The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1866-05-12
STUCK FAsT.

/ that's an mex room nelQhbor-shows me
something wrapped up 10. hannel, all pink
and Greasy, and very suuiliy, as though it
wanted its nose blowing; which couldn't
be expected, for it hadn' got any to sig
nifty.
''Ain't it little beauty ?" she says.
Well, couldn't see as i was; but didn't
like to say so, for 1 knew my wife Polly
had been reckoning on What she said we
ought to have had moro year ago; so l
didn't like to disappoint,as for know she
| lay lstenin' in The mex Teom
Polly slRa5s sad t'sfs yer was such
9 baoy as that'ones add somehow it e0as
taking to see how her face used to lite up
all over smiles when she thought warn t
looking; and knew it was all on account
of the little 'un. She never said she felt
dull now; and when at home of night l
used to ding the little thing that was allus
being pushed in,o my face to kiss; when
best il ever I See such a voracious fun in
my life: it would hang on to you-nose,
| lip, snywheres-in minute.
One day, when it was about nine months
old, it was taken all of sudden like with a
fit. Polly screamed TO me to run for the
doctor; for i: happened that was on the
club that week, and at home with bad
band. run for him, and he soon come;
and then there was a warm bath ald medi
cine; but afterwards, when l saw the little
thing lying on Polly's lap so still and qui-
Ell, and with a dull film forming over its
eyes, / felt that something was coming,
though l dared not tell her; and about
twelve o'clock The little thing suddenly
started, stared wildly an instant, and then
il was all over.
My hand warn't bad any more that week
for it took all my time to try aud cheer up
my poor heart broken lass. She did take
on dreadful, night and day, night and day,
till we buried it; and then she seemed to
take quite change. and begged of me to
forgive what she called selfshness, and wi
ped her eyes once for all. as she said, and
talked about all being for the best. But
she didn't know that lay awake Oft night,
feeling her cry silently till the pillow was
soaked with tears.
We buried the little one on the Sunday,
and on Monday morning was clapped on
10 job that didn't much relish, for it
was the rebricking off, sewer that ran down
one of the main streets, quite fifty feet IN
dergrOuud.
After two years in London, I'd seen some
change, but this was my first visit to the
bowels of the earth I'd worked on drains
down in the country, but notin such a con-
Germ as this; why, Ii life guard might have
wal ed down it easy; so that there was plen
~ of room TO work. But lhen, mind you,
It amt pleasant work; there you go, down
ladder alter ladder, past gas pipes, and wa
ter pipes, and down and down, till you get
to the stretched across the part that you are
at work on, with tue daylight so high up,
as seen through boards and scaffOlds and
| ladders, that it's no use to you who are
working by the light of faring gas, There
in front of you is dark, black arch; and
there behind you is another; while under
feet the foul rushing water hurries along,
sending up a smell az turns your silver
watch, nd every sixpense and shilling you
nave in your pocket, black as the water
that swils bubbliDg along. Every word
! you speak sounds hollow and echoing,
while it goes whispering and rumbling
along the dark arch till you think it has
| gone, when all a. once you hear it again
quite plain in a way as would make you
jump as much as when halfa brick or a bit
o. hard mortar dropped into water.
But talk about jumping nothing made me
jump more than when a bit of soil, or a
stone, was loosened up above, end came
rafting down. I've seen more than one chap
change color; and / know it's been from
the thought that. suppose the earth csTed
/ in, where should we be F.? No doubt the
first crush in would do il, aud there'd be
an end of workmen and foremen; but there
seemed something VERY awful in the idea
of being buried alive.
Big as the opening was, when / went to
work, it made me shudder: there was the
earth thrown out; there was the rope at the
side; there was the boarding round; there
/ il was for all the world like big grave
same as I'd stood by on little scale the day
before; and, feeling a bit low-spirited. il
almost seemed as though / was going down
into my Own, never to come up any more
Very stupid and foolish ideas, says you
far fetched ideas. Very likely, but
that's what thought; and there are times
when men has VERY strange ideas; and I'll
tell you for fact that something struck me
when went down that hole as / shouldn't
come up it again; aud l didn't, neither
Why, the VERY feel o. the cold, damp
place made you think O. being buried, and
when a few bits Of earth came and ratified
down upon the stage above my head. as
soon as the first start was over, il seemed
T to me so like the rafting o. the earth but
few hours before upon little coffin, tha
something fell with pat upon my brigh
trowel, which, if it had been left, WoulC
ha' been a spot o. rust
Nothing like work to put fellow t
= I lsg,ok II r.
better. and the strokes o my trowel wen
ringing away down the sewer. as cut th
bricks in half; and after bit / almost fel
, inclined TO whistle; but l didn't, for 1 KEEP
on thinking of that solitary face at home
the face that always Enlightened u
when / went back, and had made such
Z r