Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-10-27
THE TOPICAL TALKER.
A True and Tragic Tale of Tall MANA
Chapter of Wedding Town Tricks-An
Old Fashioned Estimate of Woman's


Old Fashioned Estimate of Woman's
Wisdom.
There's remarkably tall mar" I said, point
ing to a very bean-pole of a fellow who passed
us at the moment.
"Yes," remarked the banker-politician-river-
man beside me- "he is tall, but not SO tall as
man Ihad a glimpse of back in the fftles. That
was when was learning the river on the steam
er Lehigh in 1859 The boat was very crowded
that trip. Full of planters, cotton merchants,
and a sprinkling of lawyers on their way
North. 1t was at some way-down place that
the tall man I referred to came aboard. l
don't know what the dickens he was. He may
have been a lawyer or a parson, or may pc
school teacher. All know is that he was one
of the tallest oldest looking men ever saw.
HE was feet 9 if he was an inch. On top
of this he wore tall silk hat-the hat seemed
higher than any I've seen before or since-and
that with very long black coat made him mon
umental to the eye. His figure was not unlike
Lincoln's scrawny and angular. Not vestige
of hair was on his face, and his features were
bold and impressive. remarked the brilliancy
of his eyes particularly But what made him a
marked character on the Lehigh was his elo-
Quence He liked to talk on public subjects
there were not wanting stirring topics in that
flaming period before the war-and SO well did
he talk that he almost always had crowd of
attentive listeners about him. Gradually he'd
get excited, and his eloquence grew SO fiery
that everybody in the boat pressed to hear him.
Still no one seemed to know who he was and
all / can swear to now is his height and his elo-
quence. Very few orators I've heard surpassed
him.
"WE had all become greatly interested in our
monumental orator." continued the ex-river-
man, "by the time we had reached Cairo. 1t
was nighttime when we prepared to make
landing at woodward near Hurricane Island,
on the Ohio, about 60 miles above Cairo. The
river is from mile to a mile and half wide at
Hurricane Island, and it is an ugly bit of water,
turbulent and treacherous. 1t was dark
night, very dark, as the Lehigh was turned to-
ward the low mud shore, with its dismal fringe
of swampy forest The tall stranger was stand
ing with group of passengers on the forecastle
when the boat neared the shore. can see him
now, lounging by the rail
'.In those days we used a torch-basket to light
the way when we made landing. An iron
basket was filed with cinders and topped with
pine knots, which would blaze brightly. The
watchman stepped forward to light the
basket, which hung out over the boats
bow, and as the torches hared into
a bright flame the tall man gave aJell and
sprang over the rail into the water. He rose at
once, and we could hear him striking out with
powerful strokes for the shore. The boat fol-
lowed him slowly, and by the light of the
torches we saw him climb up the mud bank
and disappear in the swamp beyond. Nobody
ever saw him again. He probably met his
death in the swamp"
"How do you account for his making away
with himself?"
1.-THE sudden appearance of the flames in the
torch basket doubtless unhinged his mind. He
had been suffering from delirium tremens l
guess, and it is well known that man so
affected has an ungovernaDle horror for fire."
TALKING of brides devices to enjoy the
honeymoon iDcognito." said a Pittsburger
yesterday; II remember case in Philadelphia
wherein queer chapter of accidents oc-
CURED. 1t was a MONDAY wedding, and the
guests and newly welded couple were delayed
at the house of the brides father till late in
the afternoon. Some of the bridegroom's
brothers planned to increase his joy by
making his identity as anewly-marrled man un-
mistakable. They made streamers of white
muslin and tied them all over the big coach
horses which were to draw the family carriage
conveying bride and groom to the railway sta
tion half or three-quarters of a mile away. They
had also boot. one of pair which the bride
the picturesque udgueros she had seen there,
and this they had filed with rice.
but the bridegroom did a little planning on
his own account in an opposite direction. At
the time announced for the happy couples de-
parture when the family carriage had drawn
up at the front door, small brougham drove
with great clatter up to side door and dashed
away again with both blinds up. The guests on
the porch imagined at once that their victims
were escaping, and made wild rush with old
shoes and rice after the fast-disappearing
brougham. At that moment the bride and
upstairs and entered the family carriage. 1t
drove away, but not before the
mischievous boys aforesaid had tied to the
back of the carriage the cowboys boot before
mentioned. With the horses covered with mus
humping along behind, it was hardly possible
that the happy pair escaped the publicity they
had schemed to avoid"
IS
THE masculine notion of woman's import
ance is higher than it used to be.
For instance, a friend of mine tells me that
it chanced one day as he was driving from
Blairsville to Livermore that he stopped at a
tollgate to ask if he was travelling on the right
road. A little old woman came outand was care
fully giving the desired directions, when her
husband, an old man of IS atleast, appeared, and
waving his hand solemnly at his better half,
said: "Wil ye hoosh, woman! The gentle
man knows twice as much as 1 do and ten times
as much as you do-so hoosh nowr'
And then the old man repeated what the
woman had said. HEPBURN JOHNS.