Life — September 25, 1884 — page 5: what you’re looking at

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

- LIFE: of other old and intimate friends of mine have come on. Owing to my high political position, I feel that I shall be able to work off the bonds. I shall collar my best friends to-morrow and blow them in for all they are worth. I do not feel I shall prove a deadhead in the enterprise if I once embark in it. Can't you make it three dollars this whack? Regards to Mrs. Fisher. Yours hastily, Burn this letter. J. G. BLAINE, Vi. INDIA STREET, Boston, April 28th. DEAR BLAINE: AN’T send more than a dollar and thirty cents. those Maine suckers for all you can. A magneticman like you ought to be valuable. I send $170,000 more bonds. But would your friends in Maine be satisfied if they knew the facts ? FISHER. Play VIL. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, WASHINGTON, D. C., May Ist. DEAR FISHER? I WANT you to send me a letter, such as the enclosed draft, and six dollars. It will be a favor I will never forget. Every one of those Maine idiots took right hold— personal confidence, don't you see? I tell you there's nothing like magnetism. But wherever concealment is desirable, avoidance is advisable. That is the reason I have been dodging the 75 cent man, the 50 cent man, and another, | whom I worked day before yesterday for 65 cents. Please send $290,000 bonds this time, and don't forget the $6. | Regards to Mrs. Fisher. Yours, etc., | Burn this letter. J. G. BLaine. | SHE KNEW BETTER. “ HILDREN,” said the Sunday- school teacher, looking over the top of her glasses, “we should always be glad and happy for our many and manifold blessings. Even the birds thank their Maker in song— hear those canaries across the street, pouring forth their musical praises.” “Please ma’am,” interrupted a little girl who was playing tit-tat-too on the fly leaf of a hymnal. “Them ain’t a-praisin’. That's what canaries al- ways does.” VINGT-UN—A little game that many ladies of thirty-five and upwards cannot be made to forego. WHAT THE POLITICIANS MAY FINALLY SUCCEED IN “ DOING "— The Nation at large. NIS BALL WHY DOES NOT JACK GET THE TEN- WHICH HAS FALLEN OTHER SIDE OF THE FENCE? 173 CONCERNING THE DEATH PENALTY. HE penalty of death for wilful murder is still borne on the penal code of these states. From the number of victims, condemned murderers should be very plentiful. This is by no means the case. They are so rare as to be attrac- tive shows for a privileged few. When a friendless mur- derer is convicted and sentenced to be hanged, no one could object to his being utilized in any way calculated to improve public morality. The only difficulty is to fix the rates and rules for his exhibition. Being non-singers we do not approve of the present ranting hymn-book qualification, and think a dime or perhaps quarter dollar rate of admission should be substi- tuted. These criminals would then become self-supporting ; could even pay for their own flowers, and that class of con- tribution might perhaps be diverted into some deserving chan- nel. Arrangements might be made with Bowery museums for the loans of interesting criminals. Double murderers would fetch quite a sum. For what chance would obesity, de- | formity or any number of extra arms and limbs, have with the exhibition of the mental torture of a man to be hanged in a fortnight? Then think what prices could be asked and crowds fetched by the announcement, “ To be hanged in two days.” Almost fabulous sums would be paid to view the actual hang- ing, if sheriffs did not spoil the market by dead-heading their friends. Vigorous minds in the event of human subjects being scarce, might temporarily be accommodated with a front seat in a slaughter-house. Of course the majority of people in- dulging in this newly found, exciting fun, go to witness these spectacles physiologically or for sacred reasons, in either of which cases they would not surely grudge any amount of moncy in the respective causes of science or religion. Best Check for Pauperism—Vanderbilt's. THIS IS WHY, THE comicbooks.com