present Governor of California, to Hon. Mr. Low, the Governor elect, to
Judge Field and to Hon. Wm. M. Stewart, for the great wrong which my
natural imbecility has impelled me to do them in penning and publishing
the foregoing sanguinary absurdity. If it were to do over again, I don't
really know that I would do it. It is not possible for me to say how I
ever managed to believe that refined and educated gentlemen like these
could stoop to engage in the loathsome and degrading pastime of
prize-fighting. It was just Lawler's work, you understand--the lubberly,
swelled up effigy of a nine-days drowned man! But I shall get even with
him for this. The only excuse he offers is that he got the story from
John B. Winters, and thought of course it must be just so--as if a
future Congressman for the state of Washoe could by any possibility tell
the truth! Do you know that if either of these miserable scoundrels
were to cross my path while I am in this mood I would scalp him in a
minute? That's me--that's my style.
A CONCORD LOVE-SONG
BY JAMES JEFFREY ROCHE
Shall we meet again, love,
In the distant When, love,
When the Now is Then, love,
And the Present Past?
Shall the mystic Yonder,
On which I ponder,
I sadly wonder,
With thee be cast?
Ah, the joyless fleeting
Of our primal meeting,
And the fateful greeting
Of the How and Why!
Ah, the Thingness flying
From the Hereness, sighing
For a love undying
That fain would die!
Ah, the Ifness sadd'ning,
The Whichness madd'ning,
And the But ungladd'ning,
That lie behind!
When the signless token
Of love is broken
In the speech unspoken
Of mind to mind!
But the mind perceiveth
When the spirit grieveth,
And the heart relieveth
Itself of woe;
And the doubt-mists lifted
From the eyes love-gifted
Are rent and rifted
In the warmer glow.
In the inner Me, love,
As I turn to thee, love,
I seem to see, love,
No Ego there.
But the Meness dead, love,
The Theeness fled, love,
And born instead, love,
An Usness rare!
THE MEETING
BY S. E. KISER
One day, in Paradise,
Two angels, beaming, strolled
Along the amber walk that lies
Beside the street of gold.
At last they met and gazed
Into each other's eyes,
Then dropped their harps, amazed,
And stood in mute surprise.
And other angels came,
And, as they lingered near,
Heard both at once exclaim:
"Say, how did you get here?"
"THERE'S A BOWER OF BEAN-VINES"
BY PHOEBE CARY
There's a bower of bean-vines in Benjamin's yard,
And the cabbages grow round it, planted for greens;
In the time of my childhood 'twas terribly hard
To bend down the bean-poles, and pick off the beans.
That bower and its products I never forget,
But oft, when my landlady presses me hard,
I think, are the cabbages growing there yet,
Are the bean-vines still bearing in Benjamin's yard?
No, the bean-vines soon withered that once used to wave,
But some beans had been gathered, the last that hung on;
And a soup was distilled in a kettle, that gave
All the fragrance of summer when summer was gone.
Thus memory draws from delight, ere it dies,
An essence that breathes of it awfully hard;
As thus good to my taste as 'twas then to my eyes,
Is that bower of bean-vines in Benjamin's yard.
THE TRIAL THAT JOB MISSED
BY KENNETT HARRIS
Job had troubles, I admit;
Clearly was his patience shown,
Yet he never had to sit
Waiting at the telephone--
Waiting, waiting to connect,
The receiver at his lobe.
That's a trial, I expect,
Would have been too much for Job!
After minutes of delay,
While the cramps attacked his knees,
Then to hear Miss Central say
Innocently: "Number, please!"
When the same he'd shouted out
Twenty times--he'd rend his robe,
Tear his hair, I've little doubt;
'Twould have been too much for Job.
Job, with all the woes he bore,
Never got the "busy" buzz
When he tempted was of yore
In the ancient land of Uz.
Satan missed it when he sought
His one tender spot to probe;
If of "central" he had thought,
She'd have been too much for Job!
THE EVIDENCE IN THE CASE OF SMITH VS. JONES
BY SAMUEL L. CLEMENS
I reported this trial simply for my own amusement, one idle day last
week, and without expecting to publish any portion of it--but I have
seen the facts in the case so distorted and misrepresented in the daily
papers that I feel it my duty to come forward and do what I can to set
the plaintiff and defendant right before the public. This can best be
done by submitting the plain, unembellished statements of the witnesses
as given under oath before his Honor Judge Sheperd, in the Police Court,
and leaving the people to form their own judgment of the matters
involved, unbiased by argument or suggestion of any kind from me.
There is that nice sense of justice and that ability to discriminate
between right and wrong, among the masses, which will enable them, after
carefully reading the testimony I am about to set down here, to decide
without hesitation which is the innocent party and which the guilty in
the remarkable case of Smith vs. Jones, and I have every confidence that
before this paper shall have been out of the printing-press twenty-four
hours, the high court of The People, from whose decision there is no
appeal, will have swept from the innocent man all taint of blame or
suspicion, and cast upon the guilty one a deathless infamy.
To such as are not used to visiting the Police Court, I will observe
that there is nothing inviting about the place, there being no rich
carpets, no mirrors, no pictures, no elegant sofa or arm-chairs to
lounge in, no free lunch--and, in fact, nothing to make a man who has
been there once desire to go again--except in cases where his bail is
heavier than his fine is likely to be, under which circumstances he
naturally has a tendency in that direction again, of course, in order to
recover the difference.
There is a pulpit at the head of the hall, occupied by a handsome
gray-haired judge, with a faculty of appearing pleasant and impartial to
the disinterested spectator, and prejudiced and frosty to the last
degree to the prisoner at the bar.
To the left of the pulpit is a long table for reporters; in front of the
pulpit the clerks are stationed, and in the centre of the hall a nest of
lawyers. On the left again are pine benches behind a railing, occupied
by seedy white men, negroes, Chinamen, Kanakas--in a word, by the seedy
and dejected of all nations--and in a corner is a box where more can be
had when they are wanted.
On the right are more pine benches, for the use of prisoners, and their
friends and witnesses.
An officer, in a gray uniform, and with a star upon his breast, guards
the door.
A holy calm pervades the scene.
The case of Smith vs. Jones being called, each of these parties
(stepping out from among the other seedy ones) gave the court a
particular and circumstantial account of how the whole thing occurred,
and then sat down.
The two narratives differed from each other.
In reality, I was half persuaded that these men were talking about two
separate and distinct affairs altogether, inasmuch as no single
circumstance mentioned by one was even remotely hinted at by the other.
Mr. Alfred Sowerby was then called to the witness-stand, and testified
as follows:
"I was in the saloon at the time, your Honor, and I see this man Smith
come up all of a sudden to Jones, who warn't saying a word, and split
him in the snoot--"
LAWYER.--"Did what, sir?"
WITNESS.--"Busted him in the snoot."
LAWYER.--"What do you mean by such language as that? When you say that
the plaintiff suddenly approached the defendant, who was silent at the
time, and 'busted him in the snoot,' do you mean that the plaintiff
struck the defendant?"
WITNESS.--"That's me--I'm swearing to that very circumstance--yes, your
Honor, that was just the way of it. Now, for instance, as if you was
Jones and I was Smith. Well, I comes up all of a sudden and says I to
your Honor, says I, 'D--n your old tripe--'"
(Suppressed laughter in the lobbies.)
THE COURT.--"Order in the court! Witness, you will confine yourself to a
plain statement of the facts in this case, and refrain from the
embellishments of metaphor and allegory as far as possible."
WITNESS.--(Considerably subdued.)--"I beg your Honor's pardon--I didn't
mean to be so brash. Well, Smith comes up to Jones all of a sudden and
mashed him in the bugle--"
LAWYER.--"Stop! Witness, this kind of language will not do. I will ask
you a plain question, and I require you to answer it simply, yes or no.
Did--the--plaintiff--strike--the defendant? Did he strike him?"
WITNESS.--"You bet your sweet life he did. Gad! he gave him a paster in
the trumpet--"
LAWYER.--"Take the witness! take the witness! take the witness! I have
no further use for him."
The lawyer on the other side said he would endeavor to worry along
without more assistance from Mr. Sowerby, and the witness retired to a
neighboring bench.
Mr. McWilliamson was next called, and deposed as follows:
"I was a-standing as close to Mr. Smith as I am to this pulpit,
a-chaffing with one of the lager beer girls--Sophronia by name, being
from summers in Germany, so she says, but as to that, I--"
LAWYER.--"Well, now, never mind the nativity of the lager beer girl, but
state, as concisely as possible, what you know of the assault and
battery."
WITNESS.--"Certainly--certainly. Well, German or no German,--which I'll
take my oath I don't believe she is, being of a red-headed disposition,
with long, bony fingers, and no more hankering after Limberger cheese
than--"
LAWYER.--"Stop that driveling nonsense and stick to the assault and
battery. Go on with your story."
WITNESS.--"Well, sir, she--that is, Jones--he sidled up and drawed his
revolver and tried to shoot the top of Smith's head off, and Smith run,
and Sophronia she walloped herself down in the saw-dust and screamed
twice, just as loud as she could yell. I never see a poor creature in
such distress--and then she sung out: 'O, H--ll's fire! What are they up
to now? Ah, my poor dear mother, I shall never see you more!'--saying
which, she jerked another yell and fainted away as dead as a wax figger.
Thinks I to myself, I'll be danged if this ain't gettin' rather dusty,
and I'll--"
THE COURT.--"We have no desire to know what you thought; we only wish to
know what you saw. Are you sure Mr. Jones endeavored to shoot the top of
Mr. Smith's head off?"
WITNESS.--"Yes, your Honor."
THE COURT.--"How many times did he shoot?"
WITNESS.--"Well, sir, I couldn't say exactly as to the number--but I
should think--well, say seven or eight times--as many as that, anyway."
THE COURT.--"Be careful now, and remember you are under oath. What kind
of a pistol was it?"
WITNESS.--"It was a Durringer, your Honor."
THE COURT.--"A derringer! You must not trifle here, sir. A derringer
only shoots once--how then could Jones have fired seven or eight times?"
(The witness is evidently as stunned by that last proposition as if a
brick had struck him.)
WITNESS.--"Well, your Honor--he--that is, she--Jones, I mean--Soph--"
THE COURT.--"Are you sure he fired more than one shot? Are you sure he
fired at all?"
WITNESS.--"I--I well, perhaps he didn't--and--and your Honor may be
right. But you see, that girl, with her dratted yowling--altogether, it
might be that he did only shoot once."
LAWYER.--"And about his attempting to shoot the top of Smith's head
off--didn't he aim at his body, or his legs? Come now."
WITNESS.--(Entirely confused)--"Yes, sir--I think he did--I--I'm pretty
certain of it. Yes, sir, he must a fired at his legs."
(Nothing was elicited on the cross-examination, except that the weapon
used by Mr. Jones was a bowie knife instead of a derringer, and that he
made a number of desperate attempts to scalp the plaintiff instead of
trying to shoot him. It also came out that Sophronia, of doubtful
nativity, did not faint, and was not present during the affray, she
having been discharged from her situation on the previous evening.)
Washington Billings, sworn, said: "I see the row, and it warn't in no
saloon--it was in the street. Both of 'em was drunk, and one was a
comin' up the street, and t'other was a goin' down. Both of 'em was
close to the houses when they fust see each other, and both of 'em made
their calculations to miss each other, but the second time they tacked
across the pavement--driftin'-like, diagonal--they come together, down
by curb--al-mighty soggy, they did--which staggered 'em a moment, and
then, over they went, into the gutter. Smith was up fust, and he made a
dive for a cobble and fell on Jones; Jones dug out and made a dive for a
cobble, and slipped his hold and jammed his head into Smith's stomach.
They each done that over again, twice more, just the same way. After
that, neither of 'em could get up any more, and so they just laid there
in the slush and clawed mud and cussed each other."
(On the cross-examination, the witness could not say whether the parties
continued the fight afterward in the saloon or not--he only knew they
began it in the gutter, and to the best of his knowledge and belief they
were too drunk to get into a saloon, and too drunk to stay in it after
they got there if there were any orifice about it that they could fall
out again. As to weapons, he saw none used except the cobble-stones, and
to the best of his knowledge and belief they missed fire every time
while he was present.)
Jeremiah Driscoll came forward, was sworn, and testified as follows:--"I
saw the fight, your Honor, and it wasn't in a saloon, nor in the street,
nor in a hotel, nor in--"
THE COURT.--"Was it in the city and county of San Francisco!"
WITNESS.--"Yes, your Honor, I--I think it was."
THE COURT.--"Well, then, go on."
WITNESS.--"It was up in the Square. Jones meets Smith, and they both go
at it--that is, blackguarding each other. One called the other a thief,
and the other said he was a liar, and then they got to swearing
backwards and forwards pretty generally, as you might say, and finally
one struck the other over the head with a cane, and then they closed and
fell, and after that they made such a dust and the gravel flew so thick
that I couldn't rightly tell which was getting the best of it. When it
cleared away, one of them was after the other with a pine bench, and the
other was prospecting for rocks, and--"
LAWYER.--"There, there, there--that will do--that--will--do! How in the
world is any one to make head or tail out of such a string of nonsense
as that? Who struck the first blow?"
WITNESS.--"I can not rightly say, sir, but I think--"
LAWYER.--"You think!--don't you know?"
WITNESS.--"No, sir, it was all so sudden, and--"
LAWYER.--"Well, then, state, if you can, who struck the last."
WITNESS.--"I can't, sir, because--"
LAWYER.--"Because what?"
WITNESS.--"Because, sir, you see toward the last they clinched and went
down, and got to kicking up the gravel again, and--"
LAWYER.--(Resignedly)--"Take the witness--take the witness."
(The testimony on the cross-examination went to show that during the
fight, one of the parties drew a slung-shot and cocked it, but to the
best of the witness' knowledge and belief, he did not fire; and at the
same time, the other discharged a hand-grenade at his antagonist, which
missed him and did no damage, except blowing up a bonnet store on the
other side of the street, and creating a momentary diversion among the
milliners.) He could not say, however, which drew the slung-shot or
which threw the grenade. (It was generally remarked by those in the
court room, that the evidence of the witness was obscure and
unsatisfactory. Upon questioning him further, and confronting him with
the parties to the case before the court, it transpired that the faces
of Jones and Smith were unknown to him, and that he had been talking
about an entirely different fight all the time.)
Other witnesses were examined, some of whom swore that Smith was the
aggressor, and others that Jones began the row; some said they fought
with their fists, others that they fought with knives, others tomahawks,
others revolvers, others clubs, others axes, others beer mugs and
chairs, and others swore there had been no fight at all. However, fight
or no fight, the testimony was straightforward and uniform on one point,
at any rate, and that was, that the fuss was about two dollars and forty
cents, which one party owed the other, but after all, it was impossible
to find out which was the debtor and which the creditor.
After the witnesses had all been heard, his Honor, Judge Sheperd,
observed that the evidence in this case resembled, in a great many
points, the evidence before him in some thirty-five cases every day, on
an average. He then said he would continue the case, to afford the
parties an opportunity of procuring more testimony.
(I have been keeping an eye on the Police Court for the last few days.
Two friends of mine had business there, on account of assault and
battery concerning Washoe stocks, and I felt interested, of course.) I
never knew their names were James Johnson and John Ward, though, until I
heard them answer to them in that court. When James Johnson was called,
one of these young men said to the other: "That's you, my boy." "No,"
was the reply, "it's you--my name's John Ward--see, I've got it written
here on a card." Consequently, the first speaker sung out, "Here!" and
it was all right. As I was saying, I have been keeping an eye on that
court, and I have arrived at the conclusion that the office of Police
Judge is a profitable and a comfortable thing to have, but then, as the
English hunter said about fighting tigers in India under a shortness of
ammunition, "It has its little drawbacks." Hearing testimony must be
worrying to a Police Judge sometimes, when he is in his right mind. I
would rather be secretary to a wealthy mining company, and have nothing
to do but advertise the assessments and collect them in carefully, and
go along quiet and upright, and be one of the noblest works of God, and
never gobble a dollar that didn't belong to me--all just as those
fellows do, you know. (Oh, I have no talent for sarcasm, it isn't
likely.) But I trespass.
Now, with every confidence in the instinctive candor and fair dealing of
my race, I submit the testimony in the case of Smith vs. Jones to the
people, without comment or argument, well satisfied that after a perusal
of it, their judgment will be as righteous as it is final and impartial,
and that whether Smith be cast out and Jones exalted, or Jones cast out
and Smith exalted, the decision will be a holy and a just one.
I leave the accused and the accuser before the bar of the world--let
their fate be pronounced.
A DOUBLE-DYED DECEIVER
BY O. HENRY
The trouble began in Laredo. It was the Llano Kid's fault, for he should
have confined his habit of manslaughter to Mexicans. But the Kid was
past twenty; and to have only Mexicans to one's credit at twenty is to
blush unseen on the Rio Grande border.
It happened in old Justo Valdos's gambling house. There was a poker game
at which sat players who were not all friends, as happens often where
men ride in from afar to shoot Folly as she gallops. There was a row
over so small a matter as a pair of queens; and when the smoke had
cleared away it was found that the Kid had committed an indiscretion,
and his adversary had been guilty of a blunder. For, the unfortunate
combatant, instead of being a Greaser, was a high-blooded youth from the
cow ranches, of about the Kid's own age and possessed of friends and
champions. His blunder in missing the Kid's right ear only a sixteenth
of an inch when he pulled his gun did not lessen the indiscretion of the
better marksman.
The Kid, not being equipped with a retinue, nor bountifully supplied
with personal admirers and supporters--on account of a rather umbrageous
reputation even for the border--considered it not incompatible with his
indisputable gameness to perform that judicious tractional act known as
"pulling his freight."
Quickly the avengers gathered and sought him. Three of them overtook him
within a rod of the station. The Kid turned and showed his teeth in that
brilliant but mirthless smile that usually preceded his deeds of
insolence and violence, and his pursuers fell back without making it
necessary for him even to reach for his weapon.
But in this affair the Kid had not felt the grim thirst for encounter
that usually urged him on to battle. It had been a purely chance row,
born of the cards and certain epithets impossible for a gentleman to
brook, that had passed between the two. The Kid had rather liked the
slim, haughty, brown-faced young chap whom his bullet had cut off in the
first pride of manhood. And now he wanted no more blood. He wanted to
get away and have a good long sleep somewhere in the sun on the mesquit
grass with his handkerchief over his face. Even a Mexican might have
crossed his path in safety while he was in this mood.
The Kid openly boarded the north-bound passenger-train that departed
five minutes later. But at Webb, a few miles out, where it was flagged
to take on a traveler, he abandoned that manner of escape. There were
telegraph stations ahead; and the Kid looked askance at electricity and
steam. Saddle and spur were his rocks of safety.
The man whom he had shot was a stranger to him. But the Kid knew that he
was of the Corralitos outfit from Hidalgo; and that the punchers from
that ranch were more relentless and vengeful than Kentucky feudists when
wrong or harm was done to one of them. So, with the wisdom that has
characterized many great fighters, the Kid decided to pile up as many
leagues as possible of chaparral and pear between himself and the
retaliation of the Corralitos bunch.
Near the station was a store; and near the store, scattered among the
mesquits and elms, stood the saddled horses of the customers. Most of
them waited, half asleep, with sagging limbs and drooping heads. But
one, a long-legged roan with a curved neck, snorted and pawed the turf.
Him the Kid mounted, gripped with his knees, and slapped gently with the
owner's own quirt.
If the slaying of the temerarious card-player had cast a cloud over the
Kid's standing as a good and true citizen, this last act of his veiled
his figure in the darkest shadows of disrepute. On the Rio Grande
border, if you take a man's life you sometimes take trash; but if you
take his horse, you take a thing the loss of which renders him poor,
indeed, and which enriches you not--if you are caught. For the Kid there
was no turning back now.
With the springing roan under him he felt little care or uneasiness.
After a five-mile gallop he drew in to the plainsman's jogging trot, and
rode northeastward toward the Nueces River bottoms. He knew the country
well--its most tortuous and obscure trails through the great wilderness
of brush and pear, and its camps and lonesome ranches where one might
find safe entertainment. Always he bore to the east; for the Kid had
never seen the ocean, and he had a fancy to lay his hand upon the mane
of the great Gulf, the gamesome colt of the greater waters.
So after three days he stood on the shore at Corpus Christi, and looked
out across the gentle ripples of a quiet sea.
Captain Boone, of the schooner Flyaway, stood near his skiff, which
one of his crew was guarding in the surf. When ready to sail he
had discovered that one of the necessaries of life, in the
parallelogrammatic shape of plug tobacco, had been forgotten. A sailor
had been despatched for the missing cargo. Meanwhile the captain paced
the sands, chewing profanely at his pocket store.
A slim, wiry youth in high-heeled boots came down to the water's edge.
His face was boyish but with a premature severity that hinted at a man's
experience. His complexion was naturally dark; and the sun and wind of
an outdoor life had burned it to a coffee brown. His hair was as black
and straight as an Indian's; his face had not yet been upturned to the
humiliation of a razor; his eyes were a cold and steady blue. He carried
his left arm somewhat away from his body, for pearl-handled .45s are
frowned upon by town marshals, and are a little bulky when packed in the
left armhole of one's vest. He looked beyond Captain Boone at the gulf
with the impersonal and expressionless dignity of a Chinese emperor.
"Thinkin' of buyin' that 'ar gulf, buddy?" asked the captain, made
sarcastic by his narrow escape from a tobaccoless voyage.
"Why, no," said the Kid gently, "I reckon not. I never saw it before. I
was just looking at it. Not thinking of selling it, are you?"