New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1873-08-22
THE AERIAL COW.


playful Western tornado. UnannOunced by
the Weather Bureau, coming directly from
viewless space, and balefully descending upon
some peaceful and remote Western hamlet, 1t
is even now striking terror TO bucolic settle
ments, and furnishing awe-insplrlpg para
graphs to an unfettered country press. And
well it may. For it comes with hail whose
feeblest specimens are as large as hens eggs ;
it comes with " fire-balls," variousy colOred,
and peculiarly appalling to the rustic infant (;
il comes with torrents of water gratultously
offensive to the Western adult Albeit coming
in this large, whole-souled way, its path is
generally narrow and restricted, and it is
Obliged to compensation within a width OF
few hundred feet-the entire range of mete-
geological phenomena. Within this narrow
space hail hurtles, fre-balls glare, and Whlrl-
winds waltz, and the performances usually
conclude with a general walk-round of the
clements, and shower of frogs and other
amphibia. Blood that upon examination proves
to be infusoria occasionally lends an air 'ot
novelty to the general precipitation. and yet
we believe, as a general thing, the Western
editor is not happy.
For there is, so to speak, q certain regu-
larity and sameness about the programme.
The Western tornado exhibits a steady ma
levolence toward barns, outhouses, farm
wagons, and agricultural implements-seldom
if ever emitting hayrick from its schedule
of damages-that is, in the end, monotonous
and depressing. Then there is the usual
family just taking dinner or supper, on whom
the tornado swoops like an unlimited guest,
and carries their roof into another township;
there is the usual farmer who, being over
taken in the fields by the storm, is compelled
into waltz with his own agricultural impie-
ments, and then is dropped some hundred
wards away-a sadder and, let us hope, a
wiser man. Then there is the baby, torn
shrieling from its mothers arms and lodged
in a tree top, where, rocked like the infant OF
the nursery legend, it is afterward found UNI
harmed. Then there is the COW; but let us
speak of the COW as we find her, the gentle,
unobtrusive, prosecuted heroine of the West
ern tornado.
1t may be safely observed that of all dOmes
tic animals probably the COW is least fitted for
aerial lOcomotion. Her shape, her sedentary
habits her reflective turn of mind, her eau
tious temperament, and the embarrassing func
lions of maternity might be supposed to indi-
cate that she was incapable of soaring like
the eagle or skimming like the swallow. Even
on land, her saltatory performances are not
remarkable for grace of movement or rapidity
of action. 1t is true that it has been pOeti
cally stated that she once leaped over the
moon, but the narrative, weighted as it is by
even more improbable statements regarding an
equal levity in dog, dish and spoon,
sbould be received with great caution. Yet
notwithstanding this, with the hand of Nature
and of Fate clearly against her, it is the COW
that becomes an essential feature of the great
Western tornado. 1t is she that "rides on the
"whirlwind and directs the storm" 1t is she
that patiently Eliminating in the meadow, or
standing mid-leg deep in some quiet
pool is first swooped upon by the gy
rating whirlwnd and borne aloft only
to add another terror to the storm. Once lifted
from her native earth she assumes an awful
ness of demeanor strangely inconsistent with
her previous mildness, levity in CHASTITY con-
trast to her former dignity. Accompanied by
few trees, a roof or two, an assortment of
chimneys, and baby, she flashes like meteor
across the darkling prairie, and comes down
heavily upon the distant settlement. 1t is
then that the citizens of Indiana and Iowa call
on the rocks to cover them. She cOllides with
steeples; chmneys she scattereth like chat
before the wind she esteemeth hay-ricks as
stubble; even school-houses stay not her de-
vastating career. The next day she is found
peacefully Eliminating on the roof of church
or calmly contemplating the ruin she has
wrought from the attic window of farm
house. Her removal at such times to more
eligible location is attended with great expense
and some difficulty, Fourteen men in Wiscon-
sin, the other day, could not dislodge her from
the cupola of "a courthouse, where she was
finally killed in obedience to an excited public
sentiment.
1t is barely possible that some exaggefation