The south Kentuckian. [volume] (Hopkinsville, Ky.) 1879-1883, 1883-04-10
HIS PA AND DYNAMITE.
Peck's Sun.

81 guess your pas losses in the sil-
yer mine has made him crazy, haven't
theyf' said the grocery man to the
bad boy, as he came in the store with
his eye winkers singed of, and pow
der marks on his face, and began to
play on the harmonica, as he sat down
on thesend of stick of stove wood
and balanced himself.
20, guess not. He has hedged.
He got in with a deacon of another
church, and sold some of his stock to
him, and pa says i'll win keep my
condemn mouth shut he will unload
the whole OF it, if the churches hold
out. He goes to a new church every
night there is prayer meeting or any,
thing, and makes ma go with him,
to give him tone, and after meeting
she talks to the sisters about how to
piece silk bed quilt while pa gets
in his work selling silver stock. ]
don't know but he will order some
more stock from the factory, if he
sells all he has got" and the boy went
on playing 'There's a land that 10
fairer than day."
"But what was he skipping up
street for the other night with his hat
of, grabbing at his coat tails as
though they were on fire !? / thought
never saw pussy man run any
faster. And what was the celebra-
ton down on your street about that
time? thought the world was COM
ing to an end" and the grocery man
kept away from the boy, for fear he
would explode.
20, that was only Fenian scare.
Nothin' serious. You see pa Is sort
of half Englishman. He claims to
be an American citizen, when he
wants Office, but when they talk about
draft he claims to be subject of
Great Britain, and he says they can't
touch him. Pa is darn smart man,
and don't you forget it. There don't
any Of them get ahead of pa, much.
Well, pa has sand a good deal about
the wicked Fenians, and they ought
to be pulled, and all that, and when
read the story in the papers about the
explosion in the British Parliament
pa was hot. He said the damn Irish
was running the whole world. He
didn't dare say it at the table for our
hired girl would have knocked him
silly with a spoonful Of mashed pota-
toes, cause she is Nirish girl, and
she can lick any Englishman in this
town. Pa said there ought to have
been somebody there to have taken
that bomb up and throwed it in the
sewer before it exploded. He said if
he ever should see bomb he would
grab it right up and throw it right
away where it wouldn't hurt any
body. Pa has me read the papers to
him nights, cause his eyes have got
splinters in 'em, and after had read
oil there was in the paper made up
lot more and pretended to read it,
about how it was rumored how the
Fenians here in Milwaukee were GO
ing to place dynamite bombs at every
house where an Englishman lived,
and at given signal blow them all
up. Pa looked pale around the gills,
but he said he wasn't scared. Pa and
ma were going to call on a she dea-
con that night, that has lots of money
in the band, to see if she didn't want
to invest in a dead sure paying silver
mine, and me and my chum conclud-
ed to give them send of. We got
my big black injy rubber football,
and painted "Dinymight" in big
white letters ON II, and tied piece Of
tarred rope to it for fuse, and got a
hre-cracker, one of these old Fourth
of July horse scarers, and a basket
full of broken glass. We put the
football in front of the step, and lit
the tarred rope, and got under the
step with the fire-crackers and bas-
ket where they 60 down into the
basement. Pa and ma came out the
front door, and down the steps, and
pa saw the football and the burn
ing fuse, and he said Great God,
Hammer, we are blowed up and he
started to run, and ma she stopped to
look at it. Just as pa started to run
/ touched off the fre-cracker, and my
chum arranged it to pour out the bro
ken glass on the pavament just as the
fire-cracker went of. Well. every
thing went just as we expected, ex-
cept ma. She had examined the foot
ball and concluded it was not dan
gerous, and she was just giving it a
kick as the fire-cracker went of, and
the glass fell, and the fire-cracker
was SO near her that it scared her,
and when pa looked around ma was
flying across the sidewalk, and pa
heard the noise and he thought the
house was blown to atoms. 0, you'd
died to see him 60 around the cor
ner. You could play crokay on his
coat tail, and his face was as pale as
mas when she goes to party. But
ma didn't scare much. As quick as
she stopped against the hitching post
she knew it was us boys, and she
came down there, and maybe she
/ "a sI r - IL A..