The Findlay Jeffersonian. [volume] (Findlay, Hancock County, Ohio) 1870-1881, 1872-08-30
glEisfellaneuns.
A DARK MYSTERY,
Jim. Blaine's Wonderful Story
BY MARX TWAIN.

a The boys used to tell me ! Ough
- to get at Jim Blaine to tell me tn
- stirring story OF his grandfather
T. old ram but they always adaed tina
l. l must not mention the matter unles
/. Jim was drunk at the time-just com
10 fortably and socially drunk. The
= kept this up until my curiosity wa
q on the rack to hear the story. l go
d to hunting Blaine; but 1t was OF nj
use; the boys always found faul'
with his condition; he was oftes
moderately but never satisfactorily
drunk. / never watched a mani
condition with such absorbing inter.
g est, such anxious solicitude; / never
so pined to see q man uncOmprcms
isingly drunk before. At last one
evening 1 hurried to his cabin for ]
learned that this tipae ,iis situation
was such that even the most fastid-
ious could .h1d no fault with it; he
was traQuilly, serenely symmetrical
lily drunk-not a hiccup to mar his
voice, not a cloud upon his brain
thick enough to obscure his memory.
As l entered, he was sitting upon an
empty powder keg, with a clay pipe
in one hand and the other raised to
command silence His face was
round, red, and very serious his
throat was bare and his hair tumbled
in general appearance and costume
he was stalwart miner Of the pc
riod. On the pine table stood can
die, and its dim hight revealed "the
boys" sitting here and there on hunks,
candle boxes, powder kegs, etc. They
said:
Ssh! Don't; he's going to COM
mence." found a seat at once, and
Blaine said:
81 don't reckon them times will |
ever come again. There never was a
more bullier old ram than what he
was. Grandfather fetched him from
Illinois; got him from a man named
Yates--Bill Yates-may be you
might have heard of him; his father
was deacon-8aptist-and he was
rustler, too; man lad to get up
ruther early to get the start OF old
Thankful Yates /; it was him that put
the Greens up to jining teams with
my grandfather when be moved West.
Seth Green was probably the pick of
the flock he married Wilkerson--
Sarah Wilkerson-goOd cretur she
was--one OF the likeliest heifers that
was ever raised in old Stoddard,
every body said that knowd her.
She could heft q bar'l of flour as
essy as / can airt flapjsck. And
spin? Don't mention it Independ-
emit Humph! When Sile Hawkins
came browsing around her, she let
him know that for all his tin he
couldn't trot in harness along side OF
her. You see, Sile Hawkins was
no, it vast Hawkins, after all /; it
was u galoot by the name Of Filkins
Il disremember his first name; but
he ,oas q stump--come into par'r-
meeting drunk one night, hooraying |
for Nixon becuz he thought it was q
primary; and old Deacon Ferguson
up and scooted him through the win
dow, and be lit on old Miss Jeffer-
sons head, poor old filly. She was a
good soul-had a glass eye, and used |
to lend it to Miss Wagner, that
hadn't any, to receive company in;
it warn't big enough, and when Miss
Wagner warn't noticing, it would get
twisted around in the socket, and
look up, may be, or out to one side,
and every which way, while t'other
one was looking as straight ahead as
q spyglass. Grown people didn't
mind it, but it most always made the
children cry, it was so sort of scary.
She tried packing it in raw cotton,
but it wouldn't work, somehow; the
cotton would get loose and stick ous
and look 80 kind OF awful that the
children couldn't stand it no way.
She was always dropping it out, and
turning up her old headlight on the
company empty, and making them
uncomfortable, becuz she never could
tell when it popped out, being blind
ON that side, you see. So somebody
would have to hunch her, and say,
Your game eye has fetched loose,
Miss Wagner, dear, and then all them
would have to sit and wait till she
jammed it in again--wrong side be-
fore, as q general thing, and green ss
birds egg, being bashful cretur
and easy sOt back before company.
But being wrong side before warn't
much difference any way, becuz her
own eye was sky blue, and the glass
one was yaller on the front side, so
whichever way she turned it it didn't
match nohow. Old Miss Wagner
was considerable on the borrow, she
was. When she had a quilting or
Dorcas S'iety at her house she gen.
ally borrowed Miss Higgins's wooden
leg to stump around on /; it was con-
siderable shorter than the other pin,
but much she never minded that. She
said she couldn't abide crutches when |
had company, becuz they we're so
slow said when she had company
and things had to be done, she want |
ed to get up and hump herself. She
was as bald ss jug, and go she used
to borrow Miss Jscobs's wig-Miss
Jacobs was the coffin peddler's wife
"a ratty old buzzard he was, that
used to go roosting around where
people was sick, waiting for them /; |
and there that old rip would sit all
day, in the shade, on coffin that he
judged would fit the candidate; and
if it was slow customer and kind OF
uncertain, he'd fetch his rations and
a blanket and sleep in the coffin
nights. He was anchored out that
way in frosty weather for about three
weeks once, before old Robbins's
place, waiting for Lin, and after
that, for as much as two years, Jacobs
was not on speaking terms with old
man, Oh account of his disappointing
him. lie got one of his feet froze, and
lost money, too, becuz old Roddlns
took q favorable turn and got well. Inc
next time Robbins got sick, Jacobs
tiled to make up with him, and var