gettin’ ready to swaller. When he see the empty glass he riz up sort of
indignantly, and was agwine to say or do somethin’, but when he see who
it was, he changed his mind pooty sudden, and settlin’ down about six
inches, turned around and jest slid away easy like out of the room. As
he was gwine out I could see his ears looked as though they were
freezin’, for they were gettin’ whiter and whiter as he moved along down
the steps. As I was thinkin’ about it, a ministerial-lookin’ man come
edgin’ up to me and ses:—
“‘You’re a stranger in this quarter, I believe, and let me gin you a
little advice; it may prove valuable to ye before you git away from
yer.’
“‘Why, what’s the matter?’ I asked, wonderin’ what he was comin’ at,
‘have you got the smallpox in the house?’ I contin’ed.
“‘Smallpox!’ he answered. ‘Wuss nor that, stranger; for the love of
peace,’ he contin’ed, ‘keep clear of that feller at the counter. Let him
hev his way. You mout as well undertake to cross a crater as him in any
of his bullyin’ tantrums. Now mind I’m tellin’ ye. If his eye falls out,
don’t laugh at it, don’t betray yer emotions.
“‘If he steps on yer corns, take it as if old Jupiter hisself had
reached down his foot and trod on ye, and you’ll come out of it better
than if you _did_ object, a mi’ty sight.’
“‘Who is he?’ I inquired.
“‘Why, that’s Bill Cranebow,—Glass-eyed Bill, they call him. He’s had
more fights over that glass eye of his’n than ever a dog had over a
sheep’s shank.
“‘Everybody’s afeared of him. They hate him wuss than a lawyer does a
peacemaker. No one who knows him wants to undertake the job of gettin’
away with him; they’d ruther let it out to strangers. Oh! he’s lightnin’
at a fight, for all he looks so clumsy. What the butcher is with the
cleaver, that Glass-eyed Bill is with the bowie-knife. He knows jest
where to strike to open a jint or git betwixt two ribs. You’d think to
see him at it, he had practiced for twenty years with some old doctor,
by the way he can disarrange the “house we live in,” as the poet ses.’
[Illustration: THE MINISTERIAL LOOKING MAN.]
“‘Wal, that’s sort of curious,’ I ses; ‘ain’t thar no person around this
section that has had any experience at the cuttin’ business? He’s only
human, I reckon. If he gits a poke between wind and water he’s as likely
to wilt as anybody else, isn’t he?’ I ses, jokin’ly, jest that way.
“‘Thunder and mud!’ exclaimed the ministerial-lookin’ man. ‘You’ve bin
used to fightin’ with women, I reckon. Lose his strength? You mout as
well try to kill the strength of a red pepper cuttin’ it up, as that
feller. Why, I’ve seen that Glass-eyed Bill in some of his fights yer,
when he was so cut and slashed apart that you could see his in’ards
workin’ like a watch. And I’ll be called a down east noodle, if he
didn’t stand up to his work like a barber until he got through with his
man. He likes to fight in a dark room best, though, ’cause thar’s no
chance of gittin’ on the blind side of him thar; and the landlord not
long ago fixed up one on purpose to accommodate him, he had so much
fightin’ to do. He’ll work a quarrel out of the least thing. Laughin’ at
his eye rollin’ off is as certain a way of gettin’ into trouble as
runnin’ ag’inst a wasp’s nest.
“‘Though he smokes like a coalpit himself, I knowed him to pick a
quarrel with a young Georgian and kill him, because he happened to send
a whiff of smoke in the direction whar he was settin’. Ever since that,
whenever he comes into the room, you’ll see the fellers a-pluckin’ and
a-snappin’ thar pipes out of thar mouths and crammin’ ’em into thar
pockets or under thar coat-tails—anywhere to git ’em out of sight, like
boys who are jest learnin’ the habit when they sight thar dad a-comin’
along.
“‘Take my advice and keep away from him, for he’s dead certain to pick a
muss with strangers, as they ginnerally resent his insults. Plague on
him!’ he contin’ed, ‘I wish he’d go away from the door, I want to git
out; but it’s not good policy to go a-scrougin’ past him while he’s
lookin’ so alfired glum.’ With that the old man went quietly over to a
cheer in the corner and sat down—somethin’ the same as a monkey does
when a larger one is dropped into the cage.
“I went to bed pooty early that night, as I was plaguey tired. In the
mornin’ I learned thar had been a fight in the dark room betwixt
Glass-eyed Bill and a Tuscaloosan. Bill, as usual, had killed his man. I
began to wonder whether I’d git into some scrape or another before I’d
leave, and as there was to be an auction sale of horses and mules that
mornin’ right thar at the hotel, I concluded to make a purchase and git
away as soon as possible.
“I bid two or three times on horses, but they run ’em up too high. At
last they fetched out a big mule, and thinkin’ that would be jest the
thing, I went for him pooty strong, and succeeded in gettin’ him.
Glass-eyed Bill had bin settin’ on the door-step thar, and didn’t seem
to be takin’ any part in the biddin’; but when I went to lead the mule
off, he hollered:—
“‘Whar are ye a-gwine with that critter? Leave him standin’ thar,
please; I kin attend to him myself, I reckon.’
“‘Wal,’ ses I, jest slow and easy, that way, for I wanted to keep down
my rizin’ temper, knowin’ what I was when I got mad, ‘if I’m any judge
of auctioneerin’, the mule is mine, and I cal’late to lead him away when
and whar I please.’
“Just then the same old ministerial-lookin’ man come chuckin’ and
pullin’ at my coat, and ses he, ‘I’m takin’ ruinous risks in speakin’ to
ye now,’ he ses; ‘but I tell ye again, don’t cross him; let him have the
mule, or you’ll expire quicker than a spark when it drops into a b’ilin’
pot. He doesn’t want the mule no more than a husband wants two
mothers-in-law; but he’s jest pinin’ to git ye into a muss, and he
doesn’t see any way of doin’ it without he disputes the mule with ye.
Let him have it, or it’ll be wuss for ye; now mind what I’m tellin’ ye.’
“‘No, I’ll be shot if I will!’ I answered. ‘He ain’t a-gwine to wipe his
hoofs on me until—arter I’m dead, anyhow.’ And with that I began to move
away with the critter, when Glass-eyed Bill jumped up from whar he was
settin’ and shouted pooty snappishly like, ‘Hold on thar! drop that
rope, unless you want to collapse so quick that one-half of ye will be
in etarnity before the other half knows thar’s anythin’ amiss.’
“‘On what groun’s do ye claim the critter?’ I asked, jest a-b’ilin’
inside, but keepin’ sort of cool outwardly.
“‘Words doesn’t amount to a woman’s sneeze in settlin’ a matter of this
kind,’ answered old Glass-eye.
“‘What does, then?’ I inquired, quite innocent like, as though I didn’t
know what he meant; though I did know sure enuff what he was drivin’ at.
“‘This does!’ he answered, rizin’ up and puttin’ his hand behind him, as
I do now, and jerkin’ out a rippin’ great knife about as big as the
colter of a plow. ‘That’s the sort of a thing to settle disputes with.
No gentleman will argue a case while he’s got an arbiter like that to
leave it to,’ he contin’ed, a-slappin’ it down flatways into the palm of
his left hand as he spoke, and bringin’ an echo from an old barn that
stood near.
“I see the bystanders began to turn pale as whitewashed chimneys, and
commenced lookin’ at the ground as though huntin’ for straws or
splinters to pick thar teeth with, but they only wanted some excuse to
git away.
“‘Supposin’ I should pull out a knife about seventeen inches and a half
long,’ I ses, jest that way, ‘what then?’
“‘It’s jest exactly the thing I want to see,’ he answered quickly. ‘A
young mother was never more tickled when she discovered the fust tooth
a-peepin’ out of her young un’s gums, than I am when I see a knife
comin’ out of its sheath in a feller’s hand.’
“‘Wal, I reckon you must have been brought up in a fightin’ settlement,’
I ses, jest like that, for I couldn’t hardly keep from jokin’, he seemed
so amazin’ eager.
“‘Come, which’ll ye do? gin up the mule or fight? You’ve got to do one
or t’other,’ he ses, impatiently, as he stooped to pick up his glass
eye, which jest then dropped out and was a-rollin’ under the hoss
trough.
“‘Wal,’ I ses, ‘I ain’t perticularly stuck arter fightin’, but it’s bad
enough for a feller to squirt his terbacker juice onto you, without
wantin’ to rub it in; and if it’ll be any accommodation to ye, I’ll
fight fust and then take the mule arterwards.’
“‘Enough sed,’ he answered, just short that way; and then turnin’ to the
landlord who was standin’ in the door, he asked, ‘Is the dark room ready
for use?’
“‘No, not quite, he answered; ‘thar’s some pieces of that long
Tuscaloosan lyin’ around in thar yet, I believe, but I’ll attend to
removin’ them right away,’ and he started off with a bucket and
dust-pan.
[Illustration: STARTLING DISCLOSURES.]
“So we all went into the bar-room, and staid round thar waitin’ until
the place would be prepared. While we were thar, Glass-eyed Bill pulled
out his knife, and commenced to draw it backwards and forwards over his
boot-leg, as though to git a fine edge on it.
“‘Wal, you can whet your great scythe blade,’ I ses to myself, kind of
low that way, for I allowed he was doin’ it to skeer me. ‘It ain’t
allers the longest horned cow that does the most hookin’. my old
terbacker shaver has got p’int enough on it to inaugurate a new passage
to the interior if it _won’t_ cut a har.’
“Arter a while he leaned over to a feller that sat by the table, and
while runnin’ his thumb sort of feelin’ly along the edge of the knife,
he ses: ‘The man I bought this from in Galveston assured me it was the
best of steel; but he lied, I reckon, for I turned the edge of it last
night on that long Tuscaloosan’s ribs. Yet that’s not to be much
wondered at, arter all, for I do believe he had as many ribs as a snake.
I thought I never would succeed in gettin’ the blade betwixt ’em. Arter
I got him down in the corner and his knife away from him, I commenced
jabbin’ at his armpit, and I prospected the hull way down to his kidney,
before I could git in far enough to let his dinner loose.’
“Gewillikins! When I heered him talkin’ like that, didn’t I begin to
squirm and fidget around on my cheer! I wished then I had never seen the
place, more especially the long-eared mule. But I see I was in for it,
as the boy said when he got his head stuck in the cream jar. Thar was no
way of gittin’ out without comin’ right down to beggin’ off, and I was
too consumin’ proud to do that, you know, if I was sartain of bein’ cut
up into as many pieces as a boardin’-house pie.
“Jest then the landlord came back and sed the room was ready, but
remarked that it was a leetle slippery yet. He sed, for a lean man he
never did see a feller that had so much blood into him as that
Tuscaloosan had. Beckonin’ me to the counter he ses:—
“‘You mout as well settle your bill now before you go in thar; it may be
more satisfactory to you to have the settlin’ of your own affairs, and
it’ll save me the trouble of huntin’ over your effects arter you’re
dead.’
“‘All right,’ I ses, ‘now, if you say so; but it’s ginnerally admitted
that sure things sometimes git mi’ty slippery all to wunst, and perhaps
somebody’s goggles may prove blue in the mornin’ that were bought for
green uns at night.’
“I didn’t want to let any of ’em think I was skeered, though, by jingo!
I felt sartin of bein’ minced up, and the cold chills were jest
streakin’ all over me.
“So we started for the room, which was about twelve feet square and dark
as pitch.
“The landlord held the door open until we were in opposite corners with
our knives out. Then he shut and locked it and left us to work out our
own salvation, as the missionary did the South Sea Islanders when he
overheerd ’em talkin’ about the best way of cookin’ him the next
mornin’.
“Wasn’t it dark in thar though? and still? you could have heered a
lizard a-breathin’ in thar, it was so quiet.
“I allowed Glass-eyed Bill was expectin’ that I would go a-shufflin’ and
a-huntin’ around for him, but I had no sich foolish notion. I cal’lated
if thar was any findin’ to be done he’d have to do it, for I was
detarmined to stand right thar till I’d drop in my tracks before I’d go
a-s’archin’ around for him.
“I commenced breathin’ about twice a minute, and not makin’ any more
noise at it than a wall-bug, nuther. But for all that I heered him
a-movin’ over towards me. I’ll allers think that Cranebow had a nose
onto him like a setter dog, for he somehow or another got right over
thar whar I was standin’. Pooty soon I felt somethin’ a-stingin’ along
my forehead thar, and I suspected at once that it was the knife that was
feelin’ around for me; so I reckoned it wouldn’t be long until he was
a-proddin’ of it somewhere else, and like the boy with the candy bag, I
cal’lated the fust poke was everythin’; so I made one sudden and
detarmined plunge and a sort of upward rip, at the same time, cal’latin’
to do all the damage I could right at once while I was about it.
“He heered me start, and thought to squat down before I got the knife
into him I reckon. Though his intentions were good he only spread the
disaster, like the gal who tried to put the fire out with the corn
broom, for as he was gwine down the knife was rizin’, and the result was
truly astonishin’. I’ll be smashed if he didn’t fly open from eend to
eend like a ripe pea pod. It was done so alfired quick too, that he
didn’t realize how bad he was hurt I think. Ses he, ‘We’ll try that over
ag’in, stranger.’ As he spoke, he started to git up, but fell away
seemin’ly in two different directions.
“‘Not on this side, we won’t,’ I ses, as I went huntin’ around for the
door.
“I was surprised as much as him at the way things had turned out, for
when I stepped into that room I looked on it as steppin’ into another
world. When the door was found I commenced knockin’, and pooty soon the
landlord came and opened it. He couldn’t see me at fust, but allowed it
was the bully that was thar, of course, and ses he:—
“‘You made pooty quick work of it this time; that feller won’t want to
buy any more mules arter this, I take it.’
“‘No,’ ses I, steppin’ out, ‘nor claim a critter that doesn’t belong to
him nuther.’
“‘What!’ he cried, jumpin’ back with a look upon his face that told me
at once he was mi’ty displeased at the way things war developin’, ‘is it
you? whar’s Glass-eyed Bill?’ he contin’ed, shadin’ his eyes with his
hand and peerin’ into the darkness.
“‘He’s lyin’ around in thar somewhar,’ I answered careless like, jest
that way. ‘The head-half of him is nigh the door here, paralyzed, I
reckon, but the leg part is somewhere over in the corner thar whar ye
hear the kickin’; you mout as well be gettin’ yer bucket and dust-pan
ready, for you’ll have quite a job gettin’ all the pieces together
ag’in, I’m thinkin’,’ I contin’ed, just that indifferent way, and
walkin’ out towards the bar-room as I spoke.
“You never did see a feller so set back in your life. He looked at me as
though I had as many heads onto me as the beast we read about in the
Scripters. I’ll allers believe that he was in cahoot with old Glass-eye,
and jist kept him thar to pick quarrels with strangers so they could
have the pickin’ over of thar effects.
“Arter washin’ my hands and plasterin’ up the cut on my forehead a
little, I went out and saddled the mule, and the crowd all came out to
see me gwine off. I reckon if I had stopped in the village I could have
had things about my own way for some time. Before I rode off I turned
round to ’em and ses:—
“‘When you git so frightened of a bully ag’in that you daren’t sneeze
within forty feet of him, jest send for me, and I’ll open him up ready
for saltin’ while you’d be wipin’ your mouth.’
“With that I rode off, and left ’em all starin’ at each other, and then
arter me, as though wonderin’ who or what I was, anyhow.”
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
ROLLER SKATING.
Oh! skating, roller skating now, of pastimes takes the lead;
No more we take the moonlight sail, or mount the prancing steed,
No more to fair, or carnival, no more to masquerade,
No more along the lengthy bridge, the thousands promenade,
No more we see Othello rave, and roll his jealous eyes,
Or Hamlet leaping in the grave, where loved Ophelia lies,
Or see the boasting Falstaff sheath his blade in Percy’s corse,
Or hear the baffled Richard shout, “My kingdom for a horse!”
In vain the minstrels shake the bones, and tell the funny tale,
Their blazoned bill, or blatant band, to draw the public fail;
For those, who still their millions hide, and those at ruin’s brink,
Alike throw business cares aside, and hasten to the Rink.
Talk of your bounding horseback rides, or of the grace indeed.
A maiden shows when she bestrides the frail velocipede;
I charge ye, if you’d see a maid when graceful she appears,
Go see her on the roller skates, as round the Rink she steers.
A TERRIBLE NOSE.
I was to-day brought in contact with an old gentleman named Bickerstaff,
who keeps a crockery store in the village where I am visiting. This
Bickerstaff is the unfortunate possessor of the queerest-looking nose I
have yet encountered.
It was not the original intention of Providence that he should follow
such a proboscis through life, for there was a time when he, like other
men, had a forerunner ornamental as well as useful. But through an
accident, the nose he now bears in all its deformity was shoved upon
him.
[Illustration: BUSTING HIS BUGLE.]
It seems one day, while furiously pursuing a little urchin who had
mischievously put a stone through a glass jar by the door, he ran his
face against the end of a scantling a boy was carrying past on his
shoulder, and set his nose well up on his forehead in a triangular lump.
Strange to say, no inducements that the surgeon could hold out served to
coax it back to its former position. His wife, who was young, and rather
prepossessing in appearance, worried terribly about it. She finally left
him, and went to live with her mother, and immediately set about
obtaining a divorce from him.
She would, in all probability, have obtained it, if she had not died
before the case was properly laid before the commissioners; because she
was capable of doing better, and when you come to see the nose with
which she wished to sever her connections, you could hardly blame her.
Old Bickerstaff, to tell the honest truth, did look like the very old
Nick in masquerade costume.
His nose, as it reposed between his eyebrows, displayed an enormous pair
of nostrils large as front-door keyholes. At a short distance a person
would think he had four eyes in his head. He was the living terror of
the school children who daily passed his place of business. They either
scurried past on the run, or with their hands over their eyes.
Even among creeping infants—who had often shrunk back from the threshold
as old Bickerstaff passed the door—he was known as the Boo; and there
was no danger of them crawling into the street while he remained in the
vicinity.
Nervously-inclined women also avoided him. They would cut across the
road when they saw him coming toward them, or turn back, feeling their
pockets as though they had forgotten something, and hurry back to go
round some other way.
Dogs never barked at him. If they happened to be engaged in that pastime
when he hove in sight, they would slope off the demonstration into a
yelp. And as if they had suddenly recollected that they were wanted at
home about that time, they tucked their tails between their legs and
dusted away at a lively rate. Hitched horses even snorted lustily and
pulled hard upon their halters when old Bickerstaff shuffled by.
The old gentleman had a pew in the church directly in front of the
pulpit, and the first time he attended divine worship after his nose had
been set up, he threw the minister out of his discourse altogether. He
couldn’t keep run of what he wanted to say, no way he could fix it. He
had Jonah swallowing the whale, instead of the whale doing the job for
Jonah.
No matter how much he endeavored to keep his eyes in some other
direction, they would invariably wander back to rest upon that terrible
sight, and then he would be off the track again in a twinkling. The next
day the trustees of the church waited on Bickerstaff, and in the most
polite manner possible requested him to exchange his pew for one farther
removed from the pulpit.
The old fellow—who, by the way, had considerable temper—flew off the
handle at once, and in the most unchristian-like language denounced the
church and the doctrine that would draw the line of demarkation between
fair faces and plain.
He informed the trustees if the parson didn’t like the looks of his
congregation, he could turn his pulpit around facing the other way. Yet,
though he was rough in his speech, and given to storming considerably
when his pride was touched, he was not altogether lacking in those
qualities which go far to make up your real man; and when the trustees
offered to give him the side pew _rent free_, his voice at once grew
low, and in a becoming manner he accepted the situation. After that,
things were not quite as bad. The minister occasionally got a quartering
view of him, but the odd-looking disfigurement didn’t strike him with
full force. Still, I was informed, the Reverend gentleman’s discourse
was principally addressed to the hearers on the other side of the
church, thereafter.
But—to his credit be it mentioned—he always turned in the direction of
old Bickerstaff when he closed his eyes in prayer.
[Illustration]
A MASKED BATTERY.
I learn by an evening paper that an old lady in the lower part of the
city to-day, while burning some cast-off garments, threw an old vest
belonging to her son-in-law into the fireplace. A Remington rifle
cartridge happened to be slumbering in one of the pockets. It awakened,
and therefrom hangs a piece of crape.
This draws me on to fasten upon paper an incident that happened in the
mountains some years ago. I was spending a few days in the mines at the
time, with a friend named Colyer, who was working a claim back of
Sonora.
He had three partners in the concern. One was an old fellow named
Twitchell, who at some time in his life had been a judge in a supreme
court in one of the Southwestern States—I forget which. At all events,
they called him “Judge,” and he bore the title with becoming dignity.
[Illustration: THE ONE-EYED SWEDE.]
Another was a dark-looking, one-eyed Swede, who wore a large green patch
over the empty socket. This seemed to add a double brilliancy and fire
to the other optic, and gave to him rather a ferocious appearance. He
would have passed anywhere for a buccaneer of at least fifteen years’
cruising. Yet he was quite a mild and peaceable man, for all his
demoniacal aspect. The third was a Vermonter, named Theodore Arthur
Willoughby Spooner, called Spoon, for short. They occupied a small log
cabin near their claim, and were like miners generally, hopeful, if not
happy.
One evening Theodore Arthur Willoughby Spooner was rummaging over some
old articles left in the cabin by a former occupant. Among them he found
an odd-looking pistol which the rust of years had rendered worthless.
The weapon was an uncommon one. I never saw anything like it before or
since, and it is my daily prayer that I never may. It was a ten-shooter;
with nine chambers for bullets, and a tenth and larger barrel for
throwing buckshot, slugs, walnuts, small onions, or potatoes. In fact it
was capable of receiving almost anything not exceeding a billiard ball
in size. Such an awe-inspiring shooting iron would be invaluable to a
footpad or road agent. It was particularly suited for men of this
stripe; for the man who would not blanch, settle down on his knees and
surrender up his valuables when that battery was leveled at his head,
must be brave indeed.
After we had examined it for some time and vainly endeavored to raise
the hammer, the one-eyed Swede took it. In trying to revolve the
chambers he dropped it unswervingly upon Judge Twitchell’s favorite
corn. It weighed about as much as a good-sized anvil, and no person who
had experienced the peculiar sensation that shoots along the nerves from
an injured corn, could blame the Judge for indulging in a little
profanity about that time.
Smarting under the contusion he grabbed the instrument and in an erring
moment flung it into the fire.
Not a man of that little assemblage but would have given his day’s
pan-out to have the pistol out of the flames again; but neither wished
to assume the responsibility of poking for it. The confounded thing
hadn’t been fully canvassed, and we didn’t know whether or not it was
loaded or which way it was aiming. It might be pointing out at the door,
or up the chimney, or it might be leveled at a fellow’s very vitals;
there was a sort of creeping uncertainty about the whole thing that was
calculated to inspire solemn and serious reflection, and make us sit
uneasily upon our stools.