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jist nat’ly wasted away till she was
nothin’ but skin and bone, and she
died; but, poor creater, she died
mighty happy; and I think, in my
heart, she made the prettiest corpse,
considerin’, of anybody I most ever
seed.
Mrs, R. and Mrs. S. Emph! (sol
emnly).
(Mrs. R. What did the doctojrs
give her for the fever and ager?
Mrs. B. Oh, they gin’ her a ’bun
dance o’ truck; I don’t know what
all. But at last she got over it,
somehow or other. If they’d have
jist gin’ her a sweat o’ bitter yerbs,
jist as the spell was cornin’ on, it
would have cured her right away.
Mrs. R. Well, I reckon sheep-saf
fron the onliest thing in natur for
the ager.
Mrs. B. I’ve always hearn it was
wonderful in hives and measly ail
' ments.
Mrs. R. Well, it’s just as good
for an anger; it’s a powerful sweat.
Mrs. Clarkson told me, that her cou
sin, Betsy’s aunt Sally’s Nancy, was
cured sound and well by it, of a hard
shaking ager.
Mrs. S. Why, you don’t tell me
so!
Mrs. R. Oh. bless your heart, hon
ey, it’s every word true; for she
told me so with her own mouth.
Mrs. S. A hard, hard shakin’
ager!
Mrs. R. Oh, yes, honey; it’s the
truth.
Mrs. 8. Well, I’m told that if
you’ll wrap the inside skin of an egg
’round your little finger, and go three
days reg’lar to a young persimmon,
and tie a string ’round it, and every
day tie three knots in it, and then
not go ag’in for three days, that the
ager will leave you.
Mr§. B. I’ve often hearn o’ that,
but I don’t know about it. Some
people don’t believe in it.
Mrs. S. Well, Davy Cooper’s wife
told me she didn’t believe in it; but
she tried it, and it cured her sound
and well.
% Mrs. R. I’ve hearn of many folks
bein’ cured in this way. And what
did they do for Lucy’s cough, Mis’
Barney?
Mrs. B. Oh, dear me, they gin’
her a powerful chance o’ truck. I
reckon, first and last, she took at least
a pint o’ lodimy.
Mrs. S. and Mrs. R. The Law!
Mrs. 8. Why, that ought to have
killed her, if nothing else. If they’d
jist gin’ her a little cumfy and ale
campane, stewed in honey, or sugar,
or molasses, with a little lump o’
mutton-suet or butter in it, it would
have cured her in two days, sound
and well.
Mrs. B. I’ve always counted cum
fry and alecampane the lead of all
yerbs for colds.
Mrs.’ 8. Horehound and sugar’s
’mazin’ good.
Mrs. B. Mighty good, mighty good.
Mrs. R. Powerful good. I take
mightily to a sweat of sage tea in
desperate bad colds.
Mrs. 8. And so do I, Mis’ Reed.
Indeed, I have a great leanin’ to
sweats of yerbs, in all ailments, sich
as colds, and rheumaty pains, and
pleurisies, and sich; they’re wonder
ful good. Old brother Smith came
to my house from Bethany meeting
in a mighty bad way with a cold and
a cough, gJid his. throat and nose all
stopped up; seemed like it would
’most take his breath away; and it
was dead o’ winter, and I had noth
in’ but dried yerbs, sich as camomile,
sage, pennyryal, catmint, horehound,
and sich; so I put a hot rock to his
feet, and made him a large bowl o’
catmint tea, and I reckon he drank
most two quarts of it through the
night, and it put him in a mighty fine
sweat, and loosened all the phleem,
and opened all his head; and the next
morning, says he to me, says he,
Sister Shad—you know he’s a migh
ty kind spoken man, and always was
so ’fore he joined society; and the
old man likes a joke yet right well,
the old man does; but he’s a mighty
good man, and I think he prays with
greater lifity than most any one of
his age I most ever seed, don’t you
think he does, Mis’ Reed?
Mrs. R. Powerful.
Mrs. B. Who did he marry?
Mrs. S. Why, he married—stop,
I’ll tell you directly. Why, what
does make, my old head forget so?
Mrs. B. Well, it seems to me I
don’t remember like I used to. Did’nt
he marry a Ramsbottom?
Mrs. R. No. Stay; I’ll tell you
who he married presently. Oh, stay!
why, I’ll tell you who he married!
He maried old Daddy Johnny lloo
er’s da’ter, Mournin’.
Mrs. 8. Why, la messy on me, so
he did!
Mrs. B. Why, did he many a
Hooer?
Mrs. 8. Why, to be sure lie did.
You know Mournin’.
Mrs. B. Oh, mighty well; but I’d
forgot that brother Smith married
her; I really thought he married a
Ramsbottom.
Mrs. R. Oh, no; bless your soul,
honey, he married Mournin’.
Mrs. B. Well, the law me; I’m
clear beat!
Mrs. S. Oh, it’s so; you may be
sure it is.
Mrs. B. Emph, emph, emph, emph!
And Brother Smith married Mourn
in’. Well, I’m clear put out! Seems
to me I’m gittin’ mighty forgetful,
somehow.
Mrs. 8. Oh, yes; he married
Mournin,’ and I saw her when she
joined society.
Mrs. B. Why, you don’t tell me
so!
Mrs. 8. Oh, it’s the truth. She
didn’t join till after she was married,
and the church took on mightily
about his marrying one out of society.
But after she joined they all got
satisfied.
Mrs. R. Why, la me! the seven
stars is ’way over here!
Mrs. B. Well, let’s light our pipes,
and take a short smoke, and go to
bed. How did you come on raisin’
chickens this year, Mis’ Shad?
Mrs. S. La messy, honey! I have
had mighty bad luck. 1 had the pret
tiest parcel you most ever seed till
the varment took to killin’ ’em.
Mrs. R. and Mrs. B. The varment!
Mrs. S. Oh, dear, yes. The hawk
catched a powerful sight of them;
and then the varment took to ’em
and nat’ly took to ’em ’fore and aft,
bodily, till they left most none at
all hardly. Sucky counted ’em up
t’other day, and there warn’t but
thirty-nine, she said, countin’ in the
old speckle* hen’s chickens that jist
come off of her nest.
Mrs. R. and B, Humpb-h-h-h!
THE WEEKLY JEFFERSONIAN.
Mrs. R. Well, I’ve had bad luck,
too; Billy’s hound dog broke up all
my nests.
Mrs. B. Well, so they did me,
Mis’ Reed. I always did despise a
hound dog upon the face of yea’th.
yea’th.
Mrs. R. And them thta was hatch
est, squallinest, thievishest things ever
was about one; but Billy will have
’em, and I think in my soul his old
Troup’s the beat of all creators I
ever seed in all my born days, a
suckin’ o’ hen’s eggs. He’s clean
most broke me up entirely.
Mrs. 8. The lackaday! hr
• Mrs. R. And then that was hatch
ed out, some took to takin’ the gaps,
and some the pip, and one ailment
or other, till they most all died.
Mrs. 8. Well, I reckon there must
be somethin’ in the season this year
that ain’t good for fowls; for Lar
kin Goodman’s brother, Jimmie’s
wife’s aunt Penny, told me she lost
most all her fowls with different sorts
of ailments, the like of which she
never seed before. They’d jist go
’long lookin’ right well, and tilt
right over backwards (Mrs. B. The
law!) and die right away (Mrs. R.
Did you ever!) with a sort o’ some
thin’ like blind staggers.
Mrs. B. and Mrs. R. Messy on
me!
Mrs. B. I reckon they must have
eaten somethin’ didn’t agree with
them.
Mrs. S. No, they didn’t, for she
fed ’em every mornin’ with her own
hands.
Mrs. B. Well, it’s mighty cu
rious.
A short pause ensued, which was
broken by Mrs. Barney with, “And
Brother Smith married Mournin’
Hooer!” It came like an opiate upon
my senses, and I dropped asleep.
The next morning, when we rose
from our beds we found the good la
dies sitting round the fire just as I
left them, for they rose long before
us.
Mrs. Barney was just in the act
of ejaculating, “And Brother Smith
married Mournin’—” when she was
interrupted by our entry into the
dining-room. We were hardly seat
ed before Mrs. Reed began to verify
her promise. “Mr. ,” said
she to Ned, “didn’t you say, last
night, that them was two men that
got married to one another?”
“Yes, madam,” said Ned.
“And didn’t you say they raised
a fine parcel of children?”
“Yes, madam, except Billy. I said,
you know, that he was a little wild.”
“Well, yes; I know you said Billy
wasn’t as clever as the rest of them.
But we old women were talking about
it last night after you went out, and
none of us could make it out how
they could have children; and I said,
I reckoned you wouldn’t mind an old
woman’s chat; and, therefore, that
I would ask you how it could be? I
suppose you won’t mind tellin an
old woman how it was?”
“Certainly not, madam. They
were both widowers before they fell
in love with eachother and got mar
ried.”
“The lackaday! I wonder none
of us thought o’ that, and they had
children before they got married?”
“Yes, madam; they had none af
terwards that I heard of.”
We were here informed that* our
horses were in waiting, and we bade
the good ladies farewell.
BALDWIN.
It K H
ALGER AND McKINLEY.
The Milwaukee Journal publishes
a statement said to have been given
by the late Russell A. Alger, to be
withheld till his death. It is to the
effect that while President McKinley
three times refused Alger’s resigna
tion as secretary of war when he was
under grave accusations of incompe
tency or worse, a mere political al
liance by Alger with Governor Pin
gree against Senator McMillan sc
“annoyed and embarrassed” the
president that he had Vice-president
Hobart see Alger about it, and after
ward in person practically demanded
that the “alliance” cease. McMillan,
the statement says, was regarded by
Mr. McKinley as a strong adminis
tration man, though, as Alger recalls
he supported Thomas B. Reed for the
nomination.
The story strangely confirms the
popular notion of the whole Algei
episode. Having yielded his own am
bition to be president and delivered
the votes of Michigan, Alger took his
reward in the war portfolio. Having
entered the cabinet, not as an effi
cient man for the place, but as a pol
itician, his shortcomings as a depart
ment chief were overlooked, but his
alleged disloyalty as a politician was
regarded as serious. Alger says Mc-
Kinley had many engaging qualities
but “lacked backbone.” McKinley’s
estimate of Alger is not available.
* It
INTERESTING ITEMS.
The mines of the world employ
about 3,300,000 men.
Taking the statistics for the entire
world four and a half persons to the
thousand are either deaf, dumb, blind
or mentally deficient.
The contractors who are boring a
tunnel through Lookout Mountain for
the Southern Railway report that 3»-
600 feet have been completed during
the thirteen months and fifteen days
of operations.
Benjamin F. Shively of Indiana takes
the field as an aspirant for second
place on the Democratic national ticket
in 1908. but the printing of his name
as Shiverly makes a frosty opening
for his boom.
Up to date it costs an alien $35 in
fees to become a nationalized Briton,
and he must wait five years and then
produce evidence as to character. A
government bill is to be Introduced to
reduce the fees probably to $5.
M
George Trollope, an English actor
of considerable note, has forsaken the
stage and will enter the Catholic
priesthood. Strange as it may seem,
the first play in which he appeared
was "The Sign of the Cross.”
•e
The late Hamilton Aide was a cu
riously versatile man. He was the au
thor of many novels, verses and es
says; he was a more or less popular
composer; he turned out divers suc
cessful dramatic pieces and he paint
ed landscapes described as pleasing.
The blood of antipathetic races was
in his veins. He was the son of an
English mother and an Armenian-
Greek father.
11