Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-05-21
THE TOPICAL TALkER.

Tho Alleged Responsibilities of tho Bes
Man Were Too Much for the Young NInn
A Musical Innovntion-A Tragedy on ths
Ohio.
IT is no small undertaking to be best man at a
wedding. The awful responsibilities of the
groom usually fill the minds of the spectators
and the best mans trials are rather lost sight
i of. Still, important as the chief male assist
ants duties are, they are not really SO formid
able as they seemed TO an Allegheny man who
recently was called upon to fulfill them.
This young man was asked by an old friend
to stand up with him when he entered the sol.
emn estate of matrimony. He consented will
ingly. He is of a nervous temperament, and a
number OF his friends, for joke, resolved to
give him fright. So they went to him one by
one and impressed upon him that being best
man carried with it no small obligations. He
would have to wear new dress suit, they told
him. and a new hat, new shoes, new tie and
SO on. Besides, he would have to give the
| pride an expensive present, and contribute
literally to the groom's expenses. One par.
ticularly solicitous friend was kind enough to
hgure out exactly how m uch his performance
at the wedding would cost him. The sum to-
tai, by this fictitious figuring. was $50.
Now to young man on a mall salary as the
best-man-to-be was, $3.50 was no joke Being.
| as have said, of nervous temperament the
| obligation of spending sum so far beyond his
means affected him powerfully. He could not
think OF backing out. yet how to scrape to-
gether the money to do 'the thing well' he
hadntan idea. He worried himself sick about
it, actually sick, and to cut long story short,
when the wedding day came the young man who
should have been best man lay seriously ill in
bed in a hospital
And this is strictly true. The joke was car
ried much too far.
HEY have inaugurated very pretty custom
at the Hotel Duquesne. Yesterday for the
nrst time, everyone who took dinner at the
hotel could If he wished time his knife and fork
TO the lively strains of an orchestra posted at
the head of the stairs which lead from the
lower cafe to the upper dining room. What
erect precisely it had upon the appetites of the
business men who throng the cafe at midday is
beyond me, but everybody seemed to enjoy it.
Ihe idea, believe, may be credited to Man
ager Albert Menjou, who has fund of fancies
of this sort. The orchestra will in future play
every day during the midday dinner. and at
night for the diners in dead earnest 1t is
something novel in this country, but Pitts
burgers are likely to appreciate it.
SOME strange things have happened on board
that historic craft The Mayfower but
probably the strangest incident in her history
caused one of her passengers last Sunday much
modification.
The Mayflower took large cargo of Pitts
burgers down the Ohio last Sunday. AS the
boat was returning among the passengers who
were leaning over the rail watching the shadows
lengthen on the wooded hills were couple who
seemed very much engrossed in each other, and
supremely happy withal. A close observer
could have noticed that the lady's pretty cheeks
were constantly disturbed by a mechanical
movement of her jaws A learned person
would have perceived that she was chewing
gum. She enjoyed the chew evidently.
Suddenly shrill scream startled everyone,
and the fair chewer apparently made an effort
to throw herself overheard. Her companion
restrained her, and crowd of curious sympa-
thizers thronged about, offering assistance.
She controlled herself. but the tears coursed
down her cheeks, and nothing her escort could
say comforted her. She did not reveal her
fearful loss to the bystanders. Perhaps she
feared they would giggle.
Her upper set of false teeth had become en-
tangled with the chewing gum and somehow
or other-perhaps expelled in some ecstatic ut
terance-teeth and gum had fallen into the
brown waters of the Ohio.