Alpena weekly argus. [volume] (Alpena, Mich.) 1871-1893, 1889-02-20
Peck's Bad Boy.

ut is too bad. / can't think Of any.
thing that humiliates a boy, and
makes him so ashamed, as to have a
father that is in the habit of hosting
in too much benzlne."
eyes but guess we have got him
all right now. He is the scartest man
you ever saw" and the boy took q
can opener and began to cut the zinc
under the stove, just TO see if it would
work as well on zinc as on tin.
"What, you haven't been dissecting
him again, have you ?" said the groc-
cry man, as he pulled stool up be-
side the boy to hear the news. "How
did you bring him to his senses ?"
swell, you see ma had the minister
and some of the sisters try talking to
pa, but he broke them all up by talk
ing about what an appetite they had
for champagne punch when they were
out in camp last summer, and they
couldn't have any effect on him, so
ma said she guessed l would have 10
exercise my ingenuity on pa again.
Ma has an idea that l have got some
sense yet, so I told her that if she
would do just as | said, me and my
chum would scare pa so he would
swear off. She said she would, and
we went to work. First / took pas
spectacles down to an optician, Satur-
day night, and had the glasses taken
out and pair put in their place that
would magnify, and I took them home
and put them in pas spectacle case.
Then got suit of clothes from my
chum's. uncle's trunk, about half the
size of pas clothes. My chum's un-
Gle is very small man, and pa is COR
pulent. l got a plug hat three sizes
smaller than pas hat, and took the
name out of pas hat and put it in the
small hat. l got shirt about half
big enough for pa, and put his initials
on the thing under the bosom, and got
number fourteen collar. Pa wears
seventeen. Pa had promised to brace
up and 60 to church Sunday morning
and ma put these small clothes where
pa could put them on. l told ma,
when pa woke up, to tell him he look
ed awfully bloated, and excite his Gu
riosity, and then send for me-"
you didn't play such trick as
that on poor old man. did you ?"
said the grocery man, as smile came
over his face.
"You bet Desperate diseases re-
quire desperate remedies. Well, ma
told pa he looked awfnlly bloated,
and that his dissipation was killing
him as well as all the rest of the fam
lily. Pa said he guessed he wasn't
bloated much, but he got up and put
on his spectacles and looked at him
self in the glass. You'd died to see
him look at himself. His face look
ed as big as two faces, through the
glasses, and his nose was a sight. Pa
looked scared, and then he held up
his hand and looked at that. His
hand looked like ham. just then |
came in, and / turned pale, with some
chalk on my face, and l began to cry,
and said, oh, pa, what ails you ?
You are so swelled up hardly knew
you.' Pa looked sick to his stomach,
and then he tried to get on the pants.
Oh, my, it was all could do to keep
from laughing to see him pull them
pants on. He could just get his
legs in, and when l got a shoe horn
and gave it TO him, he was mad. He
said it was a mean boy that would
give his pa shoe horn to put on
pants with. The pants wouldn't come
around pa into ten inches, and he
said he must have eat something that
disagreed with him, and he laid it to
watermelon. Ma stuffed her handker-
chief in her mouth to keep from laf.
ing, when she see pa look at hisself.
The legs Of the pants were SO tight
pa couldn't hardly breathe, and he
turned pale, and said, Henry. your
pa is mighty sick man. and then
ma and me both laughed, and he said
we wanted him to die so we could
spend his life insurance in riotout liv-
ing. But when he put on that con-
densed shirt, ma she laid down on the |
lounge and fairly yelled, and laugh !
ed till my sides ached. Pa got it over
his head, and got his hands in the
sleeves, and couldn't get it either way,
and he couldn't see us laugh, but he
could hear us, and he said, It's darn.
ed funny, amt it, to have q parent
swelled up this way. If / bust you
will both be sorry Well, ma took
hold of one side of the shirt, and l
took hold of the other, and we pulled
it on, and when pas head came up
through the collar, his face was fairly
blue. Ma told him she was afraid he
would have a stroke of apoplexy be-
fore he got his clothes on, and | guess
pa thought so too. He tried to get
the collar on, but it wouldn't go half
way around his neck, and he looked