Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1873-12-24
Humorous.

tlOnS. jim was an inventive genius,
hardly out of cradle before he invented
a patent self-rocking crib, with churn-
ing attachment. He was an enthusias-
tic fellow, and worried as many as five
dogs of the neighborhood into an un-
timely grave, attaching them to weed
inp-machines, and bug-mashers, and
lawn-waterers, and such ike. When he
was ten, he made a double-increment
momentum velocipede with one wheel,
like drum and having got inside and
wound it up, it rushed through the
street like a thunder-gust trying to
catch the mail - apple-wOmen went
heels over head, the air was filled with
cantelopes and garden-truck generally
and still Jim rolled on. be hadn't
any stopping apparatus and, after
jumping a five-rail fence and racing
through pasture, he just pumped into
the river, and had to swim ashore. But
none of his steam pianos and fre-bal-
looms and hying-machines hurt me any.
They all went up or down or ont before
Jim's father died, and he came to live
with us. 'HiRc ilICe LqchTyBo." Then
trouble begun.
Jim brought with him his laboratory
and workbench, and all the implements
of wrath that brought desolation upon
a peaceful household, and forced me to
seek refuge in a foreign land-so to
speak.
Jim's first day passed quietly; but
on the second, he brought ont double
back action pea-sheller, that looked like
a young clothes-wringer with tin bus
tie. Maria-that's my wife-tried II,
and it mashes the peas all up, and threw
them into her best currant-ielly, Just
making; and then, when she tried to
take it OF, she knocked the head of the
tack-hammer, and it hit Bridget on the
head, causing her to sit down in tray
of bread dough, and spill a tureen of
soup on the baby. Poor John Angus
tus has been barefooted on the left side
of his head ever since then, and the cat
got so scared that she ran through the
house, and upset bottle of ink on my
manuscript on the "Origin, Rise and
Fall of the Custom OF Blowing the Nose
with the Fingers"
Then Jim got up a wringing machine
that tied my shirts into a double bow
knot, and mashed all the buttons into
fragments. He put fertilizer on Ma
ria's best verbenas, and they all Just
curied up and died. He undertook to
rid my setter-dog of fleas, but he rid
the feas of the dog. He got up pat
ent vertical-acting garden gate and as
Bridget and her beau were cooing over
it, and he reached over to say good-by,
it raised up and hoisted him up about
four feet, and waved him round, and
neighbor Tomkins' beef-hound came
along, and took a steak out OF Lis best
leg.
He got up wedding machine that
chopped off all the asters, and put
bug killer on the rose-bushes, and
turned them all yellow and blue in
blotches. He attached an upward feed
pump to the kitchen range, and that
filed our tank and made 1t run over,
and then worked backwards and put
the fire out.
One morning we couldn't get the
shutters open, because jim had at
tached new-fangled shutter-catch that
wedged the whole frame in tighter than
the devils grip on a dead backman.
When L went away on business, jim
protected" the house with a burglar
alarm that woke everybody up at one
in the morning with gong-rnging that
lasted an hour-and all on account of
our Thomas cat coming in late from
coTrting. My business requiring me TO
get up early sometimes and catch trains
at an unearthly hour, and my habit
being that OF heavy sleeper, Jim got
up an alarm bedstead that was to wake
% So, - y 81
rise up IN my wax-wOrks and stop 1t,
would pitch me out of bed. The first
time L tried it, it worked very well, and
reused me at o'clock from dreams of
trying to cram a bushel of gold into the
lining of my hat. But at 4, tribulation
came. The sound of q whizzing wheel
woke up Maria, who remembered the
intelligent contriyance, and peacefully
dropped into a sweet slumber, in which
she tried on a succession of bonnets,
each more charming than the others.
But in about ten minutes, the head
board vibrated-then the mattress quiy-
ered-and then the whole affair rose on
its hind-legs and wriggled-dropping
Maria and John Augustus on the floor,
and then, bombarding them with pill
lows, and laying the mattress on them,
sidled down to the blissful conscious
ness of having done its duty.
Ny wife and have fed and left the
inventive James to take care of the
house and OF himself. But what shall
we do? We dare not return. We are
wanderers on the face OF the earth, and
a martyr to science. Is. JABERs.
p. S.-Since writing the above, !
learn that Jim has been the victim OF
his fertile genius. Desiring protection
in our absence, he took nv double-bar-
relied gun and coil of bell-wire, and
made unto himself a man-trap and q
snare unto burglars. lie set it with .
hair-trigger, SO that any one turning
the door-knob would be assailed with
the gun from behind. When all was
ready, Jim went out TO take a look at
things, and then, on going in to glOat
over imaginary prowiers, turned the
knob, and filled his coat-tails so full Of
buckshot that his clothes looked like
map OF the oil wells. He takes his !
meals standing now, and has q little !
delicacy about sitting down before peo- !
pie older or younger than himself.
A LUDIcRoUs mistake happened some |
time ago at funeral in Mary-le-bOnc. |
The clergyman had gone on with the /
service, until he came to that part which /
says, "Our deceased brother or sister,
without knowing whether the deceased
was mate or female. He turned to one
of the mourners, and asked whether it
was a brother or sister. The man very /
reDlied ENO g-eTgFtoyl Cyf nil
Sir, only an acquaintance"
"YoU see, grandmamma, We perforate
an aperture in the apex, and cores
ponding aperture in the base, and by
applying the egg to the lips, and for
chilly inhaling the breath, the shell is
entirely discharged of It's contents."
"Bless my soul" cried the old lady,
"what wonderful improvements they
do make Now, in my younger days,
we Just made hole in each end and
sucked"