Buchanan County bulletin. [volume] (Independence, Iowa) 1869-1891, 1870-04-22
THE JOSH BILLINGS PAPERS.


The ant is menny footed nsekt.
They live about one thousand five hun
dred and fifty of them (more or less in the
same hole in the ground, and hold their
property in common.
They have no holy days, no eight-hour
system, nor never strike for emmy higher
wages.
They are very cheerful little toilers, and
hav no malice, nor back door to their
hearts.
There IL no sedentary loafers among
them, and you never see one out ov a b.
They git up arly, 20 tew bed late, work
all the time, and eat on the run.
Yu never see two ants argueing sum
phoolish question that neither of them didn't
understand they didn't kare whether the
moon IL inhabited or not !: nor whether a
fish weighing two pounds. put into a pail ov
water alreddy phull, will make the pail slop
over or weigh more.
They amt hunting after the philoso-
piers stone, nor Citing crazy over the
cause OF the sudden earthquakes.
They don't care whether Jupiter is thirty
or thirty-6ve millions Of miles up in the air,
nor whether the earth bobs around on its
axes or not, So long rs it didn't bob over
their korn krib and SPILL their barley.
They are simple, little bizzy aun:s, full ov
faith, working hard, living prudently, COM
mi,ting no sin, prazeing God by minding
their own business, and dieing when their
time comes, tew make room for the nexl
| crop ov ants.
They are reproach tew the lazy, an en-
couragement tew the Industrious, rebuke
tew the vicious, and study tew the christ
ian.
| II you want tew take lesson in arhitek
ture, 60 and set down bi the side ov theil
hole in the ground, and wonder how SC
menny kan liv so thick.
| If your pashnnes needs consolashun,
watch the aunts and be strengthened.
If man had (added tew his capacity the
pashunes and grit ov theze atoms ov ami
mated natur, every mountain on the bozzun
ov the arth would, before this, have bin lev
elled, and every inch ov surface woult
scream with f,uitfulness, and countless lot;
| ov human critters would have bin addet
tew the inhabitants ov the universe, and biz
| fed on corn and other sass.
l hav sot by the hour and half down
near an ant.hill, and msrveed hav won
| dered at their instinkts, and hav thought
| how big must be the jsekass who was salts
| fed TO believe that even an ant, the least oy
the bugs, could have been created, made
bizzy, and sot to work by chance.
Oh, how do pity the individual who be.
leaves that all things here are the work oy
an acksident! He robs himself ov all plez.
zure on earth and all right in heaven.
had rather be an ant (even hunbly,
bandy-legged, profane, swearing ant, than
look upon the things oy this world az |
would upon the throw Of the dice.
Ants are older than Adam.
Man (for very wize reasons warn't built
until all other things we're finished and pro-
nounced good.
Ifa man had been made fust, he would
hav insisted upon bossing the rest OF the
job.
He probably would hav objekted to hav-
ing emmy little, bizzy aunts at all, and vari-
Gus other objekshuns would hev bin offer
ed, equally green.
am glad that man wuz the last thing
made.
If man hadn't hav bin made at all, you
never would have heard me find emmy faul,
with it.
haven't much faith in man, not bekauze
he kant do we'll, bu, bekauze he wont.
Ants hav bye-laws, and a constltushun,
and they mean sumthing.
Their laws aint like our laws, made with
q hole in them, SO that man kan steal a
boss and ride through them on walk.
They don't hav any whisky ring. that IL
write wous, simply bekauze it hooks bi the
millyun, and then legalizes its own ackts.
They don't hav emmy legislators that W
kan buy, nor emmy Judges, laying around
on the haif shell, reddy TO be swalIered.
! rather like the ants, aud think now
shall sell out mi money and real estate and
iine them.
had rather jine them than the bulls or
bears. l like their morals better.
The bulls and the bears handle more
money, it is true, and make q CRATE deal
more noize in Wall street, one ov them
sticking his horn into habby piece Of Erie,
and tossing it up into the air, and the other
ketching it when it comes down and tramp
l,ng it under Liz paws.
This may be phun for the bulls and the
bears, but iz wnss than the cholera morbusl
for poor Erie. :,
Ants never disturb Erie yu couldn't Sell
one eny Erie emmy more than you could sell
one skrip on the Goldfish banks OF Nufound'
land.
Ants are honest, hard tugging little peo.
pie, but whether they marry and live in
marriage, IL beyond my strength /; but ii they
don't they are no wuss oph than they are
out West (near the city of Chicago where
they marry to-day and apply for an injunk
sh On tomorrow, and are reddy the next da,
| to fife it out agin on some other line.
Wedlock GU, West (near the CRATE grain
mart, Chicago,) is one ov them kind Q,
locks ,ha, almost emmy body kan pick.-N
Y WeeEIu