The Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1877-1885, 1882-12-02

rags and starvation he determined to
| change his element. Having obtained the
place of master of small steamboat on
/ the Missouri, he navigated the river for
two years, having in that time sunk three
vessels and lost according to his own cal
culation. $4,000 or $4,000. which was all
i the more deplorable as he had no money
/ TO begin with. How he made the loss he
! could never explain except on paper
| and his arithmetic is so abstruse
as to be unintelligible to the com
mon mind Teaching was his next en-
| ternrise, and such was his success that at
| the close of the third term three of the
pupils were promoted to the country luna
tic asylum. and the remainder were pro
nounced deserving of the honor, with a
/ little more encouragement. Having con
victe himself of his capacity as a public
! instructor, he decided to open a band-not
with Jimmy and outsider. rs a man of
genius would have done-and he opened
one. But having neither capital nor credit
he suspended indefinitely after the second
week and published statement-his assets
and liabilities being represented by-0.
I once showed this account to Josh. His
eyes twinkled as he read it, and he
said there was a good deal of truth in it.
His steamboat enterprise was confined to
the ONO FlVGI, mol tlG niSSuuIt 1t was
undertaken at the instance of New York
Spectators, by whom he was sent to open
u mine in Western Virginia. He bought
a steamboat at Pittsburgh and it took him
three months to get it to Charlestown, Va.
the town made famous many years after
ward as the scene of John Browns excu-
ton. His steamer piled between Charles
town and Gallipolis until the company be
came bankrupt. In the course Of his
Western wanderings Josh found himself in
California in 1S49-he was one Of your
Oldest and best-but he did not stay on the
coast for any length of time.
He married at the aged of - when on a
visit to his rather in Massachusetts. At the
age of 40 he moved East in order to edu
case his two daughters. He found good
schools at Poughkeepsie, on the Hudson.
and settled there. As he had no regular
profession, he took up the trades of
auctioneer and dealer in real estate. He
had dabbled in both of these calling in the
West. He had great success as an auction
eer in Poughkeepsie. but as the town is a
small one, his professional income was not
very large. His humor made him great
favorite wi the Toodles family
There was a little nine by seven daily
paper published in Poughkeepsie. The
editor called on Mr. Shaw one day and said
that the man who could talk as well as he
could talk ought to be able to write well,
and he wanted him to contribute some
thing to his paper. Dir. Shaw told him
that he had never written line for publ
cation in his life. But the notion pleased
him, and he thought over it, and then
wrote series of between twenty and
thirty of the short pieces that have made
his name a house word in America since
then For six months he continued his
contributions every week Nobody
noticed them outside of Pouohkeepsie. One
day Mr. Shaw read one of the essays of
Artemus Ward on subject that he had
treated in one of his short essays. He read
it over and over and over again; and the
more he read it the less he understood why
Artemus Wards writings should be popu-
lar and his pieces had fallen stillborn from
the press is it the bad spelling?" he
asked himself. He made up his mind that
it was the bad spelling and nothing else
that had lent wings to Artemus Wards |
humor and made him famous. and that it
was his own loyalty to Webster's Unab-
ridged that had weighted has humor down
and kept res name in ohscurity- So he /
took his essay on the mule. The mules /
a favorite animal with me, )" Josh once /
said to me. He has treated me pretty t
rough and I've Treated him him pretty /
rough, we understand each other and, !
without changing word. he Slowed !
round the spelling. as he expressed it, and |
sent it to the New York Fra. weekly /
paper Of not large circulation ut the time. j
Before mailing it he signed it Josh Bill /
lings. Josh" was in honor of an old |
Zone Josh Carew) Of his western
life; Billings came by inspiration, as it |
We're. His Poughkeepsie pieces were |
The misspcled Essay on /
the Mule was printed, and instantly !
went the rounds of the press and the /
name of Josh Billings became famous be
fore he had written a single essay except
ing those he had printed in the POUCH
keepsie paper. He simply translated them
into his peculiar phonetic system Of spell
ing AS soon as he saw that everything he
wrote was widely reprinted he thought he
ought TO make money by his pen, and so
he sent one of his very best short essays to
. Boston paper. The editor wrote that he
could not afford to pay more than $3.50
for it. Josh regarded this sum as rather
small pay. But. he added. Il thought
should like a nest egg, and L told the
editor to send it on. Then | opened an
account with Josh Billings and made my
first entry with this item: Essay in Bos
ton, $3.50 AS soon as he became
famous he was engaged by the New York
HeeA1g-a rival Of Bonner.s Ledgeg-at
Sa00 O week for half O. column of his es
says and sayings, He has published his