Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1878-12-26

man." So il is, but the trouble with Thur
man is, that whether he runs or not his Pres
idential chances will suffer.
Brief Biography of Methuselah
What tremendous boyhood old Me
| thuselah had! He died at the rather
advanced age of 969 years, about 9OC
years more than mans span of life. All
that rate, when he was 200 years old he
about equaled an ordinary lad of six
teen. He was thirty or forty before
his parents bought him a rattle to play
with, and he didn't have the measles
! and other infantile diseases until he
was over 100. He was in no sort OF
hurry about these things, as he had SC
far to go. We imagine that he was
rathe, a delicate child to begin with
as most people were who live to a
great age We can imagine his moth
er's anxiety with regard to his delicate
constitution, telling Mrs. Brown across
the way, on his ninetieth birthday, that
she was afraid she never would be able
to raise that child" Generations OF
men lived and passed away while he wrs
was going around in petticoats, and he
almost centenaria1 before he got into
his first boots. His father used to lick
him when he was $50 for robbing a
neighbours watermelon patch.
Young Methuselah was probably in
the vicinity of a hundred years old
when he was first sent to school. We
can imagine him sitting on the low
bench, learning his a-b-abs among the
great-great-g grandchildren of people
who began life when he did. He was
mischievous, of course-all boys are,
no matter what their age 1--WE expert
ence a mild friskiness ourself occas-
ionally), }, and had to be punished for
it.
civilian Henry Methuselah, stand
upr says the teacher, catching him in
the very act of placing a bent pin in a
seat where schoolmate was about to
sit down. What do you mean by such
conduct as thlsY
Young Methuselah began to snitfle
and wipe his eyes with the corner of his
jacket.
Zone would Think" continues the
teacher, sternly, that you wasn't over
seventy five or eighty years old by the
way you behave. Instead of that you
have already celebrated your first cen
tennial-almosta young man, in fact
You ought to be ashamed of youself."
Then Methuselah is condemned, as
an expiation, to sit among the girls un-
til recess, and if you think that isn't
an agreeable form of punishment you
will have to ask some one older than
Methuselah.
Whenever circus came to town, with
"Children half price, on its bills, young
Methuselah must have experienced diff
ficulty in making the ticket-seller un
derstand that he was entitled TO 60 in on
half price ticket, particularly after he
got along toward his two-hundredth
year. But he probably did it. Boys
are enterprising and persistent where a
circus is concerned. And we will bet
that Methuselah, in his youthful days,
could accumulate as much in old iron
as the next boy, and lay it by for the
coming show.
When this youngster got into his
.eens-say from 100 to 300 years old
he probably did as other young gentle
men Of tender age do, went around with
the girls. L: must have been little
embarrassing to him, after beauing a
young lady about spell-taking her
to concerts, parties, balls, etc.-to dis
cover that she was a great-great-g great
great great -grandchild of some old
friend of his fathers, but these
things were inevitable under the pecu-
liar and exceptional character of the
circumstances. They could hardly be
otherwise. There is no record to show
otherwise. There is no record to show
that any woman lived in his time to an
age that would begin to compare with
his. And ifthere had, the world would
never have known it. At least, not
from her. She wouldn't have acknowl-
edged to anything over forty had she
lived twice the age of Methuselah. That
is the kind of hair-pin a woman is.
Employing the proportion of twenty
one to seventy TO MethuseIah's years,
we find that he was minor until he
was 270 years old. If the laws regard
ing minors werr enforced in his day,
young Methusclah must have been run
out of billiard rooms and shut out from
bars for over two centuries. And what a
sensation must have been created when
he stepped up to deposit his first vote.
OF course he voted for all the Presi
dents, from Washington (whom he re-
members shaking hands with down.
All old men did that. And when he
got to be along in years, say 900 or
such matter, he could sit and tell
the boys about the hard winter of 81,
and the food of 80, and the hard cider
campaign of 40, and all that sort of
thing This is all we have to write at
present of Methuselah, the original
'oldest inhabitant" Cincinnati Sat
urday Night.