Puck — September 3, 1879 — page 12: what you’re looking at

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

PUCK. tree was fully fifteen miles distant, the night was pitch dark, and he was a stranger to the Toad. While these thoughts were ing through his excited brain, he had found the little win- dow of the room in which the lener slept. He tapped at it, at first, lightly, but getting no response, then heavily. “Who's there?” a hoarse voice suddenly growled. “Hish, John; it's I—Campbell.” An’ what the—but excuse me, Meester Zér- chie, but a’m no right wakened yet,” responded the old man, for it was he. “ Is there onything 7 _ No,no, John. Don't talk so loudly or you'll waken the house. Dress yourself as quickly as yop can, come quietly out, and I'll explain. And—stay—here’s something to waken you. I've no: glass, but Ez put the bottle to your mouth, if you can do it in the dark.” “That can I,” replied the old man eagerly, as he seized the bottle in his trembling and put it to his mouth. A brief silence fol- lowed, broken only by the soft gurgle of the inspiring fluid, as slowly and lovingly John sucked it down, and then—after a pull that drained it of. nearly a quarter of its contents, and wiping his mouth with his right sleeve, came a phish sigh of unspeakable relief and con- tent, and the words: “ Hech, Meester Zerchie, but that be graun stuff!” “Hurry up, then, if you want more; it’s a matter/of life and death, I tell you.” “Life and déath! life and death!" muttered the old man as he hurriedly drew on his coat, for, as was his custom, he had gone to bed in trowsers and shirt. ‘‘ Ye frichten me, man—I mean Meester Erchibauld. Savé‘us a’, what's goin’ tae happen neist ?” Happily the children, for John was a wid- ower, slept too soundly to be awakened by any ordinary noise, so John was enabled to steal out unnoticed. “Take your lantem with you,” whispered Gascoyne. “Lantern! lantern, isit? And for"— “Do as you are told and ask no questions. There’s five pounds and a bottle of whiskey waiting you if you doso. It’s for Miss Maggie.” « Five pounds—bottle o’ whuskey— Mees v A’m going clean daft.” me away, will you? and don’t stand havering there. I tell you we must be at Por- tree in three-quarters of an,hour from this.” ‘The old man lifted his hands in dismay, but me into Portree within the hour, I'll give you five more.” “A-weel, a-weel, a wilfu’ man maun hev his way, an’ if it’s a maeter o’ life an’ death, it's for Mees Maggie—no forgetting yersel’— “Great heavens! man, stop ing. It’s after one o'clock now, and we must be at Por- tree by two.” “Weel, weel,” growled his incorrigible guide, as he carefully stowed away the bank-notes in the inside pocket of his vest, “ gie us anither half ‘un frae the bottle, and I'll ride tae Auld Nick.” < “ There it is, and, for God's sake, be quick.” To take another long pull, to open the high- way gate, to mount his horse and cry, “A’ ready, sir,” as he struck good Bess’s sides with his heels, were the work of a moment, and John and Archie were galloping for dear life through the darkness and the rain. (To be continued.) Netty Grant's coffin, it appears, wasn’t loaded.— Phila, Kronikle-Herald, Tue Earl of Fife is dead. His death will not break up the royal brass-band.—W. O. Picayune. Tue angels of the Sunday-schools are some- times the demons of the melon-patch,—Modern Argo. LawRENCE BarrETT is pronounced the best actor on the Denver Stage— Mew Orleans Picayune, Tatmace is on his way home, and the roar of the ocean is hushed in reverential silence.— Modern Argo. Op Stewart's soul lies a-mouldering in the grave, but his corpse goes marching on.—Cin- cinnati Sat, Night, Since they want a new design for the God- Ir seems that if circumstances can’t be toned up to the individual, the individual must be toned down to circumstances.— Rochester Ex. press. Ir is said that Mississippi has no national banks, but she partly makes up for it by a five- legged colt and a man who has murdered three wives.—Detroit Free Press, A New York chemist has a sponge eight feet in circumference. If it only had a cane and a stand-up collar, it would beat its way out West in no time.— Detroit Free Press. ALTHOUGH the tax was taken off tobacco, the cabbage crop is so short in some sections that we presume cigars won't be any cheaper until next year.— Wheeling Leader. “To the poor all things are poor,” said the grocer, as he weighed out a half-pound of his most robust butter, for a ragged little fellow with a ten-cent piece.—Mew Haven Register, Mr. Ketty’s opinion of the height, the depth, the length, the breadth and the fulness of that barrel would be an interesting piece of information about this time.—Syracuse Stan- dard, A Georgia young man asked his sweetheart whether she had ever read “Romeo and Juliet.” She replied that she had read Romeo, but she did not think she had ever read Juliet— ew York Herald. Mrs, A. T. STewarT has not entered the par- lors of the Grand Union Hotel, at Saratoga, since the great merchant's death—Z£x. Nei- ther has Mr. Seligman. Or hardly neither.— Phila, Bulletin, In imitation of the famous chapter on Ice- land, we suggest for the new ecclesiastical en- cyclopedia: Chap. 1—On Religion in Sum- mer. There is no religion in summer.— Mew Haven Register. If Stewart was alive, he would never give $25,000 for his body, not after it was dead. This isn’t a very clear statement, but it is as clear as the news about the body’s whereabouts, —New Haven Register. Dip you ever know a barber to own up that he had cut you? They never do it; they simply go for a chunk of alum and casually re- mark: “ Well, guess I shaved that spot a trifle too close.”— Waterloo Observer. dess of Liberty, we nominate Sarah Bernhardt for the model.—Boston Post. REatty, now, Mr. Stewart has enjoyed the most extended “wake” ever accorded a corpse Archie adroitly closed his mouth by handing him thesbottle. again. He hardly needed to have done so, however. Sheer astonishment had rendered John speechless. “Lead the way to the stables,” said Archie, following up his advantage, and his companion walked mechanically on. « Now saddle your two stoutest horses; Meg and Bess, perhaps, would be best. I'll saddle one; you Bess,’’ Mechanically, as if in a stupor, John obeyed. When all was ready, Archie vaulted into his saddle. “Now, John, get up; lead the way with your lantern and gallop as if for life.” Now, dearly as John loved the whiskey and Miss Maggie, who was his pet, and Archie him- self, who was also a favorite, and much as he wanted the money—and £5 seemed a veri- table fortune —he shrank from going on so long and mysterious a ride on such a night. So, after a preliminary ‘‘hem,” and with his foot on the stirrup hesitatingly, he began to Meester ZErchibald, just conseeder”— ler!’ Confound it, man, I tell you it’s life or death. See; hold up the light here —there’s the £5 I promised, and if you get argue. “ But, « in this country. New Haven Register. Srttinc Butt has been trying to establish a quarantine against Gen. Miles. He has an idea that Miles is unhealthy.—. O. Picayune, Tue climate of St. Louis is terrible. A wo- man fell through a skylight there recently and was instantly killed.—_ New Orleans Picayune. An editorial in the Rome Sentine/, headed, “A Lie Nailed,” reminds us that the melan- choly days are almost here.—orristown He- rald. Tue composer of “ Pinafore” is in Germany. Mr. Bismarck, “there is a tide in the affairs of men," etc. Do you see your chance ?— Boston Post, We notice with astonishment that none of our contemporaries have referred to the San Francisco picnic as a ‘terrible holocaust.”— N.Y, Express. Bos INcERsOLL is trying to start a new party. ‘There is a certain wicked old party who will start him some day if he doesn’t look out.— Cincinnati Sat, Night. Tue public are soon to be permitted to in- ct the interior of M. Bartholdi’s statue of liberty. She is to have a staircase terminating- in her back-hair.—. ¥. Comm, Advertiser. Mr. Murray is not the first preacher who has been in debt; but he is the first one on re- cord who ever had eighteen trotting stallions in his stables when the sheriff came around to make a seizure.— New Orleans Picayune, A. MAN who isn’t sea-sick on a propeller in a heavy sea could stand being barreled up and rolled up and down hill all day on the Fourth of July, to please people from the country.— Detroit Free Press. A tapy in Cincinnati attempted to commit suicide because she could not master the Italian language. It does seem hard that the young ladies of America cannot be placed on an equal footing with organ-grinders.— Detroit Free £55. Tue author whose productions are usually published through the waste-basket, generally writes upon tinted paper; Pope, Shakspere, G. F. Train, and other great authors of the past, wrote on any scrap that came to hand.— Rochester Express. “A pretty style of hair-dressing for the morning,” says a fashionable journal, “is to wave all the hair.” We agree with the above. In the morning it is not only a pretty but a useful fashion for women to snatch their hair off the back of the chair, where it has re- posed during the night, and wave it around the room to chase out the flies.— Phila, Kronikle- ‘ Herald, comicbooks.com