Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1872-10-31
HALF AN HOUR WITH 4 MADMAN.

HALE AN HOT Ii With MAILMAN
1t is not at all pleasant thing to bt
locked 10 a room alone with vi0len
mailman, especially if he should harper
TO be armed with u long, sharp knife, anc
you yourself are altogether destitute o
means Of defense. Yet such was once
my case; and the reader may, perhaps, bt
somewhat interested in learning how
such an awkward adventure came tC
pass.
In the year 1859, had great deal OF
professional business to transact in Der
mondsey, q district of South London
and had occasion to spend many hours
every day among the not very pleasant
streets and lanes Of that locality. Not fa1
from the old church there is a sort OF
very narrow street or lane, called Grange
Walk
1t was in summer time-I think about
July or August-when one evening | re.
Ceiyed a message which made it needfuI
for me to call in person, the next morn
ing, at a certain house in Grange Walk
A letter and some books were to be left
for me at the house of man named
Smith; and as ! had some calls to make
close by, il would of course cost me little
time or trouble to fetch the parcel nay.
self
Now, Grange Walk is not a very pleas.
ant street. although it, is by no means so
bad as many Others near to it. There are
not SO many dirty, half-naked children
playing in the cutters, or so many untidy,
slipshod women leaning at the dO0r-ways
or gossiping on the sidewalk, as in some
other streets hard by; in fact for the
neighborhood, it is a very respectable
street in its way. ! should not have OBJ
iectcd to pass through it at midnight and
in the daytime no one would certainly
expect it to be the scene of any unpleas
ant adventure. So thought little about
the matter until the next morning, when,
having completed the other business
which had in hand, | turned my steps
toward Grange Walk.
The first difficulty which | experienced
was in finding the house The gentleman
who had written 10 me was a clergyman,
and, as every one knows, tl,o clergy, in
common with other professional men, of
ten write a very bad and indistinCt hand,
The gentleman in question was no eXCep-
ton to this rule His letters always look
ed Just rs if he had tished a large spider
out of an inkstand, and had allowed it to
crawl over clean sheet Of paper. You
could lust make out one sr two letters in
most of the longer words, and as | was
accustomed to read bad writing, and his
in particular, | generally Contrived, with
the aid of little guessing, to make out
the sense CT what he had written, In the
present case, the name smith was pref.
ty clear, but the number of Mr.. Smiths
house was by no means so. 1t might have
been intended for IL, or p, or II, or in
fact almost anything. Still, as Grange
Walk is not very large place, | anticipa-
ted less trouble in discovering the abode
Of Mr.. Smith than | actually experienced
The houses were old, rickety affairs, many
of them buing buito wood; and as most
of the doors had for many years been in
nOcent of new coat Of paint it was no
easy matter to find what the numbers
were which had originally been painted
on them. Besides which, by new postal
arrangement, they had all been newly re-
numbered, and the numbers all ran the
wrong wav-100 being where originally
was, and next to 100 came No. %, and so
on, while on most of the doors two or
three very different numbers were marked
IN chalk, as ii the people living there
had been accustomed to alter them every
few days, without taking the trouble to
= obiterate the old ones ! saw that it was
quite useless to try to unravel the diff
Guilty myself, so | applied 10 some Of the
natives for assistance. This seemed only
TO make matters worse, for while one
would strenuously assert that such a
house bore such a number, another as
sl0utly maintained an opinion diametri-
CilIy opposite. Then, too the name
"Smith" was such a very common one,
that almost every one | asked seemed to
know an infinite number Of persons bear.
ing that designation all Of whom were
living in or about Grange Walk; and the
difficulty was to choose from among such
conflicting claims the proper person-to
find not Smith, for the street appeared
full of them, but the Smith. However,
after exercising no small amount i
patience, and calling at the houses OF
d dozen gentlemen of that name, while a
dozen or more Of people chiefly women,
whom | had asked to direct me, were
watching me from as many open doors,
from whence they sometimes shouted to
me across the street 10 try such or such a
house, at last, by dint of great per.
severance, | arrived at the house Of him
whom believed to be the true and veIi-
table Smith-the real Smith, Knocking
with my stick at the open door of very
old, wooden house of three or four sto.
ries in height, | asked a dirty, sOvenly
woman who made her appearance after
the fifth knock, whether Mr.. Smith lived
there.
ooh, yes, she said, "Mr Smith, poor
man, he do live here
stated that | wished to see him, and
after hesitating a few moments, and eye
ing me all over, she said, in a peculiar
way, and with a sort Of smile which | dit
not understand
We'll, sir, ne lives, do Mr.. Smith, OF
the third floor, in the front room, but It'll
seldom he do see any one at all
con, never mind that, | answered
IN 20 up and try, for | think he ha
something to say to me. "
then ran upstairs, little noticing th,
look Of interest with which the woman
looked after me. and understanding
stu .tss ] had supposed from the let
ter That Mr.. Smith occupied the whole q
The house but this Smith, if the true one
Wa evidently only alodEer, living in on
Io@m and ] rather wondered that m
friend should hayc lief, the letters an,
books there. The front room on the thir,
h5Ur was very readily found, and
tapped at the door. Il was ouened hy
TAI. gaunt. but powerfully built man
whose appearance was certainly yer,
"t.a-sdcA i MAJ as you would not car
u &c with in the dark. Bat it was broat