Sr yee eye ere e ye ee eee eT eee eee
‘
TH# DAVLY EXAMINER, CHARLOTTETOWN, DECEMBER
24 1897.
mount'ins, in Col- orado, 9,000 feet above sea level, I struck a vein of ood mineral and surveyed a claim. I built me a log cabin, and there, miles away from any human habi- tation, I lived alone. Far below me, like a thread, was Otto Mears’ toll read from Sil- verton to Ouray, a road that cost $40,- «a mile. In clear weather I ‘could see the stages whirl along this, or, like a iniv of fies, A mule train’ pass on in single file, and sometimes, like small ants. a heaty loaded burro train. Them reminds me of a green feller I see, reading about a burroas was knocked off a road by a land- “Serves ‘em right,’’ said he, “for that heavy furnitoor way up
He wasn't much on spelling and
taking t re ”
didn't know a burro was the Colorado |
name fora donkey. The burro is the sal-
vation of the mount’in miner, for the lit-
tle creatures can walk om the picket edge
of nothing and never ariss a foot and carry a load that weighs more than they do.
Far below the toll road the Uncapaghre,
brown and dark in the shaddersand silver in the sunlight, meanders throngh the valley. How fardown? Waal, one place on that road is a cut torn from a solid mount'in wall and a look down of 900 feet. It is a ticklish place, but we gets used to them things after a time.
For six months im winter I was snowed
in in my lonely cabin. I could hear the roar of the icy gales through the crashing timber and once in awhile another sound that you never forget—a fearful roar like a monstrous wave breaking cver jagged rocks and carrying with it a grand, big ship. ‘Tbere’s a jar of the airth, a snap of trees, a crunching and rumbling and a thunder of rolling rocks, with a queer sense of moving, not where you may be, but far off. Thats asnowslide It be- gins on a mount'in peak, creeping slow, a white mass, gathering more at every inch.
getting tighter for a clinch. then faster,
taking everything in its path, cutting a elean swath, like a scythe. then whirling, Toaring. swallowing twp ai cabin. with shricking men, or a b'ar, hid and siceping forthe winter. ‘hen you understand what I mean by moving. for the air is full of it. and it lasts till. with a muffled thunder- clap, the whole mass drops down into the valley miles away
Then the summer storms. when the
lightuing dou t seem no turther off than a
ISAYS SUDDEN, “TLL DO IT, BY Gorn!” Stone's throw and glares and blinds and f0es strenking ribbons of fire over the Pines, while you re dazed and deafened by
the thunder! Don't that thunder boom,
‘@playing catch across the crags. the last
One sending it back and all of it kinder
Condensed «nd held in canyons and each
Rew roar and each past one mingling to-
— until there's a very fury of sound. nothing else on earth.
Ag in, one day you sce a mount'in peak, A gray cloud kinder hovering, low; it’s soft and ful) of crinkles amd rolls like. cotton
ngalifunginaheep Bymeby there's Schill in the air. and the gray cloud—now sun don’t shine om it—gets black as ink. It gets closer and dower and all of a turns into a sheet ef dazzling sil- ver, Now under it is a big river coming With arush and roar, faster than an ava- he and churning up rocks, earth. trees, &fimals and men in its awful boiling cur- rent That's a cloudburst It swells the ‘Water in every stream in the valley. and the river bevond. where the streams empty, @s mad and rushes on aver home and . carrying havoc and misery all along course
The silence up mount’in is awful I've Gone out andgeiied jest for the company Maneho Then worse than the quict is
sound of something walking after Right. Sometimes there's a slinking four creature like a monstrous yellow at, with the slicst gait of any animal lL That's a mountain lien Often ‘Sa heavier tread. and a clumsy crea- Koes sniffling by—a grizzly He cant tamed por the little black imp of his Uy connection ‘Then again there s sound. but when you look there aint he to make it That's the worst of
all That s ghosts ¥Y mine is a tunnel 100 feet intoa mMountin side. and often toward night I'm working | hears tap, tap, tap, and jow, but clear ds preaching. | Kits ont then, for thems the mine speerits, 8nd I don t wanter git em agin me. It's fany, ain't ity But you just live uf on™ alone and see how you feel after
— fwice a week. a burro train came 20
Auiles from for my ore, coming up _ Strait ! madgap to my mine not thn a ete’
-
throagh theni papers fecl the beating heart of the great world.
Last September I got the blues so bad }
that I quit work one day and went down to the toll read, timing my trip so as to see the stage pass and to git from some passenger something to read. A feller give me a book called ‘‘ Dombey and Son” one day. Gosh, them old seafaring fellers was the gamest crowd I ever see. Cuttle’s my choice. I know the book by heart, and Florence and Walter, and that shop and Soll Gills is jest as nateral as if I hed Knowed ‘em. Why, I set and read that ever so much, seemed like I could jest sce em coie into life and be rea) folks in the firelight. Like to know Dickens, the feller that wrote ‘em. Dead, is he? Waal, waal, he'll never know what a comfort he was to me. When I git the charnce, I’m going to lay a wreath of posies where he is plant- ed and tell him them books he’s writ has been more’n a gospel to us miners in the mount’ins, and I'll say I come clear from one of the newest states in the new world to give him my humble thanks.
Where was I? Oh, on the toll road. 1 set there and smoked my pipe, looking down the gulch on the Uncapaghre spar- Kling like a silver cord fur below and lis- tening to the wind whispering through the pines, and then | heard a sound. The road is so sun dried and hard it echoes. This Was a sorter pattering, and wan't no shod creature either. It can’t be a mount’in lion, Isays tomyself. He wouldn't dare be here. 1 felt for my gun—revolver, you know—and then | see this was a dorg, a Gordon setter and a thoroughbred, white and black, with the humanest eyes 1 ever see inaanimal I called him and after a survey he come and seemed friendly enough. He was footsore and lean and looked like he'd come a long way. I picked a cactus thorn out of his paw and wan’t be grateful? I kept a watch’ round a turn of the ground for his owner, and pretty soon I see four burros, heavy loaded, and walking behind them a youngist&a feller He was fal) and broad shouldered, aressed like the most of usin rough clothes, woolen shirt, sombrero and long boots. He was bronzed some, had curly hair, pleasant blue eyes and a straggling mustache trying hard tocover a mouth pretty as a woman's.
“Good day,’ he says. halting the pack animals ‘Thanks for helping the doy It was careless in me not to iovk when he limped ”
Howdy,” I says, looking htm over “Stranger in these parts?’
“KEngland,’ he answers, setting down on a rock and mopping his forehead.
** Miner?"
“Goinyg to be) By the way. am I any- where near the claim of a man named Day?’
* You be.” I says cautious. ‘near Bize Day's tunnel It's up that trail.”
“You must know him?’
“Sumat Do yon?’
“No, the claim 1 have purchased of Gen- eral Raymond of Denver is a half mile farther up the mountain than his *’
* Poker Sam," 1 yasps, and mebbe I swore some, for the goung feller looked sorter s' prised. ** That's his old wag, sends em here, mentions my name and gits me into his schemes Stranyer, last month there was seven men Id never set eyes on afore traveling up that trail on the look- out for Bize Day’s claim. They come different ways and times, and swore in diff'rent langwidges, but all was directed by General Raymond~—where he yot the general he dont know hisself—and had all bought claims of him I answered em civil at first. but my dander got up and 1 took the last one—a slim feliow from New York—and I says: ‘See that speck up there. that p'int a half mile ap mount’in —waal, that’s it If you dont keer for yer life and has ood leus. you might reach italive If you've breath left then, you kin diskivera tunnel six foot into the mount’in and rock, all the reck you want. but there never was, nor never will be. any streaks of pay dirt tacre and mo way of gitting it down if there was Some of her secrets this old mount'in won ¢ give up, and where a human gits overbold in climbing up and trying to find out, why she jest shets down on him ut the start.’ Poker Sam played you for a sucker’'—I looked him over—and | guess you was easy to play.”
“Possibly.” he says carelessiy He drawed out acigar and give meone He set back then smoking coolly. his hat sider hin and the little rinusof hair curling round his forehead I chewed mg cigar awhile to git the taste.
* Busted’ I asks
“In the vernacular of the country. gust that,’ he laughs
**Rich folks mebbe?”
“Havent a soul to care whether T live or die” He looked kinder far away then.
1 8ET THERE AND SMOKED MY PIPE. and I would bet ag’in heavy odds that there
was a val concerned in it shine to the feller..and after awhile I of- fered him a job np to my mine, to work on shares, him to throw in the grub stake he had with him. He was willing enough, so from that day Kd—that’s name enough, pards Folks
* Bige, and
1 took a big —
a Oe A
- on the edge of a precipice.”
Juray—and cold, teo—to git linnerment and played the nurse complete. He was lots of company, and so was the dorg—-Doe was tho pup’s name. Pard took just as much int’rest in Cuttle and Gills as me, and got more books—one about the gamest old feller, Pickwick, and the eating and drinking in that volume would make your mouth water, We read him while we eat pork and biscuit and drunk coffee 'thout so milk nor sugar. We was doing well in the mine, but when you think of the ways vittles has to be brought on the backs of them burros, you aint setting up for entrys —as Kd used to say. He was a cheerful feller, but given to fits of gloom—never said a word about his folks though.
‘Bout Chris’mus time, and we wan't so snowed in by then but that you could git along on snowshoes, we was reading Pick wick over again. He read aloud in diff’- rent voices, making it jest as real as live folks a-talking, when I says sudden, “I' do it, by gosh!’
“What? He kinder jumped, and the pup riz up and licked my hand
“Why,” says I, “1 hoof it to Ouray and lay in achicken—a turkey if I can git it—pertaters anda squash and cranberries and the truck to make a plum pudding Lil celebrate. I can’t hear of them Dick-
pecan,
I STUMELED UP TIE MOUNT’INSIDE A-HOL- LERING.
ens fellers eating no more and try to fill myself up on salt horse and slops Lil git one good teed if it takes a leg or costs a life.’
“It will be the latter,’’ he says, sober enough. “You couldn't make a walking market of yourself over three feet of snow
“I'm Jight and easy on snowshoes. ”
“But,’’ he interrupts, **what's the mat- ter with my going?’
“You ain't,” [| answers, bringing to mind his attempts to walk on snowshoes and his wabblings, ‘“‘you ain t ne bird on em, pard.”’
He laughed then like a boy.
“It’s a deal.’ I says, ‘“‘and tomorrer the 24th, I}! set off early and git back by night and we'll set up and eat till morn ing I'll git brandy for the puddiny sass, but pard,’’ | finishes anxious. *“*how is them puddings made?’
“Why flour. raisins, lard or butter-- something that’s rich’— —
* Butter,” i puts in. “is 80 cents a pound at Ouray. and 1 guess that’s rich enough.’
** Butter, currants, molasses to make it brown, and spice nixed and cooked °
“Tcal late I'll get it mixed to the store,’ I says “and my traveling will beat 1t up '
“Then you sew it up in a bay which you boil and make a sance of brardy that you pour over and set afire, and it burns biue flame. This 1s the way we used to have It at bome “ His face grew sad, and i Knew he was going tnto them glooms ag in
“Waste of good liquor.’’ 1 says under my breath, but he didn t note me
L set outearly the next morning. leaving himand the pupat home = it wasn t bed going and the air was fresh and full ot sunshine They was s prised to see me at Ouray, and laughed a deai at the truck ! bought and paid for with gold dust i found the pudding stutf so heavy that | really had it mixed ina pail fF went over to a saloon tor awhile, and it was bout 8 in the afternoon when |] come back for miy things | had asked the storekeeper, who Was also postmaster, if there were any let ters for pard but there want I tied the eight pound turkey round my veck with the pudding pail, the vegetables and a squash—that seemed to weigh a ton before { wus four miles on my way { filled my pockets with papers and books and a bot tle of brandy and tobacco As 1 fixed niy snowshves, the storekeeper came out
‘Queer thing, Bige.’’ he says *‘* Bout an hour fore you got back from the sa loon an Englishman named Ingalls was here asking 1f | Knowed your pard. Ed | told him where he was and off he goes lmpatient and stuck up enough. wouidn t listen to no caution ‘Thought mebbe our mountin trail was a bolerward where he could find hoss keers and them two wheeled cabs with a jay up behind. Off he yurmyps like a flash I says, ‘Try it. youny feller you 1) be back in an hour ortwo | I clean forgot all about you was going that wav '
“TL meet him,’ I says and starts The crowd give three cheers for me and wished wea’ Merry Chris’mus!” “Keep some ot that pudding for me till spring It will be hard enough,” yells the storekeoeper “for you wouldn t take no soda in it ”
Pard hadnt mentioned soda and ! wouldn t put itin though it was arcued it oughter be done. “S lung!’ I calls and goes on For three or four miles | cotwd see tracks quite plain tn the snow and } kept a lookout for Ingalls. but my progress was awful slow | was so beat out that | swore at the vittles, pard and Chris mus straight along ‘The turkey growed heavy ier and heavier, and once [| lost it and had to go back a half mile I want a likely pictur’ as I floundered aléng and was ugly enough to fight my best friend = Curi ous enough I put atl my mad on that feller ahead. ‘The idee,’’ I'd say, ‘of himi dar ing to climb this mount’in alone in snow time.”
Bout ten miles on my way. just as 1 was straight’ ning up my back after mak ing another hitch on the turkey. [| telt something sharp strike my face I knowec 1 was in for it. for snow at Chris’ mus time in these mount ins means darkness. drifts and death. But that didnt stump me Every inch of that road was plain as a map in my mind and blunted by
cold. stunmed by the snow and dark- ness, 1 forgot Ingalls entirely and must have passed close by him IL had enough to do to fight for my own life. On Il goes and game enough to hang to the truck. | want going to be beat outer that dinner for al) the snow in Colorado
Every now and then when I| got kinder eas ' vy idce ker how slick
VOT; +h
growed to think the old bird wanted to be roasted @hd gib Uy vo the cabin to give his remains for the celebration.
T got along all right till I got to where I ought to turn off t6 the trail,.and there I dassent leaye the road. I wasn’t sure where it lay. I listened and I heard the mufiicd sound of a gun, and this I follered, wondering where pard got his sense. I stumbled up the mount’in side s-holler- ing, and soon I got a answer and the hap-
+ piest sight of my life—I see a big yaller
glare. It was pard a-burning kerosene.
‘**Glad it’s cheap,’’ I says ironical, for it ain’t. He laughs and takes all the truck and flounders on ahead a distance, where by the howling I knowed Doe was tied, and then the house was all lit up.
**Made three stations dewn the path,” he explains; ‘house first, dog next, myself with the gun and bonfire last.”
“You'll do,” I says. He flew around looking at the stuff I’d brought, found some cloth and made a bay into which he put the pudding mixture, tied it and slung the sare into a kittle of boiling water, which he hung over the fire.
“The water’ll git in it,’”’ Isays. “Them stitches is too loose.”
“It cooks out,” he answers, beginning to cut up the squash. ‘*Now sit down, Bige, and get straightened out,’’ he goes on, bringing me a glass of brandy.
“T asked for a letter for you, but there wan't none,’’ I says, beginning to draw off my boots.
“You were very kind, but there is no one to write.”’
“Land of the living!’’ I yells, jumping up, “‘them tracks ahead—that feller.”’ It come to me aliof a sudden. Where was he?
“What did you say?’' asks pard, keer- less like.
“Ingalls,” I gasps.
“Ingalls,”” he repeats, gitting white, “for pity’s sake who—what do you know of him?’’
Itold him. He listened quite a minit, then goes to where his coat was hanging on a nail.
‘Where are you going?” I says.
“To look for him.”’
“Why? What's he to yon?”
““My worst enemy.”
“Pard, you're a fool. If me, an old mount’inecr, hed a hard fight for like a half hour ago, what will! it be for yon, and the storm is worse. The feller’s dead now anyhow. Mebbe he went back—sure he did, and you don’t budge a step.”
“You are sure he did not go back.” he says quietly, lighting the lantern. “Let go, Day, | mean to start.”
“You're so smart on snowshoes, you’) git about a mile and then tumble over a precipice. ”
‘| think not,” he says soberly. do, it don’t matter.”
“Waall, I’m not going.”
**l wouldn't let you,’ says he.
“Oh, you wouldn't,” I growls, “you wouldn't, hey. You young whipper snap- per, you cub, you. Let me go. I'll jest let you know you don’t stir a foot out till I git fixed. Here you are starting off with a lantern and a dory—no brandy, no rope, nothing. ”’
“The dorg will scent him.”
“The dorg will be snowed in 40 rods from the house, and a dead dorg in 40 minits if we don't kerry him.”
He bung his head.
“T don’t want you to risk your life,” he etammers.
“Ed,” I says, “‘you are all the thing I have in this world to keerfor If I'd a son, | couldnt love him more’n you. Come. ”’
We left the dorg in the cabin, with food where he might git at it if we didn'tcome back, and | was pretty sure he’d break the winder and git out if we were long away. Pard fixed a candle in the winder‘and put logs on the fire, and then we set out. I had the lantern tied on my back, and had made a rope fast to pard.
The night was jest like a curtain of black velvet and absolutely still. The air was thick and wet and stupefying. So we goes On ‘The snow being damp had packed some, and that kep’ us in the trail, but it was hard work, and I was already wore out. At last we tumbles into the road and stops a minit.
‘He never got as fur as this,’ 1 says, “and I'd better go on alone. You stay here and J'}) shcot when I find him.’' For answer pard ketches my lantern.
“If it’s death to one of us, it shall come to me,’ he says. ‘** You stay here. I'll go.”
He'd cut the rope that bound us and was off intothe dark I knowed one of us inust have sense, and if we lost that lit- tie trail up mount’in we was done fur. So I waited. I yelled to him to try and keep inside from the edge of the road, but | doubt if he heard, the air was so deadened The time 1 waited seemed years. I made fast the rope to a tree near the trail, and
oT? I
FY Up Le
{ SRE A FAINT, GNO"TLY LIGRT A-COMING AWFUL sLaw. .
kept one end of it, and made trips down as furas I could where he went. but I dassent let go. Bymeby I was so skepy and numbed I thought I dreamt it when | see a faint, ghostly light a-coming awful! slow and something big behind the light.
“I've got him,” says Kd. panting “1 fell across him in the snow about four niles down. I think he is dead. ’’
He had him on his back, and luckily the stranger was a small, slight chap, but as it was it was awiul. We took him be- tween us) There was no time to try to bring him to life, for the storm was thick- er every minute. But we tackled the brandy ourselves and then started. I never see sich strength as that pard of mine had Hie held most of the feller, and didn't seem to touch airth at ail—in fact, the last of the way he dragged me. We was pretty near beat out when we heard Doc’s howl. That put new life in us, and soon the light from the little cabin showed faint but stiddy. The candle we found nearly flick-
*
eerie: wet
him undressed und rubbed him with snow and poured brandy into bis clinched teeth. After an hour or so of this we could see him breathe, and this encouraged us for new efforts. Tired? We were nearly dead, and if the stranger had any skin left on him he was in luck. Bymeby he opens his eyes. ‘‘What did you wake me up for?’’ he says crossly, and drifts off into a sleep.
‘“That’s him,”’ says Ed bitterly. ‘‘He’s a natural kicker.”’
ourselves comfortable—pard was fixing the fire. ‘‘The pudding ain’t spoiled,’’ he mutters, ‘‘though the water nearly boiled out of the kittle. We'll have the dinner, after all. He? Oh, he’s Larry Ingalls. He and I were orphans distantly related to Sir John Webster of—well, somewhere.
| Sir John brought us up. Larry was a rich
orphan. Iwasa poor one, and Sir John had a daughter’’—-
“I callated there wasa young woman in the case,’ I says.
‘Lady Maud. She was a sister to us both when we were youngsters, but when we were grown I fell in love with her, and so did Larry, who always did as I did.
Ve had a bitter quarrel, he and I, and I told him Lady Maud loved me, and he, the cur, went and explained everything to her father. I was ordcred out of the house, and came here. That’sall I don’t know what InGails wants of me. I suppose he came to tell me he had married Lady Maud.”
‘Bout noon the next day 1 got up and fixed the turkey to roast and the vegetables and set the pudding back over the fire. Somehow, though it had a shape and was hard, I didn’t feel much confidence in it. Ed was lying in acorner jest wore out. While I was a-fussing round I see the new feller looking at me. ‘* Where am I[?’’ he asks. I told him, and said who saved his life at the risk of his own, and hinted that I didn’t think the life of a mean feller was worth saving, and such had better go back where they come from.
* But you don't know all,”’ he says wist- ful, his eyes full of tears. ‘‘Kd and I did guarrel, but I did not tell Sir John.”’
“Oh, you didn't,” I sneers. ‘Likely story.”
‘Lady Maud did. She ttold her father that she loved Ed and she wanted to marry him. She is that kind of a girl. She never had a secret from him. Of course he was angry, and turned Ed out. I was mean enough to be glad at first, for 1 knew her father would give Maud to me, but she xrew so thin and unhappy and took such a aislike to me that I was sorry enough for the whole affair. I tried then to find Ed
1 give you my word I did) Then an uncle came from Australia, that Kd used to brag about when he was a child and say he would bring back a trunkfu! of gold. Well, he really did come back with
“THE PLUM PUDDING OF OLD ENGLAND,” SINGS INGALLS. lots of money, and ke and Sir John are great friends now. He is a sick man or he would have come to America with me. I came for Lady Maud’'s sake. She said if I would find Ed she would give me the old sisterly affection. I told her I would be a kni-tht of the round table and find the holy grail—-a cup, you know.” Oh,’ | says, *“gorter prize winner, ch?’ “Though that is a comical comparison for Kd, who looks like a rough. 1 have
been watching him, but women generally like big, stupid bears. ’’
Thank you,”’ says Ed, gitting up, ‘I didn’t save your miserable life to be abused. Lucky for you, you were a little fellow or you wouldn't be here.”’
“Game, though,”’ Iprtsin. “The grit of him starting alone up these mount ‘ins. ”’
Ed and ki: looked at each other then like two animals ‘bout to fight. Then I seen ‘em lock hands and I knowed their
eyes was dim. “f brought you her photograph. She
sent it,’’ says Ingalls, hunting suround,
“but—but I must have lost it.’’
“Here tis,’’ 1] says. ‘It dropped outer your coat last night and I set it by the fire todry.”” The heat and wet had mussed it se you couldn't tell what the picter was
*Loo bad,’ sighs Ingalls. ‘'l meant to give it to you. 1 brought it all the way.”’
‘1 carry her face in my heart,’’ laughs Fd. and then he-fell to singing:
“Come into the garden, Maud,
For the biack bat, night, has flown. Come into the gurden, Mand,
jam here at the gate alone.’
While pard was sctting the table Ingalls, who had all our bedding piled on him, crawled out and got on his clothes
‘You live high fer miners,’’ he says
“This is Chris’mus day,”’ says Md, and then they shook hand ag’in. “The dear oid day, Larry, and we'll spend next Chris tus at home, and Lady Maud, my wife, Larry—don't that make you hate me —will welcome you under the mistletee Perhaps I!) let you kiss her then. ’’
“she is my sister,’’ answers the other. nota bit of meanness left in him, ‘‘and the world is full of fair women. Is it not so, Mr Dayy’’
“They don't trouble me none,” I says ‘But. pard, look at this pudding.’ le crossed the room still a-singing:
“My heart would hear her and beat Were it earth in an earthly bed.”
“Ne never could carry a tune,” grins Larry.
Ed turned the water outer the kittle and ripped open the bag <A round, warty looking thing, like a smal! cannon bal) and pretty near as hard, rolled out. It was a grayish color, specked with raisins and as vicious appearing a compound as | ever see. “The plum pudding of old Eng- land,”’ sings Ingalls, and then we roared with laughter. But the turkey, roasted in an oven sider the fire, was good and the vegetables splendid, and the young feilers was the best comipany I ever see, and you kin bet the dorg didn’t go hungry. He was Lady Maud’s pup, and Ed had brought him clear from England. That was the jolliest meai I ever eat, and it was as good as sunshine to see them two, friends now and forever.
Where am I going now? Oh. dcwn_to something hall, where pard lives with uncle and Lad Of course Ed mar-
|
i My
‘‘Who is he?”’ Lasks after we had made ]
Queer, though, Ingalls would have never found Ed but for Poker Sam. So the old villain did a good turn once, not knowing t. Yes, I’m pretty well fixed, rich enongh to drink champagne out of a pail—which is western—and I’m going to spend the Chris’'mus holidays with pard. I’ve brought the dorg way across the ocsan with me to show to Lady Maud. I forgot to tell you that when the young fellers went away the pup wouldn't quit me, and is mine now. We'll probably have a good dinner Chris’mus day, but the vittles won’t taste no better, nor the crowd be no merrier, than it was last year in Colorado, in the Rockies, 9,000 foet above the se About the plum pudding—waal, I hai nothing to say. That subject’s a tend one ’twixt pard and me.
PATIENCE STAPLETON,
RICHES TAKE WINGS.
A Christmas Story With an Unusual End. ing. ;
He was a fine looking fellow. In hig hands he carried three large bodied, though none too plump, turkeys, and the big cal-. ico sign behind him with its legend, ** Tur- key Raffle Within,” gave a pretty good inkling of how he came by his burden.
“Turkeys enough here to last a week, ’t; he soliloquized as he swayed to and fro og the edge of the sidewalk. **Guess that tur- key they’ ve got at home lays over all these, but then turkey is a thing you can’t have: too much of.” {
Just then a man approached him from the shadows—a man with a gaunt look and a coat that would fail to attract the attention of a rag gatherer. Iv was the. usual request for ‘*a little assistance.’’ '
**I guess they took all my spare change inside, pardner. Just hold this ‘turk’ while -I look.”’
He found aqguarter and handed it to the beggar, who started to move away, but an idea seemed to strike the young fellow and he called the man back.
“Was that dead straight about your hav- ing children at home and nothing toeat?”’.
“It’s true, sir, so help me God.” "f
“Then take this turkey.”
A block farther up an old woman crouched in the lee of a high board fence grinding out some melancholy tune ona wheezy hand organ. Without a word the young fellow approached her and dropped one of the remaining turkeys into her lap,
“I’m a trifle short on poultry,’’ he said with a merry chucke, as he hopped aboar( his street car.
On the opposite seat of the dummy sa an urchin, red eyed and sobbing.
**What’s the matter?’’ asked the turkey dispenser of the gripsman. ;
“You see, the kid’s mather is a poor woman living out near the park, and she sent him down town to buy acheap turkey for their Christmas dinner. Well, he got it right enough, but some thief snatched it from him at the corner of Seventh street. | That’s what’s the trouble.” ‘
“Say, take this home to your mother,” said the man who had been to a raffle, as he flung the bird across the car and came near knocking off the gripman’s cap in
doing so.
In the morning some one knocked at his bedroom door.
‘*What’s the matter?”
‘Matter enough. Somebody gof into, the larder during the night and stole our, turkey.”
The man in bed laughed so loud that his
onw- ee
sister, who had called to him, pronounced him an idiot. , “Bay, sia.’” :
:
“Hello!”
“ Doesn't the Bible say something about’ casting your bread’ upon the waters and’ having it come back again?’’
“Yes. Why?’
“Oh, nothing—only it don't work with turkey. But we can get along without one for Christmas. Why, wecould havea bird every Cay in the year if we wanted one.” +
mo &
A Christmas Pic. i
The following appeared in the Newcas- le Chronicle of Jan. 6, 1770: **Mon last Was bronght from Howick to Berwick to be ehipp’d fer London for sir Hen. Grey bart., a pie the contents whereof are as follows—viz, 2 bushles of flour, 20 Ibs. of butter, 4 geese, 2 turkies, 2 rab- bits, 4 wild ducks, 2 woodcocks, 6 snipes and 4 puartridges; 2 neat’s tongues, 2 cur- lows, 7 blackbirds and 6 pigeons. It ig supposed a very great curiosity was made by Mrs. Dorothy Patterson, housekeeper at Howick. It was near 9 feet in circum- ference at bottom, weighs about 12 stones, wil) take two men to present it to table: It is neatly fitted with a case and four smuull Wheels to facilitate its use to every Kucst that inclines to partake of its con- tents at table.” Thus it is no wonder George Wither sung so merrily:
So now 1s come our joyfulest feast.
Let every man be jolly. Each room with ivy leaves is drest
And every post w th holly. Though some churls at our mirth repina, Round your foreheads garlands twine, Drown surrow in a cup of wine,
And let us all be merry.
Christmas In Russia.
’ The Russian Christmas is ten days later than the English one, but is celebrated very much in English fashion. Families all meet apon that day anc country house parties are many. The tree is a Christmas yew and is beautifully decorated. The gifts are placed on small tables near the! tree The churches are decorated with greens and so are the houses, but no mis- Uletoe is used. Two or three days are pub- ic holidays at Christmas time, and the people grevt each other with, * Happy feast to yon.”" A huge pyramid of rice with raisins in it, which has beer blessed at the church, is served at the Christmas dinner, und the meats are goose, duck and sucking pig A great delicacy at a Russian Christ- mas dinner is veal which has been fed en- tircly upon milk tor that special day.
Ap Old Time Christmas.
Heap on more wood! The wind 1s chillf But let it whistle as tt will
Ve'll keep our Christmas merry still.
Exch age has Geemed the newborn year The fittest tune for festal cheer,
. And well our Christian sires of old
Loved when the yeur its course bad rolled And brought bithe Christmas back again With all bis bospitable tram.
Domestic and religious rite
Gave honor to the holy night.
On Christmas eve the bells were rung.
On Christinns eve the mass was sung. That only might in-all the year
Sew the stcied pmest the chalice rear. The damse! douved her kirtie sheen.
The hall was cressed with holly green. Forth tu the wood did merry men go
To gather in the mistletoe.
Then opened wide the baron’s hall ’ To vassal, tenant, serf and all, Power laid tas rod of rule aside,
And ceremony doffed his pride. L£
The hey, with ruses in his shoes, ee
That night might village partner chooses.
The lord, uncerogating, share ;
‘post and pair.” a atl silt al
a ea tate
seri iacnscdletascineadiblanes oneattins Agente esta site
The vulgar cane of - Ad batied, with neg
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