Judge — December 24, 1881 — page 10: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Johnny, tell the little girls what a quacruped ts.” 1 the ‘potamus, and” (after pause) "treo felant, the cor. A Right Up-and-Down Talk. “ ARE you running on schedule time, now?” said I to the conductor of an elevator in one of New York's ninety-and-nine-story buildings. ‘Well, I should kinder smirk!” replied the chipper up-and-down traveler. ‘We have to make close connections, or them felliz on the top floors will kick. Where are you goin’ to?” “0. Zone’s office,” replied I. “He's on the fifty-third floor—if you don't want to collect a bill. He's given me the straight tip to pass all felliz as wants to col- lect over the entire road and return, Youse due nine twenty-five. ‘This is a way elevator, or you'd arrive sooner. ‘The fast express docs better.” “The fast elevator?” queried I. “Of course,” said the conductor. ‘We are the same as a railroad; only the regular R. R.’s ran horizontal, while we go up and down. We have our accommodation train and our fast express, same as they. Look up there,” and he pointed through the roofofour elevator. ‘See her hile! Why, she’s doin’ a mile a minute now.” Way—way up over us I could see an cle- vator ascending at a very rapid pace. “That's the lightning express,” said my guide. “Allthe big guns go on that.” And with a dissatisfied air. he continued: |‘ While I have to tote all the office boys and pot-wras- slers, Just look at her hum!” said he, looking up again. His rapturous upturned face, with the light from the roof of the elevator coming down and suffusing it in a Rembrantesque way, made me think of the old art masterpieces. ‘<The tad who works the rope on that cle- vator is a corker. Why, there’s one spot on the line where he makes his train do a cool mile and a half a minute.” “ How many miles have you on this—line?” T asked. “Dunno! There must be over a hundred. But ours ain’t the longest road, though! They say there’s a flat up town where they have to THE JUDGE. Uittle: girls.” run sleeping cars with each elevator, and top | loorers arrive in time for eight o'clock break fast. That's pretty tall, ain’t it?” | “Pretty tall,” assented I, with all my heart. “Elevators is a great institution. It’s my opinion that, if they had placed one of Otis’ elevators in the tower of Babel, the buildin’ would have been payin’ property to this day. Important? well, I guess yes! Why, if ele- vators ever git on a general strike, there'll be thousands of poor critters way, way up on top floors as'll starve to death before they can get down-stairs to where provisions is. “Confound it! The machine don’t run well to«lay. The ropes are fouled somewhere up above. Took Evarts up yesterday, and he paralyzed the riggin’ with one of his big sentences, You never see such a mess. The ropes were twisted every which way. “Fify-third floor! Here you are! Ole man’s in his office. Don't you hear him He lived in Rye, and on it, too, sometimes. | One night last week he failed to ‘‘connect,” | but he had a certain kind of remorse, and so telegraphed home to his wife this laconic mes- sage: ‘Darling, Iam safe.” The next day he managed to assuage his sorrow with con- siderable of his town’s namesake, but a late train took him to his anxious better half. “What has happened?” was her first in- quiry. “Oh, nussin much. Why?” he asked. ‘But why did you send me this?” she asked, showing him the dispatch, He looked at it for a moment trying to think why he had sent it, and then he suddenly re- membered the Vienna horror. “Well, ole gal, fact ish, I thought you might have heard ‘bout the terrible theater fire in Vienna, an’ gotworried "bout me. Bus it’s all right; here I am all safe. See.” She led him gently to bed, and nothing has been said about the horror since. A SETTLED Pact: The cup of clear coffee. Osk: of Boston's origin “ill-tempered jokes. good-natured growls. I thinkers writes of xt we shall hear of A DIspatcH from Steubenville, Ohio, says a policeman there the other night lost his pock- et-book containing $195. ‘The question sug- gests itself, who had he been holding up.— Kansas City Times, It looks rather more like an unquestioned case of ‘knocking down.” “Sure ‘Pop’: The father whose children | resemble him in phiz. We shall have a stable government, if Bon- acr, Lorillard, Keene & Co., have any influ- ence with Arthur and his Cabinet. He that is callous to slander hath the true wit of patience. Better to bide the harvest of virtue than abide with a grass-widow. Your chronic, thin-brained traducer is a distempered cur gnawing at the bone of envy. N “Ant, drink with your bright ruby lips, Your maddening, musical tips, Deep draughts of this bottled Bordeaux, While I toss a toast to your eyes, Your beaming, beneficent eyes, ‘And crave of your love a morceau.” ‘Thus I sang to my Sal Vo As we manched at a Fulton street meal— Bat those lips snapped in angry retort, «Ewnrgve, I'm not of that sort.” Menit always finds the slippery pole of sue- cess well greased with the oleomargarine of contumely. Tue wintry winds were whistling shrill — ‘As with dead leaves they flirted— When a freshly posted opera-bill My sidelong glance diverted. I gazed apon the well-known name Of saucy Emma Abbott, And wondered If sbe was to blame For a very stagey habit Of promiscuous osculation. Sue thrillingly cackled in his dexter auricle: “ Don't goyet, dearest!” He said he wouldn't, but he fibbed equal to a detected bank clerk. Three minutes later the fecho of his uplifted wail of remonstrance had died away on the midnight zephyrs, and the sole occupant of that dadoed vestibule put his foot down as he turned to go into executive session with a tear- stained daughter. Say, are you a pretty good thinker? Well, think of some good deed you can do as well as not between this and Christmas. “Pere, that is not rheumatism you have got, it’s the gout.” ‘Well, perhapsit is, Tle free lunches they set out nowadays are a deal richer than they used to be. It’s an age of luxury, Joc.” comicbooks.com