the plow, and I wondered that he ever smiled at all, under any provocation. Of all men, it seems to me the farmer has the best right to grumble. Only, he never grumbles at the right things. He grumbles at prices, and then, of course, nobody sympathizes with him nor cares a cent for his troubles, because we grumble at the same thing. Prices never did suit anybody. The seller always thinks they are too low, and the buyer always knows they are too high. The merchant goes into bankruptcy because he is compelled to sell his goods for half what they cost him ; and the customer goes naked and starves because he can't afford to pay one-half what is asked for them. So the farmer, when he grumbles at prices, is no worse off than the rest of us, and accordingly attracts no sympathy. 260 AGKICULTURAL AFFLICTIONS. Down in Southern Indiana, soniewl.ere about Seymour, they were telling me about an old settler who was depressed on account of the hard times. Everything went wrong; this honest farmer remarked, in tones of the deepest dejection, "The big crops don't do us a bit of good. What's the use? Corn only thirty cents. Everybody and everything's dead set agin the farmer. Only thirty cents for corn! Why, by gum, it won't pay our taxes, let alone buy us clothes. It won't buy us enough salt to put up a barrel of pork. Corn only thirty cents'. By jocks, its a livin\ cold-blooded swindle on the farmer, that's what it is. It ain't worth raisin' corn for such a price as that. It's a mean, low robbery." Within the next ten days that man had sold so much more of his corn than he had intended, that he found he had to buy corn to feed through the winter with. The price nearly knocked him down. '• What : 1 1 " he yelled, '' thirty cents for corn '! Land i\\\\Q— thirty cents ! What are you givin* us? Why, I don't want to buy your farm, I only want some corn I Thirty cents for corn ! Why, I believe there's nobody left in this world but a set of graspin', blood-suckin' old misers. AGKICrLTURAL AFFLICTIOXS. 261 Why, good land, yon don't want to be able to buy a national bank with one corn crop I Thirty cents for corn! Well, Fll let my cattle an' horses run on corn stalks all winter before I'll pay any such an unheard-of outrageous price for corn as that. Why, the country's flooded with corn, and thirty cents a bushel is a blamed robber}^, an' I don't see how any man, lookin' at the crop we've had, can have the face to ask such a price." But here is where, to my way of thinking, the gazelle comes in for the farmer. It is spring, and the annual warfare begins. Early in the morning the jocund farmer liies him to the field, and hunts around in the dead weeds and grass for the plow he left out there somewhere sometime last fall. AVhen he finds it, he takes it to the shop to have it mended. When it is mended, he goes back into the field with it. Half way down the first furrow he lays, he runs the plow fairly into a big live-oak root. The handles alternately break a rib on this side of him and jab the breath out of him on the other, and the sturdy root, looking up out of the ground with a l)leased smile of recognition, says cheerfully : 262 AGEICULTUKAL AFFLICTIONS. "Ah, Mr. Thistlepod, at it again, eh?" I Fifty feet farther on he strikes a stone that doubles up the plow point like a inece of lead, and while the amazed and breathless agricul- turist leans, a limp heap of liumanity, across the plow, the relic of the glacial period re- marks, sleepily : "Ah ha; si)ring here already? Glad you woke me up." And then the granger sits down and patiently tries to tie on that plow-point with a hickory wiihe, and while lie i)ursues this fruit- less task, the friendly crow swoops down, near enough to ask : " Goin' to put this twenty in corn this year, Mr. Thistlepod?" And before he has time to answer the sable bird, a tiny grasshopper, wriggling out of a clod so full of eggs that they can't be counted, shouts briskly : "Here we are again, Mr. Thistlepod ; dinner for 500,000,000,000. And then a slow-moving, but very positive potato-bug crawls out into the sunlight to see if the frost has faded his stripes, and says : "The old-fashioned peachblow potatoes are AGRICULTURAL AFFLICTIOXS. 263 the best for a sure crop, but the early rose f should be planted for the first market." Then several new kinds of bugs who haven't made any record yet, climb over the fence and come up to inquire about the staple cro^DS of the neighborhood, and before he can get through with them Professor Tice sends him a circular stating that there won't be a drop of rain from the middle of May till the last of Oc!"ober. This almost stuns him, but he is beginning to feel a little resigned when a dis- patch is received from the dej^artment of agri- culture at AVashington, saying that all indica- tions point to a summer of unprecedented, almost incessant and long-continued rains and floods, and advising him to plant no root crops at all. While he is trying to find words in which to express his emotion, a neighbor drops in to tell him that all the peach trees in the country are winter killed, and that the hog cholera is raging fiercely in the northern part of the township. Then his wife comes out to tell him the dog has fallen into the well, and when the poor man gets to the door-yard, his children, with much shouting and excitement, meet him and tell him there are a couple of 264 AGRICULTURAL AFFLICTIONS. cats, of the pole denomination, in the spring honse, and another one under the barn. With tears and groans he returns to the field, but by that time it has begun to snow so hard he can't see the horses when he stands at the plow. He is dis- couraged and starts for the house with his team, when he meets a man who bounces him for using a three-horse clevis he made him- self, and wrings ten reluctant dollars out of him for it. When he reaches the house the drive-well man is waiting for him, and while he is settling with him a clock peddler comes in, and a lightning-rod man, screened by the storm, climbs up on the ten-dollar smoke house, and fastens 8G5 worth of lightning-rods on it, and before the poor A WELL PROTECTED :;MOKE HOUSE. A BLIGHTED CENSUS TAKER. 265 farmer can get his gun half loaded, the bailiff comes in to tell him that he has been drawn on the jury. No, I would not, even if I could, be a farmer. The life is pleasant and independent, but it seems to have its drawbacks. If I were a farmer I would grumble all I wanted, and thump the man who found fault with me for it. A BLIGHTED CENSUS TAKER. ''What does your husband do?'' asked the census man. ''He ain't doin' nothing at this time of the year," replied the young wife. " Is he a pauper V' asked the census man. She blushed scarlet to the ears. "Law, no'.'' she exclaimed, somewhat indignantly. "We ain't been married more'n two weeks." Then the census man threw down his book and rushed out into the depths of the gloomy forest, and caught hold of a white oak tree three feet through to hold himself up by. 266 POKING FUN AT THE NATIVE. ( POKING FUN AT THE NATIVE. The Sioux City and Pacific train stopped at Onawa the other day and the smart man on the train leaned out of the window and shouted to a native, "What is the name of this town f "Onawa," replied the native. "On a what?'' queried the smart man. Patiently the native repeated the name of the hamlet. "Do you want to sell it V asked the smart man. The patient native "didn't know; 'lowed mebbe they'd sell if anybody wanted to buy it bad enough." "I'll give you twenty-eight cents for it," bid the smart man. The native turned his head thoughtfully on one side and consid- ered the proposition in silence. Finally he raised his head with the air of a man who had about made up his mind to trade : " An' throw yourself in f he asked. The window came down with a slam, and as the train pulled out, there was laughter in the car, but the smart man couldn't tell whether it was meant for him- self or the native, although he was inclined to think it was. ANSWERS TO CORKESPOXDEXTS. 267 ANSWERS TO CORRESPOXDENTS. Aberdeen-, May 3.— Who was the author of the '' Waverley Novels T' COXGLOCKETTY AXGUS McPhIRSON McClAN. A man named Tom Donovan ; lives down here in Bogus Hollow and drives a dray. AVhat do you want to know for? Boston, Mass.— Can you tell me whether Connecticut has now two capitals, as formerly, or only one ? Statesman. It has live. Have you no spelling-book, that you had to send clear out here to learn what every schoolboy in Iowa could tell you ? Marion, Iowa.— Who wrote the poem called " Thanatopsis," beginning, "To him, who in the love of nature''? Asa. We did, but you need not go and tell every- body about it. Peoria, 111.— Is it true that a cat has nine lives? Thomas. It is, it is. Some of them have eleven. In the year 1853, during the reign of King IX., there was a cat at Medford-upon-Rum that had 268 ArSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS. fourteen lives, and after being beheaded the fifteenth time, got up, picked up her head in her mouth and ran away, and is supposed to be i alive to this day. And we think this same cat is the one owned and maintained by a neighbor of ours. Appleton, Wis. — Was William Tell, as is claimed by some folks, really a fabulous, or mythological character ? History. No, he was not. He was a real man ; had just as actual an existence as Washington or Grant. If you don't believe it, come down here, and we can prove it to your perfect satis- faction. We can show you a book with a pic- ture of William Tell shooting an apple from his son's head, and Tell, the apple and his son are all there. Ann Arbor, Mich. — Can you tell me why it is warmer in summer than it is in the winter ? L C. S. It isn't. Who put that nonsense into your head ? If the Ann Arbor schools can't do bet- ter than to teach people that it is warmer in the summer than it is in the winter, they had better sell out. Where did you get such an idea, anyhow ? ANSWERS TO CORRESPOXDEXTS. 269 Denver, Colorado. — (1) Where is the Yosem- ite Valley, aud [2) what route do I take to gefc there ? Traveler. 1. There is no such a place. It used to be located about three miles below St. Joseph, Missouri, on the Kansas bank of the Mississippi river, but about two years ago it was washed away by a freshet and has never been seen or heard of since. 2. We don't know, and what's more, we don't care, a red-handed, continental, star- strijped Ro3'al Bengal American nickel. Mishwauka, June 2. — Is it right for a tem- perance man to drink whisky ? Eeformer. Well, no ; it is hardly right ; hardly right ; unless, he likes it. That makes a difference, and even then it is hardly the thing for him to do. Unless he likes it very much indeed. Kewark, X. J. — How many body servants did George Washington have ? Patriot. He had five last summer, but this season he has only three, the two who traveled with Mr. Barnum's show last year being now engaged for the gorilla and the wild boy of Borneo, 270 ANSWEES TO CORRESPONDENTS. until July 1, when the gorilla will be with- drawn and Joice Heth substituted, on account of the heat. Ann Arbor, Mich. — How many bones are there in the human body, at maturity? Student. It depends on the size of the man. Xow, in a shad weighing one pound, there are 2,6*25 well defined bones. A man weighing one hundred and forty pounds, therefore, would have in his body one hundred and forty times as many as a one pound shad, or 936,8.5*2.023 bones. Given the weight of the man, it will always be per- fectly easy for you, by this method, to ascer- tain the number of bones in his body. Chicago. — Who is the wealthiest man in the United States, outside of New York State and the great mining States ? Banker. We are. But we are not lending a dollar to anybody, for anything. You understand I Boston. — Who was the author of the *' Junius letters,"' do you think? Politician. Junius, you donkey ; Junius. ANSWERS TO CORRESPOXDEXTS. 271 Warrensburg, Mo.— When is the thiie to travel ? When you hear her father's foot on the third step, young man, is about as good a time as any, to start, and you can prolong the tour to suic your own convenience and the length of the old man's cane. From the innocence with which you ask the question, we suppose you didn't travel until he was clear into the i^arlor. Served you right. Cohasset, Mass.— Why do not the lower animals speak ? We never gave the subject very close thought, but we suppose it is to avoid being called on to make addresses of welcome and after-dinner speeches. Cleveland, 0.— Mr. Editor, can you tell me what was the peculiar and specific charm in the intonation of the great actor, who, it is said, could make an audience weep, by the manner in which he could pronounce Mesopotamia I Ethel. We do not know just what was the trouble with him, Ethel, and we have always been rather inclined to think it Avas a campaign story, got up for political effect ; but it may be 272 THE TROUBLE WITH MOODY. true, for we have seen men so drunk tliat it 7 made tbem weep and howl like demons to say *' individual aggregations," and we don't be- lieve money could have hired them to say ''Mesopotamia." THE TROUBLE WITH MOODY. "Oh, pshaw!" exclaimed the gentleman who has just billed Burlington for a lecture on "The Frauds of the Bible," closing an ani- mated theological discussion in a Main street bar-room; "oh, pshaw; they ain't no sense talking that way about him. I'm willin' to give Moody credit for all the good points he's got. He's a earnest enough man ; b'lieves what he says, honest enough in his oi:)inions, I reckon ; but, dog-gone it, the man's coarse ; he ain't got no kulcher." And the discussion was closed. BEEGHIZING A CAT. 273 BERGHIZIXG A CAT. When you feel that you have got to kill a cat, when you must kill a cat or suffer night after night from the pangs of a reproving conscience, this is the way Our Dumb Animals says you must kill it, the cat, not your conscience : '•Place the cat in a box large enough to turn round in and not feel stifled. Then, for a grown cat, put two table-spoonsful of best chlo- roform on a handful of cotton batting. Put in the cat first, shutting the lid of the trunk, then open the lid wide enough to slip in the chloro- formed cotton, and immediately close it." Now, could anything be more considerate or humane ? Be sure and have the box large and well ventilated, so that the doomed cat ** will not feel stifled." Nothing is more annoying to a chloroformed cat than a close, stifling atmos- phere. Cats have been known to die from the effects of chloroform administered to them in a , tight, stifling box. The best box for the pur- pose should have a bay window in each end, and should be ventilated by the Ruttan system, and there should be a large hole cut in the side 18 274 THE PIIOXOGRAPn. of the box so that the cat could come out aud get something to eat and drink when necessary. Then you should - ^^^ — ■ have the chloro- form carefully de- odorized so as to remove any un- pleasant or nox- ious flavor, and it should be dropped on a bit of perfumed cotton and laid away in one corner of the box, within easy reach, where the cat could go and smell it when it felt like it. In the course of some ten or twelve years the cat will pass gently away. Our Dumb Ani- mals is a very excellent journal, but it has some dumb queer notions about cat killing. AN EA6Y DEATH. The phonograph will register thirty- two thousand vibrations a second. And then it can't half keep up with a man who is trying to tell how he did and what he said when the pas- sengers saw that the train was going to plunge through the open draw-bridge. A REMARKABLE CURE. 275 A REMARKABLE CURE. "For many, many years," said the man witli the bad eye, "I was troubled, annoyed, positively afflicted with a raging, burning thirst for strong drink, and alcoholic beverages. I sought for relief in every way. I sought the advice of physicians and the counsels of friends. I tried various cures recommended by the news- papers, but none of them seemed to do me any good." "And by what means," asked the clergyman in the tall hat, "did you at length succeed in allaying this terrible thirst ?" "Well," said the man with the bad eye, after a moment's reflection, " I found that Old Crow whisky, as a steady thing, kind of softened it down and quieted it about as much as anything I tried. When I found the thirst and the burning desire for a drink coming on, I would go and take about three fingers of Old Crow and the thirst would pass away, and " 276 CATCniXG THE IIOKSE-CAK. CATCHING THE HORSE-CAR. *' Stop that car !" cried old Mr. IN'osengale, chasing a flying car up Division street, the car fresh as a daisy and Mr. Nosengale badly blown, and the distance pole not a minute away. '' Stop that car !" he shouted, to a distant bnt fleet-limbed boy. " Certainly,^' shrieked back the obliging boy, ''what shall I stop it with V "Tell it to hold on,'' shouted the abandoned pas- senger. "Hold on to what f ' yelled the boy. " Make it wait for me I" puffed Mr. Nosengale. You^ got too much wei":ht that's ve now," said the boy, what's the trouble with you." "Call the driver!" gasped the perspiring citizen, and as the car rounded the corner and passed out of sight, the mocking echoes of the obliging answer came floating softly back, "All right! What shall I caU him V SOMETHING TO BOOT. 277 SOMETHING TO BOOT. "Did you trade Yoiir brown mare for Gil- deroy's gray horse even, Mr. Pillicoddy ?" the neighbor's son asked him the other evening, as they were looking at the new horse down in the stable yard. "N-no," replied the old man listlessly, "no," and then, with an air of in- terest, as he looked up and saw a young man in a little straw hat, a new summer suit, a button-hole bouquet and a cane cross the yard and drop easily into a rocking chair on the porch, within easy reach of Miss Pillicoddy's sewing-chair, "No," said the old man, kind of pulling his hat on a little tighter, "no, Tve got something to boot," and before the bloom- ing chemb could button up his seven by nine ears, he was ricocheting across the pasture fence and seated on a moist warm spot. ' ' How fresh I" murmured the old man, as he trundled the sew- insr-chair into the house, and locked and bolted the front door after him. 278 A DIRE CATASTEOPHE. A DIRE CATASTROPHE. A MAX came into tlie office the other day and said that " Yuletidewas coming on apace." We were equal to the emergency, and after a little maneuvering got him seated in the patent ''Middlerib AVelcome'' and shot him out of the alley window and through a brick wall twenty-eight inches thick. And it wasn't until the inquest came on that we thought to look into the Enryclopadia, when we were amazed to learn that Yule- tide meant Christmas. Alas, alas, how often we cause pain and give offense by our thoughtless- ness! Just for the lack of a lit- A HASTY ACTION. .-, ,- . ' ^« .• i tie patient investigation we have knocked a hole in our neighbor's wall that will cost $0.75 to repair, and that man's widow is so offended that we don't suppose she will ever speak to us again. Ah, dear, we must learn to be more patient ; in our blind slavery to an un- governable temper, we fear we may hurt some- body yet. A. TRIBUTE TO '' CULCUAW." 279 A TRIBUTE TO '^CULCHAW." DcRixG the recent convention of governors, the governor of North Carolina rose to make his usual remark, but observing that the gover- nor of Massachusetts was present, he so far amended the original resolution as to say to the governor of South Carolina that '* the leaden hours on slow, unfolding wings had dragged their weary lengths in mock eternities nigh half- way round the tiresome dial-plate, since last they bent the pregnant hinges of the elbow, and touched with earthly nectar rare, from old Ken- tucky's copper-bottomed stills, their parched lips, to cool with gurgling dewiness the dry and whistling throat." Did you ever notice that the raggeder and frayeder the neck-band of your shirt grew, the more starch the washerwoman put into it, and the harder and glossier she ironed it ? (And the higher you carried your head the more you fidgeted i) 280 EULES OF CONDUCT. RULES OF CONDUCT. Never exaggerate, at least, don't exaggerate so excessively as to cause undue remark. Never laugh at the misfortunes of others, save in the isolated instance of a man struggling between heaven and earth, with only the blue dome of the sky above him, and nothing to sjjeak of under him, except a banana peel. Never send a present, hoping for one in return. Nine times out of ten you will slip up on your expectations. Freeze to the present you buy. You are dead sure of that. Never question your neighbors' servants or children about family matters. They ai'e liable to fib to you. The best way is to ''snook" around and find out for yourself. Always offer the easiest seat in the room to a lady or an invalid. A hard bottom, straight- back chair is usually considered about the easiest thing there is made to sit on. A rock- ing chair is apt to produce sea-sickness. Never pass between two passengers who are talking together, without offering an apology. One of them may lift you a kick that will raise you through the pier glass. EULES OF CONDUCT. 281 Never put a fire or warm, dry sheets in tlie spare room. It's too awfully invitiug, and these are hard times. Never insult an acquaintance by harsh words when applied to for a favor. It is just as easy and ever so much pleasanter, to lie to him and tell him you haven t got it. He may know you are a liar, but he can't deny that you are a gentleman. Never fail to answer an invitation, either personally or by letter. If it is an invitation to dinner, by all means answer it personally. If it is an invitation to a wedding or donation party, a letter will do just as well, and is about ten times as (;heap. If you lounge down into a rocking-chair and tilt back across the toes of a man in a neat fit- ting boot, don't ask him if he is hurt, or say anything else cal- culated to make him speak, just let him stand up and smile for a few moments till he gets his voice under control. Society is used to the ghastly smile of a man with tight boots, and doesn't mind it, but the A PLEASI^-G SMILE. 282 SOUND AND SENSE. quavering tones of an anguish-stricken voire are always calculated to cast a gloom over the entire community. SOUND AND SENSE. *'Mr. Pakafine," exclaimed an indignant woman, dashing into a West llill grocery, "I don't like that sugar you sent me last week at all. It wasn't lit to use." ^'Not fit to use I" asked the astonished grocer, "why, what was the matter with it ?" "Matter enough," said the woman; "it looked nice enough, but it was as gritty as gravel." "Oh, yes," responded the grocer, "oh, yes, I know now\ It was a new brand, that was 'anded in for our customers to try. Oh, yes, I know. I'll give you something better thjfe week." And the woman looked him right in the eye, but he never quailed, and she didn't know just whether she heard him right, or whether he meant just what she thought he said, or not. EO:.IAXCE AND REALITY. 283 ro:maxce axd eeality. A PARxr of serenaders halted on Boundary street the other night, touched the light guitar, and struck up. with great feeling, '' Come where my love lies dreaming." and then a great BUSH-HEADED BRUTALITY. bush-headed x^Tetch, forty-eight years old, with a beard like a thicket, leaned out of the window and said, in a load, coarse, unfeeling manner, ''Young gentlemen, you mistake, she 284 THE APwT OF DRESSING. isn't dreaming. Far from her be it to dream, or even sleep. She's sitting on the back porch, with her feet in a tub of cistern water, drinking iced lemonade and lighting musquitoes with a palm- leaf fan, and she isn't dressed for com- pany. Sing something true." But long ere he ceased to speak, the summer night was still, the front yard was empty, and the voice of the passel tree and harp no more awoke the night in melody. THE* ART OF DllESSIXG. A New York "modiste" has written a pamphlet on the "Art of Dressing." That isn't the book the times demand. What the young men who come home at 2:15 a. m. want is lucid instructions in the art of undressing. And if such a work could be supplemented with a few hints on practical methods of dis- tinguishing the foot of the bed from the end where the pillows are, it would have an im- mense sale. CLi:\rATE OF PERU— SLAVE OF HABIT. 285 THE CLIMATE OF PERU. It never rains in Peru, and a man in that rainless climate never knows what it is to get up Sunday morning and spend five hours pumping out his cellar, when he is just wild to go to church. But to atone for the loss of this pleasant pastime, ho has to stand up about four times a week and let a raging earthquake kick him clear across the county line in one time and two motions. THE SLAVE OF HABIT. *'BoYS," said the man, holding an inverted match in one hand, and a dark cigar in the other, "never acquire the pernicious habit of smoking. I am a slave to it now, and yet I hate it. I never see a cigar that I do not want to burn it up." And then, with extreme satis- faction, he burned up the one he had in his hand. 2S0 WHY IS IT?— didn't know it was loaded. WHY IS IT? We don't uiKlerstancl why it is that aeon- stable with a search-warrant, looking forwhisky in a temperance town, can search for five days and never get a smell, while a dry and thirsty man in the same town steps ont of his office, walks briskly away, and in three minutes is seen emerging from an adjacent alley, wiping his perspiring mouth with his cuffs. DIDX'T KXOW IT WAS LOADED. A West Hill man sat up one night till two o'clock in the morning, throwing poker dice with a fellow from Nebraska City, and then, when they rose to go, and the West Hiller felt that all that he had was the man's, he smiled sadly, and in low, sweet tones, more in sorrow than in anger, remarked that "he didn t know they were loaded." THE SXOW-BALL MYSTEKY. 287 THE SXOW-BALL MYSTERY. ^nViiex a snow-ball as hard as a door-knob liics you in the back of the head as you are crossing the street, no matter how quickly you turn, the only thing yoa can see is one boy, with the most innocent face and the emptiest hands that ever confronted a false accusation. It is often remarked tliat '-the boy is father to tlie man." This may be true, but we know that after the snow-ball has knocked off the man s hat, it is father to the boy than it is to the next corner, by a long sight, and the man will find it out if he is foolish enough to chase the bov. A Germ AX dentist has invented paper teeth. 'Tischew paper, probably. 288 nEAVEN AND EARTH— FREE COUXTRY. HEAVEN AXD EARTH. '' Oir, heaven and earth are far apart," says the poet. They are, they are ; and it is just as well that it is so. If they were very close together, the cabinet-organ dealers would be buzzing the poor, harassed, distracted angels eighteen hours a day, and the advertising agents would talk them blind the rest of the time. ADVANTAGES OF A FREE COUNTRY. It is going to cost England $10,000,000 to kill ten or a dozen Zulus. It costs more to kill a Zulu than it does an Indian. Our govern- ment never pays more than §200,000 for killing an Indian ; and a white man— well, in this country you can kill a white man for almost anything you are able to pay a lawyer. "When shall we eat ?'' asks a medical jour- nal. Same as you drink, doctor, same as you drink : everj- time anybody asks you to. EEASOX Vv'lIY — TWO BUOXnERS. 289 THE REASON WHY. E. C. Sted:\iax sings, in Scrihner, ^' Why should I fear to sip The sweets of each red lip f Why ? Because, Mr. Stedman, you have a coq- viction that the gloomy-looking old gentleman in the background, with blood in his eye and a cane like the angel of death in his hand, will make a poultice of you if you do any such sampling while he is in reach. There are two brothers on West Hill who look so much alike they cannot tell each other apart, and one day last week, when John was raging like a volcano with the toothache, Henry went down to the dentist's and had six teeth pulled. "You could tell, by the easy versifica- tion," remarked the barber, on hearing "The Eaven," "that this was a poem Po-made. It's so slick." 19 290 PnOXOGRAPII IN GEKMAX— BAGGY KNEES. THE PHONOGRAPH, IN GERMAN. The name of the phonograph, in German, is nnsergehausnekeitigenfernstehanphfteich- taunsgespreecher. When you wind that up on the cylinder, and leave it till it gets cold, and then grind it out, it usually tears the machine to pieces and strikes the house with lightning. The man whose pantaloons bag most at the knees isn't necessarily the man who prays the most. Sleeping in a day coach with your knees prox)pcd up against the seat in front of you, will wreck the knees of a straight pair of pants quicker and more successfully than two years of prayer-meetings. *' Her eyes," remarked the proof reader, **are her strongest attraction. They draw your attention and admiration in spite of your- self.'' " Ah, yes," replied the cashier, "a kind of a sight draft, as you might say." LITTLE CLASSICS. HISTORIC REMIXISCEXCES OF THE EARLIER TIME. IN PROSE AND VERSE. A DAY AT TROY. Troy, Ohio, March 4. "Arma virunique cano," I sing the first Trojan, you know ; " Qui primus ab oris," Who mounted his Horace,* And settled down in Ohio. "With more terror than joy With his pa and his boy, He fled, feeling dreadful Uneasy,f ♦ This is considered one of the most intricate and elabo- rate classical jokes ever "penetrated" upon an intelligent people. Send stamp for explanation, sent closely sealed in packages to suit the purchaser. t Professor Wortman, to whom I showed the manuscript of this stanza, offered me two hundred dollars to print that [291] 292 KOCTURXE. For just about then A horse load of men Made the climate unwholcsomcly Greecey. And his fond, loving wife, The joy of his life, He ran off and left her behind, For ^neas, gay boy, AVas sure that in Troy, Ohio, new wives he could find. NOCTURNE. Had he struck this new Troy just when I did, (Oh, ^Mother, are the doughnuts done?) He'd thought with the Arctic zone he'd collided, And back to the Greeks had turned and run. For the snow was deeper than the national debt, And the slush was running like a river ; And the Trojan hackmen, you just bet. Don't drive, when the weather makes them shiver. Old Troy don't look very much as it did "When pious ^neas ruled the roost ; And I thought of the many changing years that slid. Since Vulcan gave his step-son a boost. word " ^aeas-y," but I refused. I didn't think it would be right. I have yet some little conscience in these matters. KOCTURXE. 293 For I wandered over Troy, through the slush afore- said, And I took an aged Trojan for a guide, And every time he opened his head The old man lied. ^.^miTH... CP^S'l^ STi I mused at the trenches where the Grecian warriors lay. And I wandered where Hector fired the ships, And I strolled where the " waster of cities " held sway, AVhen a Trojan daren't open his lips. Here the great son of Tel- amon nursed his achilles' little WEAK^'Ess. direful wrath. Here the mighty Achilles sulked and swore ; And there, riglit directly across the street, Is John Smith's store. Then I made certain inquiries at the hotel, And the answers I got made me mad ; For I'd wasted all my classics on a hollow-hearted sell, And I felt it was reallv too bad. 294 KECKEATIONS IN THEBAX LITERATURE. For they told that ^neas never voted in this town, And that Hector never boarded here at all, But a man named Paris, they said, was here. But he moved last fall. RECREATIOXS IX TPIEBAN LITERA- TURE. *' Married people," said Epaminondas, "can- not talk as freely and rapidly as young people." " I hadn't noticed it," said Pelopidas, " and I don't think it is true." " But it is true," replied the illustrious The- ban, " because " "Because they are paired?" sagely asked bis friend. Epaminondas shook his head. "Because the two married people are only one, while each of the young j^eople is one, two?" Epaminondas looked sad, and stifled a rising sigh. Pelopidas thought a moment, and said ; "Because their two 'heads have but a single thought' V EECREATIOXS IN TIIEBAN LITEUATUKE. 235 "Oh, no," the statesman said, "it isn't necessary to have even one thought to do an infinite amount of talking. Loolv at the Con- gressional Record. IS'o," he continued, witJi an air of interest, "but you know the marriage service is conducted orally ? Verbally ? By word of mouth, or tongue, as you may say, the knot matrimonial is tied ?" " Yes," said Pelopidas, " I see, so far." "Well, then," said Epaminondas, w^ith a faint gleam of triumph on his face, " the mar- ried folk do the less talking because they are tongue-tied." Pelopidas was wrapped in silent amazement for a few moments, and then said it was a j^retty good conundrum, if that was its first aijpearance in the West, but it reminded him of a man building a one-story house. " IIow's that ?" asked the soldier statesman. " Blamed sight more scaffolding than house," said Pelopidas. And then Epaminondas set his teeth and muttered that it was a pity some i)eople were born without any apx^reciation for anything. 296 TOO PAliTICULAR. TOO PARTICULAR. *' Peucestas," said Leonatus, one da 3% when the all-conquering army of Alexander was on its march to Malli, ''Peucestas, why is the crup- per of Bucephalus like a ship's anchor?" Peucestas was buried in deep thought for a moment; "Because it has no pocket to put it inf he ventured timidly. ''Naw !" roared the son of Pella. "Man behind the counter?" i)ursued Peu- cestas. "No!" "To cover his head?" " Shades of my fatliers, no !" " Because it's infirm ?" Leonatus only made a despairing gesture. "Because it's a slope up ?" Leonatus made a motion to strike him, and Peucestas said he wouldn't guess any more, and he couldn't see why a horse's crupper was like a ship' s anchor. " Well, it is," replied Leonatus, "because it's at the end of the hawser." " Which end ?'' presently Peucestas in- quired, with a show of interest. A GRECIAN CIRCULAPw. 297 And then Leonatus looked a long way off, and said that the peculiar appearance of the clouds and the humidity of the atmosphere indicated considerable areas of disturbances, with a right smart of mean temperature at local points. A GRECIAN CIRCULAR. "Why," asked Ulysses, as he accompanied the swift-footed Achilles on his diurnal family marketing tour, " Why do you call your butcher Ixion V^ The son of Pe- leus looked atten- tively at the Hesh- er slicing off cut- lets, to see that he didn't get in three times as much bone as calf, and then rei)lied : " Because he's the man at the veal." The waster of cities sighed heavily, and AN A2>'CIENT CONCXDKUil. 298 THE SKIRMISHING FUND. shaking his head gloomily, said he never did understand i^oUtics very well, and so, without coming to a vote, the house adjourned. THE SKIRMISHING FUND. "Yarinus," said Lentulus, one day, just before the praetor marched against Spartacus, *' Varinus, did it never occur to you that these little signs in the city parks, all over the civil- ized world, 'keep off the grass,' are instigated by British intluence ?" The praetor couldn' t see why British influ- ence should trouble itself to preserve the grass in a United States park, and he said so. ''Well,'' said the consul, "it is so. It is only another exhibition of English hatred against the Fenians, to which other powers are thus induced to lend their influence. You can see no connection between these signs and the Fenians ?" "None," replied Yarinus, " unless the signs are like the Fenians, because nobody pays any attention to them." A MISS, BUT A GOOD LINE SHOT. 209 *'Not exactly that," respondit the consul, cum some asperity, "although that isn't so bad." Varinus respondit non, sed intimated, by shaking his caput, ut he would give it up. " Well," said the consul, with a pitying look at his comrade, "it is because these things are put up to keep people from ' wearing off the green.' " It was a long time before Varinus made any reply, when he finally said he hoped, if the consul ever said anything like that again, Spar- tacus might give him the awfullest Thracian a Roman ever got. And then he called out the troops and went over to Vesuvius, and got one himself, just to see what it was like. A MISS, BUT A GOOD LI^'E SHOT. " Iphigexeia," her father said one morning, when the ships were becalmed at Aulis, " Iphi- geneia, do you know why President Hayes is like Charles IX. of France f' The daughter of Agamemnon, who was work- 300 A MISS, BUT A GOOD LINE SHOT. ing a green worsted dog on a seal-brown sofa cusliion, said, " Two greens, a pink, three yel- low and four brown," and then spoke up : "Because he was a long time reachin' to his title?" " Hey ?" shouted the venerable Calchas, who was a little hard of hearing, "lie}', what's that ?" "Because," repeated Iphigeneia, blushing at her own audacity, " he was a long time regent to his title?" The Reverend Mr. Calchas shook his head and said this i)aragraphing was too strong for him, and went away to kill a goose for its bone, and look at the corn husks to see how the win- ter was going to be, while the son of Atreus only laughed, and told his daughter she was a mile away from it, and Iphigeneia tried again. " Because," she said, " lie's a kind of a little off Mm?" But Agamemnon told her not to get slangy, and she gave it up. "Why is it?" she asked. " Because," said her father, with the happy, triumphant air of a man whose conundrum comes back to himself for solution, "because he is friendlv to Pacifv the Potter." A MISS, BUT A GOOD LINE SHOT. 301 Ipbigeneia laid her work down on lier lap, crossed her hands on the idle needles, and after musing a moment in silence, inquired : *' Friendly to which r' *' To Pacify the Potter," replied her wa^^like parent, with evident ill humor. " Pacify the Pot- ter ; can't you see? Potter ; Pacify the Potter." "Ye-es," replied Iphigeneia, "yes, I see W'hat you mean, I guess, but his name wasn't Pacify, it was Palissy ; Palissy the Potter." And then Agamemnon threw his helmet on the floor, and said something savage about the stupid French not knowing how to spell a man's name anyhow, and went and told Calchas he was tired of fooling around here, and if he couldn't tell him when they were going to have good sailing weather, he'd discharge him in a minute, and hire old Professor Tice, or else de- pend on the United States signal service reports. And ten minutes later the revengeful Calchas had cooked up a plan for cutting Iphigeneia's neck off. It appears, from the teachings of history, that it was just as hard to build a conundrum that would stay, away back in prehistoric times as it is to-day. 302 EECRKATIONS IN MYTHOLOGY. RECREATIONS IX MYTHOLOGY. ^'IIaye some yourself," sliouted tlie un- happy son of ^olus, i^ausing in his professional THE AME>-ITIES OF TARTAP.US. SISYPHUS ANT) TA>'TALCS " SA5SLNG " EACH OTHEB. duties \vith the big stone, to look at his neigh- bor in the water, who was doing his level best RECREATIONS IN MYTHOLOGY. 303 to take a modest quencher, but was always frustrated by his enforced and perpetual red- ribbon vows. '' Drink hearty, Tantalus, you're welcome." ^' Thank you, good Sisyphus," replied the disconsolate Phrygian, with an equally fine play of delicate sarcasm; "put a brick under the stone to hold it, and come down and have some of the fruit. Don't tire yourself out working all the time. Come down and have a cool bath." "Not any," replied the Corinthian, " I don't like a plunge bath ; I prefer asking our patient friend with the sieve there for a shower bath, when I perform my ablutions. But don't you get awfully tired of so much water and fruit f' " Oh, not to speak of," Tantalus said, lying with the easy grace of a paragrapher ; " I must prefer this quiet, meditative solitude to the active cares and the fatigues of a life of labor. It is a source of amazement to me, at times, to watch your persistent struggles with that rough, grimy, and unstable stone." "Oh, I'm fond of action; I live by exer- cise," replied Sisyphus, as calmly and unbhish- ingly as though he was a witness in a whisky 304 KECREATIONS IX MYTIIOLOGY. case. ''Look at my muscle," he added, dis- playing a biceps as big as a watermelon, "you bet your boots I could burst the jaw of all the Furies this side of the Stj'x. But I say," he continued, with a shout of laughter, as Tantalus made a sudden but ineffectual duck at the receding water with his chin, " when you try to take a drink you remind me of President Hayes reaching after popularity with a policy scoop. You come about as near getting it, too." "And when I see you trying to get that stone to some place on the hill where it will stick," shouted tlie indignant Tantalus, "you make me think of the republican party." "And. whyfor?" asked Sisyphus, as he leaned against the stone and held it in i^lace \vith his back while he spat on his hands. "Because," said Tantalus, "it has only to carry fourteen democratic congressional dis- tricts next election in order to get a majority in the next lioiise." And just then the boss Fury came along and stirred up the menagerie with a live snake, and the convention let go of politics and resumed the consideration of the business on the speaker's table. INSURANCE OX THE TIBER. 305 IXSUHAXCE ox THE TIBER. *' Marcus Cjelius," Cicero said to bis legal friend, meeting him one morning on the other side of a screen under the capitol, " what shall it be^' Cselius said be wonld take a little spiritiis fumenti optimns, straight, and the orator re- marking that that was about the size of his, went on : "I wish you would get out the necessary papers some time to-day, and bring suit for me against the Yellow Tiber Fire and Marine Insurance Company, for the amount of its poli- cies on my villa at Tusciilum and my town house." M. CcTeliiis looked up in amazen:en\ "Why," he exclaimed, "when did they burn down ? And what was it ? Accident ? Mob ? Some of Clodius* people ?" "No," Cicero said, " they are intact as yet, and in fact, I haven't insured them yet, but I am going to do so to morrow, and I want to bring suit against the company now, so that if they ever should happen to barn, I won't have quite so long to wait for the money." 20 306 INSURANCE ON THE TIBER. Cselius saw that the orator's head was level, and brought suit that afternoon. Eleven years afterward the villa at Tusculum and the town house were both destroyed hy tire. The suit had by that time been in live different courts, and had been confirmed, and reversed, and re- manded, and referred to the master to take proof, and stricken from the docket, and amended, and rebutted, and surrebutted, and impleaded, and rejoindered, and hied, and quashed, and continued until nobody knew what it was about, and Cicero wasnotilied, three weeks after the fire, that he would liave to prove willful and long continued absence and neglect, as he could not get a decree simply on grounds of incompatibility of temperament. And when he went to the secretary of the company, that official told him the company didn't know any- thing about the fire and had no time to attend to such things. The company's business, the secretary said, was to insure houses, not to run around to lires, asking about the insurance. If he wanted any information on those points, he would have to ask the firemen or the newspaper reporters. The more a man reads in these old histories, THE ODD I SEE. 307 the more he is convinced that the insurance business in the days of the prsetors was a great deal more like it is to-day. THE ODD I SEE. What time Ulysses, in the frosty morn, Prepared to face tlie fierce November storm, His well-saved winter duds he eager seeks, And in each closet's dark recess ho peeks. "Eheu I'' he cries, "my ulster is not here, Kor in their place the heavy boots appear ; My seal-skin cap, when I would put it on, From its accustomed peg is surely gone. I see no scarf ; by Venus and her loves, Some son of Mercury hath cribbed my gloves. Mehercule ! who's got my chest protector ? I'm cleaned out by some savings bank director." With that he ripped, and roared, and cussed and swar', "While all his household looked on from afar. To him, at length, with grieving, downcast eyes, Faithful Penelope, distracted, cries : " Ulysses, hush ; such actions more become One who is steeped in old Xew England rum. Why wag your tongue with neither rhyme nor reason, 308 THE ODD T SEE. For tilings that are so useless out of season? Why should an ulster cumber up the wall, When August sun-rays fiercely on us fall ? AVhy should your winter boots impede our way, When July sunstrokes hold their fatal sway ? Go to ; when summer's sun was hot and strong The plaster })aris peddler came along ; Quick for his wares I changed each winter robe, And sent him burdened down the dusty road. I think, forsooth, your senseless rant'll cease When you behold our plastered mantel-piece." He views the mantel ; on his knotted face, Frowns scatter smiles, and smiles the dark frowns chase. He pauses for a space, then sits him down, And makes him ready to go off down town. First pulls, to save himself from snow and sleet, Two plaster paris kittens on his feet. Around his neck, with cotton thread, he ties A snow-white angel with the bluest eyes. Napoleon, with his crossed arms firmly pressed, A PLASTER-OF-PARISIA^' OUTFIT. EGYPTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 809 He binds upon liis cougli-affected chest. Two jet black dogs with gilded collar-bands, lie draws for gloves upon his trembling hands, AVhile a huge plaster paris billy goat, Swings o'er his shoulders for an overcoat. Loud laugh the gods, as down the street he strides And e'en Penelope his style derides. EGYPTIAN PHILOSOPHY. "Erastotiiexes," asked his master, Cal- limachiis, one morning when they were taking their morning's morning down near the temple of Hephaestus, " Erastothenes, why is the — just a little more dash of tlie bitters, Johnny — why is the bread bowl of the Ptolemies like this obelisk of R-ameses ?" " Is it anything," asked Erastothenes, watching the man behind the counter slice the lemon, "is it anything about putting up a stove?" "jSTo," was the reply. "Is it anything about neither of them being able to climb a tree?" "No." "Then," said the philosopher, "I give it up." "Because," said the poet, "it is Cleopatra's kneadle." 310 STUDIES OF THE ANTIQUE. And then these two great men looked long and .silently into their glasses, and stirred them in an abstracted manner, until Calliniachus re- marked, ''Well, here's at you,'' and they leaned back th<^ir heads with a gurgling sound, while the fragrant breath of a lemon peel lloated off on the morning air, like a dream of the tropics. The world is not what it used to be! STUDIES OF THE AXTIQUE. It was the evening after Hector's last attack upon the Greek camp, and there was a general gloom, as usual after these matinees, over the entire community. The son of Peleus, yawning over a volume of the report of the committee on the "conduct of the war," turned to Agamem- non, and said, '' Why were there no democratic papers pub- lished in Israel or Judea ?" The king of men chewed his toothpick for a few moments in deep reflection, and then he said he didn't know, unless it was because the STUDIES OF THE ANTIQUE. RU Mosaic laws were so terribly down on all kinds of vice and immorality. But the swift-footed Achilles said that wouldn't do at all, and Patroclus, dearest and most honored among "the brazen- coated Achai- ans in the war," said that maybe it was because the Israelites were a commercial nation, and wouldn't sell ink and paper on long time. The son of ^-Eacus shook his head. The silver-tongued Odysseus suggested that prob- ably it was because there were no railroads in the country, consequently no editorial excur- sions nor free passes, and therefore, no incentive to publish a paper. But Achilles said : "No; because there is no letter ''f" in the Hebrew. Nothing to make a democratic paper. Nothing to write about. Nothing to say. How could they spell 'fraud' without an fr' And the wily Ulysses, who wasn't very well read up in politics, said that was too deep for him. ol2 HOME LIFE OF THE A^XIEXTS. HOME LIFE OF THE AXCIEXTS. It was a dismal, rainy day in December. S(»crates, who had no umbrella, and in fact didn't have time to live until the first one was made, stood on the front steps of his house, drawing his cloak around him, before venturing down the street. From the opposite side of the street his friend Theremenes, passing by, familiarly hailed him as " Soc,-' and shouted : ''Blustery this morning." ** Yes," replied tlie philosopher, "it's cold." "Iley'^" suddenly shot the voice of Xan- tippe, from a second story window; ''hey? what's that?" "I said," exclaimed Socrates, promptly throwing up his guard and backing prudently into the doorway ; "I say it's scold." " Said what ?"' was the sharp rejoinder " you say that again, and say it slow." ''It's cold," repeated the philosopher ; "it's scold ; it's cold ; it's scold as ice, I said." There was a moment's silence, during which Xantippe appeared to be buried in profound thought, while the great disciple of Anaxagoras i:o:jA:r domestic life. 313 occupied tlie painful interval by girding up his loins and tucldng his trousers in the tops of his boots, and making other preparations for a ' lively run. Presently there came from the window : '' You hold on there a minute, young man, till I come down. I want to see you a second before you go down town." There was a fierce, rapid flapping of Attic sandals upon the wet i)avement, the wild rush of a cloaked figure through the peltering rain, and ten minutes later Socrates was explaining to Plato and Xenophon that he had cliased a srreet car all the way from the Peiraic gate, and was clear out of breath. EOMAN DOMESTIC LIFE. It was along about the kalends of May when Coriolanus went into the hall closet at the head of the stairs and brought forth a pair of his last summer trousers. The mailed hand, that "like an eagle in a dove cote, fluttered the Voices in Corioli," dropped with a gesture of despair 314 KOMAN DOMESTIC LIFE. when he beheld a yawning postern gate in the jiaiinent, where breach or fissure there should have been none. To him, his true and honor- able wife, the fair Yirgilia, said : ''Now the gods crown tliee, Coriolanus, what appears to be the trouble with you ?" '' Nov/ the god3 mend these trousers, oh, my gracious silence!" rei)lied Coriolanus. "See what a rent the envious tooth of time has made." Yirgilia dropped her tender, beaming eyes and drew a heavy sigh, as she turned and dived mournfidly into the rag bag to hunt for a l^atch. "My lord and husband," she said, wearily dragging up bits of red llannel, tufts of raw cotton, scraps of calico, tags of carpet rags, and finding nothing that would match the lavender trousers any nearer than a slab of seal-brown empress cloth. "I've patched those trousers till my eyes and fingers ache at the sight of them. I would the immortal gods would send on E-ome and to our house the one unending blessing of eternal piece." Coriolanus looked at her steadily for a mo- THE PUPILS OF SOCRATES. 315 ment, but couldn't tell from her unrippled face whether she meant it or not. " And I too, thou noble sister of Publicola," he said, "1 too, thou moon of Eome, for my great soul, to fear invulnerable, is weary of the restless God of wore." Yirgilia dropi^ed the rag-bag and looked up at him quickly, but he never smiled. "Keno," she said. "Put it there," he said, and then they both promised they would never behave so like mouthing paragraphers again. THE PUPILS OF SOCRATES. OxE morning, on their way to the academy, and while they were yet in the city, two emi- nent disciples of Socrates, who were cramming for the junior examination as they walked along, heard the human voice uttering remarks in the female language at a rate of one hundred and ninety words a minute. The remarks were made in pure, classical Greek. Both students paused to listen. 316 THE PUPILS OF SOCilATES. '* Construe," said Apolloclorus, with mock sternness. "It is the old girl, Xantippe." "And yonder goes the master," said Apol- >3c^ lodorus, as a "^'' i^Wm venerable- loo k i n g man, in a linen duster and a hel- met hat, fled s Av i f t 1 y down a side street in the direction of the Peiraic gate, hotly pursued by a ""'""" ""[Mil , "- cistern pole with a — red-headed woman at THE PURSUIT OF KNOWLEDGE, ^i t * -x i -i the end of it, while the boys of the neighborhood rent the air with shouts of "Whoa, Emma!" and " Soc et tuum !" hector's last. 317 HECTOR'S LAST. *' Andromache," said Hector, who was sit- ting on the floor in Priam's palace, tying a cran- berry on his bunion, and swearing vengeance on the man who invented box-toed sandals ; " An- dromache." Andromache, who was getting ready for the bawl that was to come off as soon as the Greeks got inside of Troy, tried to say, "What do you want'f ' but as her mouth was full of hair-pins she only said : "Wup poo you wup?" The godlike Hector understood her all the same, and with a terrible grimace as he drew the bandage a little too tight, he said : "Why is Hawke^-e creek like Hell Gate rock V ' Andromache, who knew Hector was going out to light that morning, was wondering how she would look in black, and didn' t understand just what he said. "I didn't know," she remarked, in a tone of surprise, ^' that Hawki Krick did like Helga Trock." 818 hector's last. Hector ceased to pet bis bunion for a moment and looked up with an expression of business. Then, with the explicit intonation of a man who has a good thing and isn't going to be trilled with, he repeated his question. " Oh," exclaimed Andromache, with a matter- of-fact air, "I suppose it's because it's a blasted nuisance." And Hector, wlio liad sat up lialf tlie night fixing the tiling up, kicked his san- dal clear across the room in supreme dis- gust, and said, tes- tily : "Aw, shaw! some- body told you !" And then he gath- ered his two-handed sword with the ter- rible name and went out and chased Greeks up and down the sand, and ]lbunded Bome, and talked the hardest kind of Latin, that DELETERIOUS EFFECTS OF A BAD COXU^*DRrM UPON THE MIND OF HECTOR. hector's last. 319 no fellow could scan, to many others for two long mortal hours, and when he came back he said he'd like to bet somebody lifty dollars there were some people about Troy that had a little courteous respect for original conundrums, any- how. But Andromache only said. '* Construe, con- strue I" and that made him so mad he borrowed an opera-glass and went to see the female min- strels. THE E>D. 1880 1880. The Publishers, on receipt of price, will send any book on Jiis Catalogue by Ta^W.^osiagefree All books [unless otherwise specified] are handsomely bound in cloth, with gilt backs suitable for libraries. Mary J. Holmes* Works. Tempest and Sunshine §i English Orphans Homestead on the Hillside. 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