Alpena weekly argus. [volume] (Alpena, Mich.) 1871-1893, 1890-07-30
Passed tariff law agin you %

into Wayne township and sell them
without payin' ten cents bird into
the treasury. Tha say tina must pro-
tect their home industries, and lots OF
men over there are ketchin' mud
larks and sellin' them for Twin.
OF course | just paid the tariff and
added the ten cents bird to the
sellin' price and then them people
was satisfied"
thinks il makes 'em richer, meb-
be-" seq |.
"Well, it don't" SEE Philo. Tha
pay more for mud larks than tina need
to Just because two Of the three town.
ship trustees is in that business, and
want their infant industry protected.
Tha must be set of donkeys-oh, |
know" Philo Strengthened up then
and sort of laf broke from him,
and he walked away agin, with his
hands out of his pockets and lookin'
as pleased as though he had discover
ed something.
| didn't see him agin for two weeks
and ole day when | was patchin' the
harness he come into the stable with
bran. new suit of clothes on and a
stiff hat that didn't quite fit him, and
two rings on one hand.
"Hello," seq ! ; "gettin' rich p
eyes, am, SOL" seq he. 81 tell
you this protection is right after all.
When they put tax of ten cents a
head on my mud larks over there |
just added that dime to my selling
price. OF course it made the mud
larks sell for more, but | cleared just
the same as / had, and the market
held up all right. But one day l
thought out scheme, and it's maxim
me heaps of good money. But can't
give it away. l just come over to
pay off that note you hold agin me-"
| was surprised. He had plenty of
money and talked about buildin' a
new house, but he wouldn't tell me
what his scheme was. But when
Mike, my hired man, came home at
night he told me all about it. Philo
and his boy and his son-in-law would
90 down there into the swamp and
chase up the mud larks and drive
them over the township line. The
birds couldn't fly fur. of course, but
tina would circle around a bit and
then settle down just over the edge into
Wayne township, and tangle them
selves up in Philo's big net that had
been spread there for them. Then
he would 60 over empty handed, take
the mud larks out of the snare and
sell them at the old market price
with ten cents tax added, but as he
had caught 'em in Wayne he didn't
have no tax to pay, and he was just
coming money. Them people over
there seem satisfied. Tha had seen
him chase the mud larks over the line
and then ketch 'em, but so long as the
birds wasn't shipped in like other
merchandise, and so long as tina
bought what was caught in their own
township they was satisfied. Tha
was agin pauper producers or import
ed mud larks, tba sed, if it busted
every consumer in Wayne. SO tina
kept that up, and after while they
raised the tax another dime, though
there wasn't two birds month
brought past their custom house.
But Philo overdone the thing. He
kept hollerin' so loud for more pro-
lection for mud larks in Wayne that
the people thare, who are smart enough
when tina git their eyes open, found
that the tariff was maxim the protect
ed fellers too rich and busting every
body else, so tina wiped the hull thing
out, and mud larks was sold for Just
what they was worth, no matter who
offered them. | was sorry for Philo
but l swear could not blame them.
This last summer was awful dry
here. 1t didn't rain from the Fourth
of July to corn-shucku' time, and
every well for miles around went dry.
The creek that runs across Philo's
place was all dried up, and lots of
farmers come every day to my spring
and hauled water away. don't
know what the naborhood would do
without it. One day when the drouth
was at the worst, Philo come to me
and sed he had another scheme.
"We'll get tariff on water" he
sez. 81 see by the papers man
named Long Jones has gone to Wash.
ington to git tariff on water cause
he owns spring up in Wisconsin. l
shouldn't wonder if he got it. Well
git the township trustees to give us a
tariff tax on water too, and then we
can sell every gallon that runs out of
your spring. I'll tend to the business
for you, and divide sheer, and sheer
alike. Tha amt another bit of Twin
water in ten mile, and these people
can do no better. What do you say?"
| looked down the creek awhile
and seen lot of Dick ellis cattle