The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1882-12-30
A Lay Discourse.

A convict in the Indiana Peaitentiar,
hit the nail on the head when asked how
his downward course began. He said il
began in irving to beat twO-fortv with q
three minute horse. How many people
in all branches of business are trying tc
beat two forty with three minute bust
ness? The man who has small bushes,
that is paying him, and goes into debt
and tries to spread himself over too many
eggs, is trying to beat two-forty with a
three-minute horse. The young man
who gets small salary, and spends more
money for ice cream and perfumery and
neck ties than he earns, is trying to beat
two-forty with a three minute horse. The
girl who is calculated by nature to be
the wife of mechanic, and gets above
her business and looks with scorn upon
a man who earns his living by hard work
will look at an old maid in the glass a
few years from now, and realize that she
has been trying to beat two-forty with a
three minute horse. The ordinary, ev-
cry day sort of man, who is elected to
small Office, by a big m liority, on ac-
count of men voting for him for charity,
and who thereupon aSpires to big Of
flee for which he is untitled, will be
nominated for the big Office some dav
and be beaten higher than a kite. and
he will then feel of his aching head, ex-
anime his empty pocketbOok, look around
at the debts he has contracted and the
enemies he has made, and it will sud
denly come to him that he had
been trying to beat twoforty with
three-minute horse. The man or
woman who leaves q profession or en-
plovment to which they are fitted, and
in which they can be prosperous and
happy and. have friends, and goes upon
the stage to compete with men and women
who have been brought up to 1t, and
who have made success by a lifetime of
hard work, will some day realize to their
sorrow that they hayefailed to beat two
forty with a three-minute horse. The
young man who has been left fortune
by a dead father, who has worked a life
time to accumulate riches, and who
can't find places enough to spend money
without sitting up all night, and who
finds old sledge and peenuckle too tame
and adopts draw poker and faro, and
who forgets that his sisters are splendid
company, will in few years be walking
on his uppPrs, and having fur collars
pinned on to linen ulsterS for winter,
and he will wake up some morning with
the almightiest hea lache on record and
come to the conclusion that trying to
beat tWo-fortv with a three minute horse
is what ails him. The summer resort
hotel proprietor who fits up an old rock
cry aud fills it with guests, who are seek
ing comfort, and charges them Fifth
Ave ue prices for Bowery accomoda-
tons, will look at his empty house the
next year and say the season is back
ward, and when the guests do not come
with the dog-days he will suddenly
scratch his head and say he made fool
of himself last year in trying to beat
two-forty with three-minuteh horse. The
whole-souled, good fellow, everybody's
friend, gets to drinking too hard, and,
as he is healthy, he gets an idea
he can beat whisky, q game that so
many have tried and failed. He keeps
it up until his nose gets red, his eyes
bleared and his voice shaky, and he has
a whisky cough, and his friends try to
reason with him and get him to let up.
but he laughs at them with his good
natured laugh, and tells them he has got
a constitution like a horse, and that
nothing can hurt him, and he asks them
to take a drink. Some day he gets the
jim-iams, and all his friends say: 81
told you So" and they sit up nights with
him and drive away snakes, and Just be-
fore he dies it suddenly occurs to him
that he has been trying to beat two forty
with three minute horse. A man who
is poor and wants to live on the fat of the
land, marries a pretty little rich woman,
and begins to squander her money, and
when she tries to persuade him to stop
it, he gets to treating her like dog,
gets worse and strikes her, and after a
while she gets enough of it and obtains
a divorce, and marries a man who loves
her and doesn't want her money, and
she is happy, and her former husband
becomes dead beat and drunkard and
would fain BEG for the refuse that drops
from the table of his former wife. and
when he buttons his summer coat around
him on a winter night and walks around
a block for wind pudding, and looks
into the windows and sees the light of
the fine from the CRATE of his former
wife's sitting-room, it occurs to him that
if he had not attempted to beat two forty
with three minute horse, he could have
been in there toasting his slippers and
looking into pair of eyes that would
have always looked their love for him,
if he had been contented with a three
minute gait, but which eyes will never
look upon him again except in pity. o,
there are thousands of people who make
a mistake in trying to beat two-forty
with a three-minute horse. -Peck'S Sun.
Nothing Mean About Him.