Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1875-01-15
miscellaneous.
THAT EMERSON BOY.


That Emerson boy is dead, and there
isn't any one around that house TO make
fun. He was cheerful, lively boy, and
he did his best to make that household
put on the mantle Of joyfulness. Emer-
son often remarked that Bob didn't seem
ever to sit down and think of the grave
and death, and be probably never did.
No. Bob wasn't of that make. He
wanted to have fun Both his ears were
nearly worn up by being cuffed 50 much,
aud it took whole row Of currant
bushes to furnish whips to dust his jack
ct for the summer.
Emerson didn't know what fun was
until Bob was eight years old. Then
the boy began to launch out. He would
bore gimlet holes in the bottom of the
water-pail, put cartridges in the coal
stove, unscrew the door-knobs, gil the
kerosene lamp with water, and good
thrashing didn't burden his mind over
five inmates. Some times his father
would take him by the bair and yank
him up to the sofa and sit down and ask !:
Robert Parathon Emerson, what in
blazes ails ye y
g It's the yaller jaunders, I guess,
Bob would meekly reply.
=" Robert, don't you want to be an an
gel p the old man would continue.
And have wings? y
Yes, my son"
"And fly highcr'n kite p
Yes
And fight hawksY
Yes, guess So"
Bet your beef | would-whoop /!
Bully for the angels y
. That's saerilege, that i" the old
man would remark, and he would jerk
Bob's hair some more, and declare that
the young rascal was bound for the gall
lows. After lying under the pear tree
for six minutes. Bob would recover from
his sadness and go over to the barn, and
run the pitchfork through the straw cut
ter, harness up the COW, and stick pins
into the family horse.
One night he brought home wolf
trap and set it in the middle Of the wood
shed floor to catch rat. He chuckled
good deal that evening at the thought
Of what would happen to the rats, and
he fell asleep and dreamed that be was
hand-organ, and that some one stole the
crank from him, so that he couldn't be
played on. just before going to bed, old
Emerson went out to get a scuttlc Of coal,
and he stepped his bootless foot into that
trap. He made a mighty spring and ut
tered mighty yell, and it took two men
ten minutes to spring the trap off bis leg
g It's that boys work !" he groaned,
as he nursed his foot and took up his
boot-jack, limped into the bedroom, and
gave Bob an awful clip just as the child
was dreaming of playing baseball with
mermaid.
/" /, Ill pound We to death if We don't
stop this fooling y cried the old man,
but he hadn't been out of the room ten
minutes before Bob was planning to stop
up the chimney next day and smoke ev-
erybody out of the house. 1t wasn't
many days before he fixed darning
needle in the cushion of his fathers arm
chair and bounced the old man three feet
high; and his tickling hadn't got over
smarting before he exploded fire crack
er in his mothers snuff box That night
the old man said to him as he took him
by the ear:
Robert Parathon Emerson, do you
ever think Of whore you will go to y
Yes, SIR" be answered, g I'll go to
bed purity soon.
Then he got another mauling, and
went to dream that he was three-tined
pitched fork, and that man was using
him to load hay with.
; Poor boy! Even three days before he
died, and while on his dying bed, he
managed to slip an eight-ounce tack into
his fathers left boot and got up another
circus Detroit Free Press.