The Ouachita telegraph. [volume] (Monroe, La.) 1865-1889, 1888-06-02
TRAGEDY OF THE cucuMBERs.
The Unfortunate Fate Of Georgia
Farmer Told by an Able Romancer.


consisting of his devoted wife
aud ma. ), small children, mostly boys
aud girls. He owned o few acres Of
land, small portion of which was in
rich bottom. He conceived the idea
that by proper drainage and cultiva-
ton he might fluid arenumcrative mar
ket for them. So ne made his arrange
ments accordingly, raised the cucum-
bers, packed them in salt and shipped
them to some northern firm Tor pick
ling. The first year he was very sue
cesful and sold large quantities of them
for fair prices. The second year he felt
so much encouraged that he increased
his crop annd confidently expected a
much larger income. During the gath
ering time he was constantly engaged
in cutting, sorting and packing his Gu
cumbers In barrels aud shipping, them
TO his customers.
II Is we'll known that when cucun-
hers are first cut from tho vine there is
a piece which exudes or bleeds from
the stem. One morning the farmer
cut his hand and this juice got into the
cut and his hand commenced to in
flame, and an eruption similar to cry
sipelas made its appearance on his hand
and extended up his arm and finally
spread over his whole body. Strange
to say, there was no pain attending
these eruptions of erysipelas, and he
continued to gather and pack his Gu
cumbers and prepare them for ships
ment. To the great surprise of the far
mer these little erysipelas pimples as
sumed the appearance and form OF
small cucum bers and continued to grow.
Although the farmer kept we'll and
hearty he was compelled to strip him
seIf aud take 10 his bed. OF course the
news Of this great phenomenon spread
far and wide, and the doctors
and scientific men visited him from
various sections of the country. One
prescribed one thing and one another.
One wished to bleed him, one wished to
cut the cucumbers off; another said
not let him have any water aud they
would dry up; another said stick
hole In each cucumber and they would
die and new skin form; another wish
ell to wrap him in mammoth poul.
tice of barnyard manure and draw
them all to one head another said
they ought to be scattered. So there
was some hope that the patient would
the small cucumbers grew into big ones,
and his whole body was completely
covered with them from head to foot,
and they commenced to ripen and turn
yellow and hang down and the man
assumed the appearance Of huge
bunch OF bananas. When they got
ripe they began to shrivel and dry up,
aud so did tho man. His sap was all
gone and he died.
The doctors procured the consent of
the family to permit an autopsy to be
made for the benefit of science, and
they cut into him with their knives,
and 10 their amazement found no flesh
no blo0d-nO bOnes-nO muscles--no
sineWs--no veius-nO arteries but
found only one solid mass OF cucumber
seed. 1t was so remarkable that it
woul', g useless to have the remains
inferred. and foolish to have them ere
maIed, and she concluded that she
would keep them in tho house. She
had the corpse hung up by the hair of
the head and yelled.
The next spring some of the children
picked up some of tho seed which had
dropped on the floor and planted them.
They grew rapidly and matured, and
instead of being like the parent stock
Of cucumbers they were pure pickles,
they needed no vinegar, no pepper, no
salt, nothing but simply packing into
barrels and shipping to market and
selling. Of course news of the discove~
ny spread rapidly and multitudes Of mp.
plications for the seed flowed in like
the incoming tide, and thus enabled
the disconsolate widow and children to
turn the cause of their bereavement in
to a means of maintenance and support.
Griffin (Ga.) Ne,cS.