One of the saddest things that ever came under my notice (said the
banker's clerk) was there in Corning during the war. Dan Murphy enlisted
as a private, and fought very bravely. The boys all liked him, and when
a wound by and by weakened him down till carrying a musket was too heavy
work for him, they clubbed together and fixed him up as a sutler. He
made money then, and sent it always to his wife to bank for him. She was
a washer and ironer, and knew enough by hard experience to keep money
when she got it. She didn't waste a penny.
On the contrary, she began to get miserly as her bank-account grew. She
grieved to part with a cent, poor creature, for twice in her hard-working
life she had known what it was to be hungry, cold, friendless, sick, and
without a dollar in the world, and she had a haunting dread of suffering
so again. Well, at last Dan died; and the boys, in testimony of their
esteem and respect for him, telegraphed to Mrs. Murphy to know if she
would like to have him embalmed and sent home; when you know the usual
custom was to dump a poor devil like him into a shallow hole, and then
inform his friends what had become of him. Mrs. Murphy jumped to the
conclusion that it would only cost two or three dollars to embalm her
dead husband, and so she telegraphed "Yes." It was at the "wake" that
the bill for embalming arrived and was presented to the widow.
She uttered a wild, sad wail that pierced every heart, and said,
"Sivinty-foive dollars for stooffin' Dan, blister their sowls! Did thim
divils suppose I was goin' to stairt a Museim, that I'd be dalin' in such
expinsive curiassities !"
The banker's clerk said there was not a dry eye in the house.