The Louisiana cotton-boll. [volume] (Vermilionville [i.e. Lafayette], Attakapas, La.) 1872-1883, 1873-04-09
SANDY HIGGINS AND THE
WIDOW.

One day Sandy Higgins came into
my Office and sat down without a word.
For some minutes he sat still, watching
me intently, as if trying to make out by
the sound of my pen what l was
writing.
esquire, he said at length, "did I
ever tell you about my scrape with the
widow Horny up here on the river ?"
"Never did," said I, laying down my
pen ; "Iet's have it."
"They're curious creatures, widows
u.s." said he in a meditative tone, land
the more you study about 'em the more
you don't know anything about 'em.
What was this thing I've read about in
Egypt, or some other country, that no
body could unriddle?"
"The Sphinx, probably" I replied.
"Well," continued he, "that was a
widow as sure as you ever had a granny.
Everything else in the earth has been
found out but them, and they're as
much mystery to-day as the length of
the North Pole. You may read the his
tory of the world from Genesis to Reve-
~lations, and you'll find that widows
have been at the bottom or top of FIVE
quarters of all the devilment that has
ever been cut up. Was you ever in
love with one? ?"
"Lots of them" said I.
"You're a great gander-that's what
you are" said he. GA man that loves
one and gets over it won't never get bit
by another, if he's got as much sense
as a ground hog. don't consider that
I've got any sense at all, but I'm a little
too smart to let another of them get all
the trumps on me. The widow Horny
that I was speaking of is a little the
handsomest woman, I reckon, that ever
looked a man into fits, and I ought to
be a Judge, for I've seen lots of pretty
women in my day. She was about
twenty-five years when [ went up there
to work, just in the bloom of her beauty,
and as full of deviltry as a t~hree-year
old mule colt. There was a ball over
at Jenkins and of curse I went, for I
always go where there's any fun going
on, and generally act the fool before I
get away. OF course the widow was
there, dressed as fine as So1omon's
lilies, and flying around as frisky as a
young lamb in a rye patch. I got in
troduced to her and asked her to dance
with me, and when she flashed her eyes
at me and said yes I jumped up like
I had sat down on a hot griddle. You
may talk about sensation, but when she
took hold of my hand and I sorter
squeezed it, / felt a sensation as big as
a load of wood, and it kept running up
and down my back like a squirrel with
O hawk after him. I'm very fond of
dancing, but TIL be hanged if I knew
whether I enjoyed it that night or not,
for every time she took hold of my
hand I'd commence feeling curious be-
hind my ears and up and down my back
again, and then I wouldn't know
whether I was on earth or in a balloon,
or an a comet, anything about it. 1t
was undoubtedly a case of love at first
sight, and a powerful bad case at that.
For a wonder I got through the frolic
without making conspicuous or cutting
up any extras, as I am in the habit of
doing when I go into public I'd set
my pegs to go home with the widow
after the ball, but just as I was fixing
my mouth to ask her, up steps a big,
long, ~leather-faced doctor named Nab
ry, and walked her off before my eyes.