Centre Democrat. [volume] (Bellefonte, Pa.) 1848-1989, 1880-09-02

this mournful spot was a decayed and
azed little " frame" house with but one
room. one window and no ceiling-it
had been O smoke-house generation
before. Nicodemus was given this
lonely and ghostly den as bed-cham-
Der.
The village smarties recognized
treasure in Nicodemus, right away--a
butt to play jokes on. It was easy TO
see that he was inconceivably green and
confiding. George Jones had the glory
of :perpetrating the first Joke on him :.
He gave him cigar with q fire-cracker
in 1t, and winked to the crowd to come !;
the thing exploded presently and swept
away the bulk of Nicodemus' eyebrow
and eyelashes. He simply said.
"I consider them kind of seeg'yars
daneersome," and seemed to suspect
nothing. The next evening Nicodemus
waylaid George and poured a bucket OF
ice water over him.
One day, while Nicodemus was In
swimming, Tom McElroy "tied his
clothes. Nicodemus made a bonfire OF
Toms by way of retaliation.
A third joke was played upon Nico-
,lemus a day or two later-he walked up
the middle aisle of the village church,
Sunday night, with stsring handbill
pinned upon his shoulders. The joker
spent therest Of the night, after church,
in the cellar of deserted house, and
Nicodemus sat on the cellar door till
toward breakfast time, to make sure
that the prisoner remembered that If any
noise was made some rough treatment
would be the consequence. The cellar
had two feet of stagnant water in it, and
was bottomed with six inches of soft
mud.
But wander from the point. 1t was
the subject of skeletons that brought
this boy back to my recollection. Be-
fore long time had elapsed the village
smarties began to feel an uncomfortable !e
consciousness of not having made very
shining success out of their attempts on
the simpleton OF :" Old Shelby" Expert
young doctor came to the rescue. There
was delight and applause when he pro-
posed to them the plan of frightening
Nicodemus to death, and explained how
he was going to do it. He had a noble
new skeleton-the skeleton OF the late
and only local celebrity. Jimmy Finn,
the village drunkard-a grisly piece of
property he had bought of Jimmy Finn
himself, at auction, for fifty dollars, un-
der great competition, when Jimmy lay
very sick in the lanyard a fortnight be-
fore his death. The fifty dollars had
gone promptly for whisky, and had con-
siderably hurried up the change OF own
ership in the skeleton. The doctor
would put Jimmy Firms skeleton in
Nieodemus' bed.
This was done-about half past ten in
the evening. About Nicodemus' usual
bedtime-midnight--the village jokers
came creeping stealthily through the
jimpson weeds and sunfowers toward
the lonely frame den. They reached
the window and peeped in. There sat
the long-legged pauper on bis bed in .
very short shirt and nothing more. He
was dangling his legs contentedly back
and forth, and wheeling the music of
"Camptown Races out of q paper
Overlaid comb which he was pressing
against his mouth; by him lay a new
jew's-harp, new top, solid india rub
Der ball, a handful of painted marbles,
five pounds of "store" candy and a
well-Enawed slab of gingerbread as big
and thick as a volume of sheet music.
He had sold the skeleton to a travelling
quack for three dollars, and was enjoy
ing the result.-Fron, Mark Trdin's Neso
Book, "a Tramp abroad"