Mower County transcript. [volume] (Lansing, Minn.) 1868-1915, 1869-07-15
6eueral SntelliQemte.
SHIRTS AND THELlTTLE HEATREN.
l Melancholy Mistake.

BY JOHN QUILL.
'.But they must have clothes, Mr.. Will
kins."
mo they mustn't It's ridiculous non.
sense for any collection of old women like
your sewing society to start out lot OF
buds and things to the heather in Africa.
tbs confounded stupid. shy. What do
you suppose lot Of old cotfee-colored pa.
gans, stepped in ignorance and vice, want
with shirts Hey? Why they don't want
'em. They We're born without ;em
weren't they? And if it was right for them
to have clothes don't You suppose they
would have had EN-? Don't You suppose
benihcient nature knows better than you
and all the other heifers down at the sew
ing bee? Why, it absolutely redic--
Wilkins you shan't talk that way
'.It's perfectly ridiculous. But do you
90 on; you 90 on and send them over there
to Africa, and do you know what will hap.
pen? Do you know what will be the re.
suit of your tom-foolery! Why the very
first thing you know some benighted heath
en- or other will go and mount one of those
shirts some night, and paddle around in
the dark and scare the other heather and
make them believe in ghosts and set the
whole continent Of Africa to falling down
and sacrificing themselves to a lot of old
nine headed idols, and jsbbering away Ut
their pagan prayers. You've got sin enough
on your soul old woman, without that
want you to understand"
MIR. Wilkins, you are too contemplate
to notice." =
Eyes, and I'd just like to know what m
ignorant heather knows about shirts any
howl $,F2 i ~ :,
''Why, absolutely nothing, and very like
~ the first fellow that tries to get into. one
will get it on upside down, and mix his
legs all up in the sleeves, aud get himself
into tangle aud trip up. and fall over
some precipice or other, and then there
will be tho responsibility for . mangled
man added to your list of crimes, But Id
like you to bear in mind that you don't
send any Of my wardrobe out there. don't
want parcel Of Ethiops sporting around
on Afric's sunny shore in my linen, Not
exactly. like to see men enjoy themselves
but not in that indecent style.
but, Mr.. Wilkins--"5 "a
Pretty spectacle it will be now, won't
simple but chaste garb Of white shirts sit
ting along q bench in Sunday School wrig-
Cling their toes, or else enjoying themselves
at recess singing ham, fat and doing the
walk around That pretty way to civil
ize heather land, amt it p? For they
won't wear any pants you observe. If you
go shipping a lot Of pants over there the
first thing you know they will have them
tackled on to some idol or other or rammed
full of feather, and holding religious ser
vice before each pant, and as, for socks,
why every sock as has ever been sent over
there has been stuffed with sand, and used
as war club. That's so, and I've no
doubt that very identical pair your knit
ting on now will brain a stray pagan some
day or other in some muss." =.
''Mr. Wilkins yOa know that's ,not,so."E
If you want to do your. celored, friends
q service, why don't you go to work and
ship them lot of the delicacies of the sea-
son? Why don't you ship ship load of
canned missionaries, or something else
that will make their mouths water? Or you
might collect an assortment ofsecond- hand
jaw bones, aud give them to them for neck
laces or send out your own false teeth,
'Wilkins I'll scratch"
"Or go yourself and see how it feels to
be eaten. Iwent stop you. You've got
my permission, You understand. But I
pity the poor pagan that stufis himself with
you. You won't agree with him. You
never did with me, my love.
"Mr. Wilkins, you. are brute"
':But for my part I think you had better
instead of fooling down there ct that society
with lot of tabbies, who SANDER their
neighbors, and make more mischief than
they do underclothes for the naked Hotten.
tots"
"Mr. Wilkins, that's not So" T.
You'd better stay at home and sew for
your family, that's what you had better do.
There's William Henry going round for
six weeks or more with only one 'gallus on
his pants, and looking as if he was a, de-
formed cripple with only one shoulder a
foot higher than the other, while his stock
ings have no feet, and the upper part of
them keep working up his leg until tho boy
nearly goes mad" i,-
"What an awful story, Wilkins" .,,.,int
"And Bucephalus Alexander's best Sun
day jacket has burst out all over in spots,
and Breckenridge Augustus, having run out
of handkercheifs has lately been practising
wiping his nose on his sleeve in church,
was SO mortified that had to take him
out last Sunday and have him stood in the
coal-hole and spanked like the nation by
the sexton. Unaffected simplicity is all well
enough in its way, but that's carrying it q
little to far" .r
"Mr Wilkins, you know that's not true "
"And, as for Mary Jane, she just is going
straight to destruction. She's got to imita-
ting your example, and now she thinks it
amt worth while to live if you can't do
something for the heather. So what did
she do Yesterday but go and give my best
high hat to the boy who swept the chimney
ov1 ~ roor1v, 101us1 IN hio xuoio< on1
asked him if he Had ever read Dr.. McPher-
sons treatise on the ssWhole Duty of Man, -
and he observed that he didn't know nuf-
fin about dat dar, he reckon" and while
she went up stairs to get it for him he en-
bezzled two chunks of corned beef and o
cold potatoe, and the first thing You know
he will be in the penitentiary, and all along
of your blamed foolishment.''
Il declare Mr.. Wilkins you are scandu-
lous story teller" j. =. o.
''And there's the boys, it was only last
Saturday that they took their crowd up
stairs and played the garnet was Africa, and
half of them represented heather, and ran
around without stitch of clothes OH Cl,ena,
and Bucephalus Alexander he distributed
my clean shirts among them, and they up
set all the barrels, fired away my old books
in q, skirmish with tie savages, and one OF
them that was the cannibal, like to gnawed
the whole thumb off William Henry, trying
to swallow him because he said he was q
missionary and it amt we'll yet"
':Pshaw, Mr.. Wilkins, you talk like a.
'.And then what must Mary Jane do, but
to represent heather mother; wholly I'M
enlightened by Christianity trying to drown
her infant in the sacred river which was
represented by sousing the cat in the bath
tub, but that animal wouldn't play fair, and
liked to scratch the whole hide off of her,
while she let the water run until the loom
was full, and it poured like a perfect cas-
would represent the overlooking Of the Nile,
like she read in.her Sunday school lesson.
I say it's perfectly outrageous to bring up
your children in that kind of style, If you
love the heather, why go among them. but
don't 60 poisoning the minds ofyour inno'
nocent offspring"
GAS long as you've made such fuss
about the sewing circle, MIR. Wilkins I'll
tell you what have been making there. "
ssYou needn't mind, don't want to hear
it. I'm tired Of hearing you talk. just
give me chance to speak word now, will
you ?"
20 don't but me; won't listen to you.
II wasn't sewing for the heather"
tWhat?'
II didn't stick o stitch for the heather
at the sewing-cifcle
"Well, what in the mischief were you
fooling your time away down there for,
then ?''
"Why-I-was-maki ng-you-.a-dozen
new-shirts- while you-were-ab abusing
-me-you'll break my heart-yes, you
will -