Morning journal and courier., 1888-02-15
How Josef Hofman's Playing Impress
 ed Doubling Jerseyman.

He was such an alfred little chap, an tn peano was such an everlastin' big-as- -all-eut doors concern that when he sat down to tackL it says to myself: s'It's all up with tha boy" It seemed kind O unfair that they
 didn't give him peano somewhere nigh hil own size-he was sech an all-fired little chap Somehow it looked just about as ridiculous a.
 askin' a one armed man t'play the music o
 the spears on the harp of the thousan
 strings.
 But the boy warn't afraid O the machine,
 not bit of it-although he was sech an all fired little chap. He walked right up to it
 as big as life, with just as much as to say:
 s'Who's skeered of youa You've got two rows O teeth, one white an one black, but you can't bite me-not if my names J. Hof- mann" An the peano stood there, not say in Q word, but lookin' for all the world like some beast with it's mouth wide open, ready to swaller that boy. It was one O them pinched off sort O peanos, taperin' down from big wide mouth to 8 narrow, round tail, and with a lo-sided cover, remindin' one of a bat with an overgrown wing on one side an none on t'other.
 The boy dipped his little hand among the teeth O the machine. He must hev touched a hollar melar, for the thing grow1ed and groaned like all git out. Pausin' for an in- stant an half he did so again, and then there was roarin' and ravin' like one hears on stormy nights in winter when tn wind blows straight up from Somers' Point fifteen miles till it strikes the pines back O our house. Then the boy took a rest, an jest sot back on his red stool as much as to say to the machine |" Show yer teeth to me. will you How do you like that 3" And jest about then the orchestra, seein' that he were sech an alfred little chap, kind Q chimed in with 8 few gratis tunes an seoh, as if to encourage him.
 Then J. Hofmann put his hand into her mouth again, cautious like an keerful. The sound that came out this time was a song-a low, soft, velvet sort O song, like it was sung on 0 summer afternoon in an orchard where the apples were red an the winds had quit anyone was listenin' and who sung because she couldn't help it. The sunshine and the smell O clover seemed to be sitting down through that song, and it looked like fine evenin', but in less'n no time the whole sky changed. J. Hofmann had hit another tooth an' there was another row. The thunder be. gan to rumble away of down the valley and nasty 1ookin' clouds began chasin' one an- other across the sky; the wind sobbed an moaned an 1ightnia' cracked and flashed angrily like as if it wanted to punish the earth for smilin'. The storm roared an' shrieked an all creation was scared to death: the trees bent and broke with noises that seemed like the snappin' O dead mems bones, an jest as everybody set to wonderin' if ever there was such tempest afore the clouds cleared off all on a sudden, the sun- shine hiokered through the branches again, the girl was singin' that same velvety song under the apples, an it warn't so much of storm after all.
 J. Hofmann had no more trouble with the peano after that. The cretur' had found it's boss an' master. He tickled it under the chin, 50 to speak, an it filled all the air with the laughter and song of innocent children at play among the daisies an wild roses: he teched it with the finger of reverence, an' we heard the mellow tones of far-eff church bells sanctifyin' the Sabbath calm with peace and benediction; he earessed it with a wooer's hand an we heard the low voices an tender