Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1876-04-15
Correspondence ISDEPESBENr GAZETTE.
Letter from Bert Darlington.

Letter from Bert Darlington.
WHITEHEAD, n. H., April 10, 1876.
Mr.. EditCrt--
II the people Of this keen old town
could be induced to confess the full meas
ure OF their losses by investments inhum-
bug patent rights, they would look one
another in the face in blank establishment
1t is said by those who know all about
everything - and our town has an ample
share of these interesting worthies-that
Whtefeld has thrown away more money
in this direction than any other town in
the county, in proportion to its popnla-
ton This may not be so, but it is a well
known fact, that thousands of hard earned
dollars have slipped out of our hands to
enrich public swindlcrs and hunbugs.
Take 4 peep into most any of our shed
chambers, attics or clubhouse Store-roolns
and you viii find this strange truth sym
| boi2ed by old castaway humbugS of some
kind. And, what seems strangeSt Of all,
| the sharpeSt among US the ones who are
used to taking hold of their neighbors
with their teeth, and shaking the very life
out of them and their pocket-books, with
out suffering a Zip in return were the
| first to bend knee before the brass
throne of the patent right vcnder. Men
who could easily stretch seven pints into
the smiling sGmblance of gallon, and
nail it with proofs from holy writ men
| who could blandly take your arm stand
before hundred feat of hollow hearted
cordwood and tickle your Imagination till
! it laughed ut the generous hump on the
back of that cord, and fairly glowed with
a poetic admiration of human nature :;
these were the men who were most easily
tripped by the athletic tongue of the pa
tentee. | would not name Spraguc as one
of these slippery victims, because every
body knows that outside of politics and
religion Sprague is honest. His purchase
or the 'Great American Spring Bed" pa
tent right WAS q wonder to every body
who knew him, rs he always laughed at the
ambitious ventures of his fellow-neighbors
in patent rights. Still nobody should be
expected to stand everything, and so
Sprague bought the right to make AMI sell
these wonderful spring beds. I hav'nt
time to tell it all today; it's enough to say
the bed proved co be an uncomfortable
success. Sprague tried one himself and
found that he slept so much sounder and
faster than he did on an ordinary couch
that he couldn't shut an eye after daylight,
and he got mad, threw the bed out of the
chamber window, and quietly pronounced
! it fraud, a failure and menace against
good hours, solid comfort and rational
humanity, and that was the end of it, be-
cause Spraguc is standard authority on
all practical questions hera. About this
time two of our leading citizens bought
the right to sell patent bee hives in the
State of Indiana. This bee hive was to
set the whole world in buzz of delight,
and revolutionize the honey question.
The buyers actually went to Indiana to in
troduce the hives, but they couldn't sell
enough of them to pay hotel expenses
and they returned wiser if not happier
men.
Among the scores of patent humbugS,
might mention pitchforks, stump pullers
gates, washing machines, mop wringcrs,
brooms, and the like, all of which have
played part in our comedy of errors,
but as the parties who were sold with the
patents feel sensitive about having theil
names used in connection with the sell
and believing that they have already beer
sufficiently punished to teach them better
in the future, / will forbear going into de-
tails. In my next | shall give some &C
count Of our towns experience in OF
stocks. Thine,
BERT DARLINGTON.