The New Orleans bulletin. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1874-1876, 1875-02-18
ROAST TURKEY on ICE.

BumbletOn has been without a barber fo
over q month; and there has been no end o
| hacking and slicing Of Bumbletonian jaws il
exasperating attempts to perform imprompt1
scrapings with dull razors. For three sue
cessive Sundays the parson and most of tn
adult brethren Of Bumbleton Church hav
looked as if they had taken a lively share in
badger-drawing or cat-worrying enterprise
the night before; and court plaster Of various
f like an endemic eruption. Last Sabbath
morning Deacon Skiggs, while excitedly re
preaching his razor severely gashed his dew
lap, seeing which, Mrs. Skiggs fell down
fainting, and Mary Ann, the domestic, went
raving to the window-demoralizing her jute
top-knot and shouting murder ' The SEN
timent is now gaining strength in Bumb!eton
that shaving is unconstitutional, and that the
human beard is patriarchal and ornamental
appendage.
Fitzgerald Smythe, the innocent cause of
all this inconvenience and profanity, was the
pink of shaving brush knight-errantry, and
| highly popular in Bumbleton. 1t was under
stood, on his personal authority, that he was
Liverpool cockney, the son of Spanish
mother. by an octoroon Irishman. Old Years
night he bought a turkey, and fattened the
kinks out OF his hair in rapturous expectancy
Of the coming morrow. For in the pros
pective absence Of her parents, it had been
agreed by Miss Zilla Madonna Wiffen that the
barber and she would surreptitiously spend
the afternoon together, gaze into each others
eyes and hearts, and dine beautifully off roast
turkey. The course of true love, unfortu-
nately, ran its proverbial cascading style be-
tween these lovers. Fitzgerald Smythe bore
upon his person evidences of parental disap-
proval in the shape Of snpe shot.
But now the smart of this nocturnal dis
aster was gone; and tomorrow, while the old
Mohawk would be carousing miles away. he
would be enraptured by the daughters smiles. |
and enchanted at banquet of mutual admira |
ton and-turkey. When old Wiffen drove
away that New Years morning, Mr.. Fitzgerald |
Smythe's neck was craned passed the corner
Of the haystack in the rear premises. Soon
after, Fitzgerald Symthe himself, and the tur-
key, stuffed and skewered ready for the oven.
and tied in a scented shaving towel. were
being examined and admired and gloated
over, and handled, and banquetted on antici
patively by Miss Zilla Madonna Wiffan.
The day was cold and clear, the parlor nm
stairs was warm; the sun peeped cheerily
through the window, and the heart of Fitz-
gerald Smythe was stirred to its profoundest
iepths. He told z. M. w. that she was.
without exception, the most idolized and
beautiful being in New Jersey or the world.
md that parental disapprova!, as exemplifed
~ shotgun IN the hands of a certain father.
whom he distinctly refused to name was a
rhine punished in the ancient Babylonian re-
public by hanging, drawing, quartering and
followed by an Immediate distri- II
'utlon OF the malefactor's effects among the
'earest work-houses and lunatlc asylums
Chatting on in this enthusiastic and atfec-
lonate way, the sun went down, the curtains
Iere drawn, the lamp was lit, and the turkey
'as cooked, and lay in reeking richness-a t
hound OF gustatofial.elysium before the enam- f
red pair. The Wiffen knives were blunt. +
MI. Smythe carved with razor, delicately s
hitting the flesh from the limbs and wings a
the fowl instead Of vulgarly dismembering il
lem. u
Fitzgerald's fork was half way to his mouth, /.
ith his first bite, when heavy slamming of
he front door was followed by ponderous
'ot on the stairs Zille Madonna tried to
,ream; but her mouth was full, and she D
loked herself instead. Her lover flew to
le window, over the wreck Of dollar chair,
Id dropped quickly and quietly on the large
alter barrel outside. Hs had hardly sue "
eded IN balancing himself on the slippery "
! when ne felt an astounding sensation. 1t
emed as if some one were forcing hole A.
rough thick hawthorn hedge with
aven head, while his neither extremities =
ere being dipped in boiling oil In other
ords Zilla Madonna, in order to hide the
raey from her approaching pa, pitched
from the window, when, descending, it
tiled. piping hot, upon the unlucky lovers -,
ad, like an old-fashioned admi ais hat, Ai'
d, upsetting his balance, precipitated him
to the frozen water butt up to his neck
When, Immediately after, he heard Old Ci'
iffen disappearing vociferously few feet
owe him. and firing his double barrelled
ot-gun into the dim stump of distant !
e. the feeling of that barber-lover may be !
agined but not described Finally, when
} window was closed, and he contriyed to d
wi out, he trudged off home like moving :
cla-a burning crater upon locomotive
pillar. He was frozen so hard that his
covered pantaloons refused to accompany
motion, and clanking in ice ointed armor
finally reached home. During that pil-
mage his young love for Zilla Madonna
fen was frozen and scorched out. He will cou
er trouble himself to call upon her again
there is talk of her throwing herself
" upon pork butcher
ew hair is said to be already appearing on y
gerald Smythe's head, and if no unfavor- ,a 20
} symptoms supervene he may be able to con
round in a fortnight or So But he saws nit
the way his hair is spolt and his toes see
t-bitten will prevent him from returning fave
re barber shop any more. VIII