Puck — September 12, 1877 — page 13: what you’re looking at

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

PUCK. ; in its softness and grace her form ex- ressed voluptuous languor, but active beauty sparkled in her eyes—such as is seen in those of a swordsman who looks in his adversary’s face for the thrust to parry, or the advantage to be taken. She was no child Hugh looked at. Minerva never looked less childish. This was a woman with a fixed purpose. The mere earning of a few shillings, even a vain girl's de- sire to create admiration, could not have lent the deep significance of her gaze; yet to what urpose it was due Hugh could not imagine. “Tf she intends to punish me with her wo- man’s weapon for my supposed misdeeds, why doesn’t she open out fire, and have it over? It is not usual for women to delay execution.” René had been betrayed by her feelings into saying more than she intended; and now she was surprised, at a moment when the busy oc- cupation of her mind with the task before her caused her to forget the part she had to sustain. Hugh’s speculative expression recalled her to her position, Her eyes, as Hugh looked into them, melted into a kind, sly smile, and she ‘said, with her affected drawl: “Well, do you like me any better than Mrs. Reynolds?” nce more Hugh was plunged into perplexity and doubt. He saw only a beautiful creature, with something rather wicked than noble in her expression, and he considered that, after all, if her sarcasms were intended, they might have been prompted only by the jealousy that one pretty woman feels for another. That flash of quick intelligence in her eyes might have been purely accidental. ‘As he did not again refer to Mrs. Reynolds, René was silent on the subject. She spoke scarcely a dozen words during the remainder of the sitting. “May I come to-morrow morning?” she asked, looking sidelong as Hugh held the door. “Eleven o'clock,” said Hugh, in the most business-like manner; but when he had closed the door he looked at the seat she had vacated, with a feeling of regret which he could not ac- count for. [To be continued.] THE DEPRAVED RED-SKIN. (Boucicaulted from the N.Y, Times.) XPAHE life of this man Joseph is one long re- cord of uninterrupted infamy. From his earliest manhood he has been conspic- uous for unparalleled impudence. Instead of murdering and robbing an occasional white man, as the consistent savage would have done, he has until very recently been guilty of the ef. | frontery of behaving himself like a peaceful and honest man. Not one of his band was permitted to perpetrate a single outrage upon a settler during the whole time that he was living at peace with the United States, Thus this miserable savage impudently aped the customs of civilized and Christian men and took away from his white neighbors every plausible pre- text for exterminating him. Not very long ago the Government, which must have become thoroughly tired of Joseph’s impudent peacefulness, notified him that he must give up to white settlers the reservation upon which his tribe lived, and which had been solemnly guaranteed to the Nez Percés by a treaty. Instead of promptly obeying the order, | Joseph, with a degree of impudence whic was really startling, remonstrated with the Gov- ernment, and actually hinted that it was under | obligation to maintain its own treaties and to keep faith with him. Of course, the idea that a great and enlightened Government ought to keep faith with a feeble tribe was too absurd to merit notice, and Joseph was once more calmly | murderer. requested to hasten his departure. In the meantime white men entered his reservation, in spite of his ridiculous claim that he had rights of property which anybody was bound to respect. Presently it so happened that one of his young men was killed by an energetic settler. Incredible as it may seem, Joseph went to the extreme length of asserting that this trifling incident was a murder, and sent to the nearest settlement and gravely requested the authorities to arrest and punish the so-called One can fancy the inextinguishable laughter with which this request was greeted. Had Joseph requested the punishment of aman who had shot a woodchuck or a prairie-dog his impudence would have been sufficiently amus- ing, but that he should expect a white man to be punished for killing a mere Indian was _per- haps the most absurd idea that ever entered the aboriginal brain. Upon the hollow pretext that to be turned out of the home which the Government had guaranteed to him, and to have his young men shot for the amusement of frontier riflemen, constituted a grievance, Joseph deliberately took up arms and made war against the United States. There was something heroic in the conduct of the patriots of the Revolution who preferred to fight the British Empire rather than to pay taxes without representation, but there is nothing to relieve the vulgar impudence of the chief of a small band of savages who prefers to fight forty millions of people rather than to give up his wretched little country. Of course, after he had thus displayed the full ma- lignity of his nature there was nothing left to be done except to exterminate him, and troops weresent against him for that laudable purpose. It shocks all our finer feelings to be com- pelled to say that so far Joseph has fiendishly refused to be exterminated. He has not only defended himself with a skill that is plainly the direct inspiration of the devil, but he has will- fully refrained from perpetrating the outrages which we have a right to expect from a savage foe. When Gen. Gibbon’s army attacked one of his villages, the women and children were heroically killed by the troops; but when Jo- seph the other day attacked a little band of white people he released the women without injuring them. ‘This was clearly the act of a cold-blooded, calculating savage, who cun- | ningly pretended to place his enemies in a false light by permitting them to monopolize the cruelties of which he ought, in accordancewith his aboriginal nature, to have been the sole au- thor. ‘The longer this unspeakable wretch postpones his extermination the more he deserves our in- dignation. There never was a holier cause than that for which our troops are fighting. We are sustaining the sacred right of our Government to repudiate {ts treaties and protesting against | the wicked assumption that an Indian can ever have any rights whatever. In opposing this noble cause, Joseph is invoking the condemna- tion of all fair-minded men, while his wanton refusal to kill women and children, even after we have set him the example, ought to create a whirlwind of indignation all over the land. At the same time we should humbly confess that we are not altogether blameless. If we had poisoned Joseph and his band years ago we should not now be forced to fight him. Though we exterminate Joseph and his warriors, and though we shoot every woman and bayo- net every baby of his tribe, we cannot fully atone for our neglect to poison them in the days when that good work could have been done cheaply, safely, and easily. Mars is mentioned by the Chicago Journal as the latest victim of new-moonia. “The tune that old cow died on,” must have been written in beef-flat.— Whitehall Times. A CONTEMPORARY asks: ‘ What is Truth?” He may quickly learn what it is by carefully reading this column.— Norristown Herald, So long as it only takes four small slap-jacks at a common hotel to weigh 2 pound, the Amer- ican people will be stricken with dyspepsia. Wuart a neat analysis of character is afforded by the remark: ‘He would have invented coun did it not already exist!"— Yonkers aselte, Tuat story by Eli Perkins about Abraham Veeder, of Schenectady, is very good. It was good when we first printed it in the Saratogian, —Saratogian, Grant is in Scotland, but as most Scotch- men are cold and distant, Grant doesn’t like them. He likes Scotch, but he likes it hot.— Phila. Chronicle. Generat. Howarp is going to mount his command on saw horses, and then if he don’t catch up with Joseph it will be the horses’ fault, —Fhila, Chronicle, ‘Tue reign of the saw is approaching and the wood-pile is smiling with joy, while the fatherless husband is sighing for a muscular, tractable boy. —Rhinebeck Gasette. I7 is not positively known that Lot married for money, but it is supposed that he did. The Bible mentions that Mrs. Lot was pretty well salted.— Phil. Chronicle. Tite is in London, and the Cockneys be- lieve he’s the man whose wife used to pick little bits of lint off of Mr. Beecher’s coat-collar.— Turners Falls Reporter. Unappreciatep.—When Stanley Matthews made that speech he must have felt as Samson did when he was killing his enemies with the same weapon.— Hawkeye. A Sr. Louis man was thrown out of a window by his wife the other morning. _In this case, as usual, woman was the power behind the thrown. | —New York Commercial. Durinc a thunder storm two dogs that howled dismally at night were struck by lightning. Howling dogs should cut this out and paste it in their hats.—Norristown Herald. ‘THERE is one advantage in living in England. Owing to the scarcity of watermelons in that country, paregoric is cheaper there than it is in America.— Philadelphia Chronicle, ‘Times are dreadfully hard in Ohio. Unless a man is trustee of some orphan asylum fund, or administrator on some good estate, it is just all he can do to make a living.— Hawkeye. WIFE-MURDER is becoming so fashionable that young girls, instead of spending so much time fooling over dresses, should devote a few hours each day learning how to box, shoot and run. An exchange says, “the first American wine was made in Florida, in 1564.” We don't know anything about that, but we'd like to bet a dollar it was all gone next day.—Burlington Hawkeye. A CORRESPONDENT wants to know how an oyster can get fresh air, when its shell is closed tight? Why, the air in bi-valves, of course. Ask us something harder.— Whitehall Times. comicbooks.com