Chapter III (5)

The minutes crept by, and at half past eight, Kathleen, blushing and timid-eyed, and looking like the Lorelei that charmed men's souls from their bodies on the purple heights of the Rhine, took her stand by the keg, and shyly drew for her father's guests glass after glass of the ruby liquid, scarcely less red than the glow upon her own fair cheek.

At a quarter to nine Fergus had not come, and all hands began to grow anxious.

At ten minutes to nine, Mr. O'Malley brought in his shotgun and carefully loaded it. Kathleen burst into tears.

Where was Fergus O'Hollihan?

* * * * *

In the garish halls of the Young Men's Christian Association were gathered a group of gay young men.

Little do the majority of our citizens know what scenes go on in places of this kind. Our police well know that these resorts exist, but such is our system of city government that rarely do the guardians of peace set foot in establishments of the kind. Two or three young men were playing checkers, feverishly crowning the kings of their opponents, and watching the board with that hollow-eyed absorption and compressed lips so often noted in men of that class. Another played upon the guitar, while in a corner harsh ribald laughter broke from the lips of a man who was reading the Austin _Statesman_.

At a little table at one side of the room sat Fergus O'Hollihan and William Meeks. Before them, on a waiter, were two large glasses of ice water. William Meeks was speaking in a low, treacherous voice, and Fergus was listening with an abandoned and reckless look upon his face.

"Sobriety," said William, insinuatingly, as his snaky eyes were fixed upon the open and ingenious countenance of Fergus, "sobriety is one of our cardinal virtues. Why should a man debase himself, destroy his brain, deaden his conscience and forge chains that eventually will clog his best efforts and ruin his fondest hopes? Let us be men and live temperate and cleanly lives. Believe me, Mr. O'Hollihan, it is the better plan."

Fergus' unsteady hand went out to the glass of water and he tossed it down his throat. "More," he gasped, gazing with feverish eyes. A member of the association in passing by stopped and laid his hand on William's shoulder.

"Old man," he said in a whisper, "the boys know you've struck a soft thing, but don't carry it too far. We don't want to have to bore another artesian well."

William shot a glance of displeasure at the young man, and he went away.

Just then a quartette began to sing "Come, Thou Fount," and Fergus, forgetting all his associations and best impulses, joined in with his strong tenor, and William Meeks' face wore a look of fiendish gloating.

At this moment Kathleen was weeping in her mother's arms. Mr. O'Malley was just ramming down the wad on the buckshot in his gun, and the beautiful wedding supper was growing cold upon the banquet table.

Suddenly in the street before the hall a brass band began to play an air that was Kathleen's favorite. It brought Fergus to his senses. He sprang to his feet and overturned the table and William Meeks. William sprang to his feet, rushed to the cooler and drawing a glass of water thrust it into Fergus' hands. Fergus hurled the glass to the floor and made a dash for the door. The secretary of the association met him there with the water hose and turned it full in his face. Fergus shut his mouth tightly, put the secretary to sleep with one on the point of his chin, and dashed down the stairs into the street.

* * * * *

As the clock struck nine, Mr. O'Malley placed two caps on his gun and one upon his head and started to find his son-in-law elect. The door burst open and Fergus rushed in. Kathleen ran to meet him with open arms, but he waved her sternly aside.

"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.

(_Houston Daily Post_, Sunday morning, April 19, 1896.)

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.

Mrs. Jessamine is thoughtful, kindhearted and an excellent manager. She has two children, a little boy of 7 and a little girl of 4, of whom she is extravagantly fond. The Jessamines are going to keep a cook as soon as Mr. Jessamine's salary is raised, but just at present Mrs. Jessamine is doing her own work.

While she is attending to her duties she gives the children a paper of needles, the scissors, some sample packages of aniline dyes and a box of safety matches to play with, and during the intervals of baking and sweeping the rooms she rushes in, kisses and cuddles them and then flies back to her work singing merrily.

One afternoon last week Mrs. Jessamine was lying on the bed reading a Sunday paper. The children were blowing soap bubbles with some old pipestems of Mr. Jessamine's that he had discarded because they were full of nicotine.

Mrs. Jessamine was reading an account of some cruel treatment of children that had been unearthed by the Gerry Society, and the tears came to her eyes as she thought of the heartless and criminally careless mothers of the land who are the cause of so much suffering to their innocent little ones.

Presently she fell asleep and dreamed this dream:

She was all alone in a great room. She heard the doorbell snap and footsteps leaving and dying away in the hall outside. The room was a strange one, and she went about to examine it. She paused in front of a mirror and saw her reflection, and lo, she was a little child, in a white pinafore, with wide-open, wondering eyes and tangled dark curls.

She heard the front door below stairs close and the gate open and shut. She began to play around the room with some dolls and pictures, and for a while was quite happy.

She undressed and dressed her doll and talked to it soothingly and put it to bed. She could see out the window, but there were some big trees growing in the yard and the wind blew a branch against the corner of the house, making a queer noise that rather frightened her. Then she saw the closet door standing open and a lot of different shaped bottles on a low shelf. She dragged a chair in front of the shelf and climbed into it. The bottles had all kinds of pretty colored liquids in them and she found some that she could pull the corks from quite easily. She tasted one or two of the corks. Some of them were sweet and nice and one was bitter and badtasting. One bottle was full of something clear like water, so she got that one and pulled out the cork, but the bottle slipped from her hand, fell to the floor and broke. Where the liquid spilled it fumed and sputtered and turned green, and a kind of hot, biting vapor arose. She climbed down and began to feel lonesome and scared. She called "Mamma," three or four times loudly, but all the house was still. Then she began to cry and ran to the door. Just then she thought she heard something scratch behind the bed, and she screamed and beat upon the door with her hands, crying for her mamma to come. Nobody answered her.

Then she listened fearfully for a little and crept over and got her dolly from its bed and crouched in a corner whimpering and hugging her doll tightly, with her heart beating wildly, and watching the dark place under the bed with frightened eyes.

Presently she saw a pretty red box on a table and curiosity for the moment overcame her fear. She opened the box and saw a lot of funny little sticks, with little round heads on them. She played with them on the floor, building little pigpens and fences and houses.

In changing her position her heel fell upon the little sticks and the next moment a big blaze flared up, caught her dress, and with a loud scream she ran to the locked door, wrapped in burning, stinging flames, in an agony of pain and horror.

* * * * *

Mrs. Jessamine awoke with a start and sprang wildly from the bed. The children were playing merrily on the floor, and she ran to them and caught them in her arms in thankfulness that the terrible dream was over. How she wished for someone to whom she could relate it and gain sympathy. Three blocks away lived Mrs. Flutter, her best friend and confidante. Not for a long time had Mrs. Jessamine had a dream that made such an impression upon her mind.

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.

(_Houston Daily Post_, Sunday morning, December 15, 1895.)

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.

George St. Bibbs loved fashionable society and his wife was domestic in her ways, so she had made him move to Houston, so that he would not have a chance to gratify his tastes. However, George still went to functions, and things of that kind, and left his wife at home.

One night there was to be a very high-toned blowout by society people, gotten up by the Business League and the Daughters of the Survivors of the Confederate Reunion.

After George had left, his wife looked into her little hand mirror and said to herself:

"I'll bet a dollar there isn't a lady at that ball that stacks up half as well as I do when I fix up."

Then an idea struck her.

She rang for her maid and told her to bring a cup of hot tea, and then she dressed in a magnificent evening dress, left the maid to look after Dolly and Polly and got on the street car and went to the ball.

George was at the ball enjoying himself very much. All the tony people were there, and music's voluptuous swell rose like everything, and soft eyes looked love to eyes that spake again, and all that sort of thing.

Among the guests was the Vicomte Carolus de Villiers, a distinguished French nobleman, who had been forced to leave Paris on account of some political intrigue, and who now worked on a large strawberry farm near Alvin.

The viscount stood near a portiere picking his teeth, when he saw Mrs. St. Bibbs enter.

He was at her side in a moment, and had written his name opposite hers for every dance.

George looked over and saw them, and gasped in surprise: "Jerusalem, that's Molly!"

He leaned against a velvet cul-de-sac near the doorway and watched them. Mrs. St. Bibbs was the belle of the evening. Everybody crowded about her, and the viscount leaned over her and talked in his most engaging manner, fanning her with an old newspaper, as she smiled brightly upon him, a brilliant stream of wit, persiflage and repartee falling from her lips.

"_Mon dieu!_" said the viscount to himself, as his ardent gaze rested upon her, "I wish I knew who she is."

At supper Mrs. St. Bibbs was the life of the gang. She engaged in a witty discussion with the brightest intellects around the table, completely overwhelming the boss joshers of the town. She conversed readily with gents from the wards, speaking their own dialect, and even answered without hesitation a question put to her by a man who had a sister attending the State University.

George could scarcely believe that this fascinating, brilliant woman of the world was the quiet little wife he had left at home that evening.

When the ball was over and the musicians had been stood off, George went up to his wife, feeling ashamed and repentant.

"Molly," he said, "forgive me. I didn't know how beautiful and gay you could be in swell society. The next time our Longfellow Literary Coterie gives a fish fry at the Hook and Ladder Company Hall I'll take you along."

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.

(_Houston Daily Post_, Monday morning, May 18, 1896.)

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.

"Haircut?" asked the barber in a quiet but thoroughly dangerous tone.

"Shave," said the Post Man.

The barber raised his eyebrows, gave his victim a look of deep disdain, and hurled the chair with a loud rattle and crash back to a reclining position.

Then he seized a mug and brush and, after bestowing upon the Post Man a look of undying contumely, turned with a sneer to the water faucet. Thence he returned, enveloped the passive victim in a voluminous cloth, and with a pitiless hand daubed a great brushful of sweetish tasting lather across his mouth.

Then he began to talk.

"Ever been in Seattle, Washington Territory?" he asked.

"Blub-a-lub-blub," said the Post Man, struggling against the soap, and then he shook his head feebly.

"Neither have I," said the barber, "but I have a brother named Bill who runs an orange orchard nine miles from St. John, Fla. That's only a split hair on your neck; it's growing the wrong way. They are caused by shaving the neck in the wrong direction. Sometimes whiskey will make them do that way. Whisky is a terrible thing. Do you drink it?"

The Post Man only had one eye of all his features uncovered by lather and he tried to throw an appealing expression implying negation into this optic, but the barber was too quick for him and filled the eye with soap by a dextrous flap of his brush.

"My brother Bill used to drink," continued the barber. "He could drink more whiskey than any man in Houston, but he never got drunk. He had a chair in my shop, but I had to let him go. Bill had a wonderful constitution. When he got all he could hold he would quit drinking. The only way he showed it was in his eyes. They would get kind of glazed and fishy and wouldn't turn in his head. When Bill wanted to look to one side he used to take his fingers and turn his eyeballs a little the way he wanted to see. His eyes looked exactly like those little round windows you see in the dome of the postoffice. You could hear Bill breathe across the street when he was full. He could shave people when he was drunk as well as he could sober.--Razor hurt you?"

The Post Man tried to wave one of his hands to disclaim any sense of pain, but the barber's quick eye caught the motion and he leaned his weight against the hand, crushing it against the chair.

"I kept noticing," went on the barber, "that Bill was getting about four customers to my one, even if he did drink so much. People would come in three or four at a time and sit down and wait their turns with Bill when my chair was vacant. I didn't know what to make of it. Bill had all he could do, and he was so crowded that he didn't have time to go out to a saloon, but he kept a big jug in the back room, and every few minutes he would slip in there and take a drink.

"One day I noticed a man that got out of Bill's chair acting queer and he staggered as he went out. A day or two afterwards the shop was full of customers from morning till night, and one man came back and had a shave three different times in the forenoon. In a couple of days more there was a crowd of men in the shop, and they had a line formed outside two or three doors down the sidewalk. Bill made $9.00 that day. That evening a policeman came in and jerked me up for running a saloon without a license. It seems that Bill's breath was so full of whiskey that every man he shaved went out feeling pretty hilarious and sent his friends there to be shaved. It cost me $300 to get out of it, and I shipped Bill to Florida pretty soon afterward."

* * * * *

"I was sent for once," went on the barber, as he seized his victim by the ear and slammed his head over on the other side, "to go out on Piney Street and shave a dead man. Barbers don't much like a job of that kind, although they get from $5 to $10 for the work. It was 1908 Piney Street. I started about 11 o'clock at night. I found the street all right and I counted from the corner until I found 1908. I had my razors, soap and mug in a little case I use for such purposes. I went in and knocked at the door. An old man opened it and his eye fell on my case.

"'You've come, have you?' he asked. 'Well, go upstairs; he's in the front room to your right. There's nobody with him. He hasn't any friends or relatives in town; he's only been boarding here about a week.'

"'How long since he--since it occurred?' I asked.

"'About an hour, I guess,' says the old man. I was glad of that because corpses always shave better before they get good and cold. I went in the room and turned up the lamp. The man was laid out on the bed. He was warm yet and he had about a week's growth of beard on. I got to work and in half an hour I had given him a nice clean shave that would have done his heart good if he had been alive. Then I went downstairs and saw the old man.

"'What success?' he asked.

"'Good,' says I. 'He's fixed up all right. Who's to pay?'

"'He gave me $30 to send his folks in Alabama yesterday,' says the old man. 'I guess your fee will have to come out of it.'

"'It'll be five,' I said.

"The old man handed me a five dollar bill and I went home very well satisfied."

Here the barber seized the chair, hurled it upright, snatched off the cloth, buried his hands in the Post Man's hair and tore out a handful, bumped and thumped his head, shook it violently and hissed sarcastically: "Bay rum?"

The Post Man nodded stupidly, closed his eyes and tried unsuccessfully to recall a prayer.

"Next day," said the barber, "I heard some news. It seems that a man had died at 1908 Piney Street and just a little while before a man in the next house had taken poison. The folks in one house sent for a doctor and the ones in the other sent for a barber. The funny part is the doctor and I both made a mistake and got into the wrong house. He went in to see the dead man and found the family doctor just getting ready to leave. The doctor didn't waste any time asking questions, but got out his stomach pump, stuck it into the dead man and went to work pumping the poison out. All this time I was busy shaving the man who had taken poison. And the funniest part of it all is that after the doctor had pumped all the other doctor's medicine out of the dead man, he opened his eyes, raised up in bed and asked for a steak and potatoes.

"This made the family doctor mad, and he and the doctor with a stomach pump got into a fight and fell down the stairs and broke the hat rack all to pieces."

"And how about your man who had taken poison?" asked the Post Man timidly.

"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.

(_Houston Daily Post_, Sunday morning, May 31, 1896.)

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.

In a few moments there was a rattle and a bang, the customer in the chair was thrown violently on his feet, and fled out of the shop pursued by the African who was making vicious dabs at him with a whisk broom full of tacks and splinters.

The Post Man took a long look at the sunlight, pinned a little note to his tie with his scarf pin, giving his address, in case the worst should happen, and settled into the chair.

He informed the barber, in answer to a stern inquiry, that he did not want his hair cut, and in turn received a look of cold incredulity and contempt.

The chair was hurled to a reclining position, the lather was mixed, and as the deadly brush successively stopped all sense of hearing, sight and smell, the Post Man sank into a state of collapse, from which he was aroused by the loud noise of a steel instrument with which the barber was scraping off the lather and wiping it on the Post Man's shirt sleeve.

"Everybody's riding bicycles now," said the barber, "and it's going to be very difficult for the fashionable people to keep it an exclusive exercise. You see, you can't prevent anybody from riding a bicycle that wants to, and the streets are free for everyone. I don't see any harm in the sport, myself, and it's getting more popular every day. After a while, riding will become so general that a lady on a wheel will not create any more notice than she would walking. It's good exercise for the ladies, and that makes up for their looking like a bag full of fighting cats slung over a clothes line when they ride.

"But the pains they do take to make themselves mannish! Why can't a lady go in for athletics without trying to look and dress tough? If I should tell you what one of them did the other day you wouldn't believe it."

The barber here glared so fiercely at the Post Man that he struggled up to the top of the lather by a superhuman effort and assured the artist that anything he said would be received with implicit faith.

"I was sent for," continued the barber, "to go up on McKinney Avenue and was to bring my razor and shaving outfit. I went up and found the house.

"A good-looking young lady was riding a bicycle up and down in front of the gate. She had on a short skirt, leggings, and a sack coat, cut like a man's.

"I went in and knocked and they showed me into a side room. In a few minutes the young lady came in, sat down on a chair and an old lady whom I took to be her ma dropped in.

"'Shave,' said the young lady. 'Twice over, and be in a hurry; I've an engagement.'

"I was nearly knocked down with surprise, but I managed to get my outfit in shape. It was evident that that young lady ruled the house. The old lady said to me in a whisper that her daughter was one of the leaders among the girls who believed in the emancipation of women, and she had resolved to raise a moustache and thus get ahead of her young lady companions.

"The young lady leaned back in the chair and closed her eyes.

"I dipped my brush in the lather and ran it across her upper lip. As soon as I did so she sprang to her feet, her eyes flashing with rage.

"'How dare you insult me!' she stormed, looking as if she would like to eat me up. 'Leave the house, immediately,' she went on.

"I was dumbfounded. I thought perhaps she was a trifle flighty, so I put up my utensils and started for the door. When I got there, I recovered my presence of mind enough to say:

"Miss, I am sure I have done nothing to offend you. I always try to act a gentleman whenever it is convenient. In what way have I insulted you?

"'Take your departure,' she said angrily. 'I guess I know when a man kisses me.'

"And so I left. Now, what do you think of that?" asked the barber, as he pushed about an ounce of soap into the Post Man's mouth with his thumb.

"I think that's a pretty tough story to believe," said the Post Man, summoning up his courage.

The barber stopped shaving and bent a gaze of such malignant and cool ferocity upon his victim that the Post Man hastened to say:

"But no doubt it occurred as you have stated."

"It did," said the barber. "I don't ask you to take my word for it. I can prove it. Do you see that blue mug on the shelf, the third from the right? Well, that's the mug I carried with me that day. I guess you'll believe it now."

"Speaking of bald heads," went on the barber, although no one had said a word about bald heads, "reminds me of how a man worked a game on me once right here in Houston. You know there's nothing in the world that will make hair grow on a bald head. Lots of things are sold for that purpose, but if the roots are dead nothing can bring them to life. A man came into my shop one day last fall and had a shave. His head was as bald and smooth as a tea cup. All the tonics in the world couldn't have started one hair growing there. The man was a stranger to me, but said he ran a truck garden out on the edge of town. He came in about three times and got shaved and then he struck me to fix him up something to make his hair grow."

The barber here reached back upon a shelf and got a strip of sticking plaster. Then he cut a gash along the Post Man's chin and stuck the plaster over it.

"When a man asks for a hair tonic," continued the barber, "in a barbershop he always gets it. You can fix up a mixture that a man may use on his head for a long time before he finds it is doing him no good. In the meantime he continues to shave in your shop.

"I told my customer that I had invented a hair tonic that if its use were persisted in would certainly cause the hair to grow on the smoothest head. I sat down and wrote him out a formula and told him to have it prepared at a drug store and not to give away the information, as I intended after a while to have it patented and sell it on a large scale. The recipe contained a lot of harmless stuff, some salts of tartar, oil of almonds, bay rum, rose water, tincture of myrrh and some other ingredients. I wrote them down at random just as they came into my head, and half an hour afterwards I couldn't have told what it was composed of myself. The man took it, paid me a dollar for the formula and went off to get it filled at a drug store.

"He came back twice that week to get shaved, and he said he was using it faithfully. Then he didn't come any more for about two weeks. He dropped in one afternoon and hung his hat up, and it nearly knocked me down when I saw that the finest kind of a suit of hair had started on his head. It was growing splendidly, and only two weeks before his head had been as bald as a door knob.

"He said he was awfully pleased with my tonic, and well he might be. While I was shaving him I tried to think what the ingredients were that I had written down for him to use, but I couldn't remember the quantities or half the things I had used. I knew that I had accidentally struck upon a tonic that would make the hair grow, and I knew furthermore that that formula was worth a million dollars to any man if it would do the work. Making hair grow on bald heads, if it could be done, would be better than any gold mine ever worked. I made up my mind to have that formula. When he was about to start away I said carelessly:

"'By the way, Mr. Plunket, I have mislaid my memorandum book that has the formula of my tonic in it and I want to have a bottle or two prepared this morning. If you have the one I gave you I'd like to make a copy of it while you are here.'

"I must have looked too anxious, for he looked at me for a few minutes and then broke out into a laugh.

"'By Jiminy,' he said, 'I don't believe you've got a copy of it anywheres. I believe you just happend to hit on the right thing and you don't remember what it was. I ain't half as green as I look. That hair grower is worth a fortune, and a big one, too. I think I'll just keep my recipe and get somebody to put the stuff up and sell it.'

"He started out, and I called him into the back room and talked to him half an hour.

"I finally made a trade with him and bought the formula back for $250 cash. I went up to the bank and got the money which I had there saving up to build a house. He then gave me back the recipe I had given him and signed a paper relinquishing all rights to it. He also agreed to sign a testimonial about the stuff having made his hair grow out in two weeks."

The barber began to look gloomy and ran his fingers inside the Post Man's shirt collar, tearing out the button hole, and the collar button flew out the door across the sidewalk into the gutter.

"I went to work next day," said the barber, "and filed application at Washington for a patent on my tonic and arranged with a big drug firm in Houston to put it on the market for me. I had a million dollars in sight. I fixed up a room where I mixed the tonic--for I wouldn't let the druggists or anybody else know what was in it--and then the druggists bottled and labeled it.

"I quit working in the shop and put all my time into my tonic.

"Mr. Plunket came into the shop once or twice within the next two weeks and his hair was still growing finely. Pretty soon I had about $200 worth of the tonic ready for the market, and Mr. Plunket was to come in town on Saturday and give me his testimonial to print on advertising dodgers and circulars with which I was going to flood the country.

"I was waiting in the room where I mixed my tonic about 11 o'clock Saturday when the door opened and Mr. Plunket came in. He was very much excited and very angry.

"'Look here,' he cried, 'what's the matter with your infernal stuff?'

"He pulled off his hat, and his head was as shiny and bare as a china egg.

"'It all came out,' he said roughly. 'It was growing all right until yesterday morning, when it commenced to fall out, and this morning there wasn't a hair left.'

"I examined his head and there wasn't the ghost of a hair to be found anywhere.

"'What's the good of your stuff," he asked angrily, 'if it makes your hair grow and then all fall out again?'

"'For heaven's sake, Mr. Plunket,' I said, 'don't say anything about it or you'll ruin me. I've got every cent I've got in the world invested in this hair tonic, and I've got to get my money back. It made your hair grow, give me the testimonial and let me sell what I've got put up, anyway. You are $250 ahead on it and you ought to help me out of it.'

"He was very mad and cut up quite roughly and said he had been swindled and would expose the tonic as a fraud and a lot of things like that. Finally he agreed that if I would pay him $100 more he would give me the testimonial to the effect that the tonic had made his hair grow and say nothing about its having fallen out again. If I could sell what I had put up at $1.00 per bottle I would come out about even.

"I went out and borrowed the money and paid it to him and he signed the testimonial and left."

* * * * *

"Did you sell your tonic out?" asked the Post Man, trying to speak in a tone calculated not to give offense.

The barber gave him a look of derisive contempt and then said in a tone of the utmost sarcasm:

"Oh, yes, I sold it out. I sold exactly five bottles, and the purchasers, after using the mixture faithfully for a month, came back and demanded their money. Not one of them that used it ever had a new hair to start on his head."

"How do you account for its having made the hair grow on Mr. Plunket's head?" asked the Post Man.

"How do I account for it?" repeated the barber in so dangerous a tone that the Post Man shuddered. "How do I account for it? I'll tell you how I account for it. I went out one day to where Mr. Plunket lived on the edge of town and asked for him.

"'Which Mr. Plunket?' asked a man who came out to the gate?

"'Come off,' I said, 'the Plunket that lives here.'

"'They've both moved,' said the man.

"'What do you mean by "both?"' I said, and then I began to think, and I said to the man:

"'What kind of looking men were the Plunkets?'

"'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.

(_Houston Daily Post_, Sunday morning, June 7, 1896.)

Part Two: Sketches

Did You See the Circus?

Some Twenty Thousand Other People Were There

WONDERS OF THE STREET PARADE

The Good People Came Out to Show the Children the Animals A Good Parade

If some man had cornered the children market day before yesterday, he could have made a fortune.

Yesterday was circus day, and every deacon and elder and staid business man in Houston who wanted to see Mademoiselle Marie Meers ride barebacked and walk the tight rope, and had no kids of his own, was out offering love and money for somebody's else to take along as an excuse for going to the circus. In some New England towns large families make a living by renting out their children to church members for this purpose.

When a man tells you that he doesn't believe in the Old Testament, just ask him what made him follow the band wagon and the steam piano and the animal cages when he was a boy, and what makes him still sneak into the circus and feed the elephant peanuts and stare the monkeys out of countenance. It's nothing in the world but a feeling we all inherited from Noah when he put on the greatest show on water for a run of forty nights and as many matinees all over the world. The smell of the gas jets and sawdust, the crack of the ring-master's whip, the ancient jokes of the clown, and the wonderful linguistic performances of the lemonade man are temptations that most of us strive to resist in vain.

For many weeks Houston has been posted with the bills and banners of Barnum and Bailey's show, and as the time drew nigh the small boy developed insomnia and an unusual affection for indulgent uncles and big brothers with money.

When the day came, the pleasure of anticipation developed into the rapture of attainment.

All men think of their boyhood days with fond remembrance when the circus comes. Even Susan B. Anthony falls into dreamy retrospection when she sees the animals walking in the parade two by two, and she recalls the time long, long ago when she first saw them go in out of the wet during that dreadful forty days and nights' rain.

* * * * *

The street parade at 10 o'clock was the best ever seen in Houston.

The procession was nearly twenty minutes passing a given point. The cages were new, and the horses, especially, were magnificent specimens of their kind. The animals exhibited were in good condition as a rule and some of them assumed to perfection their role of wild beasts. The lions, however, appeared to be old, and were mere wrecks of the king of beasts. The man who was in the cage with them cowing them down with his eagle eye deserves the attention of the S. P. C. A. This show has twenty elephants and but four tigers, but this should not discourage good democrats. It is a long time yet before the election. The pageant of the world's nations was immense. England, France, Germany, Turkey, Belgium, and other nations were represented by cavalry attired in the national uniform. America was properly represented by a float containing the Goddess of Liberty on a throne, Uncle Sam in front, sailors on the four corners, Jesse James and Richard Croker in the middle. Some Roman chariots came next. We admire the enterprise of Barnum and Bailey in this line, but we think they are carrying realism a little too far when they procure Roman matrons of the time of Marcus Aurelius to drive these chariots in our streets. Is the cigarette girl exhausted or Newport society all engaged, that they cannot furnish us with something better to look upon?

It is estimated by a level citizen that fully 15,000 human beings witnessed the street parade, and probably 800 or 900 populists.

The crowd awaiting the parade was the same old circus crowd. The streets were lined with pretty girls, dudes, merchants, clerks and country folks. The woman chewing gum and dragging around a howling kid was there; the woman with a baby carriage, receiving the curses and reviling of the crowd with her usual complacent smile, was there; the girl who ate popcorn and shrieked at every bite was there; the man who said it was the same old thing he had seen forty years ago was there.

A chilly wind was blowing, and a cold, drizzling rain falling, and one of the shivering Egyptians riding a camel bethought him of his sunny native home and said to one of his countrymen, "Bedad, and Oi wish Oi was in Donnegan's joint on T'irteenth Street long enough to put about half a point of the craythur under me shirt," and the sad-eyed Oriental at his left replied, "Py Cott, dot cold vint a man's pack sdrikes like der teyfel, aindt it?"

The Mr. Bailey of this show is not, as some people think, Mr. George Bailey of the _Dallas News_. Mr. George Bailey has nothing to do with the circus, except to write their bill posters.

At 1 o'clock the doors of the Ethnological Congress were thrown open, and the surging crowd went down into its pants pocket and drew forth the price. The performance in the circus tent began at 2.

The animal exhibit was first-class, and many of the boys who had had the d.t.'s recognized some old friends. In the center of the tent was an international bargain counter on which were displayed families of Hindus, Singalese dancers, Fiji Islanders, Ratmaliatmas, Samoans, etc.

The Post Man approached an intelligent-looking Samoan and said:

"Lovely and sad-hearted exile from the wave-kissed beach of Pacific's coral-stranded isle, dost thou not pine for thy beloved far-off home?"

The large Samoan cast a wistful glance at his questioner and said in his sonorous native tongue: "Cut it short, Cully. Yer can't razzle-dazzle me. Get a movelet on your joblots, or I'll give yer a wipe wid dis property battle-axe. See?"

This show has the distinction of carrying the most remarkable dwarf in the world. The owners offer a considerable reward for his equal. He is the largest dwarf now before the public, being nearly six feet in height.

* * * * *

The pious and stately man who takes the children to see the animals was very much in evidence. One of them, very sour-looking, with his coat buttoned up high, said to a small boy he was leading by the hand: "That animal you see, Willie, is the leopard, of which, as you know the Good Book says, 'he cannot change his spots.'"

"But he can, though, papa," said Willie. "A minute ago he was way over in that corner of the cage, and now he's up here in front."

"Do not be sacrilegious, my son," said the sour-looking man. "Come, let us go into the tent where Mademoiselle Meers is riding eight horses while in her famous Trilby pose. I wish you to study that noble animal, the horse."

Another starchy-looking man, with a plug hat and white tie, had four or five children with him. All paused a moment in the animal tent, and he said rapidly: "My dear children, these are lions, tigers, monkeys, elephants, hippopotamuses and camels. You are all familiar with them from the pictures in your story books. Let us now go into the other tent and view the human form, the noblest work of God, as Mademoiselle Matthews does her act upon the flying trapeze."

In the circus tent there were three performances taking place in as many rings at once. The acrobatic acts, tumbling and balancing were good. The "refined contortion act" by Miss Maude Allington and Mr. H. Wentworth was a revelation. Ladies and gentlemen who had heretofore regarded the contortion act as something low and vulgar were surprised and delighted with delicacy, tact and exquisite diplomatic finesse with which these thorough artists tied their legs behind their necks and did the split.

"Europe's greatest rider," Mr. William Wallett, was fine, and divided honors with Rider Haggard, the assistant author of the programme and show bills.

The ladies who were advertised to ride bareback more than fulfilled their promised feats. They were barebacked, and also bare--that is, were dressed something like surf bathers in Galveston.

Evetta, the only lady clown on earth, came into the ring and caused roars of laughter by putting her hands in her bloomer pockets and standing on one foot. She then did the excruciatingly funny thing of sticking out her tongue at the crowd. Then, after convulsing the audience by standing on the other foot, she retired. For that tired feeling, see Evetta, the only lady clown.

* * * * *

A man who had evidently come up the street on the saloon side went into the side show and seemed fascinated with the tattooed man from Borneo, who exhibited upon his person a great variety of ornamental designs, such as roses, landscapes, ballet girls, ships, etc. "Ladies 'n gent'l'men," he said, "come 'n shee zhis great phenomenon. Always wanted see livin' picshers. Zis fus' livin' picsher ever shee. Set 'em up all round; z'my treat."

The tattooed man leaned down and hissed in a low tone: "Say, stop dat song and dance and git a move on you, Cully, or I'll tump you one on de smeller. See?" =

* * * * *

It must be said of Barnum and Bailey's show that it is orderly and well conducted. The gang of swindlers, toughs and confidence men who generally follow circuses are not allowed to annoy the crowd. The tents are large and the accommodations good. Their immense business is conducted with perfect system and each man in the aggregation fills his place in producing the harmonious working of the whole.

* * * * *

The performance itself was only the average circus performance, with a great deal that was neither new nor remarkable, but with a feature here and there that was far above the ordinary even in that line. The trouble is in attempting to do too much. Had the programme been executed in the old style, in one ring, it might have been too long; but it would have impressed the public far more than when distributed among three rings. The spectator becomes bewildered and catches a good thing only now and then, while he misses possibly two or three other brilliant acts. There could have been no complaint for want of variety. There was a little of everything and all done at least with the usual skill of the circus performer.

Several innovations were introduced, among them a female ring master and a female clown. Trilby on horseback, a skirt dance on horseback, and a serpentine dance on horseback are others. The water carnival, an exhibition of high diving, somersaults into water and other aquatic sports is perhaps the newest circus idea. It is given in a lake of water, to use the fertile press agent's phrase, forty-two feet across and six feet deep. In the menagerie are a number of new animals, notably several new elephants, making the herd now number twenty-four. The Ethnological Congress is all new, and those who have seen the Midway Plaisances at the big fairs will be especially interested in this peripatetic plaisance, which contains a curious assortment of curious peoples. In its acrobatic department, the aerial swinging and leaping and high trapeze work were very fine indeed; and with the equestrian accomplishments of the Meeks sisters, particularly, when the two rode one horse, constituted the most meritorious parts of the performance. A notable feature also was the performance in the ring of a herd of elephants, among other things going through a quadrille. It is such a performance and, to quote the voluble agent again, such an aggregation of panoramic novelties, with much that is old, that the public generally will leave the big tents fully satisfied that they have received their money's worth.

(_Houston Daily Post_, Wednesday morning, October 30, 1895.)

Thanksgiving Remarks

A great many people who are skeptical on other subjects swallow Thanksgiving Day without questioning the validity of its title.

There are plenty of people in Houston who will sit at the table today, with their mouths so full of turkey and dressing that they will be utterly unable to answer the smallest question about the origin of this National festival.

The United States is the only country in the world that has a day of National thanksgiving in commemoration of one special event. Among the earliest settlers in this country, with the exception of cocktails, were the Pilgrim Fathers. They were a noble band of religious enthusiasts, who sailed from England to America in a ship called the _Mayflower_ after a celebrated brand of soap by the same name.

By good fortune and fast sailing they managed to reach America before Thanksgiving Day. They landed at Plymouth Rock, where they were met by Hon. F. R. Lubbock and welcomed with an address. It was a very cold, and not a good day for speeches, either.

This heroic little band of refugees were called Puritans in England, which is French for abolitionists. As they stood upon the bleak inhospitable shore, shivering in the biting blast, Captain Miles Standish, who had the stoutest heart and also the most jovial temper in the party, said: "Say, you fellows, can't you stop chattering your teeth and shaking your knees? There don't any of you look like you wanted to pass resolutions against burning anything just at present. You're a jolly-looking lot of guys."

Among the distinguished members of this band were William Bradford, Edward Winslow, John Alden, John Carver and Marc. Anthony, a nephew of Susan B.

According to the habits of true Americans, they had not been on land half an hour till they went into caucus to elect a governor.

John Carver carried around the hat and collected the ballots, and consequently was elected.

"Now," said Governor Carver, "I hereby announce my proclamation that next Thursday shall be Thanksgiving Day."

"What for?" asked Captain Standish.

"Oh, it's the proper thing," said the governor. "You'll find it in all the school books and histories."

Governor Carver then appointed a committee with Captain Standish as chairman to explore the country around.