The Arizona sentinel., 1886-02-20
RUNNING A FURNACE.
How Mr. Jones Managed to Keep Warm
 While His Family Shivered.

There are few things in this world so
 easy as running furnace.
 That is what Jones thought when he put his in last fall; though, to tell the truth, the opinion was not original with Jones. It was suggested to Jones in the first place by the man who sold
 the furnace, but Jones received the opinion as sort of chromo thrown in with the furnace, and utilized it as though it were his own property, as in- deed it was.
 The first time that Jones attempted to build fire in his new furnace, he suc- ceeded admirably in making a roaring blaze with the kindlings, in blackening his hands and face and transmitting himself into the semblance of a burnt cork serenader of the Megatherium or Senegambian variety, and in driving the family incontinently from the house by that peculiarly pungent odor which is sent forth by heated stove-polish fresh from the shop; but he was not so suc- cessful in accomplishing fire.
 The kindlings behaved in a most praiseworthy manner, allowing them- selves to be consumed to the uttermost splinter, but they failed miserably in transferring their warmth to the coal which Jones had very literally shoveled atop of them. In fact, when the flames had finished the kindlings, they appeared to have considered their part of the con- tract completed, and unceremoniously went about their business elsewhere.
 Then Jones proceeded to fill his hair and cover his clothing with dust by means of the shaker, which the dealer had assured Jones could be operated without raising sufficient dust to soil lady's pocket-handkerchief. Unfortun- ately, Jones did not have a lady pocket handkerchief with him at the time, or he would, perhaps, have demonstrated to the world that whereas this shaker might be somewhat careless in regard to the person and clothing of a great horrid man, it was eminently punctilious in its regard for the pocket-handkerchief of the fair sex.
 But, however it might have been with the supposititious handkerchief afore- said, there could be no doubt about the possibilities of that shaker in the dust-raising line so far as Jones and his environment were concerned. The dust not only covered his exterior, but his ears and nose and mouth were crowded with it. His teeth were as full of grit as Cane cock, and at every inhalation the carbOniferous de- posits in his lungs grew more dense.
 Jones got the thing cleaned out at last hut his natural beauty was not i'm proved by the experience. He had perspired plentifuilv, what with the heat of his own exerti0ns added to the artincIal neat winch viio nI..Sa...1gs had created in the furnace (not to speak of the temperature his temper had acquired by this time), and the dirty streams which constantly flowed adown his face on to his linen did not add to the cleanliness of his appearance.
 Then he filled her up again and touched her off. It was all right this time, and in less than half-hour every window in the house had to be opened to prevent its occupants from slow but certain cremation. But that was not the fault of the furnace. It was all owing to the weather being so unseason- ably warm. "Wait until we have cold day." said Jones.
 We'll, next day it was cold enough to suit an arctic adventurer.
 ''Now," said Jones, ''we'll show lem how to keep warmr' And as he shov- eled in the coal-it is remarkable how much coal furnace can get away with when its appetite is all right-he chuckled to himself as he thought how snug and warm he should be, while Thompson's folks, across the way, would be shivering like slack sail in gale of wind.
 By this time Jones had a roaring fire. ''That'll do,'' he said, with glow of satisfaction irradiating his features; 'thatn do.' Then he went upstairs, to find Mrs. Jones and the children hud dled about the register, looking more like the family of Harry Gill of chatter ing memory, than the wife and off spring of John Jones, owner of a new and improved furnace.
 And they continued to chatter, not withstanding Jones did little else all day long than to pile the anthracite into the greedy maw of that furnace He opened the cold-air box, he shut the cold-air box, he shut this damper and opened that check draft; Heaven knows what he didn't do. But it was no use. The at mosphere above the cellar floor was arctic, and his wife and children were not happy-not so happy, perhaps, as the Thompsons, across the way, who circled about their red-faced stove, and quite forgot to shiver; nor so comfort able as the sparrows on the chimney top, for there seemed to be no lack of heat there-else why should all the spar rows in the neighborhood perch thereon, as about family hearth?
 The weather began to moderate that night; then the furnace, to show that it could be versatile as well as the weather, began to send up a fervent breath through the registers, and by the time the mercury outside had risen to sixty degrees or thereabouts, the temperature in the Jones domicile was climbing up among the eighties. Up go the windows again.
 Jones still thinks that it is easy enough | to run furnace, but ifyou want to know how to run it so as to have a cool house | on warm day, and warm house when the weather is cold, you must ask some body with more experience than he pos sesses.
 P. S.-Jones has new and improved | furnace which he will sell cheap for cash.-BoSton Transcript.
 -"Old man Pennybunker has mar ried again" "You don't tell me so." ''Yes, and he has married right young