San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1889-12-26
HE ASKED FOR THEPROOFS.

But as the Expounder Couldn't Fur
nish EN- the Good Man Skipped.
Texas SiftinRs.
The minister had been sent out
from the city to establish church in
a particularly tough locality in Indi-
ana. No meetings ever having been
held in that township, the school
house was pretty well packed with
farmers and their families, who had
come "tO see the fun and learn what
it was the city chap wanted 'em to do,
anyway" After q lengthy and forci-
BILE sermon, in which the beauties of
the next world were held up in favor.
able contrast with the barren and I'M
satisfying delusions of our mundane
sphere, the minister said:
Now, my brothers and sisters, you
are free agents. No restrictions are
placed upon you. 1t is for you to say
which Of these places you will select
as your future home. Will you pitch
your tents in the unwholesOme and
pestileatial lowlands of the world?
Or will you encamp i'm the fertile val
leys of the New Jerusalem, and dwell
forever in it's peaceful groves, eating
OF the fruit of the tree of life and
drinking from its crystal streams? L
ask you, which shall it be-"
The minister paused, as though eX-
pecting reply, when an old man In
the back of the room, who seemed to
be laborinV under the impression
that the preacher was a land agent,
endeavoring to form colony for the
of
whose location was not altogether clear
to him, arose, and, clearing his mouth
of a seemingly limitless quantity OF
saliva, evidently the accumulation Of
the entire forty minutes since the
opening of the services, replied:
"Well, mister, I don't doubt but
that the place you speak of is all
fired good country-perhaps q sight
better that Indiana; but the chap you
mentioned as going ahead to prepare
the way is a total stranger to me, and
'spects he is to most every one here.
Leastwise, 1 never hearn tell OH him
afore. I'll admit that you speak
mighty fair; but our people was took
in bad by mighty slick looking chap
from your town, a while ago, who in
duced a lot of 'em to buy some land
he had tor sale in Kansas, by repres-
entin' as how the potatoes out there
grew a sight bigger than the pun
kins here, and that one ear of corn
they raised there would makea good
| size grist. Some Of our people sold
their farms and went with him; but
they are all back now. ceptin' Deacon
Smith and his family, as was
| blown over into Newbrasky by a
cyclone. and Hank Soaper and his
wife as was skulped to death by injuns.
If you have got any proofs with you
that them trees bear fruit right along
winter and summer. and that it rains
bread regularly every night, we
mought talk to you. And do them
streams have pike and catfish as big
as them we catch in the Wabash? l
amt doubtin' your word, mister; but
it is risky business for a man to
pull up and go to a undiscovered
country, without he knows what he
is about, sure enough"
Looking around at the assembled
multitude, and seeing in every face
unmlstakable signs that the old man
had voiced the sen timents of the COM
munity, aud not having the docu-
ments with him In the shape ofmanna,
fruit and other productions OF the
country he was representing, the
preacher realized the futility OF fur
ther argument and sorrowfully took
his departure.