The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1885-07-16


iZen / ever saw.
Notwithstanding his economy in the
matter of stars we got along swimmingly.
to be satisfied with that Ithen thought
he had an idea his invoice of planets
and asteroids might run short. found
out differently later.
Il want to see a comet" said one
night,
"I'll find You one." remarked Lig-
gins, who was very accommodating
person. I'VE will have comets to NOR
row."
Sure enough, he was as good as his
word, and trotted out q big comet
as promised. 1t was somewhat breezy
in the tail, and not exactly as i ex-
pected. spoke to my wife about it,
and she thought it was unbecoming in
me to find fault with the solar system.
Next thing / would be talking positive
infdelity. / must learn not to set my
self up against Copernicus, Kepler,
Newton. La Place. Herschel, Lockyer,
Proctor, and all those. The job lot of
names she fred at me sounded as if
they belonged to hard crowd to beat,
so went out and smoked.
Although the cloudy nights came in
pretty thick about that time, we made
very fair progress, doing up Mars,
Uranus, Neptune, Venus, the tleiades,
the Milky Way, the Dipper, Saturn,
and some others. Saturn with its rings
looked like target in q shooting gal
lery.
Liggins had been telling me about
French astronomer by the name of
Verne, who built big common, and
crawling into a hollow ball, shot him
self to the moon, proceeding which 1
would consider tri1e risky. He took
a flyer around the orb ("orb" is one of
higgins gags, rounding the last quar-
ter post without skip, and lit on earth
again all right. It's funny the news
papers didn't say anything about it.
| They usually do touch on such things.
Well, that little story got me inter-
ested in the moon, and we fixed date
to investigate it. My wife settled on
the same night for one of her sympo-
Sums, to be followed by little pro-
gressive eucher and toned up trife by
something in the refreshment line. My
wife is noted for her literary gather
ings.
| Liggins came around as usual, and,
| to alleviate his disappointment at my
not coming to time on astronomy, 1 had
a waiter carry out a dollar, plate of
chicken salad, and glass of cham
payne. Unfortunately, the bottle was
left within his reach, and he went home
satisfied with every one on this earth,
and especially grateful to the solar sys-
tenn. For the first time since 1 had
known him he left his telescope on the
back porch.
and my wife was cross, but frightened
up when / came home to lunch.
"Tom," said she, do you know how
to run that telescope?".
"N-no-I don't know as do. Lig-
gins always attended to that"
She said nothing more about it and
/ went down town. When / returned
/ found the girl on her knees scrubbing
kerosene spot on the sitting room
carpet and the wreck of the telescope,
dissected by my wife, lying about the
floor. She grabbed me by the arm and
took me to q window. There she held
up piece of dirty glass.
what is that, do you think?" she
asked, in her superior way.
1T looks like photo negative"
at looks like it. but it isn't"
"Now listen" Just as if / could do
anything else but listen. THAT miser-
able astronomer, whom told my friends
was a distinguished savong in dis
tress, is nothing but mean cheat.
On this piece of glass Is clumsy
picture of the moon in India ink. Hold
It up to the sun. That light spot is the
moon, and this Opaque part represents
sky"
My face showed that didn't under
stand her, and it irritated her.
"That telescope was nothing but a big
tin tube bronzed over with slide Up
near the end, to slip this glass in, and
place beyond it for small hanging
kerosene lamp to light it up similar to
transparency. That is what you have
been looking at all this time. Study
ing astronomy! Good heavensi"
There are times when the English
language does not fill the bill as a
medium of expression.
My wife caught me struggling with
| my ONerCOat. lQOIudS henry, where
are you going?"
I'm going to interview Mr.. Higgins.
"You shall do nothing of the sort.
You will make yourself the laughing
stock of the town. Take off that coat. Z"
My wife was right. as usual.
"How did you discover the fraud?' L
asked, after 1 had cooled down. My
wife looked embarrassed, d saw
there was something in the wind. L
did not find out that day, nor the next,
but by q strict attention to business /
managed eventually to ascertain. She
had always believed the Livingstones,
although they held their heads rather
high, did not have enough to eat on the
table half the time. AS we can COM
maud view of their dining-room from
our sitting-room window, by using a
powerful glass, she had tried to bring q
little science to bear on the problem,
with the narrated result.
When Liggins came for his telescope
it was given him in pieces. Inever saw
him again, but some months later he
sent for me to pay q fine for vagrancy.
He, however. went up for sixty days,
and shipped him a copy of Dicks