The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1878-07-03

out with such alarming CELEBRITY that the
tortured dry nurse caught it by the
heels Just in time to save it from falling
to the floor.
"He'n kill that child yet" said the
gloomy woman who talked bass, and
MI. Thumbledirk felt the blood curdlei in
cold waves in his veins. By this time
the baby was screaming like a calliope,
and the noise added inexpressibly te
MI Tumbledirk's confusion and dis
tress. he would have trotted the baby
on his knee, but the attempt occasioned
too much comment. The fat woman
with the market basket said:
"Oh-h, the little dear"
And the short, pretty woman snapped
her eyes and said.
"Oh-h-h how cruel
And the woman in the black bomba.
zine, and tho woman in the sun bonnet
said:
"Oh.h-h | just look at himl"
And tho woman who talked bass said,
in her NJ st sepulchral and penetrating
accent:
"The mans q fool"
And the baby itsel., utterly ignoring
the fact that Mi. ,Tnumbledirk was labor
ing in it's own interests, threw. all the
obstruction it could IN the way of furth-
er proceedings ~ alternately straight
ening itself. out into an abnormal con-
dition of such appalling rigidity, that
MI. Thumblekirk vasobliged to hold it's
head tightly in one i,and and its heels
in the other, and then suddenly doub-
ling itself up into SO small q knot that
the poor man had to hold his two hands
close together, like & bowl, and hold
the baby as he would a Pint of sand, and
these transitions from ont extreme to
the other were made with such startling
rapidity and appalling suddenness, that
MI. Thumbledirk had to be constantly on
the alert, and his arms ached SO, and be
exhibited such signs of fatigue and dis
tress that the depot policeman looked in
to say to him that if he wa tired out, he
would send in a section hand or the
steam shovel to give him q spell.
It seemed to MI. ThumDIedlrk that
he never heard so much noise come from
so small a baby in his life. The more
he turned it around and tossed it about
the more its cloak and dress, and skirts
and things became entangled around it's
neck, and now and then the mass of
drapery would get over the baby's face
and stiae it's cries for a second, but the
noise would come out stronger than ever
when the tossing little hands would tear
away the obstruction. And the louder
the baby screamed the faster the vigor-
GUS, fat legs few, kicking in every di-
rection, like crazy fy-wheels with the
rim off. Sometimes MI. Thumbledirk
made as high as a hundred and eighty
grabs a minute at those leg, and never
touched one of them. f. was hot,
blind and wild with terror and confu-
sion. Once he tried to sing to the baby,
but when he quavered out a "Hootchy,
pootchy, puddin' and pie" the women
laughed, all but the gloomy woman who
talked bass-she SMILED, and he stopped.
He gave the baby his pearl-handled
knife, and the innocent threw it into the
stove. He gave it his gold watch, and
it dashed it on the floor. He gave it his
emerald scarf-pin, and the baby put it
into its mouth.
The pretty woman screamed.
The sad woman in the bombazlne
shrieked.
The angular woman in the sun-bonnet
yelled, "Oh, mercy on US |"
The fat woman with the market-basket
called wildly for q doctor.
The gloomy woman who talked bass
shouted hoarsely:
"He's killed it !"
And Mr.. Thumbledirk hooked his
finger into that child's mouth and cboked
it until its face was purple and black,
trying to find that pin. And Mr.. Thum-
bledirk couldn't hear even the ~chatterlng
woman. It beat the air with its clenched
fists, and thrashed and kicked with its
fat bare legs, and walled and howled
and choked and screamed and doubled
up and Strengthened out until Mr..
Thumbledirk, steeling his nerves to the
awful effort, clasped the screaming baby
in his arms and rose to his feet.
He was going to 80 out and throw
himself and the baby under the first
train that came along.
The baby's mother sprang in through
the door like an angel of mercy.
She took the baby in her arms and
with one slight motion CT one hand, had
it's raiment Strengthened out so exquisite.
" smooth there wasn't a wrinkle in it.
The baby lay in her arms as placid,
quiet, flexible, graceful and c%ontented
as a dream of Paradise.
The mother thanked Mr.. Thumbledirk
for the agony and torture he had endrr-
ed 30 patiently for her. This was the
way she thanked him. She did not look
at him. She looked straight out the
window with a stony glare, and said, in
tones that made the thermometer shiver;
"Mr. Thumbledirk isn't a very good
nurse, is he, baby2"
ALI the women smiled, except the
gloomy woman who talked bass. She
nodded a%pprovingly.
The baby looked up into Mr.. Thum.
bledirk's face and laughed aloud.
What MI. Thumbledirk said when he
dashed in at the sanctum last evening
was this:
"By the avenging daughters of Night
the everlasting, snake-haired Erynnes
the terror-haunted shades never knew
the horrors that haunt the soul of a sen
sible single man that tries to take care
of some other FOOLS bowling, squalling
squirming baby r'-Bwrhnagton Hawk
eye.