The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1871-03-07

| to secure the privilege of the hotel TO him, on
condition that he should receive n share Of
| the profits and so he introduced Gouge Junior
| TO the President, who saw no objection t0 the
scheme, provided he had another share In
the profits. SO the President and the two
Gouges share the profits of the hotel between
them. In the same way he secured valuable
railway contract for the leading Democrat In
| Van Snookville, upon the understanding thas
he should command the whole vote whenever
| he required il, few refractory Democrats
being s'squared" with srnall shares in the con-
tract, aud the whole helping to swell the
| political influence of the President of the
! V. S. and b. H. B. r., who received besides a
large pecuniary share in the profits of the
contract And so Gouge quietly stopped
with his twenty Thousand dollars from
being station-master into the proprietor
| ship of the Ivan Snookville Democrat,
which paper he worked so successfully for
The interest of the railway aud the Demo
cratic party in general aud himself in par
ticulsr. that when the Van Snookvile Ma
tioDal Bank started, the voice of public
opinion unanimously pointed TO Gouge a.
! president; and Gouge finding himself, to uss
his own words, reluctantly forced into this
! position of responsibility and prominence by
his appreciatIve fellow-to wnsmen" (who are
by this time so completely cowed by him
! that they are afraid to call their
ing institution, the First National
Bank of Van Snookville, as he did the Wild
cat, entirely for his own benefit. Is there
any wonder, therefore, that, though the ma
! jority If the population of Van Snookville is
Republican, by some mysterious dispensation
| the vote of the town is always largely Demo-
! cratic? for could not Gouge who is Presi-
dent of the First National Bank, Director of
the V. S. and b. II. b. r., town supervisor,
proprietor of the cyan Snookville Demo-
crat, part proprietor of the Van Suookvlle
Railway Hotel, and joint owner with his son,
who runs it, of the principal store in the viii
Iage, with one-haf of the population in debt
tJ bis bank, aud the other half dependent
in some form or other ON the V. s
and Il. II b R.-could not Gouge, [
say, bring such terrific pressure to bear upon
| any luckless individual who ventured to tn wart
bis sovereign will, that life i'm Van Saookville
would be burden to him? If Gonge want to
| force public road across mans field all
he has to do is to tell the Judge, who owes
his election to Gonges Influence, that he had
better appoint assessors prepared to clay
! the road thus, and de- his (Gouges) will or he
| need never more hope to dispense Justice in
that peighbolhood. Gouge's life seems bent
on the invebtion of political and social screws,
! and Instruments of moral torture; aud as
all the functionaries are elected, and he prac-
! tica]ly controls the elections, he manages to
work the electors aud the elected against each
other with such alroitness, that the power hs
wields may he said to be absolute. Provi
dentally Congo drinks! Van Snookvlle, as
ungratefnl as her rival Paris, to the man to
whom she owes, il not her beauty, at least
her prosperity-Van Spookville less bold
than her ''irreconciabe" sister, il afraid
to vote ''Do" against her oppressor,
but finds a grateful solace in the conso-
latory reflection that he drinks. For week
OF xuh,, ,1,x,r
rule over us. Then Swomp who is perpetual
arch. grand knight of the Good Templars, ral-
lies his SONS of temperance, and the leading
church members enter into deep mysteri ous
coDclaves as to the best means of riddiu O
themselves from the hated yoke of Gouge.
The old man and Swomp sink their reli-
gious and trading aninIosities to combine
against the common enemy; aud holy all-
| ance is formed bet eeen the Methodists and
Baptists, which results in the announcement
that Splurge, the great revivalst preacher,
| VIII shortly arrive, to quicken the slum-
! bering c)nsciences of the Van Snookvil-
| ieites; and the junior members of the
cemmunity, of both sects and sexes
look forward with some little hutter of ex-
citement TO the prospect of IA protracted
meeting" and unlimited opportunities of
tiItalion. 1t is hoped that ny tremendous
effort of religion and morality Gouge may be
crushed. did not take any part in the re-
Nlval myself, because Dole did not approve
Of it, and she only allowed Orange Zee to
! go because he said he ought to be there in
his capacity of town constable; but his real
| object was to act as soy upon Swomp aud
the old man, and report their machinstions
against Gouge to that accomplished operator
and boon-c companion Orange Zee you see, did
not believe that the great Gouge could be
crushed, even by Splurge, although that
distinguished divine hkened him to a roaring
lion seeking whom he could devour, and
called upon his hearers to ''fiee from him and
his contracts, and his newspaper and his
hotel, and his store, and all his works"
During the fortnight that the pro-
tracted meeting lasted, all farming ope-
rations were suspended. 1t took place at
Il season of the year when work
was not pressing, and day
after day wagon-loads of old
and young of both sexes in their best COS
tune, drove up alternately to the Methodist
and Baptist churches; and the voice of
Splurge might be heard for some distance
down the village street exhorting his hearers
10 come forward to ''the mourners' bench ="
Here those who had been most powerfully
acted upon made their confession aud their
profession, aud from that time forward they
were said to have ''got" or experienced reli-
! gioD." The exact number of persons who
'got religion" during this visit of Splurga's
was afterwards published among those inte-
resting heart statistics, If L may be allowed
The phrase, which are to be found in those
spare columns which the religious journals do
not devote to abusing each other. 1t
is quite an interesting study to turn over iile
| of these, and add up the total of broken aud