Oxford Democrat. [volume] (Paris, Me.) 1833-1933, 1883-04-10
LEAKY ROOFS.
BY OUR GEORGE.


tied States. For the past six or eight
thousand years the inventive genius Of
man has been all concentrated upon pat
enting perfect fitting corset, and
ssfety-pin that would not stab the wearel
every time she moved, and all this time
humanity has had to 20 to bed with ar
umbrella over it, and life preserver un.
der the pillow-every time that it looked
like rain or thaw.
The same rule that would make q
carpenter tight would not apply to a
building, and roof that was tight in
summer as.l pair Of fashionable pants
would leak like Kidding seive in win
ter. | don't know what a Kidding seivs
is, exactly, but it expresses the idea Of
want of tightness better than any of the
thirty thousand words tina. have on my
tongues end. A leak always occurs in
the night. A mysterious providence has
thus arranged it, just as it has that
fellow always gets an invitation to a
kissing party after he has been eating
onions, and it either comes where it will
ruin the best paper in the house. or else
it is exactly over the bed. Few things
discourage a man more than to be awak-
ened in the night by ics cold water drip
ping on his face. At first he imagines
tina, it is the cold, clammy hand of death,
till it occurs to him that deaths hand is
not clammy, and also that it always
tackles the feet first. First he lights
out of bed. and then he lights lamp,
and sees above his bed on the ceiling an
irregular crack, along which procession
Of drops of water are marching in single
file. He sees the leader go along till It
gets exactly over the place where the
sleeper lay in bed, when it let's 60 the
crack and pounces down on the up,urned
face, while the next drop behind shakes
with laughter and hurries along to the
same spot, when it goes through the
same performance. And then the bed is
pulled out, and the ash-bowl, and
pitcher, and slopjar, and towels, and
cuspadore, and coal-hod are formed into
an amateur base ball nine, with the
catcher holding the most prominent po-
sition and leaving them to play out the
first innings, the occupant Of the room
meanders through the house, waking up
everybody and peering into all the rooms
in search of other leaks and be general
ly finds water, water everywhere, and
not a drop Of anything in the house TO
drink for If there is any time when a
man needs to tie divorced from his Good
Templar pledge for just few moments
it is when he is wandering about a cold
house in the night, clad only in a small
lamp and three and half yards of
Wamsutta cotton cloth, with a turn
down collar and breast pocket in it
not in the collar but in the rest Of the
cloth. He finds foods everywhere, and
as he wanders around, occasionally a
damn will give way and large stream
of oaths will pervade the room He will
find the water coming down in the par
lor, right over the etagere, and he will
have to take two hundred and thirty one
ornaments and Christmas cards off before
he can move it, and he will find another
stream, coming down through the closet
where all his wife's best clothes are hung
and by the time he has finished his tour
of inspection, every tin utensil, pan,
bucket and dish in the house has been
called into requisition, and he thinks if
he owned pail factory, that he could
run it on full time TO supply his demand.
Disguised and mad. he goes back to bed
only to wait until morning, that he may
clear the snow off the roof. Now clear
ing some two or three tons of snow and
ice from roof where It's frozen solid 10
the gutter while standing on ladder is
not as pleasant a job as sitting on front
step on summer night pouring taffy in
to a pretty girls ear, and is a more dan
gerous too. II your tongue slips In the
latter case, you can correct the mistake
before It's TOO late, but If your ladder slips
or the snow slides OFF the roof, taking YOU
with 1t, there doesn't seem TO be any way
for you to recover either your position or
damages. gentleman in Belfast having
suffered from leaky house, determined,
last Saturday, TO entice the snow from his
roof through the mild influence of hatchet.
But he did not know the best way to 20 TO
work 10 get II of. The easiest way man
i,a Of l.
another man 10 do IL; but this gentleman
did not think Of that simple aud safe way
50 he planted a twenty-five foot ladder up
against the caves OF the house and with his
Ratchet in hand he cautiously climbed up
and commenced loosening the ice with the
Ratchet. He hacked aud chopped, and bits
OF ice few in his eyes, and lit on the top OF
his shirt collar and crept down his back
where they could warm themselves against
his undershirt, and filled his mouth aud
ears full. And ever and anon the handle
of the ha:chet would strike the gutter in.
stead OF the blade striking the Ice and
numbness would run up his arm, and his flu
gers would tingle as II some one had patted
him On his crazy bone with a club. Sud.
denly he heard sound that resembled the
scream Of So rocket when il Is touched
of, and the next instant the top of his lad
der began to promenade along the edge OF
the gutter and he felt himself moving to-
ward mother earth with a speed that he
had never equalled since boy, when he
ran out OF an orchard In order to prevent
lending the seat Of his trousers TO dog
that wanted to borrow it. He hung on to
the ladder with his hands, but his feet let
go their hold and the ladder was wrenched
from his grasp and then he commenced TO
gyrate, and describe angles aud lines In
The air, and finally laid down 10 l6 diff rent
positions in snow drift with only 25-
foot ladder for bed spread. The female !
occupants of the house hearing the crash, |
looked out OF the lower window lust in |
time TO see him go by, some two laps
ahead OF the ladder, and doctor, seeing |
him when be got the word npo y filed a |