diff --git a/src/epub/css/local.css b/src/epub/css/local.css index bd01131..8de7368 100644 --- a/src/epub/css/local.css +++ b/src/epub/css/local.css @@ -42,7 +42,7 @@ abbr.era{ font-style: italic; } -section > header [epub|type~="epigraph"]{ +article > header [epub|type~="epigraph"]{ display: inline-block; margin: auto; max-width: 80%; @@ -50,7 +50,7 @@ section > header [epub|type~="epigraph"]{ } @supports(display: table){ - section > header [epub|type~="epigraph"]{ + article > header [epub|type~="epigraph"]{ display: table; } } diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-bird-of-bagdad.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-bird-of-bagdad.xhtml index 0a49abe..4b14019 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-bird-of-bagdad.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-bird-of-bagdad.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Bird of Bagdad

Without a doubt much of the spirit and genius of the Caliph Harun Al Rashid descended to the Margrave August Michael von Paulsen Quigg.

Quigg’s restaurant is in Fourth Avenue⁠—that street that the city seems to have forgotten in its growth. Fourth Avenue⁠—born and bred in the Bowery⁠—staggers northward full of good resolutions.

@@ -61,6 +61,6 @@

Simmons looked up with a flashing eye.

“A dead one!” said he.

“Goot!” roared Hildebrant, rocking the table with giant glee. “Dot is right! You gome at mine house at 8 o’clock to der party.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-blackjack-bargainer.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-blackjack-bargainer.xhtml index 909087e..b105fa7 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-blackjack-bargainer.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-blackjack-bargainer.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Blackjack Bargainer

The most disreputable thing in Yancey Goree’s law office was Goree himself, sprawled in his creaky old armchair. The rickety little office, built of red brick, was set flush with the street⁠—the main street of the town of Bethel.

Bethel rested upon the foothills of the Blue Ridge. Above it the mountains were piled to the sky. Far below it the turbid Catawba gleamed yellow along its disconsolate valley.

@@ -111,6 +111,6 @@

Goree leaned heavily against Coltrane, but he did not fall. The horses kept pace, side by side, and the Colonel’s arm kept him steady. The little white houses of Laurel shone through the trees, half a mile away. Goree reached out one hand and groped until it rested upon Coltrane’s fingers, which held his bridle.

“Good friend,” he said, and that was all.

Thus did Yancey Goree, as he rode past his old home, make, considering all things, the best showing that was in his power.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-call-loan.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-call-loan.xhtml index 4100452..6b1ef13 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-call-loan.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-call-loan.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Call Loan

In those days the cattlemen were the anointed. They were the grandees of the grass, kings of the kine, lords of the lea, barons of beef and bone. They might have ridden in golden chariots had their tastes so inclined. The cattleman was caught in a stampede of dollars. It seemed to him that he had more money than was decent. But when he had bought a watch with precious stones set in the case so large that they hurt his ribs, and a California saddle with silver nails and Angora skin suaderos, and ordered everybody up to the bar for whisky⁠—what else was there for him to spend money for?

Not so circumscribed in expedient for the reduction of surplus wealth were those lairds of the lariat who had womenfolk to their name. In the breast of the rib-sprung sex the genius of purse lightening may slumber through years of inopportunity, but never, my brothers, does it become extinct.

@@ -54,6 +54,6 @@

They were at the door of Merwin’s house. He kicked it open and fell over an old valise lying in the middle of the floor. A sunburned, firm-jawed youth, stained by travel, lay upon the bed puffing at a brown cigarette.

“What’s the word, Ed?” gasped Merwin.

“So, so,” drawled that capable youngster. “Just got in on the 9:30. Sold the bunch for fifteen, straight. Now, buddy, you want to quit kickin’ a valise around that’s got $29,000 in greenbacks in its in’ards.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-chaparral-christmas-gift.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-chaparral-christmas-gift.xhtml index f46a8b7..cf0f602 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-chaparral-christmas-gift.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-chaparral-christmas-gift.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Chaparral Christmas Gift

The original cause of the trouble was about twenty years in growing.

At the end of that time it was worth it.

@@ -58,6 +58,6 @@

“Well, the Frio Kid’s got his dose of lead at last,” he remarked to the postmaster.

“That so? How’d it happen?”

“One of old Sanchez’s Mexican sheep herders did it!⁠—think of it! the Frio Kid killed by a sheep herder! The Greaser saw him riding along past his camp about twelve o’clock last night, and was so skeered that he up with a Winchester and let him have it. Funniest part of it was that the Kid was dressed all up with white Angora-skin whiskers and a regular Santy Claus rig-out from head to foot. Think of the Frio Kid playing Santy!”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-chaparral-prince.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-chaparral-prince.xhtml index 6922802..d4a60ab 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-chaparral-prince.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-chaparral-prince.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Chaparral Prince

Nine o’clock at last, and the drudging toil of the day was ended. Lena climbed to her room in the third half-story of the Quarrymen’s Hotel. Since daylight she had slaved, doing the work of a full-grown woman, scrubbing the floors, washing the heavy ironstone plates and cups, making the beds, and supplying the insatiate demands for wood and water in that turbulent and depressing hostelry.

The din of the day’s quarrying was over⁠—the blasting and drilling, the creaking of the great cranes, the shouts of the foremen, the backing and shifting of the flatcars hauling the heavy blocks of limestone. Down in the hotel office three or four of the labourers were growling and swearing over a belated game of checkers. Heavy odours of stewed meat, hot grease, and cheap coffee hung like a depressing fog about the house.

@@ -80,6 +80,6 @@

“Rubbish!” cried Fritz Bergmann. “Fairy tales! How did you come from the quarries to my wagon?”

“The Prince brought me,” said Lena, confidently.

And to this day the good people of Fredericksburg haven’t been able to make her give any other explanation.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-cheering-thought.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-cheering-thought.xhtml index 67087d5..6c7715c 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-cheering-thought.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-cheering-thought.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Cheering Thought

A weary-looking man with dejected auburn whiskers, walked into the police station yesterday afternoon and said to the officer in charge:

“I want to give myself up. I expect you had better handcuff me and put me into a real dark cell where there are plenty of spiders and mice. I’m one of the worst men you ever saw, and I waive trial. Please tell the jailer to give me moldy bread to eat, and hydrant water with plenty of sulphur in it.”

@@ -20,6 +20,6 @@

“Durned if I believe he was, now I remember about that neighbor of mine,” said the penitent, beginning to brighten up. “You don’t know what a weight you’ve taken off my mind. I was just feeling like I was one of the worst sinners in the world. I’ll bet any man ten dollars he was talking right straight at that miserable, contemptible scalawag that sat right behind me. Say, come on and let’s go out and take somethin’, will you?”

The officer declined and the weary-looking man ran his finger down his neck and pulled his collar up into sight and said:

“I’ll never forget your kindness, sir, in helping me out of this worry. It has made me feel bad all day. I am going out to the racetrack now, and take the field against the favorite for a few plunks. Good day, I shall always remember your kindness.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-christmas-pi.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-christmas-pi.xhtml index f145c1d..1422bf1 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-christmas-pi.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-christmas-pi.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Christmas Pi

I am not without claim to distinction. Although I still stick to suspenders⁠—which, happily, reciprocate⁠—I am negatively egregious. I have never, for instance, seen a professional baseball game, never said that George M. Cohan was “clever,” never started to keep a diary, never called Eugene Walter by his first name, never parodied “The Raven,” never written a Christmas story, never⁠—but what denizen of Never-Never Land can boast so much? Or would, I overhear you think, if he could?

Always have I been on the lookout for the Impossible, always on the trail of the Unattainable. Someday, perhaps, I shall find a sleeping-car with a name that means something, an intelligent West Indian hallboy in a New York apartment building, a boardinghouse whose inmates occasionally smile, a man born in Manhattan, a 60-cent table d’hôte that serves six oysters the portion instead of four, a Southerner who leaves you in doubt as to his birthplace longer than ten minutes after the introduction, and myself writing a Christmas story. But that will happen ten days after the millennium, and as the millennium is to be magazineless⁠—

@@ -21,6 +21,6 @@

“Nothing of the kind,” I contradicted. “People don’t try to steal diamonds on a crowded street for any such purpose. I’m not a detective, as you might know by my guessing so correctly.”

“Well,” he laughed, pulling out a bill and giving it to the waiter for the check; “it’s a good joke and I’ll let you in, though you can’t appreciate it. I thought if I hurled that brick in I’d get arrested quick and be sent to a cell or over on the island or something like that. You see, I’m a magazine writer and I wanted to get a real story⁠—‘Yuletide on the Island’ or something. What’s your line, spoiler of a good story?”

“I?” I said. “My name is John Horner, and I’m a plumber.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-comedy-in-rubber.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-comedy-in-rubber.xhtml index 41401fa..15abd15 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-comedy-in-rubber.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-comedy-in-rubber.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Comedy in Rubber

One may hope, in spite of the metaphorists, to avoid the breath of the deadly upas tree; one may, by great good fortune, succeed in blacking the eye of the basilisk; one might even dodge the attentions of Cerberus and Argus, but no man, alive or dead, can escape the gaze of the Rubberer.

New York is the Caoutchouc City. There are many, of course, who go their ways, making money, without turning to the right or the left, but there is a tribe abroad wonderfully composed, like the Martians, solely of eyes and means of locomotion.

@@ -34,6 +34,6 @@

But the hour for the wedding came and went, and the bride and bridegroom came not. And impatience gave way to alarm and alarm brought about search, and they were not found. And then two big policemen took a hand and dragged out of the furious mob of onlookers a crushed and trampled thing, with a wedding ring in its vest pocket and a shredded and hysterical woman beating her way to the carpet’s edge, ragged, bruised and obstreperous.

William Pry and Violet Seymour, creatures of habit, had joined in the seething game of the spectators, unable to resist the overwhelming desire to gaze upon themselves entering, as bride and bridegroom, the rose-decked church.

Rubber will out.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-conditional-pardon.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-conditional-pardon.xhtml index d604862..5c4d5a8 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-conditional-pardon.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-conditional-pardon.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Conditional Pardon

The runaway couple had just returned, and she knelt at the old man’s feet and begged forgiveness.

“Yes, forgive us,” cried the newly wedded husband. “Forgive me for taking her away from you, but see, I have brought her back.”

@@ -17,6 +17,6 @@

A careful inquiry has revealed the fact that Samson was the first man who rushed the growler.

Better blow your own horn than one you haven’t paid for.

If your rye offend you, buy a better quality.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-cosmopolite-in-a-cafe.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-cosmopolite-in-a-cafe.xhtml index 7110345..50e7abc 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-cosmopolite-in-a-cafe.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-cosmopolite-in-a-cafe.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Cosmopolite in a Café

At midnight the café was crowded. By some chance the little table at which I sat had escaped the eye of incomers, and two vacant chairs at it extended their arms with venal hospitality to the influx of patrons.

And then a cosmopolite sat in one of them, and I was glad, for I held a theory that since Adam no true citizen of the world has existed. We hear of them, and we see foreign labels on much luggage, but we find travellers instead of cosmopolites.

@@ -39,6 +39,6 @@

“The man with the red tie” (that was my cosmopolite), said he, “got hot on account of things said about the bum sidewalks and water supply of the place he come from by the other guy.”

“Why,” said I, bewildered, “that man is a citizen of the world⁠—a cosmopolite. He⁠—”

“Originally from Mattawamkeag, Maine, he said,” continued McCarthy, “and he wouldn’t stand for no knockin’ the place.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-departmental-case.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-departmental-case.xhtml index d2451c6..3d56818 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-departmental-case.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-departmental-case.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Departmental Case

In Texas you may travel a thousand miles in a straight line. If your course is a crooked one, it is likely that both the distance and your rate of speed may be vastly increased. Clouds there sail serenely against the wind. The whip-poor-will delivers its disconsolate cry with the notes exactly reversed from those of his Northern brother. Given a drought and a subsequently lively rain, and lo! from a glazed and stony soil will spring in a single night blossomed lilies, miraculously fair. Tom Green County was once the standard of measurement. I have forgotten how many New Jerseys and Rhode Islands it was that could have been stowed away and lost in its chaparral. But the legislative axe has slashed Tom Green into a handful of counties hardly larger than European kingdoms. The legislature convenes at Austin, near the centre of the state; and, while the representative from the Rio Grande country is gathering his palm-leaf fan and his linen duster to set out for the capital, the Panhandle solon winds his muffler above his well-buttoned overcoat and kicks the snow from his well-greased boots ready for the same journey. All this merely to hint that the big ex-republic of the Southwest forms a sizable star on the flag, and to prepare for the corollary that things sometimes happen there uncut to pattern and unfettered by metes and bounds.

The Commissioner of Insurance, Statistics, and History of the State of Texas was an official of no very great or very small importance. The past tense is used, for now he is Commissioner of Insurance alone. Statistics and history are no longer proper nouns in the government records.

@@ -93,6 +93,6 @@

Mrs. Sharp soon rose to depart. She had arranged to remain in town until the policy was paid. The commissioner did not detain her. She was a woman, and he did not know just what to say to her at present. Rest and time would bring her what she needed.

But, as she was leaving, Luke Standifer indulged himself in an official remark:

“The Department of Insurance, Statistics, and History, ma’am, has done the best it could with your case. ’Twas a case hard to cover according to red tape. Statistics failed, and History missed fire, but, if I may be permitted to say it, we came out particularly strong on Insurance.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-dinner-at-.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-dinner-at-.xhtml index ba5829b..4a94cfc 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-dinner-at-.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-dinner-at-.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Dinner at ⸻3

@@ -94,6 +94,6 @@

The Editors

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-disagreement.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-disagreement.xhtml index a1e704b..443b9c8 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-disagreement.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-disagreement.xhtml @@ -6,9 +6,9 @@ -
+

A Disagreement

“Dat Mr. Bergman, vot run de obera house, not dread me right,” said a Houston citizen. “Ven I go dere und vant ein dicket to see dot ‘Schpider und dot Vly’ gompany de oder night, I asg him dot he let me in mit half brice, for I was teaf py von ear, and can not but one half of dot performance hear; und he dell me I should bay double brice, as it vould dake me dwice as long to hear de berformance as anypody else.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-double-dyed-deceiver.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-double-dyed-deceiver.xhtml index e7747b1..4db9972 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-double-dyed-deceiver.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-double-dyed-deceiver.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Double-Dyed Deceiver

The trouble began in Laredo. It was the Llano Kid’s fault, for he should have confined his habit of manslaughter to Mexicans. But the Kid was past twenty; and to have only Mexicans to one’s credit at twenty is to blush unseen on the Rio Grande border.

It happened in old Justo Valdos’s gambling house. There was a poker game at which sat players who were not all friends, as happens often where men ride in from afar to shoot Folly as she gallops. There was a row over so small a matter as a pair of queens; and when the smoke had cleared away it was found that the Kid had committed an indiscretion, and his adversary had been guilty of a blunder. For, the unfortunate combatant, instead of being a Greaser, was a high-blooded youth from the cow ranches, of about the Kid’s own age and possessed of friends and champions. His blunder in missing the Kid’s right ear only a sixteenth of an inch when he pulled his gun did not lessen the indiscretion of the better marksman.

@@ -111,6 +111,6 @@

Outside, the ancient landau of Don Santos Urique rattled to the door. The coachman ceased his bellowing. Señora Urique, in a voluminous gay gown of white lace and flying ribbons, leaned forward with a happy look in her great soft eyes.

“Are you within, dear son?” she called, in the rippling Castilian.

“Madre mia, yo vengo [mother, I come],” answered the young Don Francisco Urique.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-fatal-error.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-fatal-error.xhtml index 06fa717..3eaa639 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-fatal-error.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-fatal-error.xhtml @@ -6,12 +6,12 @@ -
+

A Fatal Error

“What are you looking so glum about?” asked a Houston man as he dropped into a friend’s office on Christmas Day.

“Same old fool break of putting a letter in the wrong envelope, and I’m afraid to go home. My wife sent me down a note by the hired man an hour ago, telling me to send her ten dollars, and asking me to meet her here at the office at three o’clock and go shopping with her. At the same time I got a bill for ten dollars from a merchant I owe, asking me to remit. I scribbled off a note to the merchant saying: ‘Can’t possibly do it. I’ve got to meet another little thing today that won’t be put off.’ I made the usual mistake and sent the merchant the ten dollars and my wife the note.”

“Can’t you go home and explain the mistake to your wife?”

“You don’t know her. I’ve done all I can. I’ve taken out an accident policy for $10,000 good for two hours, and I expect her here in fifteen minutes. Tell all the boys goodbye for me, and if you meet a lady on the stairs as you go down keep close to the wall.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-fog-in-santone.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-fog-in-santone.xhtml index a536eb2..cab6628 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-fog-in-santone.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-fog-in-santone.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Fog in Santone

The drug clerk looks sharply at the white face half concealed by the high-turned overcoat collar.

“I would rather not supply you,” he said doubtfully. “I sold you a dozen morphine tablets less than an hour ago.”

@@ -85,6 +85,6 @@

“Purest atmosphere⁠—in the world⁠—litmus paper all long⁠—nothing hurtful⁠—our city⁠—nothing but pure ozone.”

The waiter returns for the tray and glasses. As he enters, the girl crushes a little empty pasteboard box in her hand and throws it in a corner. She is stirring something in her glass with her hatpin.

“Why, Miss Rosa,” says the waiter with the civil familiarity he uses⁠—“putting salt in your beer this early in the night!”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-ghost-of-a-chance.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-ghost-of-a-chance.xhtml index 43bdbd4..bbe1e26 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-ghost-of-a-chance.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-ghost-of-a-chance.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Ghost of a Chance

“Actually, a hod!” repeated Mrs. Kinsolving, pathetically.

Mrs. Bellamy Bellmore arched a sympathetic eyebrow. Thus she expressed condolence and a generous amount of apparent surprise.

@@ -70,6 +70,6 @@

“And look about, Brooks,” added Terence, a little anxiously, “for a silk handkerchief with my initials in one corner. I must have dropped it somewhere.”

It was a month later when Mrs. Bellmore and one or two others of the smart crowd were making up a list of names for a coaching trip through the Catskills. Mrs. Bellmore looked over the list for a final censoring. The name of Terence Kinsolving was there. Mrs. Bellmore ran her prohibitive pencil lightly through the name.

“Too shy!” she murmured, sweetly, in explanation.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-good-story-spoiled.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-good-story-spoiled.xhtml index 3339075..76adf43 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-good-story-spoiled.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-good-story-spoiled.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Good Story Spoiled

Few nights ago in a rather tough saloon in a little town on the Central Railroad, a big, strapping desperado, who had an unenviable reputation as a bad man generally, walked up to the bar and in a loud voice ordered everybody in the saloon to walk up and take a drink. The crowd moved quickly to the bar at his invitation, as the man was half drunk and was undoubtedly dangerous when in that condition.

One man alone failed to accept the invitation. He was a rather small man, neatly dressed, who sat calmly in his chair, gazing idly at the crowd. A student of physiognomy would have been attracted by the expression of his face, which was one of cool determination and force of will. His jaw was square and firm, and his eye gray and steady, with that peculiar gray glint in the iris that presages more danger than any other kind of optic.

@@ -15,6 +15,6 @@

The small man rose to his feet and walked coolly toward the desperado.

“Excuse me,” he said in a low but determined tone, “I’m a little deaf and didn’t hear you the first time. Gimme whisky straight.”

And another story was spoiled for the papers.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-green-hand.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-green-hand.xhtml index c4155f6..fa7af35 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-green-hand.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-green-hand.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Green Hand

“I shall never again employ any but experienced salesmen, who thoroughly understand the jewelry business,” said a Houston jeweler to a friend yesterday.

“You see, at Christmas time we generally need more help, and sometimes employ people who can sell goods, but are not familiar with the fine points of the business. Now, that young man over there is thoroughly good and polite to everyone, but he has just lost me one of my best customers.”

@@ -14,6 +14,6 @@

“A man who always trades with us came in with his wife last week and with her assistance selected a magnificent diamond pin that he had promised her for a Christmas present and told this young man to lay it aside for him till today.”

“I see,” said the friend, “and he sold it to someone else and disappointed him.”

“It’s plain you don’t know much about married men,” said the jeweler. “That idiot of a clerk actually saved the pin for him and he had to buy it.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-guarded-secret.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-guarded-secret.xhtml index b8ca418..adcffa1 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-guarded-secret.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-guarded-secret.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Guarded Secret

It is time to call a halt upon the persistent spreaders of the alleged joke that a woman can not keep a secret. No baser ingratitude has been shown by man toward the fair sex than the promulgation of this false report. Whenever a would-be humorous man makes use of this antiquated chestnut which his fellow men feel in duty bound to applaud, the face of the woman takes on a strange, inscrutable, pitying smile that few men ever read.

The truth is that it is only woman who can keep a secret. Only a divine intelligence can understand the marvelous power with which ninety-nine married women out of a hundred successfully hide from the rest of the world the secret that they have bound themselves to something unworthy of the pure and sacrificing love they have given them. She may whisper to her neighbor that Mrs. Jones has turned her old silk dress twice, but if she has in her breast anything affecting one she loves, the gods themselves could not drag it from her.

@@ -15,6 +15,6 @@

Adam’s conduct would have caused his name to be stricken from the list of every decent club in the country. And since that day, woman has stood by man, faithful, true, and ready to give up all for his sake. She hides his puny peccadilloes from the world, she glosses over his wretched misdemeanors, and she keeps silent when a word would pierce his inflated greatness and leave him a shriveled and shrunken rag.

And man says that woman can not keep a secret!

Let him be thankful that she can, or his littleness would be proclaimed from the housetops.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-guess-proof-mystery-story.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-guess-proof-mystery-story.xhtml index 509276e..464a3dc 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-guess-proof-mystery-story.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-guess-proof-mystery-story.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Guess-Proof Mystery Story

The most popular and recent advertising dodge in literature is the Grand Guess Contest Mystery Story. Everybody is invited to guess how the story will end, at any time before the last chapter is published, and incidentally to buy a paper or subscribe. It is the easiest thing in the world to write a story of mystery that will defy the most ingenious guessers in the country.

To prove it, here is one that we offer $10,000 to any man and $15,000 to any woman who guesses the mystery before the last chapter.

@@ -35,6 +35,6 @@

Chapter V

The footsteps prove to be those of Thomas R. Hefflebomer of Washington Territory, who introduces positive proof of having murdered the judge during a fit of mental aberration, and Mabel marries a man named Tompkins, whom she met two years later at Hot Springs.

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A Harlem Tragedy

Harlem.

Mrs. Fink had dropped into Mrs. Cassidy’s flat one flight below.

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“Tell me, Maggie,” pleaded Mame, “or I’ll go in there and find out. What was it? Did he hurt you⁠—what did he do?”

Mrs. Fink’s face went down again despairingly on the bosom of her friend.

“For God’s sake don’t open that door, Mame,” she sobbed. “And don’t ever tell nobody⁠—keep it under your hat. He⁠—he never touched me, and⁠—he’s⁠—oh, Gawd⁠—he’s washin’ the clothes⁠—he’s washin’ the clothes!”

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A Houston Romance

About two years ago one of the most popular young society men in Houston mysteriously disappeared. He had been the glass of fashion and the mold of form of the Magnolia City for several years. Especially was he noted for his exquisite and fashionable dress, and he was regarded as the leader in bringing out the latest and correct styles of clothing. No one in Houston ever saw a wrinkle in his elegantly fitting clothes, or a spot upon his snowy linen. He possessed sufficient means to enable him to devote his whole time to society and the art of dress, and in his whole bearing and manners was well nigh equal to the famous Beau Brummel.

About a year ago it was noticed that he was beginning to grow preoccupied and reserved. His gay and gallant manner was as Chesterfieldian as ever, but he was becoming more silent and moody, and there seemed to be something weighing upon his mind. Suddenly, without a word of farewell, he disappeared, and no traces of him could be discovered. He left a good balance in the bank to his credit, and society racked its brains to conjecture some reason for his mysterious disappearance. He had no relatives in Houston, and with proverbial fickleness his acquaintances and butterfly friends soon allowed him to pass from their minds.

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“In heaven’s name,” said his friend, “what brought you here to bury yourself forever from the world; why did you leave your friends and pleasures to pass your days in this dreary place?”

“Listen,” said the monk, “and I will tell you. I am now supremely and ecstatically happy. I have attained the goal of my desires. Look at this robe.” He glanced proudly at the dark, severe robe that swept downward from his waist in graceful folds.

“I am one man,” he continued, “who has arrived at the fruition of his dearest earthly hopes. I have got something on at least that will not bag at the knees.”

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A Lickpenny Lover

There, were 3,000 girls in the Biggest Store. Masie was one of them. She was eighteen and a saleslady in the gents’ gloves. Here she became versed in two varieties of human beings⁠—the kind of gents who buy their gloves in department stores and the kind of women who buy gloves for unfortunate gents. Besides this wide knowledge of the human species, Masie had acquired other information. She had listened to the promulgated wisdom of the 2,999 other girls and had stored it in a brain that was as secretive and wary as that of a Maltese cat. Perhaps nature, foreseeing that she would lack wise counsellors, had mingled the saving ingredient of shrewdness along with her beauty, as she has endowed the silver fox of the priceless fur above the other animals with cunning.

For Masie was beautiful. She was a deep-tinted blonde, with the calm poise of a lady who cooks butter cakes in a window. She stood behind her counter in the Biggest Store; and as you closed your hand over the tapeline for your glove measure you thought of Hebe; and as you looked again you wondered how she had come by Minerva’s eyes.

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“Oh, him?” said Masie, patting her side curls. “He ain’t in it any more. Say, Lu, what do you think that fellow wanted me to do?”

“Go on the stage?” guessed Lulu, breathlessly.

“Nit; he’s too cheap a guy for that. He wanted me to marry him and go down to Coney Island for a wedding tour!”

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A Little Local Colour

I mentioned to Rivington that I was in search of characteristic New York scenes and incidents⁠—something typical, I told him, without necessarily having to spell the first syllable with an “i.”

“Oh, for your writing business,” said Rivington; “you couldn’t have applied to a better shop. What I don’t know about little old New York wouldn’t make a sonnet to a sunbonnet. I’ll put you right in the middle of so much local colour that you won’t know whether you are a magazine cover or in the erysipelas ward. When do you want to begin?”

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We said our farewells and boarded a home-bound car. We had a rabbit on upper Broadway, and then I parted with Rivington on a street corner.

“Well, anyhow,” said he, braced and recovered, “it couldn’t have happened anywhere but in little old New York.”

Which to say the least, was typical of Rivington.

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A Little Talk About Mobs

“I see,” remarked the tall gentleman in the frock coat and black slouch hat, “that another street car motorman in your city has narrowly excaped lynching at the hands of an infuriated mob by lighting a cigar and walking a couple of blocks down the street.”

“Do you think they would have lynched him?” asked the New Yorker, in the next seat of the ferry station, who was also waiting for the boat.

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“No, sir, I am not. No intelligent man is. But, sir, there are certain cases when people rise in their just majesty and take a righteous vengeance for crimes that the law is slow in punishing. I am an advocate of law and order, but I will say to you that less than six months ago I myself assisted at the lynching of one of that race that is creating a wide chasm between your section of country and mine, sir.”

“It is a deplorable condition,” said the New Yorker, “that exists in the South, but⁠—”

“I am from Indiana, sir,” said the tall man, taking another chew; “and I don’t think you will condemn my course when I tell you that the colored man in question had stolen $9.60 in cash, sir, from my own brother.”

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A Lunar Episode

The scene was one of supernatural weirdness. Tall, fantastic mountains reared their seamed peaks over a dreary waste of igneous rock and burned-out lava beds. Deep lakes of black water stood motionless as glass under frowning, honeycombed crags, from which ever and anon dropped crumbled masses with a sullen plunge. Vegetation there was none. Bitter cold reigned and ridges of black and shapeless rocks cut the horizon on all sides. An extinct volcano loomed against a purple sky, black as night and old as the world.

The firmament was studded with immense stars that shone with a wan and spectral light. Orion’s belt hung high above.

@@ -17,6 +17,6 @@

At length one prevailed. He seized his opponent, and raising him high above his head, hurled him into space.

The vanquished combatant shot through the air like a stone from a catapult in the direction of the luminous earth.

“That’s three of ’em this week,” said the Man in the Moon as he lit a cigarette and turned back into the house. “Those New York interviewers are going to make me tired if they keep this thing up much longer.”

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A Madison Square Arabian Night

To Carson Chalmers, in his apartment near the square, Phillips brought the evening mail. Beside the routine correspondence there were two items bearing the same foreign postmark.

One of the incoming parcels contained a photograph of a woman. The other contained an interminable letter, over which Chalmers hung, absorbed, for a long time. The letter was from another woman; and it contained poisoned barbs, sweetly dipped in honey, and feathered with innuendoes concerning the photographed woman.

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“The face, man⁠—the subject⁠—the original⁠—what would you say of that?”

“The face,” said Reineman, “is the face of one of God’s own angels. May I ask who⁠—”

“My wife!” shouted Chalmers, wheeling and pouncing upon the astonished artist, gripping his hand and pounding his back. “She is traveling in Europe. Take that sketch, boy, and paint the picture of your life from it and leave the price to me.”

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A Matter of Loyalty

Two men were talking at the Grand Central depot yesterday, and one of them was telling about a difficulty he had recently been engaged in.

“He said I was the biggest liar ever heard in Texas,” said the man, “and I jumped on him and blacked both his eyes in about a minute.”

“That’s right,” said the other man, “a man ought to resent an imputation of that sort right away.”

“It wasn’t exactly that,” said the first speaker, “but Tom Achiltree is a second cousin of mine, and I won’t stand by and hear any man belittle him.”

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A Matter of Mean Elevation

One winter the Alcazar Opera Company of New Orleans made a speculative trip along the Mexican, Central American and South American coasts. The venture proved a most successful one. The music-loving, impressionable Spanish-Americans deluged the company with dollars and “vivas.” The manager waxed plump and amiable. But for the prohibitive climate he would have put forth the distinctive flower of his prosperity⁠—the overcoat of fur, braided, frogged and opulent. Almost was he persuaded to raise the salaries of his company. But with a mighty effort he conquered the impulse toward such an unprofitable effervescence of joy.

At Macuto, on the coast of Venezuela, the company scored its greatest success. Imagine Coney Island translated into Spanish and you will comprehend Macuto. The fashionable season is from November to March. Down from La Guayra and Caracas and Valencia and other interior towns flock the people for their holiday season. There are bathing and fiestas and bull fights and scandal. And then the people have a passion for music that the bands in the plaza and on the sea beach stir but do not satisfy. The coming of the Alcazar Opera Company aroused the utmost ardour and zeal among the pleasure seekers.

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“Thank you,” said Armstrong; “not just now, I believe. I’ve several things to attend to.”

He walked out and down the street, and met Rucker coming up from the Consulate.

“Play you a game of billiards,” said Armstrong. “I want something to take the taste of the sea level out of my mouth.”

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A Midsummer Knight’s Dream

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The man who said he thought New York the finest summer resort in the country dropped into a café on his way home and had a glass of beer under an electric fan.

“Wonder what kind of a fly old Harding used,” he said to himself.

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A Midsummer Masquerade

“Satan,” said Jeff Peters, “is a hard boss to work for. When other people are having their vacation is when he keeps you the busiest. As old Dr. Watts or St. Paul or some other diagnostician says: ‘He always finds somebody for idle hands to do.’

“I remember one summer when me and my partner, Andy Tucker, tried to take a layoff from our professional and business duties; but it seems that our work followed us wherever we went.

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“ ‘The Duchess shook me,’ he cries out, and slides out of the chair and weeps on the porch.

“Well, of course, that fixed the scheme. The women boarders all left the next morning. The landlord wouldn’t speak to us for two days, but when he found we had money to pay our way he loosened up.

“So me and Andy had a quiet, restful summer after all, coming away from Crow Knob with $1,100, that we enticed out of old Smoke-’em-out playing seven up.”

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A Municipal Report

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I wonder what’s doing in Buffalo!

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A Mystery of Many Centuries

Up to a few years ago man regarded the means of locomotion possessed by the fair sex as a sacred areanum into which it were desecration to inquire.

The bicycle costume has developed the fact that there are two⁠—well, that there are two. Whereas man bowed down and worshipped what he could not understand nor see, when the veil of mystery was rent, his reverence departed. For generations woman has been supposed in moving from one place to another to simply get there. Whether borne like Venus in an invisible car drawn by two milk white doves, or wafted imperceptibly by the force of her own sweet will, admiring man did not pause to consider. He only knew that there was a soft rustle of unseen drapery, an entrancing frou-frou of something agitated but unknown and the lovely beings would be standing on another spot. Whereat he wondered, adoring, but uninquisitive. At times beneath the lace-hemmed snowy skirts might be seen the toe of a tiny slipper, and perhaps the gleam of a silver buckle upon the arch of an instep, but thence imagination retired, baffled, but enthralled. In olden times the sweetest singers among the poets sang to their lutes of those Lilliputian members, and romance struck a lofty note when it wove the deathless legend of Cinderella and the slipper of glass. Courtiers have held aloft the silken slipper of the adored one filled with champagne and drank her health. Where is the bicyclist hero who would undertake the task of draining to the good health of his lady love her bicycle gaiter filled with beer?

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The other, day the Post Man saw a nice, clean-minded old gentleman, who is of the old school of cavaliers, and who is loath to see woman come down from the pedestal on which he has always viewed her.

He was watching a lady bicycle rider go by. The Post Man asked him what he thought.

“I never see a lady on a bicycle,” said he, “but I am reminded of God, for they certainly move in a mysterious way their wonders to perform.”

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A Narrow Escape

A meek-looking man, with one eye and a timid, shuffling gait, entered a Houston saloon while no one was in except the bartender, and said:

“Excuse me, sir, but would you permit me to step behind the bar for just a moment? You can keep your eye on me. There is something there I wanted to look at.”

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“Yes, sir, I am feeling a little out of sorts today, and it always makes me real cross and impatient when I get that way. A little gin and bitters always helps me. It was six times, I think, that I fired, the time I was telling you about. Straight whisky would do if the gin is out.”

“If I had any fly paper,” said the bartender, sweetly, “I would stick you on it and set you in the back window; but I am out, consequently, I shall have to adopt harsher measures. I shall tie a knot in this towel, and then count ten, and walk around the end of the bar. That will give you time to do your shooting, and I’ll see that you let out that same old yell that you spoke of.”

“Wait a moment,” said the meek man. “Come to think of it, my doctor ordered me not to drink anything for six weeks. But you had a narrow escape all the same. I think I shall go down to the next drug store and fall in a fit on the sidewalk. That’s good for some peppermint and aromatic spirits of ammonia, anyhow.”

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A New Microbe

There is a Houston man who is a great lover of science and an ardent student of her mysteries. He has a small laboratory fitted up at home and spends a great deal of his time in experimenting with chemicals and analyzing different substances.

Of late he has been much interested in various germ theories, and has somewhat neglected his business to read Pasteur’s and Koch’s writings, and everything he could procure relating to sundry kinds of bacilli.

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“Funny little round things, ain’t they?” she said. “Are they injurious to the system?”

“Sure death. Get one of ’em in your alimentary canal and you’re a goner. I’m going to write to the London Lancet and the New York Academy of Sciences tonight. What shall we call ’em, Ellen? Let’s see⁠—Ellenobes, or Ellenites, or what?”

“Oh, John, you wretch!” shrieked his wife, as she caught sight of the tin bucket on the table. “You’ve got my bucket of Galveston oysters that I bought to take to the church supper! Microbes, indeed!”

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A Newspaper Story

At 8 a.m. it lay on Giuseppi’s newsstand, still damp from the presses. Giuseppi, with the cunning of his ilk, philandered on the opposite corner, leaving his patrons to help themselves, no doubt on a theory related to the hypothesis of the watched pot.

This particular newspaper was, according to its custom and design, an educator, a guide, a monitor, a champion and a household counsellor and vade mecum.

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The remaining leaves of the active journal also went loyally to the proving of its potency.

When Johnny returned from school he sought a secluded spot and removed the missing columns from the inside of his clothing, where they had been artfully distributed so as to successfully defend such areas as are generally attacked during scholastic castigations. Johnny attended a private school and had had trouble with his teacher. As has been said, there was an excellent editorial against corporal punishment in that morning’s issue, and no doubt it had its effect.

After this can anyone doubt the power of the press?

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A Night Errant

One of the greatest of books is the daily life around us. All that the human mind can conceive; all that the human heart can feel, and the lips tell are encompassed in the little world about us. He that beholds with understanding eyes can see beneath the thin veil of the commonplace, the romance, the tragedy and the broad comedy that is being played upon the world’s stage by the actors great and little who tread the boards of the Theater of the Universe.

Life is neither tragedy nor comedy. It is a mingling of both. High above us omnipotent hands pull the strings that choke our laughter with sobs and cause strange sounds of mirth to break in upon our deepest grief. We are marionettes that dance and cry, scarce at our own wills; and at the end, the flaring lights are out, we are laid to rest in our wooden boxes, and down comes the dark night to cover the scene of our brief triumph.

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“Dat man what left de stuff, mammy, he couldn’t have been God, for God don’t get full; but if it wasn’t him, mammy, I bet a dollar he was Dan Stuart.”

As the Post Man trudges back along the dark road to the city, he says to himself:

“We have seen tonight good springing up where we would never have looked for it, and something of a mystery all the way from Alabama. Heigho! this is a funny little world.”

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A Night in New Arabia

The great city of Bagdad-on-the-Subway is caliph-ridden. Its palaces, bazaars, khans, and byways are thronged with Al Rashids in divers disguises, seeking diversion and victims for their unbridled generosity. You can scarcely find a poor beggar whom they are willing to let enjoy his spoils unsuccored, nor a wrecked unfortunate upon whom they will not reshower the means of fresh misfortune. You will hardly find anywhere a hungry one who has not had the opportunity to tighten his belt in gift libraries, nor a poor pundit who has not blushed at the holiday basket of celery-crowned turkey forced resoundingly through his door by the eleemosynary press.

So then, fearfully through the Harun-haunted streets creep the one-eyed calenders, the Little Hunchback and the Barber’s Sixth Brother, hoping to escape the ministrations of the roving horde of caliphoid sultans.

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“Better make that vinegar raise three cents instead of two. I’ll be back in an hour and sign the letters.”

The true history of the Caliph Harun Al Rashid relates that toward the end of his reign he wearied of philanthropy, and caused to be beheaded all his former favorites and companions of his “Arabian Nights” rambles. Happy are we in these days of enlightenment, when the only death warrant the caliphs can serve on us is in the form of a tradesman’s bill.

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A Pastel

Above all hangs the dreadful night.

He pleads with her.

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He pleads with her.

At last she turns, conquered.

He has refused to treat to oysters.

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A Personal Insult

Young lady in Houston became engaged last summer to one of the famous shortstops of the Texas baseball league.

Last week he broke the engagement, and this is the reason why.

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The famous shortstop threw the book out the window, stuck out his chin and said:

“No Texas sis can gimme de umpire face like dat. I swipes nine daisy cutters outer ten dat comes in my garden, I do.”

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A Philistine in Bohemia

George Washington, with his right arm upraised, sits his iron horse at the lower corner of Union Square, forever signaling the Broadway cars to stop as they round the curve into Fourteenth Street. But the cars buzz on, heedless, as they do at the beck of a private citizen, and the great General must feel, unless his nerves are iron, that rapid transit gloria mundi.

Should the General raise his left hand as he has raised his right it would point to a quarter of the city that forms a haven for the oppressed and suppressed of foreign lands. In the cause of national or personal freedom they have found a refuge here, and the patriot who made it for them sits his steed, overlooking their district, while he listens through his left ear to vaudeville that caricatures the posterity of his protégés. Italy, Poland, the former Spanish possessions and the polyglot tribes of Austria-Hungary have spilled here a thick lather of their effervescent sons. In the eccentric cafés and lodging-houses of the vicinity they hover over their native wines and political secrets. The colony changes with much frequency. Faces disappear from the haunts to be replaced by others. Whither do these uneasy birds flit? For half of the answer observe carefully the suave foreign air and foreign courtesy of the next waiter who serves your table d’hôte. For the other half, perhaps if the barber shops had tongues (and who will dispute it?) they could tell their share.

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“You have seen!” said Mr. Brunelli, laying one hand upon his collar bone. “I am Antonio Brunelli! Yes; I am the great ’Tonio! You have not suspect that! I loave you, Katy, and you shall marry with me. Is it not so? Call me ‘Antonio,’ and say that you will be mine.”

Katy’s head drooped to the shoulder that was now freed from all suspicion of having received the knightly accolade.

“Oh, Andy,” she sighed, “this is great! Sure, I’ll marry wid ye. But why didn’t ye tell me ye was the cook? I was near turnin’ ye down for bein’ one of thim foreign counts!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-poor-rule.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-poor-rule.xhtml index eea9a1b..6b05f64 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-poor-rule.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-poor-rule.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Poor Rule

I have always maintained, and asserted time to time, that woman is no mystery; that man can foretell, construe, subdue, comprehend, and interpret her. That she is a mystery has been foisted by herself upon credulous mankind. Whether I am right or wrong we shall see. As “Harper’s Drawer” used to say in bygone years: “The following good story is told of Miss ⸻, Mr. ⸻, Mr. ⸻, and Mr. ⸻.”

We shall have to omit “Bishop X” and “the Rev. ⸻,” for they do not belong.

@@ -100,6 +100,6 @@

That night there were four instead of three of us sitting on the station platform and swinging our feet. C. Vincent Vesey was one of us. We discussed things while dogs barked at the moon that rose, as big as a five-cent piece or a flour barrel, over the chaparral.

And what we discussed was whether it is better to lie to a woman or to tell her the truth.

And as all of us were young then, we did not come to a decision.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-professional-secret.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-professional-secret.xhtml index 7825de0..74c0579 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-professional-secret.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-professional-secret.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Professional Secret The Story of a Maid Made Over @@ -94,6 +94,6 @@

“As you say,” he made answer, “she appears to have recovered, as far as her friends can judge.”

When he could spare the time. Doctor Prince again invaded the sanctum of the great Grumbleton Myers, and together they absorbed the poison of nicotine.

“Yes,” said the great Myers, when the door was opened and Doctor Prince began to ooze out with the smoke, “I think you have come to the right decision. As long as none of the persons concerned has any suspicion of the truth, and is happy in the present circumstances, I don’t think it necessary to inform him that the feuditis Beallorum et Rankinorum⁠—how’s the Latin, doctor?⁠—has only been driven to Miss Rankin’s brain.”

-

+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-question-of-direction.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-question-of-direction.xhtml index 945fbab..7a6e930 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-question-of-direction.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-question-of-direction.xhtml @@ -6,11 +6,11 @@ -
+

A Question of Direction

Do you mean to tell me,” gasped the horrified gentleman from Boston, “that this man you speak of was shot and killed at a meeting of your debating society, and by the presiding officer himself, during the discussion of a question, simply because he arose and made a motion that was considered out of order?”

“He certainly was, sure,” said the colonel. “This is simply awful,” said the traveler. “I must make a note of this occurrence so that the people of my State can be apprised of the dreadful lawlessness that prevails in this section⁠—a man shot down and killed at a social and educational meeting for the infringement of an unimportant parliamentary error! It is awful to contemplate.”

“That’s whatever,” said the colonel reflectively. “It is for a fact. But you might state, in order to do justice to our community and town, which is, as it were, the Athens of Texas, that the motion made by the deceased was in the direction of his hip pocket. Shall we all liquor?”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-ramble-in-aphasia.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-ramble-in-aphasia.xhtml index 1c18a2f..de456aa 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-ramble-in-aphasia.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-ramble-in-aphasia.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Ramble in Aphasia

My wife and I parted on that morning in precisely our usual manner. She left her second cup of tea to follow me to the front door. There she plucked from my lapel the invisible strand of lint (the universal act of woman to proclaim ownership) and bade me to take care of my cold. I had no cold. Next came her kiss of parting⁠—the level kiss of domesticity flavored with Young Hyson. There was no fear of the extemporaneous, of variety spicing her infinite custom. With the deft touch of long malpractice, she dabbed awry my well-set scarf pin; and then, as I closed the door, I heard her morning slippers pattering back to her cooling tea.

When I set out I had no thought or premonition of what was to occur. The attack came suddenly.

@@ -120,6 +120,6 @@

“Of course,” said Doctor Volney.

I got up from the couch. Someone had set a vase of white roses on the centre table⁠—a cluster of white roses, freshly sprinkled and fragrant. I threw them far out of the window, and then I laid myself upon the couch again.

“It will be best, Bobby,” I said, “to have this cure happen suddenly. I’m rather tired of it all, anyway. You may go now and bring Marian in. But, oh, Doc,” I said, with a sigh, as I kicked him on the shin⁠—“good old Doc⁠—it was glorious!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-retrieved-reformation.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-retrieved-reformation.xhtml index 326cb6a..5caded7 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-retrieved-reformation.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-retrieved-reformation.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Retrieved Reformation

A guard came to the prison shoe-shop, where Jimmy Valentine was assiduously stitching uppers, and escorted him to the front office. There the warden handed Jimmy his pardon, which had been signed that morning by the governor. Jimmy took it in a tired kind of way. He had served nearly ten months of a four year sentence. He had expected to stay only about three months, at the longest. When a man with as many friends on the outside as Jimmy Valentine had is received in the “stir” it is hardly worthwhile to cut his hair.

“Now, Valentine,” said the warden, “you’ll go out in the morning. Brace up, and make a man of yourself. You’re not a bad fellow at heart. Stop cracking safes, and live straight.”

@@ -78,6 +78,6 @@

And then Ben Price acted rather strangely.

“Guess you’re mistaken, Mr. Spencer,” he said. “Don’t believe I recognize you. Your buggy’s waiting for you, ain’t it?”

And Ben Price turned and strolled down the street.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-righteous-outburst.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-righteous-outburst.xhtml index bf0248b..f927893 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-righteous-outburst.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-righteous-outburst.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Righteous Outburst

He smelled of gin and his whiskers resembled the cylinder of a Swiss music box. He walked into a toy shop on Main Street yesterday and leaned sorrowfully against the counter.

“Anything today?” asked the proprietor coldly.

@@ -15,6 +15,6 @@

“Before you go out,” said the proprietor, “which you are going to do in about fifteen seconds, I am willing to inform you that I have a branch store on Trains Street, and was around there yesterday. You came in and made the same talk about your little girl, whom you called Daisy, and I gave you a wagon. It seems you don’t remember your little girl’s name very well.”

The man drew himself up with dignity, and started for the door. When nearly there, he turned and said:

“Her name is Lilian Daisy, sir, and the wagon you gave me had a rickety wheel and some of the paint was scratched off the handle. I have a friend who tends bar on Willow Street, who is keeping it for me till Christmas, but I will feel a flush of shame on your behalf, sir, when Lilian Daisy sees that old, slab-sided, squeaking, secondhand, leftover-from-last-year’s-stock wagon. But, sir, when Lilian Daisy kneels at her little bed at night I shall get her to pray for you, and ask Heaven to have mercy on you. Have you one of your business cards handy, so Lilian Daisy can get your name right in her petitions?”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-ruler-of-men.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-ruler-of-men.xhtml index 08c3b1d..568d38e 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-ruler-of-men.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-ruler-of-men.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Ruler of Men

I walked the streets of the City of Insolence, thirsting for the sight of a stranger face. For the City is a desert of familiar types as thick and alike as the grains in a sandstorm; and you grow to hate them as you do a friend who is always by you, or one of your own kin.

And my desire was granted, for I saw near a corner of Broadway and Twenty-ninth Street, a little flaxen-haired man with a face like a scaly-bark hickory-nut, selling to a fast-gathering crowd a tool that omnigeneously proclaimed itself a can-opener, a screwdriver, a buttonhook, a nail-file, a shoehorn, a watch-guard, a potato-peeler, and an ornament to any gentleman’s key-ring.

@@ -178,6 +178,6 @@

Now and then some passenger with a shred of soul and self-respect left to him turned to offer remonstrance; but the blue uniform on the towering figure, the fierce and conquering glare of his eye and the ready impact of his ham-like hands glued together the lips that would have spoken complaint.

When the train was full, then he exhibited to all who might observe and admire his irresistible genius as a ruler of men. With his knees, with his elbows, with his shoulders, with his resistless feet he shoved, crushed, slammed, heaved, kicked, flung, pounded the overplus of passengers aboard. Then with the sounds of its wheels drowned by the moans, shrieks, prayers, and curses of its unfortunate crew, the express dashed away.

“That’s him. Ain’t he a wonder?” said Kansas Bill admiringly. “That tropical country wasn’t the place for him. I wish the distinguished traveller, writer, war correspondent, and playright, Richmond Hobson Davis, could see him now. O’Connor ought to be dramatized.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-sacrifice-hit.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-sacrifice-hit.xhtml index a1ab547..5b7ef3e 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-sacrifice-hit.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-sacrifice-hit.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Sacrifice Hit

The editor of the Hearthstone Magazine has his own ideas about the selection of manuscript for his publication. His theory is no secret; in fact, he will expound it to you willingly sitting at his mahogany desk, smiling benignantly and tapping his knee gently with his gold-rimmed eyeglasses.

“The Hearthstone,” he will say, “does not employ a staff of readers. We obtain opinions of the manuscripts submitted to us directly from types of the various classes of our readers.”

@@ -43,6 +43,6 @@

“Say, you!” said the office boy confidentially, “your name’s Slayton, ain’t it? I guess I mixed cases on you without meanin’ to do it. The boss give me some manuscript to hand around the other day and I got the ones for Miss Puffkin and the janitor mixed. I guess it’s all right, though.”

And then Slayton looked closer and saw on the cover of his manuscript, under the title Love Is All, the janitor’s comment scribbled with a piece of charcoal:

“The ⸻ you say!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-service-of-love.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-service-of-love.xhtml index 228bc45..c8075ae 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-service-of-love.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-service-of-love.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Service of Love

When one loves one’s Art no service seems too hard.

That is our premise. This story shall draw a conclusion from it, and show at the same time that the premise is incorrect. That will be a new thing in logic, and a feat in story-telling somewhat older than the great wall of China.

@@ -60,6 +60,6 @@

And then they both laughed, and Joe began:

“When one loves one’s Art no service seems⁠—”

But Delia stopped him with her hand on his lips. “No,” she said⁠—“just ‘When one loves.’ ”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-slight-mistake.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-slight-mistake.xhtml index f9fd257..68695d3 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-slight-mistake.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-slight-mistake.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Slight Mistake

An ordinary-looking man wearing a last season’s negligee shirt stepped into the business office and unrolled a strip of manuscript some three feet long.

“I wanted to see you about this little thing I want to publish in the paper. There are fifteen verses besides the other reading matter. The verses are on spring. My handwriting is a trifle illegible and I may have to read it over to you. This is the way it runs:

@@ -52,6 +52,6 @@

“Then why in thunder don’t you get into some decent business, instead of going around writing confounded trash and reading it to busy people? Ain’t you got any manhood about you?”

“Excuse me for troubling you,” said the ordinary-looking man, as he walked toward the door. “I tell you how it is. I cleared over $80,000 last year on these little things I write. I am placing my spring and summer ads for the Sarsaparilla firm of which I am a member. I had decided to place about $1,000 in advertising in this town. I will see the other papers you spoke of. Good morning!”

The business manager has since become so cautious that all the amateur poets in the city now practice reading their verses to him, and he listens without a murmur.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-snapshot-at-the-president.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-snapshot-at-the-president.xhtml index f925292..0033b99 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-snapshot-at-the-president.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-snapshot-at-the-president.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Snapshot at the President

(It will be remembered that about a month ago there were special rates offered to the public for a round trip to the City of Washington. The price of the ticket being exceedingly low, we secured a loan of twenty dollars from a public-spirited citizen of Austin, by mortgaging our press and cow, with the additional security of our brother’s name and a slight draught on Major Hutchinson for $4,000.

@@ -70,6 +70,6 @@

“When you get back to Texas,” said the President, rising, “you must write to me. Your visit has awakened in me quite an interest in your State which I fear I have not given the attention it deserves. There are many historical and otherwise interesting places that you have revived in my recollection⁠—the Alamo, where Davy Jones fell; Goliad, Sam Houston’s surrender to Montezuma, the petrified boom found near Austin, five-cent cotton and the Siamese Democratic platform born in Dallas. I should so much like to see the gals in Galveston, and go to the wake in Waco. I am glad I met you. Turn to the left as you enter the hall and keep straight on out.” I made a low bow to signify that the interview was at an end, and withdrew immediately. I had no difficulty in leaving the building as soon as I was outside.

I hurried downtown in order to obtain refreshments at some place where viands had been placed upon the free list.

I shall not describe my journey back to Austin. I lost my return ticket somewhere in the White House, and was forced to return home in a manner not especially beneficial to my shoes. Everybody was well in Washington when I left, and all send their love.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-sporting-interest.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-sporting-interest.xhtml index 7b13ddb..cd0e2e4 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-sporting-interest.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-sporting-interest.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Sporting Interest

It is a busy scene in the rear of one of Houston’s greatest manufacturing establishments. A number of workmen are busy raising some heavy object by means of blocks and tackles. Somehow, a rope is worn in two by friction, and a derrick falls. There is a hurried scrambling out of the way, a loud jarring crash, a cloud of dust, and a man stretched out dead beneath the heavy timbers.

The others gather round and with herculean efforts drag the beams from across his mangled form. There is a hoarse murmur of pity from rough but kindly breasts, and the question runs around the group, “Who is to tell her?”

@@ -20,6 +20,6 @@

“Derrick fell,” says Mike.

“Then I’ve lost my bet,” she says. “I thought sure it would be whisky.”

Life, messieurs, is full of disappointments.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-startling-demonstration.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-startling-demonstration.xhtml index 27e256c..5fba08a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-startling-demonstration.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-startling-demonstration.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Startling Demonstration

What a terrible state of affairs it would be if we could read each other’s minds! It is safe to say that if such were the case, most of us would be afraid to think above a whisper.

As an illustration, a case might be cited that occurred in Houston. Some months ago a very charming young lady came to this city giving exhibitions in mind reading, and proved herself to be marvelously gifted in that respect. She easily read the thoughts of the audience, finding many articles hidden by simply holding the hand of the person secreting them, and read sentences written on little slips of paper by some at a considerable distance from her.

@@ -14,6 +14,6 @@

One evening they were sitting on the porch of their residence holding each other’s hands, and wrapt in the close communion of mutual love, when she suddenly rose and knocked him down the steps with a large flowerpot. He arose astonished, with a big bump on his head, and asked her, if it were not too much trouble, to explain.

“You can’t fool me,” she said with flashing eyes. “You were thinking of a redheaded girl named Maud with a gold plug in her front tooth and a light pink waist and a black silk skirt on Rusk Avenue, standing under a cedar bush chewing gum at twenty minutes to eight with your arm around her waist and calling her ‘sweetness,’ while she fooled with your watch chain and said: ‘Oh, George, give me a chance to breathe,’ and her mother was calling her to supper. Don’t you dare to deny it. Now, when you can get your mind on something better than that, you can come in the house and not before.”

Then the door slammed and George and the broken flowerpot were alone.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-story-for-men.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-story-for-men.xhtml index 5a4c1f0..45ad5f3 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-story-for-men.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-story-for-men.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Story for Men

This little story will be a disappointment to women who read it. They will all say: “I don’t see anything in that.” Probably there isn’t much.

Mrs. Jessamine lives in Houston. You can meet any number of ladies every day out walking on Main Street that resemble her very much. She is not famous or extraordinary in any way. She has a nice family, is in moderate circumstances and lives in her own house. I would call her an average woman if that did not imply that some were below the average, which would be an ungallant insinuation. Mrs. Jessamine is a genuine woman. She always steps on a street car with her left foot first, wears her snowiest lace-trimmed sub-skirts on muddy days, and can cut a magazine, wind a clock, pick walnuts, open a trunk and clean out an inkstand, all with a hairpin. She can take twenty dollars worth of trimming and make over an old dress so you couldn’t tell it from a brand new fifteen dollar one. She is intelligent, reads the newspapers regularly and once cut a cooking recipe out of an old magazine that took the prize offered by a newspaper for the best original directions for making a green tomato pie. Her husband has such confidence in her household management that he trusts her with the entire housekeeping, sometimes leaving her in charge until a late hour of the night.

@@ -27,6 +27,6 @@

She hastily put on her hat and cloak and said:

“Now, be good children till I come back.” Then she went out, locked the door and hurried away to Mrs. Flutter’s.

That is all.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-strange-case.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-strange-case.xhtml index 54cc11e..f8c8d77 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-strange-case.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-strange-case.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Strange Case

A Post reporter met a young Houston physician the other afternoon, with whom he is well acquainted, and suggested that they go into a neighboring café and partake of a cooling lemonade. The physician agreed, and they were soon seated at a little table in a quiet corner, under an electric fan. After the physician had paid for the lemonade, the reporter turned the conversation upon his practice, and asked if he did not meet with some strange cases in his experience.

“Yes, indeed,” said the doctor, “many that professional etiquette will not allow me to mention, and others that involve no especial secrecy, but are quite as curious in their way. I had one case only a few weeks ago that I considered very unusual, and without giving names, I think I can relate it to you.”

@@ -34,6 +34,6 @@

“It was simply to wear a pair of bloomers,” said the young physician. “You see by separating the opposing factions harmony was restored. The Adams and the Redmond divisions no longer clashed, and the cure of the patient was complete. Let me see,” continued the physician, “it is nearly half past seven, and I have an engagement to call upon her at eight. In confidence, I may say that she has consented to change her name to mine at an early date. I would not have you repeat what I have told you, of course.”

“To be sure, I will not,” said the reporter. “But won’t you take another lemo⁠—”

“No, no, thank you,” said the doctor, rising hurriedly, “I must go. Good evening. I will see you again in a few days.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-strange-story.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-strange-story.xhtml index e4c0b03..fbd9d93 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-strange-story.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-strange-story.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Strange Story

In the northern part of Austin there once dwelt an honest family by the name of Smothers. The family consisted of John Smothers, his wife, himself, their little daughter, five years of age, and her parents, making six people toward the population of the city when counted for a special write-up, but only three by actual count.

One night after supper the little girl was seized with a severe colic, and John Smothers hurried downtown to get some medicine.

@@ -25,6 +25,6 @@

The old man drew a bottle of medicine from his pocket and gave Pansy a spoonful.

She got well immediately.

“I was a little late,” said John Smothers, “as I waited for a street car.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-sure-method.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-sure-method.xhtml index 2167bbc..0df4160 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-sure-method.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-sure-method.xhtml @@ -6,12 +6,12 @@ -
+

A Sure Method

The editor sat in his palatially furnished sanctum bending over a mass of manuscripts, resting his beetling brow upon his hand. It wanted but one hour of the time of going to press and there was that editorial on the Venezuelan question to write. A pale, intellectual youth approached him with a rolled manuscript tied with a pink ribbon.

“It is a little thing,” said the youth, “that I dashed off in an idle moment.”

The editor unrolled the poem and glanced down the long row of verses. He then drew from his pocket a $20 bill and held it toward the poet. A heavy thud was heard, and at the tinkle of an electric bell the editor’s minions entered and carried the lifeless form of the poet away.

“That’s three today,” muttered the great editor as he returned the bill to his pocket. “It works better than a gun or a club and the coroner always brings in a verdict of heart failure.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-technical-error.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-technical-error.xhtml index 748ab18..63b0f4f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-technical-error.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-technical-error.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Technical Error

I never cared especially for feuds, believing them to be even more overrated products of our country than grapefruit, scrapple, or honeymoons. Nevertheless, if I may be allowed, I will tell you of an Indian Territory feud of which I was press-agent, camp-follower, and inaccessory during the fact.

I was on a visit to Sam Durkee’s ranch, where I had a great time falling off unmanicured ponies and waving my bare hand at the lower jaws of wolves about two miles away. Sam was a hardened person of about twenty-five, with a reputation for going home in the dark with perfect equanimity, though often with reluctance.

@@ -66,6 +66,6 @@

“There’s a code,” I heard Sam say, either to me or to himself, “that won’t let you shoot a man in the company of a woman; but, by thunder, there ain’t one to keep you from killing a woman in the company of a man!”

And, quicker than my mind could follow his argument, he whipped a Colt’s automatic from under his left arm and pumped six bullets into the body that the brown dress covered⁠—the brown dress with the lace collar and cuffs and the accordion-plaited skirt.

The young person in the dark sack suit, from whose head and from whose life a woman’s glory had been clipped, laid her head on her arms stretched upon the table; while people came running to raise Ben Tatum from the floor in his feminine masquerade that had given Sam the opportunity to set aside, technically, the obligations of the code.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-tempered-wind.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-tempered-wind.xhtml index 5060de7..6e8ddf7 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-tempered-wind.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-tempered-wind.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Tempered Wind

The first time my optical nerves was disturbed by the sight of Buckingham Skinner was in Kansas City. I was standing on a corner when I see Buck stick his straw-colored head out of a third-story window of a business block and holler, “Whoa, there! Whoa!” like you would in endeavoring to assuage a team of runaway mules.

I looked around; but all the animals I see in sight is a policeman, having his shoes shined, and a couple of delivery wagons hitched to posts. Then in a minute downstairs tumbles this Buckingham Skinner, and runs to the corner, and stands and gazes down the other street at the imaginary dust kicked up by the fabulous hoofs of the fictitious team of chimerical quadrupeds. And then B. Skinner goes back up to the third-story room again, and I see that the lettering on the window is “The Farmers’ Friend Loan Company.”

@@ -125,6 +125,6 @@

We pasted on the Chill Cure labels about half an hour and Buck says:

“Making an honest livin’s better than that Wall Street, anyhow; ain’t it, Pick?”

“You bet,” says I.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-tragedy.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-tragedy.xhtml index 6ae538b..e726292 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-tragedy.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-tragedy.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Tragedy

“By the beard of the Prophet. Oh, Scheherezade, right well hast thou done,” said the Caliph, leaning back and biting off the end of a three-for.

For one thousand nights Scheherezade No. 2, daughter of the Grand Vizier, had sat at the feet of the mighty Caliph of the Indies relating tales that held the court entranced and breathless.

@@ -23,6 +23,6 @@

“I have said it, oh, Caliph. It is too gross.”

The Caliph made a sign: Mesrour, the executioner, whirled his scimeter through the air and the head of Scheherezade rolled upon the floor. The Caliph pulled his beard and muttered softly to himself:

“I knew all the time that 288 is two gross, but puns don’t go anywhere in my jurisdiction at present.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-universal-favorite.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-universal-favorite.xhtml index a925e04..446d5e6 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-universal-favorite.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-universal-favorite.xhtml @@ -6,11 +6,11 @@ -
+

A Universal Favorite

The most popular and best loved young lady in the United States is Miss Annie Williams of Philadelphia. Her picture is possessed by more men, and is more eagerly sought after than that of Lillian Russell, Mrs. Langtry, or any other famous beauty. There is more demand for her pictures than for the counterfeit presentments of all the famous men and women in the world combined. And yet she is a modest, charming, and rather retiring young lady, with a face less beautiful than of a clear and classic outline.

Miss Williams is soon to be married, but it is expected that the struggle for her pictures will go on as usual.

She is the lady the profile of whose face served as the model for the head of Liberty on our silver dollar.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-valedictory.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-valedictory.xhtml index 9b1ecbf..42b2109 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-valedictory.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-valedictory.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

A Valedictory

@@ -24,6 +24,6 @@

We really intended our light to burn for years, and to have the wick snuffed so quickly, although done in sorrowing kindness, causes us to sputter and smoke a little as we go out.

When the true Messiah comes along and shies his valise over to the night clerk, and turns back his cuffs ready to fill the long-felt want; if he should ever hear the whoops of those unappreciative critics who would crucify him, these few lines may teach him to fly to Brenham where his papa, the great intellectual lord of the universe, will protect him.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-villainous-trick.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-villainous-trick.xhtml index 3de07bf..9d0f3b9 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-villainous-trick.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-villainous-trick.xhtml @@ -6,11 +6,11 @@ -
+

A Villainous Trick

When it becomes necessary for an actor to write a letter during the performance of a play, it is a custom to read the words aloud as he writes them. It is necessary to do this in order that the audience may be apprised of its contents, otherwise the clearness of the plot might be obscured. The writing of a letter upon the stage, therefore, generally has an important bearing upon the situation being presented, and of course the writer is forced to read aloud what he writes for the benefit of the audience. During the production of “Monbars” in Houston some days ago, the gentleman who assumed the character of the heavy villain took advantage of a situation of this description in a most cowardly manner.

In the last act, Mantell, as Monbars, writes a letter of vital importance, and, as customary, reads the lines aloud as he writes them. The villain hides behind the curtains of a couch and listens in fiendish glee to the contents of the letter as imparted by Mr. Mantell in strict confidence to the audience. He then uses the information obtained in this underhanded manner to further his own devilish designs.

Mr. Mantell ought not to allow this. A man who is a member of his own company, and who, no doubt is drawing a good salary, should be above taking a mean advantage of a mere stage technicality.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/a-years-supply.xhtml b/src/epub/text/a-years-supply.xhtml index 6f0e651..34fc359 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/a-years-supply.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/a-years-supply.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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A Years Supply

He was one of the city’s wealthiest men, but he made no ostentatious display of his wealth. A little, thin, poorly clad girl stood looking in the window of the restaurant at the good things to eat. The man approached and touched her on the shoulder.

“What is your name, little girl?” he asked.

@@ -28,6 +28,6 @@

“Oh, see, mama!” she cried. “A gentleman gave me this. He said it would last us a whole year.”

The pale woman unrolled the package with trembling hands.

It was a nice new calendar.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/according-to-their-lights.xhtml b/src/epub/text/according-to-their-lights.xhtml index f1974b3..7537782 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/according-to-their-lights.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/according-to-their-lights.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

According to Their Lights

Somewhere in the depths of the big city, where the unquiet dregs are forever being shaken together, young Murray and the Captain had met and become friends. Both were at the lowest ebb possible to their fortunes; both had fallen from at least an intermediate Heaven of respectability and importance, and both were typical products of the monstrous and peculiar social curriculum of their overweening and bumptious civic alma mater.

The captain was no longer a captain. One of those sudden moral cataclysms that sometimes sweep the city had hurled him from a high and profitable position in the Police Department, ripping off his badge and buttons and washing into the hands of his lawyers the solid pieces of real estate that his frugality had enabled him to accumulate. The passing of the flood left him low and dry. One month after his dishabilitation a saloon-keeper plucked him by the neck from his free-lunch counter as a tabby plucks a strange kitten from her nest, and cast him asphaltward. This seems low enough. But after that he acquired a pair of cloth top, button Congress gaiters and wrote complaining letters to the newspapers. And then he fought the attendant at the Municipal Lodging House who tried to give him a bath. When Murray first saw him he was holding the hand of an Italian woman who sold apples and garlic on Essex Street, and quoting the words of a song book ballad.

@@ -69,6 +69,6 @@

“Twenty feet longer than it was last night,” said Murray, looking up at his measuring angle of Grace Church.

“Half an hour,” growled the Captain, “before we get our punk.”

The city clocks began to strike 12; the Bread Line moved forward slowly, its leathern feet sliding on the stones with the sound of a hissing serpent, as they who had lived according to their lights closed up in the rear.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/after-supper.xhtml b/src/epub/text/after-supper.xhtml index 3e1809b..92a774f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/after-supper.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/after-supper.xhtml @@ -6,10 +6,10 @@ -
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After Supper

Mr. Sharp: “My darling, it seems to me that every year that passes over your head but brings out some new charm, some hidden beauty, some added grace. There is a look in your eyes tonight that is as charming and girllike as when I first met you. What a blessing it is when two hearts can grow but fonder as time flies. You are scarcely less beautiful now than when⁠—”

Mrs. Sharp: “I had forgotten it was lodge night, Robert. Don’t be out much after twelve, if you can help it.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/after-twenty-years.xhtml b/src/epub/text/after-twenty-years.xhtml index 63bde50..66ec1ee 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/after-twenty-years.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/after-twenty-years.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

After Twenty Years

The policeman on the beat moved up the avenue impressively. The impressiveness was habitual and not for show, for spectators were few. The time was barely 10 o’clock at night, but chilly gusts of wind with a taste of rain in them had well nigh de-peopled the streets.

Trying doors as he went, twirling his club with many intricate and artful movements, turning now and then to cast his watchful eye adown the pacific thoroughfare, the officer, with his stalwart form and slight swagger, made a fine picture of a guardian of the peace. The vicinity was one that kept early hours. Now and then you might see the lights of a cigar store or of an all-night lunch counter; but the majority of the doors belonged to business places that had long since been closed.

@@ -44,6 +44,6 @@

Bob: I was at the appointed place on time. When you struck the match to light your cigar I saw it was the face of the man wanted in Chicago. Somehow I couldn’t do it myself, so I went around and got a plainclothes man to do the job.

Jimmy.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/an-adjustment-of-nature.xhtml b/src/epub/text/an-adjustment-of-nature.xhtml index 914212f..9c899f4 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/an-adjustment-of-nature.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/an-adjustment-of-nature.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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An Adjustment of Nature

In an art exhibition the other day I saw a painting that had been sold for $5,000. The painter was a young scrub out of the West named Kraft, who had a favourite food and a pet theory. His pabulum was an unquenchable belief in the Unerring Artistic Adjustment of Nature. His theory was fixed around corned-beef hash with poached egg. There was a story behind the picture, so I went home and let it drip out of a fountain-pen. The idea of Kraft⁠—but that is not the beginning of the story.

Three years ago Kraft, Bill Judkins (a poet), and I took our meals at Cypher’s, on Eighth Avenue. I say “took.” When we had money, Cypher got it “off of” us, as he expressed it. We had no credit; we went in, called for food and ate it. We paid or we did not pay. We had confidence in Cypher’s sullenness and smouldering ferocity. Deep down in his sunless soul he was either a prince, a fool or an artist. He sat at a worm-eaten desk, covered with files of waiters’ checks so old that I was sure the bottomest one was for clams that Hendrik Hudson had eaten and paid for. Cypher had the power, in common with Napoleon III and the goggle-eyed perch, of throwing a film over his eyes, rendering opaque the windows of his soul. Once when we left him unpaid, with egregious excuses, I looked back and saw him shaking with inaudible laughter behind his film. Now and then we paid up back scores.

@@ -48,6 +48,6 @@

“We’ve bought a cottage in the Bronx with the money,” said he. “Any evening at 7.”

“Then,” said I, “when you led us against the lumberman⁠—the⁠—Klondiker⁠—it wasn’t altogether on account of the Unerring Artistic Adjustment of Nature?”

“Well, not altogether,” said Kraft, with a grin.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/an-afternoon-miracle.xhtml b/src/epub/text/an-afternoon-miracle.xhtml index 1f50223..742a17a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/an-afternoon-miracle.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/an-afternoon-miracle.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

An Afternoon Miracle

At the United States end of an international river bridge, four armed rangers sweltered in a little ’dobe hut, keeping a fairly faithful espionage upon the lagging trail of passengers from the Mexican side.

Bud Dawson, proprietor of the Top Notch Saloon, had, on the evening previous, violently ejected from his premises one Leandro Garcia, for alleged violation of the Top Notch code of behaviour. Garcia had mentioned twenty-four hours as a limit, by which time he would call and collect a painful indemnity for personal satisfaction.

@@ -87,6 +87,6 @@

The cañoncito was growing dusky. Beyond its terminus in the river bluff they could see the outer world yet suffused with the waning glory of sunset.

A scream⁠—a piercing scream of fright from Alvarita. Back she cowered, and the ready, protecting arm of Buckley formed her refuge. What terror so dire as to thus beset the close of the reign of the never-before-daunted Queen?

Across the path there crawled a caterpillar⁠—a horrid, fuzzy, two-inch caterpillar! Truly, Kuku, thou wert avenged. Thus abdicated the Queen of the Serpent Tribe⁠—viva la reina!

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/an-expensive-veracity.xhtml b/src/epub/text/an-expensive-veracity.xhtml index e8cd205..72cda40 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/an-expensive-veracity.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/an-expensive-veracity.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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An Expensive Veracity

A Houston man who attended a great many of Sam Jones’s sermons was particularly impressed with his denunciation of prevaricators, and of lies of all kinds, white, variegated, and black.

So strongly was he affected and in such fertile ground did the seed sown by the great evangelist fall, that the Houston man, who had been accustomed occasionally to evade the truth, determined one morning he would turn over a new leaf and tell the truth in all things, big and little. So he commenced the day by scorning to speak even a word that did not follow the exact truth for a model.

@@ -19,6 +19,6 @@

“Yes,” said Henry, “you do. It’s a good thing your horse has a blind bridle on, for if he got a sight of you he’d run away and break your neck.”

His aunt glared furiously at him and drove away without saying a word.

Henry figured it up afterward and found that every word he said to her cost him $8,000.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/an-inspiration.xhtml b/src/epub/text/an-inspiration.xhtml index 5768fe9..9e97a3a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/an-inspiration.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/an-inspiration.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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An Inspiration

He was seated on an empty box on Main Street late yesterday evening during the cold drizzling rain. He was poorly clad and his thick coat was buttoned up high under his chin. He had a woeful, harassed appearance, and there was something about him that indicated that he was different from the average tramp who beats his way by lies and fraud.

The Post man felt a touch of sympathy and went up to him and said:

@@ -26,6 +26,6 @@

“Well, that makes more room everywhere. You just raise all your tenants’ rent on account of the extra space.”

“Young man, you’re a genius. I’ll put rents up twenty percent tomorrow.”

And one more capitalist was saved.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/an-odd-character.xhtml b/src/epub/text/an-odd-character.xhtml index f05b5ee..7a6caa9 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/an-odd-character.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/an-odd-character.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

An Odd Character

A Post Reporter stood on the San Jacinto Street bridge last night. Half of a May moon swam in a sea of buttermilky clouds high in the east. Below, the bayou gleamed dully in the semi-darkness, merging into inky blackness farther down. A steam tug glided noiselessly down the sluggish waters, leaving a shattered trail of molten silver. Foot passengers across the bridge were scarce. A few belated Fifth-Warders straggled past, clattering along the uneven planks of the footway. The reporter took off his hat and allowed a cool breath of a great city to fan his brow. A mellow voice, with, however, too much dramatic inflection, murmured at his elbow, and quoted incorrectly from Byron:

@@ -50,6 +50,6 @@

He unrolled it, took something from it between his thumb and finger and thrust it into his mouth.

The sickly, faint, sweet odor of gum opium reached the reporter.

The mystery about the tramp was solved.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/an-opportunity-declined.xhtml b/src/epub/text/an-opportunity-declined.xhtml index 53341ff..81c7d86 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/an-opportunity-declined.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/an-opportunity-declined.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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An Opportunity Declined

A farmer who lives about four miles from Houston noticed a stranger in his front yard one afternoon last week acting in a rather unusual manner. He wore a pair of duck trousers stuffed in his boots, and had a nose the color of Elgin pressed brick. In his hand he held a sharpened stake about two feet long, which he would stick into the ground, and after sighting over it at various objects would pull it up and go through the same performance at another place.

The farmer went out in the yard and inquired what he wanted.

@@ -17,6 +17,6 @@

“You refuse to take $50,000 for de ground, den?”

“I do. Are you going to chop that wood, or shall I whistle for Tige?”

“Gimme dat axe, mister, and show me dat wood, and tell de missus to bake an extra pan of biscuits for supper. When dat Columbus and Houston grand trunk railway runs up against your front fence you’ll be sorry you didn’t take up dat offer. And tell her to fill up the molasses pitcher, too, and not to mind about putting the dish of cooking butter on de table. See?”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/an-original-idea.xhtml b/src/epub/text/an-original-idea.xhtml index 1780545..1ba5ea0 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/an-original-idea.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/an-original-idea.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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An Original Idea

There is a lady in Houston who is always having original ideas.

Now, this is a very reprehensible thing in a woman and should be frowned down. A woman should find out what her husband thinks about everything and regulate her thoughts to conform with his. Of course, it would not be so bad if she would keep her independent ideas to herself, but who ever knew a woman to do that?

@@ -40,6 +40,6 @@

“Zas d⁠⸺⁠d lie!” said Robert, as he threw a beer glass through the mirror. “Been down t’ office helpin’ friend pos’ up books ’n missed last car. Say, now, Susie, old girl, you owe me two beers from las’ time. Give ’em to me or I’ll kick down bar.”

Robert’s wife was named Henrietta. When he made this remark she came around to the front and struck him over the eye with a lemon squeezer. Robert then kicked over the table, broke about half the bottles, spilled the beer, and used language not suited for the mailable edition.

Ten minutes later his wife had him tied with the clothes line, and during the intervals between pounding him on the head with a potato masher she was trying to think how to get rid of her last great original idea.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/an-unfinished-christmas-story.xhtml b/src/epub/text/an-unfinished-christmas-story.xhtml index 6a1b7ff..63f1126 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/an-unfinished-christmas-story.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/an-unfinished-christmas-story.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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An Unfinished Christmas Story

Now, a Christmas story should be one. For a good many years the ingenious writers have been putting forth tales for the holiday numbers that employed every subtle, evasive, indirect and strategic scheme they could invent to disguise the Christmas flavor. So far has this new practice been carried that nowadays when you read a story in a holiday magazine the only way you can tell it is a Christmas story is to look at the footnote which reads: [“The incidents in the above story happened on December 25th.⁠—Ed.”]

There is progress in this; but it is all very sad. There are just as many real Christmas stories as ever, if we would only dig ’em up. Me, I am for the Scrooge and Marley Christmas story, and the Annie and Willie’s prayer poem, and the long lost son coming home on the stroke of twelve to the poorly thatched cottage with his arms full of talking dolls and popcorn balls and⁠—Zip! you hear the second mortgage on the cottage go flying off it into the deep snow.

@@ -40,6 +40,6 @@

[Here the manuscript ends.]

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/an-unfinished-story.xhtml b/src/epub/text/an-unfinished-story.xhtml index d4fe9bf..57ac403 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/an-unfinished-story.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/an-unfinished-story.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

An Unfinished Story

We no longer groan and heap ashes upon our heads when the flames of Tophet are mentioned. For, even the preachers have begun to tell us that God is radium, or ether or some scientific compound, and that the worst we wicked ones may expect is a chemical reaction. This is a pleasing hypothesis; but there lingers yet some of the old, goodly terror of orthodoxy.

There are but two subjects upon which one may discourse with a free imagination, and without the possibility of being controverted. You may talk of your dreams; and you may tell what you heard a parrot say. Both Morpheus and the bird are incompetent witnesses; and your listener dare not attack your recital. The baseless fabric of a vision, then, shall furnish my theme⁠—chosen with apologies and regrets instead of the more limited field of pretty Polly’s small talk.

@@ -54,6 +54,6 @@

“Who are they?” I asked.

“Why,” said he, “they are the men who hired working-girls, and paid ’em five or six dollars a week to live on. Are you one of the bunch?”

“Not on your immortality,” said I. “I’m only the fellow that set fire to an orphan asylum, and murdered a blind man for his pennies.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/an-unknown-romance.xhtml b/src/epub/text/an-unknown-romance.xhtml index bf18210..415c38f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/an-unknown-romance.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/an-unknown-romance.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

An Unknown Romance

The first pale star peeped down the gorge. Above, to illimitable heights reached the Alps, snow-white above, shadowy around, and black in the depths of the gorge.

A young and stalwart man, clad in the garb of a chamois hunter, passed up the path. His face was bronzed with sun and wind, his eye was frank and clear, his step agile and firm. He was singing fragments of a Bavarian hunting song, and in his hand he held a white blossom of the edelweiss he had plucked from the cliff. Suddenly he paused, and the song broke, and dropped from his lips. A girl, costumed as the Swiss peasants are, crossed the path along one that bisected his, carrying a small stone pitcher full of water. Her hair was of the lightest gold and hung far below her trim waist in a heavy braid. Her eyes shone through the gathering twilight, and her lips, slightly parted, showed a faint gleam of the whitest teeth.

@@ -25,6 +25,6 @@

Miss Augusta Vance had flown from the irritating presence of fussy female friends and hysterical relatives to her boudoir for a few moments’ quiet. She had no letters to burn; no past to bury. Her mother was in an ecstasy of delight, for the family millions had brought them places in the front row of Vanity Fair.

Her marriage to Pelham Van Winkler was to be at high noon. Miss Vance fell suddenly into a dreamy reverie. She recalled a trip she had taken with her family a year before, to Europe, and her mind dwelt lingeringly upon a week they had spent among the foothills of the Alps in the cottage of a Swiss mountaineer. One evening at twilight she had gone with a pitcher across the road and filled it from a spring. She had fancied to put on that day the peasant costume of Babette, the daughter of their host. It had become her well, with her long braid of light-gold hair and blue eyes. A hunter had crossed the road as she was returning⁠—an Alpine chamois hunter, strong, stalwart, bronzed and free. She had looked up and caught his eyes, and his held hers. She went on, and still those magnetic eyes claimed her own. The door of the cottage had opened and voices called. She started and obeyed the impulse to tear a bunch of gentians from her bosom and throw them to him. He had caught them, and springing forward gave her an edelweiss flower. Not since that evening had the image of that chamois hunter left her. Surely fate had led him to her, and he seemed a man among men. But Miss Augusta Vance, with a dowry of five millions, could not commit the folly of thinking of a common hunter of the Alps mountains.

Miss Vance arose and opened a gold locket that lay upon her dressing case. She took from it a faded edelweiss flower and slowly crumpled it to dust between her fingers. Then she rang for her maid, as the church bells began to chime outside for the marriage.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/an-unsuccessful-experiment.xhtml b/src/epub/text/an-unsuccessful-experiment.xhtml index 1b91259..938c615 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/an-unsuccessful-experiment.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/an-unsuccessful-experiment.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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An Unsuccessful Experiment

There is an old colored preacher in Texas who is a great admirer of the Rev. Sam Jones.2 Last Sunday he determined to drop his old style of exhorting the brethren, and pitch hot shot plump into the middle of their camp, after the manner so successfully followed by the famous Georgia evangelist. After the opening hymn had been sung, and the congregation led in prayer by a worthy deacon, the old preacher laid his spectacles on his Bible, and let out straight from the shoulder.

“My dearly belubbed,” he said, “I has been preachin’ to you fo’ mo’ dan five years, and de grace ob God hab failed to percolate in yo’ obstreperous hearts. I hab nebber seen a more or’nery lot dan dis belubbed congregation. Now dar is Sam Wadkins in de fo’th bench on de left. Kin anybody show me a no’counter, trashier, lowdowner buck nigger in dis community? Whar does the chicken feathers come from what I seen in his back yard dis mawnin’? Kin Brudder Wadkins rise and explain?”

@@ -21,6 +21,6 @@

Bill Rodgers stood up and put his thumbs in the armholes of his vest. “I could name, sah,” he said, “a certain party who wuz run off ob Colonel Yancy’s fahm fo’ playin’ sebben up wid marked cya’ds, ef I choosed to.”

“Dat’s anudder lie,” said the preacher, closing his Bible and turning up his cuffs. “Look out, Bill Rodgers, I’m comin’ down dar to you.”

The preacher got out of his pulpit and made for Bill, but Miss Simpson got her hands in his wool first, and Sam Wadkins and Elder Hoskins came quickly to her assistance. Then the rest of the brothers and sisters joined in, and the flying hymn books and the sound of ripping clothes testified to the fact that Sam Jones’s style of preaching did not go in that particular church.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/an-x-ray-fable.xhtml b/src/epub/text/an-x-ray-fable.xhtml index 8a1e77d..7002724 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/an-x-ray-fable.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/an-x-ray-fable.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

An X-Ray Fable

And it came to pass that a man with a Cathode Ray went about the country finding out and showing the people, for a consideration, the insides of folks’ heads and what they were thinking about. And he never made a mistake.

And in a certain town lived a man whose name was Reuben and a maid whose name was Ruth. And the two were sweethearts and were soon to be married.

@@ -17,6 +17,6 @@

And the man and the maid opened the pieces of paper and saw written on one “Reuben” and on the other “Ruth,” and they were filled with joy and happiness, and went away with arms about each other’s waists.

But the man with the Ray neglected to mention the fact that the photographs he had taken showed that Reuben’s head was full of deep and abiding love for Reuben and Ruth’s showed her to be passionately enamored of Ruth.

The moral is that the proprietor of the Ray probably knew his business.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/answers-to-inquiries.xhtml b/src/epub/text/answers-to-inquiries.xhtml index efc4963..43d512d 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/answers-to-inquiries.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/answers-to-inquiries.xhtml @@ -6,12 +6,12 @@ -
+

Answers to Inquiries

Dear Editor: I want to ask a question in arithmetic. I am a school boy and am anxious to know the solution. If my pa, who keeps a grocery on Milam Street, sells four cans of tomatoes for twenty-five cents, and twenty-two pounds of sugar, and one can of extra evaporated apples and three cans of superior California plums, for only⁠—

There! There! little boy; that will do. Tell your pa to come around and see the advertising manager, who is quite an arithmetician, and will doubtless work the sum for you at the usual rates.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/aristocracy-versus-hash.xhtml b/src/epub/text/aristocracy-versus-hash.xhtml index c5cbd89..fa936ee 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/aristocracy-versus-hash.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/aristocracy-versus-hash.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Aristocracy Versus Hash

The snake reporter of The Rolling Stone was wandering up the avenue last night on his way home from the YMCA rooms when he was approached by a gaunt, hungry-looking man with wild eyes and dishevelled hair. He accosted the reporter in a hollow, weak voice.

“ ‘Can you tell me, Sir, where I can find in this town a family of scrubs?’

@@ -25,6 +25,6 @@

“ ‘Is there such a place in Austin?’

“The snake reporter sadly shook his head. ‘I do not know,’ he said, ‘but I will shake you for the beer.’

“Ten minutes later the slate in the Blue Ruin saloon bore two additional characters: 10.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/art-and-the-bronco.xhtml b/src/epub/text/art-and-the-bronco.xhtml index d788a27..eee8a8f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/art-and-the-bronco.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/art-and-the-bronco.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Art and the Bronco

Out of the wilderness had come a painter. Genius, whose coronations alone are democratic, had woven a chaplet of chaparral for the brow of Lonny Briscoe. Art, whose divine expression flows impartially from the fingertips of a cowboy or a dilettante emperor, had chosen for a medium the Boy Artist of the San Saba. The outcome, seven feet by twelve of besmeared canvas, stood, gilt-framed, in the lobby of the Capitol.

The legislature was in session; the capital city of that great Western state was enjoying the season of activity and profit that the congregation of the solons bestowed. The boardinghouses were corralling the easy dollars of the gamesome lawmakers. The greatest state in the West, an empire in area and resources, had arisen and repudiated the old libel or barbarism, lawbreaking, and bloodshed. Order reigned within her borders. Life and property were as safe there, sir, as anywhere among the corrupt cities of the effete East. Pillow-shams, churches, strawberry feasts and habeas corpus flourished. With impunity might the tenderfoot ventilate his “stovepipe” or his theories of culture. The arts and sciences received nurture and subsidy. And, therefore, it behooved the legislature of this great state to make appropriation for the purchase of Lonny Briscoe’s immortal painting.

@@ -64,6 +64,6 @@

Away scuttled the San Saba delegation out of the hall, down the steps, along the dusty street.

Halfway to the San Saba country they camped that night. At bedtime Lonny stole away from the campfire and sought Hot Tamales, placidly eating grass at the end of his stake rope. Lonny hung upon his neck, and his art aspirations went forth forever in one long, regretful sigh. But as he thus made renunciation his breath formed a word or two.

“You was the only one, Tamales, what seen anything in it. It did look like a steer, didn’t it, old hoss?”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/at-arms-with-morpheus.xhtml b/src/epub/text/at-arms-with-morpheus.xhtml index bb6b563..c8055a6 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/at-arms-with-morpheus.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/at-arms-with-morpheus.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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At Arms with Morpheus

I never could quite understand how Tom Hopkins came to make that blunder, for he had been through a whole term at a medical college⁠—before he inherited his aunt’s fortune⁠—and had been considered strong in therapeutics.

We had been making a call together that evening, and afterward Tom ran up to my rooms for a pipe and a chat before going on to his own luxurious apartments. I had stepped into the other room for a moment when I heard Tom sing out:

@@ -47,6 +47,6 @@

I told him no. His memory seemed bad about the entire affair. I concluded that he had no recollection of my efforts to keep him awake, and decided not to enlighten him. Some other time, I thought, when he was feeling better, we would have some fun over it.

When Tom was ready to go he stopped, with the door open, and shook my hand.

“Much obliged, old fellow,” he said, quietly, “for taking so much trouble with me⁠—and for what you said. I’m going down now to telegraph to the little girl.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/babes-in-the-jungle.xhtml b/src/epub/text/babes-in-the-jungle.xhtml index ee86560..bc6d3d5 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/babes-in-the-jungle.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/babes-in-the-jungle.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Babes in the Jungle

Montague Silver, the finest street man and art grafter in the West, says to me once in Little Rock: “If you ever lose your mind, Billy, and get too old to do honest swindling among grown men, go to New York. In the West a sucker is born every minute; but in New York they appear in chunks of roe⁠—you can’t count ’em!”

Two years afterward I found that I couldn’t remember the names of the Russian admirals, and I noticed some gray hairs over my left ear; so I knew the time had arrived for me to take Silver’s advice.

@@ -56,6 +56,6 @@

“Did you see Mr. Morgan?” I asks. “How much did he pay you for it?”

Silver sits down and fools with a tassel on the table cover.

“I never exactly saw Mr. Morgan,” he says, “because Mr. Morgan’s been in Europe for a month. But what’s worrying me, Billy, is this: The department stores have all got that same picture on sale, framed, for $3.48. And they charge $3.50 for the frame alone⁠—that’s what I can’t understand.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/barbershop-adventure.xhtml b/src/epub/text/barbershop-adventure.xhtml index e7ebc84..5a1c3a7 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/barbershop-adventure.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/barbershop-adventure.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Barbershop Adventure

When the Post Man entered the shop yesterday the chairs were full of customers, and for a brief moment he felt a thrill of hope that he might escape, but the barber’s eye, deadly and gloomy fixed itself upon him.

“You’re next,” he said, with a look of diabolical malevolence, and the Post Man sank into a hard chair nailed to the wall, with a feeling of hopeless despair.

@@ -72,6 +72,6 @@

“ ‘As much like as two peas,’ said the man. ‘They were twins, and nobody could tell ’em apart from their faces or their talk. The only difference between ’em was that one of ’em was as bald-headed as a hen egg and the other had plenty of hair.’ ”

“Now,” said the barber as he poured about two ounces of bay rum down the Post Man’s shirt front, “that’s how I account for it. The bald-headed Plunket would come in my shop one time and the one with hair would come in another, and I never knew the difference.”

When the barber finished the Post Man saw the African with the whisk broom waiting for him near the front door, so he fled by the back entrance, climbed a brick wall and escaped by a side street.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/bestseller.xhtml b/src/epub/text/bestseller.xhtml index 06897e4..3416e27 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/bestseller.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/bestseller.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Bestseller

I

@@ -118,6 +118,6 @@

I glanced downward and saw the bestseller. I picked it up and set it carefully farther along on the floor of the car, where the raindrops would not fall upon it. And then, suddenly, I smiled, and seemed to see that life has no geographical metes and bounds.

“Good-luck to you, Trevelyan,” I said. “And may you get the petunias for your princess!”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/between-rounds.xhtml b/src/epub/text/between-rounds.xhtml index d33710d..54c26c9 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/between-rounds.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/between-rounds.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Between Rounds

The May moon shone bright upon the private boardinghouse of Mrs. Murphy. By reference to the almanac a large amount of territory will be discovered upon which its rays also fell. Spring was in its heydey, with hay fever soon to follow. The parks were green with new leaves and buyers for the Western and Southern trade. Flowers and summer-resort agents were blowing; the air and answers to Lawson were growing milder; hand-organs, fountains and pinochle were playing everywhere.

The windows of Mrs. Murphy’s boardinghouse were open. A group of boarders were seated on the high stoop upon round, flat mats like German pancakes.

@@ -62,6 +62,6 @@

“By the deported snakes!” he exclaimed, “Jawn McCaskey and his lady have been fightin’ for an hour and a quarter by the watch. The missis could give him forty pounds weight. Strength to his arm.”

Policeman Cleary strolled back around the corner.

Old man Denny folded his paper and hurried up the steps just as Mrs. Murphy was about to lock the door for the night.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/bexar-scrip-no-2692.xhtml b/src/epub/text/bexar-scrip-no-2692.xhtml index 916aaa9..b3941c3 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/bexar-scrip-no-2692.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/bexar-scrip-no-2692.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Bexar Scrip No. 2692

Whenever you visit Austin you should by all means go to see the General Land Office.

As you pass up the avenue you turn sharp round the corner of the courthouse, and on a steep hill before you you see a medieval castle.

@@ -136,6 +136,6 @@

On closer examination, in the left breast pocket of the skeleton’s coat, there was found a flat, oblong packet of papers, cut through and through in three places by a knife blade, and so completely soaked and clotted with blood that it had become an almost indistinguishable mass.

With the aid of a microscope and the exercise of a little imagination this much can be made out of the letter; at the top of the papers:

B⁠⸺⁠x a⁠⸺ ⸺⁠rip N⁠⸺⁠2⁠⸺⁠92.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/bill-nye.xhtml b/src/epub/text/bill-nye.xhtml index 2e2da22..ce2352c 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/bill-nye.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/bill-nye.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Bill Nye

Bill Nye, who recently laid down his pen for all time, was a unique figure in the field of humor. His best work probably more nearly represented American humor than that of any other writer. Mr. Nye had a sense of ludicrous that was keen and judicious. His humor was peculiarly American in that it depended upon sharp and unexpected contrasts, and the bringing of opposites into unlooked-for comparison for its effect. Again, he had the true essence of kindliness, without which humor is stripped of its greatest component part.

Bill Nye’s jokes never had a sting. They played like summer lightning around the horizon of life, illuminating and spreading bright, if transitory, pictures upon the sky, but they were as harmless as the smile of a child. The brain of the man conceived the swift darts that he threw, but his great manly heart broke off their points.

@@ -14,6 +14,6 @@

His was the child’s heart, the scholar’s knowledge, and the philosopher’s view of life. He might have won laurels in other fields, for he was a careful reasoner, and a close observer, but he showed his greatness in putting aside cold and fruitless discussions that have wearied the world long ago, and set himself the task of arousing bubbling laughter instead of consuming doubt.

The world has been better for him, and when that can be said of a man, the tears that drop upon his grave are more potent than the loud huzzas that follow the requiem of the greatest conqueror or the most successful statesman.

The kindliest thoughts and the sincerest prayers follow the great humanitarian⁠—for such he was into the great beyond, and such solace as the hearty condolement of a million people can bring to the bereaved loved ones of Bill Nye, is theirs.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/binkleys-practical-school-of-journalism.xhtml b/src/epub/text/binkleys-practical-school-of-journalism.xhtml index 4f50918..5097cf2 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/binkleys-practical-school-of-journalism.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/binkleys-practical-school-of-journalism.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Binkley’s Practical School of Journalism

Last Tuesday afternoon a ragged and disreputable-looking man was noticed standing on a corner of Main Street. Several persons who had occasion to pass a second time along the street saw him still standing there on their return.

He seemed to be waiting for someone. Finally a young man came down the sidewalk, and the ragged man sprang upon him without saying a word and engaged him in fierce combat.

@@ -75,6 +75,6 @@

“I must tell you,” said the Post Man, “that I don’t believe your story at all.”

The ragged man replied sadly and reproachfully: “Did I not pay my last dollar for refreshments while telling it to you? Have I asked you for anything?”

“Well,” said the Post Man, after reflecting a while, “it may be true, but⁠—”

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Blind Man’s Holiday

Alas for the man and for the artist with the shifting point of perspective! Life shall be a confusion of ways to the one; the landscape shall rise up and confound the other. Take the case of Lorison. At one time he appeared to himself to be the feeblest of fools; at another he conceived that he followed ideals so fine that the world was not yet ready to accept them. During one mood he cursed his folly; possessed by the other, he bore himself with a serene grandeur akin to greatness: in neither did he attain the perspective.

Generations before, the name had been “Larsen.” His race had bequeathed him its fine-strung, melancholy temperament, its saving balance of thrift and industry.

@@ -165,6 +165,6 @@

“Sir,” said the priest, “do you owe me nothing? Be quiet. It seems so often that Heaven lets fall its choicest gifts into hands that must be taught to hold them. Listen again. You forgot that repentant sin must not compromise, but look up, for redemption, to the purest and best. You went to her with the finespun sophistry that peace could be found in a mutual guilt; and she, fearful of losing what her heart so craved, thought it worth the price to buy it with a desperate, pure, beautiful lie. I have known her since the day she was born; she is as innocent and unsullied in life and deed as a holy saint. In that lowly street where she dwells she first saw the light, and she has lived there ever since, spending her days in generous self-sacrifice for others. Och, ye spalpeen!” continued Father Rogan, raising his finger in kindly anger at Lorison. “What for, I wonder, could she be after making a fool of hersilf, and shamin’ her swate soul with lies, for the like of you!”

“Sir,” said Lorison, trembling, “say what you please of me. Doubt it as you must, I will yet prove my gratitude to you, and my devotion to her. But let me speak to her once now, let me kneel for just one moment at her feet, and⁠—”

“Tut, tut!” said the priest. “How many acts of a love drama do you think an old bookworm like me capable of witnessing? Besides, what kind of figures do we cut, spying upon the mysteries of midnight millinery! Go to meet your wife tomorrow, as she ordered you, and obey her thereafter, and maybe some time I shall get forgiveness for the part I have played in this night’s work. Off wid yez down the shtairs, now! ’Tis late, and an ould man like me should be takin’ his rest.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/board-and-ancestors.xhtml b/src/epub/text/board-and-ancestors.xhtml index 7ff880d..4515d1c 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/board-and-ancestors.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/board-and-ancestors.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Board and Ancestors

The snake reporter of the Post was wending his way homeward last night when he was approached by a very gaunt, hungry-looking man with wild eyes and an emaciated face.

“Can you tell me, sir,” he inquired, “where I can find in Houston a family of lowborn scrubs?”

@@ -25,6 +25,6 @@

The snake reporter shook his head sadly. “I never heard of any,” he said. “The boarding houses here are run by ladies who do not take boarders to make a living; they are all trying to get a better rating in Bradstreet’s than Hetty Green.”

“Then,” said the emaciated man desperately, “I will shake you for a long toddy.”

The snake reporter felt in his vest pocket haughtily for a moment, and then refusing the proposition scornfully, moved away down the dimly lighted street.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/book-reviews.xhtml b/src/epub/text/book-reviews.xhtml index 87dd95e..eda520f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/book-reviews.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/book-reviews.xhtml @@ -6,13 +6,13 @@ -
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Book Reviews

Unnabridged Dictionary by Noah Webster, L. L. D. F. R. S. X. Y. Z.

We find on our table quite an exhaustive treatise on various subjects, written in Mr. Webster’s well-known, lucid, and piquant style. There is not a dull line between the covers of the book. The range of subjects is wide, and the treatment light and easy without being flippant. A valuable feature of the work is the arranging of the articles in alphabetical order, thus facilitating the finding of any particular word desired. Mr. Webster’s vocabulary is large, and he always uses the right word in the right place. Mr. Webster’s work is thorough and we predict that he will be heard from again.

Houston’s City Directory, by Morrison and Fourmy.

This new book has the decided merit of being non-sensational. In these days of erratic and ultra-imaginative literature of the modern morbid self-analytical school it is a relief to peruse a book with so little straining after effect, so well balanced, and so pure in sentiment. It is a book that a man can place in the hands of the most innocent member of his family with the utmost confidence. Its material is healthy, and its literary style excellent, as it adheres to the methods used with such thrilling effect by Mr. Webster in his famous dictionary, viz: alphabetical arrangement.

We venture to assert that no one can carefully and conscientiously read this little volume without being a better man, or lady, as circumstances over which they have no control may indicate.

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Brickdust Row

Blinker was displeased. A man of less culture and poise and wealth would have sworn. But Blinker always remembered that he was a gentleman⁠—a thing that no gentleman should do. So he merely looked bored and sardonic while he rode in a hansom to the center of disturbance, which was the Broadway office of Lawyer Oldport, who was agent for the Blinker estate.

“I don’t see,” said Blinker, “why I should be always signing confounded papers. I am packed, and was to have left for the North Woods this morning. Now I must wait until tomorrow morning. I hate night trains. My best razors are, of course, at the bottom of some unidentifiable trunk. It is a plot to drive me to bay rum and a monologueing, thumb-handed barber. Give me a pen that doesn’t scratch. I hate pens that scratch.”

@@ -84,6 +84,6 @@

“The tenants have some such name for it,” said Lawyer Oldport.

Blinker arose and jammed his hat down to his eyes.

“Do what you please with it,” he said harshly. “Remodel it, burn it, raze it to the ground. But, man, it’s too late I tell you. It’s too late. It’s too late. It’s too late.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/bulgers-friend.xhtml b/src/epub/text/bulgers-friend.xhtml index acb4f77..b0846fc 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/bulgers-friend.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/bulgers-friend.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Bulger’s Friend

It was rare sport for a certain element in the town when old Bulger joined the Salvation Army. Bulger was the town’s odd “character,” a shiftless, eccentric old man, and a natural foe to social conventions. He lived on the bank of a brook that bisected the town, in a wonderful hut of his own contriving, made of scrap lumber, clapboards, pieces of tin, canvas and corrugated iron.

The most adventurous boys circled Bulger’s residence at a respectful distance. He was intolerant of visitors, and repelled the curious with belligerent and gruff inhospitality. In return, the report was current that he was of unsound mind, something of a wizard, and a miser with a vast amount of gold buried in or near his hut. The old man worked at odd jobs, such as weeding gardens and whitewashing; and he collected old bones, scrap metal and bottles from alleys and yards.

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“Hallelujah!” cried the sergeant.

“And a new bass drum,” concluded Bulger.

And then the sergeant made another speech.

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Buried Treasure

There are many kinds of fools. Now, will everybody please sit still until they are called upon specifically to rise?

I had been every kind of fool except one. I had expended my patrimony, pretended my matrimony, played poker, lawn-tennis, and bucket-shops⁠—parted soon with my money in many ways. But there remained one rule of the wearer of cap and bells that I had not played. That was the Seeker after Buried Treasure. To few does the delectable furor come. But of all the would-be followers in the hoof-prints of King Midas none has found a pursuit so rich in pleasurable promise.

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For May Martha Mangum abides with me. There is an eight-room house in a live-oak grove, and a piano with an automatic player, and a good start toward the three thousand head of cattle is under fence.

And when I ride home at night my pipe and slippers are put away in places where they cannot be found.

But who cares for that? Who cares⁠—who cares?

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Buying a Piano

A Houston man decided a few days ago to buy his wife a piano for a Christmas present. Now, there is more competition, rivalry, and push among piano agents than any other class of men. The insurance and fruit tree businesses are mild and retiring in comparison with the piano industry. The Houston man, who is a prominent lawyer, knew this, and he was careful not to tell too many people of his intentions, for fear the agents would annoy him. He inquired in a music store only once, regarding prices, etc., and intended after a week or so to make his selection.

When he left the store he went around by the post-office before going back to work.

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“Confound you, you’re drumming for a piano, too, are you?” yelled the lawyer, drawing the stone from his pocket. He fired away and knocked the minister’s tall hat across the street, and kicked him in the shin. The minister believed in the church militant, and he gave the lawyer a one-two on the nose, and they clinched and rolled off the sidewalk on a pile of loose bricks. The neighbors heard the row and came out with shotguns and lanterns, and finally an understanding was arrived at.

The lawyer was considerably battered up, and the family doctor was sent for to patch him. As the doctor bent over him with sticking-plaster and a bottle of arnica, he said:

“You’ll be out in a day or two, and then I want you to come around and buy a piano from my brother. The one he is agent for is acknowledged to be the best one for sweetness, durability, style, quality, and action in the world.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/by-courier.xhtml b/src/epub/text/by-courier.xhtml index 13321c3..ac0821b 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/by-courier.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/by-courier.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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By Courier

It was neither the season nor the hour when the Park had frequenters; and it is likely that the young lady, who was seated on one of the benches at the side of the walk, had merely obeyed a sudden impulse to sit for a while and enjoy a foretaste of coming Spring.

She rested there, pensive and still. A certain melancholy that touched her countenance must have been of recent birth, for it had not yet altered the fine and youthful contours of her cheek, nor subdued the arch though resolute curve of her lips.

@@ -41,6 +41,6 @@

“De gent wants an answer,” said the messenger. “Wot’s de word?”

The lady’s eyes suddenly flashed on him, bright, smiling and wet.

“Tell that guy on the other bench,” she said, with a happy, tremulous laugh, “that his girl wants him.”

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By Easy Stages

You’re at the wrong place,” said Cerberus. “This is the gate that leads to the infernal regions, while it is a passport to Heaven that you have handed me.”

“I know it,” said the departed shade wearily, “but it allows a stopover here; you see, I’m from Galveston and I have got to make the change gradually.”

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Calculations

A gentleman with long hair and an expression indicating heavenly resignation stepped off the twelve-thirty train at the Grand Central Depot yesterday. He had a little bunch of temperance tracts in his hand, and he struck a strong scent and followed it up to a red-nosed individual who was leaning on a trunk near the baggage room.

“My friend,” said the long-haired man, “do you know that if you had placed the price of three drinks out at compound interest at the time of the building of Solomon’s temple, you would now have $47,998,645.22?”

“I do,” said the red-nosed man. “I am something of a calculator myself. I also figured out when the doctor insisted on painting my nose with iodine to cure that boil, that the first lanternjawed, bone-spavined, rubbernecked son-of-a-gun from the amen corner of Meddlesome County that made any remarks about it would have to jump seventeen feet in nine seconds or get kicked thirteen times below the belt. You have just four seconds left.”

The long-haired man made a brilliant retreat within his allotted time, and bore down with his temperance tracts upon a suspicious-looking Houston man who was carrying home a bottle of mineral water wrapped in a newspaper to his mother-in-law.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/calloways-code.xhtml b/src/epub/text/calloways-code.xhtml index 87c24f4..d944566 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/calloways-code.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/calloways-code.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Calloway’s Code

The New York Enterprise sent H. B. Calloway as special correspondent to the Russo-Japanese-Portsmouth war.

For two months Calloway hung about Yokohama and Tokyo, shaking dice with the other correspondents for drinks of rickshaws⁠—oh, no, that’s something to ride in; anyhow, he wasn’t earning the salary that his paper was paying him. But that was not Calloway’s fault. The little brown men who held the strings of Fate between their fingers were not ready for the readers of the Enterprise to season their breakfast bacon and eggs with the battles of the descendants of the gods.

@@ -127,6 +127,6 @@

On the second day following, the city editor halted at Vesey’s desk where the reporter was writing the story of a man who had broken his leg by falling into a coal-hole⁠—Ames having failed to find a murder motive in it.

“The old man says your salary is to be raised to twenty a week,” said Scott.

“All right,” said Vesey. “Every little helps. Say⁠—Mr. Scott, which would you say⁠—‘We can state without fear of successful contradiction,’ or, ‘On the whole it can be safely asserted’?”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/caught.xhtml b/src/epub/text/caught.xhtml index c523bb2..3b8ce72 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/caught.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/caught.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Caught

The plans for the detention of the flying President Miraflores and his companion at the coast line seemed hardly likely to fail. Dr. Zavalla himself had gone to the port of Alazan to establish a guard at that point. At Solitas the Liberal patriot Varras could be depended upon to keep close watch. Goodwin held himself responsible for the district about Coralio.

The news of the president’s flight had been disclosed to no one in the coast towns save trusted members of the ambitious political party that was desirous of succeeding to power. The telegraph wire running from San Mateo to the coast had been cut far up on the mountain trail by an emissary of Zavalla’s. Long before this could be repaired and word received along it from the capital the fugitives would have reached the coast and the question of escape or capture been solved.

@@ -90,6 +90,6 @@

You will hear also that Señor Goodwin, like a tower of strength, shielded Doña Isabel Guilbert through those subsequent distressful days; and that his scruples as to her past career (if he had any) vanished; and her adventuresome waywardness (if she had any) left her, and they were wedded and were happy.

The American built a home on a little foothill near the town. It is a conglomerate structure of native woods that, exported, would be worth a fortune, and of brick, palm, glass, bamboo and adobe. There is a paradise of nature about it; and something of the same sort within. The natives speak of its interior with hands uplifted in admiration. There are floors polished like mirrors and covered with handwoven Indian rugs of silk fibre, tall ornaments and pictures, musical instruments and papered walls⁠—“figure-it-to-yourself!” they exclaim.

But they cannot tell you in Coralio (as you shall learn) what became of the money that Frank Goodwin dropped into the orange-tree. But that shall come later; for the palms are fluttering in the breeze, bidding us to sport and gaiety.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/cherchez-la-femme.xhtml b/src/epub/text/cherchez-la-femme.xhtml index 1412acf..cf671d1 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/cherchez-la-femme.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/cherchez-la-femme.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Cherchez La Femme

Robbins, reporter for the Picayune, and Dumars, of L’Abeille⁠—the old French newspaper that has buzzed for nearly a century⁠—were good friends, well proven by years of ups and downs together. They were seated where they had a habit of meeting⁠—in the little, Creole-haunted café of Madame Tibault, in Dumaine Street. If you know the place, you will experience a thrill of pleasure in recalling it to mind. It is small and dark, with six little polished tables, at which you may sit and drink the best coffee in New Orleans, and concoctions of absinthe equal to Sazerac’s best. Madame Tibault, fat and indulgent, presides at the desk, and takes your money. Nicolette and Mémé, madame’s nieces, in charming bib aprons, bring the desirable beverages.

Dumars, with true Creole luxury, was sipping his absinthe, with half-closed eyes, in a swirl of cigarette smoke. Robbins was looking over the morning Pic., detecting, as young reporters will, the gross blunders in the makeup, and the envious blue-pencilling his own stuff had received. This item, in the advertising columns, caught his eye, and with an exclamation of sudden interest he read it aloud to his friend.

@@ -86,6 +86,6 @@

He dragged Dumars by the arm into the outer room. Madame was screaming for Nicolette and Mémé to come and observe the fortune returned to her by M’sieur Morin, that best of men, that saint in glory.

“Marsy,” said Robbins, “I’m going on a jamboree. For three days the esteemed Pic. will have to get along without my valuable services. I advise you to join me. Now, that green stuff you drink is no good. It stimulates thought. What we want to do is to forget to remember. I’ll introduce you to the only lady in this case that is guaranteed to produce the desired results. Her name is Belle of Kentucky, twelve-year-old Bourbon. In quarts. How does the idea strike you?”

“Allons!” said Dumars. “Cherchez la femme.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/christmas-by-injunction.xhtml b/src/epub/text/christmas-by-injunction.xhtml index 3397cec..27e5dd4 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/christmas-by-injunction.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/christmas-by-injunction.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Christmas by Injunction

Cherokee was the civic father of Yellowhammer. Yellowhammer was a new mining town constructed mainly of canvas and undressed pine. Cherokee was a prospector. One day while his burro was eating quartz and pine burrs Cherokee turned up with his pick a nugget, weighing thirty ounces. He staked his claim and then, being a man of breadth and hospitality, sent out invitations to his friends in three States to drop in and share his luck.

Not one of the invited guests sent regrets. They rolled in from the Gila country, from Salt River, from the Pecos, from Albuquerque and Phoenix and Santa Fe, and from the camps intervening.

@@ -115,6 +115,6 @@

“Tomorrow⁠—silver-mounted.”

Cherokee took out his watch.

“Half-past nine. We’ll hit the Junction plumb on time with Christmas Day. Are you cold? Sit closer, son.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/city-perils.xhtml b/src/epub/text/city-perils.xhtml index 52dbce2..0fbd247 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/city-perils.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/city-perils.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

City Perils

Jeremiah Q. Dilworthy lives away up on San Jacinto Street. He walks home every night. On January first, he promised his wife he would not take another drink in a year. He forgot his promise and on Tuesday night we met some of the boys, and when he started home about nine o’clock he was feeling a trifle careless.

Mr. Dilworthy was an old resident of Houston, and on rainy nights he always walked in the middle of the street, which is well paved.

@@ -14,6 +14,6 @@

He started out all right, and just as he was walking up San Jacinto Street he staggered over to one side of the street.

A policeman standing on the comer heard a loud yell of despair, and turning, saw a man throw up his arms and then disappear from sight. Before the policeman could call someone who could swim the man had gone for the third and last time.

Mr. Jeremiah Q. Dilworthy had fallen into the sidewalk.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/coming-to-him.xhtml b/src/epub/text/coming-to-him.xhtml index 42425bf..3bf5be5 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/coming-to-him.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/coming-to-him.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Coming to Him

The man who keeps up with the latest scientific discoveries is abroad in the land. He knows all about bacilli, microbes, and all the various newly found foes to mankind. He reads the papers and heeds all the warnings that lead to longevity and safety to mind and limb. He stopped a friend on Main Street yesterday who was hurrying to the post-office and said excitedly:

“Wait a minute, Brown. Do you ever bite your finger nails ?”

@@ -22,6 +22,6 @@

“Wait just a minute. Dr. Pasteur says that⁠—”

But the victim was gone.

Ten minutes later the heeder of new discoveries was knocked down by a wagon while trying to cross the street reading about a new filter, and was carried home by sympathizing friends.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/compliments-of-the-season.xhtml b/src/epub/text/compliments-of-the-season.xhtml index dbe6f73..34eb5cb 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/compliments-of-the-season.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/compliments-of-the-season.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Compliments of the Season

There are no more Christmas stories to write. Fiction is exhausted; and newspaper items, the next best, are manufactured by clever young journalists who have married early and have an engagingly pessimistic view of life. Therefore, for seasonable diversion, we are reduced to very questionable sources⁠—facts and philosophy. We will begin with⁠—whichever you choose to call it.

Children are pestilential little animals with which we have to cope under a bewildering variety of conditions. Especially when childish sorrows overwhelm them are we put to our wits’ end. We exhaust our paltry store of consolation; and then beat them, sobbing, to sleep. Then we grovel in the dust of a million years, and ask God why. Thus we call out of the rattrap. As for the children, no one understands them except old maids, hunchbacks, and shepherd dogs.

@@ -91,6 +91,6 @@

James stalked back obsequiously, leaving Fuzzy waiting unsteadily, with his brief spark of the divine fire gone.

Outside, Black Riley stamped his cold feet and got a firmer grip on his section of gas-pipe.

“You will conduct this gentleman,” said the lady, “Downstairs. Then tell Louis to get out the Mercedes and take him to whatever place he wishes to go.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/confessions-of-a-humorist.xhtml b/src/epub/text/confessions-of-a-humorist.xhtml index 51f01a3..159dbf7 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/confessions-of-a-humorist.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/confessions-of-a-humorist.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Confessions of a Humorist

There was a painless stage of incubation that lasted twenty-five years, and then it broke out on me, and people said I was It.

But they called it humor instead of measles.

@@ -82,6 +82,6 @@

With the editor’s letter in her hand to justify the deed I had done, my wife could advance no objections save a few mild ones based on the feminine inability to appreciate a good thing such as the little back room of Peter Hef⁠—no, of Heffelbower & Co’s. undertaking establishment.

In conclusion, I will say that today you will find no man in our town as well liked, as jovial, and full of merry sayings as I. My jokes are again noised about and quoted; once more I take pleasure in my wife’s confidential chatter without a mercenary thought, while Guy and Viola play at my feet distributing gems of childish humor without fear of the ghastly tormentor who used to dog their steps, notebook in hand.

Our business has prospered finely. I keep the books and look after the shop, while Peter attends to outside matters. He says that my levity and high spirits would simply turn any funeral into a regular Irish wake.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/conscience-in-art.xhtml b/src/epub/text/conscience-in-art.xhtml index 5a52b2d..c65dbe3 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/conscience-in-art.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/conscience-in-art.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Conscience in Art

“I never could hold my partner, Andy Tucker, down to legitimate ethics of pure swindling,” said Jeff Peters to me one day.

“Andy had too much imagination to be honest. He used to devise schemes of money-getting so fraudulent and high-financial that they wouldn’t have been allowed in the bylaws of a railroad rebate system.

@@ -90,6 +90,6 @@

“ ‘It was,’ says Andy. ‘It was his own. When I was looking at his curios yesterday he stepped out of the room for a moment and I pocketed it. Now, will you pick up your suitcase and hurry?’

“ ‘Then,’ says I, ‘why was that story about finding another one in the pawn⁠—’

“ ‘Oh,’ says Andy, ‘out of respect for that conscience of yours. Come on.’ ”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/convinced.xhtml b/src/epub/text/convinced.xhtml index 66ecbb4..fa9090a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/convinced.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/convinced.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Convinced

Houston is the dwelling place of a certain young lady who is exceptionally blessed with the gifts of the goddess of fortune. She is very fair to look upon, bright, witty, and possesses that gracious charm so difficult to describe, but so potent to please, that is commonly called personal magnetism. Although cast in such a lonely world, and endowed with so many graces of mind and matter, she is no idle butterfly of fashion, and the adulation she receives from a numerous circle of admirers has not turned her head.

She has a close friend, a young lady of plain exterior, but a sensible and practical mind, whom she habitually consults as a wise counselor and advisor concerning the intricate problems of life.

@@ -19,6 +19,6 @@

“All but one. Mr. Judson sat back in his chair and never applauded at all. He told me after I had finished that he was afraid I had very little dramatic talent at all.”

“Now,” said Marian. “You know who is sincere and genuine?”

“Yes,” said the beautiful girl, with eyes shining with enthusiasm. “The test was a complete success. I detest that odious Judson, and I’m going to begin studying for the stage right away.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/correcting-a-great-injustice.xhtml b/src/epub/text/correcting-a-great-injustice.xhtml index 84bf1d7..2e33fa9 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/correcting-a-great-injustice.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/correcting-a-great-injustice.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Correcting a Great Injustice

Something has been recently disclosed that will fill every chivalrous man in the country with contrition. For a long time men have supposed that the habit of wearing tall hats at the theater by the ladies was nothing more than a lack of consideration on their part for the unfortunate individuals who were so unlucky as to get a seat behind them.

It now appears that the supposition did the fair sex a great injustice. A noted female physician has exposed an affliction that the female sex has long suffered with, and have succeeded up to this time in keeping a profound secret. Their habit of wearing hats in places of public entertainment is the result of a necessity, and relieves them of the charge of selfish disregard of the convenience of others, which has been so often brought against them.

@@ -14,6 +14,6 @@

Strange to say, this infirmity is never felt by a young woman, but as soon as she passes the heyday of youth, it is at once perceptible. The fact is generally known to women, and discussed among themselves, but they have jealously guarded the secret, even from their nearest male relatives and friends. The lady physician who recently exposed the matter in a scientific journal is the first of her sex to make it known to the public.

If anyone will take the trouble to make a test of the statement, its truth will be unquestionably proven. Engage a woman of middle age in conversation beneath a well-lighted chandelier, and in a few moments she will grow uneasy, and very soon the pain inflicted by the light will cause her to move away from under its source. On young and healthy girls the rays of light have no perceptible effect. So, when we see a lady at a theater wearing a tall and cumbersome hat, we should reflect that she is more than thirty-five years old, and is simply protecting herself from an affliction that advancing years have brought upon her. Whenever we observe one wearing small and unobtrusive headgear we know that she is still young and charming, and can yet sit beneath the rays of penetrating light without inconvenience.

No man who has had occasion to rail against woman’s supposed indifference to the public comfort in this respect, will hesitate to express sincere regret that he has so misunderstood them. It is characteristic of Americans to respect the infirmities of age, especially among the fair sex, and when the facts here narrated have been generally known, pity and toleration will take the place of censure. Henceforth a tall hat, with nodding feathers and clustering flowers and trimming, will not be regarded with aversion when we see it between us and the stage, but with respect, since we are assured that its wearer is no longer young, but is already on the down hill of life, and is forced to take the precaution that advancing years render necessary to infirm women.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/cupid-a-la-carte.xhtml b/src/epub/text/cupid-a-la-carte.xhtml index 497bf80..b0f233a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/cupid-a-la-carte.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/cupid-a-la-carte.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Cupid a La Carte

“The dispositions of woman,” said Jeff Peters, after various opinions on the subject had been advanced, “run, regular, to diversions. What a woman wants is what you’re out of. She wants more of a thing when it’s scarce. She likes to have souvenirs of things that never happened. She likes to be reminded of things she never heard of. A one-sided view of objects is disjointing to the female composition.

“ ’Tis a misfortune of mine, begotten by nature and travel,” continued Jeff, looking thoughtfully between his elevated feet at the grocery stove, “to look deeper into some subjects than most people do. I’ve breathed gasoline smoke talking to street crowds in nearly every town in the United States. I’ve held ’em spellbound with music, oratory, sleight of hand, and prevarications, while I’ve sold ’em jewelry, medicine, soap, hair tonic, and junk of other nominations. And during my travels, as a matter of recreation and expiation, I’ve taken cognisance some of women. It takes a man a lifetime to find out about one particular woman; but if he puts in, say, ten years, industrious and curious, he can acquire the general rudiments of the sex. One lesson I picked up was when I was working the West with a line of Brazilian diamonds and a patent fire kindler just after my trip from Savannah down through the cotton belt with Dalby’s Anti-explosive Lamp Oil Powder. ’Twas when the Oklahoma country was in first bloom. Guthrie was rising in the middle of it like a lump of self-raising dough. It was a boom town of the regular kind⁠—you stood in line to get a chance to wash your face; if you ate over ten minutes you had a lodging bill added on; if you slept on a plank at night they charged it to you as board the next morning.

@@ -111,6 +111,6 @@

“There we were, and there was the order being served. ’Twas a banquet for a dozen, but we felt like a dozen. I looked across the table at Mame and smiled, for I had recollections. Mame was looking at the table like a boy looks at his first stem-winder. Then she looked at me, straight in the face, and two big tears came in her eyes. The waiter was gone after more grub.

“ ‘Jeff,’ she says, soft like, ‘I’ve been a foolish girl. I’ve looked at things from the wrong side. I never felt this way before. Men get hungry every day like this, don’t they? They’re big and strong, and they do the hard work of the world, and they don’t eat just to spite silly waiter girls in restaurants, do they, Jeff? You said once⁠—that is, you asked me⁠—you wanted me to⁠—well, Jeff, if you still care⁠—I’d be glad and willing to have you always sitting across the table from me. Now give me something to eat, quick, please.’

“So, as I’ve said, a woman needs to change her point of view now and then. They get tired of the same old sights⁠—the same old dinner table, washtub, and sewing machine. Give ’em a touch of the various⁠—a little travel and a little rest, a little tomfoolery along with the tragedies of keeping house, a little petting after the blowing-up, a little upsetting and a little jostling around⁠—and everybody in the game will have chips added to their stack by the play.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/cupids-exile-number-two.xhtml b/src/epub/text/cupids-exile-number-two.xhtml index 779df0d..ae1ae03 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/cupids-exile-number-two.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/cupids-exile-number-two.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Cupid’s Exile Number Two

The United States of America, after looking over its stock of consular timber, selected Mr. John De Graffenreid Atwood, of Dalesburg, Alabama, for a successor to Willard Geddie, resigned.

Without prejudice to Mr. Atwood, it will have to be acknowledged that, in this instance, it was the man who sought the office. As with the self-banished Geddie, it was nothing less than the artful smiles of lovely woman that had driven Johnny Atwood to the desperate expedient of accepting office under a despised Federal Government so that he might go far, far away and never see again the false, fair face that had wrecked his young life. The consulship at Coralio seemed to offer a retreat sufficiently removed and romantic enough to inject the necessary drama into the pastoral scenes of Dalesburg life.

@@ -48,6 +48,6 @@

“I’m no disseminator of narratives,” said Keogh. “I can use language for purposes of speech; but when I attempt a discourse the words come out as they will, and they may make sense when they strike the atmosphere, or they may not.”

“I want to hear about that graft,” persisted Johnny. “You’ve got no right to refuse. I’ve told you all about every man, woman and hitching post in Dalesburg.”

“You shall hear it,” said Keogh. “I said my instincts of narrative were perplexed. Don’t you believe it. It’s an art I’ve acquired along with many other of the graces and sciences.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/dicky.xhtml b/src/epub/text/dicky.xhtml index 2bf8eec..624065a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/dicky.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/dicky.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Dicky

There is little consecutiveness along the Spanish Main. Things happen there intermittently. Even Time seems to hang his scythe daily on the branch of an orange tree while he takes a siesta and a cigarette.

After the ineffectual revolt against the administration of President Losada, the country settled again into quiet toleration of the abuses with which he had been charged. In Coralio old political enemies went arm-in-arm, lightly eschewing for the time all differences of opinion.

@@ -93,6 +93,6 @@

“I was thinking,” she began, anticipating Dicky’s question, “of the foolish things girls have in their minds. Because I went to school in the States I used to have ambitions. Nothing less than to be the president’s wife would satisfy me. And, look, thou red picaroon, to what obscure fate thou hast stolen me!”

“Don’t give up hope,” said Dicky, smiling. “More than one Irishman has been the ruler of a South American country. There was a dictator of Chili named O’Higgins. Why not a President Maloney, of Anchuria? Say the word, santita mia, and we’ll make the race.”

“No, no, no, thou red-haired, reckless one!” sighed Pasa; “I am content”⁠—she laid her head against his arm⁠—“here.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/doughertys-eye-opener.xhtml b/src/epub/text/doughertys-eye-opener.xhtml index 9d9bf83..8078259 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/doughertys-eye-opener.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/doughertys-eye-opener.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Dougherty’s Eye-Opener

Big Jim Dougherty was a sport. He belonged to that race of men. In Manhattan it is a distinct race. They are the Caribs of the North⁠—strong, artful, self-sufficient, clannish, honorable within the laws of their race, holding in lenient contempt neighboring tribes who bow to the measure of Society’s tapeline. I refer, of course, to the titled nobility of sportdom. There is a class which bears as a qualifying adjective the substantive belonging to a wind instrument made of a cheap and base metal. But the tin mines of Cornwall never produced the material for manufacturing descriptive nomenclature for “Big Jim” Dougherty.

The habitat of the sport is the lobby or the outside corner of certain hotels and combination restaurants and cafés. They are mostly men of different sizes, running from small to large; but they are unanimous in the possession of a recently shaven, blue-black cheek and chin and dark overcoats (in season) with black velvet collars.

@@ -48,6 +48,6 @@

“Thank you for taking me out, Jim,” she said, gratefully. “You’ll be going back up to Seltzer’s now, of course.”

“To ⸻ with Seltzer’s,” said “Big Jim,” emphatically. “And d⁠⸺ Pat Corrigan! Does he think I haven’t got any eyes?”

And the door closed behind both of them.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/elsie-in-new-york.xhtml b/src/epub/text/elsie-in-new-york.xhtml index fc5463b..2ea4c89 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/elsie-in-new-york.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/elsie-in-new-york.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Elsie in New York

No, bumptious reader, this story is not a continuation of the Elsie series. But if your Elsie had lived over here in our big city there might have been a chapter in her books not very different from this.

Especially for the vagrant feet of youth are the roads of Manhattan beset “with pitfall and with gin.” But the civic guardians of the young have made themselves acquainted with the snares of the wicked, and most of the dangerous paths are patrolled by their agents, who seek to turn straying ones away from the peril that menaces them. And this will tell you how they guided my Elsie safely through all peril to the goal that she was seeking.

@@ -66,6 +66,6 @@

“Oscar,” said he, “I want you to reserve the same table for me this evening. … What? Why, the one in the Moorish room to the left of the shrubbery. … Yes; two. … Yes, the usual brand; and the ’85 Johannisburger with the roast. If it isn’t the right temperature I’ll break your neck. … No; not her … No, indeed … A new one⁠—a peacherino, Oscar, a peacherino!”

Tired and tiresome reader, I will conclude, if you please, with a paraphrase of a few words that you will remember were written by him⁠—by him of Gad’s Hill, before whom, if you doff not your hat, you shall stand with a covered pumpkin⁠—aye, sir, a pumpkin.

Lost, Your Excellency. Lost Associations and Societies. Lost, Right Reverends and Wrong Reverends of every order. Lost, Reformers and Lawmakers, born with heavenly compassion in your hearts, but with the reverence of money in your souls. And lost thus around us every day.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/endnotes.xhtml b/src/epub/text/endnotes.xhtml index 7dd418e..8e0039d 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/endnotes.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/endnotes.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Endnotes

  1. @@ -46,6 +46,6 @@

    Mr. Vesey afterward explained that the logical journalistic complement of the word “unfortunate” was once the word “victim.” But, since the automobile became so popular, the correct following word is now “pedestrians.” Of course, in Calloway’s code it meant infantry. ↩

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/even-worse.xhtml b/src/epub/text/even-worse.xhtml index e3e3427..cf536de 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/even-worse.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/even-worse.xhtml @@ -6,11 +6,11 @@ -
+

Even Worse

Two Houston men were going home one rainy night last week, and as they stumbled and plowed through the mud across one of the principal streets, one of them said:

“This is hell, isn’t it?”

“Worse,” said the other. “Even hell is paved with good intentions.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/explaining-it.xhtml b/src/epub/text/explaining-it.xhtml index 423c6f6..e526842 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/explaining-it.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/explaining-it.xhtml @@ -6,11 +6,11 @@ -
+

Explaining It

A member of the Texas Legislature from one of the eastern counties was at the chrysanthemum show at Turner Hall last Thursday night, and was making himself agreeable to one of the lady managers.

“You were in the House at the last session, I believe?” she inquired.

“Well, madam,” he said, “I was in the House, but the Senate had me for about forty-five dollars when we adjourned.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/extradited-from-bohemia.xhtml b/src/epub/text/extradited-from-bohemia.xhtml index 3bf0518..3175997 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/extradited-from-bohemia.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/extradited-from-bohemia.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Extradited from Bohemia

From near the village of Harmony, at the foot of the Green Mountains, came Miss Medora Martin to New York with her color-box and easel.

Miss Medora resembled the rose which the autumnal frosts had spared the longest of all her sister blossoms. In Harmony, when she started alone to the wicked city to study art, they said she was a mad, reckless, headstrong girl. In New York, when she first took her seat at a West Side boardinghouse table, the boarders asked: “Who is the nice-looking old maid?”

@@ -60,6 +60,6 @@

On the train she said to him suddenly:

“I wonder why you came when you got my letter.”

“Oh, shucks!” said Beriah. “Did you think you could fool me? How could you be run away to that Bohemia country like you said when your letter was postmarked New York as plain as day?”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/fickle-fortune-or-how-gladys-hustled.xhtml b/src/epub/text/fickle-fortune-or-how-gladys-hustled.xhtml index 6ede812..be81a08 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/fickle-fortune-or-how-gladys-hustled.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/fickle-fortune-or-how-gladys-hustled.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Fickle Fortune or How Gladys Hustled

“Press me no more Mr. Snooper,” said Gladys Vavasour-Smith. “I can never be yours.”

“You have led me to believe different, Gladys,” said Bertram D. Snooper.

@@ -55,6 +55,6 @@

With a loving cry Gladys threw herself in Henry R. Grasty’s arms.

Twenty minutes later Bertram D. Snooper was seen deliberately to enter a beer saloon on Seventeenth Street.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/fox-in-the-morning.xhtml b/src/epub/text/fox-in-the-morning.xhtml index 5f70709..a1671f9 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/fox-in-the-morning.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/fox-in-the-morning.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

“Fox-In-The-Morning”

Coralio reclined, in the midday heat, like some vacuous beauty lounging in a guarded harem. The town lay at the sea’s edge on a strip of alluvial coast. It was set like a little pearl in an emerald band. Behind it, and seeming almost to topple, imminent, above it, rose the sea-following range of the Cordilleras. In front the sea was spread, a smiling jailer, but even more incorruptible than the frowning mountains. The waves swished along the smooth beach; the parrots screamed in the orange and ceiba-trees; the palms waved their limber fronds foolishly like an awkward chorus at the prima donna’s cue to enter.

Suddenly the town was full of excitement. A native boy dashed down a grass-grown street, shrieking: “Busca el Señor Goodwin. Ha venido un telégrafo por el!”

@@ -52,6 +52,6 @@

“No, there’s no news to tell, I believe,” said Goodwin, with a mischievous look in his eye, “except that old Geddie is getting grumpier and crosser every day. If something doesn’t happen to relieve his mind I’ll have to quit smoking on his back porch⁠—and there’s no other place available that is cool enough.”

“He isn’t grumpy,” said Paula Brannigan, impulsively, “when he⁠—”

But she ceased suddenly, and drew back with a deepening colour; for her mother had been a mestizo lady, and the Spanish blood had brought to Paula a certain shyness that was an adornment to the other half of her demonstrative nature.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/friends-in-san-rosario.xhtml b/src/epub/text/friends-in-san-rosario.xhtml index 3428a5d..e807b3b 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/friends-in-san-rosario.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/friends-in-san-rosario.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Friends in San Rosario

The westbound train stopped at San Rosario on time at 8:20 a.m. A man with a thick black-leather wallet under his arm left the train and walked rapidly up the main street of the town. There were other passengers who also got off at San Rosario, but they either slouched limberly over to the railroad eating-house or the Silver Dollar saloon, or joined the groups of idlers about the station.

Indecision had no part in the movements of the man with the wallet. He was short in stature, but strongly built, with very light, closely-trimmed hair, smooth, determined face, and aggressive, gold-rimmed nose glasses. He was well dressed in the prevailing Eastern style. His air denoted a quiet but conscious reserve force, if not actual authority.

@@ -109,6 +109,6 @@

The major began to tear the note into small pieces and throw them into his waste basket. He gave a satisfied little chuckle as he did so.

“Confounded old reckless cowpuncher!” he growled, contentedly, “that pays him some on account for what he tried to do for me in the sheriff’s office twenty years ago.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/from-each-according-to-his-ability.xhtml b/src/epub/text/from-each-according-to-his-ability.xhtml index 5cea087..772cc00 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/from-each-according-to-his-ability.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/from-each-according-to-his-ability.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

From Each According to His Ability

Vuyning left his club, cursing it softly, without any particular anger. From ten in the morning until eleven it had bored him immeasurably. Kirk with his fish story, Brooks with his Porto Rico cigars, old Morrison with his anecdote about the widow, Hepburn with his invariable luck at billiards⁠—all these afflictions had been repeated without change of bill or scenery. Besides these morning evils Miss Allison had refused him again on the night before. But that was a chronic trouble. Five times she had laughed at his offer to make her Mrs. Vuyning. He intended to ask her again the next Wednesday evening.

Vuyning walked along Forty-fourth Street to Broadway, and then drifted down the great sluice that washes out the dust of the goldmines of Gotham. He wore a morning suit of light gray, low, dull kid shoes, a plain, finely woven straw hat, and his visible linen was the most delicate possible shade of heliotrope. His necktie was the blue-gray of a November sky, and its knot was plainly the outcome of a lordly carelessness combined with an accurate conception of the most recent dictum of fashion.

@@ -73,6 +73,6 @@

“I’ll go too,” said Miss Allison, forcibly. Vuyning filled her glass with Apollinaris.

“Here’s to Rowdy the Dude!” he gave⁠—a toast mysterious.

“Don’t know him,” said Miss Allison; “but if he’s your friend, Jimmy⁠—here goes!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/from-the-cabbys-seat.xhtml b/src/epub/text/from-the-cabbys-seat.xhtml index 81a55dd..dca4b9a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/from-the-cabbys-seat.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/from-the-cabbys-seat.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

From the Cabby’s Seat

The cabby has his point of view. It is more single-minded, perhaps, than that of a follower of any other calling. From the high, swaying seat of his hansom he looks upon his fellow-men as nomadic particles, of no account except when possessed of migratory desires. He is Jehu, and you are goods in transit. Be you President or vagabond, to cabby you are only a Fare, he takes you up, cracks his whip, joggles your vertebrae and sets you down.

When time for payment arrives, if you exhibit a familiarity with legal rates you come to know what contempt is; if you find that you have left your pocketbook behind you are made to realise the mildness of Dante’s imagination.

@@ -49,6 +49,6 @@

“A fare, sargeant,” he continued, with a grin, “that I want to inthroduce to ye. It’s me wife that I married at ould man Walsh’s this avening. And a divil of a time we had, ’tis thrue. Shake hands wid th’ sargeant, Norah, and we’ll be off to home.”

Before stepping into the cab Norah sighed profoundly.

“I’ve had such a nice time, Jerry,” said she.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/georgias-ruling.xhtml b/src/epub/text/georgias-ruling.xhtml index a91be4c..0dbfaf5 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/georgias-ruling.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/georgias-ruling.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Georgia’s Ruling

If you should chance to visit the General Land Office, step into the draughtsmen’s room and ask to be shown the map of Salado County. A leisurely German⁠—possibly old Kampfer himself⁠—will bring it to you. It will be four feet square, on heavy drawing-cloth. The lettering and the figures will be beautifully clear and distinct. The title will be in splendid, undecipherable German text, ornamented with classic Teutonic designs⁠—very likely Ceres or Pomona leaning against the initial letters with cornucopias venting grapes and wieners. You must tell him that this is not the map you wish to see; that he will kindly bring you its official predecessor. He will then say, “Ach, so!” and bring out a map half the size of the first, dim, old, tattered, and faded.

By looking carefully near its northwest corner you will presently come upon the worn contours of Chiquito River, and, maybe, if your eyes are good, discern the silent witness to this story.

@@ -86,6 +86,6 @@

The speech of the Commissioner rebounded lightly from the impregnable Hamlin and Avery. They smiled, rose gracefully, spoke of the baseball team, and argued feelingly that quite a perceptible breeze had arisen from the east. They lit fresh fat brown cigars, and drifted courteously away. But later they made another tiger-spring for their quarry in the courts. But the courts, according to reports in the papers, “coolly roasted them” (a remarkable performance, suggestive of liquid-air didoes), and sustained the Commissioner’s Ruling.

And this Ruling itself grew to be a Precedent, and the Actual Settler framed it, and taught his children to spell from it, and there was sound sleep o’ nights from the pines to the sagebrush, and from the chaparral to the great brown river of the north.

But I think, and I am sure the Commissioner never thought otherwise, that whether Kampfer was a snuffy old instrument of destiny, or whether the meanders of the Chiquito accidentally platted themselves into that memorable sweet profile or not, there was brought about “something good for a whole lot of children,” and the result ought to be called “Georgia’s Ruling.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/getting-acquainted.xhtml b/src/epub/text/getting-acquainted.xhtml index fc4d5c9..4c317df 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/getting-acquainted.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/getting-acquainted.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Getting Acquainted

His coat was rusty and his hat out of style, but his nose glasses, secured by a black cord, lent him a distinguished air, and his manner was jaunty and assured. He stepped into a new Houston grocery yesterday, and greeted the proprietor cordially.

“I’ll have to introduce myself,” he said. “My name is ⸻, and I live next door to the house you have just moved in. Saw you at church Sunday. Our minister also observed you, and after church he says, ‘Brother ⸻, you must really find out who that intelligent-looking stranger is who listened so attentively today.’ How did you like the sermon?”

@@ -21,6 +21,6 @@

“Say,” said the grocer. “I bought out an old stock of groceries here, and put in a lot of new ones. I see your name on the old books charged with $87.10 balance on account. Did you want something more today?”

“No, sir,” said the rusty man, drawing himself up and glaring through his glasses. “I merely called in from a sense of Christian duty to extend you a welcome, but I see you are not the man I took you to be. I don’t want any of your groceries. I can see the mites in that cheese from the other side of the street, and my wife says your wife is wearing an underskirt made out of an old tablecloth. Several of our congregation were speaking of your smelling of toddy in church, and snoring during the prayers. My wife will return that cup of lard she borrowed at your house this morning just as quick as my last order comes up from the store where we trade. Good morning, sir.”

The grocer softly whispered, “There Won’t Anybody Play with Me,” and whittled a little lead out of one of his weights, in an absentminded way.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/getting-at-the-facts.xhtml b/src/epub/text/getting-at-the-facts.xhtml index 0dde6f4..f5ee2fb 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/getting-at-the-facts.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/getting-at-the-facts.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Getting at the Facts

It was late in the afternoon and the day staff was absent. The night editor had just come in, pulled off his coat, vest, collar, and necktie, rolled up his shirtsleeves and eased down his suspenders, and was getting ready for work.

Someone knocked timidly outside the door, and the night editor yelled, “Come in.”

@@ -67,6 +67,6 @@

“You horrid thing,” said the young lady, “give me my manuscript. I will bring it back when the literary editor is in.”

“I’m sorry,” said the night editor as he handed her the roll. “We’re short on news tonight, and it would have made a nice little scoop. Don’t happen to know of any accidents in your ward: births, runaways, holdups, or breach of promise suits, do you?”

But the slamming of the door was the only answer from the fair poetess.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/girl.xhtml b/src/epub/text/girl.xhtml index 5bb517c..c9e9e5c 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/girl.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/girl.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

“Girl”

In gilt letters on the ground glass of the door of room No. 962 were the words: “Robbins & Hartley, Brokers.” The clerks had gone. It was past five, and with the solid tramp of a drove of prize Percherons, scrub-women were invading the cloud-capped twenty-story office building. A puff of red-hot air flavoured with lemon peelings, soft-coal smoke and train oil came in through the half-open windows.

Robbins, fifty, something of an overweight beau, and addicted to first nights and hotel palm-rooms, pretended to be envious of his partner’s commuter’s joys.

@@ -75,6 +75,6 @@

He stooped and whispered something at her ear.

His wife screamed. Her mother came running into the hall. The dark-haired woman screamed again⁠—the joyful scream of a well-beloved and petted woman.

“Oh, mamma!” she cried ecstatically, “what do you think? Vivienne is coming to cook for us! She is the one that stayed with the Montgomerys a whole year. And now, Billy, dear,” she concluded, “you must go right down into the kitchen and discharge Héloise. She has been drunk again the whole day long.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/grounds-for-uneasiness.xhtml b/src/epub/text/grounds-for-uneasiness.xhtml index 1850ab5..71ecb6e 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/grounds-for-uneasiness.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/grounds-for-uneasiness.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Grounds for Uneasiness

When Sousa’s Band was in Houston a week or so ago, Professor Sousa was invited to dine with a prominent citizen who had met him while on a visit to the North.

This gentleman, while a man of high standing and reputation, has made quite a fortune by the closest kind of dealing. His economies in the smallest matters are a fruitful subject of discussion in his neighborhood, and one or two of his acquaintances have gone so far as to call him stingy.

@@ -15,6 +15,6 @@

“Say,” he said, “please play something livelier. Give us a jig or a quickstep⁠—something fast and jolly.”

“Ah,” said the Professor, “this sad music affects your spirits then?”

“No,” said the host, “I’ve got a man in the back yard sawing wood by the day, and he’s been keeping time to your music for the last half hour.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/guessed-everything-else.xhtml b/src/epub/text/guessed-everything-else.xhtml index 30ea380..cfbc87a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/guessed-everything-else.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/guessed-everything-else.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Guessed Everything Else

A man with a long, sharp nose and a big bundle which he carried by a strap went up the steps of the gloomy-looking brick house, set his bundle down, rang the bell, and took off his hat and wiped his brow.

A woman opened the door and he said: “Madam, I have a number of not only useful but necessary articles here that I would like to show you. First, I want you to look at these elegant illustrated books of travel and biography, written by the best authors. They are sold only by subscription. They are bound in⁠—”

@@ -20,6 +20,6 @@

“Oh, you have a small family. Let’s see, then I have here a⁠—”

“I’m trying to tell you,” said the woman, “that we have smallpox in the family, and⁠—”

The long-nosed man made a convulsive grab at his goods and rolled down the steps in about two seconds, while the woman softly closed the door just as a man got out of a buggy and nailed a yellow flag on the house.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/had-a-use-for-it.xhtml b/src/epub/text/had-a-use-for-it.xhtml index fbfd130..1954c06 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/had-a-use-for-it.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/had-a-use-for-it.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Had a Use for It

A strong scent of onions and the kind of whisky advertised “for mechanical purposes” came through the keyhole, closely followed by an individual bearing a bulky manuscript under his arm about the size of a roll of wall paper.

The individual was of the description referred to by our English cousins as “one of the lower classes,” and by Populist papers as “the bone and sinew of the country,” and the scene of his invasion was the sanctum of a great Texas weekly newspaper.

@@ -24,6 +24,6 @@

Ten minutes later six india-rubber erasers had been purchased, and the entire office force were at work upon the manuscript.

The great weekly came out on time, but the editor gazed pensively at his last month’s unreceipted paper bill and said:

“So far, so good; but I wonder what we will print on next week!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/he-also-serves.xhtml b/src/epub/text/he-also-serves.xhtml index c79a98b..87dfaf9 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/he-also-serves.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/he-also-serves.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

He Also Serves

If I could have a thousand years⁠—just one little thousand years⁠—more of life, I might, in that time, draw near enough to true Romance to touch the hem of her robe.

Up from ships men come, and from waste places and forest and road and garret and cellar to maunder to me in strangely distributed words of the things they have seen and considered. The recording of their tales is no more than a matter of ears and fingers. There are only two fates I dread⁠—deafness and writer’s cramp. The hand is yet steady; let the ear bear the blame if these printed words be not in the order they were delivered to me by Hunky Magee, true camp-follower of fortune.

@@ -94,6 +94,6 @@

“Nothing like that,” said Hunky, positively. “What ailed High Jack was too much booze and education. They’ll do an Indian up every time.”

“But what about Miss Blue Feather?” I persisted.

“Say,” said Hunky, with a grin, “that little lady that stole High Jack certainly did give me a jar when I first took a look at her, but it was only for a minute. You remember I told you High Jack said that Miss Florence Blue Feather disappeared from home about a year ago? Well, where she landed four days later was in as neat a five-room flat on East Twenty-third Street as you ever walked sideways through⁠—and she’s been Mrs. Magee ever since.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/hearts-and-crosses.xhtml b/src/epub/text/hearts-and-crosses.xhtml index 24ccce7..9f43a49 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/hearts-and-crosses.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/hearts-and-crosses.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Hearts and Crosses

Baldy Woods reached for the bottle, and got it. Whenever Baldy went for anything he usually⁠—but this is not Baldy’s story. He poured out a third drink that was larger by a finger than the first and second. Baldy was in consultation; and the consultee is worthy of his hire.

“I’d be king if I was you,” said Baldy, so positively that his holster creaked and his spurs rattled.

@@ -124,6 +124,6 @@

“What’s the Nopalito ranch brand, Wilson?”

“X Bar Y,” said Wilson.

“I thought so,” said Quinn. “But look at that white heifer there; she’s got another brand⁠—a heart with a cross inside of it. What brand is that?”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/hearts-and-hands.xhtml b/src/epub/text/hearts-and-hands.xhtml index 390d518..f8a93d1 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/hearts-and-hands.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/hearts-and-hands.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Hearts and Hands

At Denver there was an influx of passengers into the coaches on the eastbound B. & M. express. In one coach there sat a very pretty young woman dressed in elegant taste and surrounded by all the luxurious comforts of an experienced traveler. Among the newcomers were two young men, one of handsome presence with a bold, frank countenance and manner; the other a ruffled, glum-faced person, heavily built and roughly dressed. The two were handcuffed together.

As they passed down the aisle of the coach the only vacant seat offered was a reversed one facing the attractive young woman. Here the linked couple seated themselves. The young woman’s glance fell upon them with a distant, swift disinterest; then with a lovely smile brightening her countenance and a tender pink tingeing her rounded cheeks, she held out a little gray-gloved hand. When she spoke her voice, full, sweet, and deliberate, proclaimed that its owner was accustomed to speak and be heard.

@@ -32,6 +32,6 @@

The two passengers in a seat nearby had heard most of the conversation. Said one of them: “That marshal’s a good sort of chap. Some of these Western fellows are all right.”

“Pretty young to hold an office like that, isn’t he?” asked the other.

“Young!” exclaimed the first speaker, “why⁠—Oh! didn’t you catch on? Say⁠—did you ever know an officer to handcuff a prisoner to his right hand?”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/helping-the-other-fellow.xhtml b/src/epub/text/helping-the-other-fellow.xhtml index 699906d..5d41303 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/helping-the-other-fellow.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/helping-the-other-fellow.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Helping the Other Fellow

“But can thim that helps others help thimselves!”

@@ -91,6 +91,6 @@

When I arrived at the Crescent City I hurried away⁠—far away from the St. Charles to a dim chambre garnie in Bienville Street. And there, looking down from my attic window from time to time at the old, yellow, absinthe house across the street, I wrote this story to buy my bread and butter.

“Can thim that helps others help thimselves?”

- + diff --git a/src/epub/text/her-failing.xhtml b/src/epub/text/her-failing.xhtml index 8379453..46a7f49 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/her-failing.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/her-failing.xhtml @@ -6,13 +6,13 @@ -
+

Her Failing

They were two Houston girls, and they were taking a spin on their wheels. They met a fluffy girl who didn’t “bike,” out driving with a young man in a buggy.

Of course they must say something about her⁠—as this is a true story and they were real, live girls⁠—so one of them said:

“I never did like that girl.”

“Why?”

“Oh, she’s too effeminate.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/her-mysterious-charm.xhtml b/src/epub/text/her-mysterious-charm.xhtml index b3bc425..dfd997b 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/her-mysterious-charm.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/her-mysterious-charm.xhtml @@ -6,13 +6,13 @@ -
+

Her Mysterious Charm

In the conservatory of a palatial Houston home Roland Pendergast stood with folded arms and an inscrutable smile upon his face, gazing down upon the upturned features of Gabrielle Smithers.

“Why is it,” he said, “that I am attracted by you? You are not beautiful, you lack aplomb, grace, and savoir faire. You are cold, unsympathetic and bowlegged.

“I have striven to analyze the power you have over me, but in vain. Some esoteric chain of mental telepathy binds us two together, but what is its nature? I dislike being in love with one who has neither chic, naivete nor front teeth, but fate has willed it so. You personally repel me, but I can not tear you from my heart. You are in my thoughts by day and nightmares by night.

“Your form reminds me of a hatrack, but when I press you to my heart I feel strange thrills of joy. I can no more tell you why I love you than I can tell why a barber can rub a man’s head fifteen minutes without touching the spot that itches. Speak, Gabrielle, and tell me what is this spell you have woven around me!”

“I will tell you,” said Gabrielle with a soft smile. “I have fascinated many men in the same way. When I help you on with your overcoat I never reach under and try to pull your other coat down from the top of your collar.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/her-ruse.xhtml b/src/epub/text/her-ruse.xhtml index 6dce30b..8c45b4d 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/her-ruse.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/her-ruse.xhtml @@ -6,10 +6,10 @@ -
+

Her Ruse

“How do I keep John home of nights?” asked a Houston lady of a friend the other day.

“Well, I struck a plan once by a sudden inspiration, and it worked very nicely. John had been in a habit of going downtown every night after supper and staying until ten or eleven o’clock. One night he left as usual, and after going three or four blocks he found he had forgotten his umbrella and came back for it. I was in the sitting room reading, and he slipped in the room on his tiptoes and came up behind me and put his hands over my eyes. John expected me to be very much startled, I suppose, but I only said softly, ‘Is that you, Tom?’ John hasn’t been downtown at night since.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/his-dilemma.xhtml b/src/epub/text/his-dilemma.xhtml index 40134b6..d7ed188 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/his-dilemma.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/his-dilemma.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

His Dilemma

An old man with long white chin whiskers and a derby hat two sizes small, dropped into a Main Street drug store yesterday and beckoned a clerk over into a corner. He was about sixty-five years old, but he wore a bright red necktie, and was trying to smoke a very bad and strong cigar in as offhand a style as possible.

“Young man,” he said, “you lemme ask you a few questions, and I’ll send you a big watermelon up from the farm next summer. I came to Houston to see this here carnival, and do some tradin’. Right now, before I go any further, have you got any hair dye?”

@@ -24,6 +24,6 @@

“Wait a minute, young feller. Now on the other hand I hears rumors of wars this mornin’, and I hears alarmin’ talk about this here Monroe docterin’. Ef I uses hair dye and trains down to thirty-eight or forty years of age, I ketches the widder, but I turns into a peart and chipper youth what is liable to be made to fight in this here great war. Ef I gives up the hair dye, the recrutin’ sargent salutes these white hairs and passes by, but I am takin’ big chances on the widder. She has been to meetin’ twicet with a man what has been divorced, and ties his own cree-vat, and this here Monroe docterin’ is all what keeps me from pulling out seventy-five cents and makin’ a strong play with said dye. What would you do, ef you was me, young feller?”

“I don’t think there will be any war soon,” said the clerk.

“Jerusalem; I’m glad to hear it! Gimme the biggest bottle of blue-black hair dye fur seventy-five cents that you got. I’m goin’ to purpose to that widder before it gets dry, and risk the chances of Monroe takin’ water again on this war business.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/his-doubt.xhtml b/src/epub/text/his-doubt.xhtml index 643b9dc..47090db 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/his-doubt.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/his-doubt.xhtml @@ -6,11 +6,11 @@ -
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His Doubt

They lived in a neat little cottage on Prairie Avenue, and had been married about a year. She was young and sentimental and he was a clerk at fifty dollars per month. She sat rocking the cradle and looking at a bunch of something pink and white that was lying asleep, and he was reading the paper.

“Charlie,” she said, presently, “you must begin to realize that you must economize and lay aside something each month for the future. You must realize that the new addition to our home that will bring us joy arid pleasure and make sweet music around our fireside must be provided for. You must be ready to meet the obligations that will be imposed upon you, and remember that another than ourselves must be considered, and that as our hands strike the chords so shall either harmony or discord be made, and as the notes mount higher and higher, we shall be held to account for our trust here below. Do you realize the responsibility?”

Charlie said “Yes,” and then went out in the woodshed and muttered to himself: “I wonder whether she was talking about the kid, or means to buy a piano on the installment plan.”

-
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+

His Only Opportunity

Last week “The Rainmakers” gave two performances in Houston. At the night performance a prominent local politician occupied one of the front seats, as near to the stage as possible. He carried in his hand a glossy silk hat, and he seemed to be in a state of anxious suspense, fidgeting about in his chair, and holding his hat in both hands straight before him. A friend who occupied a seat directly behind, leaned over and asked the cause of his agitation.

“I’ll tell you, Bill,” said the politician in a confidential whisper, “just how it is. I’ve been in politics now for ten years, and I’ve been bemoaned and abused and cussed out, and called so many hard names that I thought I’d like to be addressed in a decent manner once more before I die, and this is about the only opportunity I shall have. There is a sleight-of-hand performance between two of the acts in this show, and the professor is going to step down to the front and say: ‘Will some gentleman kindly loan me a hat?’ Then I’m going to stand up and give him mine, and it’ll make me feel good for a week. I haven’t been called a gentleman in so long. I expect I’ll whoop right out hard when he takes the hat. Excuse me now. I’ve got to be ready and get my hat in first. I see one of the city councilmen over there with an old derby in his hand, and I’ll bet he’s up to the same game.”

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His Pension

“Speaking of the $140,000,000 paid out yearly by the government in pensions,” said a prominent member of Hood’s brigade to the Post’s representative, “I am told that a man in Indiana applied for a pension last month on account of a surgical operation he had performed on him during the war. And what do you suppose that surgical operation was?”

“Haven’t the least idea.”

“He had his retreat cut off at the battle of Gettysburg!”

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Holding Up a Train

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But the outlaw carries one thought constantly in his mind⁠—and that is what makes him so sore against life, more than anything else⁠—he knows where the marshals get their recruits of deputies. He knows that the majority of these upholders of the law were once lawbreakers, horse thieves, rustlers, highwaymen, and outlaws like himself, and that they gained their positions and immunity by turning state’s evidence, by turning traitor and delivering up their comrades to imprisonment and death. He knows that some day⁠—unless he is shot first⁠—his Judas will set to work, the trap will be laid, and he will be the surprised instead of a surpriser at a stickup.

That is why the man who holds up trains picks his company with a thousand times the care with which a careful girl chooses a sweetheart. That is why he raises himself from his blanket of nights and listens to the tread of every horse’s hoofs on the distant road. That is why he broods suspiciously for days upon a jesting remark or an unusual movement of a tried comrade, or the broken mutterings of his closest friend, sleeping by his side.

And it is one of the reasons why the train-robbing profession is not so pleasant a one as either of its collateral branches⁠—politics or cornering the market.

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Hostages to Momus

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I

I never got inside of the legitimate line of graft but once. But, one time, as I say, I reversed the decision of the revised statutes and undertook a thing that I’d have to apologize for even under the New Jersey trust laws.

Me and Caligula Polk, of Muskogee in the Creek Nation, was down in the Mexican State of Tamaulipas running a peripatetic lottery and monte game. Now, selling lottery tickets is a government graft in Mexico, just like selling forty-eight cents’ worth of postage-stamps for forty-nine cents is over here. So Uncle Porfirio he instructs the rurales to attend to our case.

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“It’s a great town for epicures,” says I. “You’d soon fall into their ways if you was there.”

“I’ve heard it was,” says Caligula. “But I reckon I wouldn’t. I can polish my fingernails all they need myself.”

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II

After breakfast we went out on the front porch, lighted up two of the landlord’s flor de upas perfectos, and took a look at Georgia.

The installment of scenery visible to the eye looked mighty poor. As far as we could see was red hills all washed down with gullies and scattered over with patches of piny woods. Blackberry bushes was all that kept the rail fences from falling down. About fifteen miles over to the north was a little range of well-timbered mountains.

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“It ain’t exactly set forth in the papers,” says Caligula. “I suppose it’s a matter of sentiment. You know he wrote this poem, ‘Little Breeches’; and them Greeks wear little or none. But anyhow, John Hay sends the Brooklyn and the Olympia over, and they cover Africa with thirty-inch guns. And then Hay cables after the health of the persona grata. ‘And how are they this morning?’ he wires. ‘Is Burdick Harris alive yet, or Mr. Raisuli dead?’ And the King of Morocco sends up the seventy thousand dollars, and they turn Burdick Harris loose. And there’s not half the hard feelings among the nations about this little kidnapping matter as there was about the peace congress. And Burdick Harris says to the reporters, in the Greek language, that he’s often heard about the United States, and he admires Roosevelt next to Raisuli, who is one of the whitest and most gentlemanly kidnappers that he ever worked alongside of. So you see, Pick,” winds up Caligula, “we’ve got the law of nations on our side. We’ll cut this colonel man out of the herd, and corral him in them little mountains, and stick up his heirs and assigns for ten thousand dollars.”

“Well, you seldom little redheaded territorial terror,” I answers, “you can’t bluff your uncle Tecumseh Pickens! I’ll be your company in this graft. But I misdoubt if you’ve absorbed the inwardness of this Burdick Harris case, Calig; and if on any morning we get a telegram from the Secretary of State asking about the health of the scheme, I propose to acquire the most propinquitous and celeritous mule in this section and gallop diplomatically over into the neighboring and peaceful nation of Alabama.”

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III

Me and Caligula spent the next three days investigating the bunch of mountains into which we proposed to kidnap Colonel Jackson T. Rockingham. We finally selected an upright slice of topography covered with bushes and trees that you could only reach by a secret path that we cut out up the side of it. And the only way to reach the mountain was to follow up the bend of a branch that wound among the elevations.

Then I took in hand an important subdivision of the proceedings. I went up to Atlanta on the train and laid in a two-hundred-and-fifty-dollar supply of the most gratifying and efficient lines of grub that money could buy. I always was an admirer of viands in their more palliative and revised stages. Hog and hominy are not only inartistic to my stomach, but they give indigestion to my moral sentiments. And I thought of Colonel Jackson T. Rockingham, president of the Sunrise & Edenville Tap Railroad, and how he would miss the luxury of his home fare as is so famous among wealthy Southerners. So I sunk half of mine and Caligula’s capital in as elegant a layout of fresh and canned provisions as Burdick Harris or any other professional kidnappee ever saw in a camp.

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Me and Caligula read it, and decided to let it go; for we, being cooks, were amenable to praise, though it sounded out of place on a sight draft for ten thousand dollars.

I took the letter over to the Mountain Valley road and watched for a messenger. By and by a colored equestrian came along on horseback, riding toward Edenville. I gave him a dollar to take the letter to the railroad offices; and then I went back to camp.

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IV

About four o’clock in the afternoon, Caligula, who was acting as lookout, calls to me:

“I have to report a white shirt signalling on the starboard bow, sir.”

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What’s the use to go into details? One or two will be enough. I remember Major Tallahassee Tucker playing on a jew’sharp, and Caligula waltzing with his head on the watch pocket of a tall baggage-master. I hesitate to refer to the cakewalk done by me and Mr. Patterson G. Coble with Colonel Jackson T. Rockingham between us.

And even on the next morning, when you wouldn’t think it possible, there was a consolation for me and Caligula. We knew that Raisuli himself never made half the hit with Burdick Harris that we did with the Sunrise & Edenville Tap Railroad.

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How It Started

“You had better move your chair a little further back,” said the old resident. “I saw one of the Judkinses go into the newspaper office just now with his gun, and there may be some shooting.”

The reporter, who was in the town gathering information for the big edition, got his chair quickly behind a pillar of the hotel piazza, and asked what the trouble was about.

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“And you see,” continued the old resident, “the Judkinses got mad.”

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How She Got in the Swim

There was no happier couple in all Houston than George W. St. Bibbs and his wife before the shadow of the tempter crossed their path. It is remarkable how the tempter always comes up so his shadow will fall across one’s path, isn’t it? It seems as if a tempter who knew his business would either approach on the other side or select a cloudy day for crossing people’s paths. But, we digress.

The St. Bibbses lived in a cosy and elegantly furnished cottage, and had everything that could be procured on credit. They had two charming little girls named Dolly and Polly.

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Mrs. St. Bibbs took her husband’s arm with a sweet smile.

“All right, George,” she said, “I just wanted you to see that this town can’t put up no society shindigs that are too high up for me to tackle. I once spent two weeks in Galveston, and I generally catch on to what’s proper as quick as anybody.”

At present there are no two society people in town more sought after and admired than George St. Bibbs and his accomplished wife.

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How Willie Saved Father

Willie Flint was a little Houston boy, six years of age. He was a beautiful child, with long golden curls and wondering, innocent blue eyes. His father was a respectable, sober citizen, who owned four or five large business buildings on Main Street. All day long Mr. Flint toiled among his renters, collecting what was due him, patching up broken window panes, nailing down loose boards and repairing places where the plastering had fallen off. At noon he would sit down upon the stairs of one of his buildings and eat the frugal dinner he had brought, wrapped up in a piece of newspaper, and think about the hard times. Gay and elegantly attired clerks and business men would pass up and down the stairs, but Mr. Flint did not envy them. He lived in a little cottage near the large trash pile known as “Tomato Can Heights,” on one of the principal residence streets of Houston. He was perfectly contented to live there with his wife and little boy Willie, and eat his frugal but wholesome fare and draw his $1,400 per month rent for his buildings. He was industrious and temperate, and hardly a day passed that he did not raise the rent of some of his offices, and lay by a few more dollars for a rainy day.

One night Mr. Flint came home ill. He had been pasting up some cheap green wall paper on an empty stomach, or rather on the wall of one of his stores without eating, and it had not agreed with him. He went to bed flushed with fever, muttering: “God help my poor wife and child! What will become of them now?”

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Mr. Flint sank into a peaceful slumber and his fever left him. The next day he was able to sit up, and feeling much stronger, when Willie told him whose rent it was he had raised.

Mr. Flint then fell dead.

Alas! messieurs, life is full of disappointments!

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Hungry Henry’s Ruse

Hungry Henry: Madam, I am state agent for a new roller-action, unbreakable, double-elastic suspender. Can I show you some?

Mrs. Lonestreet: No, there ain’t no man on the place.

Hungry Henry: Well, then, I am also handling something unique in the way of a silvermounted, morocco leather, dog collar, with name engraved free of charge. Perhaps⁠—

Mrs. Lonestreet: ’Tain’t no use. I ain’t got a dog.

Hungry Henry: Hat’s what I wanted to know. Now fix me de best supper you’se kin, and do it quick or it won’t be healthy fur you. See?

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Hush Money

He was a great practical joker, and never lost a chance to get a good one on somebody. A few days ago he stopped a friend on Main Street and said, confidentially:

“I never would have believed it, but I believe it my duty to make it known. Mr. ⸻, the alderman for our ward, has been taking hush money.”

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Then he went on without explaining any further, and the thing got talked around considerably for a day or two.

He forgot all about it until one day he met the alderman and suffered from the encounter to the extent of two black eyes and a coat split up the back.

And then he had to go all round and explain that what he meant was that he had seen the alderman’s wife give him a dime to buy some paregoric for the baby.

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Hygeia at the Solito

If you are knowing in the chronicles of the ring you will recall to mind an event in the early ’nineties when, for a minute and sundry odd seconds, a champion and a “would-be” faced each other on the alien side of an international river. So brief a conflict had rarely imposed upon the fair promise of true sport. The reporters made what they could of it, but, divested of padding, the action was sadly fugacious. The champion merely smote his victim, turned his back upon him, remarking, “I know what I done to dat stiff,” and extended an arm like a ship’s mast for his glove to be removed.

Which accounts for a trainload of extremely disgusted gentlemen in an uproar of fancy vests and neckwear being spilled from their pullmans in San Antonio in the early morning following the fight. Which also partly accounts for the unhappy predicament in which “Cricket” McGuire found himself as he tumbled from his car and sat upon the depot platform, torn by a spasm of that hollow, racking cough so familiar to San Antonian ears. At that time, in the uncertain light of dawn, that way passed Curtis Raidler, the Nueces County cattleman⁠—may his shadow never measure under six foot two.

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“Ah⁠—g’wan!” said McGuire, with a flash of his old asperity, “nobody can’t bluff me. You never ast me. You made your spiel, and you t’rowed me out, and I let it go at dat. And, say, friend, dis chasin’ cows is outer sight. Dis is de whitest bunch of sports I ever travelled with. You’ll let me stay, won’t yer, old man?”

Raidler looked wonderingly toward Ross Hargis.

“That cussed little runt,” remarked Ross tenderly, “is the Jo-dartin’est hustler⁠—and the hardest hitter in anybody’s cow camp.”

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Identified

A stranger walked into a Houston bank the other day and presented a draft to the cashier for payment.

“You will have to be identified,” said the cashier, “by someone who knows your name to be Henry B. Saunders.”

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The man unbuttoned his vest and showed the initial, H. B. S., on his shirt. “Does that go?” he asked. The cashier shook his head. “You might have Henry B. Saunders’ letters, and his papers, and also his shirt on, without being the right man. We are forced to be very careful.”

The stranger tore open his shirt front, and exhibited a large mustard plaster, covering his entire chest. “There,” he shouted, “if I wasn’t Henry B. Saunders, do you suppose I would go around wearing one of his mustard plasters stuck all over me? Do you think I would carry my impersonation of anybody far enough to blister myself to look like him? Gimme tens and fives, now, I haven’t got time to fool any more.”

The cashier hesitated and then shoved out the money. After the stranger had gone, the official rubbed his chin gently and said softly to himself: “That plaster might be somebody else’s after all, but no doubt it’s all right.”

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In Mezzotint

The doctor had long ago ceased his hospital practice, but whenever there was a case of special interest among the wards, his spirited team of bays was sure to be seen standing at the hospital gates. Young, handsome, at the head of his profession, possessing an ample income, and married but six months to a beautiful girl who adored him, his lot was certainly one to be envied.

It must have been nine o’clock when he reached home. The stableman took the team, and he ran up the steps lightly. The door opened, and Doris’s arms were flung tightly about his neck, and her wet cheek pressed to his.

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ADMIT TWO

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Innocents of Broadway

“I hope some day to retire from business,” said Jeff Peters; “and when I do I don’t want anybody to be able to say that I ever got a dollar of any man’s money without giving him a quid pro rata for it. I’ve always managed to leave a customer some little gewgaw to paste in his scrapbook or stick between his Seth Thomas clock and the wall after we are through trading.

“There was one time I came near having to break this rule of mine and do a profligate and illaudable action, but I was saved from it by the laws and statutes of our great and profitable country.

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“We put the certificate of stock in the cigar man’s hand and went out to pack our suitcases.

“On the ferryboat Andy says to me: ‘Is your conscience easy about taking the money now, Jeff?’

“ ‘Why shouldn’t it be?’ says I. ‘Are we any better than any other Holding Corporation?’ ”

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Jack the Giant Killer

The other day a lady canvasser came up into the Post editorial room with a book she was selling. She went into the editor-in-chief’s office, and her little five-year-old girl, who came up with her, remained in the outer rooms, doubtless attracted by the brilliant and engaging appearance of the staff, which was lolling about at its various desks during one of its frequent intervals of leisure.

She was a bright, curly-haired maiden, of a friendly disposition, so she singled out the literary editor for attack, no doubt fascinated by his aristocratic air, and his peculiarity of writing with his gloves on.

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“Tan ’ou tell me de ’tory about Dack de Diant Killer?” asked the little girl.

Just then the lady came out, and the little girl jumped down and ran to her. They had a little consultation, and as they went out the door the staff heard the lady say:

“B’ess urn’s heart, muzzer will tell ums all about Jack when us gets home.”

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Jeff Peters as a Personal Magnet

Jeff Peters has been engaged in as many schemes for making money as there are recipes for cooking rice in Charleston, SC.

Best of all I like to hear him tell of his earlier days when he sold liniments and cough cures on street corners, living hand to mouth, heart to heart with the people, throwing heads or tails with fortune for his last coin.

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“ ‘Mr. Mayor,’ says I, ‘the time will come soon when you’ll believe that personal magnetism is a success. And you’ll be sure that it succeeded in this case, too.’

“And I guess it did.

“When we got nearly to the gate, I says: ‘We might meet somebody now, Andy. I reckon you better take ’em off, and⁠—’ Hey? Why, of course it was Andy Tucker. That was his scheme; and that’s how we got the capital to go into business together.”

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Jimmy Hayes and Muriel

I

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And then, from beneath the weather-beaten rags of the dead man, there wriggled out a horned frog with a faded red ribbon around its neck, and sat upon the shoulder of its long quiet master. Mutely it told the story of the untried youth and the swift “paint” pony⁠—how they had outstripped all their comrades that day in the pursuit of the Mexican raiders, and how the boy had gone down upholding the honour of the company.

The ranger troop herded close, and a simultaneous wild yell arose from their lips. The outburst was at once a dirge, an apology, an epitaph, and a paean of triumph. A strange requiem, you may say, over the body of a fallen, comrade; but if Jimmy Hayes could have heard it he would have understood.

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Journalistically Impossible

“Did you report that suicide as I told you to do last night?” asked the editor of the new reporter, a graduate of a school of journalism.

“I saw the corpse, sir, but found it impossible to write a description of the affair.”

“Why?”

“How in the world was I to state that the man’s throat was cut from ear to ear when he had only one ear?”

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Just a Little Damp

As the steamer reached Aransas Pass a Galveston man fell overboard. A life buoy was thrown him, but he thrust it aside contemptuously. A boat was hurriedly lowered, and reached him just as he came to the surface for the second time. Helping hands were stretched forth to rescue him, but he spurned their aid. He spat out about a pint of sea water and shouted:

“Go away and leave me alone. I’m walking on the bottom. You’ll run your boat aground in a minute. I’ll wade out when I get ready and go up to a barber shop and get dusted off. The ground’s damp a little, but I ain’t afraid of catching cold.”

He went under for the last time, and the boat pulled back for the ship. The Galveston man had exhibited to the last his scorn and contempt for any other port that claimed deep water.

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Knew What Was Needed

A gentleman from Ohio, who has come South on a hunting trip, arrived in Houston, rather late one night last week, and on his way to a hotel stopped in a certain saloon to get a drink. A colored man was behind the bar temporarily and served him with what he wanted. The gentleman had his shotgun in its case, and he laid it upon the bar while waiting.

“Is there any game about here?” he asked, after paying for his drink.

“I guess dey is, boss,” said the colored man, looking doubtfully at the gun on the counter, “but you jest wait a minute, boss, till I fixes you up in better shape.”

He opened a drawer and handed the gentleman a six-shooter.

“You take dis, Boss,” he said. “Dat dar gun ob yourn am too long fur you to get quick action in de game what we hab here. Now you jest go up dem steps and knock free times on de doah to your left.”

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Law and Order

I found myself in Texas recently, revisiting old places and vistas. At a sheep ranch where I had sojourned many years ago, I stopped for a week. And, as all visitors do, I heartily plunged into the business at hand, which happened to be that of dipping the sheep.

Now, this process is so different from ordinary human baptism that it deserves a word of itself. A vast iron cauldron with half the fires of Avernus beneath it is partly filled with water that soon boils furiously. Into that is cast concentrated lye, lime, and sulphur, which is allowed to stew and fume until the witches’ broth is strong enough to scorch the third arm of Palladino herself.

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“ ‘I’ve got him back,’ says Luke. ‘He’s mine again. I never thought⁠—’

“ ‘Wait a minute,’ says I. ‘We’ve got to have law and order. You and me have got to preserve ’em both in Mojada County according to our oath and conscience. The kid shot Pedro Johnson, one of Bildad’s most prominent and⁠—’

“ ‘Oh, hell!’ says Luke. ‘That don’t amount to anything. That fellow was half Mexican, anyhow.’ ”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/leap-year-advice.xhtml b/src/epub/text/leap-year-advice.xhtml index 7caa559..a74fb89 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/leap-year-advice.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/leap-year-advice.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Leap Year Advice

Spinsters must be up and doing: 1896 will be the only leap year for the next eight years. Once in every four years the wise men who made the calendar insert an extra day so that the average year will not be so short. Once in every hundred years this extra day is omitted, and a leap year is also dropped. The year 1900 will not be a leap year. Unmarried ladies who yearn for matrimonial chains, and have been left standing in the comer by fickle man must get to work. If they fail in landing their prize during 1896 they will have to wait eight years more before they can propose again. Therefore they should work early and late during the present year.

The following communication pertaining to the subject was received yesterday.

@@ -27,6 +27,6 @@

After getting a victim to stand, speak gently to him until he ceases to quiver in his limbs and roll his eyes. Do not pat his chest, or rub his nose, as men will sometimes kick at this treatment. Bear in mind the fact that 1900 is not leap year, and keep between him and the door.

Approach the subject gradually, allowing him no time to pray and remove the cigars from his vest pocket. If he should shudder and turn pale, turn the conversation upon progressive euchre, Braun’s egotism, or some other light subject, until a handkerchief applied to his neck will not come off wet. If possible, get him to seat himself, and then, grasping both lapels of his coat, breathe heavily upon him, and speak of your lonely life.

At this stage he will mutter incoherently, answer at random, and try to climb up the chimney. When his pulse gets to 195, and he begins to babble of green fields and shows only the whites of his eyes, strike him on the point of the chin, propose, chloroform him, and telephone for a minister.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/led-astray.xhtml b/src/epub/text/led-astray.xhtml index 705b1fa..af24c3d 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/led-astray.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/led-astray.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Led Astray

There was no happier family in all Houston than the O’Malleys. Mr. O’Malley held a responsible position in one of our large breweries, and was a thrifty citizen and an indulgent husband and father. His son Pat was part owner of a flourishing little grocery, and also played the E-flat horn in the band that discourses sweet music Sunday afternoons in a building on one of our quietest unpaved avenues.

The light and hope of the family was the youngest daughter, Kathleen, an ebon-haired girl of 19, with Madonna-like features, and eyes as black as the wings of the crow. They lived in a little rose-embowered cottage near the corner where the street car turns.

@@ -80,6 +80,6 @@

“I have first,” he said, “a duty to perform.” He knelt before the whiskey keg, closed his mouth over the faucet and turned on the handle.

Sing, happy birds, in the green trees, but your songs make not half the melody that ripples in the glad heart of little Kathleen.

When Fergus arose from the keg, he was the same old Fergus once more. He gathered his bride to his heart, and Mr. O’Malley fired both barrels of his gun into the ceiling with joy. Fergus was rescued.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/let-me-feel-your-pulse.xhtml b/src/epub/text/let-me-feel-your-pulse.xhtml index 3cad20b..1d8b443 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/let-me-feel-your-pulse.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/let-me-feel-your-pulse.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Let Me Feel Your Pulse

So I went to a doctor.

“How long has it been since you took any alcohol into your system?” he asked.

@@ -132,6 +132,6 @@

And so for the exercise one is referred to good Doctor Tatum on Black Oak Mountain⁠—take the road to your right at the Methodist meeting house in the pine-grove.

Absolute rest and exercise!

What rest more remedial than to sit with Amaryllis in the shade, and, with a sixth sense, read the wordless Theocritan idyl of the gold-bannered blue mountains marching orderly into the dormitories of the night?

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/little-speck-in-garnered-fruit.xhtml b/src/epub/text/little-speck-in-garnered-fruit.xhtml index 25177af..4cbe41a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/little-speck-in-garnered-fruit.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/little-speck-in-garnered-fruit.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

“Little Speck in Garnered Fruit”

The honeymoon was at its full. There was a flat with the reddest of new carpets, tasselled portières and six steins with pewter lids arranged on a ledge above the wainscoting of the dining-room. The wonder of it was yet upon them. Neither of them had ever seen a yellow primrose by the river’s brim; but if such a sight had met their eyes at that time it would have seemed like⁠—well, whatever the poet expected the right kind of people to see in it besides a primrose.

The bride sat in the rocker with her feet resting upon the world. She was wrapt in rosy dreams and a kimono of the same hue. She wondered what the people in Greenland and Tasmania and Beloochistan were saying one to another about her marriage to Kid McGarry. Not that it made any difference. There was no welterweight from London to the Southern Cross that could stand up four hours⁠—no; four rounds⁠—with her bridegroom. And he had been hers for three weeks; and the crook of her little finger could sway him more than the fist of any 142-pounder in the world.

@@ -65,6 +65,6 @@

And now he stood by her chair and laid the peach in her hand.

“Naughty boy!” she said, fondly. “Did I say a peach? I think I would much rather have had an orange.”

Blest be the bride.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/lord-oakhursts-curse.xhtml b/src/epub/text/lord-oakhursts-curse.xhtml index 56e3bdc..dd0b8c4 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/lord-oakhursts-curse.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/lord-oakhursts-curse.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Lord Oakhurst’s Curse

I

@@ -33,6 +33,6 @@

Sir Everhard FitzArmond descended the stairway of Oakhurst Castle and passed out into the avenue that led from the doorway to the great iron gates of the park. Lord Oakhurst had been a great sportsman during his life and always kept a well-stocked kennel of curs, which now rushed out from their hiding places and with loud yelps sprang upon the physician, burying their fangs in his lower limbs and seriously damaging his apparel.

Sir Everhard, startled out of his professional dignity and usual indifference to human suffering, by the personal application of feeling, gave vent to a most horrible and blighting curse and ran with great swiftness to his carriage and drove off toward the city.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/lost-on-dress-parade.xhtml b/src/epub/text/lost-on-dress-parade.xhtml index 2ea6da1..57d0131 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/lost-on-dress-parade.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/lost-on-dress-parade.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Lost on Dress Parade

Mr. Towers Chandler was pressing his evening suit in his hall bedroom. One iron was heating on a small gas stove; the other was being pushed vigorously back and forth to make the desirable crease that would be seen later on extending in straight lines from Mr. Chandler’s patent leather shoes to the edge of his low-cut vest. So much of the hero’s toilet may be entrusted to our confidence. The remainder may be guessed by those whom genteel poverty has driven to ignoble expedient. Our next view of him shall be as he descends the steps of his lodging-house immaculately and correctly clothed; calm, assured, handsome⁠—in appearance the typical New York young clubman setting out, slightly bored, to inaugurate the pleasures of the evening.

Chandler’s honorarium was $18 per week. He was employed in the office of an architect. He was twenty-two years old; he considered architecture to be truly an art; and he honestly believed⁠—though he would not have dared to admit it in New York⁠—that the Flatiron Building was inferior in design to the great cathedral in Milan.

@@ -55,6 +55,6 @@

“We will have to marry some day,” she said dreamily⁠—“both of us. We have so much money that we will not be allowed to disappoint the public. Do you want me to tell you the kind of a man I could love, Sis?”

“Go on, you scatterbrain,” smiled the other.

“I could love a man with dark and kind blue eyes, who is gentle and respectful to poor girls, who is handsome and good and does not try to flirt. But I could love him only if he had an ambition, an object, some work to do in the world. I would not care how poor he was if I could help him build his way up. But, sister dear, the kind of man we always meet⁠—the man who lives an idle life between society and his clubs⁠—I could not love a man like that, even if his eyes were blue and he were ever so kind to poor girls whom he met in the street.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/lucky-either-way.xhtml b/src/epub/text/lucky-either-way.xhtml index e8f3b02..8ad3581 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/lucky-either-way.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/lucky-either-way.xhtml @@ -6,13 +6,13 @@ -
+

Lucky Either Way

The Memphis Commercial-Appeal, in commenting on errors in grammar made by magazines, takes exception to an error in construction occurring in Gode’s Magazine in which, in J. H. Connelly’s story entitled “Mr. Pettigrew’s Bad Dog,” a character is made to say: “You will be lucky if you escape with only marrying one.”

A man says this to another one who is being besieged by two ladies, and the Commercial-Appeal thinks he intended to say: “You will be lucky if you escape with marrying only one.”

Now, after considering the question, it seems likely that there is more in Mr. J. H. Connelly’s remark than is dreamed of in the philosophy of the Commercial-Appeal.

The history of matrimony gives color to the belief that, to whichever one of the ladies the gentleman might unite himself, he would be lucky if he escaped with only marrying her. Getting married is the easiest part of the affair. It is what comes afterward that makes a man sometimes wish a wolf had carried him into the forest when he was a little boy. It takes only a little nerve, a black coat, from five to ten dollars, and a girl, for a man to get married. Very few men are lucky enough to escape with only marrying a woman. Women are sometimes so capricious and unreasonable that they demand that a man stay around afterward, and board and clothe them, and build fires, and chop wood, and rock the chickens out of the garden, and tell the dressmaker when to send in her bill again.

We would like to read “Mr. Pettigrew’s Bad Dog” and find out whether the man was lucky enough to only marry the lady, or whether she held on to him afterward and didn’t let him escape.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/madame-bo-peep-of-the-ranches.xhtml b/src/epub/text/madame-bo-peep-of-the-ranches.xhtml index 5daec4a..4f98b0b 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/madame-bo-peep-of-the-ranches.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/madame-bo-peep-of-the-ranches.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Madame Bo-Peep, of the Ranches

“Aunt Ellen,” said Octavia, cheerfully, as she threw her black kid gloves carefully at the dignified Persian cat on the window-seat, “I’m a pauper.”

“You are so extreme in your statements, Octavia, dear,” said Aunt Ellen, mildly, looking up from her paper. “If you find yourself temporarily in need of some small change for bonbons, you will find my purse in the drawer of the writing desk.”

@@ -172,6 +172,6 @@

Octavia drew his head down, and whispered in his ear, But that is one of the tales they brought behind them.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/makes-the-whole-world-kin.xhtml b/src/epub/text/makes-the-whole-world-kin.xhtml index 1c72328..e0b6eca 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/makes-the-whole-world-kin.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/makes-the-whole-world-kin.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Makes the Whole World Kin

The burglar stepped inside the window quickly, and then he took his time. A burglar who respects his art always takes his time before taking anything else.

The house was a private residence. By its boarded front door and untrimmed Boston ivy the burglar knew that the mistress of it was sitting on some oceanside piazza telling a sympathetic man in a yachting cap that no one had ever understood her sensitive, lonely heart. He knew by the light in the third-story front windows, and by the lateness of the season, that the master of the house had come home, and would soon extinguish his light and retire. For it was September of the year and of the soul, in which season the house’s good man comes to consider roof gardens and stenographers as vanities, and to desire the return of his mate and the more durable blessings of decorum and the moral excellencies.

@@ -59,6 +59,6 @@

“ ‘Liked to forgot my money,” he explained; “laid it on the dresser last night.”

The burglar caught him by the right sleeve.

“Come on,” he said bluffly. “I ask you. Leave it alone. I’ve got the price. Ever try witch hazel and oil of wintergreen?”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/mammon-and-the-archer.xhtml b/src/epub/text/mammon-and-the-archer.xhtml index 082e2b7..c6cee00 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/mammon-and-the-archer.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/mammon-and-the-archer.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Mammon and the Archer

Old Anthony Rockwall, retired manufacturer and proprietor of Rockwall’s Eureka Soap, looked out the library window of his Fifth Avenue mansion and grinned. His neighbour to the right⁠—the aristocratic clubman, G. Van Schuylight Suffolk-Jones⁠—came out to his waiting motorcar, wrinkling a contumelious nostril, as usual, at the Italian renaissance sculpture of the soap palace’s front elevation.

“Stuck-up old statuette of nothing doing!” commented the ex-Soap King. “The Eden Musee’ll get that old frozen Nesselrode yet if he don’t watch out. I’ll have this house painted red, white, and blue next summer and see if that’ll make his Dutch nose turn up any higher.”

@@ -72,6 +72,6 @@

“You didn’t notice,” said he, “anywhere in the tie-up, a kind of a fat boy without any clothes on shooting arrows around with a bow, did you?”

“Why, no,” said Kelly, mystified. “I didn’t. If he was like you say, maybe the cops pinched him before I got there.”

“I thought the little rascal wouldn’t be on hand,” chuckled Anthony. “Goodbye, Kelly.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/man-about-town.xhtml b/src/epub/text/man-about-town.xhtml index 74b5509..9c2d41f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/man-about-town.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/man-about-town.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Man About Town

There were two or three things that I wanted to know. I do not care about a mystery. So I began to inquire.

It took me two weeks to find out what women carry in dress suitcases. And then I began to ask why a mattress is made in two pieces. This serious query was at first received with suspicion because it sounded like a conundrum. I was at last assured that its double form of construction was designed to make lighter the burden of woman, who makes up beds. I was so foolish as to persist, begging to know why, then, they were not made in two equal pieces; whereupon I was shunned.

@@ -39,6 +39,6 @@

A hospital nurse laid a hand that was not particularly soft upon my brow that was not at all fevered. A young doctor came along, grinned, and handed me a morning newspaper.

“Want to see how it happened?” he asked cheerily. I read the article. Its headlines began where I heard the buzzing leave off the night before. It closed with these lines:

“⁠—Bellevue Hospital, where it was said that his injuries were not serious. He appeared to be a typical Man About Town.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/marvelous.xhtml b/src/epub/text/marvelous.xhtml index f1ad974..b765b58 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/marvelous.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/marvelous.xhtml @@ -6,11 +6,11 @@ -
+

Marvelous

There is one man we know who is about as clever a reasoner as this country has yet produced. He has a way of thinking out a problem that is sometimes little short of divination. One day last week his wife told him to make some purchases, and as with all his logical powers he is rather forgetful on ordinary subjects, she tied a string around his finger so he would not forget his errand. About nine o’clock that night while hurrying homeward, he suddenly felt the string on his finger and stopped short. Then for the life of him he could not remember for what purpose the string had been placed there.

“Let’s see,” he said. “The string was tied on my finger so I would not forget. Therefore it is a forget-me-not. Now forget-me-not is a flower. Ah, yes, that’s it. I was to get a sack of flour.”

The giant intellect had got in its work.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/masters-of-arts.xhtml b/src/epub/text/masters-of-arts.xhtml index 0d240e9..378fb13 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/masters-of-arts.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/masters-of-arts.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Masters of Arts

A two-inch stub of a blue pencil was the wand with which Keogh performed the preliminary acts of his magic. So, with this he covered paper with diagrams and figures while he waited for the United States of America to send down to Coralio a successor to Atwood, resigned.

The new scheme that his mind had conceived, his stout heart endorsed, and his blue pencil corroborated, was laid around the characteristics and human frailties of the new president of Anchuria. These characteristics, and the situation out of which Keogh hoped to wrest a golden tribute, deserve chronicling contributive to the clear order of events.

@@ -96,6 +96,6 @@

“Carry,” he said, in an absentminded way, “you think a heap of your art, don’t you?”

“More,” said White, frankly, “than has been for the financial good of myself and my friends.”

“I thought you were a fool the other day,” went on Keogh, quietly, “and I’m not sure now that you wasn’t. But if you was, so am I. I’ve been in some funny deals, Carry, but I’ve always managed to scramble fair, and match my brains and capital against the other fellow’s. But when it comes to⁠—well, when you’ve got the other fellow cinched, and the screws on him, and he’s got to put up⁠—why, it don’t strike me as being a man’s game. They’ve got a name for it, you know; it’s⁠—confound you, don’t you understand? A fellow feels⁠—it’s something like that blamed art of yours⁠—he⁠—well, I tore that photograph up and laid the pieces on that stack of money and shoved the whole business back across the table. ‘Excuse me, Mr. Losada,’ I said, ‘but I guess I’ve made a mistake in the price. You get the photo for nothing.’ Now, Carry, you get out the pencil, and we’ll do some more figuring. I’d like to save enough out of our capital for you to have some fried sausages in your joint when you get back to New York.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/memoirs-of-a-yellow-dog.xhtml b/src/epub/text/memoirs-of-a-yellow-dog.xhtml index feaffa6..85f13eb 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/memoirs-of-a-yellow-dog.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/memoirs-of-a-yellow-dog.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Memoirs of a Yellow Dog

I don’t suppose it will knock any of you people off your perch to read a contribution from an animal. Mr. Kipling and a good many others have demonstrated the fact that animals can express themselves in remunerative English, and no magazine goes to press nowadays without an animal story in it, except the old-style monthlies that are still running pictures of Bryan and the Mont Pélee horror.

But you needn’t look for any stuck-up literature in my piece, such as Bearoo, the bear, and Snakoo, the snake, and Tammanoo, the tiger, talk in the jungle books. A yellow dog that’s spent most of his life in a cheap New York flat, sleeping in a corner on an old sateen underskirt (the one she spilled port wine on at the Lady Longshoremen’s banquet), mustn’t be expected to perform any tricks with the art of speech.

@@ -43,6 +43,6 @@

But what pleased me most was when my old man pulled both of my ears until I howled, and said: “You common, monkey-headed, rat-tailed, sulphur-coloured son of a door mat, do you know what I’m going to call you?”

I thought of “Lovey,” and I whined dolefully.

“I’m going to call you ‘Pete,’ ” says my master; and if I’d had five tails I couldn’t have done enough wagging to do justice to the occasion.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/modern-rural-sports.xhtml b/src/epub/text/modern-rural-sports.xhtml index bb0fd3f..aabd706 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/modern-rural-sports.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/modern-rural-sports.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Modern Rural Sports

Jeff Peters must be reminded. Whenever he is called upon, pointedly, for a story, he will maintain that his life has been as devoid of incident as the longest of Trollope’s novels. But lured, he will divulge. Therefore I cast many and divers flies upon the current of his thoughts before I feel a nibble.

“I notice,” said I, “that the Western farmers, in spite of their prosperity, are running after their old populistic idols again.”

@@ -70,6 +70,6 @@

Here Jeff Peters ceased, and I inferred that his story was done.

“Then you think”⁠—I began.

“Yes,” said Jeff. “Something like that. You let the farmers go ahead and amuse themselves with politics. Farming’s a lonesome life; and they’ve been against the shell game before.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/money-maze.xhtml b/src/epub/text/money-maze.xhtml index 6655571..77a4cdb 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/money-maze.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/money-maze.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Money Maze

The new administration of Anchuria entered upon its duties and privileges with enthusiasm. Its first act was to send an agent to Coralio with imperative orders to recover, if possible, the sum of money ravished from the treasury by the ill-fated Miraflores.

Colonel Emilio Falcon, the private secretary of Losada, the new president, was despatched from the capital upon this important mission.

@@ -73,6 +73,6 @@

“All right,” said Goodwin. “Buenas noches.”

“Beelzebub” Blythe lingered over his cups, polishing his eyeglasses with a disreputable handkerchief.

“I thought I could do it, but I couldn’t,” he muttered to himself after a time. “A gentleman can’t blackmail the man that he drinks with.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/nemesis-and-the-candy-man.xhtml b/src/epub/text/nemesis-and-the-candy-man.xhtml index 403cc65..eaa6f67 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/nemesis-and-the-candy-man.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/nemesis-and-the-candy-man.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Nemesis and the Candy Man

“We sail at eight in the morning on the Celtic,” said Honoria, plucking a loose thread from her lace sleeve.

“I heard so,” said young Ives, dropping his hat, and muffing it as he tried to catch it, “and I came around to wish you a pleasant voyage.”

@@ -86,6 +86,6 @@

“What is it?” he called.

Sidonie’s severe head came into the window.

“Mademoiselle is overcome by bad news,” she said. “One whom she loved with all her soul has gone⁠—you may have heard of him⁠—he is Monsieur Ives. He sails across the ocean tomorrow. Oh, you men!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/new-york-by-camp-fire-light.xhtml b/src/epub/text/new-york-by-camp-fire-light.xhtml index 078a768..87c8a11 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/new-york-by-camp-fire-light.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/new-york-by-camp-fire-light.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

New York by Camp Fire Light

Away out in the Creek Nation we learned things about New York.

We were on a hunting trip, and were camped one night on the bank of a little stream. Bud Kingsbury was our skilled hunter and guide, and it was from his lips that we had explanations of Manhattan and the queer folks that inhabit it. Bud had once spent a month in the metropolis, and a week or two at other times, and he was pleased to discourse to us of what he had seen.

@@ -41,6 +41,6 @@

“Blamed if that New York man didn’t sit right up when he heard the Doc say that.

“ ‘Say,’ says he, kind of disappointed, ‘was that heaven? Confound it all, I thought it was Broadway. Some of you fellows get my clothes. I’m going to get up.’

“And I’ll be blamed,” concluded Bud, “if he wasn’t on the train with a ticket for New York in his pocket four days afterward!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/next-to-reading-matter.xhtml b/src/epub/text/next-to-reading-matter.xhtml index 42c886c..337fbf8 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/next-to-reading-matter.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/next-to-reading-matter.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

“Next to Reading Matter”

He compelled my interest as he stepped from the ferry at Desbrosses Street. He had the air of being familiar with hemispheres and worlds, and of entering New York as the lord of a demesne who revisited it in after years of absence. But I thought that, with all his air, he had never before set foot on the slippery cobblestones of the City of Too Many Caliphs.

He wore loose clothes of a strange bluish drab colour, and a conservative, round Panama hat without the cock-a-loop indentations and cants with which Northern fanciers disfigure the tropic headgear. Moreover, he was the homeliest man I have ever seen. His ugliness was less repellent than startling⁠—arising from a sort of Lincolnian ruggedness and irregularity of feature that spellbound you with wonder and dismay. So may have looked afrites or the shapes metamorphosed from the vapour of the fisherman’s vase. As he afterward told me, his name was Judson Tate; and he may as well be called so at once. He wore his green silk tie through a topaz ring; and he carried a cane made of the vertebrae of a shark.

@@ -119,6 +119,6 @@

“If readers can swallow so many proprietary automobiles,” I said to myself, “they ought not to strain at one of Tate’s Compound Magic Chuchula Bronchial Lozenges.”

And so if you see this story in print you will understand that business is business, and that if Art gets very far ahead of Commerce, she will have to get up and hustle.

I may as well add, to make a clean job of it, that you can’t buy the chuchula plant in the drug stores.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/no-help-for-it.xhtml b/src/epub/text/no-help-for-it.xhtml index 881110f..c5443f5 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/no-help-for-it.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/no-help-for-it.xhtml @@ -6,11 +6,11 @@ -
+

No Help for It

John,” said a Houston grocer the other day to one of his clerks. “You have been a faithful and competent clerk, and in order to show my appreciation, I have decided to take you into partnership. From this time on you are to have a share in the business, and be a member of the firm.”

“But, sir,” said John anxiously, “I have a family to support. I appreciate the honor, but I fear I am too young for the responsibility. I would much rather retain my present place.”

“Can’t help it,” said the grocer. “Times are hard and I’ve got to cut down expenses if I have to take every clerk in the house into the firm.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/no-story.xhtml b/src/epub/text/no-story.xhtml index edd771b..ccae2ed 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/no-story.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/no-story.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

No Story

To avoid having this book hurled into corner of the room by the suspicious reader, I will assert in time that this is not a newspaper story. You will encounter no shirt-sleeved, omniscient city editor, no prodigy “cub” reporter just off the farm, no scoop, no story⁠—no anything.

But if you will concede me the setting of the first scene in the reporters’ room of the Morning Beacon, I will repay the favor by keeping strictly my promises set forth above.

@@ -75,6 +75,6 @@

“What!” I said, looking at him keenly.

“Oh yes,” he responded, dully. “George Brown, alias Tripp. What’s the use?”

Barring the WCTU, I’d like to know if anybody disapproves of my having produced promptly from my pocket Tripp’s whiskey dollar and unhesitatingly laying it in his hand.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/no-time-to-lose.xhtml b/src/epub/text/no-time-to-lose.xhtml index cb3c6fe..a5e476f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/no-time-to-lose.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/no-time-to-lose.xhtml @@ -6,13 +6,13 @@ -
+

No Time to Lose

A young Houston mother rushed into die house the other day in the utmost excitement, calling out to her mother to put an iron on the fire as quick as possible.

“What is the matter?” asked the old lady.

“A dog has just bitten Tommy, and I am afraid it was mad. Oh, hurry up, mother; be as quick as you can!”

“Are you going to try to cauterize the wound?”

“No⁠—I’ve got to iron that blue skirt before I can wear it to go after the doctor. Do be in a hurry.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/not-so-much-a-tam-fool.xhtml b/src/epub/text/not-so-much-a-tam-fool.xhtml index fee967d..fd398c1 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/not-so-much-a-tam-fool.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/not-so-much-a-tam-fool.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

“Not So Much a Tam Fool”

A man without a collar, wearing a white vest and holes in his elbows, walked briskly into a Congress Street grocery last Saturday with a package in his hand and said:

“Here, Fritz, I bought two dozen eggs here this afternoon, and I find your clerk made a mistake, I⁠—”

@@ -17,6 +17,6 @@

“Emil,” said the grocer, “gif dis man t’ree dozen goot fresh eggs at vonce and let him go. Ve makes pad eggs good ven ve sells dem. Hurry up quick and put in drei or four extra vons.”

“But, listen to me, sir,” said the man. “I want to⁠—”

“Say, mein frindt,” said the grocer in a lower voice, “you petter dake dose eggs und go home. I know vat you pring pack dose eggs for. If I dake dem, I say, ‘Veil, dot is ein very good man; he vas honest py dose eggs, aind’t it?’ Den you coom pack Monday und you puy nine tollers’ vorth of vlour and paeon and canned goots, and you say you bay me Saturday night. I was not so much a tarn fool as eferypody say I look like. You petter dake dose t’ree dozen eggs and call it skvare. Ve always correct leedle misdakes ven ve make dem. Emil, you petter make it t’ree dozen und a half fur good measure, and put in two t’ree stick candy for die kinder.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/nothing-new-under-the-sun.xhtml b/src/epub/text/nothing-new-under-the-sun.xhtml index 317379c..c8a7f4d 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/nothing-new-under-the-sun.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/nothing-new-under-the-sun.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Nothing New Under the Sun

The wind tears at the shingles that poorly cover the attic at the top of seven flights of stairs. The snow crystals, blown as fine as frost by the force of the tempest, buzz through crannies and sift upon the mean bed. Some shutters outside slam and creak with every frequent gale, and the snow clouds sweeping southward suffer a splendent blue-tinged star to turn a radiant eye downward upon the world.

Through a rift in the roof of the attic the star alone sees what transpires there that night. On the bare floor stands some rickety furniture, and in the center is a table on which lie paper, pens and ink, and stands a lighted candle.

@@ -27,6 +27,6 @@

“It’s peculiar stuff. I can’t just make it out. Look at his hand; he’s got an old newspaper in it gripped like a vise.”

He stoops and forces the old paper from the cold fingers. He examines it from curiosity and dully stumbles upon the truth.

“Say, Bill,” he says, “here’s a funny thing. This old newspaper’s got an article in it very near exactly the same as that thing the gent wrote himself.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/october-and-june.xhtml b/src/epub/text/october-and-june.xhtml index 2ea94f3..9d45b3f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/october-and-june.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/october-and-june.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

October and June

The Captain gazed gloomily at his sword that hung upon the wall. In the closet nearby was stored his faded uniform, stained and worn by weather and service. What a long, long time it seemed since those old days of war’s alarms!

And now, veteran that he was of his country’s strenuous times, he had been reduced to abject surrender by a woman’s soft eyes and smiling lips. As he sat in his quiet room he held in his hand the letter he had just received from her⁠—the letter that had caused him to wear that look of gloom. He reread the fatal paragraph that had destroyed his hope.

@@ -30,6 +30,6 @@

He took the train for the North that night. On the next evening he was back in his room, where his sword was hanging against the wall. He was dressing for dinner, tying his white tie into a very careful bow. And at the same time he was indulging in a pensive soliloquy.

“ ’Pon my honour, I believe Theo was right, after all. Nobody can deny that she’s a peach, but she must be twenty-eight, at the very kindest calculation.”

For you see, the Captain was only nineteen, and his sword had never been drawn except on the parade ground at Chattanooga, which was as near as he ever got to the Spanish-American War.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/on-behalf-of-the-management.xhtml b/src/epub/text/on-behalf-of-the-management.xhtml index 60a4d58..f70697c 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/on-behalf-of-the-management.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/on-behalf-of-the-management.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

On Behalf of the Management

This is the story of the man manager, and how he held his own until the very last paragraph.

I had it from Sully Magoon, viva voce. The words are indeed his; and if they do not constitute truthful fiction my memory should be taxed with the blame.

@@ -105,6 +105,6 @@

“Is Mr. Galloway still in the managing business?” I asked, as Mr. Magoon ceased.

Sully shook his head.

“Denver married an auburn-haired widow that owns a big hotel in Harlem. He just helps around the place.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/one-consolation.xhtml b/src/epub/text/one-consolation.xhtml index aedee8d..6f1aa07 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/one-consolation.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/one-consolation.xhtml @@ -6,11 +6,11 @@ -
+

One Consolation

Breakfast was over and Adam had gone to his daily occupation of pasting the names of the animals on their cages. Eve took the parrot to one side and said: “It was this way. He made a big kick about those biscuits not being good at breakfast.”

“And what did you say?” asked the parrot.

“I told him there was one consolation; he couldn’t say his mother ever made any better ones.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/one-dollars-worth.xhtml b/src/epub/text/one-dollars-worth.xhtml index b10708e..8165596 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/one-dollars-worth.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/one-dollars-worth.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

One Dollar’s Worth

The judge of the United States court of the district lying along the Rio Grande border found the following letter one morning in his mail:

@@ -75,6 +75,6 @@

At the noon recess Kilpatrick strolled into the district attorney’s office.

“I’ve just been down to take a squint at old Mexico Sam,” said the deputy. “They’ve got him laid out. Old Mexico was a tough outfit, I reckon. The boys was wonderin’ down there what you shot him with. Some said it must have been nails. I never see a gun carry anything to make holes like he had.”

“I shot him,” said the district attorney, “with Exhibit A of your counterfeiting case. Lucky thing for me⁠—and somebody else⁠—that it was as bad money as it was! It sliced up into slugs very nicely. Say, Kil, can’t you go down to the jacals and find where that Mexican girl lives? Miss Derwent wants to know.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/one-thousand-dollars.xhtml b/src/epub/text/one-thousand-dollars.xhtml index 1adb0b2..5e185e2 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/one-thousand-dollars.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/one-thousand-dollars.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

One Thousand Dollars

“One thousand dollars,” repeated Lawyer Tolman, solemnly and severely, “and here is the money.”

Young Gillian gave a decidedly amused laugh as he fingered the thin package of new fifty-dollar notes.

@@ -72,6 +72,6 @@

Mr. Tolman reached for the envelope. Gillian was a little the quicker in taking it up. He tore the account and its cover leisurely into strips and dropped them into his pocket.

“It’s all right,” he said, smilingly. “There isn’t a bit of need to bother you with this. I don’t suppose you’d understand these itemized bets, anyway. I lost the thousand dollars on the races. Good day to you, gentlemen.”

Tolman & Sharp shook their heads mournfully at each other when Gillian left, for they heard him whistling gayly in the hallway as he waited for the elevator.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/out-of-nazareth.xhtml b/src/epub/text/out-of-nazareth.xhtml index 950cfa5..557b6e3 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/out-of-nazareth.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/out-of-nazareth.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Out of Nazareth

Okochee, in Georgia, had a boom, and J. Pinkney Bloom came out of it with a “wad.” Okochee came out of it with a half-million-dollar debt, a two and a half percent city property tax, and a city council that showed a propensity for traveling the back streets of the town. These things came about through a fatal resemblance of the river Cooloosa to the Hudson, as set forth and expounded by a Northern tourist. Okochee felt that New York should not be allowed to consider itself the only alligator in the swamp, so to speak. And then that harmless, but persistent, individual so numerous in the South⁠—the man who is always clamoring for more cotton mills, and is ready to take a dollar’s worth of stock, provided he can borrow the dollar⁠—that man added his deadly work to the tourist’s innocent praise, and Okochee fell.

The Cooloosa River winds through a range of small mountains, passes Okochee and then blends its waters trippingly, as fall the mellifluous Indian syllables, with the Chattahoochee.

@@ -174,6 +174,6 @@

“I believe not,” said Mr. Cooly.

“It’s a hymn,” said J. Pinkney Bloom. “Now, show me the way to a livery stable, son, for I’m going to hit the dirt road back to Okochee.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/paderewskis-hair.xhtml b/src/epub/text/paderewskis-hair.xhtml index 0c6a3fc..1cb2293 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/paderewskis-hair.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/paderewskis-hair.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Paderewski’s Hair

The Post Man had the pleasure of meeting Colonel Warburton Pollock yesterday in the rotunda of the New Hutchins.

Colonel Pollock is one of the most widely known men in this country, and has probably a more extended acquaintance with distinguished men of the times than any other living man. He is a wit, a raconteur of rare gifts, a born diplomat, and a man of worldwide travel and experience. Nothing pleases him so well as to relate his extremely interesting reminiscences of men and events to some congenial circle of listeners. His recollections of his associations with famous men and women would fill volumes.

@@ -61,6 +61,6 @@

“I understand DeWolf Hopper is going to dramatize the incident, and will produce it next season, appearing as a kangaroo.

“Coxey was caught on the edge of a little stream which he refused to enter, and the natives dragged him before an English justice of the peace who released him the next day. The prince took the whole thing as a good joke. He is an all round good fellow and no mistake.

“Sometime,” said Colonel Pollock, as he rose to receipt for a telegram, “I will tell you about an adventure I had among the Catacombs of Rome, along with Ralph Waldo Emerson, Barney Gibbs and the Shah of Persia.” Colonel Pollock leaves on the night train for San Antonio on his way to the City of Mexico.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/past-one-at-rooneys.xhtml b/src/epub/text/past-one-at-rooneys.xhtml index 126ea92..10e9611 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/past-one-at-rooneys.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/past-one-at-rooneys.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Past One at Rooney’s

Only on the lower East Side of New York do the houses of Capulet and Montagu survive. There they do not fight by the book of arithmetic. If you but bite your thumb at an upholder of your opposing house you have work cut out for your steel. On Broadway you may drag your man along a dozen blocks by his nose, and he will only bawl for the watch; but in the domain of the East Side Tybalts and Mercutios you must observe the niceties of deportment to the wink of any eyelash and to an inch of elbow room at the bar when its patrons include foes of your house and kin.

So, when Eddie McManus, known to the Capulets as Cork McManus, drifted into Dutch Mike’s for a stein of beer, and came upon a bunch of Montagus making merry with the suds, he began to observe the strictest parliamentary rules. Courtesy forbade his leaving the saloon with his thirst unslaked; caution steered him to a place at the bar where the mirror supplied the cognizance of the enemy’s movements that his indifferent gaze seemed to disdain; experience whispered to him that the finger of trouble would be busy among the chattering steins at Dutch Mike’s that night. Close by his side drew Brick Cleary, his Mercutio, companion of his perambulations. Thus they stood, four of the Mulberry Hill Gang and two of the Dry Dock Gang, minding their P’s and Q’s so solicitously that Dutch Mike kept one eye on his customers and the other on an open space beneath his bar in which it was his custom to seek safety whenever the ominous politeness of the rival associations congealed into the shapes of bullets and cold steel.

@@ -124,6 +124,6 @@

“She’ll be all right in a minute,” said Cork. “It’s a straight deal.”

“Reverend Jeremiah Jones,” read the cop from the doorplate with true detective cunning.

“Correct,” said Cork. “On the dead level, we’re goin’ to get married.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/phoebe.xhtml b/src/epub/text/phoebe.xhtml index b47e098..75ee286 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/phoebe.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/phoebe.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Phoebe

“You are a man of many novel adventures and varied enterprises,” I said to Captain Patricio Maloné. “Do you believe that the possible element of good luck or bad luck⁠—if there is such a thing as luck⁠—has influenced your career or persisted for or against you to such an extent that you were forced to attribute results to the operation of the aforesaid good luck or bad luck?”

This question (of almost the dull insolence of legal phraseology) was put while we sat in Rousselin’s little red-tiled café near Congo Square in New Orleans.

@@ -128,6 +128,6 @@

Captain Maloné ceased again.

“After all, do you believe in luck?” I asked.

“Do you?” answered the captain, with his ambiguous smile shaded by the brim of his soft straw hat.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/proof-of-the-pudding.xhtml b/src/epub/text/proof-of-the-pudding.xhtml index c287e0d..e4bd084 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/proof-of-the-pudding.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/proof-of-the-pudding.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Proof of the Pudding

Spring winked a vitreous optic at Editor Westbrook of the Minerva Magazine, and deflected him from his course. He had lunched in his favorite corner of a Broadway hotel, and was returning to his office when his feet became entangled in the lure of the vernal coquette. Which is by way of saying that he turned eastward in Twenty-sixth Street, safely forded the spring freshet of vehicles in Fifth Avenue, and meandered along the walks of budding Madison Square.

The lenient air and the settings of the little park almost formed a pastoral; the color motif was green⁠—the presiding shade at the creation of man and vegetation.

@@ -98,6 +98,6 @@

“Say, Shack, ain’t that a hell of a note? Wouldn’t that knock you off your perch, Shack? Ain’t it hell, now, Shack⁠—ain’t it?”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/psyche-and-the-pskyscraper.xhtml b/src/epub/text/psyche-and-the-pskyscraper.xhtml index 1976f9a..f0f5867 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/psyche-and-the-pskyscraper.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/psyche-and-the-pskyscraper.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Psyche and the Pskyscraper

If you are a philosopher you can do this thing: you can go to the top of a high building, look down upon your fellow-men 300 feet below, and despise them as insects. Like the irresponsible black waterbugs on summer ponds, they crawl and circle and hustle about idiotically without aim or purpose. They do not even move with the admirable intelligence of ants, for ants always know when they are going home. The ant is of a lowly station, but he will often reach home and get his slippers on while you are left at your elevated station.

Man, then, to the housetopped philosopher, appears to be but a creeping, contemptible beetle. Brokers, poets, millionaires, bootblacks, beauties, hod-carriers and politicians become little black specks dodging bigger black specks in streets no wider than your thumb.

@@ -62,6 +62,6 @@

Joe had a lull in trade, and by squirming among his stock succeeded in lighting a cigarette and getting one cold foot against the attenuated stove.

The door was burst open, and Daisy, laughing, crying, scattering fruit and candies, tumbled into his arms.

“Oh, Joe, I’ve been up on the skyscraper. Ain’t it cozy and warm and homelike in here! I’m ready for you, Joe, whenever you want me.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/queries-and-answers.xhtml b/src/epub/text/queries-and-answers.xhtml index 6bf689b..81c2de4 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/queries-and-answers.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/queries-and-answers.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Queries and Answers

Can you inform me where I can buy an interest in a newspaper of some kind? I have some money and would be glad to invest it in something of the sort, if someone would allow me to put in my capital against his experience.

College Graduate.

@@ -58,6 +58,6 @@

Is the Lakeside Improvement Company making anything out of their own town tract on the lake?

Inquisitive.

Yes, lots.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/recognition.xhtml b/src/epub/text/recognition.xhtml index 1a2a180..6a78f06 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/recognition.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/recognition.xhtml @@ -6,13 +6,13 @@ -
+

Recognition

The new woman came in with a firm and confident tread. She hung her hat on a nail, stood her cane in the corner, and kissed her husband gayly as he was mixing the biscuit for supper.

“Any luck today, dearie?” asked the man as his careworn face took on an anxious expression.

“The best of luck,” she said with a joyous smile. “The day has come when the world recognizes woman as man’s equal in everything. She is no longer content to occupy a lower plane than his, and is his competitor in all the fields of action. I obtained a position today at fifty dollars per week for the entire season.”

“What is the position?”

“Female impersonator at the new theater.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/reconciliation.xhtml b/src/epub/text/reconciliation.xhtml index 9725c33..5ea39bb 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/reconciliation.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/reconciliation.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Reconciliation A One-Act Drama @@ -135,6 +135,6 @@

Curtain

-

+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/red-conlins-eloquence.xhtml b/src/epub/text/red-conlins-eloquence.xhtml index 9716e82..ede75b2 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/red-conlins-eloquence.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/red-conlins-eloquence.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Red Conlin’s Eloquence

They were speaking of the power of great orators, and each one had something to say of his especial favorite.

The drummer was for backing Bourke Cockran for oratory against the world, the young lawyer thought the suave Ingersoll the most persuasive pleader, and the insurance agent advanced the claims of the magnetic W. C. P. Breckenridge.

@@ -32,6 +32,6 @@

“ ‘How is it’?’ we whispered, almost afraid to hear him speak.

“ ‘It’s fixed,’ says Red, ‘and the widdy and I asks ye to the weddin’ nixt Chuesday night.’

“That fellow Red Conlin could talk.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/relieved.xhtml b/src/epub/text/relieved.xhtml index 4efae7e..41aa752 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/relieved.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/relieved.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Relieved

A Houston gentleman who is worth somewhere up in the hundreds of thousands and lives on eleven dollars a week, was sitting in his private office a few days ago, when a desperate looking man entered and closed the door carefully behind him. The man had an evil, villainous-looking face, and in his hand he held with the utmost care an oblong, square-shaped package. “What do you want?” asked the capitalist.

“I must have money,” hissed the stranger. I am starving while you are rolling in wealth. Do you see this little package? Do you know what it contains?”

@@ -14,6 +14,6 @@

“No, no,” he gasped. “You would not be so cruel, so heartless.”

“This package,” continued the desperate man, “contains enough dynamite, if let fall upon the floor, to hurl this building into a shapeless mass of ruins.”

“Is that all?” said the capitalist, sinking into his chair and picking up his newspaper with a sigh of relief. “You don’t know how much you frightened me. I thought it was a gold brick.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/revenge.xhtml b/src/epub/text/revenge.xhtml index d32e0dd..bbe2053 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/revenge.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/revenge.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Revenge

@@ -16,6 +16,6 @@

Although we can stand a great deal, this attack has goaded us to what is perhaps a bitter and cruel, but not entirely an unjustifiable revenge. Below will be found an editorial from the last number of the Star-Vindicator:

“Spring, with her magic word of music, pathos, and joy, has touched a thousand hills and vales, has set a million throats to warbling; sunshine, song, and flowers bedeck every altar and crown each day more glorious. Imperial spring is here⁠—the brightest, gayest, and best of all God’s seasons. Springtime is like the little child⁠—crowned with its own purity and love not tarnished and seared with the hand of Time. It is like the bright, sparkling miniature rivulet that bursts from the mountain side and goes merrily over the shining pebbles before it hastens into a dark, deep, dangerous river. The sweet cadence of music, the scent of wafted perfumes, the stretch of glorious landscape, radiated and beautified with lovely gems of Oriental hue, catch our attention at every step. The world today is a wilderness of flowers, a bower of beauty, and millions of sweet native warblers make its pastures concert halls, where we can go in peace at even-time, after the strife, the toil, the disappointments, and sorrows of our labors here and gather strength, courage, and hope to meet on the morrow life’s renewed duties and responsibilities.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/ridiculous.xhtml b/src/epub/text/ridiculous.xhtml index 3dbe5e2..1c7a849 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/ridiculous.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/ridiculous.xhtml @@ -6,12 +6,12 @@ -
+

Ridiculous

The following conundrum was left at the office yesterday by a young man, who immediately fled:

“Why is the coming Sunday like a very young body?”

Answer: “Because it’s neck’s weak.”

We do not see any reason why this should be the case. It is impossible for Sunday or any other day in the week to have a neck. The thing is printed merely to show what kind of stuff people send in to the paper.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/roads-of-destiny.xhtml b/src/epub/text/roads-of-destiny.xhtml index e7cbb38..11a3e67 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/roads-of-destiny.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/roads-of-destiny.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Roads of Destiny

@@ -271,6 +271,6 @@

M. Papineau, whose nose had brought him there among the first, picked up the weapon and ran his eye over its silver mountings with a mingled air of connoisseurship and grief.

“The arms,” he explained, aside, to the curé, “and crest of Monseigneur, the Marquis de Beaupertuys.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/roses-ruses-and-romance.xhtml b/src/epub/text/roses-ruses-and-romance.xhtml index 6c3699e..48c97d5 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/roses-ruses-and-romance.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/roses-ruses-and-romance.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Roses, Ruses and Romance

Ravenel⁠—Ravenel, the traveller, artist and poet, threw his magazine to the floor. Sammy Brown, broker’s clerk, who sat by the window, jumped.

“What is it, Ravvy?” he asked. “The critics been hammering your stock down?”

@@ -66,6 +66,6 @@

“Roses,” said Sammy, briefly. “Four of ’em today. Means four o’clock at the corner of Broadway and Twenty-third.”

“But the geranium?” persisted Ravenel, clutching at the end of flying Romance’s trailing robe.

“Means half-past,” shouted Sammy from the hall. “See you tomorrow.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/rouge-et-noir.xhtml b/src/epub/text/rouge-et-noir.xhtml index 5d987f7..fb09dd7 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/rouge-et-noir.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/rouge-et-noir.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Rouge Et Noir

It has been indicated that disaffection followed the elevation of Losada to the presidency. This feeling continued to grow. Throughout the entire republic there seemed to be a spirit of silent, sullen discontent. Even the old Liberal party to which Goodwin, Zavalla and other patriots had lent their aid was disappointed. Losada had failed to become a popular idol. Fresh taxes, fresh import duties and, more than all, his tolerance of the outrageous oppression of citizens by the military had rendered him the most obnoxious president since the despicable Alforan. The majority of his own cabinet were out of sympathy with him. The army, which he had courted by giving it license to tyrannize, had been his main, and thus far adequate support.

But the most impolitic of the administration’s moves had been when it antagonized the Vesuvius Fruit Company, an organization plying twelve steamers and with a cash capital somewhat larger than Anchuria’s surplus and debt combined.

@@ -64,6 +64,6 @@

“There’ll be another ‘presidente proclamada’ in the morning,” said Mr. Vincenti, musingly. “As a rule they are not as reliable as the elected ones, but this youngster seems to have some good stuff in him. He planned and maneuvered the entire campaign. Olivarra’s widow, you know, was wealthy. After her husband was assassinated she went to the States, and educated her son at Yale. The Vesuvius Company hunted him up, and backed him in the little game.”

“It’s a glorious thing,” said Cronin, half jestingly, “to be able to discharge a government, and insert one of your own choosing, in these days.”

“Oh, it is only a matter of business,” said Vincenti, stopping and offering the stump of his cigar to a monkey that swung down from a lime tree; “and that is what moves the world of today. That extra real on the price of bananas had to go. We took the shortest way of removing it.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/round-the-circle.xhtml b/src/epub/text/round-the-circle.xhtml index ca990d2..5ca7fba 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/round-the-circle.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/round-the-circle.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Round the Circle

“Find yo’ shirt all right, Sam?” asked Mrs. Webber, from her chair under the live-oak, where she was comfortably seated with a paperback volume for company.

“It balances perfeckly, Marthy,” answered Sam, with a suspicious pleasantness in his tone. “At first I was about ter be a little reckless and kick ’cause ther buttons was all off, but since I diskiver that the button holes is all busted out, why, I wouldn’t go so fur as to say the buttons is any loss to speak of.”

@@ -39,6 +39,6 @@

Sam shook himself queerly, like a man coming out of a dream, and slowly dismounted. He moistened his dry lips.

“I see you are still a-settin’,” he said, “a-readin’ of them billy-by-dam yaller-back novils.”

Sam had traveled round the circle and was himself again.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/rus-in-urbe.xhtml b/src/epub/text/rus-in-urbe.xhtml index f2efea2..b8c7f22 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/rus-in-urbe.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/rus-in-urbe.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Rus in Urbe

Considering men in relation to money, there are three kinds whom I dislike: men who have more money than they can spend; men who have more money than they do spend; and men who spend more money than they have. Of the three varieties, I believe I have the least liking for the first. But, as a man, I liked Spencer Grenville North pretty well, although he had something like two or ten or thirty millions⁠—I’ve forgotten exactly how many.

I did not leave town that summer. I usually went down to a village on the south shore of Long Island. The place was surrounded by duck-farms, and the ducks and dogs and whippoorwills and rusty windmills made so much noise that I could sleep as peacefully as if I were in my own flat six doors from the elevated railroad in New York. But that summer I did not go. Remember that. One of my friends asked me why I did not. I replied:

@@ -83,6 +83,6 @@

She came closer to me, and I can see the look in her eyes yet as she spoke.

“I can pick ducks,” she said.

We sold the first year’s feathers for $350.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/schools-and-schools.xhtml b/src/epub/text/schools-and-schools.xhtml index da204a8..da0e8d2 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/schools-and-schools.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/schools-and-schools.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Schools and Schools

I

@@ -125,6 +125,6 @@

“Word for word,” said Gilbert, “it was this: ‘My dear Miss Warren⁠—You were right about the flower. It was a hydrangea, and not a lilac.’ ”

“All right,” said Nevada. “But let’s forget it. The joke’s on Barbara, anyway!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/seats-of-the-haughty.xhtml b/src/epub/text/seats-of-the-haughty.xhtml index 4d30fc2..72b3496 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/seats-of-the-haughty.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/seats-of-the-haughty.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Seats of the Haughty

Golden by day and silver by night, a new trail now leads to us across the Indian Ocean. Dusky kings and princes have found our Bombay of the West; and few be their trails that do not lead down to Broadway on their journey for to admire and for to see.

If chance should ever lead you near a hotel that transiently shelters some one of these splendid touring grandees, I counsel you to seek Lucullus Polk among the republican tuft-hunters that besiege its entrances. He will be there. You will know him by his red, alert, Wellington-nosed face, by his manner of nervous caution mingled with determination, by his assumed promoter’s or broker’s air of busy impatience, and by his bright-red necktie, gallantly redressing the wrongs of his maltreated blue serge suit, like a battle standard still waving above a lost cause. I found him profitable; and so may you. When you do look for him, look among the light-horse troop of Bedouins that besiege the picket-line of the travelling potentate’s guards and secretaries⁠—among the wild-eyed genii of Arabian Afternoons that gather to make astounding and egregrious demands upon the prince’s coffers.

@@ -106,6 +106,6 @@

“There!” said Mr. Polk triumphantly. “My best saddle is as good as sold⁠—the one with turquoises set in the rim of the cantle. Have you three dollars that you could loan me for a short time?”

It happened that I had; and I did.

If this should meet the eye of the Imam of Muskat, may it quicken his whim to visit the land of the free! Otherwise I fear that I shall be longer than a short time separated from my dollars three.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/shearing-the-wolf.xhtml b/src/epub/text/shearing-the-wolf.xhtml index 7b95e9a..a6d216e 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/shearing-the-wolf.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/shearing-the-wolf.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Shearing the Wolf

Jeff Peters was always eloquent when the ethics of his profession was under discussion.

“The only times,” said he, “that me and Andy Tucker ever had any hiatuses in our cordial intents was when we differed on the moral aspects of grafting. Andy had his standards and I had mine. I didn’t approve of all of Andy’s schemes for levying contributions from the public, and he thought I allowed my conscience to interfere too often for the financial good of the firm. We had high arguments sometimes. One word led on to another till he said I reminded him of Rockefeller.

@@ -55,6 +55,6 @@

“ ‘Why, certainly,’ says I. ‘What else could it have been? Wasn’t it yours, too?’

“In about half an hour Andy spoke again. I think there are times when Andy don’t exactly understand my system of ethics and moral hygiene.

“ ‘Jeff,’ says he, ‘some time when you have the leisure I wish you’d draw off a diagram and footnotes of that conscience of yours. I’d like to have it to refer to occasionally.’ ”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/ships.xhtml b/src/epub/text/ships.xhtml index bc9d59e..56379a4 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/ships.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/ships.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Ships

Within a week a suitable building had been secured in the Calle Grande, and Mr. Hemstetter’s stock of shoes arranged upon their shelves. The rent of the store was moderate; and the stock made a fine showing of neat white boxes, attractively displayed.

Johnny’s friends stood by him loyally. On the first day Keogh strolled into the store in a casual kind of way about once every hour, and bought shoes. After he had purchased a pair each of extension soles, congress gaiters, button kids, low-quartered calfs, dancing pumps, rubber boots, tans of various hues, tennis shoes and flowered slippers, he sought out Johnny to be prompted as to names of other kinds that he might inquire for. The other English-speaking residents also played their parts nobly by buying often and liberally. Keogh was grand marshal, and made them distribute their patronage, thus keeping up a fair run of custom for several days.

@@ -62,6 +62,6 @@

“My name is Pinkney Dawson,” said the cornerer of the cockleburr market.

Billy Keogh slid rapturously and gently from his chair to his favourite strip of matting on the floor.

There were not many sounds in Coralio on that sultry afternoon. Among those that were may be mentioned a noise of enraptured and unrighteous laughter from a prostrate Irish-American, while a sunburned young man, with a shrewd eye, looked on him with wonder and amazement. Also the “tramp, tramp, tramp” of many well-shod feet in the streets outside. Also the lonesome wash of the waves that beat along the historic shores of the Spanish Main.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/shoes.xhtml b/src/epub/text/shoes.xhtml index 2ea530f..cbaf313 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/shoes.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/shoes.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Shoes

John De Graffenreid Atwood ate of the lotus, root, stem, and flower. The tropics gobbled him up. He plunged enthusiastically into his work, which was to try to forget Rosine.

Now, they who dine on the lotus rarely consume it plain. There is a sauce au diable that goes with it; and the distillers are the chefs who prepare it. And on Johnny’s menu card it read “brandy.” With a bottle between them, he and Billy Keogh would sit on the porch of the little consulate at night and roar out great, indecorous songs, until the natives, slipping hastily past, would shrug a shoulder and mutter things to themselves about the “Americanos diablos.”

@@ -87,6 +87,6 @@

To Pinkney Dawson, Dalesburg, Ala.

Draft for $100 comes to you next mail. Ship me immediately 500 pounds stiff, dry cockleburrs. New use here in arts. Market price twenty cents pound. Further orders likely. Rush.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/simmons-saturday-night.xhtml b/src/epub/text/simmons-saturday-night.xhtml index 1a35781..a486e48 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/simmons-saturday-night.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/simmons-saturday-night.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Simmon’s Saturday Night How a Guileless Cattle Man Saw the Sights in Houston @@ -119,6 +119,6 @@

“Gentlemen,” he said, “I invite you all when in New York to call at my joint, at 2508 Bowery. Ask for Diamond Joe, and you’ll see me. I’m going into Mexico for two weeks to see after my mining plants and I’ll be at home any time after then. Upstairs, 2508 Bowery; don’t forget the number. I generally make my traveling expenses as I go. Good night.”

Mr. Simmons backed quickly out and disappeared.

Five minutes later Captain Richard Saxon Clancy, paymaster (?) for the M. K. & T. Railway Company, and member (?) of the Dallas Young Men’s Christian Association, alias “Jimmy,” stood at a corner bar and said: “Whiskey, old man, and⁠—say get a bigger glass than that, will you? I need it.”

-

+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/sisters-of-the-golden-circle.xhtml b/src/epub/text/sisters-of-the-golden-circle.xhtml index d80b93d..4e80089 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/sisters-of-the-golden-circle.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/sisters-of-the-golden-circle.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Sisters of the Golden Circle

The Rubberneck Auto was about ready to start. The merry top-riders had been assigned to their seats by the gentlemanly conductor. The sidewalk was blockaded with sightseers who had gathered to stare at sightseers, justifying the natural law that every creature on earth is preyed upon by some other creature.

The megaphone man raised his instrument of torture; the inside of the great automobile began to thump and throb like the heart of a coffee drinker. The top-riders nervously clung to the seats; the old lady from Valparaiso, Indiana, shrieked to be put ashore. But, before a wheel turns, listen to a brief preamble through the cardiaphone, which shall point out to you an object of interest on life’s sightseeing tour.

@@ -52,6 +52,6 @@

“If you can explain,” he began rather stiffly, “why you⁠—”

“Dear,” she interrupted, “listen. It was an hour’s pain and trial to you. I did it for her⁠—I mean the girl who spoke to me on the coach. I was so happy, Jim⁠—so happy with you that I didn’t dare to refuse that happiness to another. Jim, they were married only this morning⁠—those two; and I wanted him to get away. While they were struggling with you I saw him slip from behind his tree and hurry across the park. That’s all of it, dear⁠—I had to do it.”

Thus does one sister of the plain gold band know another who stands in the enchanted light that shines but once and briefly for each one. By rice and satin bows does mere man become aware of weddings. But bride knoweth bride at the glance of an eye. And between them swiftly passes comfort and meaning in a language that man and widows wot not of.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/slightly-mixed.xhtml b/src/epub/text/slightly-mixed.xhtml index b798aae..96e2adf 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/slightly-mixed.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/slightly-mixed.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Slightly Mixed

A certain Houston racing man was married some months ago. He also is the proud possessor of a fine two-year-old filly that has made five and a half furlongs in 1:09 and he expects her to do better at the next races. He has named the filly after his wife and both of them are dear to his heart. A Post man who ran across him yesterday found him quite willing to talk.

“Yes,” he said, “I am the happiest man in Texas. Bessie and I are keeping house now and getting quite well settled down. That filly of mine is going to do wonders yet. Bessie takes as much interest in her as I do. You know I have named her for my wife. She is a thoroughbred. I tell you it’s fine to see her trotting around at home.”

@@ -20,6 +20,6 @@

“What are you talking about? I mean the filly. The races come off just on the anniversary of our marriage. The races are going to be a big thing. You know we have been married just a year. I expect Bessie to do wonders. There’s a newcomer going to be here, that we are looking for with much interest. You must really come out and see our first event.”

“I⁠—I⁠—I really, it would be indelicate⁠—you must really excuse me. I never saw anything of the kind. I⁠—I⁠—”

“Oh, there’s nothing wrong about horse racing. It’s fine sport. So long now. I’ve got to go and take Bessie out and sweat her a little.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/smith.xhtml b/src/epub/text/smith.xhtml index d4c0d5c..22425cd 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/smith.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/smith.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Smith

Goodwin and the ardent patriot, Zavalla, took all the precautions that their foresight could contrive to prevent the escape of President Miraflores and his companion. They sent trusted messengers up the coast to Solitas and Alazan to warn the local leaders of the flight, and to instruct them to patrol the water line and arrest the fugitives at all hazards should they reveal themselves in that territory. After this was done there remained only to cover the district about Coralio and await the coming of the quarry. The nets were well spread. The roads were so few, the opportunities for embarkation so limited, and the two or three probable points of exit so well guarded that it would be strange indeed if there should slip through the meshes so much of the country’s dignity, romance, and collateral. The president would, without doubt, move as secretly as possible, and endeavour to board a vessel by stealth from some secluded point along the shore.

On the fourth day after the receipt of Englehart’s telegram the Karlsefin, a Norwegian steamer chartered by the New Orleans fruit trade, anchored off Coralio with three hoarse toots of her siren. The Karlsefin was not one of the line operated by the Vesuvius Fruit Company. She was something of a dilettante, doing odd jobs for a company that was scarcely important enough to figure as a rival to the Vesuvius. The movements of the Karlsefin were dependent upon the state of the market. Sometimes she would ply steadily between the Spanish Main and New Orleans in the regular transport of fruit; next she would be making erratic trips to Mobile or Charleston, or even as far north as New York, according to the distribution of the fruit supply.

@@ -67,6 +67,6 @@

Like some passing bird of brilliant plumage, Smith alights on this palmy shore but to preen his wings for an instant and then to fly away upon silent pinions. When morning dawned there was no Smith, no waiting gig, no yacht in the offing. Smith left no intimation of his mission there, no footprints to show where he had followed the trail of his mystery on the sands of Coralio that night. He came; he spake his strange jargon of the asphalt and the cafés; he sat under the coconut-tree, and vanished. The next morning Coralio, Smithless, ate its fried plantain and said: “The man of pictured clothing went himself away.” With the siesta the incident passed, yawning, into history.

So, for a time, must Smith pass behind the scenes of the play. He comes no more to Coralio nor to Doctor Gregg, who sits in vain, wagging his redundant beard, waiting to enrich his derelict audience with his moving tale of trepanning and jealousy.

But prosperously to the lucidity of these loose pages, Smith shall flutter among them again. In the nick of time he shall come to tell us why he strewed so many anxious cigar stumps around the coconut palm that night. This he must do; for, when he sailed away before the dawn in his yacht Rambler, he carried with him the answer to a riddle so big and preposterous that few in Anchuria had ventured even to propound it.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/sociology-in-serge-and-straw.xhtml b/src/epub/text/sociology-in-serge-and-straw.xhtml index 6bb8a12..3f83477 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/sociology-in-serge-and-straw.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/sociology-in-serge-and-straw.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Sociology in Serge and Straw

The season of irresponsibility is at hand. Come, let us twine round our brows wreaths of poison ivy (that is for idiocy), and wander hand in hand with sociology in the summer fields.

Likely as not the world is flat. The wise men have tried to prove that it is round, with indifferent success. They pointed out to us a ship going to sea, and bade us observe that, at length, the convexity of the earth hid from our view all but the vessel’s topmast. But we picked up a telescope and looked, and saw the decks and hull again. Then the wise men said: “Oh, pshaw! anyhow, the variation of the intersection of the equator and the ecliptic proves it.” We could not see this through our telescope, so we remained silent. But it stands to reason that, if the world were round, the queues of Chinamen would stand straight up from their heads instead of hanging down their backs, as travellers assure us they do.

@@ -79,6 +79,6 @@

“What do you mean?” asked the man of progress.

“Why, look what he has done to ‘Smoky’,” I replied.

“You will always be a fool,” said my friend, the sociologist, getting up and walking away.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/solemn-thoughts.xhtml b/src/epub/text/solemn-thoughts.xhtml index d890ca1..665ccaf 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/solemn-thoughts.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/solemn-thoughts.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Solemn Thoughts

The golden crescent of the new moon hung above the market house, and the night was cool, springlike, and perfect.

Five or six men were sitting in front of the Hutchins House, and they had gradually shifted their chairs until they were almost in a group.

@@ -49,6 +49,6 @@

there is sweet relief in knowing that those we leave behind us are shielded from want.

“Gentlemen, we are all far from home and you know the risks of travel. I am representing one of the best accident insurance companies on earth, and I want to write every one of you. I offer you the finest death, partial disablement, loss of finger or toe, nervous shock, sick benefit policy known to⁠—”

But the man with gold spectacles was talking to five empty chairs, and the moon slipped down below the roof of the market house with a sardonic smile.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/some-ancient-news-notes.xhtml b/src/epub/text/some-ancient-news-notes.xhtml index 07c8875..834387f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/some-ancient-news-notes.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/some-ancient-news-notes.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Some Ancient News Notes

It will be remembered that a short while ago, some very ancient documents and records were discovered in an old monastery on Mt. Sinai, where they have been kept filed away by the monks among their dusty archives. Some of them antedate the oldest writings previously known by one hundred years. The finders claim that among them are the original Scripture traced in Syriac language, and that they differ in many material ways from the translation in use. We have procured some advance sheets from the discoverers and in a few fragments given below our readers will perceive that human nature was pretty much the same a thousand years ago. It is evident from the palimpsests in our possession that newspapers were not entirely unknown even at that early date. We give some random translations from the original manuscripts:

@@ -23,6 +23,6 @@

“Colonel Job, who has been suffering from quite a siege of boils at his residence on Avenue C, was arrested yesterday for cussing and disturbing the neighborhood. The colonel has generally a very equable temper, but completely lost his balance on finding that Mrs. Job had put a large quantity of starch in his only night robe.”

“About 1,500 extra deputy clerks were put on by the county clerk yesterday to assist in getting out summonses for witnesses in the divorce case recently brought by Judge Solomon against the last batch of his wives.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/somebody-lied.xhtml b/src/epub/text/somebody-lied.xhtml index d3ec4fe..3f6a371 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/somebody-lied.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/somebody-lied.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Somebody Lied

Two men went into a saloon on Main Street yesterday and braced up solemnly to the bar. One was an old man with gray whiskers, the other was a long, lanky youth, evidently his son. Both were dressed like farm hands and they appeared somewhat bewildered at the splendor of the saloon.

The bartender asked them what they would have.

@@ -26,6 +26,6 @@

“Yes, sonny, this here is what comes of goin’ back on yer ma. Does yer feel real bad?”

“Bad ez ther devil, Dad.”

“Look a here, mister,” said the old man to the bartender, “somebody has lied to us about the fun in gettin’ drunk. We’re a goin’ home and never goin’ to do it again. I’d ruther hev the blind staggers, the itch, en the cramp colic all to onct, then ter git drunk. Come on, sonny, en let’s hunt the waggin.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/something-for-baby.xhtml b/src/epub/text/something-for-baby.xhtml index c1053fa..9d44af0 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/something-for-baby.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/something-for-baby.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Something for Baby

This is nothing but a slight jar in the happy holiday music; a minor note struck by the finger of Fate, slipping upon the keys, as anthems of rejoicing and Christmas carols make the Yuletide merry.

The Post man stood yesterday in one of the largest fancy and drygoods stores on Main Street, watching the throng of well-dressed buyers, mostly ladies, who were turning over the stock of Christmas notions and holiday goods.

@@ -17,6 +17,6 @@

“Please, sir,” she answered in a weak voice, “Mamma gave me this dime to get something for baby.”

“Something for baby, for a dime? Want to buy baby a Christmas present, eh? Well now, don’t you think you had better run around to a toyshop? We don’t keep such things here. You want a tin horse, or a ball, or a jumping jack, now don’t you?”

“Please, sir, Mamma said I was to come here. Baby isn’t with us now. Mamma told me to get⁠—ten⁠—cents⁠—worth⁠—of⁠—crape, sir, if you please.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/sound-and-fury.xhtml b/src/epub/text/sound-and-fury.xhtml index e99b25a..0b689b2 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/sound-and-fury.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/sound-and-fury.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Sound and Fury

@@ -235,6 +235,6 @@

Asbestos Curtain

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/speaking-of-big-winds.xhtml b/src/epub/text/speaking-of-big-winds.xhtml index 39c9748..1cca4b1 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/speaking-of-big-winds.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/speaking-of-big-winds.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Speaking of Big Winds

The man with the bronzed face and distinguished air was a great traveler, and had just returned from a tour around the world. He sat around the stove at the Lamlor, and four or five drummers and men about town listened with much interest to his tales.

He was speaking of the fierce wind storms that occur in South America, when the long grass of the pampas is interlaced and blown so flat by the hurricanes that it is cut into strips and sold for the finest straw matting.

@@ -20,6 +20,6 @@

“He came tumbling down, struck the sidewalk with a sound you could have heard four blocks away, bounded up at least ten feet, came down on his feet and shouted ‘Front foot!’

“It was Bob Long. His beard was a little grayer and longer, but he was all business still. He had noticed the changes that had taken place while he was coming down, and when he finished the sentence that he began when the cyclone took him up, he altered his language accordingly. Bob was a hustler. Sometime after that he⁠—”

“Never mind,” said the traveler. “Let’s go in and take something on this one first. I claim the usual time before the next round.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/springtime-a-la-carte.xhtml b/src/epub/text/springtime-a-la-carte.xhtml index e4e4674..ce63efd 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/springtime-a-la-carte.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/springtime-a-la-carte.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Springtime à La Carte

It was a day in March.

Never, never begin a story this way when you write one. No opening could possibly be worse. It is unimaginative, flat, dry and likely to consist of mere wind. But in this instance it is allowable. For the following paragraph, which should have inaugurated the narrative, is too wildly extravagant and preposterous to be flaunted in the face of the reader without preparation.

@@ -56,6 +56,6 @@

Sarah recognised the first card she had typewritten that afternoon. There was still the rayed splotch in the upper right-hand corner where a tear had fallen. But over the spot where one should have read the name of the meadow plant, the clinging memory of their golden blossoms had allowed her fingers to strike strange keys.

Between the red cabbage and the stuffed green peppers was the item:

“Dearest Walter, with hard-boiled egg.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/squaring-the-circle.xhtml b/src/epub/text/squaring-the-circle.xhtml index 68e9317..bf77684 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/squaring-the-circle.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/squaring-the-circle.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Squaring the Circle

At the hazard of wearying you this tale of vehement emotions must be prefaced by a discourse on geometry.

Nature moves in circles; Art in straight lines. The natural is rounded; the artificial is made up of angles. A man lost in the snow wanders, in spite of himself, in perfect circles; the city man’s feet, denaturalized by rectangular streets and floors, carry him ever away from himself.

@@ -38,6 +38,6 @@

There was a sudden spring, a ripple in the stream of passersby and the sound of Sam’s voice crying:

“Howdy, Cal! I’m durned glad to see ye.”

And in the angles of Broadway, Fifth Avenue and Twenty-third Street the Cumberland feudists shook hands.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/strictly-business.xhtml b/src/epub/text/strictly-business.xhtml index 85c91c4..f431191 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/strictly-business.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/strictly-business.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Strictly Business

I suppose you know all about the stage and stage people. You’ve been touched with and by actors, and you read the newspaper criticisms and the jokes in the weeklies about the Rialto and the chorus girls and the long-haired tragedians. And I suppose that a condensed list of your ideas about the mysterious stageland would boil down to something like this:

Leading ladies have five husbands, paste diamonds, and figures no better than your own (madam) if they weren’t padded. Chorus girls are inseparable from peroxide, Panhards and Pittsburg. All shows walk back to New York on tan oxford and railroad ties. Irreproachable actresses reserve the comic-landlady part for their mothers on Broadway and their step-aunts on the road. Kyrle Bellew’s real name is Boyle O’Kelley. The ravings of John McCullough in the phonograph were stolen from the first sale of the Ellen Terry memoirs. Joe Weber is funnier than E. H. Sothern; but Henry Miller is getting older than he was.

@@ -85,6 +85,6 @@

“But, my God,” said Bob Hart, rising to his feet, “it’s too late. It’s too late, I tell you, Sam; it’s too late. It can’t be. You must be wrong. It’s impossible. There’s some mistake.

“She’s crying for you,” said the Tramp Juggler. “For love of you she’s fighting three, and calling your name so loud they don’t dare to raise the curtain. Wake up, man.”

“For love of me?” said Bob Hart with staring eyes. “Don’t I tell you it’s too late? It’s too late, man. Why, Cherry and I have been married two years!”

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Sufficient Provocation

“He hit me fust.”

“He gimme de probumcation, judge.”

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“Keep still,” said the recorder sternly. “Go on with your statement.”

“I wuz playin’ en up comes dis here coon what I hit. He am pow’ful jealous ob my playin’ en he wuz mad ’coz de flo’ committee selected me to puhfahm. While I wuz playin’ dis obstrepelous coon came right close up to me en he say: ‘Watermillions be gittin’ ripe now in nudder mont’. I keeps on playin’. He says: ‘Sposin’ you had a great big ripe watermillion, wid red meat en black seeds.’ I keeps on playin’. He says: ‘You take him en bus him open on a rock, en you scoop up a big han’ful ob de heart, en you look all roun’ en nobody come.’ I keeps on playin. He says: ‘You cram de heart in yo’ mouf, en crunch down on hit, en de juice hit run down yo’ ahm en hit run down yo’ chin to yo’ neck, en de sweetness run down you’ th’oat.’ Den my mouf water so it fill dat French hahp plum full, en de music stop, en de flo’ committee look aroun’. Den I up wit a chair en bus’ dis coon ober de head, en I flings myself on de mussy ob dis co’t, kase, Mars Judge, you knows what dese here sandy lan’ watermillions is yo’sef.”

“Get out of here, both of you,” said the recorder. “Next case.”

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Suite Homes and Their Romance

Few young couples in the Big-City-of-Bluff began their married existence with greater promise of happiness than did Mr. and Mrs. Claude Turpin. They felt no especial animosity toward each other; they were comfortably established in a handsome apartment house that had a name and accommodations like those of a sleeping-car; they were living as expensively as the couple on the next floor above who had twice their income; and their marriage had occurred on a wager, a ferryboat and first acquaintance, thus securing a sensational newspaper notice with their names attached to pictures of the Queen of Roumania and M. Santos-Dumont.

Turpin’s income was $200 per month. On pay day, after calculating the amounts due for rent, instalments on furniture and piano, gas, and bills owed to the florist, confectioner, milliner, tailor, wine merchant and cab company, the Turpins would find that they still had $200 left to spend. How to do this is one of the secrets of metropolitan life.

@@ -53,6 +53,6 @@

“Say no more,” said Claude, gently as he fondly caressed her waving curls.

“And you are sure that you fully forgive me?” asked Vivien, gazing at him entreatingly with dewy eyes of heavenly blue.

“Almost sure, little one,” answered Claude, stooping and lightly touching her snowy forehead with his lips. “I’ll let you know later on. I’ve got a month’s salary down on Vanilla to win the three-year-old steeplechase tomorrow; and if the ice-cream hunch is to the good you are It again⁠—see?”

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Supply and Demand

Finch keeps a hats-cleaned-by-electricity-while-you-wait establishment, nine feet by twelve, in Third Avenue. Once a customer, you are always his. I do not know his secret process, but every four days your hat needs to be cleaned again.

Finch is a leathern, sallow, slow-footed man, between twenty and forty. You would say he had been brought up a bushelman in Essex Street. When business is slack he likes to talk, so I had my hat cleaned even oftener than it deserved, hoping Finch might let me into some of the secrets of the sweatshops.

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“That’s the right kind of a law,” remarked Finch, as he carefully broke some of the stitches of my hatband so that it would assuredly come off within a few days⁠—“the law of supply and demand. But they’ve both got to work together. I’ll bet,” he went on, with his dry smile, “she’ll get jelly beans with that nickel⁠—she likes ’em. What’s supply if there’s no demand for it?”

“What ever became of the King?” I asked, curiously.

“Oh, I might have told you,” said Finch. “That was Shane came in and bought the tickets. He came back with me, and he’s on the force now.”

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Taking No Chances

Let’s see,” said the genial manager as he looked over the atlas. “Here’s a town one might strike on our way back. Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar, is a city of 100,000 ininhabitants.”

“That sounds promising,” said Mark Twain, running his hands through his busy curls, “read some more about it.”

@@ -14,6 +14,6 @@

“Sounds like it might be all right,” said the humorist, “read some more.”

“Madagascar is the home,” read the manager, “of an enormous bird called the epyornis, that lays an egg 15½ by 9½ in. in size, weighing from ten to twelve pounds. These eggs⁠—”

“Never mind reading any more,” said Mark Twain. “We will not go to Madagascar.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/telemachus-friend.xhtml b/src/epub/text/telemachus-friend.xhtml index 96eaaf3..e3e0767 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/telemachus-friend.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/telemachus-friend.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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Telemachus, Friend

Returning from a hunting trip, I waited at the little town of Los Piños, in New Mexico, for the southbound train, which was one hour late. I sat on the porch of the Summit House and discussed the functions of life with Telemachus Hicks, the hotel proprietor.

Perceiving that personalities were not out of order, I asked him what species of beast had long ago twisted and mutilated his left ear. Being a hunter, I was concerned in the evils that may befall one in the pursuit of game.

@@ -68,6 +68,6 @@

“About ten o’clock that night I sets down in the front door and pulls off my boots a while in the cool breeze, while Mrs. Hicks was fixing around in the room. Right soon the light went out inside; and I sat there a while reverberating over old times and scenes. And then I heard Mrs. Hicks call out, ‘Ain’t you coming in soon, Lem?’

“ ‘Well, well!’ says I, kind of rousing up. ‘Durn me if I wasn’t waiting for old Paisley to⁠—’

“But when I got that far,” concluded Telemachus Hicks, “I thought somebody had shot this left ear of mine off with a forty-five. But it turned out to be only a lick from a broomhandle in the hands of Mrs. Hicks.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-admiral.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-admiral.xhtml index 5b2e86a..45a0354 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-admiral.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-admiral.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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The Admiral

Spilled milk draws few tears from an Anchurian administration. Many are its lacteal sources; and the clocks’ hands point forever to milking time. Even the rich cream skimmed from the treasury by the bewitched Miraflores did not cause the newly-installed patriots to waste time in unprofitable regrets. The government philosophically set about supplying the deficiency by increasing the import duties and by “suggesting” to wealthy private citizens that contributions according to their means would be considered patriotic and in order. Prosperity was expected to attend the reign of Losada, the new president. The ousted officeholders and military favourites organized a new “Liberal” party, and began to lay their plans for a re-succession. Thus the game of Anchurian politics began, like a Chinese comedy, to unwind slowly its serial length. Here and there Mirth peeps for an instant from the wings and illumines the florid lines.

A dozen quarts of champagne in conjunction with an informal sitting of the president and his cabinet led to the establishment of the navy and the appointment of Felipe Carrera as its admiral.

@@ -47,6 +47,6 @@

“Not yet, Señor el Almirante,” the telegraph clerk would call to him⁠—”poco tiempo!”

At the answer the admiral would plump himself down with a great rattling of scabbard to await the infrequent tick of the little instrument on the table.

“They will come,” would be his unshaken reply; “I am the admiral.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-adventures-of-shamrock-jolnes.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-adventures-of-shamrock-jolnes.xhtml index 40d6e3a..33cf9a4 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-adventures-of-shamrock-jolnes.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-adventures-of-shamrock-jolnes.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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The Adventures of Shamrock Jolnes

I am so fortunate as to count Shamrock Jolnes, the great New York detective, among my muster of friends. Jolnes is what is called the “inside man” of the city detective force. He is an expert in the use of the typewriter, and it is his duty, whenever there is a “murder mystery” to be solved, to sit at a desk telephone at headquarters and take down the messages of “cranks” who phone in their confessions to having committed the crime.

But on certain “off” days when confessions are coming in slowly and three or four newspapers have run to earth as many different guilty persons, Jolnes will knock about the town with me, exhibiting, to my great delight and instruction, his marvellous powers of observation and deduction.

@@ -69,6 +69,6 @@

“In his breast pocket,” said the great detective, “something large and oval made a protuberance. Good liquor is scarce on trains, and it is a long journey from New York to Fairfax County.”

“Again, I must bow to you,” I said. “And tell me this, so that my last shred of doubt will be cleared away; why did you decide that he was from Virginia?”

“It was very faint, I admit,” answered Shamrock Jolnes, “but no trained observer could have failed to detect the odour of mint in the car.”

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The Apple

A youth held in his hand a round, red, luscious apple.

“Eat,” said the Spirit, “it is the apple of life.”

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The man bit into it and found rottenness and bitter dust.

“What is this?” he asked.

“It was the apple of Life,” said the Spirit. “It is now the apple of Success.”

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The Assessor of Success

Hastings Beauchamp Morley sauntered across Union Square with a pitying look at the hundreds that lolled upon the park benches. They were a motley lot, he thought; the men with stolid, animal, unshaven faces; the women wriggling and self-conscious, twining and untwining their feet that hung four inches above the gravelled walks.

Were I Mr. Carnegie or Mr. Rockefeller I would put a few millions in my inside pocket and make an appointment with all the Park Commissioners (around the corner, if necessary), and arrange for benches in all the parks of the world low enough for women to sit upon, and rest their feet upon the ground. After that I might furnish libraries to towns that would pay for ’em, or build sanitariums for crank professors, and call ’em colleges, if I wanted to.

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Morley knew her. Eight years before he had sat on the same bench with her at school. There had been no sentiment between them⁠—nothing but the friendship of innocent days.

But he turned down the side street to a quiet spot and laid his suddenly burning face against the cool iron of a lamppost, and said dully:

“God! I wish I could die.”

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The Atavism of John Tom Little Bear

I saw a light in Jeff Peters’s room over the Red Front Drug Store. I hastened toward it, for I had not known that Jeff was in town. He is a man of the Hadji breed, of a hundred occupations, with a story to tell (when he will) of each one.

I found Jeff repacking his grip for a run down to Florida to look at an orange grove for which he had traded, a month before, his mining claim on the Yukon. He kicked me a chair, with the same old humorous, profound smile on his seasoned countenance. It had been eight months since we had met, but his greeting was such as men pass from day to day. Time is Jeff’s servant, and the continent is a big lot across which he cuts to his many roads.

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“John Tom frowns, and thinks a little. ‘Combined,’ says he directly, ‘with the interesting little physiological shakeup known as reversion to type. I remember now. Have they gone yet?’

“ ‘On the 7:30 train,’ I answers.

“ ‘Ugh!’ says John Tom; ‘better so. Paleface, bring big Chief Wish-Heap-Dough a little bromo-seltzer, and then he’ll take up the redman’s burden again.’ ”

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The “Bad Man”

A bold, bad man made a general display of himself in a Texas town a few days ago. It seems that he’d imbibed a sufficient number of drinks to become anxious to impress the town with his badness, and when the officers tried to arrest him he backed up against the side of a building and defied arrest. A considerable crowd of citizens, among whom were a number of drummers from a hotel close by, had gathered to witness the scene.

The bad man was a big, ferocious-looking fellow with long, curling hair that fell on his shoulders, a broad-brimmed hat, a buckskin coat with fringe around the bottom, and a picturesque vocabulary. He was flourishing a big six-shooter and swore by the bones of Davy Crockett that he would perforate the man who attempted to capture him.

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Then the desperado walked sheepishly down the sidewalk, and the little man came back across the street.

“Bad man?” he said. “I guess not. He wouldn’t hurt a fly. That’s Zeke Skinner. He was raised on the farm next to me in Connecticut. He’s selling some kind of fake liver medicine, and that’s his street rig he’s got on now. I loaned him eight dollars in Hartford nine years ago, and never expected to see him again. Thought I knew his voice. Pay? I reckon he paid me. I calculate I always collect what’s owing to me.”

Then the crowd scattered and the twelve policeman headed Zeke off at the next corner and clubbed him all the way to the station house.

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The Badge of Policeman O’roon

It cannot be denied that men and women have looked upon one another for the first time and become instantly enamored. It is a risky process, this love at first sight, before she has seen him in Bradstreet or he has seen her in curl papers. But these things do happen; and one instance must form a theme for this story⁠—though not, thank Heaven, to the overshadowing of more vital and important subjects, such as drink, policemen, horses and earldoms.

During a certain war a troop calling itself the Gentle Riders rode into history and one or two ambuscades. The Gentle Riders were recruited from the aristocracy of the wild men of the West and the wild men of the aristocracy of the East. In khaki there is little telling them one from another, so they became good friends and comrades all around.

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“I wish you and the rest of the police force and all badges, horses, brass buttons and men who can’t drink two glasses of brut without getting upset were at the devil,” said Remsen feelingly.

O’Roon smiled with evident satisfaction.

“Good old Remsen,” he said, affably, “I know all about it. They trailed me down and cornered me here two hours ago. There was a little row at home, you know, and I cut sticks just to show them. I don’t believe I told you that my Governor was the Earl of Ardsley. Funny you should bob against them in the Park. If you damaged that horse of mine I’ll never forgive you. I’m going to buy him and take him back with me. Oh, yes, and I think my sister⁠—Lady Angela, you know⁠—wants particularly for you to come up to the hotel with me this evening. Didn’t lose my badge, did you, Remsen? I’ve got to turn that in at Headquarters when I resign.”

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The Barber Talks

The Post Man slid into the chair with an apologetic manner, for the barber’s gaze was superior and scornful. He was so devilish, cool and selfpossessed, and held the public in such infinite contempt.

The Post Man’s hair had been cut close with the clippers on the day before.

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“Him?” said the barber, “why he died, of course, but he died with one of the beautifulest shaves that ever a man had.⁠—Brush!”

An African of terrible aspect bore down upon the Post Man, struck him violently with the stub of a whisk broom, seized his coat at the back and ripped it loose from its collar.

“Call again,” growled the barber in a voice of the deepest menace, as the scribe made a rush for the door and escaped.

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The Brief Debut of Tildy

If you do not know Bogle’s Chop House and Family Restaurant it is your loss. For if you are one of the fortunate ones who dine expensively you should be interested to know how the other half consumes provisions. And if you belong to the half to whom waiters’ checks are things of moment, you should know Bogle’s, for there you get your money’s worth⁠—in quantity, at least.

Bogle’s is situated in that highway of bourgeoisie, that boulevard of Brown-Jones-and-Robinson, Eighth Avenue. There are two rows of tables in the room, six in each row. On each table is a caster-stand, containing cruets of condiments and seasons. From the pepper cruet you may shake a cloud of something tasteless and melancholy, like volcanic dust. From the salt cruet you may expect nothing. Though a man should extract a sanguinary stream from the pallid turnip, yet will his prowess be balked when he comes to wrest salt from Bogle’s cruets. Also upon each table stands the counterfeit of that benign sauce made “from the recipe of a nobleman in India.”

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But behind the convenient screen Tildy had thrown herself flat upon a table among the butter chips and the coffee cups, and was sobbing her heart out⁠—out and back again to the grey plain wherein travel they with blunt noses and hay-coloured hair. From her knot she had torn the red hair-bow and cast it upon the floor. Seeders she despised utterly; she had but taken his kiss as that of a pioneer and prophetic prince who might have set the clocks going and the pages to running in fairyland. But the kiss had been maudlin and unmeant; the court had not stirred at the false alarm; she must forevermore remain the Sleeping Beauty.

Yet not all was lost. Aileen’s arm was around her; and Tildy’s red hand groped among the butter chips till it found the warm clasp of her friend’s.

“Don’t you fret, Til,” said Aileen, who did not understand entirely. “That turnip-faced little clothespin of a Seeders ain’t worth it. He ain’t anything of a gentleman or he wouldn’t ever of apologised.”

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The Bruised Reed

The popular preacher sat in his study before a glowing grate, and a satisfied smile stole over his features, as he remembered his sermon of that morning. He had struck strong blows at sin; relating to his breathless congregation in plain and burning words, tales of the wickedness, debauchery, drunkenness and depravity that was going on in their very midst.

Following the prominent example of a certain pureminded and original servant of the Lord, he had gone down himself among the lowest haunts of vice and iniquity, and there sketched in his mind those flaming and accusive portraits that he had painted before the astonished eyes of his congregation, with a broad brush and vivid colors. He had heard blasphemies from lips that were once as pure as his sisters’; he had stood in the midst of unbridled vice, where wine flowed like water and amidst songs, curses, laughing and revelry, the chink of money, earned by dripping hearts’ blood, could be heard as it fell into the coffers of the devil. Oh, he had astonished his flock! He had hurled at them fiery words of blame that these things were allowed to exist. It had been a new departure for him, but he expected grand results. And now he sat by his anthracite fire, and thought over the success of his labors, and smiled with satisfaction. The latch of his study door clicked and a being entered. He was grizzly, rum-soaked, dirty, ragged, disreputable, blear-eyed and of uncertain step. Once, he might have been a man.

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“His wonderful, magnetic influence is as powerful to move the hearts of his roughest, most unlettered hearer, as it is to touch a responsive chord in the cultured brain of the man of refinement and taste.”

“And my sermon,” said the preacher, laying his delicate finger tips one against the other, and allowing the adulation even of this being to run with a slight exhilaration through his veins. “Did it awaken in you any remorse for the life of sin you have led, or bring any light of Divine pity and pardon to your soul, as He promises even unto the most degraded and wicked of creation?”

“Yer sermon, reverend?” asked the being, carrying a trembling hand to the disfiguring wounds upon his face. “Do you see them cuts and them bruises? Do you know where I got ’em? I never heard yer sermon. I got dese cuts on de rocks outside when de cop and yer usher fired me out de church. De bruised reed He will not quench, an’ de smokin’ flax He will not ’stinguish. Has you anything to say, reverend?

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The Buyer from Cactus City

It is well that hay fever and colds do not obtain in the healthful vicinity of Cactus City, Texas, for the dry goods emporium of Navarro & Platt, situated there, is not to be sneezed at.

Twenty thousand people in Cactus City scatter their silver coin with liberal hands for the things that their hearts desire. The bulk of this semiprecious metal goes to Navarro & Platt. Their huge brick building covers enough ground to graze a dozen head of sheep. You can buy of them a rattlesnake-skin necktie, an automobile or an eighty-five dollar, latest style, ladies’ tan coat in twenty different shades. Navarro & Platt first introduced pennies west of the Colorado River. They had been ranchmen with business heads, who saw that the world did not necessarily have to cease its revolutions after free grass went out.

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“What’s it like?”

“Why, it’s principally earthquakes and negroes and monkeys and malarial fever and volcanoes.”

“I don’t care,” said Miss Asher, blithely; “I’m going there tomorrow.”

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The Caballero’s Way

The Cisco Kid had killed six men in more or less fair scrimmages, had murdered twice as many (mostly Mexicans), and had winged a larger number whom he modestly forbore to count. Therefore a woman loved him.

The Kid was twenty-five, looked twenty; and a careful insurance company would have estimated the probable time of his demise at, say, twenty-six. His habitat was anywhere between the Frio and the Rio Grande. He killed for the love of it⁠—because he was quick-tempered⁠—to avoid arrest⁠—for his own amusement⁠—any reason that came to his mind would suffice. He had escaped capture because he could shoot five-sixths of a second sooner than any sheriff or ranger in the service, and because he rode a speckled roan horse that knew every cow-path in the mesquite and pear thickets from San Antonio to Matamoras.

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The Cactus

The most notable thing about Time is that it is so purely relative. A large amount of reminiscence is, by common consent, conceded to the drowning man; and it is not past belief that one may review an entire courtship while removing one’s gloves.

That is what Trysdale was doing, standing by a table in his bachelor apartments. On the table stood a singular-looking green plant in a red earthen jar. The plant was one of the species of cacti, and was provided with long, tentacular leaves that perpetually swayed with the slightest breeze with a peculiar beckoning motion.

@@ -29,6 +29,6 @@

“Very well. It’s a tropical concern. See hundreds of ’em around Punta every day. Here’s the name on this tag tied to it. Know any Spanish, Trysdale?”

“No,” said Trysdale, with the bitter wraith of a smile⁠—“Is it Spanish?”

“Yes. The natives imagine the leaves are reaching out and beckoning to you. They call it by this name⁠—Ventomarme. Name means in English, ‘Come and take me.’ ”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-caliph-and-the-cad.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-caliph-and-the-cad.xhtml index fc86c2c..d5a4ee0 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-caliph-and-the-cad.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-caliph-and-the-cad.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Caliph and the Cad

Surely there is no pastime more diverting than that of mingling, incognito, with persons of wealth and station. Where else but in those circles can one see life in its primitive, crude state unhampered by the conventions that bind the dwellers in a lower sphere?

There was a certain Caliph of Bagdad who was accustomed to go down among the poor and lowly for the solace obtained from the relation of their tales and histories. Is it not strange that the humble and poverty-stricken have not availed themselves of the pleasure they might glean by donning diamonds and silks and playing Caliph among the haunts of the upper world?

@@ -43,6 +43,6 @@

“The drinks for us,” said Corny, “me and my friend.”

“You’re a queer feller,” said the lady’s late escort⁠—“lick a man and then want to set ’em up.”

“You’re my best friend,” said Corny exultantly. “You don’t understand? Well, listen. You just put me wise to somethin’. I been playin’ gent a long time, thinkin’ it was just the glad rags I had and nothin’ else. Say⁠—you’re a swell, ain’t you? Well, you trot in that class, I guess. I don’t; but I found out one thing⁠—I’m a gentleman, by⁠—and I know it now. What’ll you have to drink?”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-caliph-cupid-and-the-clock.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-caliph-cupid-and-the-clock.xhtml index bdcd9e7..ac8ea27 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-caliph-cupid-and-the-clock.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-caliph-cupid-and-the-clock.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Caliph, Cupid and the Clock

Prince Michael, of the Electorate of Valleluna, sat on his favourite bench in the park. The coolness of the September night quickened the life in him like a rare, tonic wine. The benches were not filled; for park loungers, with their stagnant blood, are prompt to detect and fly home from the crispness of early autumn. The moon was just clearing the roofs of the range of dwellings that bounded the quadrangle on the east. Children laughed and played about the fine-sprayed fountain. In the shadowed spots fauns and hamadryads wooed, unconscious of the gaze of mortal eyes. A hand organ⁠—Philomel by the grace of our stage carpenter, Fancy⁠—fluted and droned in a side street. Around the enchanted boundaries of the little park street cars spat and mewed and the stilted trains roared like tigers and lions prowling for a place to enter. And above the trees shone the great, round, shining face of an illuminated clock in the tower of an antique public building.

Prince Michael’s shoes were wrecked far beyond the skill of the carefullest cobbler. The ragman would have declined any negotiations concerning his clothes. The two weeks’ stubble on his face was grey and brown and red and greenish yellow⁠—as if it had been made up from individual contributions from the chorus of a musical comedy. No man existed who had money enough to wear so bad a hat as his.

@@ -54,6 +54,6 @@

The other policeman stooped and looked at something crumpled and crisp in the hand of the sleeper.

“Gee!” he remarked. “He’s doped out a fifty-dollar bill, anyway. Wish I knew the brand of hop that he smokes.”

And then “Rap, rap, rap!” went the club of realism against the shoe soles of Prince Michael, of the Electorate of Valleluna.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-call-of-the-tame.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-call-of-the-tame.xhtml index ec9477b..e0ed682 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-call-of-the-tame.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-call-of-the-tame.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Call of the Tame

When the inauguration was accomplished⁠—the proceedings were made smooth by the presence of the Rough Riders⁠—it is well known that a herd of those competent and loyal ex-warriors paid a visit to the big city. The newspaper reporters dug out of their trunks the old broad-brimmed hats and leather belts that they wear to North Beach fish fries, and mixed with the visitors. No damage was done beyond the employment of the wonderful plural “tenderfeet” in each of the scribe’s stories. The Westerners mildly contemplated the skyscrapers as high as the third story, yawned at Broadway, hunched down in the big chairs in hotel corridors, and altogether looked as bored and dejected as a member of Ye Ancient and Honorable Artillery separated during a sham battle from his valet.

Out of this sightseeing delegations of good King Teddy’s Gentlemen of the Royal Bear-hounds dropped one Greenbrier Nye, of Pin Feather, Ariz.

@@ -62,6 +62,6 @@

“Two more of them cocktail drinks,” ordered Greenbrier.

Merritt looked at him and smiled significantly.

“They’re on me,” said Greenbrier, blowing a puff of smoke to the ceiling.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-chair-of-philanthromathematics.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-chair-of-philanthromathematics.xhtml index 7d72f7b..906fb9e 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-chair-of-philanthromathematics.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-chair-of-philanthromathematics.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Chair of Philanthromathematics

“I see that the cause of Education has received the princely gift of more than fifty millions of dollars,” said I.

I was gleaning the stray items from the evening papers while Jeff Peters packed his briar pipe with plug cut.

@@ -66,6 +66,6 @@

“ ‘Great!’ says I. ‘I’ll be ready. But, Andy,’ says I, ‘I wish I could have met that Professor James Darnley McCorkle before we went. I had a curiosity to know that man.’

“ ‘That’ll be easy,’ says Andy, turning around to the faro dealer.

“ ‘Jim,’ says Andy, ‘shake hands with Mr. Peters.’ ”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-champion-of-the-weather.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-champion-of-the-weather.xhtml index 830b5e4..6be20b0 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-champion-of-the-weather.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-champion-of-the-weather.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Champion of the Weather

If you should speak of the Kiowa Reservation to the average New Yorker he probably wouldn’t know whether you were referring to a new political dodge at Albany or a leitmotif from Parsifal. But out in the Kiowa Reservation advices have been received concerning the existence of New York.

A party of us were on a hunting trip in the Reservation. Bud Kingsbury, our guide, philosopher, and friend, was broiling antelope steaks in camp one night. One of the party, a pinkish-haired young man in a correct hunting costume, sauntered over to the fire to light a cigarette, and remarked carelessly to Bud:

@@ -46,6 +46,6 @@

As I was unrolling my bedding I heard the pinkish-haired young man saying to Bud, with something like anxiety in his voice:

“As I say, Mr. Kingsbury, there is something really beautiful about this night. The delightful breeze and the bright stars and the clear air unite in making it wonderfully attractive.”

“Yes,” said Bud, “it’s a nice night.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-church-with-an-overshot-wheel.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-church-with-an-overshot-wheel.xhtml index cdd118d..cc8dbd5 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-church-with-an-overshot-wheel.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-church-with-an-overshot-wheel.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Church with an Overshot-Wheel

Lakelands is not to be found in the catalogues of fashionable summer resorts. It lies on a low spur of the Cumberland range of mountains on a little tributary of the Clinch River. Lakelands proper is a contented village of two dozen houses situated on a forlorn, narrow-gauge railroad line. You wonder whether the railroad lost itself in the pine woods and ran into Lakelands from fright and loneliness, or whether Lakelands got lost and huddled itself along the railroad to wait for the cars to carry it home.

You wonder again why it was named Lakelands. There are no lakes, and the lands about are too poor to be worth mentioning.

@@ -110,6 +110,6 @@

“Ah,” said Father Abram, with a little sigh, “I see. You want to ask Ralph to come.”

Aglaia looked up at him with a tender smile.

“I want to ask him to wait,” she said. “I have just found my father, and I want it to be just we two for a while. I want to tell him he will have to wait.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-city-of-dreadful-night.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-city-of-dreadful-night.xhtml index ea39343..26453fd 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-city-of-dreadful-night.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-city-of-dreadful-night.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The City of Dreadful Night

“During the recent warmed-over spell,” said my friend Carney, driver of express wagon No. 8,606, “a good many opportunities was had of observing human nature through peekaboo waists.

“The Park Commissioner and the Commissioner of Polis and the Forestry Commission gets together and agrees to let the people sleep in the parks until the Weather Bureau gets the thermometer down again to a living basis. So they draws up open-air resolutions and has them OK’d by the Secretary of Agriculture, Mr. Comstock and the Village Improvement Mosquito Exterminating Society of South Orange, NJ.

@@ -36,6 +36,6 @@

“ ‘The matter will be attended to at once,’ says the man, putting up his book.

“ ‘Are ye the Park Commissioner?’ I asks.

“ ‘I own the Beersheba Flats,’ says he. ‘God bless the grass and the trees that give extra benefits to a man’s tenants. The rents shall be raised fifteen percent tomorrow. Good night,’ says he.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-clarion-call.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-clarion-call.xhtml index 0bb4f20..d569199 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-clarion-call.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-clarion-call.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Clarion Call

Half of this story can be found in the records of the Police Department; the other half belongs behind the business counter of a newspaper office.

One afternoon two weeks after Millionaire Norcross was found in his apartment murdered by a burglar, the murderer, while strolling serenely down Broadway ran plump against Detective Barney Woods.

@@ -66,6 +66,6 @@

Barnard Woods.

“I kind of thought they would do that,” said Woods, “when you were jollying them so hard. Now, Johnny, you’ll come to the police station with me.”

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+

The Colonel’s Romance

They were sitting around a stove and the tobacco was passed around. They began to grow introspective.

The talk turned upon their old homes and the changes that the cycling years bring about. They had lived in Houston for many years, but only one was a native Texan.

@@ -25,6 +25,6 @@

The crowd was silent. The major wiped his eyes, and the judge sniffed a little. They were middle-aged men now, but they, too, had known love.

“And then,” said the grocer, “you left right away for Texas and never saw her again ?”

“No,” said the colonel. “When I didn’t come round that night she sent her father after me, and we were married two months later. She and the five kids are up at the house now. Pass the tobacco, please.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-coming-out-of-maggie.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-coming-out-of-maggie.xhtml index 2f8fbdb..f0db96c 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-coming-out-of-maggie.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-coming-out-of-maggie.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Coming-Out of Maggie

Every Saturday night the Clover Leaf Social Club gave a hop in the hall of the Give and Take Athletic Association on the East Side. In order to attend one of these dances you must be a member of the Give and Take⁠—or, if you belong to the division that starts off with the right foot in waltzing, you must work in Rhinegold’s paper-box factory. Still, any Clover Leaf was privileged to escort or be escorted by an outsider to a single dance. But mostly each Give and Take brought the paper-box girl that he affected; and few strangers could boast of having shaken a foot at the regular hops.

Maggie Toole, on account of her dull eyes, broad mouth and left-handed style of footwork in the two-step, went to the dances with Anna McCarty and her “fellow.” Anna and Maggie worked side by side in the factory, and were the greatest chums ever. So Anna always made Jimmy Burns take her by Maggie’s house every Saturday night so that her friend could go to the dance with them.

@@ -64,6 +64,6 @@

“Say, Mag,” he said, “I’ll see you home. And how about next Saturday night? Will you come to the hop with me if I call around for you?”

It was remarkable how quickly Maggie’s eyes could change from dull to a shining brown.

“With you, Dempsey?” she stammered. “Say⁠—will a duck swim?”

-
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+

The Complete Life of John Hopkins

There is a saying that no man has tasted the full flavour of life until he has known poverty, love and war. The justness of this reflection commends it to the lover of condensed philosophy. The three conditions embrace about all there is in life worth knowing. A surface thinker might deem that wealth should be added to the list. Not so. When a poor man finds a long-hidden quarter-dollar that has slipped through a rip into his vest lining, he sounds the pleasure of life with a deeper plummet than any millionaire can hope to cast.

It seems that the wise executive power that rules life has thought best to drill man in these three conditions; and none may escape all three. In rural places the terms do not mean so much. Poverty is less pinching; love is temperate; war shrinks to contests about boundary lines and the neighbors’ hens. It is in the cities that our epigram gains in truth and vigor; and it has remained for one John Hopkins to crowd the experience into a rather small space of time.

@@ -57,6 +57,6 @@

“Sure,” said Hopkins, “and I knocked around a while outside. It’s a nice night.”

He sat upon the hornblende sofa, took out the stump of his cigar, lighted it, and gazed at the graceful figures in “The Storm” on the opposite wall.

“I was telling you,” said he, “about Mr. Whipple’s suit. It’s a gray, with an invisible check, and it looks fine.”

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+

The Confession of a Murderer

He is dead and I killed him.

I gaze upon him, lying cold and still, with the crimson blood welling from his wound, and I laugh with joy. On my hand his life blood leaped and I hold it proudly aloft bearing it accusing stain and in my heart there is no pity, no remorse, no softness. Seeing him lie there crushed and pulseless is to me more than the pleasure of paradise. For months he escaped me. With all the intense hate I bore him at times, I felt admiration for his marvelous courage, his brazen effrontery, his absolute ignorance of fear. Why did I kill him? Because he had with a fixed purpose and a diabolical, persistent effrontery, conspired to rob me of that which is as dear to me as my life. Brave as I have said he was, he scarcely dared to cross my path openly, but with insidious cunning had ever sought to strike me a blow in the dark.

@@ -15,6 +15,6 @@

But, thank heaven, she was faithful and true and his honeyed songs and wiles had no effect. When she would tell me of his approaches, how I would grind my teeth and clench my hands in fury, and long for the time when I would wreak a just vengeance upon him. The time has come. I found him worn and helpless from cold and hunger, but there was no pity in my heart. I struck him down and reveled with heartfelt joy when I saw him sink down, bathed in blood, and die by my hands. I do not fear the consequences. When I tell my tale I will be upheld by all.

He is dead and I am satisfied.

I think he is the largest and fattest mosquito I ever saw.

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+

The Cop and the Anthem

On his bench in Madison Square Soapy moved uneasily. When wild geese honk high of nights, and when women without sealskin coats grow kind to their husbands, and when Soapy moves uneasily on his bench in the park, you may know that winter is near at hand.

A dead leaf fell in Soapy’s lap. That was Jack Frost’s card. Jack is kind to the regular denizens of Madison Square, and gives fair warning of his annual call. At the corners of four streets he hands his pasteboard to the North Wind, footman of the mansion of All Outdoors, so that the inhabitants thereof may make ready.

@@ -56,6 +56,6 @@

“Nothin’,” said Soapy.

“Then come along,” said the policeman.

“Three months on the Island,” said the Magistrate in the Police Court the next morning.

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+

The Count and the Wedding Guest

One evening when Andy Donovan went to dinner at his Second Avenue boardinghouse, Mrs. Scott introduced him to a new boarder, a young lady, Miss Conway. Miss Conway was small and unobtrusive. She wore a plain, snuffy-brown dress, and bestowed her interest, which seemed languid, upon her plate. She lifted her diffident eyelids and shot one perspicuous, judicial glance at Mr. Donovan, politely murmured his name, and returned to her mutton. Mr. Donovan bowed with the grace and beaming smile that were rapidly winning for him social, business and political advancement, and erased the snuffy-brown one from the tablets of his consideration.

Two weeks later Andy was sitting on the front steps enjoying his cigar. There was a soft rustle behind and above him, and Andy turned his head⁠—and had his head turned.

@@ -63,6 +63,6 @@

“Sure,” said Andy. “It’s all right about that. Back to the cemetery for the Count. You’ve straightened everything out, Maggie. I was in hopes you would before the wedding-day. Bully girl!”

“Andy,” said Maggie, with a somewhat shy smile, after she had been thoroughly assured of forgiveness, “did you believe all that story about the Count?”

“Well, not to any large extent,” said Andy, reaching for his cigar case, “because it’s Big Mike Sullivan’s picture you’ve got in that locket of yours.”

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+

The Country of Elusion

The cunning writer will choose an indefinable subject, for he can then set down his theory of what it is; and next, at length, his conception of what it is not⁠—and lo! his paper is covered. Therefore let us follow the prolix and unmappable trail into that mooted country, Bohemia.

Grainger, subeditor of Doc’s Magazine, closed his roll-top desk, put on his hat, walked into the hall, punched the “down” button, and waited for the elevator.

@@ -61,6 +61,6 @@

“I didn’t quite catch the trains,” said she. “How long was Mary in Crocusville?”

“Ten hours and five minutes,” I replied.

“Well, then, the story may do,” said Minnie. “But if she had stayed there a week Kappelman would have got his kiss.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-cynic.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-cynic.xhtml index bf514ee..539d6b8 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-cynic.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-cynic.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Cynic

Junior Partner: Here’s an honest firm!

Sharp and Simpson send us a check for $50 in addition to their monthly account, to cover difference in price of a higher grade of goods shipped them last time by mistake.

@@ -20,6 +20,6 @@

“I’m dead in it,” said the spoiled bivalve at the clambake.

“I think I shall get along well,” said the artesian water company.

“And my work is all being cut out for me,” said the grape seed.

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+

The Day Resurgent

I can see the artist bite the end of his pencil and frown when it comes to drawing his Easter picture; for his legitimate pictorial conceptions of figures pertinent to the festival are but four in number.

First comes Easter, pagan goddess of spring. Here his fancy may have free play. A beautiful maiden with decorative hair and the proper number of toes will fill the bill. Miss Clarice St. Vavasour, the well-known model, will pose for it in the “Lethergogallagher,” or whatever it was that Trilby called it.

@@ -71,6 +71,6 @@

“Do you hear our lad readin’ to me?” he said. “There is none finer in the land. My two eyes have come back to me again.”

After supper he said to Danny: “ ’Tis a happy day, this Easter. And now ye will be off to see Katy in the evening. Well enough.”

“Who pays the rent and buys the food that is eaten in this house?” said Danny, angrily. “Have I no right to stay in it? After supper there is yet to come the reading of the battle of Corinth, 146 BC, when the kingdom, as they say, became an in-integral portion of the Roman Empire. Am I nothing in this house?”

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+

The Day We Celebrate

“In the tropics” (“Hop-along” Bibb, the bird fancier, was saying to me) “the seasons, months, fortnights, weekends, holidays, dog-days, Sundays, and yesterdays get so jumbled together in the shuffle that you never know when a year has gone by until you’re in the middle of the next one.”

“Hop-along” Bibb kept his bird store on lower Fourth Avenue. He was an ex-seaman and beachcomber who made regular voyages to southern ports and imported personally conducted invoices of talking parrots and dialectic paroquets. He had a stiff knee, neck, and nerve. I had gone to him to buy a parrot to present, at Christmas, to my Aunt Joanna.

@@ -55,6 +55,6 @@

“ ‘Christmas, hell!’ says I. ‘I thought it was the Fourth of July.’ ”

“Merry Christmas!” said the red, white, and blue cockatoo.

“Take him for six dollars,” said Hop-along Bibb. “He’s got his dates and colours mixed.”

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+

The Defeat of the City

Robert Walmsley’s descent upon the city resulted in a Kilkenny struggle. He came out of the fight victor by a fortune and a reputation. On the other hand, he was swallowed up by the city. The city gave him what he demanded and then branded him with its brand. It remodelled, cut, trimmed and stamped him to the pattern it approves. It opened its social gates to him and shut him in on a close-cropped, formal lawn with the select herd of ruminants. In dress, habits, manners, provincialism, routine and narrowness he acquired that charming insolence, that irritating completeness, that sophisticated crassness, that overbalanced poise that makes the Manhattan gentleman so delightfully small in his greatness.

One of the upstate rural counties pointed with pride to the successful young metropolitan lawyer as a product of its soil. Six years earlier this county had removed the wheat straw from between its huckleberry-stained teeth and emitted a derisive and bucolic laugh as old man Walmsley’s freckle-faced “Bob” abandoned the certain three-per-diem meals of the one-horse farm for the discontinuous quick lunch counters of the three-ringed metropolis. At the end of the six years no murder trial, coaching party, automobile accident or cotillion was complete in which the name of Robert Walmsley did not figure. Tailors waylaid him in the street to get a new wrinkle from the cut of his unwrinkled trousers. Hyphenated fellows in the clubs and members of the oldest subpoenaed families were glad to clap him on the back and allow him three letters of his name.

@@ -45,6 +45,6 @@

Why had she come and was standing so close by his side?

“But I find that I have married”⁠—was this Alicia talking?⁠—“something better⁠—a man⁠—Bob, dear, kiss me, won’t you?”

The city was far away.

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The Detective Detector

I was walking in Central Park with Avery Knight, the great New York burglar, highwayman, and murderer.

“But, my dear Knight,” said I, “it sounds incredible. You have undoubtedly performed some of the most wonderful feats in your profession known to modern crime. You have committed some marvellous deeds under the very noses of the police⁠—you have boldly entered the homes of millionaires and held them up with an empty gun while you made free with their silver and jewels; you have sandbagged citizens in the glare of Broadway’s electric lights; you have killed and robbed with superb openness and absolute impunity⁠—but when you boast that within forty-eight hours after committing a murder you can run down and actually bring me face to face with the detective assigned to apprehend you, I must beg leave to express my doubts⁠—remember, you are in New York.”

@@ -51,6 +51,6 @@

“But how did you do it?” I asked again.

“It was very simple,” replied the distinguished murderer. “I assumed that the detective would go exactly opposite to the clues he had. I have given you a description of myself. Therefore, he must necessarily set to work and trail a short man with a white beard who likes to be in the papers, who is very wealthy, is fond of oatmeal, wants to die poor, and is of an extremely generous and philanthropic disposition. When thus far is reached the mind hesitates no longer. I conveyed you at once to the spot where Shamrock Jolnes was piping off Andrew Carnegie’s residence.”

“Knight,” said I, “you’re a wonder. If there was no danger of your reforming, what a rounds man you’d make for the Nineteenth Precinct!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-diamond-of-kali.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-diamond-of-kali.xhtml index 947edbf..5645a97 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-diamond-of-kali.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-diamond-of-kali.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Diamond of Kali

The original news item concerning the diamond of the goddess Kali was handed in to the city editor. He smiled and held it for a moment above the wastebasket. Then he laid it back on his desk and said: “Try the Sunday people; they might work something out of it.”

The Sunday editor glanced the item over and said: “H’m!” Afterward he sent for a reporter and expanded his comment.

@@ -70,6 +70,6 @@

This exhausts the facts concerning the Kali diamond. But it is deemed not inconsequent to close with the following brief (paid) item that appeared two days later in a morning paper.

“It is rumored that a niece of Gen. Marcellus B. Ludlow, of New York City, will appear on the stage next season.

“Her diamonds are said to be extremely valuable and of much historic interest.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-discounters-of-money.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-discounters-of-money.xhtml index 4dc4d6c..7bbb83e 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-discounters-of-money.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-discounters-of-money.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Discounters of Money

The spectacle of the money-caliphs of the present day going about Bagdad-on-the-Subway trying to relieve the wants of the people is enough to make the great Al Raschid turn Haroun in his grave. If not so, then the assertion should do so, the real caliph having been a wit and a scholar and therefore a hater of puns.

How properly to alleviate the troubles of the poor is one of the greatest troubles of the rich. But one thing agreed upon by all professional philanthropists is that you must never hand over any cash to your subject. The poor are notoriously temperamental; and when they get money they exhibit a strong tendency to spend it for stuffed olives and enlarged crayon portraits instead of giving it to the instalment man.

@@ -53,6 +53,6 @@

In his room, Pilkins opened the box and took out the staring, funny kitten, long ago ravaged of his candy and minus one shoe-button eye. Pilkins looked at it sorrowfully.

“After all,” he said, “I don’t believe that just money alone will⁠—”

And then he gave a shout and dug into the bottom of the box for something else that had been the kitten’s resting-place⁠—a crushed but red, red, fragrant, glorious, promising Jacqueminot rose.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-dissipated-jeweler.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-dissipated-jeweler.xhtml index 2c6bd97..7189b51 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-dissipated-jeweler.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-dissipated-jeweler.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Dissipated Jeweler

You will not find the name of Thomas Keeling in the Houston city directory. It might have been there by this time, if Mr. Keeling had not discontinued his business a month or so ago and moved to other parts. Mr. Keeling came to Houston about that time and opened up a small detective bureau. He offered his services to the public as a detective in rather a modest way. He did not aspire to be a rival of the Pinkerton agency, but preferred to work along less risky lines.

If an employer wanted the habits of a clerk looked into, or a lady wanted an eye kept upon a somewhat too gay husband, Mr. Keeling was the man to take the job. He was a quiet, studious man with theories. He read Gaboriau and Conan Doyle and hoped some day to take a higher place in his profession. He had held a subordinate place in a large detective bureau in the East, but as promotion was slow, he decided to come West, where the field was not so well covered.

@@ -73,6 +73,6 @@

“James H. Miggles, alias Slick Simon, alias The Weeping Widow, alias Bunco Kate, alias Jimmy the Sneak, General confidence man and burglar. Works generally in female disguises. Very plausible and dangerous. Wanted in Kansas City, Oshkosh, New Orleans and Milwaukee.”

This is why Mr. Thomas Keeling did not continue his detective business in Houston.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-distraction-of-grief.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-distraction-of-grief.xhtml index dcec9ef..9dbbd4d 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-distraction-of-grief.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-distraction-of-grief.xhtml @@ -6,12 +6,12 @@ -
+

The Distraction of Grief

The other day a Houston man died and left a young and charming widow to mourn his loss. Just before the funeral, the pastor came around to speak what words of comfort he could, and learn her wishes regarding the obsequies. He found her dressed in a becoming mourning costume, sitting with her chin in her hand, gazing with far-off eyes in an unfathomable sea of retrospection.

The pastor approached her gently, and said: “Pardon me for intruding upon your grief, but I wish to know whether you prefer to have a funeral sermon preached, or simply to have the service read.”

The heartbroken widow scarcely divined his meaning, so deeply was she plunged in her sorrowful thoughts, but she caught some of his words, and answered brokenly:

“Oh, red, of course. Red harmonizes so well with black.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-dog-and-the-playlet.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-dog-and-the-playlet.xhtml index d81cb96..6593b9b 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-dog-and-the-playlet.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-dog-and-the-playlet.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Dog and the Playlet

Usually it is a cold day in July when you can stroll up Broadway in that month and get a story out of the drama. I found one a few breathless, parboiling days ago, and it seems to decide a serious question in art.

There was not a soul left in the city except Hollis and me⁠—and two or three million sunworshippers who remained at desks and counters. The elect had fled to seashore, lake, and mountain, and had already begun to draw for additional funds. Every evening Hollis and I prowled about the deserted town searching for coolness in empty cafés, dining-rooms, and roofgardens. We knew to the tenth part of a revolution the speed of every electric fan in Gotham, and we followed the swiftest as they varied. Hollis’s fiancée, Miss Loris Sherman, had been in the Adirondacks, at Lower Saranac Lake, for a month. In another week he would join her party there. In the meantime, he cursed the city cheerfully and optimistically, and sought my society because I suffered him to show me her photograph during the black coffee every time we dined together.

@@ -39,6 +39,6 @@

“You were right about that theatrical business, old man,” he said, quietly, as he tossed a note to me.

I read it.

Loris had run away with Tom Tolliver.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-door-of-unrest.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-door-of-unrest.xhtml index 23850e0..d2ca7b3 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-door-of-unrest.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-door-of-unrest.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Door of Unrest

I sat an hour by sun, in the editor’s room of the Montopolis Weekly Bugle. I was the editor.

The saffron rays of the declining sunlight filtered through the cornstalks in Micajah Widdup’s garden-patch, and cast an amber glory upon my paste-pot. I sat at the editorial desk in my non-rotary revolving chair, and prepared my editorial against the oligarchies. The room, with its one window, was already a prey to the twilight. One by one, with my trenchant sentences, I lopped off the heads of the political hydra, while I listened, full of kindly peace, to the homecoming cowbells and wondered what Mrs. Flanagan was going to have for supper.

@@ -90,6 +90,6 @@

“When old Mike has a spell,” went on Uncle Abner, tepidly garrulous, “he thinks he’s the Wanderin’ Jew.”

“He is,” said I, nodding away.

And Uncle Abner cackled insinuatingly at the editor’s remark, for he was expecting at least a “stickful” in the “Personal Notes” of the Bugle.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-dream.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-dream.xhtml index 6f6fd65..36ccdce 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-dream.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-dream.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Dream

Murray dreamed a dream.

Both psychology and science grope when they would explain to us the strange adventures of our immaterial selves when wandering in the realm of “Death’s twin brother, Sleep.” This story will not attempt to be illuminative; it is no more than a record of Murray’s dream. One of the most puzzling phases of that strange waking sleep is that dreams which seem to cover months or even years may take place within a few seconds or minutes.

@@ -31,6 +31,6 @@

Here, in the very middle of a sentence, the hand of Death interrupted the telling of O. Henry’s last story. He had planned to make this story different from his others, the beginning of a new series in a style he had not previously attempted. “I want to show the public,” he said, “that I can write something new⁠—new for me, I mean⁠—a story without slang, a straightforward dramatic plot treated in a way that will come nearer my idea of real story-writing.” Before starting to write the present story, he outlined briefly how he intended to develop it: Murray, the criminal accused and convicted of the brutal murder of his sweetheart⁠—a murder prompted by jealous rage⁠—at first faces the death penalty, calm, and, to all outward appearances, indifferent to his fate. As he nears the electric chair he is overcome by a revulsion of feeling. He is left dazed, stupefied, stunned. The entire scene in the death-chamber⁠—the witnesses, the spectators, the preparations for execution⁠—become unreal to him. The thought flashes through his brain that a terrible mistake is being made. Why is he being strapped to the chair? What has he done? What crime has he committed? In the few moments while the straps are being adjusted a vision comes to him. He dreams a dream. He sees a little country cottage, bright, sunlit, nestling in a bower of flowers. A woman is there, and a little child. He speaks with them and finds that they are his wife, his child⁠—and the cottage their home. So, after all, it is a mistake. Someone has frightfully, irretrievably blundered. The accusation, the trial, the conviction, the sentence to death in the electric chair⁠—all a dream. He takes his wife in his arms and kisses the child. Yes, here is happiness. It was a dream. Then⁠—at a sign from the prison warden the fatal current is turned on.

Murray had dreamed the wrong dream.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-duel.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-duel.xhtml index 32d4939..1b34d52 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-duel.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-duel.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Duel

The gods, lying beside their nectar on ’Lympus and peeping over the edge of the cliff, perceive a difference in cities. Although it would seem that to their vision towns must appear as large or small anthills without special characteristics, yet it is not so. Studying the habits of ants from so great a height should be but a mild diversion when coupled with the soft drink that mythology tells us is their only solace. But doubtless they have amused themselves by the comparison of villages and towns; and it will be no news to them (nor, perhaps, to many mortals), that in one particularity New York stands unique among the cities of the world. This shall be the theme of a little story addressed to the man who sits smoking with his Sabbath-slippered feet on another chair, and to the woman who snatches the paper for a moment while boiling greens or a narcotized baby leaves her free. With these I love to sit upon the ground and tell sad stories of the death of Kings.

New York City is inhabited by 4,000,000 mysterious strangers; thus beating Bird Centre by three millions and half a dozen nine’s. They came here in various ways and for many reasons⁠—Hendrik Hudson, the art schools, green goods, the stork, the annual dressmakers’ convention, the Pennsylvania Railroad, love of money, the stage, cheap excursion rates, brains, personal column ads, heavy walking shoes, ambition, freight trains⁠—all these have had a hand in making up the population.

@@ -38,6 +38,6 @@

He kept the boy waiting ten minutes, and then wrote the reply: “Impossible to leave here at present.” Then he sat at the window again and let the city put its cup of mandragora to his lips again.

After all it isn’t a story; but I wanted to know which one of the heroes won the battle against the city. So I went to a very learned friend and laid the case before him. What he said was: “Please don’t bother me; I have Christmas presents to buy.”

So there it rests; and you will have to decide for yourself.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-duplicity-of-hargraves.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-duplicity-of-hargraves.xhtml index 8369fa5..e6c8673 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-duplicity-of-hargraves.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-duplicity-of-hargraves.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Duplicity of Hargraves

When Major Pendleton Talbot, of Mobile, sir, and his daughter, Miss Lydia Talbot, came to Washington to reside, they selected for a boarding place a house that stood fifty yards back from one of the quietest avenues. It was an old-fashioned brick building, with a portico upheld by tall white pillars. The yard was shaded by stately locusts and elms, and a catalpa tree in season rained its pink and white blossoms upon the grass. Rows of high box bushes lined the fence and walks. It was the Southern style and aspect of the place that pleased the eyes of the Talbots.

In this pleasant, private boarding house they engaged rooms, including a study for Major Talbot, who was adding the finishing chapters to his book, “Anecdotes and Reminiscences of the Alabama Army, Bench, and Bar.”

@@ -126,6 +126,6 @@

“Any mail for us this morning, Lydia, dear?” he asked.

Miss Lydia slid the letter beneath a fold of her dress.

“The Mobile Chronicle came,” she said promptly. “It’s on the table in your study.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-easter-of-the-soul.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-easter-of-the-soul.xhtml index 3f6cf29..12de44a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-easter-of-the-soul.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-easter-of-the-soul.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Easter of the Soul

It is hardly likely that a goddess may die. Then Eastre, the old Saxon goddess of spring, must be laughing in her muslin sleeve at people who believe that Easter, her namesake, exists only along certain strips of Fifth Avenue pavement after church service.

Aye! It belongs to the world. The ptarmigan in Chilkoot Pass discards his winter white feathers for brown; the Patagonian Beau Brummell oils his chignon and clubs him another sweetheart to drag to his skull-strewn flat. And down in Chrystie Street⁠—

@@ -67,6 +67,6 @@

“Tiger” McQuirk, in his shirtsleeves, with his hat on the back of his head, stood outside in the whirling snow, puffing at a black cigar.

“Donnerwetter!” shouted Lutz, “der vinter, he has gome back again yet!”

“Yer a liar, Dutch,” called back Mr. McQuirk, with friendly geniality, “it’s springtime, by the watch.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-elusive-tenderloin.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-elusive-tenderloin.xhtml index 33fcbbb..4a2621f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-elusive-tenderloin.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-elusive-tenderloin.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Elusive Tenderloin

There is no Tenderloin. There never was. That is, none that you could run a tapeline around. The word really implies a condition or a quality⁠—much as you would say “reprehensibility” or “cold feet.”

Metes and bounds have been assigned to it. I know. Realists have prated of “from Fourteenth to Forty-second,” and “as far west as” etc., but the larger meaning of the word remains with me.

@@ -39,6 +39,6 @@

“The sounds come out through a big door in a high buildin’ and I went in to see the fun. Thinks I, I’ll get a small slice of this here Tenderloin anyhow. Well, I went in, and that’s where I dropped the dollar. They came around and collected it.”

“What was inside. Bill?” I asked.

“A fellow told me, when we come out,” said Bill, “it was a church, and one of these preachers that mixes up in politics was denouncin’ the evils of the Tenderloin.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-emancipation-of-billy.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-emancipation-of-billy.xhtml index 5c073a2..2f9bc01 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-emancipation-of-billy.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-emancipation-of-billy.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Emancipation of Billy

In the old, old, square-porticoed mansion, with the wry window-shutters and the paint peeling off in discoloured flakes, lived one of the last of the war governors.

The South has forgotten the enmity of the great conflict, but it refuses to abandon its old traditions and idols. In “Governor” Pemberton, as he was still fondly called, the inhabitants of Elmville saw the relic of their state’s ancient greatness and glory. In his day he had been a man large in the eye of his country. His state had pressed upon him every honour within its gift. And now when he was old, and enjoying a richly merited repose outside the swift current of public affairs, his townsmen loved to do him reverence for the sake of the past.

@@ -77,6 +77,6 @@

And Billy! We had nearly forgotten Billy. He was cast for Son, and he waited patiently for his cue. He carried his “plug” in his hand, and felt serene. He admired his father’s striking air and pose. After all, it was a great deal to be a son of a man who could so gallantly hold the position of a cynosure for three generations.

General Deffenbaugh cleared his throat. Elmville opened its mouth, and squirmed. The chieftain with the kindly, fateful face was holding out his hand, smiling. Ex-war-Governor Pemberton extended his own across the chasm. But what was this the General was saying?

“Mr. President, allow me to present to you one who has the honour to be the father of our foremost, distinguished citizen, learned and honoured jurist, beloved townsman, and model Southern gentleman⁠—the Honourable William B. Pemberton.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-enchanted-kiss.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-enchanted-kiss.xhtml index 0cabdec..24b9770 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-enchanted-kiss.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-enchanted-kiss.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Enchanted Kiss

But a clerk in the Cut-rate Drug Store was Samuel Tansey, yet his slender frame was a pad that enfolded the passion of Romeo, the gloom of Laura, the romance of D’Artagnan, and the desperate inspiration of Melnotte. Pity, then, that he had been denied expression, that he was doomed to the burden of utter timidity and diffidence, that Fate had set him tongue-tied and scarlet before the muslin-clad angels whom he adored and vainly longed to rescue, clasp, comfort, and subdue.

The clock’s hands were pointing close upon the hour of ten while Tansey was playing billiards with a number of his friends. On alternate evenings he was released from duty at the store after seven o’clock. Even among his fellow-men Tansey was timorous and constrained. In his imagination he had done valiant deeds and performed acts of distinguished gallantry; but in fact he was a sallow youth of twenty-three, with an overmodest demeanour and scant vocabulary.

@@ -105,6 +105,6 @@

“How awkward I was! Can you find your way⁠—Sam?”

“I⁠—I think I have a match, Miss K-Katie.”

A scratching sound; a flame; a glow of light held at arm’s length by the recreant follower of Destiny illuminating a tableau which shall end the ignominious chronicle⁠—a maid with unkissed, curling, contemptuous lips slowly lifting the lamp chimney and allowing the wick to ignite; then waving a scornful and abjuring hand toward the staircase⁠—the unhappy Tansey, erstwhile champion in the prophetic lists of fortune, ingloriously ascending to his just and certain doom, while (let us imagine) half within the wings stands the imminent figure of Fate jerking wildly at the wrong strings, and mixing things up in her usual able manner.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-enchanted-profile.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-enchanted-profile.xhtml index b98e5c7..a4088a6 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-enchanted-profile.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-enchanted-profile.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Enchanted Profile

There are few Caliphesses. Women are Scheherazades by birth, predilection, instinct, and arrangement of the vocal cords. The thousand and one stories are being told every day by hundreds of thousands of viziers’ daughters to their respective sultans. But the bowstring will get some of ’em yet if they don’t watch out.

I heard a story, though, of one lady Caliph. It isn’t precisely an Arabian Nights story, because it brings in Cinderella, who flourished her dishrag in another epoch and country. So, if you don’t mind the mixed dates (which seem to give it an Eastern flavour, after all), we’ll get along.

@@ -54,6 +54,6 @@

“You are an artist,” said I, “and haven’t figured out why Maggie Brown conceived such a strong liking for Miss Bates⁠—that was? Let me show you.”

The bride wore a simple white dress as beautifully draped as the costumes of the ancient Greeks. I took some leaves from one of the decorative wreaths in the little parlour, and made a chaplet of them, and placed them on née Bates’ shining chestnut hair, and made her turn her profile to her husband.

“By jingo!” said he. “Isn’t Ida’s a dead ringer for the lady’s head on the silver dollar?”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-ethics-of-pig.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-ethics-of-pig.xhtml index a56a01b..44f8281 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-ethics-of-pig.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-ethics-of-pig.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Ethics of Pig

On an eastbound train I went into the smoker and found Jefferson Peters, the only man with a brain west of the Wabash River who can use his cerebrum, cerebellum, and medulla oblongata at the same time.

Jeff is in the line of unillegal graft. He is not to be dreaded by widows and orphans; he is a reducer of surplusage. His favorite disguise is that of the target-bird at which the spendthrift or the reckless investor may shy a few inconsequential dollars. He is readily vocalized by tobacco; so, with the aid of two thick and easy-burning brevas, I got the story of his latest Autolycan adventure.

@@ -106,6 +106,6 @@

“But,” I began, with the freedom of long acquaintance, “the rule should work both ways. If you had offered to divide the reward you would not have lost⁠—”

Jeff’s look of dignified reproach stopped me.

“That don’t involve the same principles at all,” said he. “Mine was a legitimate and moral attempt at speculation. Buy low and sell high⁠—don’t Wall Street endorse it? Bulls and bears and pigs⁠—what’s the difference? Why not bristles as well as horns and fur?”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-exact-science-of-matrimony.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-exact-science-of-matrimony.xhtml index e79cd4e..1374cfe 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-exact-science-of-matrimony.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-exact-science-of-matrimony.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Exact Science of Matrimony

“As I have told you before,” said Jeff Peters, “I never had much confidence in the perfidiousness of woman. As partners or coeducators in the most innocent line of graft they are not trustworthy.”

“They deserve the compliment,” said I. “I think they are entitled to be called the honest sex.”

@@ -77,6 +77,6 @@

“ ‘She gave it to me,’ says Andy. ‘I’ve been calling on her three evenings a week for more than a month.’

“ ‘Then are you William Wilkinson?’ says I.

“ ‘I was,’ says Andy.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-ferry-of-unfulfilment.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-ferry-of-unfulfilment.xhtml index 21c2000..0dccd0e 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-ferry-of-unfulfilment.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-ferry-of-unfulfilment.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Ferry of Unfulfilment

At the street corner, as solid as granite in the “rush-hour” tide of humanity, stood the Man from Nome. The Arctic winds and sun had stained him berry-brown. His eye still held the azure glint of the glaciers.

He was as alert as a fox, as tough as a caribou cutlet and as broad-gauged as the aurora borealis. He stood sprayed by a Niagara of sound⁠—the crash of the elevated trains, clanging cars, pounding of rubberless tires and the antiphony of the cab and truck-drivers indulging in scarifying repartee. And so, with his gold dust cashed in to the merry air of a hundred thousand, and with the cakes and ale of one week in Gotham turning bitter on his tongue, the Man from Nome sighed to set foot again in Chilkoot, the exit from the land of street noises and Dead Sea apple pies.

@@ -44,6 +44,6 @@

The word came sharply and loudly from Miss Colby’s lips, giving evidence that in her dreams she was now behind her counter in the great department store of Sieber-Mason.

Her head suddenly bobbed over sideways. She awoke, sat straight, and rubbed her eyes. The Man from Nome was gone.

“Gee! I believe I’ve been asleep,” said Miss Colby “Wonder what became of the White Wings!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-fifth-wheel.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-fifth-wheel.xhtml index 74ae3d8..7a6b66f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-fifth-wheel.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-fifth-wheel.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Fifth Wheel

The ranks of the Bed Line moved closer together; for it was cold. They were alluvial deposit of the stream of life lodged in the delta of Fifth Avenue and Broadway. The Bed Liners stamped their freezing feet, looked at the empty benches in Madison Square whence Jack Frost had evicted them, and muttered to one another in a confusion of tongues. The Flatiron Building, with its impious, cloud-piercing architecture looming mistily above them on the opposite delta, might well have stood for the tower of Babel, whence these polyglot idlers had been called by the winged walking delegate of the Lord.

Standing on a pine box a head higher than his flock of goats, the Preacher exhorted whatever transient and shifting audience the north wind doled out to him. It was a slave market. Fifteen cents bought you a man. You deeded him to Morpheus; and the recording angel gave you credit.

@@ -120,6 +120,6 @@

“Say, Annie,” said he confidentially, “maybe it’s one of the last dreams of booze, but I’ve a kind of a recollection of riding in an automobile with a swell guy that took me to a house full of eagles and arc lights. He fed me on biscuits and hot air, and then kicked me down the front steps. If it was the d.t.’s, why am I so sore?”

“Shut up, you fool,” said Annie.

“If I could find that funny guy’s house,” said Thomas, in conclusion, “I’d go up there some day and punch his nose for him.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-flag-paramount.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-flag-paramount.xhtml index 2d57d24..7e63882 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-flag-paramount.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-flag-paramount.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Flag Paramount

At the head of the insurgent party appeared that Hector and learned Theban of the southern republics, Don Sabas Placido. A traveller, a soldier, a poet, a scientist, a statesman and a connoisseur⁠—the wonder was that he could content himself with the petty, remote life of his native country.

“It is a whim of Placido’s,” said a friend who knew him well, “to take up political intrigue. It is not otherwise than as if he had come upon a new tempo in music, a new bacillus in the air, a new scent, or rhyme, or explosive. He will squeeze this revolution dry of sensations, and a week afterward will forget it, skimming the seas of the world in his brigantine to add to his already world-famous collections. Collections of what? Por Dios! of everything from postage stamps to prehistoric stone idols.”

@@ -78,6 +78,6 @@

Stooping he raised the limp shoulders, drew the priceless and induplicable flag under them and over the breast, pinning it there with the diamond star of the Order of San Carlos that he took from the collar of his own coat.

He followed after the others, and stood with them upon the deck of the Salvador. The sailors that steadied El Nacional shoved her off. The jabbering Caribs hauled away at the rigging; the sloop headed for the shore.

And Herr Grunitz’s collection of naval flags was still the finest in the world.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-fool-killer.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-fool-killer.xhtml index 0ff082d..5cb153e 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-fool-killer.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-fool-killer.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Fool-Killer

Down South whenever anyone perpetrates some particularly monumental piece of foolishness everybody says: “Send for Jesse Holmes.”

Jesse Holmes is the Fool-Killer. Of course he is a myth, like Santa Claus and Jack Frost and General Prosperity and all those concrete conceptions that are supposed to represent an idea that Nature has failed to embody. The wisest of the Southrons cannot tell you whence comes the Fool-Killer’s name; but few and happy are the households from the Roanoke to the Rio Grande in which the name of Jesse Holmes has not been pronounced or invoked. Always with a smile, and often with a tear, is he summoned to his official duty. A busy man is Jesse Holmes.

@@ -78,6 +78,6 @@

I walked away.

“Where are you going?” called Kerner.

“I am going to look for Jesse Holmes,” I answered, with dignity and reserve.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-foreign-policy-of-company-99.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-foreign-policy-of-company-99.xhtml index 9a0a20b..34ba3fc 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-foreign-policy-of-company-99.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-foreign-policy-of-company-99.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Foreign Policy of Company 99

John Byrnes, hose-cart driver of Engine Company No. 99, was afflicted with what his comrades called Japanitis.

Byrnes had a war map spread permanently upon a table in the second story of the engine-house, and he could explain to you at any hour of the day or night the exact positions, conditions and intentions of both the Russian and Japanese armies. He had little clusters of pins stuck in the map which represented the opposing forces, and these he moved about from day to day in conformity with the war news in the daily papers.

@@ -56,6 +56,6 @@

Just then Alderman Foley, who was on his way home and did not know of the runaway, stopped at the door of the engine-house and called to Byrnes:

“Hello there, Jimmy, me boy⁠—how’s the war coming along? Japs still got the bear on the trot, have they?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said John Byrnes, argumentatively, “them Japs haven’t got any walkover. You wait till Kuropatkin gets a good whack at ’em and they won’t be knee-high to a puddle-ducksky.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-fourth-in-salvador.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-fourth-in-salvador.xhtml index 8460385..68793ec 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-fourth-in-salvador.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-fourth-in-salvador.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Fourth in Salvador

On a summer’s day, while the city was rocking with the din and red uproar of patriotism, Billy Casparis told me this story.

In his way, Billy is Ulysses, Jr. Like Satan, he comes from going to and fro upon the earth and walking up and down in it. Tomorrow morning while you are cracking your breakfast egg he may be off with his little alligator grip to boom a town site in the middle of Lake Okeechobee or to trade horses with the Patagonians.

@@ -84,6 +84,6 @@

“ ‘If Señor Casparis,’ says the bay man, ‘will present himself to the treasury on the sixth day of this month he will receive back the thousand dollars he did deposit as a forfeit. Adios, señor.’

“The General and the bay man bowed themselves out, and I bowed as often as they did.

“And when the carriage rolls away through the sand I bows once more, deeper than ever, till my hat touches the ground. But this time ’twas not intended for them. For, over their heads, I saw the old flag fluttering in the breeze above the consul’s roof; and ’twas to it I made my profoundest salute.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-friendly-call.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-friendly-call.xhtml index b8e4b3a..56a151c 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-friendly-call.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-friendly-call.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Friendly Call

When I used to sell hardware in the West, I often “made” a little town called Saltillo, in Colorado. I was always certain of securing a small or a large order from Simon Bell, who kept a general store there. Bell was one of those six-foot, low-voiced products, formed from a union of the West and the South. I liked him. To look at him you would think he should be robbing stage coaches or juggling gold mines with both hands; but he would sell you a paper of tacks or a spool of thread, with ten times more patience and courtesy than any saleslady in a city department store.

I had a twofold object in my last visit to Saltillo. One was to sell a bill of goods; the other to advise Bell of a chance that I knew of by which I was certain he could make a small fortune.

@@ -100,6 +100,6 @@

“Missis Bell,” he replied, “won’t live in Mountain City, She hates the place and wouldn’t go there. I’ve got to keep right on here in Saltillo.”

“Mrs. Bell!” I exclaimed, too puzzled to conjecture what he meant.

“I ought to explain,” said Bell. “I know George and I know Mrs. Bell. He’s impatient in his ways. He can’t stand things that fret him, long, like I can. Six months, I give them⁠—six months of married life, and there’ll be another disunion. Mrs. Bell will come back to me. There’s no other place for her to go. I’ve got to stay here and wait. At the end of six months, I’ll have to grab a satchel and catch the first train. For George will be sending out The Call.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-furnished-room.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-furnished-room.xhtml index 87d8ce2..49d7145 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-furnished-room.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-furnished-room.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Furnished Room

Restless, shifting, fugacious as time itself is a certain vast bulk of the population of the red brick district of the lower West Side. Homeless, they have a hundred homes. They flit from furnished room to furnished room, transients forever⁠—transients in abode, transients in heart and mind. They sing “Home, Sweet Home” in ragtime; they carry their lares et penates in a bandbox; their vine is entwined about a picture hat; a rubber plant is their fig tree.

Hence the houses of this district, having had a thousand dwellers, should have a thousand tales to tell, mostly dull ones, no doubt; but it would be strange if there could not be found a ghost or two in the wake of all these vagrant guests.

@@ -50,6 +50,6 @@

“As you say, we has our living to be making,” remarked Mrs. Purdy.

“Yis, ma’am; ’tis true. ’Tis just one wake ago this day I helped ye lay out the third floor, back. A pretty slip of a colleen she was to be killin’ herself wid the gas⁠—a swate little face she had, Mrs. Purdy, ma’am.”

“She’d a-been called handsome, as you say,” said Mrs. Purdy, assenting but critical, “but for that mole she had a-growin’ by her left eyebrow. Do fill up your glass again, Mrs. McCool.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-gift-of-the-magi.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-gift-of-the-magi.xhtml index 35e2c22..1e3584e 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-gift-of-the-magi.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-gift-of-the-magi.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Gift of the Magi

One dollar and eighty-seven cents. That was all. And sixty cents of it was in pennies. Pennies saved one and two at a time by bulldozing the grocer and the vegetable man and the butcher until one’s cheeks burned with the silent imputation of parsimony that such close dealing implied. Three times Della counted it. One dollar and eighty-seven cents. And the next day would be Christmas.

There was clearly nothing to do but flop down on the shabby little couch and howl. So Della did it. Which instigates the moral reflection that life is made up of sobs, sniffles, and smiles, with sniffles predominating.

@@ -51,6 +51,6 @@

Instead of obeying, Jim tumbled down on the couch and put his hands under the back of his head and smiled.

“Dell,” said he, “let’s put our Christmas presents away and keep ’em a while. They’re too nice to use just at present. I sold the watch to get the money to buy your combs. And now suppose you put the chops on.”

The magi, as you know, were wise men⁠—wonderfully wise men⁠—who brought gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplication. And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest. Of all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-girl-and-the-graft.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-girl-and-the-graft.xhtml index a4001f9..0ee6f86 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-girl-and-the-graft.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-girl-and-the-graft.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Girl and the Graft

The other day I ran across my old friend Ferguson Pogue. Pogue is a conscientious grafter of the highest type. His headquarters is the Western Hemisphere, and his line of business is anything from speculating in town lots on the Great Staked Plains to selling wooden toys in Connecticut, made by hydraulic pressure from nutmegs ground to a pulp.

Now and then when Pogue has made a good haul he comes to New York for a rest. He says the jug of wine and loaf of bread and Thou in the wilderness business is about as much rest and pleasure to him as sliding down the bumps at Coney would be to President Taft. “Give me,” says Pogue, “a big city for my vacation. Especially New York. I’m not much fond of New Yorkers, and Manhattan is about the only place on the globe where I don’t find any.”

@@ -48,6 +48,6 @@

“And that’s why I say,” concluded Ferguson Pogue, “that a woman is too busy occupied with her natural vocation and instinct of graft such as is given her for self-preservation and amusement to make any great success in special lines.”

“What was in the bundle that they left?” I asked, with my usual curiosity.

“Why,” said Ferguson, “there was a scalper’s railroad ticket as far as Kansas City and two pairs of Mr. Vaucross’s old pants.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-girl-and-the-habit.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-girl-and-the-habit.xhtml index 5ea811e..5aa7b1a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-girl-and-the-habit.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-girl-and-the-habit.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Girl and the Habit

@@ -42,6 +42,6 @@

“Cut that joshing out,” she said, coolly and briskly. “Who do you think you are talking to? Your check, please. Oh, Lordy!⁠—”

Patrons of the bazaar became aware of a commotion and pressed around a certain booth. The Earl of Hitesbury stood nearby pulling a pale blond and puzzled whisker.

“Miss McRamsey has fainted,” someone explained.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-gold-that-glittered.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-gold-that-glittered.xhtml index 749eebf..b52acd8 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-gold-that-glittered.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-gold-that-glittered.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Gold That Glittered

A story with a moral appended is like the bill of a mosquito. It bores you, and then injects a stinging drop to irritate your conscience. Therefore let us have the moral first and be done with it. All is not gold that glitters, but it is a wise child that keeps the stopper in his bottle of testing acid.

Where Broadway skirts the corner of the square presided over by George the Veracious is the Little Rialto. Here stand the actors of that quarter, and this is their shibboleth: “ ‘Nit,’ says I to Frohman, ‘you can’t touch me for a kopeck less than two-fifty per,’ and out I walks.”

@@ -72,6 +72,6 @@

“Ah,” said the General, footing up a column, “that is what you call politics. War and revolution they are not nice. Yes. It is not best that one shall always follow Minerva. No. It is of quite desirable to keep hotels and be with that Juno⁠—that ox-eyed Juno. Ah! what hair of the gold it is that she have!”

Mr. Kelley choked again.

“Ah, Señor Kelley!” said the General, feelingly and finally, “is it that you have never eaten of the corned beef hash that Madame O’Brien she make?”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-good-boy.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-good-boy.xhtml index 01ed945..868a58a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-good-boy.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-good-boy.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Good Boy (Mostly in Words of One Syllable) @@ -20,6 +20,6 @@

At this the boys did rail and laugh.

“Oh, boys,” said James, “do not be rude and speak so harsh. At home, I have a dear old grandma, and this kind lady may be one, too.”

The lady took James by the ear and said: “You contemptible little rapscallion. I’ve a good mind to spank you until you can’t navigate. Grandmother, indeed! I’m only twenty-nine my last birthday, and I don’t feel a day over eighteen. Now, you clear out, or I’ll slap you good.”

-

+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-great-french-detective-in-austin.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-great-french-detective-in-austin.xhtml index ba55318..6281917 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-great-french-detective-in-austin.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-great-french-detective-in-austin.xhtml @@ -6,12 +6,12 @@ -
+

The Great French Detective, in Austin A Successful Political Intrigue

-
+

I

It is not generally known that Tictocq, the famous French detective, was in Austin last week. He registered at the Avenue Hotel under an assumed name, and his quiet and reserved manners singled him out at once for one not to be singled out.

No one knows why he came to Austin, but to one or two he vouchsafed the information that his mission was an important one from the French Government.

@@ -49,7 +49,7 @@

“Jim.”

“You can go.”

-
+

II

The drawing-rooms of one of the most magnificent private residences in Austin are a blaze of lights. Carriages line the streets in front, and from gate to doorway is spread a velvet carpet, on which the delicate feet of the guests may tread.

The occasion is the entrée into society of one of the fairest buds in the City of the Violet Crown. The rooms are filled with the culture, the beauty, the youth and fashion of society. Austin society is acknowledged to be the wittiest, the most select, and the highest bred to be found southwest of Kansas City.

@@ -81,7 +81,7 @@

The company is returning, no longer hearing the music.

Tictooq hesitates not. He seizes the professor, throws him upon the floor, tears off his shoes and socks, and escapes with the latter through the open window into the garden.

-
+

III

Tictocq’s room in the Avenue Hotel.

A knock is heard at the door.

@@ -121,6 +121,6 @@

All left the room except Tictocq and the Democrats.

“Let’s all go down and open a bottle of fizz on the Finance Committee,” said the Chairman of the Executive Committee, Platform No. 2.

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+
diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-greater-coney.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-greater-coney.xhtml index 050d59e..03a5240 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-greater-coney.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-greater-coney.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Greater Coney

“Next Sunday,” said Dennis Carnahan, “I’ll be after going down to see the new Coney Island that’s risen like a phoenix bird from the ashes of the old resort. I’m going with Norah Flynn, and we’ll fall victims to all the dry goods deceptions, from the red-flannel eruption of Mount Vesuvius to the pink silk ribbons on the race-suicide problems in the incubator kiosk.

“Was I there before? I was. I was there last Tuesday. Did I see the sights? I did not.

@@ -39,6 +39,6 @@

“ ‘’Twas me fault,’ says I. ‘I came here for the same reason meself. Look at the lights, Norah,’ I says, turning my back to the sea⁠—‘ain’t they pretty?’

“ ‘They are,’ says Norah, with her eyes shinin’; ‘and do ye hear the bands playin’? Oh, Denny, I think I’d like to see it all.’

“ ‘The old Coney is gone, darlin’,’ I says to her. ‘Everything moves. When a man’s glad it’s not scenes of sadness he wants. ’Tis a greater Coney we have here, but we couldn’t see it till we got in the humour for it. Next Sunday, Norah darlin’, we’ll see the new place from end to end.”

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+

The Green Door

Suppose you should be walking down Broadway after dinner, with ten minutes allotted to the consummation of your cigar while you are choosing between a diverting tragedy and something serious in the way of vaudeville. Suddenly a hand is laid upon your arm. You turn to look into the thrilling eyes of a beautiful woman, wonderful in diamonds and Russian sables. She thrusts hurriedly into your hand an extremely hot buttered roll, flashes out a tiny pair of scissors, snips off the second button of your overcoat, meaningly ejaculates the one word, “parallelogram!” and swiftly flies down a cross street, looking back fearfully over her shoulder.

That would be pure adventure. Would you accept it? Not you. You would flush with embarrassment; you would sheepishly drop the roll and continue down Broadway, fumbling feebly for the missing button. This you would do unless you are one of the blessed few in whom the pure spirit of adventure is not dead.

@@ -61,6 +61,6 @@

At the corner of the block in which he lived Rudolf stopped for a glass of beer and a cigar. When he had come out with his lighted weed he buttoned his coat, pushed back his hat and said, stoutly, to the lamp post on the corner:

“All the same, I believe it was the hand of Fate that doped out the way for me to find her.”

Which conclusion, under the circumstances, certainly admits Rudolf Steiner to the ranks of the true followers of Romance and Adventure.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-guardian-of-the-accolade.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-guardian-of-the-accolade.xhtml index bdf3598..f95bb1d 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-guardian-of-the-accolade.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-guardian-of-the-accolade.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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The Guardian of the Accolade

Not the least important of the force of the Weymouth Bank was Uncle Bushrod. Sixty years had Uncle Bushrod given of faithful service to the house of Weymouth as chattel, servitor, and friend. Of the colour of the mahogany bank furniture was Uncle Bushrod⁠—thus dark was he externally; white as the uninked pages of the bank ledgers was his soul. Eminently pleasing to Uncle Bushrod would the comparison have been; for to him the only institution in existence worth considering was the Weymouth Bank, of which he was something between porter and generalissimo-in-charge.

Weymouth lay, dreamy and umbrageous, among the low foothills along the brow of a Southern valley. Three banks there were in Weymouthville. Two were hopeless, misguided enterprises, lacking the presence and prestige of a Weymouth to give them glory. The third was The Bank, managed by the Weymouths⁠—and Uncle Bushrod. In the old Weymouth homestead⁠—the red brick, white-porticoed mansion, the first to your right as you crossed Elder Creek, coming into town⁠—lived Mr. Robert Weymouth (the president of the bank), his widowed daughter, Mrs. Vesey⁠—called “Miss Letty” by everyone⁠—and her two children, Nan and Guy. There, also in a cottage on the grounds, resided Uncle Bushrod and Aunt Malindy, his wife. Mr. William Weymouth (the cashier of the bank) lived in a modern, fine house on the principal avenue.

@@ -66,6 +66,6 @@

“I’m going to quit drinking,” Mr. Robert concluded. “I’ve come to the conclusion that a man can’t keep it up and be quite what he’d like to be⁠—‘pure and fearless and without reproach’⁠—that’s the way old Bushrod quoted it.”

“Well, I’ll have to admit,” said the judge, thoughtfully, as they climbed into the wagon, “that the old darkey’s argument can’t conscientiously be overruled.”

“Still,” said Mr. Robert, with a ghost of a sigh, “there was two quarts of the finest old silk-velvet Bourbon in that satchel you ever wet your lips with.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-guilty-party.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-guilty-party.xhtml index 308f642..c001b78 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-guilty-party.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-guilty-party.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

“The Guilty Party”

A red-haired, unshaven, untidy man sat in a rocking chair by a window. He had just lighted a pipe, and was puffing blue clouds with great satisfaction. He had removed his shoes and donned a pair of blue, faded carpet-slippers. With the morbid thirst of the confirmed daily news drinker, he awkwardly folded back the pages of an evening paper, eagerly gulping down the strong, black headlines, to be followed as a chaser by the milder details of the smaller type.

In an adjoining room a woman was cooking supper. Odors from strong bacon and boiling coffee contended against the cut-plug fumes from the vespertine pipe.

@@ -65,6 +65,6 @@

“Poor girl,” said Special Terrestrial Officer the Reverend Jones, with a tear in his eye. “It was one of the saddest cases that I ever met with. Of course she was⁠—”

“Discharged,” said the court officer. “Come here, Jonesy. First thing you know you’ll be switched to the potpie squad. How would you like to be on the missionary force in the South Sea Islands⁠—hey? Now, you quit making these false arrests, or you’ll be transferred⁠—see? The guilty party you’ve got to look for in this case is a red-haired, unshaven, untidy man, sitting by the window reading, in his stocking feet, while his children play in the streets. Get a move on you.”

Now, wasn’t that a silly dream?

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-halberdier-of-the-little-rheinschloss.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-halberdier-of-the-little-rheinschloss.xhtml index 351ad83..e035e7f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-halberdier-of-the-little-rheinschloss.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-halberdier-of-the-little-rheinschloss.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Halberdier of the Little Rheinschloss

I go sometimes into the Bierhalle and restaurant called Old Munich. Not long ago it was a resort of interesting Bohemians, but now only artists and musicians and literary folk frequent it. But the Pilsner is yet good, and I take some diversion from the conversation of Waiter No. 18.

For many years the customers of Old Munich have accepted the place as a faithful copy from the ancient German town. The big hall with its smoky rafters, rows of imported steins, portrait of Goethe, and verses painted on the walls⁠—translated into German from the original of the Cincinnati poets⁠—seems atmospherically correct when viewed through the bottom of a glass.

@@ -81,6 +81,6 @@

I dislike to be sidetracked from an original proposition.

“But you haven’t told me, Eighteen,” said I, “how the cigar-case came to be broken.”

“Oh, that was last night,” said Eighteen. “Sir Percival and the girl drove up in a cream-coloured motorcar, and had dinner in the Rindslosh. ‘The same table, Billy,’ I heard her say as they went up. I waited on ’em. We’ve got a new halberdier now, a bowlegged guy with a face like a sheep. As they came downstairs Sir Percival passes him a ten-case note. The new halberdier drops his halberd, and it falls on the cigar-case. That’s how that happened.”

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+

The Hand That Riles the World

“Many of our great men,” said I (apropos of many things), “have declared that they owe their success to the aid and encouragement of some brilliant woman.”

“I know,” said Jeff Peters. “I’ve read in history and mythology about Joan of Arc and Mme. Yale and Mrs. Caudle and Eve and other noted females of the past. But, in my opinion, the woman of today is of little use in politics or business. What’s she best in, anyway?⁠—men make the best cooks, milliners, nurses, housekeepers, stenographers, clerks, hairdressers and launderers. About the only job left that a woman can beat a man in is female impersonator in vaudeville.”

@@ -50,6 +50,6 @@

“The paper was for Bill, all right, and a genuine document, but it appointed him postmaster of Dade City, Fla.

“Me and Andy got off the train at Little Rock and sent Bill’s appointment to him by mail. Then we struck northeast toward Lake Superior.

“I never saw Bill Humble after that.”

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+

The Handbook of Hymen

’Tis the opinion of myself, Sanderson Pratt, who sets this down, that the educational system of the United States should be in the hands of the weather bureau. I can give you good reasons for it; and you can’t tell me why our college professors shouldn’t be transferred to the meteorological department. They have been learned to read; and they could very easily glance at the morning papers and then wire in to the main office what kind of weather to expect. But there’s the other side of the proposition. I am going on to tell you how the weather furnished me and Idaho Green with an elegant education.

We was up in the Bitter Root Mountains over the Montana line prospecting for gold. A chin-whiskered man in Walla-Walla, carrying a line of hope as excess baggage, had grubstaked us; and there we was in the foothills pecking away, with enough grub on hand to last an army through a peace conference.

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“Well, Mr. Pratt,” says he, “you evidently got on the wrong line in reading your diagnosis. The recipe for suffocation says: ‘Get the patient into fresh air as quickly as possible, and place in a reclining position.’ The flaxseed remedy is for ‘Dust and Cinders in the Eye,’ on the line above. But, after all⁠—”

“See here,” interrupts Mrs. Sampson, “I reckon I’ve got something to say in this consultation. That flaxseed done me more good than anything I ever tried.” And then she raises up her head and lays it back on my arm again, and says: “Put some in the other eye, Sandy dear.”

And so if you was to stop off at Rosa tomorrow, or any other day, you’d see a fine new yellow house with Mrs. Pratt, that was Mrs. Sampson, embellishing and adorning it. And if you was to step inside you’d see on the marble-top centre table in the parlour Herkimer’s Handbook of Indispensable Information, all rebound in red morocco, and ready to be consulted on any subject pertaining to human happiness and wisdom.

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The Harbinger

Long before the springtide is felt in the dull bosom of the yokel does the city man know that the grass-green goddess is upon her throne. He sits at his breakfast eggs and toast, begirt by stone walls, opens his morning paper and sees journalism leave vernalism at the post.

For, whereas, spring’s couriers were once the evidence of our finer senses, now the Associated Press does the trick.

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Spring had come.

On the bench in Union Square Mr. Ragsdale and Mr. Kidd squirmed, tongue-parched, awaiting D’Artagnan and his dollar.

“I wish I had choked her at first,” said Mr. Peters to himself.

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The Headhunter

When the war between Spain and George Dewey was over, I went to the Philippine Islands. There I remained as bushwhacker correspondent for my paper until its managing editor notified me that an eight-hundred-word cablegram describing the grief of a pet carabao over the death of an infant Moro was not considered by the office to be war news. So I resigned, and came home.

On board the trading-vessel that brought me back I pondered much upon the strange things I had sensed in the weird archipelago of the yellow-brown people. The manoeuvres and skirmishings of the petty war interested me not: I was spellbound by the outlandish and unreadable countenance of that race that had turned its expressionless gaze upon us out of an unguessable past.

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“It’s the little things that count, after all,” said I.

“It’s your little bed that counts with you just now,” said the doctor. “You come with me at once, or I’ll throw up the case. ‘You’re as loony as a loon.”

So I got no coconut-pudding that evening, but I conceived a distrust as to the value of the method of the headhunters. Perhaps for many centuries the maidens of the villages may have been looking wistfully at the heads in the baskets at the doorways, longing for other and lesser trophies.

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The Hiding of Black Bill

A lank, strong, red-faced man with a Wellington beak and small, fiery eyes tempered by flaxen lashes, sat on the station platform at Los Piños swinging his legs to and fro. At his side sat another man, fat, melancholy, and seedy, who seemed to be his friend. They had the appearance of men to whom life had appeared as a reversible coat⁠—seamy on both sides.

“Ain’t seen you in about four years, Ham,” said the seedy man. “Which way you been travelling?”

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“This H. Ogden,” resumed the red-faced man, “through a lawyer, proved himself free by alibis and other legal terminalities, as I so heard afterward. He never suffered no harm. He did me favors, and I hated to hand him over.”

“How about the bills they found in his pocket?” asked the seedy man.

“I put ’em there,” said the red-faced man, “while he was asleep, when I saw the posse riding up. I was Black Bill. Look out, Snipy, here she comes! We’ll board her on the bumpers when she takes water at the tank.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-higher-abdication.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-higher-abdication.xhtml index 7a6912e..9ca7684 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-higher-abdication.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-higher-abdication.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
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The Higher Abdication

Curly the tramp sidled toward the free-lunch counter. He caught a fleeting glance from the bartender’s eye, and stood still, trying to look like a business man who had just dined at the Menger and was waiting for a friend who had promised to pick him up in his motor car. Curly’s histrionic powers were equal to the impersonation; but his makeup was wanting.

The bartender rounded the bar in a casual way, looking up at the ceiling as though he was pondering some intricate problem of kalsomining, and then fell upon Curly so suddenly that the roadster had no excuses ready. Irresistibly, but so composedly that it seemed almost absendmindedness on his part, the dispenser of drinks pushed Curly to the swinging doors and kicked him out, with a nonchalance that almost amounted to sadness. That was the way of the Southwest.

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“The clock,” cried old “Kiowa” loudly. “The eight-day clock used to stand there. Why⁠—”

He turned to Ranse, but Ranse was not there.

Already a hundred yards away, Vaminos, the good flea-bitten dun, was bearing him eastward like a racer through dust and chaparral towards the Rancho de los Olmos.

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The Higher Pragmatism

I

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“Phil,” she said, in the Telfair, sweet, thrilling tones, “why didn’t you tell me about it before? I thought it was sister you wanted all the time, until you telephoned to me a few minutes ago!”

I suppose Mack and I always will be hopeless amateurs. But, as the thing has turned out in my case, I’m mighty glad of it.

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The Hypotheses of Failure

Lawyer Gooch bestowed his undivided attention upon the engrossing arts of his profession. But one flight of fancy did he allow his mind to entertain. He was fond of likening his suite of office rooms to the bottom of a ship. The rooms were three in number, with a door opening from one to another. These doors could also be closed.

“Ships,” Lawyer Gooch would say, “are constructed for safety, with separate, watertight compartments in their bottoms. If one compartment springs a leak it fills with water; but the good ship goes on unhurt. Were it not for the separating bulkheads one leak would sink the vessel. Now it often happens that while I am occupied with clients, other clients with conflicting interests call. With the assistance of Archibald⁠—an office boy with a future⁠—I cause the dangerous influx to be diverted into separate compartments, while I sound with my legal plummet the depth of each. If necessary, they may be baled into the hallway and permitted to escape by way of the stairs, which we may term the lee scuppers. Thus the good ship of business is kept afloat; whereas if the element that supports her were allowed to mingle freely in her hold we might be swamped⁠—ha, ha, ha!”

@@ -97,6 +97,6 @@

The satchel lay upon the floor, wide open, with its contents spilled about. Mechanically, Lawyer Gooch stooped to gather up the articles. The first was a collar; and the omniscient eye of the man of law perceived, wonderingly, the initials H. K. J. marked upon it. Then came a comb, a brush, a folded map, and a piece of soap. Lastly, a handful of old business letters, addressed⁠—every one of them⁠—to “Henry K. Jessup, Esq.”

Lawyer Gooch closed the satchel, and set it upon the table. He hesitated for a moment, and then put on his hat and walked into the office boy’s anteroom.

“Archibald,” he said mildly, as he opened the hall door, “I am going around to the Supreme Court rooms. In five minutes you may step into the inner office, and inform the lady who is waiting there that”⁠—here Lawyer Gooch made use of the vernacular⁠—“that there’s nothing doing.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-indian-summer-of-dry-valley-johnson.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-indian-summer-of-dry-valley-johnson.xhtml index 1579e66..00ef9af 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-indian-summer-of-dry-valley-johnson.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-indian-summer-of-dry-valley-johnson.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Indian Summer of Dry Valley Johnson

Dry Valley Johnson shook the bottle. You have to shake the bottle before using; for sulphur will not dissolve. Then Dry Valley saturated a small sponge with the liquid and rubbed it carefully into the roots of his hair. Besides sulphur there was sugar of lead in it and tincture of nux vomica and bay rum. Dry Valley found the recipe in a Sunday newspaper. You must next be told why a strong man came to fall a victim to a Beauty Hint.

Dry Valley had been a sheepman. His real name was Hector, but he had been rechristened after his range to distinguish him from “Elm Creek” Johnson, who ran sheep further down the Frio.

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Without flinching and with the same unchanging dark glow in her eyes, Panchita came steadily toward him through the strawberry vines. Dry Valley’s trembling hand released his whip handle. When within a yard of him Panchita stretched out her arms.

“God, kid!” stammered Dry Valley, “do you mean⁠—?”

But the seasons are versatile; and it may have been Springtime, after all, instead of Indian Summer, that struck Dry Valley Johnson.

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The Lady Higher Up

New York City, they said, was deserted; and that accounted, doubtless, for the sounds carrying so far in the tranquil summer air. The breeze was south-by-southwest; the hour was midnight; the theme was a bit of feminine gossip by wireless mythology. Three hundred and sixty-five feet above the heated asphalt the tiptoeing symbolic deity on Manhattan pointed her vacillating arrow straight, for the time, in the direction of her exalted sister on Liberty Island. The lights of the great Garden were out; the benches in the Square were filled with sleepers in postures so strange that beside them the writhing figures in Dore’s illustrations of the Inferno would have straightened into tailor’s dummies. The statue of Diana on the tower of the Garden⁠—its constancy shown by its weathercock ways, its innocence by the coating of gold that it has acquired, its devotion to style by its single, graceful flying scarf, its candour and artlessness by its habit of ever drawing the long bow, its metropolitanism by its posture of swift flight to catch a Harlem train⁠—remained poised with its arrow pointed across the upper bay. Had that arrow sped truly and horizontally it would have passed fifty feet above the head of the heroic matron whose duty it is to offer a cast-ironical welcome to the oppressed of other lands.

Seaward this lady gazed, and the furrows between steamship lines began to cut steerage rates. The translators, too, have put an extra burden upon her. “Liberty Lighting the World” (as her creator christened her) would have had a no more responsible duty, except for the size of it, than that of an electrician or a Standard Oil magnate. But to “enlighten” the world (as our learned civic guardians “Englished” it) requires abler qualities. And so poor Liberty, instead of having a sinecure as a mere illuminator, must be converted into a Chautauqua schoolma’am, with the oceans for her field instead of the placid, classic lake. With a fireless torch and an empty head must she dispel the shadows of the world and teach it its A, B, C’s.

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“A fine chat I’ve had with ye, Miss Diana, ma’am, but I see one of them European steamers a-sailin’ up the Narrows, and I must be attendin’ to me duties. ’Tis me job to extend aloft the torch of Liberty to welcome all them that survive the kicks that the steerage stewards give ’em while landin’. Sure ’tis a great country ye can come to for $8.50, and the doctor waitin’ to send ye back home free if he sees yer eyes red from cryin’ for it.”

The golden statue veered in the changing breeze, menacing many points on the horizon with its aureate arrow.

“So long, Aunt Liberty,” sweetly called Diana of the Tower. “Some night, when the wind’s right. I’ll call you up again. But⁠—say! you haven’t got such a fierce kick coming about your job. I’ve kept a pretty good watch on the island of Manhattan since I’ve been up here. That’s a pretty sick-looking bunch of liberty chasers they dump down at your end of it; but they don’t all stay that way. Every little while up here I see guys signing checks and voting the right ticket, and encouraging the arts and taking a bath every morning, that was shoved ashore by a dock labourer born in the United States who never earned over forty dollars a month. Don’t run down your job, Aunt Liberty; you’re all right, all right.”

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The Last Leaf

In a little district west of Washington Square the streets have run crazy and broken themselves into small strips called “places.” These “places” make strange angles and curves. One street crosses itself a time or two. An artist once discovered a valuable possibility in this street. Suppose a collector with a bill for paints, paper and canvas should, in traversing this route, suddenly meet himself coming back, without a cent having been paid on account!

So, to quaint old Greenwich Village the art people soon came prowling, hunting for north windows and eighteenth-century gables and Dutch attics and low rents. Then they imported some pewter mugs and a chafing dish or two from Sixth Avenue, and became a “colony.”

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The next day the doctor said to Sue: “She’s out of danger. You’ve won. Nutrition and care now⁠—that’s all.”

And that afternoon Sue came to the bed where Johnsy lay, contentedly knitting a very blue and very useless woolen shoulder scarf, and put one arm around her, pillows and all.

“I have something to tell you, white mouse,” she said. “Mr. Behrman died of pneumonia today in the hospital. He was ill only two days. The janitor found him on the morning of the first day in his room downstairs helpless with pain. His shoes and clothing were wet through and icy cold. They couldn’t imagine where he had been on such a dreadful night. And then they found a lantern, still lighted, and a ladder that had been dragged from its place, and some scattered brushes, and a palette with green and yellow colors mixed on it, and⁠—look out the window, dear, at the last ivy leaf on the wall. Didn’t you wonder why it never fluttered or moved when the wind blew? Ah, darling, it’s Behrman’s masterpiece⁠—he painted it there the night that the last leaf fell.”

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The Last of the Troubadours

Inexorably Sam Galloway saddled his pony. He was going away from the Rancho Altito at the end of a three-months’ visit. It is not to be expected that a guest should put up with wheat coffee and biscuits yellow-streaked with saleratus for longer than that. Nick Napoleon, the big Negro man cook, had never been able to make good biscuits. Once before, when Nick was cooking at the Willow Ranch, Sam had been forced to fly from his cuisine, after only a six-weeks’ sojourn.

On Sam’s face was an expression of sorrow, deepened with regret and slightly tempered by the patient forgiveness of a connoisseur who cannot be understood. But very firmly and inexorably he buckled his saddle-cinches, looped his stake-rope and hung it to his saddle-horn, tied his slicker and coat on the cantle, and looped his quirt on his right wrist. The Merrydews (householders of the Rancho Altito), men, women, children, and servants, vassals, visitors, employees, dogs, and casual callers were grouped in the “gallery” of the ranch house, all with faces set to the tune of melancholy and grief. For, as the coming of Sam Galloway to any ranch, camp, or cabin between the rivers Frio or Bravo del Norte aroused joy, so his departure caused mourning and distress.

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Then there was a little silence in the castle except for the spluttering of a venison steak that the Kiowa was cooking.

“Sam,” said old man Ellison, stroking his white whiskers with a tremulous hand, “would you mind getting the guitar and playing that ‘Huile, huile, palomita’ piece once or twice? It always seems to be kind of soothing and comforting when a man’s tired and fagged out.”

There is no more to be said, except that the title of the story is wrong. It should have been called “The Last of the Barons.” There never will be an end to the troubadours; and now and then it does seem that the jingle of their guitars will drown the sound of the muffled blows of the pickaxes and trip hammers of all the Workers in the world.

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The Legend of San Jacinto The Hermit of the Battle Ground Relates an Ancient Tradition to a Post Man @@ -34,6 +34,6 @@

“ ‘ “ ‘ “ ‘ “ ‘ “My son, I am growing old and will not be with you long. There is an old legend connected with this ground, and I feel that it should be told you. A long time ago, before you were born my grandfather one day⁠—” ’ ” ’ ” ’ ” ’ ”

“See here, you old blatherskite,” said the Post reporter, “you’ve got this story back about 600 years before the Pontius Pilate’s time now. Don’t you know a news item from an inscription on the pyramids? Our paper doesn’t use plate matter. Why don’t you work this gag of yours off on the syndicates?”

The aged hermit then frowned and reached under his coat tail, and the reporter ran swiftly, but in a dignified manner, to the Hoodoo Jane and embarked. But there is a legend about the San Jacinto battle ground somewhere in the neighborhood, if one could only get at it.

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The Lonesome Road

Brown as a coffee-berry, rugged, pistoled, spurred, wary, indefeasible, I saw my old friend, Deputy-Marshal Buck Caperton, stumble, with jingling rowels, into a chair in the marshal’s outer office.

And because the courthouse was almost deserted at that hour, and because Buck would sometimes relate to me things that were out of print, I followed him in and tricked him into talk through knowledge of a weakness he had. For, cigarettes rolled with sweet corn husk were as honey to Buck’s palate; and though he could finger the trigger of a forty-five with skill and suddenness, he never could learn to roll a cigarette.

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“I’ve been worrying over that business ever since it happened,” continued Buck. “There’s one thing about it that’s got me all twisted up, and I can’t figure it out.”

“What was that?” I asked, as I rolled and handed Buck the last cigarette.

“Why, I’ll tell you: When I saw the look that little woman gave Perry when she turned round and saw him coming back to the ranch safe⁠—why was it I got the idea all in a minute that that look of hers was worth more than the whole caboodle of us⁠—sarsaparilla, checkers, and all, and that the d⁠⸺⁠n fool in the game wasn’t named Perry Rountree at all?”

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The Lost Blend

Since the bar has been blessed by the clergy, and cocktails open the dinners of the elect, one may speak of the saloon. Teetotalers need not listen, if they choose; there is always the slot restaurant, where a dime dropped into the cold bouillon aperture will bring forth a dry Martini.

Con Lantry worked on the sober side of the bar in Kenealy’s café. You and I stood, one-legged like geese, on the other side and went into voluntary liquidation with our week’s wages. Opposite danced Con, clean, temperate, clearheaded, polite, white-jacketed, punctual, trustworthy, young, responsible, and took our money.

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Con lifted her clear from the floor and held her there.

“The news is,” he said, “that we’re to be married.”

“Put me down, sir!” she cried indignantly, “or I will⁠—Oh, Con, where, oh, wherever did you get the nerve to say it?”

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The Lotus and the Bottle

Willard Geddie, consul for the United States in Coralio, was working leisurely on his yearly report. Goodwin, who had strolled in as he did daily for a smoke on the much coveted porch, had found him so absorbed in his work that he departed after roundly abusing the consul for his lack of hospitality.

“I shall complain to the civil service department,” said Goodwin;⁠—“or is it a department?⁠—perhaps it’s only a theory. One gets neither civility nor service from you. You won’t talk; and you won’t set out anything to drink. What kind of a way is that of representing your government?”

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“He’s under that tarpauling,” said the mate, pointing to the boat, “and he’s rather more than half drownded. We seen him from the steamer nearly a mile out from shore, swimmin’ like mad after a bottle that was floatin’ in the water, outward bound. We lowered the gig and started for him. He nearly had his hand on the bottle, when he gave out and went under. We pulled him out in time to save him, maybe; but the doctor is the one to decide that.”

“A bottle?” said the old man, rubbing his eyes. He was not yet fully awake. “Where is the bottle?”

“Driftin’ along out there some’eres,” said the mate, jerking his thumb toward the sea. “Get on with you, Simon.”

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The Love-Philtre of Ikey Schoenstein

The Blue Light Drug Store is downtown, between the Bowery and First Avenue, where the distance between the two streets is the shortest. The Blue Light does not consider that pharmacy is a thing of bric-a-brac, scent and ice-cream soda. If you ask it for painkiller it will not give you a bonbon.

The Blue Light scorns the laboursaving arts of modern pharmacy. It macerates its opium and percolates its own laudanum and paregoric. To this day pills are made behind its tall prescription desk⁠—pills rolled out on its own pill-tile, divided with a spatula, rolled with the finger and thumb, dusted with calcined magnesia and delivered in little round pasteboard pillboxes. The store is on a corner about which coveys of ragged-plumed, hilarious children play and become candidates for the cough drops and soothing syrups that wait for them inside.

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“Pulled it off,” said Chunk with Elysium in his grin. “Rosy hit the fire-escape on time to a second, and we was under the wire at the Reverend’s at 9:30¼. She’s up at the flat⁠—she cooked eggs this mornin’ in a blue kimono⁠—Lord! how lucky I am! You must pace up some day, Ikey, and feed with us. I’ve got a job down near the bridge, and that’s where I’m heading for now.”

“The⁠—the⁠—powder?” stammered Ikey.

“Oh, that stuff you gave me!” said Chunk, broadening his grin; “well, it was this way. I sat down at the supper table last night at Riddle’s, and I looked at Rosy, and I says to myself, ‘Chunk, if you get the girl get her on the square⁠—don’t try any hocus-pocus with a thoroughbred like her.’ And I keeps the paper you give me in my pocket. And then my lamps fall on another party present, who, I says to myself, is failin’ in a proper affection toward his comin’ son-in-law, so I watches my chance and dumps that powder in old man Riddle’s coffee⁠—see?”

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The Making of a New Yorker

Besides many other things, Raggles was a poet. He was called a tramp; but that was only an elliptical way of saying that he was a philosopher, an artist, a traveller, a naturalist and a discoverer. But most of all he was a poet. In all his life he never wrote a line of verse; he lived his poetry. His Odyssey would have been a Limerick, had it been written. But, to linger with the primary proposition, Raggles was a poet.

Raggles’s specialty, had he been driven to ink and paper, would have been sonnets to the cities. He studied cities as women study their reflections in mirrors; as children study the glue and sawdust of a dislocated doll; as the men who write about wild animals study the cages in the zoo. A city to Raggles was not merely a pile of bricks and mortar, peopled by a certain number of inhabitants; it was a thing with a soul characteristic and distinct; an individual conglomeration of life, with its own peculiar essence, flavor and feeling. Two thousand miles to the north and south, east and west, Raggles wandered in poetic fervor, taking the cities to his breast. He footed it on dusty roads, or sped magnificently in freight cars, counting time as of no account. And when he had found the heart of a city and listened to its secret confession, he strayed on, restless, to another. Fickle Raggles!⁠—but perhaps he had not met the civic corporation that could engage and hold his critical fancy.

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“He was runnin’ down me town,” said Raggles.

“What town?” asked the nurse.

“Noo York,” said Raggles.

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The Man Higher Up

Across our two dishes of spaghetti, in a corner of Provenzano’s restaurant, Jeff Peters was explaining to me the three kinds of graft.

Every winter Jeff comes to New York to eat spaghetti, to watch the shipping in East River from the depths of his chinchilla overcoat, and to lay in a supply of Chicago-made clothing at one of the Fulton Street stores. During the other three seasons he may be found further west⁠—his range is from Spokane to Tampa. In his profession he takes a pride which he supports and defends with a serious and unique philosophy of ethics. His profession is no new one. He is an incorporated, uncapitalized, unlimited asylum for the reception of the restless and unwise dollars of his fellowmen.

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“I see,” said I, “the president of this mining company signs himself A. L. Fredericks. I was wondering⁠—”

“Let me see that stock,” said Jeff quickly, almost snatching it from me.

To mitigate, even though slightly, the embarrassment I summoned the waiter and ordered another bottle of the Barbera. I thought it was the least I could do.

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The Marionettes

The policeman was standing at the corner of Twenty-fourth Street and a prodigiously dark alley near where the elevated railroad crosses the street. The time was two o’clock in the morning; the outlook a stretch of cold, drizzling, unsociable blackness until the dawn.

A man, wearing a long overcoat, with his hat tilted down in front, and carrying something in one hand, walked softly but rapidly out of the black alley. The policeman accosted him civilly, but with the assured air that is linked with conscious authority. The hour, the alley’s musty reputation, the pedestrian’s haste, the burden he carried⁠—these easily combined into the “suspicious circumstances” that required illumination at the officer’s hands.

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“The money is there⁠—as he described it⁠—eight hundred and thirty dollars. I beg to leave my card with you, in case I can be of any service later on.”

So, he had thought of her⁠—and kindly⁠—at the last! So late! And yet the lie fanned into life one last spark of tenderness where she had thought all was turned to ashes and dust. She cried aloud “Rob! Rob!” She turned, and, upon the ready bosom of her true servitor, diluted her grief in relieving tears. It is well to think, also, that in the years to follow, the murderer’s falsehood shone like a little star above the grave of love, comforting her, and gaining the forgiveness that is good in itself, whether asked for or no.

Hushed and soothed upon the dark bosom, like a child, by a crooning, babbling sympathy, at last she raised her head⁠—but the doctor was gone.

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The Marquis and Miss Sally

Without knowing it, Old Bill Bascom had the honor of being overtaken by fate the same day with the Marquis of Borodale.

The Marquis lived in Regent Square, London. Old Bill lived on Limping Doe Creek, Hardeman County, Texas. The cataclysm that engulfed the Marquis took the form of a bursting bubble known as the Central and South American Mahogany and Caoutchouc Monopoly. Old Bill’s Nemesis was in the no less perilous shape of a band of civilized Indian cattle thieves from the Territory who ran off his entire herd of four hundred head, and shot old Bill dead as he trailed after them. To even up the consequences of the two catastrophes, the Marquis, as soon as he found that all he possessed would pay only fifteen shillings on the pound of his indebtedness, shot himself.

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“Oh, it was as soon as we struck the camp, when Saunders bawled out ‘The Marquis and Miss Sally!’ I saw how rattled you got at the name, and I had my sus⁠—”

“Cheeky!” whispered the Marquis. “And why should you think that I thought he was calling me ‘Miss Sally’?”

“Because,” answered the cook, calmly, “I was the Marquis. My father was the Marquis of Borodale. But you’ll excuse that, won’t you, Sally? It really isn’t my fault, you know.”

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The Marry Month of May

Prithee, smite the poet in the eye when he would sing to you praises of the month of May. It is a month presided over by the spirits of mischief and madness. Pixies and flibbertigibbets haunt the budding woods: Puck and his train of midgets are busy in town and country.

In May nature holds up at us a chiding finger, bidding us remember that we are not gods, but overconceited members of her own great family. She reminds us that we are brothers to the chowder-doomed clam and the donkey; lineal scions of the pansy and the chimpanzee, and but cousins-german to the cooing doves, the quacking ducks and the housemaids and policemen in the parks.

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“I found out what made it cold,” said Mrs. Widdup, leanin’ against his chair. “ ’Twas ice⁠—tons of it⁠—in the basement and in the furnace room, everywhere. I shut off the registers that it was coming through into your room, Mr. Coulson, poor soul! And now it’s Maytime again.”

“A true heart,” went on old man Coulson, a little wanderingly, “that the springtime has brought to life again, and⁠—but what will my daughter say, Mrs. Widdup?”

“Never fear, sir,” said Mrs. Widdup, cheerfully. “Miss Coulson, she ran away with the iceman last night, sir!”

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The Memento

Miss Lynnette D’Armande turned her back on Broadway. This was but tit for tat, because Broadway had often done the same thing to Miss D’Armande. Still, the “tats” seemed to have it, for the ex-leading lady of the “Reaping the Whirlwind” company had everything to ask of Broadway, while there was no vice-versâ.

So Miss Lynnette D’Armande turned the back of her chair to her window that overlooked Broadway, and sat down to stitch in time the lisle-thread heel of a black silk stocking. The tumult and glitter of the roaring Broadway beneath her window had no charm for her; what she greatly desired was the stifling air of a dressing-room on that fairyland street and the roar of an audience gathered in that capricious quarter. In the meantime, those stockings must not be neglected. Silk does wear out so, but⁠—after all, isn’t it just the only goods there is?

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“And then I caught the four-thirty-eight, soft-coal unlimited; and here I am.”

“You didn’t tell me what was in the box, Lee,” said Miss D’armande, anxiously.

“One of those yellow silk garters that I used to kick off my leg into the audience during that old vaudeville swing act of mine. Is there any of the cocktail left, Lynn?”

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The Mirage on the Frio

The sheep man rejected the offer of a match, and lit his pipe from a burning brand. We were down on Buffalo Bayou fishing, and had cooked and eaten supper. Fried fresh fish, coffee, corn bread, potatoes, and just enough crisp bacon to flavor gave us a supper at which none murmured.

We reclined at ease and worshipped the goddess Nicotine. The moon made a glory in the eastern sky and spread a white shimmering glamour upon the black water of the bayou. A phantom tug crept down stream, leaving a ghostly, wavering silver wake, and a mysterious lapping and washing along the unseen shores. Mosquitoes hummed angrily about the borders of the hanging cloud of tobacco smoke. A dank fresh smell arose from bursting buds and wild flowers. We five sat in the chiaroscuro of the live oaks and cypresses, and babbled as most men and all women will when Night, the tongue loosener, succeeds the discrete Day.

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“I’ve told you all I know,” said the sheep man. “Sallie said the man dropped all of a sudden while he was choppin’ at the door, and she never heard no gun shoot. I don’t pretend to explain nothin’, I’m telling you what happened. You might say somebody in the brush seen him breakin’ in the door and shot him, usin’ noiseless powder, and then slipped away without leavin’ his card, or you might say you don’t know nothin’ at all about it, as I do.”

“Do you think⁠—” began the young man.

“No, I don’t think,” said the sheep man, rather shortly. “I said I’d tell you about the mi-ridge I seen, and I told you just as it happened. Is they any coffee left in that pot?”

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The Missing Chord

I stopped overnight at the sheep-ranch of Rush Kinney, on the Sandy Fork of the Nueces. Mr. Kinney and I had been strangers up to the time when I called “Hallo!” at his hitching-rack; but from that moment until my departure on the next morning we were, according to the Texas code, undeniable friends.

After supper the ranchman and I lugged our chairs outside the two-room house, to its floorless gallery roofed with chaparral and sacuista grass. With the rear legs of our chairs sinking deep into the hardpacked loam, each of us reposed against an elm pillar of the structure and smoked El Toro tobacco, while we wrangled amicably concerning the affairs of the rest of the world.

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“Instead of a piano, it was one of the machines they’ve invented to play the piano with. By itself it was about as musical as the holes of a flute without the flute.

“And that was the piano that Uncle Cal had selected; and standing by it was the good, fine, all-wool girl that never let him know it.

“And what you heard playing a while ago,” concluded Mr. Kinney, “was that same deputy-piano machine; only just at present it’s shoved up against a six-hundred-dollar piano that I bought for Marilla as soon as we was married.”

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The Moment of Victory

Ben Granger is a war veteran aged twenty-nine⁠—which should enable you to guess the war. He is also principal merchant and postmaster of Cadiz, a little town over which the breezes from the Gulf of Mexico perpetually blow.

Ben helped to hurl the Don from his stronghold in the Greater Antilles; and then, hiking across half the world, he marched as a corporal-usher up and down the blazing tropic aisles of the open-air college in which the Filipino was schooled. Now, with his bayonet beaten into a cheese-slicer, he rallies his corporal’s guard of cronies in the shade of his well-whittled porch, instead of in the matted jungles of Mindanao. Always have his interest and choice been for deeds rather than for words; but the consideration and digestion of motives is not beyond him, as this story, which is his, will attest.

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“Willie sighs.

“ ‘All right, Ben,’ says he. ‘Darned if I didn’t forget all about that.’

“And that’s why I say,” concluded Ben Granger, “that you can’t tell where ambition begins any more than you can where it is going to wind up.”

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The Octopus Marooned

“A trust is its weakest point,” said Jeff Peters.

“That,” said I, “sounds like one of those unintelligible remarks such as, ‘Why is a policeman?’ ”

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“Then I locked up the cash and went out to see what had happened. I met a man who told me all about it. Andy had made the finest two hour speech that had ever been heard in Texas, he said, or anywhere else in the world.

“ ‘What was it about?’ I asked.

“ ‘Temperance,’ says he. ‘And when he got through, every man in Bird City signed the pledge for a year.’ ”

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The Old Landmark

He was old and feeble and his sands of life were nearly run out. He walked with faltering steps along one of the most fashionable avenues in the city of Houston. He had left the city twenty years ago, when it was little more than a thriving village, and now, weary of wandering through the world and filled with an unutterable longing to rest his eyes once more upon the scenes of his youth, he had come back to find a bustling modem city covering the site of his former home. He sought in vain for some familiar object, some old time sight that would recall memories of bygone days. All had changed. On the site where his father’s cottage had stood, a stately mansion reared its walls; the vacant lot where he had played when a boy, was covered with modem buildings. Magnificent lawns stretched on either hand, running back to palatial dwellings. Not one of the sights of his boyhood days was left.

Suddenly, with a glad cry, he rushed forward with renewed vigor. He saw before him, untouched by the hand of man and unchanged by time, an old familiar object around which he had played when a child. He reached out his arms and ran toward it with a deep sigh of satisfaction.

Later on they found him asleep, with a peaceful smile on his face, lying on the old garbage pile in the middle of the street, the sole relic of his boyhood’s recollections.

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The Other Side of It

There is an item going the rounds of the press relative to the well-known curiosity of woman. It states that if a man brings a newspaper home out of which a piece has been clipped his wife will never rest until she has procured another paper to see what it was that had been cut out.

A Houston man was quite impressed with the idea, so he resolved to make the experiment. One night last week he cut out of the day’s paper a little two-inch catarrh cure advertisement, and left the mutilated paper on the table where his wife would be sure to read it.

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“Don’t add perjury to your crimes, sir!”

The man tried unsuccessfully to speak three or four times, and then grabbed his hat and ran downtown. Fifteen minutes later he came back bringing two new silk dress patterns, four pounds of caramels, and his bookkeeper and three clerks to prove that he was hard at work in the store on the night in question.

The affair was finally settled satisfactorily, hut there is one Houston man who has no further curiosity about woman’s curiosity.

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The Passing of Black Eagle

For some months of a certain year a grim bandit infested the Texas border along the Rio Grande. Peculiarly striking to the optic nerve was this notorious marauder. His personality secured him the title of “Black Eagle, the Terror of the Border.” Many fearsome tales are on record concerning the doings of him and his followers. Suddenly, in the space of a single minute, Black Eagle vanished from earth. He was never heard of again. His own band never even guessed the mystery of his disappearance. The border ranches and settlements feared he would come again to ride and ravage the mesquite flats. He never will. It is to disclose the fate of Black Eagle that this narrative is written.

The initial movement of the story is furnished by the foot of a bartender in St. Louis. His discerning eye fell upon the form of Chicken Ruggles as he pecked with avidity at the free lunch. Chicken was a “hobo.” He had a long nose like the bill of a fowl, an inordinate appetite for poultry, and a habit of gratifying it without expense, which accounts for the name given him by his fellow vagrants.

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The train bell clanged. The bandit chief unbuckled his belt and cast it, with its revolvers, upon the ground. His spurs followed quickly, and his broad sombrero. Black Eagle was moulting. The train started with a rattling jerk. The ex-Terror of the Border scrambled into the box car and closed the door. Stretched luxuriously upon the excelsior, with the black bottle clasped closely to his breast, his eyes closed, and a foolish, happy smile upon his terrible features Chicken Ruggles started upon his return trip.

Undisturbed, with the band of desperate bandits lying motionless, awaiting the signal to attack, the train pulled out from Espina. As its speed increased, and the black masses of chaparral went whizzing past on either side, the express messenger, lighting his pipe, looked through his window and remarked, feelingly:

“What a jim-dandy place for a holdup!”

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The Pendulum

“Eighty-first Street⁠—let ’em out, please,” yelled the shepherd in blue.

A flock of citizen sheep scrambled out and another flock scrambled aboard. Ding-ding! The cattle cars of the Manhattan Elevated rattled away, and John Perkins drifted down the stairway of the station with the released flock.

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John Perkins looked at the clock. It was 8:15. He reached for his hat and walked to the door.

“Now, where are you going, I’d like to know, John Perkins?” asked Katy, in a querulous tone.

“Thought I’d drop up to McCloskey’s,” said John, “and play a game or two of pool with the fellows.”

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The Phonograph and the Graft

“What was this graft?” asked Johnny, with the impatience of the great public to whom tales are told.

“ ’Tis contrary to art and philosophy to give you the information,” said Keogh, calmly. “The art of narrative consists in concealing from your audience everything it wants to know until after you expose your favourite opinions on topics foreign to the subject. A good story is like a bitter pill with the sugar coating inside of it. I will begin, if you please, with a horoscope located in the Cherokee Nation; and end with a moral tune on the phonograph.

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“And that,” said Keogh, “is the way me and Henry Horsecollar introduced the phonograph into this country. Henry went back to the States, but I’ve been rummaging around in the tropics ever since. They say Mellinger never travelled a mile after that without his phonograph. I guess it kept him reminded about his graft whenever he saw the siren voice of the boodler tip him the wink with a bribe in its hand.”

“I suppose he’s taking it home with him as a souvenir,” remarked the consul.

“Not as a souvenir,” said Keogh. “He’ll need two of ’em in New York, running day and night.”

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The Pimienta Pancakes

While we were rounding up a bunch of the Triangle-O cattle in the Frio bottoms a projecting branch of a dead mesquite caught my wooden stirrup and gave my ankle a wrench that laid me up in camp for a week.

On the third day of my compulsory idleness I crawled out near the grub wagon, and reclined helpless under the conversational fire of Judson Odom, the camp cook. Jud was a monologist by nature, whom Destiny, with customary blundering, had set in a profession wherein he was bereaved, for the greater portion of his time, of an audience.

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“They’re delicious,” I answered. “Why don’t you have some, too, Jud?”

I was sure I heard a sigh.

“Me?” said Jud. “I don’t ever eat ’em.”

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The Pint Flask

A prominent Houston colonel, who is also a leading church member, started for church last Sunday morning with his family, as was his custom. He was serene and solid-looking, and his black frock coat and light gray trousers fitted him snugly and stylishly. They passed along Main Street on the way to church, and the colonel happened to think of a letter on his desk that he wanted, so he told his family to wait at the door a moment while he stopped in his office to get it. He went in and got the letter, and, to his surprise, there was a disreputable-looking pint whisky flask with about an ounce of whisky left in it standing on his desk. The colonel abominates whisky and never touches a drop of anything strong. He supposed that someone, knowing this, had passed his desk, and set the flask there by way of a mild joke.

He looked about for a place to throw the bottle, but the back door was locked, and he tried unsuccessfully to raise the window that overlooked the alley. The colonel’s wife, wondering why he was so long in coming, opened the door and surprised him, so that scarcely thinking what he was doing he thrust the flask under his coat tail into his hip pocket.

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He hurled the flask at the minister and it struck him on the ear and broke into twenty pieces. The minister let out a yell and turned and ran back to his house.

The colonel gathered a pile of stones and hid among the tall weeds, resolved to fight the whole town as long as his ammunition held out. His hard luck had made him desperate. An hour later three mounted policemen got into the weeds, and the colonel surrendered. He had cooled off by that time enough to explain matters, and as he was well known to be a perfectly sober and temperate citizen, he was allowed to go home.

But you can’t get him to pick up a bottle now, empty or full.

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The Plutonian Fire

There are a few editor men with whom I am privileged to come in contact. It has not been long since it was their habit to come in contact with me. There is a difference.

They tell me that with a large number of the manuscripts that are submitted to them come advices (in the way of a boost) from the author asseverating that the incidents in the story are true. The destination of such contributions depends wholly upon the question of the enclosure of stamps. Some are returned, the rest are thrown on the floor in a corner on top of a pair of gum shoes, an overturned statuette of the Winged Victory, and a pile of old magazines containing a picture of the editor in the act of reading the latest copy of Le Petit Journal, right side up⁠—you can tell by the illustrations. It is only a legend that there are waste baskets in editors’ offices.

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“But,” I protested, “you are reversing the decision of the world’s greatest⁠—”

“Goodbye, Old Hoss,” said Pettit.

“Critics,” I continued. “But⁠—say⁠—if the Major can use a fairly good salesman and bookkeeper down there in the store, let me know, will you?”

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The Poet and the Peasant

The other day a poet friend of mine, who has lived in close communion with nature all his life, wrote a poem and took it to an editor.

It was a living pastoral, full of the genuine breath of the fields, the song of birds, and the pleasant chatter of trickling streams.

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“When I read the first line of ‘The Doe and the Brook,’ ” said the editor, “I knew it to be the work of one whose life has been heart to heart with Nature. The finished art of the line did not blind me to that fact. To use a somewhat homely comparison, it was as if a wild, free child of the woods and fields were to don the garb of fashion and walk down Broadway. Beneath the apparel the man would show.”

“Thanks,” said Conant. “I suppose the check will be round on Thursday, as usual.”

The morals of this story have somehow gotten mixed. You can take your choice of “Stay on the Farm” or “Don’t Write Poetry.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-power-of-reputation.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-power-of-reputation.xhtml index 303a502..cb540e0 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-power-of-reputation.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-power-of-reputation.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Power of Reputation

One night last week in San Antonio a tall, solemn-looking man, wearing a silk hat, walked into a hotel bar from the office, and stood by the stove where a group of men were sitting smoking and talking. A fat man, who noticed him go in, asked the hotel clerk who it was. The clerk told his name and the fat man followed the stranger into the barroom, casting at him glances of admiration and delight.

“Pretty cold night, gentlemen, for a warm country,” said the man in the silk hat.

@@ -42,6 +42,6 @@

Wholesale Undertakers’ Supplies

The crowd was out $32 on treats, and they armed themselves and are laying for the fat man. When a stranger attempts to be funny in San Antonio now, he has to produce proper credentials in writing before he can raise a smile.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-pride-of-the-cities.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-pride-of-the-cities.xhtml index 0798512..925463d 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-pride-of-the-cities.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-pride-of-the-cities.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Pride of the Cities

Said Mr. Kipling, “The cities are full of pride, challenging each to each.” Even so.

New York was empty. Two hundred thousand of its people were away for the summer. Three million eight hundred thousand remained as caretakers and to pay the bills of the absentees. But the two hundred thousand are an expensive lot.

@@ -48,6 +48,6 @@

“You must admit,” said he, “that in the way of noise New York is far ahead of any other⁠—”

“Back to the everglades!” said the man from Topaz City. “In 1900, when Sousa’s band and the repeating candidate were in our town you couldn’t⁠—”

The rattle of an express wagon drowned the rest of the words.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-princess-and-the-puma.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-princess-and-the-puma.xhtml index 0e0cffa..6ad478c 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-princess-and-the-puma.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-princess-and-the-puma.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Princess and the Puma

There had to be a king and queen, of course. The king was a terrible old man who wore six-shooters and spurs, and shouted in such a tremendous voice that the rattlers on the prairie would run into their holes under the prickly pear. Before there was a royal family they called the man “Whispering Ben.” When he came to own 50,000 acres of land and more cattle than he could count, they called him O’Donnell “the Cattle King.”

The queen had been a Mexican girl from Laredo. She made a good, mild, Colorado-claro wife, and even succeeded in teaching Ben to modify his voice sufficiently while in the house to keep the dishes from being broken. When Ben got to be king she would sit on the gallery of Espinosa Ranch and weave rush mats. When wealth became so irresistible and oppressive that upholstered chairs and a centre table were brought down from San Antone in the wagons, she bowed her smooth, dark head, and shared the fate of the Danae.

@@ -55,6 +55,6 @@

An hour later, when the lights were out, Josefa, in her night-robe, came to her door and called to the king in his own room across the brick-paved hallway:

“Say, pop, you know that old Mexican lion they call the ‘Gotch-eared Devil’⁠—the one that killed Gonzales, Mr. Martin’s sheep herder, and about fifty calves on the Salado range? Well, I settled his hash this afternoon over at the White Horse Crossing. Put two balls in his head with my .38 while he was on the jump. I knew him by the slice gone from his left ear that old Gonzales cut off with his machete. You couldn’t have made a better shot yourself, daddy.”

“Bully for you!” thundered Whispering Ben from the darkness of the royal chamber.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-prisoner-of-zembla-by-anthony-hoke.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-prisoner-of-zembla-by-anthony-hoke.xhtml index 7175733..5130ece 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-prisoner-of-zembla-by-anthony-hoke.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-prisoner-of-zembla-by-anthony-hoke.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Prisoner of Zembla By Anthony Hoke @@ -31,6 +31,6 @@

With a yell of rage the victorious knight threw himself on his horse and rode away at a furious gallop.

The king was about to speak when a horrible suspicion flashed upon him and he fell dead upon the grandstand.

“My God!” he cried, as he expired, “he has forgotten to take the princess with him.”

-

+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-prisoner-of-zembla.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-prisoner-of-zembla.xhtml index 1798c79..5692a1c 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-prisoner-of-zembla.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-prisoner-of-zembla.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Prisoner of Zembla

So the king fell into a furious rage, so that none durst go near him for fear, and he gave out that since the Princess Ostla had disobeyed him there would be a great tourney, and to the knight who should prove himself of the greatest valor he would give the hand of the princess.

And he sent forth a herald to proclaim that he would do this.

@@ -29,6 +29,6 @@

With a yell of rage the victorious knight threw himself on his horse and rode away at a furious gallop.

The king was about to speak, when a horrible suspicion flashed upon him and he fell dead upon the grandstand.

“My God!” he cried. “He has forgotten to take the princess with him!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-proem.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-proem.xhtml index 7837393..b1c83fe 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-proem.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-proem.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Proem By the Carpenter @@ -34,6 +34,6 @@

The game still goes on. The guns of the rovers are silenced; but the tintype man, the enlarged photograph brigand, the kodaking tourist and the scouts of the gentle brigade of fakirs have found it out, and carry on the work. The hucksters of Germany, France, and Sicily now bag its small change across their counters. Gentleman adventurers throng the waiting-rooms of its rulers with proposals for railways and concessions. The little opéra-bouffe nations play at government and intrigue until some day a big, silent gunboat glides into the offing and warns them not to break their toys. And with these changes comes also the small adventurer, with empty pockets to fill, light of heart, busy-brained⁠—the modern fairy prince, bearing an alarm clock with which, more surely than by the sentimental kiss, to awaken the beautiful tropics from their centuries’ sleep. Generally he wears a shamrock, which he matches pridefully against the extravagant palms; and it is he who has driven Melpomene to the wings, and set Comedy to dancing before the footlights of the Southern Cross.

So, there is a little tale to tell of many things. Perhaps to the promiscuous ear of the Walrus it shall come with most avail; for in it there are indeed shoes and ships and sealing-wax and cabbage-palms and presidents instead of kings.

Add to these a little love and counterplotting, and scatter everywhere throughout the maze a trail of tropical dollars⁠—dollars warmed no more by the torrid sun than by the hot palms of the scouts of Fortune⁠—and, after all, here seems to be Life, itself, with talk enough to weary the most garrulous of Walruses.

-

+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-purple-dress.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-purple-dress.xhtml index 54241df..7dbb119 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-purple-dress.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-purple-dress.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Purple Dress

We are to consider the shade known as purple. It is a color justly in repute among the sons and daughters of man. Emperors claim it for their especial dye. Good fellows everywhere seek to bring their noses to the genial hue that follows the commingling of the red and blue. We say of princes that they are born to the purple; and no doubt they are, for the colic tinges their faces with the royal tint equally with the snub-nosed countenance of a woodchopper’s brat. All women love it⁠—when it is the fashion.

And now purple is being worn. You notice it on the streets. Of course other colors are quite stylish as well⁠—in fact, I saw a lovely thing the other day in olive green albatross, with a triple-lapped flounce skirt trimmed with insert squares of silk, and a draped fichu of lace opening over a shirred vest and double puff sleeves with a lace band holding two gathered frills⁠—but you see lots of purple too. Oh, yes, you do; just take a walk down Twenty-third Street any afternoon.

@@ -53,6 +53,6 @@

Someone turned a corner and blocked her way. She looked up into Mr. Ramsay’s eyes, sparkling with admiration and interest.

“Why, Miss Maida,” said he, “you look simply magnificent in your new dress. I was greatly disappointed not to see you at our dinner. And of all the girls I ever knew, you show the greatest sense and intelligence. There is nothing more healthful and invigorating than braving the weather as you are doing. May I walk with you?”

And Maida blushed and sneezed.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-rake-off.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-rake-off.xhtml index 1f85ae3..3e19a30 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-rake-off.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-rake-off.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Rake-Off

“Who bids?”

The auctioneer held up a child’s rocking-horse, battered and stained. It had belonged to some little member of the man’s family whose household property was being sold under the hammer.

@@ -19,6 +19,6 @@

The auctioneer, with a queer moisture in his eyes, handed the rocking-horse to the man without a word. He seized it with eager hands, and he and the veiled woman hurried away.

The crowd murmured with sympathy.

The man and the woman went into an empty room and set the rocking-horse down. He took out his knife, ripped open the front of the horse, and took out a roll of bills. He counted them and said: “It’s a cold day when I fail without a rake-off. Eight thousand five hundred dollars, but that auctioneer came very near busting up the game.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-ransom-of-mack.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-ransom-of-mack.xhtml index 71b66c8..ab2b602 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-ransom-of-mack.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-ransom-of-mack.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Ransom of Mack

Me and old Mack Lonsbury, we got out of that Little Hide-and-Seek gold mine affair with about $40,000 apiece. I say “old” Mack; but he wasn’t old. Forty-one, I should say; but he always seemed old.

“Andy,” he says to me, “I’m tired of hustling. You and me have been working hard together for three years. Say we knock off for a while, and spend some of this idle money we’ve coaxed our way.”

@@ -71,6 +71,6 @@

“He will,” says I.

“There was lots of women at the wedding,” says Mack, smoking up. “But I didn’t seem to get any ideas from ’em. I wish I was informed in the structure of their attainments like you said you was.”

“That was two months ago,” says I, reaching up for the banjo.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-ransom-of-red-chief.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-ransom-of-red-chief.xhtml index 262b1e1..5d14a26 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-ransom-of-red-chief.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-ransom-of-red-chief.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Ransom of Red Chief

It looked like a good thing: but wait till I tell you. We were down South, in Alabama⁠—Bill Driscoll and myself⁠—when this kidnapping idea struck us. It was, as Bill afterward expressed it, “during a moment of temporary mental apparition”; but we didn’t find that out till later.

There was a town down there, as flat as a flannel-cake, and called Summit, of course. It contained inhabitants of as undeleterious and self-satisfied a class of peasantry as ever clustered around a Maypole.

@@ -110,6 +110,6 @@

“I’m not as strong as I used to be,” says old Dorset, “but I think I can promise you ten minutes.”

“Enough,” says Bill. “In ten minutes I shall cross the Central, Southern and Middle Western States, and be legging it trippingly for the Canadian border.”

And, as dark as it was, and as fat as Bill was, and as good a runner as I am, he was a good mile and a half out of Summit before I could catch up with him.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-rathskeller-and-the-rose.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-rathskeller-and-the-rose.xhtml index 485e369..c250adb 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-rathskeller-and-the-rose.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-rathskeller-and-the-rose.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Rathskeller and the Rose

Miss Posie Carrington had earned her success. She began life handicapped by the family name of “Boggs,” in the small town known as Cranberry Corners. At the age of eighteen she had acquired the name of “Carrington” and a position in the chorus of a metropolitan burlesque company. Thence upward she had ascended by the legitimate and delectable steps of “broiler,” member of the famous “Dickey-bird” octette, in the successful musical comedy, “Fudge and Fellows,” leader of the potato-bug dance in “Fol-de-Rol,” and at length to the part of the maid “ ‘Toinette” in “The King’s Bathrobe,” which captured the critics and gave her her chance. And when we come to consider Miss Carrington she is in the heydey of flattery, fame and fizz; and that astute manager, Herr Timothy Goldstein, has her signature to ironclad papers that she will star the coming season in Dyde Rich’s new play, “Paresis by Gaslight.”

Promptly there came to Herr Timothy a capable twentieth-century young character actor by the name of Highsmith, who besought engagement as “Sol Haytosser,” the comic and chief male character part in “Paresis by Gaslight.”

@@ -46,6 +46,6 @@

At 11:45 a.m. on the next day Highsmith, handsome, dressed in the latest mode, confident, with a fuchsia in his buttonhole, sent up his card to Miss Carrington in her select apartment hotel.

He was shown up and received by the actress’s French maid.

“I am sorree,” said Mlle. Hortense, “but I am to say this to all. It is with great regret. Mees Carrington have cancelled all engagements on the stage and have returned to live in that⁠—how you call that town? Cranberry Cornaire!”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-red-roses-of-tonia.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-red-roses-of-tonia.xhtml index 9473280..82e269f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-red-roses-of-tonia.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-red-roses-of-tonia.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Red Roses of Tonia

A trestle burned down on the International Railroad. The southbound from San Antonio was cut off for the next forty-eight hours. On that train was Tonia Weaver’s Easter hat.

Espirition, the Mexican, who had been sent forty miles in a buckboard from the Espinosa Ranch to fetch it, returned with a shrugging shoulder and hands empty except for a cigarette. At the small station, Nopal, he had learned of the delayed train and, having no commands to wait, turned his ponies toward the ranch again.

@@ -99,6 +99,6 @@

Tonia flew into the buckboard like a bird. The vehicles sped away for Cactus.

“What have you been doing, Pearson?” asked Daddy Weaver. “You ain’t looking so well as common.”

“Me?” said Pearson. “I’ve been painting flowers. Them roses was white when I left Lone Elm. Help me down, Daddy Weaver, for I haven’t got any more paint to spare.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-reformation-of-calliope.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-reformation-of-calliope.xhtml index 97d468f..f98ac64 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-reformation-of-calliope.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-reformation-of-calliope.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Reformation of Calliope

Calliope Catesby was in his humours again. Ennui was upon him. This goodly promontory, the earth⁠—particularly that portion of it known as Quicksand⁠—was to him no more than a pestilent congregation of vapours. Overtaken by the megrims, the philosopher may seek relief in soliloquy; my lady find solace in tears; the flaccid Easterner scold at the millinery bills of his womenfolk. Such recourse was insufficient to the denizens of Quicksand. Calliope, especially, was wont to express his ennui according to his lights.

Over night Calliope had hung out signals of approaching low spirits. He had kicked his own dog on the porch of the Occidental Hotel, and refused to apologise. He had become capricious and faultfinding in conversation. While strolling about he reached often for twigs of mesquite and chewed the leaves fiercely. That was always an ominous act. Another symptom alarming to those who were familiar with the different stages of his doldrums was his increasing politeness and a tendency to use formal phrases. A husky softness succeeded the usual penetrating drawl in his tones. A dangerous courtesy marked his manners. Later, his smile became crooked, the left side of his mouth slanting upward, and Quicksand got ready to stand from under.

@@ -52,6 +52,6 @@

“Easy there!” said Buck Patterson. “You keep that badge right where it is, Calliope Catesby. Don’t you dare to take it off till the day your mother leaves this town. You’ll be city marshal of Quicksand as long as she’s here to know it. After I stir around town a bit and put ’em on I’ll guarantee that nobody won’t give the thing away to her. And say, you leather-headed, rip-roarin’, low-down son of a locoed cyclone, you follow that advice she give me! I’m goin’ to take some of it myself, too.”

“Buck,” said Calliope feelingly, “ef I don’t I hope I may⁠—”

“Shut up,” said Buck. “She’s a-comin’ back.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-remnants-of-the-code.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-remnants-of-the-code.xhtml index 4680051..3fcf007 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-remnants-of-the-code.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-remnants-of-the-code.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Remnants of the Code

Breakfast in Coralio was at eleven. Therefore the people did not go to market early. The little wooden market-house stood on a patch of short-trimmed grass, under the vivid green foliage of a breadfruit tree.

Thither one morning the venders leisurely convened, bringing their wares with them. A porch or platform six feet wide encircled the building, shaded from the mid-morning sun by the projecting, grass-thatched roof. Upon this platform the venders were wont to display their goods⁠—newly-killed beef, fish, crabs, fruit of the country, cassava, eggs, dulces and high, tottering stacks of native tortillas as large around as the sombrero of a Spanish grandee.

@@ -62,6 +62,6 @@

“In two hours,” his dry lips muttered to Goodwin, as he marched down the steps and turned his face toward the town.

In the edge of the cool banana grove “Beelzebub” halted, and snapped the tongue of his belt buckle into another hole.

“I couldn’t do it,” he explained, feverishly, to the waving banana fronds. “I wanted to, but I couldn’t. A gentleman can’t drink with the man that he blackmails.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-renaissance-at-charleroi.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-renaissance-at-charleroi.xhtml index 363c119..0367edc 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-renaissance-at-charleroi.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-renaissance-at-charleroi.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Renaissance at Charleroi

Grandemont Charles was a little Creole gentleman, aged thirty-four, with a bald spot on the top of his head and the manners of a prince. By day he was a clerk in a cotton broker’s office in one of those cold, rancid mountains of oozy brick, down near the levee in New Orleans. By night, in his three-story-high chambre garnier in the old French Quarter he was again the last male descendant of the Charles family, that noble house that had lorded it in France, and had pushed its way smiling, rapiered, and courtly into Louisiana’s early and brilliant days. Of late years the Charleses had subsided into the more republican but scarcely less royally carried magnificence and ease of plantation life along the Mississippi. Perhaps Grandemont was even Marquis de Brassé. There was that title in the family. But a Marquis on seventy-five dollars per month! Vraiment! Still, it has been done on less.

Grandemont had saved out of his salary the sum of six hundred dollars. Enough, you would say, for any man to marry on. So, after a silence of two years on that subject, he reopened that most hazardous question to Mlle. Adèle Fauquier, riding down to Meade d’Or, her father’s plantation. Her answer was the same that it had been any time during the last ten years: “First find my brother, Monsieur Charles.”

@@ -92,6 +92,6 @@

Too far overcome by sleep and fatigue was the lost one to talk that night. Days afterward, when the tropic calentura had cooled in his veins, the disordered fragments he had spoken were completed in shape and sequence. He told the story of his angry flight, of toils and calamities on sea and shore, of his ebbing and flowing fortune in southern lands, and of his latest peril when, held a captive, he served menially in a stronghold of bandits in the Sonora Mountains of Mexico. And of the fever that seized him there and his escape and delirium, during which he strayed, perhaps led by some marvellous instinct, back to the river on whose bank he had been born. And of the proud and stubborn thing in his blood that had kept him silent through all those years, clouding the honour of one, though he knew it not, and keeping apart two loving hearts. “What a thing is love!” you may say. And if I grant it, you shall say, with me: “What a thing is pride!”

On a couch in the reception chamber Victor lay, with a dawning understanding in his heavy eyes and peace in his softened countenance. Absalom was preparing a lounge for the transient master of Charleroi, who, tomorrow, would be again the clerk of a cotton-broker, but also⁠—

“Tomorrow,” Grandemont was saying, as he stood by the couch of his guest, speaking the words with his face shining as must have shone the face of Elijah’s charioteer when he announced the glories of that heavenly journey⁠—“Tomorrow I will take you to Her.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-roads-we-take.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-roads-we-take.xhtml index 3e3a871..15c7b8f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-roads-we-take.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-roads-we-take.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Roads We Take

Twenty miles west of Tucson, the “Sunset Express” stopped at a tank to take on water. Besides the aqueous addition the engine of that famous flyer acquired some other things that were not good for it.

While the fireman was lowering the feeding hose, Bob Tidball, “Shark” Dodson and a quarter-bred Creek Indian called John Big Dog climbed on the engine and showed the engineer three round orifices in pieces of ordnance that they carried. These orifices so impressed the engineer with their possibilities that he raised both hands in a gesture such as accompanies the ejaculation “Do tell!”

@@ -45,6 +45,6 @@

“Excuse me,” said Peabody, rather nervously “for speaking of it, but I’ve been talking to Williams. He’s an old friend of yours, Mr. Dodson, and you practically have a corner in XYX. I thought you might⁠—that is, I thought you might not remember that he sold you the stock at 98. If he settles at the market price it will take every cent he has in the world and his home too to deliver the shares.”

The expression on Dodson’s face changed in an instant to one of cold ferocity mingled with inexorable cupidity. The soul of the man showed itself for a moment like an evil face in the window of a reputable house.

“He will settle at one eighty-five,” said Dodson. “Bolivar cannot carry double.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-robe-of-peace.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-robe-of-peace.xhtml index c2a839b..c4f0d18 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-robe-of-peace.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-robe-of-peace.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Robe of Peace

Mysteries follow one another so closely in a great city that the reading public and the friends of Johnny Bellchambers have ceased to marvel at his sudden and unexplained disappearance nearly a year ago. This particular mystery has now been cleared up, but the solution is so strange and incredible to the mind of the average man that only a select few who were in close touch with Bellchambers will give it full credence.

Johnny Bellchambers, as is well known, belonged to the intrinsically inner circle of the elite. Without any of the ostentation of the fashionable ones who endeavor to attract notice by eccentric display of wealth and show he still was au fait in everything that gave deserved lustre to his high position in the ranks of society.

@@ -29,6 +29,6 @@

“You fellows don’t understand,” he said, soothingly. “It’s nice of you to want me to go back, but the old life will never know me again. I have reached here the goal of all my ambitions. I am entirely happy and contented. Here I shall remain for the remainder of my days. You see this robe that I wear?” Bellchambers caressingly touched the straight-hanging garment: “At last I have found something that will not bag at the knees. I have attained⁠—”

At that moment the deep boom of the great brass bell reverberated through the monastery. It must have been a summons to immediate devotions, for Brother Ambrose bowed his head, turned and left the chamber without another word. A slight wave of his hand as he passed through the stone doorway seemed to say a farewell to his old friends. They left the monastery without seeing him again.

And this is the story that Tommy Eyres and Lancelot Gilliam brought back with them from their latest European tour.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-romance-of-a-busy-broker.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-romance-of-a-busy-broker.xhtml index c1d9ee6..a0d42a1 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-romance-of-a-busy-broker.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-romance-of-a-busy-broker.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Romance of a Busy Broker

Pitcher, confidential clerk in the office of Harvey Maxwell, broker, allowed a look of mild interest and surprise to visit his usually expressionless countenance when his employer briskly entered at half past nine in company with his young lady stenographer. With a snappy “Good morning, Pitcher,” Maxwell dashed at his desk as though he were intending to leap over it, and then plunged into the great heap of letters and telegrams waiting there for him.

The young lady had been Maxwell’s stenographer for a year. She was beautiful in a way that was decidedly unstenographic. She forewent the pomp of the alluring pompadour. She wore no chains, bracelets or lockets. She had not the air of being about to accept an invitation to luncheon. Her dress was grey and plain, but it fitted her figure with fidelity and discretion. In her neat black turban hat was the gold-green wing of a macaw. On this morning she was softly and shyly radiant. Her eyes were dreamily bright, her cheeks genuine peachblow, her expression a happy one, tinged with reminiscence.

@@ -40,6 +40,6 @@

“Don’t you understand?” said Maxwell, restively. “I want you to marry me. I love you, Miss Leslie. I wanted to tell you, and I snatched a minute when things had slackened up a bit. They’re calling me for the phone now. Tell ’em to wait a minute, Pitcher. Won’t you, Miss Leslie?”

The stenographer acted very queerly. At first she seemed overcome with amazement; then tears flowed from her wondering eyes; and then she smiled sunnily through them, and one of her arms slid tenderly about the broker’s neck.

“I know now,” she said, softly. “It’s this old business that has driven everything else out of your head for the time. I was frightened at first. Don’t you remember, Harvey? We were married last evening at 8 o’clock in the Little Church Around the Corner.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-rose-of-dixie.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-rose-of-dixie.xhtml index d6faa9e..11cc37f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-rose-of-dixie.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-rose-of-dixie.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

“The Rose of Dixie”

When The Rose of Dixie magazine was started by a stock company in Toombs City, Georgia, there was never but one candidate for its chief editorial position in the minds of its owners. Col. Aquila Telfair was the man for the place. By all the rights of learning, family, reputation, and Southern traditions, he was its foreordained, fit, and logical editor. So, a committee of the patriotic Georgia citizens who had subscribed the founding fund of $100,000 called upon Colonel Telfair at his residence, Cedar Heights, fearful lest the enterprise and the South should suffer by his possible refusal.

The colonel received them in his great library, where he spent most of his days. The library had descended to him from his father. It contained ten thousand volumes, some of which had been published as late as the year 1861. When the deputation arrived, Colonel Telfair was seated at his massive white-pine centre-table, reading Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholy. He arose and shook hands punctiliously with each member of the committee. If you were familiar with The Rose of Dixie you will remember the colonel’s portrait, which appeared in it from time to time. You could not forget the long, carefully brushed white hair; the hooked, high-bridged nose, slightly twisted to the left; the keen eyes under the still black eyebrows; the classic mouth beneath the drooping white mustache, slightly frazzled at the ends.

@@ -150,6 +150,6 @@ T. Roosevelt

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-rubaiyat-of-a-scotch-highball.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-rubaiyat-of-a-scotch-highball.xhtml index f684056..09b289c 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-rubaiyat-of-a-scotch-highball.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-rubaiyat-of-a-scotch-highball.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Rubaiyat of a Scotch Highball

This document is intended to strike somewhere between a temperance lecture and the “Bartender’s Guide.” Relative to the latter, drink shall swell the theme and be set forth in abundance. Agreeably to the former, not an elbow shall be crooked.

Bob Babbitt was “off the stuff.” Which means⁠—as you will discover by referring to the unabridged dictionary of Bohemia⁠—that he had “cut out the booze”; that he was “on the water wagon.” The reason for Bob’s sudden attitude of hostility toward the “demon rum”⁠—as the white ribboners miscall whiskey (see the “Bartender’s Guide”), should be of interest to reformers and saloon-keepers.

@@ -89,6 +89,6 @@

“It’s shattered all right,” said Bob, crunching some glass under his heel.

In some dungeon below the accurate ear of Mrs. Pickens, the landlady, located the smash.

“It’s that wild Mr. Babbitt coming home soused again,” she said. “And he’s got such a nice little wife, too!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-rubber-plants-story.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-rubber-plants-story.xhtml index a1b29aa..28304a7 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-rubber-plants-story.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-rubber-plants-story.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Rubber Plant’s Story

We rubber plants form the connecting link between the vegetable kingdom and the decorations of a Waldorf-Astoria scene in a Third Avenue theatre. I haven’t looked up our family tree, but I believe we were raised by grafting a gum overshoe on to a 30-cent table d’hôte stalk of asparagus. You take a white bulldog with a Bourke Cockran air of independence about him and a rubber plant and there you have the fauna and flora of a flat. What the shamrock is to Ireland the rubber plant is to the dweller in flats and furnished rooms. We get moved from one place to another so quickly that the only way we can get our picture taken is with a kinetoscope. We are the vagrant vine and the flitting fig tree. You know the proverb: “Where the rubber plant sits in the window the moving van draws up to the door.”

We are the city equivalent to the woodbine and the honeysuckle. No other vegetable except the Pittsburg stogie can withstand as much handling as we can. When the family to which we belong moves into a flat they set us in the front window and we become lares and penates, flypaper and the peripatetic emblem of “Home Sweet Home.” We aren’t as green as we look. I guess we are about what you would call the soubrettes of the conservatory. You try sitting in the front window of a $40 flat in Manhattan and looking out into the street all day, and back into the flat at night, and see whether you get wise or not⁠—hey? Talk about the tree of knowledge of good and evil in the garden of Eden⁠—say! suppose there had been a rubber plant there when Eve⁠—but I was going to tell you a story.

@@ -35,6 +35,6 @@

“Do I not,” says she, looking up at him and sneaking close to his vest, “and now I say it again, and it is to last forever. Look, Dick, at its leaves, how wet they are. Those are my tears, and it was thinking of you that made them fall.”

“The dear old magnolias!” says the young man, pinching one of my leaves. “I love them all.”

Magnolia! Well, wouldn’t that⁠—say! those innocents thought I was a magnolia! What the⁠—well, wasn’t that tough on a genuine little old New York rubber plant?

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-sensitive-colonel-jay.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-sensitive-colonel-jay.xhtml index 27b618f..fd4a02f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-sensitive-colonel-jay.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-sensitive-colonel-jay.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Sensitive Colonel Jay

The sun is shining brightly, and the birds are singing merrily in the trees! All nature wears an aspect of peace and harmony. On the porch of a little hotel in a neighboring county a stranger is sitting on a bench waiting for the train, quietly smoking his pipe.

Presently a tall man wearing boots and a slouch hat, steps to the door of the hotel from the inside with a six-shooter in his hand and fires. The man on the bench rolls over with a loud yell as the bullet grazes his ear. He springs to his feet in amazement and wrath and shouts:

@@ -14,6 +14,6 @@

The tall man advances with his slouch hat in his hand, bows and says: “Beg pardon, sah. I am Colonel Jay, sah, and I understood you to insult me, sah, but I see I was mistaken. Am very glad I did not kill you, sah.”

“I insult you⁠—how?” inquires the stranger. “I never said a word.”

“You tapped on the bench, sah, as much as to say you was a woodpeckah, sah, and I belong to the other faction. I see now that you was only knockin’ the ashes from you’ pipe, sah. I ask yo’ pahdon, and that you will come in and have a drink with me, sah, to show that you do not harbor any ill feeling after a gentleman apologizes to you, sah.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-shamrock-and-the-palm.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-shamrock-and-the-palm.xhtml index 9801bf8..d1c8644 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-shamrock-and-the-palm.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-shamrock-and-the-palm.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Shamrock and the Palm

One night when there was no breeze, and Coralio seemed closer than ever to the gratings of Avernus, five men were grouped about the door of the photograph establishment of Keogh and Clancy. Thus, in all the scorched and exotic places of the earth, Caucasians meet when the day’s work is done to preserve the fullness of their heritage by the aspersion of alien things.

Johnny Atwood lay stretched upon the grass in the undress uniform of a Carib, and prated feebly of cool water to be had in the cucumber-wood pumps of Dalesburg. Dr. Gregg, through the prestige of his whiskers and as a bribe against the relation of his imminent professional tales, was conceded the hammock that was swung between the door jamb and a calabash-tree. Keogh had moved out upon the grass a little table that held the instrument for burnishing completed photographs. He was the only busy one of the group. Industriously from between the cylinders of the burnisher rolled the finished depictments of Coralio’s citizens. Blanchard, the French mining engineer, in his cool linen viewed the smoke of his cigarette through his calm glasses, impervious to the heat. Clancy sat on the steps, smoking his short pipe. His mood was the gossip’s; the others were reduced, by the humidity, to the state of disability desirable in an audience.

@@ -101,6 +101,6 @@

“Tell ’em, ye divil,” he chuckled, “how you got even with the tropical general in the way of agricultural maneuverings.”

“Havin’ no money,” concluded Clancy, with unction, “they set him to work his fine out with a gang from the parish prison clearing Ursulines Street. Around the corner was a saloon decorated genially with electric fans and cool merchandise. I made that me headquarters, and every fifteen minutes I’d walk around and take a look at the little man filibusterin’ with a rake and shovel. ’Twas just such a hot broth of a day as this has been. And I’d call at him ‘Hey, monseer!’ and he’d look at me black, with the damp showin’ through his shirt in places.

“ ‘Fat, strong mans,’ says I to General De Vega, ‘is needed in New Orleans. Yes. To carry on the good work. Carrambos! Erin go bragh!’ ”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-shock.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-shock.xhtml index bd9df2f..609ecd8 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-shock.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-shock.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Shock

A man with a very pale face, wearing a woolen comforter and holding a slender stick in his hand, staggered into a Houston drug store yesterday and leaned against the counter, holding the other hand tightly against his breast.

The clerk got a graduating glass, and poured an ounce of spiritus frumenti into it quickly, and handed it to him. The man drank it at a gulp.

@@ -27,6 +27,6 @@

“Shall I call a doctor?” asked the clerk.

“No, I guess not. Your kindness has revived me. I’ll tell you about it. I have one of those toy spiders attached to a string at the end of this stick, and I saw that red-faced man sitting on a doorstep with his back to me, and I let the spider down over his head in front of his nose. I didn’t know who he was, then.

“He fell over backwards and cut his ear on the foot-scraper and broke a set of sixty-dollar false teeth. That man is my landlord and I owe him $37 back rent, and he holds a ten-dollar mortgage on my cow, and has already threatened to break my back. I slipped in here and he hasn’t seen me yet. The shock to my feelings when I saw who it was, was something awful. If you have a little more of that spirits now, I⁠—”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-shocks-of-doom.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-shocks-of-doom.xhtml index 3affb8a..d617b94 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-shocks-of-doom.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-shocks-of-doom.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Shocks of Doom

There is an aristocracy of the public parks and even of the vagabonds who use them for their private apartments. Vallance felt rather than knew this, but when he stepped down out of his world into chaos his feet brought him directly to Madison Square.

Raw and astringent as a schoolgirl⁠—of the old order⁠—young May breathed austerely among the budding trees. Vallance buttoned his coat, lighted his last cigarette and took his seat upon a bench. For three minutes he mildly regretted the last hundred of his last thousand that it had cost him when the bicycle cop put an end to his last automobile ride. Then he felt in every pocket and found not a single penny. He had given up his apartment that morning. His furniture had gone toward certain debts. His clothes, save what were upon him, had descended to his manservant for back wages. As he sat there was not in the whole city for him a bed or a broiled lobster or a streetcar fare or a carnation for buttonhole unless he should obtain them by sponging on his friends or by false pretenses. Therefore he had chosen the park.

@@ -50,6 +50,6 @@

Lawyer Mead turned on his heel to Vallance and smiled.

“I am glad you came in,” he said, genially. “Your uncle wants you to return home at once. He is reconciled to the situation that led to his hasty action, and desires to say that all will be as⁠—”

“Hey, Adams!” cried Lawyer Mead, breaking his sentence, and calling to his clerk. “Bring a glass of water⁠—Mr. Vallance has fainted.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-skylight-room.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-skylight-room.xhtml index e2a2d81..4a77cc8 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-skylight-room.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-skylight-room.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Skylight Room

First Mrs. Parker would show you the double parlours. You would not dare to interrupt her description of their advantages and of the merits of the gentleman who had occupied them for eight years. Then you would manage to stammer forth the confession that you were neither a doctor nor a dentist. Mrs. Parker’s manner of receiving the admission was such that you could never afterward entertain the same feeling toward your parents, who had neglected to train you up in one of the professions that fitted Mrs. Parker’s parlours.

Next you ascended one flight of stairs and looked at the second-floor-back at $8. Convinced by her second-floor manner that it was worth the $12 that Mr. Toosenberry always paid for it until he left to take charge of his brother’s orange plantation in Florida near Palm Beach, where Mrs. McIntyre always spent the winters that had the double front room with private bath, you managed to babble that you wanted something still cheaper.

@@ -64,6 +64,6 @@

That is all. Is it a story? In the next morning’s paper I saw a little news item, and the last sentence of it may help you (as it helped me) to weld the incidents together.

It recounted the reception into Bellevue Hospital of a young woman who had been removed from No. 49 East ⸺ street, suffering from debility induced by starvation. It concluded with these words:

“Dr. William Jackson, the ambulance physician who attended the case, says the patient will recover.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-sleuths.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-sleuths.xhtml index 839ff01..e74f5e0 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-sleuths.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-sleuths.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Sleuths

In The Big City a man will disappear with the suddenness and completeness of the flame of a candle that is blown out. All the agencies of inquisition⁠—the hounds of the trail, the sleuths of the city’s labyrinths, the closet detectives of theory and induction⁠—will be invoked to the search. Most often the man’s face will be seen no more. Sometimes he will reappear in Sheboygan or in the wilds of Terre Haute, calling himself one of the synonyms of “Smith,” and without memory of events up to a certain time, including his grocer’s bill. Sometimes it will be found, after dragging the rivers, and polling the restaurants to see if he may be waiting for a well-done sirloin, that he has moved next door.

This snuffing out of a human being like the erasure of a chalk man from a blackboard is one of the most impressive themes in dramaturgy.

@@ -74,6 +74,6 @@

When Meeks had settled his bill and departed, Shamrock Jolnes stood with his hat in his hand before Juggins.

“If it would not be asking too much,” he stammered⁠—“if you would favour me so far⁠—would you object to⁠—”

“Certainly not,” said Juggins pleasantly. “I will tell you how I did it. You remember the description of Mrs. Snyder? Did you ever know a woman like that who wasn’t paying weekly instalments on an enlarged crayon portrait of herself? The biggest factory of that kind in the country is just around the corner. I went there and got her address off the books. That’s all.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-snow-man.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-snow-man.xhtml index 5449416..daf0ffd 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-snow-man.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-snow-man.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Snow Man

Housed and windowpaned from it, the greatest wonder to little children is the snow. To men, it is something like a crucible in which their world melts into a white star ten million miles away. The man who can stand the test is a Snow Man; and this is his reading by Fahrenheit, Reaumur, or Moses’s carven tablets of stone.

Night had fluttered a sable pinion above the canyon of Big Lost River, and I urged my horse toward the Bay Horse Ranch because the snow was deepening. The flakes were as large as an hour’s circular tatting by Miss Wilkins’s ablest spinster, betokening a heavy snowfall and less entertainment and more adventure than the completion of the tatting could promise. I knew Ross Curtis of the Bay Horse, and that I would be welcome as a snowbound pilgrim, both for hospitality’s sake and because Ross had few chances to confide in living creatures who did not neigh, bellow, bleat, yelp, or howl during his discourse.

@@ -122,6 +122,6 @@

“Snow is my last name,” said George. He swung into the saddle and they started cautiously out into the darkening swirl of fresh new currency just issuing from the Snowdrop Mint. The girl, to keep her place, clung happily to the sturdy figure of the camp cook.

I brought three things away from Ross Curtis’s ranch house⁠—yes, four. One was the appreciation of snow, which I have so humbly tried here to render; (2) was a collarbone, of which I am extra careful; (3) was a memory of what it is to eat very extremely bad food for a week; and (4) was the cause of (3) a little note delivered at the end of the week and hand-painted in blue pencil on a sheet of meat paper.

“I cannot come back there to that there job. Mrs. Snow say no, George. I been revolvin’ it in my mind; considerin’ circumstances she’s right.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-social-triangle.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-social-triangle.xhtml index 8b5a9e8..71eef77 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-social-triangle.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-social-triangle.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Social Triangle

At the stroke of six Ikey Snigglefritz laid down his goose. Ikey was a tailor’s apprentice. Are there tailor’s apprentices nowadays?

At any rate, Ikey toiled and snipped and basted and pressed and patched and sponged all day in the steamy fetor of a tailor-shop. But when work was done Ikey hitched his wagon to such stars as his firmament let shine.

@@ -58,6 +58,6 @@

“I want to know you people,” he said, sincerely. “I am going to help you as much as I can. We shall be friends.”

As the auto crept carefully away Cortlandt Van Duyckink felt an unaccustomed glow about his heart. He was near to being a happy man.

He had shaken the hand of Ikey Snigglefritz.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-song-and-the-sergeant.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-song-and-the-sergeant.xhtml index 0c88741..4973634 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-song-and-the-sergeant.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-song-and-the-sergeant.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Song and the Sergeant

Half a dozen people supping at a table in one of the upper-Broadway all-night restaurants were making too much noise. Three times the manager walked past them with a politely warning glance; but their argument had waxed too warm to be quelled by a manager’s gaze. It was midnight, and the restaurant was filled with patrons from the theatres of that district. Some among the dispersed audiences must have recognized among the quarrelsome sextet the faces of the players belonging to the Carroll Comedy Company.

Four of the six made up the company. Another was the author of the comedietta, “A Gay Coquette,” which the quartette of players had been presenting with fair success at several vaudeville houses in the city. The sixth at the table was a person inconsequent in the realm of art, but one at whose bidding many lobsters had perished.

@@ -75,6 +75,6 @@

“No, no,” cried the wood nymph, “his way was the best. I didn’t know, but⁠—it was just what I wanted, Bobby.”

She sprang like a green grasshopper; and the comedian opened his arms, and⁠—smiled.

“Get out of this,” roared the desk sergeant to the waiting waiter from the restaurant. “There’s nothing doing here for you.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-sparrows-in-madison-square.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-sparrows-in-madison-square.xhtml index b3ae5d2..cdd981f 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-sparrows-in-madison-square.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-sparrows-in-madison-square.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Sparrows in Madison Square

The young man in straitened circumstances who comes to New York City to enter literature has but one thing to do, provided he has studied carefully his field in advance. He must go straight to Madison Square, write an article about the sparrows there, and sell it to the Sun for $15.

I cannot recall either a novel or a story dealing with the popular theme of the young writer from the provinces who comes to the metropolis to win fame and fortune with his pen in which the hero does not get his start that way. It does seem strange that some author, in casting about for startlingly original plots, has not hit upon the idea of having his hero write about the bluebirds in Union Square and sell it to the Herald. But a search through the files of metropolitan fiction counts up overwhelmingly for the sparrows and the old Garden Square, and the Sun always writes the check.

@@ -40,6 +40,6 @@

“Say,” said my fellow bivouacker, “this ain’t so bad when a fellow’s hungry. It reminds me of when I struck New York first⁠—about fifteen years ago. I come in from the West to see if I could get a job on a newspaper. I hit the Madison Square Park the first mornin’ after, and was sitting around on the benches. I noticed the sparrows chirpin’, and the grass and trees so nice and green that I thought I was back in the country again. Then I got some papers out of my pocket, and⁠—”

“I know,” I interrupted. “You sent it to the Sun and got $15.”

“Say,” said my friend, suspiciously, “you seem to know a good deal. Where was you? I went to sleep on the bench there, in the sun, and somebody touched me for every cent I had⁠—$15.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-sphinx-apple.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-sphinx-apple.xhtml index 1676c57..c2bd503 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-sphinx-apple.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-sphinx-apple.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Sphinx Apple

Twenty miles out from Paradise, and fifteen miles short of Sunrise City, Bildad Rose, the stage-driver, stopped his team. A furious snow had been falling all day. Eight inches it measured now, on a level. The remainder of the road was not without peril in daylight, creeping along the ribs of a bijou range of ragged mountains. Now, when both snow and night masked its dangers, further travel was not to be thought of, said Bildad Rose. So he pulled up his four stout horses, and delivered to his five passengers oral deductions of his wisdom.

Judge Menefee, to whom men granted leadership and the initiatory as upon a silver salver, sprang from the coach at once. Four of his fellow-passengers followed, inspired by his example, ready to explore, to objurgate, to resist, to submit, to proceed, according as their prime factor might be inclined to sway them. The fifth passenger, a young woman, remained in the coach.

@@ -102,6 +102,6 @@

“And now, Miss Garland,” he announced, “we have concluded. It is for you to award the prize to the one of us whose argument⁠—especially, I may say, in regard to his estimate of true womanhood⁠—approaches nearest to your own conception.”

No answer came from the lady passenger. Judge Menefee bent over solicitously. The passenger who was nobody in particular laughed low and harshly. The lady was sleeping sweetly. The Judge essayed to take her hand to awaken her. In doing so he touched a small, cold, round, irregular something in her lap.

“She has eaten the apple,” announced Judge Menefee, in awed tones, as he held up the core for them to see.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-sporting-editor-on-culture.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-sporting-editor-on-culture.xhtml index e321bc0..cae15fa 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-sporting-editor-on-culture.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-sporting-editor-on-culture.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Sporting Editor on Culture

“Is the literary editor in?”

The sporting editor looked up from the paper he was reading, and saw a vision of female loveliness about twenty years of age, with soft blue eyes, and a heavy mass of golden brown hair arranged in a coiffure of the latest and most becoming style.

@@ -21,6 +21,6 @@

“Oh,” returned the sporting editor, in a disappointed tone, “you are on the society and pink tea racket. Sorry. That lets me out. Hoped you were going in for athletics. You could do it so well, too. Take my advice now, and try that little exercise every morning for a week. You’ll be surprised to see how much it will benefit your muscles. As I said, just stand on one⁠—”

Bang! went the door, and the blue-eyed young lady was gone.

“It’s a pity,” said the sporting editor, “that these girls don’t pay some attention to self-culture without that⁠—that ethical part.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-strangers-appeal.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-strangers-appeal.xhtml index 62cfaaf..68bfa74 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-strangers-appeal.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-strangers-appeal.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Stranger’s Appeal

He was tall and angular and had a keen gray eye and a solemn face. His dark coat was buttoned high and had something of a clerical cut. His pepper and salt trousers almost cleared the tops of his shoes, but his tall hat was undeniably respectable, and one would have said he was a country preacher out for a holiday. He was driving a light wagon, and he stopped and climbed out when he came up to where five or six men were sitting on the post-office porch in a little country town in Texas.

“My friends,” he said, “you all look like intelligent men, and I feel it my duty to say a few words to you in regard to the terrible and deplorable state of things now existing in this section of the country. I refer to the horrible barbarities recently perpetrated in the midst of some of the most civilized of Texas towns, when human beings created in the image of their Maker were subjected to cruel torture and then inhumanly burned in the public streets. Something must be done to wipe the stigma from the fair name of your state. Do you not agree with me?”

@@ -18,6 +18,6 @@

“And you will continue to visit upon them the horrible suffering of being burned to death?”

“If the occasion demands it.”

“Well, then, gentlemen, since you are so determined, I want to sell you a few gross of the cheapest matches you ever laid your eyes upon. Step out to the wagon and see them. Warranted not to go out in a strong wind, and to strike on anything, wood, bricks, glass, bloomers, boot soles and iron. How many boxes will you take, gentlemen?”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-struggle-of-the-outliers.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-struggle-of-the-outliers.xhtml index b3c87bd..b194817 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-struggle-of-the-outliers.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-struggle-of-the-outliers.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Struggle of the Outliers

Again today, at a certain street, on the ragged boundaries of the city, Lawrence Holcombe stopped the trolley car and got off. Holcombe was a handsome, prosperous business man of forty; a man of high social standing and connections. His comfortable suburban residence was some five miles farther out on the car line from the street where so often of late he had dropped off the outgoing car. The conductor winked at a regular passenger, and nodded his head archly in the direction of Holcombe’s hurrying figure.

“Getting to be a regular thing,” commented the conductor.

@@ -58,6 +58,6 @@

“I’ve heard of her,” said Weatherly. “They say she stayed a year with them without a single day off. But I don’t believe any fairy story like that.”

“ ’Twas a fact. Well, I engaged her today for a cook. She’s going out to the house tomorrow.”

“Confound you for a lucky dog,” shouted Weatherly, with envy in his tones and his heart, “and you live four blocks further out than we do!”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-sunday-excursionist.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-sunday-excursionist.xhtml index 18f1aab..192f40e 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-sunday-excursionist.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-sunday-excursionist.xhtml @@ -6,13 +6,13 @@ -
+

The Sunday Excursionist

Somebody⁠—who it was doesn’t make any difference⁠—has said something like the following: “There is something grand in the grief of the Common People, but there is no sadder sight on earth than that of a Philistine enjoying himself.”

If a man would realize the truth of this, let him go on a Sunday excursion. The male Sunday excursionist enjoys himself, as the darkies say, “a gwine and a cornin’.” No other being on earth can hold quite so much bubbling and vociferous joy. The welkin that would not ring when the Sunday excursionist opens his escape valve is not worth a cent. Six days the Sunday excursionist labors and does his work, but he does his best to refute the opponents of the theory of the late Charles Darwin. He occupies all the vacant seats in the car with his accomplices, and lets his accursed good nature spray over the rest of the passengers. He is so infernally happy that he wants everybody, to the brakeman on the rear car, to know it. He is so devilish agreeable, so perniciously jolly and so abominably entertaining that people who were bom with or have acquired brains love him most vindictively.

People who become enamored of the Sunday excursionist are apt to grow insanely jealous, and have been known to rise up and murder him when a stranger enters the car and he proceeds to repeat his funny remarks for the benefit of a fresh audience.

The female Sunday excursionist generally accompanies him. She brings her laugh with her, and does a turn in the pauses of his low comedy work. She never by any accident misplaces her laugh or allows it to get out of curl. It ripples naturally and conforms readily to the size of the car. She puts on the male Sunday excursionist’s hat, and he puts on hers, and if the other passengers are feeling worse than usual, they sing “The Swanee River.” There is enough woe and sorrow in the world without augmenting it in this way.

Men who have braved the deepest troubles and emerged unscathed from the heaviest afflictions have gone down with a shriek of horror and despair before the fatal hilarity of the Sunday excursionist. There is no escape from his effects.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-tale-of-a-tainted-tenner.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-tale-of-a-tainted-tenner.xhtml index 9a75612..1e5df5a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-tale-of-a-tainted-tenner.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-tale-of-a-tainted-tenner.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Tale of a Tainted Tenner

Money talks. But you may think that the conversation of a little old ten-dollar bill in New York would be nothing more than a whisper. Oh, very well! Pass up this sotto voce autobiography of an X if you like. If you are one of the kind that prefers to listen to John D’s checkbook roar at you through a megaphone as it passes by, all right. But don’t forget that small change can say a word to the point now and then. The next time you tip your grocer’s clerk a silver quarter to give you extra weight of his boss’s goods read the four words above the lady’s head. How are they for repartee?

I am a ten-dollar Treasury note, series of 1901. You may have seen one in a friend’s hand. On my face, in the centre, is a picture of the bison Americanus, miscalled a buffalo by fifty or sixty millions of Americans. The heads of Capt. Lewis and Capt. Clark adorn the ends. On my back is the graceful figure of Liberty or Ceres or Maxine Elliot standing in the centre of the stage on a conservatory plant. My references is⁠—or are⁠—Section 3,588, Revised Statutes. Ten cold, hard dollars⁠—I don’t say whether silver, gold, lead or iron⁠—Uncle Sam will hand you over his counter if you want to cash me in.

@@ -54,6 +54,6 @@

“Shut up,” says I; “there’s no such thing. I know the rest of it. There’s a ‘lendeth to the Lord’ somewhere in it. Now look on my back and read what you see there.”

“This note is a legal tender at its face value for all debts public and private.”

“This talk about tainted money makes me tired,” says I.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-telegram.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-telegram.xhtml index 650691f..4cb6c9a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-telegram.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-telegram.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Telegram

Scene: Telegraph office in Houston.

@@ -97,6 +97,6 @@
Oh, yes: so kind of you. I expect to send all my telegrams through your office, you have been so accommodating. Good morning.
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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-theory-and-the-hound.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-theory-and-the-hound.xhtml index ea0f51f..d952104 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-theory-and-the-hound.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-theory-and-the-hound.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Theory and the Hound

Not many days ago my old friend from the tropics, J. P. Bridger, United States consul on the island of Ratona, was in the city. We had wassail and jubilee and saw the Flatiron building, and missed seeing the Bronxless menagerie by about a couple of nights. And then, at the ebb tide, we were walking up a street that parallels and parodies Broadway.

A woman with a comely and mundane countenance passed us, holding in leash a wheezing, vicious, waddling, brute of a yellow pug. The dog entangled himself with Bridger’s legs and mumbled his ankles in a snarling, peevish, sulky bite. Bridger, with a happy smile, kicked the breath out of the brute; the woman showered us with a quick rain of well-conceived adjectives that left us in no doubt as to our place in her opinion, and we passed on. Ten yards farther an old woman with disordered white hair and her bankbook tucked well hidden beneath her tattered shawl begged. Bridger stopped and disinterred for her a quarter from his holiday waistcoat.

@@ -92,6 +92,6 @@

“And how did he know?” I inquired, being in a kind of bewilderment.

“When he put Morgan in the dory,” answered Bridger, “the next day to take him aboard the Pajaro, this man Plunkett stopped to shake hands with me and I asked him the same question.”

“ ‘Mr. Bridger,’ said he, ‘I’m a Kentuckian, and I’ve seen a great deal of both men and animals. And I never yet saw a man that was overfond of horses and dogs but what was cruel to women.’ ”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-things-the-play.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-things-the-play.xhtml index 75e3d95..fd68402 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-things-the-play.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-things-the-play.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Thing’s the Play

Being acquainted with a newspaper reporter who had a couple of free passes, I got to see the performance a few nights ago at one of the popular vaudeville houses.

One of the numbers was a violin solo by a striking-looking man not much past forty, but with very gray thick hair. Not being afflicted with a taste for music, I let the system of noises drift past my ears while I regarded the man.

@@ -62,6 +62,6 @@

“Don’t you remember me, Helen⁠—the one who has always loved you best? I am John Delaney. If you can forgive⁠—”

But she was gone, leaping, stumbling, hurrying, flying up the stairs toward the music and him who had forgotten, but who had known her for his in each of his two existences, and as she climbed up she sobbed, cried and sang: “Frank! Frank! Frank!”

Three mortals thus juggling with years as though they were billiard balls, and my friend, the reporter, couldn’t see anything funny in it!

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-third-ingredient.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-third-ingredient.xhtml index f7f0b87..c98ba76 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-third-ingredient.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-third-ingredient.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Third Ingredient

The (so-called) Vallambrosa Apartment-House is not an apartment-house. It is composed of two old-fashioned, brownstone-front residences welded into one. The parlor floor of one side is gay with the wraps and headgear of a modiste; the other is lugubrious with the sophistical promises and grisly display of a painless dentist. You may have a room there for two dollars a week or you may have one for twenty dollars. Among the Vallambrosa’s roomers are stenographers, musicians, brokers, shop-girls, space-rate writers, art students, wiretappers, and other people who lean far over the banister-rail when the doorbell rings.

This treatise shall have to do with but two of the Vallambrosians⁠—though meaning no disrespect to the others.

@@ -132,6 +132,6 @@

“Little Brother,” she said, “go in there. The little fool you fished out of the river is there waiting for you. Go on in. I’ll give you three minutes before I come. Potatoes is in there, waiting. Go on in, Onions.”

After he had tapped at the door and entered, Hetty began to peel and wash the onion at the sink. She gave a gray look at the gray roofs outside, and the smile on her face vanished by little jerks and twitches.

“But it’s us,” she said, grimly, to herself, “it’s us that furnished the beef.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-trimmed-lamp.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-trimmed-lamp.xhtml index 217c282..c4c1248 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-trimmed-lamp.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-trimmed-lamp.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Trimmed Lamp

Of course there are two sides to the question. Let us look at the other. We often hear “shop-girls” spoken of. No such persons exist. There are girls who work in shops. They make their living that way. But why turn their occupation into an adjective? Let us be fair. We do not refer to the girls who live on Fifth Avenue as “marriage-girls.”

Lou and Nancy were chums. They came to the big city to find work because there was not enough to eat at their homes to go around. Nancy was nineteen; Lou was twenty. Both were pretty, active, country girls who had no ambition to go on the stage.

@@ -100,6 +100,6 @@

And then Lou looked, and saw that something better than prosperity had descended upon Nancy⁠—something that shone brighter than gems in her eyes and redder than a rose in her cheeks, and that danced like electricity anxious to be loosed from the tip of her tongue.

“Yes, I’m still in the store,” said Nancy, “but I’m going to leave it next week. I’ve made my catch⁠—the biggest catch in the world. You won’t mind now Lou, will you?⁠—I’m going to be married to Dan⁠—to Dan!⁠—he’s my Dan now⁠—why, Lou!”

Around the corner of the park strolled one of those new-crop, smooth-faced young policemen that are making the force more endurable⁠—at least to the eye. He saw a woman with an expensive fur coat, and diamond-ringed hands crouching down against the iron fence of the park sobbing turbulently, while a slender, plainly-dressed working girl leaned close, trying to console her. But the Gibsonian cop, being of the new order, passed on, pretending not to notice, for he was wise enough to know that these matters are beyond help so far as the power he represents is concerned, though he rap the pavement with his nightstick till the sound goes up to the furthermost stars.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-unknown-quantity.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-unknown-quantity.xhtml index caa2e18..9b41aa8 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-unknown-quantity.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-unknown-quantity.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Unknown Quantity

@@ -71,6 +71,6 @@

Kenwitz was trying to train his socialistic and economic comprehension on her wonderful fur boa and the carriage waiting outside.

“Why, Miss Boyne!” he began.

“Mrs. Kinsolving,” she corrected. “Dan and I were married a month ago.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-unprofitable-servant.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-unprofitable-servant.xhtml index 4dd1e7d..a7e5383 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-unprofitable-servant.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-unprofitable-servant.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Unprofitable Servant

I am the richer by the acquaintance of four newspaper men. Singly, they are my encyclopedias, friends, mentors, and sometimes bankers. But now and then it happens that all of them will pitch upon the same printworthy incident of the passing earthly panorama and will send in reportorial constructions thereof to their respective journals. It is then that, for me, it is to laugh. For it seems that to each of them, trained and skilled as he may be, the same occurrence presents a different facet of the cut diamond, life.

One will have it (let us say) that Mme. André Macarté’s apartment was looted by six burglars, who descended via the fire-escape and bore away a ruby tiara valued at two thousand dollars and a five-hundred-dollar prize Spitz dog, which (in violation of the expectoration ordinance) was making free with the halls of the Wuttapesituckquesunoowetunquah Apartments.

@@ -84,6 +84,6 @@

[Here the manuscript ends.]

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-venturers.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-venturers.xhtml index 08165b0..7f82501 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-venturers.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-venturers.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Venturers

Let the story wreck itself on the spreading rails of the Non Sequitur Limited, if it will; first you must take your seat in the observation car “Raison d’être” for one moment. It is for no longer than to consider a brief essay on the subject⁠—let us call it: “What’s Around the Corner.”

Omne mundus in duas partes divisum est⁠—men who wear rubbers and pay poll-taxes, and men who discover new continents. There are no more continents to discover; but by the time overshoes are out of date and the poll has developed into an income tax, the other half will be paralleling the canals of Mars with radium railways.

@@ -94,6 +94,6 @@

On the next Thursday afternoon Forster came hurriedly to Ive’s hotel.

“Old man,” said he, “we’ll have to put that dinner off for a year or so; I’m going abroad. The steamer sails at four. That was a great talk we had the other night, and it decided me. I’m going to knock around the world and get rid of that incubus that has been weighing on both you and me⁠—the terrible dread of knowing what’s going to happen. I’ve done one thing that hurts my conscience a little; but I know it’s best for both of us. I’ve written to the lady to whom I was engaged and explained everything⁠—told her plainly why I was leaving⁠—that the monotony of matrimony would never do for me. Don’t you think I was right?”

“It is not for me to say,” answered Ives. “Go ahead and shoot elephants if you think it will bring the element of chance into your life. We’ve got to decide these things for ourselves. But I tell you one thing, Forster, I’ve found the way. I’ve found out the biggest hazard in the world⁠—a game of chance that never is concluded, a venture that may end in the highest heaven or the blackest pit. It will keep a man on edge until the clods fall on his coffin, because he will never know⁠—not until his last day, and not then will he know. It is a voyage without a rudder or compass, and you must be captain and crew and keep watch, every day and night, yourself, with no one to relieve you. I have found the Venture. Don’t bother yourself about leaving Mary Marsden, Forster. I married her yesterday at noon.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-vitagraphoscope.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-vitagraphoscope.xhtml index 24d7a90..81c59ac 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-vitagraphoscope.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-vitagraphoscope.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Vitagraphoscope

Vaudeville is intrinsically episodic and discontinuous. Its audiences do not demand dénoûements. Sufficient unto each “turn” is the evil thereof. No one cares how many romances the singing comédienne may have had if she can capably sustain the limelight and a high note or two. The audiences reck not if the performing dogs get to the pound the moment they have jumped through their last hoop. They do not desire bulletins about the possible injuries received by the comic bicyclist who retires headfirst from the stage in a crash of (property) chinaware. Neither do they consider that their seat coupons entitle them to be instructed whether or no there is a sentiment between the lady solo banjoist and the Irish monologist.

Therefore let us have no lifting of the curtain upon a tableau of the united lovers, backgrounded by defeated villainy and derogated by the comic, osculating maid and butler, thrown in as a sop to the Cerberi of the fifty-cent seats.

@@ -46,6 +46,6 @@

Curtain

- + diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-voice-of-the-city.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-voice-of-the-city.xhtml index 4a5d4cd..93111b7 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-voice-of-the-city.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-voice-of-the-city.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Voice of the City

Twenty-five years ago the school children used to chant their lessons. The manner of their delivery was a singsong recitative between the utterance of an Episcopal minister and the drone of a tired sawmill. I mean no disrespect. We must have lumber and sawdust.

I remember one beautiful and instructive little lyric that emanated from the physiology class. The most striking line of it was this:

@@ -54,6 +54,6 @@

After half an hour Aurelia said, with that smile of hers:

“Do you know, you haven’t spoken a word since you came back!”

“That,” said I, nodding wisely, “is the Voice of the City.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-whirligig-of-life.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-whirligig-of-life.xhtml index ce36384..857d31b 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-whirligig-of-life.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-whirligig-of-life.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Whirligig of Life

Justice-of-the-Peace Benaja Widdup sat in the door of his office smoking his elder-stem pipe. Halfway to the zenith the Cumberland range rose blue-gray in the afternoon haze. A speckled hen swaggered down the main street of the “settlement,” cackling foolishly.

Up the road came a sound of creaking axles, and then a slow cloud of dust, and then a bull-cart bearing Ransie Bilbro and his wife. The cart stopped at the Justice’s door, and the two climbed down. Ransie was a narrow six feet of sallow brown skin and yellow hair. The imperturbability of the mountains hung upon him like a suit of armour. The woman was calicoed, angled, snuff-brushed, and weary with unknown desires. Through it all gleamed a faint protest of cheated youth unconscious of its loss.

@@ -65,6 +65,6 @@

Ariela caught the gleam of promise in his words. Swiftly her hand went to her bosom. Freely as an alighting dove the bill fluttered to the Justice’s table. Her sallow cheek coloured as she stood hand in hand with Ransie and listened to the reuniting words.

Ransie helped her into the cart, and climbed in beside her. The little red bull turned once more, and they set out, hand-clasped, for the mountains.

Justice-of-the-peace Benaja Widdup sat in his door and took off his shoes. Once again he fingered the bill tucked down in his vest pocket. Once again he smoked his elder-stem pipe. Once again the speckled hen swaggered down the main street of the “settlement,” cackling foolishly.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-winner.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-winner.xhtml index d644d37..c978516 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-winner.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-winner.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Winner

After the performance of “In Old Kentucky” Friday night three old cronies went into a saloon with the inflexible determination of taking a drink. After doing so, they added an amendment in the shape of another and then tacked on an emergency clause.

When they got to feeling a little mellow they sat down at a table and commenced lying. Not maliciously, but just ordinary, friendly lying, about the things they had seen and done. They all tried their hand at relating experiences, and as the sky was clear, there was no matinee performance of the Ananias tragedy.

@@ -14,6 +14,6 @@

The major and the judge led off with a couple of marvelous narratives which were about a tie. The colonel moistened his lips as his eye rested on the big glass filled with diamonds and amber, and crowned with fragrant mint. He commenced his story:

“The incident I am about to relate is not only wonderful, but true. It happened in this very town on Saturday afternoon. I got up rather early Saturday morning, as I had a big day’s work ahead of me. My wife fixed me up a rattling good cocktail when I got up and I was feeling pretty good. When I came downstairs she handed me a five-dollar bill that had dropped out of my pocket and said: ‘John, you must really get a better looking housemaid. Jane is so homely, and you never did admire her. See if you can find a real nice-looking one⁠—and John, dear, you are working too hard. You must really have some recreation. Why not take Miss Muggins, your typewriter, out for a drive this afternoon? Then you might stop at the milliner’s and tell them not to send up that hat I ordered, and⁠—”

“Hold on. Colonel,” said the judge. “You just drink that mint julep right now. You needn’t go any further with your story.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-world-and-the-door.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-world-and-the-door.xhtml index 6c6e1ef..b5069a5 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-world-and-the-door.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-world-and-the-door.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The World and the Door

A favourite dodge to get your story read by the public is to assert that it is true, and then add that Truth is stranger than Fiction. I do not know if the yarn I am anxious for you to read is true; but the Spanish purser of the fruit steamer El Carrero swore to me by the shrine of Santa Guadalupe that he had the facts from the US vice-consul at La Paz⁠—a person who could not possibly have been cognizant of half of them.

As for the adage quoted above, I take pleasure in puncturing it by affirming that I read in a purely fictional story the other day the line: “ ‘Be it so,’ said the policeman.” Nothing so strange has yet cropped out in Truth.

@@ -102,6 +102,6 @@

Tio Pancho bowed as an elephant bows.

“Buenas tardes, Señora Conant,” he said, as a cavalier talks. And then he went on, less at his ease:

“But does not the señora know that Señor Merriam sailed on the Pajaro for Panama at three o’clock of this afternoon?”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/the-wounded-veteran.xhtml b/src/epub/text/the-wounded-veteran.xhtml index c512a93..96d3152 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/the-wounded-veteran.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/the-wounded-veteran.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

The Wounded Veteran

A party of Northern tourists passed through Houston the other day, and while their train was waiting at the depot an old colored man, with one arm bandaged and hung in an old red handkerchief for a sling, walked along the platform.

“What’s the matter with your arm, uncle?” called out one of the tourists.

@@ -37,6 +37,6 @@

“She po’ out of de bilin’ tea-kittle a big pan full ob hot water an’ she fling it all ober de Cunnel. I gits a big lot ob it on dis arm as I was pilin’ de wood in de box, an’ it tuk de skin off, an’ I dun had it wrapped up fo’ days. De Cunnel am in bed yit, but he sw’ar w’en he git up he gwine ter wuk.

“Dat’s how dis here wah wid Spain done up dis ole niggah. ’Bout w’en, boss, will de fus’ payment ob dat penshun git here, do you recum?”

“The ignorance and stupidity,” said the tourist, as he shut down his window, “of the colored man in the South are appalling.”

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/thimble-thimble.xhtml b/src/epub/text/thimble-thimble.xhtml index 46773c5..59745b9 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/thimble-thimble.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/thimble-thimble.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Thimble, Thimble

These are the directions for finding the office of Carteret & Carteret, Mill Supplies and Leather Belting:

You follow the Broadway trail down until you pass the Crosstown Line, the Bread Line, and the Dead Line, and come to the Big Canyons of the Moneygrubber Tribe. Then you turn to the left, to the right, dodge a pushcart and the tongue of a two-ton four-horse dray and hop, skip, and jump to a granite ledge on the side of a twenty-one-story synthetic mountain of stone and iron. In the twelfth story is the office of Carteret & Carteret. The factory where they make the mill supplies and leather belting is in Brooklyn. Those commodities⁠—to say nothing of Brooklyn⁠—not being of interest to you, let us hold the incidents within the confines of a one-act, one-scene play, thereby lessening the toil of the reader and the expenditure of the publisher. So, if you have the courage to face four pages of type and Carteret & Carteret’s office boy, Percival, you shall sit on a varnished chair in the inner office and peep at the little comedy of the Old Nigger Man, the Hunting-Case Watch, and the Open-Faced Question⁠—mostly borrowed from the late Mr. Frank Stockton, as you will conclude.

@@ -101,6 +101,6 @@

Both of the cousins had forgotten Uncle Jake for the time. But now they heard the shuffling of his shoes as he came across the rug toward them from his seat in the corner.

“Young marster,” he said, “take yo’ watch.”

And without hesitation he laid the ancient timepiece in the hand of its rightful owner.

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+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/three-paragraphs.xhtml b/src/epub/text/three-paragraphs.xhtml index 1aeef91..254905a 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/three-paragraphs.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/three-paragraphs.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Three Paragraphs

“Copy,” yelled the small boy at the door. The sick woman lying on the bed began to move her fingers aimlessly upon the worn counterpane. Her eyes were bright with fever; her face, once beautiful, was thin and pain drawn. She was dying, but neither she nor the man who held her hand and wrote on a paper tablet knew that the end was so near.

Three paragraphs were lacking to fill the column of humorous matter that the foreman had sent for. The small pay it brought them barely furnished shelter and food. Medicine was lacking but the need for that was nearly over.

@@ -24,6 +24,6 @@

Then he sprang to the door, dashed the column of copy into the boy’s hand, and moved swiftly to the bed.

He put his arm softly under the brown head that had suffered so much, but it turned heavily aside.

The fever was gone. The humourist was alone.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/to-him-who-waits.xhtml b/src/epub/text/to-him-who-waits.xhtml index 4f0ddae..65ecb15 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/to-him-who-waits.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/to-him-who-waits.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

To Him Who Waits

The Hermit of the Hudson was hustling about his cave with unusual animation.

The cave was on or in the top of a little spur of the Catskills that had strayed down to the river’s edge, and, not having a ferry ticket, had to stop there. The bijou mountains were densely wooded and were infested by ferocious squirrels and woodpeckers that forever menaced the summer transients. Like a badly sewn strip of white braid, a macadamized road ran between the green skirt of the hills and the foamy lace of the river’s edge. A dim path wound from the comfortable road up a rocky height to the hermit’s cave. One mile upstream was the Viewpoint Inn, to which summer folk from the city came; leaving cool, electric-fanned apartments that they might be driven about in burning sunshine, shrieking, in gasoline launches, by spindle-legged Modreds bearing the blankest of shields.

@@ -86,6 +86,6 @@

The hermit glanced up at the inn on the hillside whence burst suddenly a triumphant strain of splendid harmony.

“And up there,” said he, “they are playing Mendelssohn⁠—what is going on up there?”

“Up in de inn,” said the dusky one, “dey is a weddin’ goin’ on. Mr. Binkley, a mighty rich man, am marryin’ Miss Trenholme, sah⁠—de young lady who am quite de belle of de place, sah.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/tobins-palm.xhtml b/src/epub/text/tobins-palm.xhtml index 8fed48c..cd2b45c 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/tobins-palm.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/tobins-palm.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Tobin’s Palm

Tobin and me, the two of us, went down to Coney one day, for there was four dollars between us, and Tobin had need of distractions. For there was Katie Mahorner, his sweetheart, of County Sligo, lost since she started for America three months before with two hundred dollars, her own savings, and one hundred dollars from the sale of Tobin’s inherited estate, a fine cottage and pig on the Bog Shannaugh. And since the letter that Tobin got saying that she had started to come to him not a bit of news had he heard or seen of Katie Mahorner. Tobin advertised in the papers, but nothing could be found of the colleen.

So, to Coney me and Tobin went, thinking that a turn at the chutes and the smell of the popcorn might raise the heart in his bosom. But Tobin was a hardheaded man, and the sadness stuck in his skin. He ground his teeth at the crying balloons; he cursed the moving pictures; and, though he would drink whenever asked, he scorned Punch and Judy, and was for licking the tintype men as they came.

@@ -70,6 +70,6 @@

“ ’Tis me humble dwelling,” says he, “and I begin to perceive by the signs that me wife has retired to slumber. Therefore I will venture a bit in the way of hospitality. ’Tis me wish that ye enter the basement room, where we dine, and partake of a reasonable refreshment. There will be some fine cold fowl and cheese and a bottle or two of ale. Ye will be welcome to enter and eat, for I am indebted to ye for diversions.”

The appetite and conscience of me and Tobin was congenial to the proposition, though ’twas sticking hard in Danny’s superstitions to think that a few drinks and a cold lunch should represent the good fortune promised by the palm of his hand.

“Step down the steps,” says the man with the crooked nose, “and I will enter by the door above and let ye in. I will ask the new girl we have in the kitchen,” says he, “to make ye a pot of coffee to drink before ye go. ’Tis fine coffee Katie Mahorner makes for a green girl just landed three months. Step in,” says the man, “and I’ll send her down to ye.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/tommys-burglar.xhtml b/src/epub/text/tommys-burglar.xhtml index 1d9f34e..37b7bff 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/tommys-burglar.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/tommys-burglar.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Tommy’s Burglar

At ten o’clock p.m. Felicia, the maid, left by the basement door with the policeman to get a raspberry phosphate around the corner. She detested the policeman and objected earnestly to the arrangement. She pointed out, not unreasonably, that she might have been allowed to fall asleep over one of St. George Rathbone’s novels on the third floor, but she was overruled. Raspberries and cops were not created for nothing.

The burglar got into the house without much difficulty; because we must have action and not too much description in a 2,000-word story.

@@ -70,6 +70,6 @@

“Yes,” said Tommy, “but what⁠—”

“I’m afraid he’ll catch me,” said the burglar. “You mustn’t forget that this is fiction.”

“Great head!” said Tommy, turning. “Come out by the back door.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/too-late.xhtml b/src/epub/text/too-late.xhtml index 8f4d483..8df3e4e 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/too-late.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/too-late.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Too Late

Young Lieutenant Baldwin burst excitedly into his general’s room and cried hoarsely: “For God’s sake, General! Up! Up! and come. Spotted Lightning has carried off your daughter, Inez!”

General Splasher sprang to his feet in dismay. “What,” he cried, “not Spotted Lightning, the chief of the Kiomas, the most peaceful tribe in the reservation?”

@@ -30,6 +30,6 @@

At that instance the door of the tent opened and Inez Splasher, the general’s daughter, a maiden of about thirty-seven summers, emerged, bearing in her hand the gory scalp of Spotted Lightning.

“Too late!” cried the general as he fell senseless from his horse.

“I knew it,” said Bowie Knife Bill, folding his arms with a silent smile, “but what surprises me is how he ever got this far alive.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/too-wise.xhtml b/src/epub/text/too-wise.xhtml index ed37379..d57421d 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/too-wise.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/too-wise.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Too Wise

Here is a man in Houston who keeps quite abreast of the times. He reads the papers, has traveled extensively and is an excellent judge of human nature. He has a natural gift for detecting humbugs and fakirs, and it would be a smooth artist indeed who could impose upon him in any way.

Last night as he was going home, a shady looking man with his hat pulled over his eyes stepped out from a doorway and said:

@@ -17,6 +17,6 @@

“Oh, John,” she said. “I went shopping this afternoon and lost my solitaire diamond ring. Oh, what shall I⁠—”

John turned without a word and rushed back down the street, but the shady-looking man was not to be found.

His wife often wonders why he never scolded her for losing the ring.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/tracked-to-doom.xhtml b/src/epub/text/tracked-to-doom.xhtml index 5f3b857..6dfd639 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/tracked-to-doom.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/tracked-to-doom.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Tracked to Doom The Mystery of the Rue de Peychaud @@ -110,6 +110,6 @@

The Count Carnaignole tears from his own face a false beard and reveals the flashing eyes and well-known features of Tictocq, the detective.

Then, springing forward, he snatches a wig and false eyebrows from his visitor, and the Gray Wolf, grinding his teeth in rage, stands before him.

The murderer of Marie Cusheau was never discovered.

-

+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/transformation-of-martin-burney.xhtml b/src/epub/text/transformation-of-martin-burney.xhtml index 9fe9311..45b7401 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/transformation-of-martin-burney.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/transformation-of-martin-burney.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Transformation of Martin Burney

In behalf of Sir Walter’s soothing plant let us look into the case of Martin Burney.

They were constructing the Speedway along the west bank of the Harlem River. The grub-boat of Dennis Corrigan, subcontractor, was moored to a tree on the bank. Twenty-two men belonging to the little green island toiled there at the sinew-cracking labour. One among them, who wrought in the kitchen of the grub-boat was of the race of the Goths. Over them all stood the exorbitant Corrigan, harrying them like the captain of a galley crew. He paid them so little that most of the gang, work as they might, earned little more than food and tobacco; many of them were in debt to him. Corrigan boarded them all in the grub-boat, and gave them good grub, for he got it back in work.

@@ -41,6 +41,6 @@

Tony arose and fled. His vendetta he again relegated to the files of things that might have been. Beyond the boat he fled and away-away; he was afraid to remain.

Burney, with expanded chest, watched his late co-plotter disappear. Then he, too, departed, setting his face in the direction of the Bronx.

In his wake was a rank and pernicious trail of noisome smoke that brought peace to his heart and drove the birds from the roadside into the deepest thickets.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/transients-in-arcadia.xhtml b/src/epub/text/transients-in-arcadia.xhtml index 82ad17a..c8ff456 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/transients-in-arcadia.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/transients-in-arcadia.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Transients in Arcadia

There is a hotel on Broadway that has escaped discovery by the summer-resort promoters. It is deep and wide and cool. Its rooms are finished in dark oak of a low temperature. Homemade breezes and deep-green shrubbery give it the delights without the inconveniences of the Adirondacks. One can mount its broad staircases or glide dreamily upward in its aerial elevators, attended by guides in brass buttons, with a serene joy that Alpine climbers have never attained. There is a chef in its kitchen who will prepare for you brook trout better than the White Mountains ever served, sea food that would turn Old Point Comfort⁠—“by Gad, sah!”⁠—green with envy, and Maine venison that would melt the official heart of a game warden.

A few have found out this oasis in the July desert of Manhattan. During that month you will see the hotel’s reduced array of guests scattered luxuriously about in the cool twilight of its lofty dining-room, gazing at one another across the snowy waste of unoccupied tables, silently congratulatory.

@@ -44,6 +44,6 @@

Below the balcony the sweltering city growled and buzzed in the July night. Inside the Hotel Lotus the tempered, cool shadows reigned, and the solicitous waiter single-footed near the low windows, ready at a nod to serve Madame and her escort.

At the door of the elevator Farrington took his leave, and Madame Beaumont made her last ascent. But before they reached the noiseless cage he said: “Just forget that ‘Harold Farrington,’ will you?⁠—McManus is the name⁠—James McManus. Some call me Jimmy.”

“Good night, Jimmy,” said Madame.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/two-recalls.xhtml b/src/epub/text/two-recalls.xhtml index 025452e..0e6f736 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/two-recalls.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/two-recalls.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Two Recalls

There remains three duties to be performed before the curtain falls upon the patched comedy. Two have been promised: the third is no less obligatory.

It was set forth in the programme of this tropic vaudeville that it would be made known why Shorty O’Day, of the Columbia Detective Agency, lost his position. Also that Smith should come again to tell us what mystery he followed that night on the shores of Anchuria when he strewed so many cigar stumps around the coconut palm during his lonely night vigil on the beach. These things were promised; but a bigger thing yet remains to be accomplished⁠—the clearing up of a seeming wrong that has been done according to the array of chronicled facts (truthfully set forth) that have been presented. And one voice, speaking, shall do these three things.

@@ -71,6 +71,6 @@

“I knew what that meant.

“ ‘So that’s the president of the monkeys,’ says I. ‘Well, why couldn’t he have said so?’

“Wouldn’t it jar you?”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/two-renegades.xhtml b/src/epub/text/two-renegades.xhtml index 51e7ab4..c4a0360 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/two-renegades.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/two-renegades.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Two Renegades

In the Gate City of the South the Confederate Veterans were reuniting; and I stood to see them march, beneath the tangled flags of the great conflict, to the hall of their oratory and commemoration.

While the irregular and halting line was passing I made onslaught upon it and dragged from the ranks my friend Barnard O’Keefe, who had no right to be there. For he was a Northerner born and bred; and what should he be doing hallooing for the Stars and Bars among those gray and moribund veterans? And why should he be trudging, with his shining, martial, humorous, broad face, among those warriors of a previous and alien generation?

@@ -101,6 +101,6 @@

“ ‘Now let’s hear you give the password,’ says Doc Millikin.

“ ‘Hurrah for Jeff Davis!’ says I.

“ ‘Correct,’ says Doc. ‘And let me tell you something: The next tune I learn on my flute is going to be “Yankee Doodle.” I reckon there’s some Yanks that are not so pizen. Or, if you was me, would you try “The Red, White, and Blue”?’ ”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/two-thanksgiving-day-gentlemen.xhtml b/src/epub/text/two-thanksgiving-day-gentlemen.xhtml index 0f26fa7..901097d 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/two-thanksgiving-day-gentlemen.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/two-thanksgiving-day-gentlemen.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Two Thanksgiving Day Gentlemen

There is one day that is ours. There is one day when all we Americans who are not self-made go back to the old home to eat saleratus biscuits and marvel how much nearer to the porch the old pump looks than it used to. Bless the day. President Roosevelt gives it to us. We hear some talk of the Puritans, but don’t just remember who they were. Bet we can lick ’em, anyhow, if they try to land again. Plymouth Rocks? Well, that sounds more familiar. Lots of us have had to come down to hens since the Turkey Trust got its work in. But somebody in Washington is leaking out advance information to ’em about these Thanksgiving proclamations.

The big city east of the cranberry bogs has made Thanksgiving Day an institution. The last Thursday in November is the only day in the year on which it recognizes the part of America lying across the ferries. It is the one day that is purely American. Yes, a day of celebration, exclusively American.

@@ -39,6 +39,6 @@

And lo! an hour later another ambulance brought the Old Gentleman. And they laid him on another bed and spoke of appendicitis, for he looked good for the bill.

But pretty soon one of the young doctors met one of the young nurses whose eyes he liked, and stopped to chat with her about the cases.

“That nice old gentleman over there, now,” he said, “you wouldn’t think that was a case of almost starvation. Proud old family, I guess. He told me he hadn’t eaten a thing for three days.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/ulysses-and-the-dogman.xhtml b/src/epub/text/ulysses-and-the-dogman.xhtml index 0aeaeaa..b6cb352 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/ulysses-and-the-dogman.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/ulysses-and-the-dogman.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Ulysses and the Dogman

Do you know the time of the dogmen?

When the forefinger of twilight begins to smudge the clear-drawn lines of the Big City there is inaugurated an hour devoted to one of the most melancholy sights of urban life.

@@ -76,6 +76,6 @@

Suddenly the swift landing of three or four heavy kicks was heard, the air was rent by piercing canine shrieks, and a pained, outraged, lubberly, bowlegged pudding of a dog ran frenziedly up the street alone.

“Ticket to Denver,” said Jim.

“Make it two,” shouted the ex-dogman, reaching for his inside pocket.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/vanity-and-some-sables.xhtml b/src/epub/text/vanity-and-some-sables.xhtml index 1243a77..81f4112 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/vanity-and-some-sables.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/vanity-and-some-sables.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Vanity and Some Sables

When “Kid” Brady was sent to the rope by Molly McKeever’s blue-black eyes he withdrew from the Stovepipe Gang. So much for the power of a colleen’s blanderin’ tongue and stubborn true-heartedness. If you are a man who read this, may such an influence be sent you before 2 o’clock tomorrow; if you are a woman, may your Pomeranian greet you this morning with a cold nose⁠—a sign of doghealth and your happiness.

The Stovepipe Gang borrowed its name from a sub-district of the city called the “Stovepipe,” which is a narrow and natural extension of the familiar district known as “Hell’s Kitchen.” The “Stovepipe” strip of town runs along Eleventh and Twelfth Avenues on the river, and bends a hard and sooty elbow around little, lost homeless DeWitt Clinton park. Consider that a stovepipe is an important factor in any kitchen and the situation is analyzed. The chefs in “Hell’s Kitchen” are many, and the “Stovepipe” gang wears the cordon blue.

@@ -71,6 +71,6 @@

“You can take dose nippers off,” said Kohen to the detective. “Before I leaf de station de report come in dat de lady vind her saples⁠—hanging in her wardrobe. Young man, I excuse you dat punch in my vace⁠—dis von time.”

Ransom handed Molly her furs. Her eyes were smiling upon the Kid. She wound the scarf and threw the end over her left shoulder with a duchess’ grace.

“A gouple of young vools,” said Policeman Kohen to Ransom; “come on away.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/vereton-villa.xhtml b/src/epub/text/vereton-villa.xhtml index 4d907d1..25c0d73 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/vereton-villa.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/vereton-villa.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Veriton Villa

The following story of Southern life and manners won a prize offered by a Boston newspaper, and was written by a young lady in Boston, a teacher in one of the advanced schools of that city. She has never visited the South, but the faithful local color and character drawing shows an intimate acquaintance with the works of Mrs. H. B. Stowe, Albion W. Tourgee and other well known chroniclers of Southern life. Everyone living in the South will recognize the accurate portraits of Southern types of character and realistic description of life among the Southern planters.

@@ -107,6 +107,6 @@

One of his great toes fell through the car window and fell in my lap.

Cyrus is not of a jealous disposition, and I now have that great toe in a bottle of alcohol on my writing desk. We are married now, and I will never taken another trip to the South.

The Southern people are too impulsive.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/what-it-was.xhtml b/src/epub/text/what-it-was.xhtml index 7fa2480..5265dc7 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/what-it-was.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/what-it-was.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

What It Was

There was something the matter with the electric lights Tuesday night, and Houston was as dark as Egypt when Moses blew the gas out. They were on Rusk Avenue, out on the lawn, taking advantage of the situation, and were holding as close a session as possible.

Presently she said:

@@ -14,6 +14,6 @@

“What is it, my darling?” asked George, in an agony of suspense. “Speak, my own, and tell me what it is that has come between you and me?”

“I think, George” she softly sighed, “it is your watch.”

And George loosened his hold for a moment and shifted his Waterbury.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/what-you-want.xhtml b/src/epub/text/what-you-want.xhtml index 3d67f22..33922d6 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/what-you-want.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/what-you-want.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

“What You Want”

Night had fallen on that great and beautiful city known as Bagdad-on-the-Subway. And with the night came the enchanted glamour that belongs not to Arabia alone. In different masquerade the streets, bazaars and walled houses of the occidental city of romance were filled with the same kind of folk that so much interested our interesting old friend, the late Mr. H. A. Rashid. They wore clothes eleven hundred years nearer to the latest styles than H. A. saw in old Bagdad; but they were about the same people underneath. With the eye of faith, you could have seen the Little Hunchback, Sinbad the Sailor, Fitbad the Tailor, the Beautiful Persian, the one-eyed Calenders, Ali Baba and Forty Robbers on every block, and the Barber and his Six Brothers, and all the old Arabian gang easily.

But let us revenue to our lamb chops.

@@ -45,6 +45,6 @@

Presently, to his cell came the doorman and said:

“Say, kid, that old gazabo that was pinched with you for scrapping seems to have been the goods after all. He phoned to his friends, and he’s out at the desk now with a roll of yellowbacks as big as a Pullman car pillow. He wants to bail you, and for you to come out and see him.”

“Tell him I ain’t in,” said James Turner.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/while-the-auto-waits.xhtml b/src/epub/text/while-the-auto-waits.xhtml index 927b871..20ed293 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/while-the-auto-waits.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/while-the-auto-waits.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

While the Auto Waits

Promptly at the beginning of twilight, came again to that quiet corner of that quiet, small park the girl in gray. She sat upon a bench and read a book, for there was yet to come a half hour in which print could be accomplished.

To repeat: Her dress was gray, and plain enough to mask its impeccancy of style and fit. A large-meshed veil imprisoned her turban hat and a face that shone through it with a calm and unconscious beauty. She had come there at the same hour on the day previous, and on the day before that; and there was one who knew it.

@@ -57,6 +57,6 @@

The cashier’s desk was well to the front. A red-haired girl an the stool climbed down, glancing pointedly at the clock as she did so. The girl in gray mounted in her place.

The young man thrust his hands into his pockets and walked slowly back along the sidewalk. At the corner his foot struck a small, paper-covered volume lying there, sending it sliding to the edge of the turf. By its picturesque cover he recognized it as the book the girl had been reading. He picked it up carelessly, and saw that its title was “New Arabian Nights,” the author being of the name of Stevenson. He dropped it again upon the grass, and lounged, irresolute, for a minute. Then he stepped into the automobile, reclined upon the cushions, and said two words to the chauffeur:

“Club, Henri.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/whiskey-did-it.xhtml b/src/epub/text/whiskey-did-it.xhtml index f46d9af..757646c 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/whiskey-did-it.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/whiskey-did-it.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Whiskey Did It

A solemn philanthropist was standing at a corner of the Market House square yesterday making a calculation in his head as to how long it would take a man to save enough beer money to build Solomon’s temple. While he was musing, a small, slender policeman with a fiery eye came along, dragging by the wrist a big negro man about twice as large as himself.

The policeman stopped for a moment on the steps to rest, and the philanthropist, with a pitying glance, said to the negro:

@@ -16,6 +16,6 @@

“It done it in dis way,” said the negro, ducking his head as the policeman raised his hand to brush a fly off his nose. “I is one ob de wust niggers in dis town, en dey don’t no policeman got sand ’nuff to try en ’rest me fo’ de last two years. Dis mawnin’ dis here mis’able little dried-up ossifer what’s got me, goes out an’ fills hisse’f up wid mean whisky till he ain’t know what danger he am in, an’ he come an’ scoop me up. Dis little runt wid brass buttons wouldn’t er tetch me ef he ain’t plum full er whisky. Yes, boss, de whisky am done it, an’ nuffin’ else.”

The philanthropist put up his note book and walked away, while the officer whacked the negro over the head a couple of times with his club and dragged him down the steps, exclaiming:

“Come along ’n shuzzer mouse, you blacksh rascal. Strongarm e’r law gossher zis time, ’n no mistake.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/whistling-dicks-christmas-stocking.xhtml b/src/epub/text/whistling-dicks-christmas-stocking.xhtml index 9818652..9f166d9 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/whistling-dicks-christmas-stocking.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/whistling-dicks-christmas-stocking.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Whistling Dick’s Christmas Stocking

It was with much caution that Whistling Dick slid back the door of the boxcar, for Article 5716, City Ordinances, authorized (perhaps unconstitutionally) arrest on suspicion, and he was familiar of old with this ordinance. So, before climbing out, he surveyed the field with all the care of a good general.

He saw no change since his last visit to this big, alms-giving, long-suffering city of the South, the cold weather paradise of the tramps. The levee where his freight-car stood was pimpled with dark bulks of merchandise. The breeze reeked with the well-remembered, sickening smell of the old tarpaulins that covered bales and barrels. The dun river slipped along among the shipping with an oily gurgle. Far down toward Chalmette he could see the great bend in the stream, outlined by the row of electric lights. Across the river Algiers lay, a long, irregular blot, made darker by the dawn which lightened the sky beyond. An industrious tug or two, coming for some early sailing ship, gave a few appalling toots, that seemed to be the signal for breaking day. The Italian luggers were creeping nearer their landing, laden with early vegetables and shellfish. A vague roar, subterranean in quality, from dray wheels and street cars, began to make itself heard and felt; and the ferryboats, the Mary Anns of water craft, stirred sullenly to their menial morning tasks.

@@ -116,6 +116,6 @@

A small, ruffled, brown-breasted bird, sitting upon a dogwood sapling, began a soft, throaty, tender little piping in praise of the dew which entices foolish worms from their holes; but suddenly he stopped, and sat with his head turned sidewise, listening.

From the path along the levee there burst forth a jubilant, stirring, buoyant, thrilling whistle, loud and keen and clear as the cleanest notes of the piccolo. The soaring sound rippled and trilled and arpeggioed as the songs of wild birds do not; but it had a wild free grace that, in a way, reminded the small, brown bird of something familiar, but exactly what he could not tell. There was in it the bird call, or reveille, that all birds know; but a great waste of lavish, unmeaning things that art had added and arranged, besides, and that were quite puzzling and strange; and the little brown bird sat with his head on one side until the sound died away in the distance.

The little bird did not know that the part of that strange warbling that he understood was just what kept the warbler without his breakfast; but he knew very well that the part he did not understand did not concern him, so he gave a little flutter of his wings and swooped down like a brown bullet upon a big fat worm that was wriggling along the levee path.

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/why-conductors-are-morose.xhtml b/src/epub/text/why-conductors-are-morose.xhtml index d44ebf6..e1f4eb8 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/why-conductors-are-morose.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/why-conductors-are-morose.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Why Conductors Are Morose

Street car conductors often have their tempers tried by the inconsiderate portion of the public, but they are not allowed to ease their feelings by “talking back.” One of them related yesterday an occurrence on his line a few days ago.

A very fashionably dressed lady, accompanied by a little boy, was in the car, which was quite full of people. “Conductor,” she said languidly, “let me know when we arrive at Peas Avenue.”

@@ -14,6 +14,6 @@

“Peas Avenue, ma’am,” he said, climbing off to assist her from the car.

The lady raised the little boy to his knees and pointed out the window at the name of the street which was on a board, nailed to the corner of a fence.

“Look, Freddy,” she said, “that tall, straight letter with a funny little curl at the top is a ‘P.’ Now don’t forget it again. You can go on, conductor; we get off at Gray Street.”

-
+ diff --git a/src/epub/text/why-he-hesitated.xhtml b/src/epub/text/why-he-hesitated.xhtml index d68f904..7e9e865 100644 --- a/src/epub/text/why-he-hesitated.xhtml +++ b/src/epub/text/why-he-hesitated.xhtml @@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ -
+

Why He Hesitated

A man with a worn, haggard countenance that showed traces of deep sorrow and suffering rushed excitedly up the stairs into the editorial rooms of the Post.

The literary editor was alone in his corner and the man threw himself into a chair nearby and said:

@@ -20,6 +20,6 @@

The literary editor rose with indignation in his face.

“For shame, sir,” he said, “do not act so unworthy a part. Confront your faithless wife, Mr. Skinner, and denounce her for wrecking your life and home. Why do you hesitate to stand up for your honor and your rights?”

“You do not understand,” said the man, his face white with fear and apprehension, as he climbed out the window upon a shed. “I am William Wagstaff.”

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Willing to Compromise

As he walked up to the bar he pulled up his collar with both hands and straightened the old red tie that was trying to creep around under one ear.

The bartender glanced at him and then went on chipping lemon peel into a saucer.

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“I don’t know that I would give you ten dollars,” he said, “but here’s some whisky that I put some turpentine in by mistake this morning and forgot to throw it out. Will that do as well?”

“It will,” said the man with the red tie, reaching for the glass, “and I am also soliciting aid for the Cuban patriots. If you want to assist the cause of liberty and can’t spare the cash, if you could rustle up a glass of beer with a fly in it, I would⁠—”

“Trot out, now,” said the bartender. “There’s a church member looking in the back door, and he won’t come in till everybody’s out.”

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Witches’ Loaves

Miss Martha Meacham kept the little bakery on the corner (the one where you go up three steps, and the bell tinkles when you open the door).

Miss Martha was forty, her bankbook showed a credit of two thousand dollars, and she possessed two false teeth and a sympathetic heart. Many people have married whose chances to do so were much inferior to Miss Martha’s.

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“He’s been working hard for three months drawing a plan for a new city hall. It was a prize competition. He finished inking the lines yesterday. You know, a draftsman always makes his drawing in pencil first. When it’s done he rubs out the pencil lines with handfuls of stale bread crumbs. That’s better than India rubber.

“Blumberger’s been buying the bread here. Well, today⁠—well, you know, ma’am, that butter isn’t⁠—well, Blumberger’s plan isn’t good for anything now except to cut up into railroad sandwiches.”

Miss Martha went into the back room. She took off the blue-dotted silk waist and put on the old brown serge she used to wear. Then she poured the quince seed and borax mixture out of the window into the ash can.

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