Custer chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, Black Hills, D.T. [S.D.]) 1880-1890, 1889-07-20

y $500 NN's -
Another new method for the reduc-
ton Of obesity has been discovered, as
all great discoveries are brought about,
purely by accident.
You see, it was just like this, ex-
pounded its inventor. Ny wife and |
went to housekeeping a while ago for
the first time, and she thought she
couldn't keep house without some pets.
You know how it is when your wife
makes up her mind to have anything.
Well, l got the pets, n cat and a dog.
At that time | was working a rowing
machine night and morning, swinging a
fifteen pound club, and various things of
that kind to keep my flesh down. Well,
the first week after the dog came, it kept
me so busy etfecting reconciliation be-
tween her and the cat, teaching her that
| q didn't enjoy tearing off down the block
after her every time the door opened,
and curbing her propensity for rearrang-
ing rug and the little curtains and
sashes my wife hangs around on tables
and chairs, and in bringing things, par
ticularly my wearing apparel, from the
the back yard, where she had Il trick of
dragging them, that | didn't nave time
to use the machine and club at all. At
the end of the week | had a whip on
every floor, and had lost two pounds of
flesh.
After harmony had been established
between Gladys and the cat, peace
seemed TO have been declared on her
part with all the feline race. She began
TO cultivate a gaunt tomcat that came
growing into the yard, but Tom didn't
reciprocate her friendly approaches. He
had known bitter experiences, and his
instincts were p~cSsimistic and aggressive.
He made "a dive at Gladys, who was all
unpreparod for the onslaught, and, of
curse, she got the worst of it. In a lull
in the proceedings put a bullet through
Toms back and finished tie fray. ! in
tended TO hit the cat in the head, but
with the usual perversity of his kind, he
continued to spring just enough TO take
it in the back. He crawled up a tree in
a sickening and writhing way, kicking
out his quivering hind legs, and my wife
began to cry and get white. and say she
knew she was going to faint. | begged
of her not to until | could bury my dead,
before the n%eighbors rushed in, and just
then the cat gave one last wiggle and
dropped out of the tree. | put my wife
on the bed with the Ponds extract bottle,
as | couldn't find the cologne, and rushed
down to bury the cat under a rose bush.
Gladys looked on ~approvingly, and when
the grave was smoothed over she snutfed
around it in a satisfied sort of way,
which intimated that the interment was
all correct and proper.
The next night when | got home that
cat lay under the rose bush without a
hair On its carcass, and beside it sat
Gladys triumphant, radiant and expect
ant, waiting my commendation. Some
OF the dirt from that grave was OF the
parlor windows, some in the pan Of let
tuce set out on the door step, and a lot
more was over the fence in the next
yard. Well, | licked the dog as usual,
as scientifically and handsomely as !
knew how, rubbed her nose on tho cat,
on the spade in the grave, explaining
meantime that | wanted the cat left
alone. Then | buried it again, Gladys
capering about the yard, catching the
various Tutoring pendant garments on
the clothes line in her teeth, and swing
ing round and round in great glce until
the clothes tore or the pins came out.
The next night when | went home my
wife was gone. didn't have to inquire.
/ knew without. A heavy tiger skin
rug had been dragged into the next
room and turned upside down, with n
white silk scarf off the cabinet around
the tigers head. A large fur rug had
been dragged away from the fireplace
and piled up with a down pillow and a
rug Of choice skins from the couch; in a
corner a Venitian glass lay in
fragments on the floor, and in the midst
Of the devastation, in a white and gold
chair SO decked out with blue ribbons
and plush that neither | or any guest
who ever came here had sufficient to-
merity to sit down in it, sat Gladys, ami
mated, expectant and delighted to sec
me. | went to the window to get q
whip and looked out. There lay the cat,
stark, stiff and staring.
1t took me a long time to polish that
dog off as she deserved and get the eat
buried again to my satisfaction, and 1t
was not quite agreeable, ever TO me, to
be rubbing the dogs nose in the corpse
in the way she deserved.
The next night, when l went home, l
found my wife crying by the wash bowl
and holding some wriggling, squirming
thing sewed up in q little muslin bag
under water with her finger. 1t proved
to bo three of the four kittens which she
had asked me to kill, and which l had
forgotten. The Lord only knows how
long she had been about it, for she sobbed
out that they wouldn't die and she was
80 faint and sick. l went out to enrich
another rose bush with the last remains
Of the three embryonic cats, when Gladys
came rushing up SO delighted about some
thing that l knew she needed her usual
licking. The cat was not entirely disin-
TERED; only his two hind feet stuck up
straight and hairless above the ground.
Evidently I had in my haste buried him
with his feet up. / thrashed the dog and
the mex night found the two fore feet
unearthed- l hammered the dog again
and buried the cat. That was the last