Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1882-09-01
A Moving Tale.
When Whafshisname said

a WONinu HnDNctl ~ ike IL rlN6r trDuOIcu,
he family expressed the condition of a
man, woman, or child who is obliged to
pack up, bag and baggage, on the lst Of
the merry month of May and remove to
a new place of abode. From the middle
of April to the last of May, the average
man of family wishes that. by some
sort of metamorphosis, he could be
changed to chipmunk or gopher so
that he would live in hole in the
ground. and let the world with its rents
and taxes jog ulheeding by. Along
toward the latter part of April he lays in
q bountiful supply OF court-plaster, and
begins trying a little family swearing.
just to get his wife accustomed to it.
In the meantime. both he and his good
lady have been searching high and low
for new house. They have invaded a
hundred houses and sought bubble
French flats oven at the mouth
of the deadly sewer-gas. They have
spent their substance in riotous
advertising, sought for happiness
in house.renting agencies. and night
after night have they returned from
their shoe and bOotlcsS search and gone
to bed supperless-she, with her cold
feet in the small OF his back, to dream of
4 ten-room flat with all the modern i'm
provements, and he to swear at May
day. high rents and the coldne,s of the
aforesaid feet. Thus it goes on until at
last a house is found. He generally
chooses it in sheer desperation. and it is
accepted by her with some tears and a
great deal of pout.
Then the moving begins. About Il
week before the moving day arrives they
begin to pull up the carpet. She takes
a screw-driver. gets down iii corner.
and jabs aimlessly at a forlorn and
leather-headed tack on the third base.
She hits it three or four times, but it
lodges out of the way, and she succeeds
in taking all the skin off the knuckles
of her right hand. With howl of pain
she throws the screw-driver through a
mirror, and says something which
sounds like SAM" but isn't. Then her
better two-thirds laughs like a fiend,
and says taking up a carpet is one of the
things for which man was especially Or
dained by a kind and far-seeing Provi-
dence. She seats herself on the piano.
stool and sucks her crimson knucklcs,
while he. with the smile of conscious
superiority on his duSt-begrinmed face,
takes OF his coat and vest, picks up the
offending screw-driver, and SAYS: MY
dear, you should not attempt what you
know you cannot do. You should be
prepared for accidents, and when they
come, take them philosophically." So
saying, ne kneels upon the carpet. and,
holding the tack and adjoining carpet in
one hand. inserts the point of the screw
driver under the head of the tack and
attempts to pry it out. After a few
lunges he makes q more vigorous one,
because he hears litter from the piano.
stool. The point slips and he gouges
about quarter Of a pound of flesh out
of his left hand. while the fiend on the
piano-stool forgets her own troubles and
fairly crows c'ith delight as he executes
an impromptu war-dance. which would
have made the heart of Zuni Indian
green with envy. He has recourse to
arnica and plaster, after which he flies
savagely at the carpet. and with one pull
rips up an entire side, the tackS still re-
naming to the floor and making the edge
of the carpet look like cribbage-board
For the next six days the house looks as
If monkey and n parrot had been en-
joying themselves there while the family
were at the seaside. When he comes in
late at night he walks through a plate
glass mirror which she has paced Oppo-
site the door, and when crossing the front
room he engages in deadly combat with
hat-rack, miStaking it for a burglar
Then she screams. and n neighbor turns
in an alarm for the police patrol. When
quiet is restored he has the satisfaction
of knowing that his neighbors think the
landlord caught him trying to Jump"
his April rent. When the moving really
commences he has an economic streak
and gets along with only one truckman.
who gets an advance, on account, out of
the twenty dollars he is going to get for
his fOur-block job. and in the space of
fifteen minutes he is hopelessly and aim
lessly saturated with the drink which
cheers and also inebriates. Husband and
wife work like tigers all the morning,
she undoing nearly everything he does.
She picks up in her arms length of
stove pipe, litter, two piilow-cases and
three OF his linen collars. and makes for
the front door. They live upstairs, and
on the way down she m images to drop one
of the pillows and the pipe, and reaches
the truck with u iifteen-and-a "a half
inch linen collar, which she tosscs
into the empty wagon. He, fol
lowing behind her with step
ladder and u wash-tub. trips I'D on one
OF the pillows and takes '.header
down below" bringing up at the bot
tom with his face jammed into one end
OF the stove pipe, About this time his
language would not be admitted into
any known version of the Bible. The
little woman places mirror in the bot
tom of the packing-box. and then gently
drops ilat-iron in the coal-scuttle in
on top of it. and wonders what it was
that cracked. After unscrewing the
legs OF the piano he places the instru-
ment at the heal of the stairs, and gets
in front of it to lease her down" as he
says. The piano-forte. however, starts
OF ITS own accord. and comes down with
him on top of it. 1t goes out of the front
door with rush, and breaks in pieces
against the hind wheel of the truck.
leaving the unfortunate man in a mass
OF cords. wires, pedals and strings.
with his right heel in the middle of the
Moonlight Sonata" and his nose firmly
lmbedded in the march from s.Fatin-
TIA" At Atlength he is cxtricated. AMI
the wagon is slowly loaded with torn
curtains, broken furniture, and smashed
crockcry, Arrived ut the new abode.
the wife of his bosom helps him to carry
the things in, handful at u time As he
is striving to cary an Eastlake book
case up the steep steps. she aid, him by
standing at the top and repeating:
My only books
Were wumru's looks
And folly all they taught me.
The climax is capped, however. when
he and the obejoyful truckman are en-
deavoring to carry the kitchen stove up
the back stairs. The lining of the stove
comes out and covers him from head To
foot with brick-dust and rust. He wants
to sign his new lease for twenty five
years If he can. Chicago Times.