Alpena weekly argus. [volume] (Alpena, Mich.) 1871-1893, 1883-11-28
Rare Ben Holiday.

a VIGOROUSLY good one, says a Wash
ington letter to, the New York Times.
But when Uucle Ben begins to tell a
story about the plains it behooves
everybody to listen. So we waited, of
course, and lit fresh cigars, and tossed
another log on the fire. / am sure l
cannot give any adequate idea of the
story as | heard it. There was more
in the story as it was told than in the
substance of it. If / spoil it in tell
ing, it is my fault for poor story
teller, and not Uncle Ben's. When it
has the accompaniments of a roaring
fire, Virginia cabin, bottle or two,
plenty of tobacco, and good relator,
it is n prime story. How it will go,
told in cold lampblack and oil, !
have my doubts. However, here it is,
near as l can initiate the original.
"You see, Mother Butterworth," I"
Uncle Ben began, "was a friend of
mine, because she was the wife of one
of my chums. She lived in Washing
ton, and IN those days / lived there
too. She was a very strict church
member, and had holy and very
popular horror of cards, rum and
tobacco. One of her little peculiari-
ties was that all sorts of distilled
FFhdS6ss she called gin, which she pro-
nounced with hard G, like ginn.
Her husband-well her husband
wasn't quite so religious. No, not
just quite. He was chum of mine,
and | s'pose that's nuff said. He was
one of the boys, if there ever was one.
He was older than was, and could
bet on bob tailed flush with a harder
cheek; but somehow Mrs. Butterworth
always gave me credit for leading him
astray. She thought | was an awful
ly wicked man.
"But she rather liked me, too, per-
haps for the same reason that an angel
would like occasionally to watch Old
Nick to see what kind of an animal
he is. And | had a sort of liking for
her maybe on the same account. She
was so awfully good, you see, and |
was so awfully bad, or she thought !
was. Sometimes she used to ask me
to eat dinner with her, and then l
always took pains, to make myself
out worse than / was, just to shock
her. Well, one day she said to me !:
'Mr. Holiday, | want you to come
down tomorrow and take dinner with
me, to meet our new pastor. He's
such good man | want you to know
him.
"Now I'm not much of hand for
such dinner parties, to meet our pas
tors. So told her | though / was
too wicked to eat with preacher, but
I'd drop in after dinner just about the
time the desert and wine came on. l
thought at first she was laying out TO
have the minister convert me, but /
found afterwards the pastor had met
me years before OH the plains, and
wanted to see me. But Mrs. Butter
worth was quite willing to give me a
little raking over, having the minister
on hand for a sort of left bower. She
began at me about the trip had just
taken down the Pacific coast. took
dozen friends on a steamer, you
know, and went off on months frolic.
She said she heard we did nothing but
play poker, day and night, Sundays
and all, till we got home.
al assured her that such was not
the case. The story was base libel,
and | told the exact truth about it,
like an honest man. We didn't begin
playing poker till we were out of the
harbor, six miles from Frisco, and
we stopped before we reached the har-
Dor coming back and we never play
ed poker on Sunday while we were in
port. We didn't have time OH ac-
count of the cock-fghts."
"I am so glad, said the pastor,
that you don't play poker all the
time. l knew that story couldn't be
true, and I'll tell you why, ! once
met you out on the plains, and l knew
the Ben Holladay who treated me so
well out there couldn't be guilty of
such a thing. l was making a long
journey across the plains in one of
your coaches, and was about used up.
One day We saw coach coming in
the opposite direction, and our driver
said Ben Holiday himself was in it,
because his flag, with B. II. on it, was
flying over the top. Presently the
coaches met, and both stopped. You
got out and said we must be tired,
and passed around box of cigars.
/ spoke to you, and you said looked
i'll Gas indeed / was), and you said
you had some medicine in your coach
that you thought would do me good.
And we got into the coach, which had
no other passengers, and l took the
medicine, while the mail agent trans
ferred the mail bags"
al told him | remembered some