The Grinder Papers — page 229: what you’re looking at

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

224 THE GRINDER PAPERS. what you de—only folks are allers askin’ me how on airth you caught him. a Didn't hev to ketch, hey? SoTallers say. SezI, ‘‘S’posin’ I’d made up my mind to hevany one. Sim Slum would have been the last. Fustly, his hair is most on't gone, and next his legs is bow; and then the pecooliarity o’ his sittiwation would ha’ deterred a lady o my delicacy o' feelin’ from unitin’ with him. What pecooliarity? Never knowed nothin’, eh? Why, good gracious! there’s a’most an awtul secret connected with the birth o’ your pardner. Sence he hasn't told it, probably I’m indis- Criminate in alludin’ tu it. I sha’n’t say nothin’ more. Don’t urge me. Pass me the cold mutton, please, and the salt. You must know? Why, marsy me! I wouldn't hev spoke ef I’d a-thought though ’twas pecooliar fur tu take a pardner with- out tellin’ her. Your husband, Miss Slum, dunno tu this day whether he’s his own uncle or his own nephew. | Am I crazy? Law, no! Jest keep up your sperits and I'll tell ye. : Old Grand’ther Slum lost his fust wife airly, you know, and him and his son Eben, they kep’ bachelder’s hall together, until Eben was thirty. Then he took and got married to a widdy with a grown gal o’ sixteen. He did it unbeknownst to grand’- ther, and the old gentleman was hoppin’ mad. Sez he, ‘‘I’ll punish him for it, ef I kin,” and the way he took was to marry the widdy’s darter. _ He punished himself the worst, for she led him a awful life— comicbooks