The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1873-05-10

ERAL ROW THAT CARPET is WHIPPED
To YOUR HEARTS CONTENT.
The annual ceremony of taking up, whip
ping and putting down carpets is almost
upon us. 1t is one of the ills which flesh
is heir to, and cannot be avoided. You go
home some pleasant spring day, at peace
with the world, and find the baby with a
clean face, and you get your favorite pud-
ding for dinner. Then your wife tells you
how much younger you are looking, and
says she really hopes she can turn that
walking dress she wore last fall, and save
the expense of new suit, and then she
asks you if you can't just help her about
taking up the carpet. If you are a fool,
and you generally are by that time, you
tell her of course you can, just as well
as not. Then she gets saucer for the
tacks, and stands and holds it, and then
you get the claw and 60 down on your
knees and begin to help her. You feel
quite economical about the first three tacks,
and take them out carefully, and put them
in the saucer. Your wife is good about
holding the saucer and begulles you with
an interesting story about how your neigh
boris little boy is not expected to live till
morning. Then you come to the tack with
crooked head, and you get the claw under
it an the head comes off, and the leather
comes off, and the carpet comes off, and as
it wont do to leave the tack in the floor,
because it will tear the carpet when it is
put down again, you go to work and skin
your knuckles, and get silver under your
thumb nail, and tell your wife to shut up
about that everlasting boy, and make up
your mind that it does not m axe any diff
erence about that tack, and so you begin
on the corner where the carpet is doubled
two or three times, and has been nailed
down with a shingle nail.
You don't care continental about saw
ing the nail, because you find that it is
not good time for the practice of economy,
but you do feel little hurt when both
claws break off from the hamer, and the
nail does not bulge peg. Then your
manhood asserts Itself, and you rise in
your might. and throw ii lie carpet claw at
the dog, and get hold of the carpet with
both hands, and the air is full Of dust and
flying tacks, and there is fringe OF carpet
yarn all along the mop-board. and the baby
cries, and the cat goes anywhere, any where
out of the world, and your. wife says you
ought to be ashamed of yourself to talk so
but ahat carpet comes up. Then you
tries to get the carpet from under it, but
cant because you are standing on it. SO
YOU try new hold, and just after your back
breaks the carpet is clear. You are not
through vet. Your wife don't tell you any
more little st ,ries, but gets your old coat
and hangs it VI you and opens the back
door and shows YOU out, and intimates that
the carpet needs whipping. When you
hang the tormen ing thing across the
clothes line the wrong way, and get it
righted, and have it slide off into the mud.
and hang it up again, aud get nan pint
of dust and three broken tacks snapped
mouth by the wind, you make some obs "
vations which you neglected to mention
while in the house. Then you hunt up a
stick and 60 for that carpet
The first blow hides the sun, and all the
face of nature, behind cloud of dust. and
right in the centre of that cloud, with the
wind square in your face, no matter how
YOU sta nd, you weld that cudgel until both
hands are blistered. and the milk of hui
man kind ness curdles in your bosom
You can whip the carpet a longer or short
er period, according to the size of your
mad; it don't make any difference to the
carpet, it is just as dusty and fuzzy and
disagreeable after you have whipped it
two hours as it was when you commenced
Then you bundle it up, with one corner
dragging, and stumble into the house, and
have more trouble with the stove, and fail
to find any way of using the carpet stretch
er while you stand on the carpet, and fail
to find any place to stand off from the car
pet. and then you get on your knees again,
while your wife holds the saucer, and, with
blind confidence, hands you broken tacks,
tacks with no points. tacks with no heads,
tacks with no feathers, tacks with the
biggest end at the points. Finally the
carpet is down, and the baby comes back,
and the cat comes back, and the dog comes
back, and Your wife smiles sweetly, and
says she is glad that job is off her mind
AS it is too late to do anything else. you
sit by the fire and smoke, with the inner
consciousness that you are the meanesi
man in America. The next day you hear
your wife tell friend that she is SO tired
: he took up and put down that great heavy
ca, oct yesterday Utica (N. ~ Herald.