Life — December 29, 1892 — page 25: what you’re looking at

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

*LIFE: with their own dining-car, and were assigned in advance to Christian boarding houses in New York, so Dolly's duties did not promise to be very arduous. Perhaps then the idea of the hours of freedom in New York, when her aunt should be in attendance on the sessions of the convention, really had as much as anything else to do with her ready approval of the proposition that she should go with her Aunt Mary. At all events the expedition was organized on this basis, and both ladies set about the preparations for a trip which each anticipated only with pleasure. T had taken thirty-six bitterly contested rounds for Dooney Murphy, of New York, 152 pounds, to convince The Boston Coon, 154% pounds, that the New York method of placing fists where they would do the most harm was super- «ior to the method favored by the Bos- ton idea. The sportsmen and sport- ing men who had confidence in Mr. Murphy's greater attainments in his chosen calling, were now returning home on their special train from the scene where the dispute had taken place. With them their disfigured champion, quite an amount of Boston capital, and innumera- _. ble bottles containing fluids from the _-” sun-kissed hills of France, and the copper stills of Kentucky. On board the train joy prevailed. There was not a loser in the party, and all was gayety. If any one had the rash- ness to fall asleep some facetious friend would gently open Naturally this would awaken the sleeper, and cause him to pour forth unique and forcible oaths, which were more or less softened were his eyelids and introduce a few drops of whiskey. by the hoarse laughter of his genial companions. Pleasant- ries like this took the sting out of many doleful quarters of As the darkness gathered the snow fell faster and faster, and the train made more frequent stops, starting each time with greater difficulty. Those who took from the inno- cent merriment inside time enough to look out of the win- dows saw naught but whirling snow flakes. At last the train came to a dead stop, and five hundred of New. York's sport- ing aristocracy learned from the train hands that the engine had blown out a cylinder head. The rapidly enlarging snow drifts made it look likely that they would spend the night before Christmas in the Connecticut wilds. ‘The worst of it was that they were ten miles away from even a railway sandwich, For an hour our friends kept up their spirits by putting down other spirits, but in spite of this process a feel- ing of moroseness began to prevail. The knowledge that there was no possible chance of getting anything to eat made the pangs of hunger gain force with a rapidity surprising to men who had spent most of their lives within convenient reach of the lunch counters of New York's palatial bars. Through the comparative stillness that had settled down an hour, 11 on the crowd was at last heard the labored puffing of an engine. Its headlight finally passed along slowly before the faces of the returning New Yorkers, pressed closely against the glass of the car-windows. sooner had it abreast than it poked its nose into the six or more feet of snow that had drifted against the special train from the prize come fight. Then before the eyes of the famished horde there Nashed a sight, compared with which Moses’s vision of the promised land was a cheap panorama, Not three feet from their noses were the plate glass windows of a large dining- ar, The tables, covered with white linen, bright silver and sparkling glass were laid for dinner, and up and down the aisle flew white-jacketed darkies adding the last touches be- fore all should be ready. There was a silence as of strong men taking breath for a mighty effort, and then, with one unanimous yell, the New Yorkers fled from their own train, and as many of them as could find a foot-hold clambered on the platforms of the dining-car. UNT MARY OTIS had enjoyed immensely the s 4 of the New York convention of the Women's African Temperance Association. She felt a firmer conviction than ever that the natives of the Mjambi district would be saved from the clutches of the Demon, Rum, and her guileless heart had been warmed by the honor of be- ing appointed chairman of the committee on preparing an edé= tion de luxe of * Ten Nights in a Bar Room,” for presentation to the lady president of the association, As the SN ladies in attendance had “SK. not been limited in the time they might talk on ~— SS their pet subjects, they _}F found themselves still in deli- VS __ cious discussion when the day before ~* Christmas arrived. It was not until that afternoon that the New England delegation boarded its spe- cial train for home. As they rolled out of the Grand Central Depot they arranged their satchels and parcels of Christmas purchases, and then settled themselves down to talk about the convention, and to anticipations of Christmas rejoicings in their own homes, Among the ladies of the Women’s African Temperance Association beauty is not a predominant feature. They run cither to the gentlest of curves, or the most acute of angles, the majority being angular. Spectacles and eye-glasses have also much to do with their picturesqueness, ladies who own the angles and the adipos deny the curves, are impartial in their fondness for eye-glasses and spectacles, with the general result that a convention of the Women’s African Temperance Association is a thing espe- ssions The anemic ladies who cannot comicbooks.com