Waterbury evening Democrat., 1891-11-25

| with the sword
of ridicule, and then follows his thrust
with cannonading of vituperative cpl
| thets-"
IF you hadn't allowed those fellows
to run poor old Sultan"
"Oh, Sultan be hanged! They didn't
hurt him any"
HE might have overlooked past Of
lenses, and mightn't -
Look here, Kittie McCalligan, what's
the use of your nights and your
'mightn' ts'-Uncle Mac detests, abhors,
abominates, despises, hates and 1oathes
the college boys"
For which 1 am painfully aware he
| has, too often, just cause. Who ties
cats to his window shutters? Who puts
turtle eggs under the hen? Who smug-
giles bowling dogs into the cellar at
dead of night, fills Sultan's name with
burs, and paints the front fence red,
white and blue? You may use all the
telling synonyms you care to"
''If he didn't hate EN- they wouldn't
| do it"
"'7Hey' - with Teddy McCalligan,
ring-leader, left out?''
''Oh, say, Kit
You fellows don't do much to make
him love you that 1 have ever seen.
Great, grown boys like you, at that,
not soul among you under seven
| teen"
Nor one of us over twenty. Twen-
tvs awful young for boy, Kit, and all
the fellows SO far from home, and that,
and halfway homesick, the most of
EN-, and not one allowed to go home at
| Thanksgiving, with the Don kicking up
such dust about it all"
| You can go home, at any rate, and
as for being homesiclz, I'll wager that
| Jim"
''Oh! Jim Junior-'beautiful Jim
he's the FUNNIEST cove of the lot, if YOU
lil1e-and you needn't roll your eyes
around in such an indignant manner,
either-you're not the only girl living"
"Teddy!"
''Well, you are, then; but 1 happened
to see photograph in Jin's chest
| pocket"
Teddy"
stunning picture-eyes like stars,
mouth like-well, what you crying
about?"
Ibid you-did-did-did you ever hear
Jim say he wa-was homesiclz?''
Think the fellows a blubbering
idiot? S'pose you imagine he's going
around dampening handlzerchiefs with
the brine! Oh, l say, Kit, that was your
photograph caught on to-help a fell
low out, won't you?"
When man in impecunious circun1-
stances acts in a manner somewhat
unusual, he is straightway dubbed
crank; if, on the other hand,
man of means is guilty of the
selfsame actions, he is termed mere
| ly eccentric. Maj. McCalligans bank
account was large enough to allow him
to be called by the longer and more
euphonious appellation, and persistent
enough in his oddity to keep the sib-
| liant word continually upon the tongues
OF the people unluckily obliged, by
stress of circumstances, to dwell inside
the corporation of the populous college
| town. The major had settled there
long before any great barracks of a
school building had been erected, be-
fore the noise and confusion consequent
upon the arrival of hundreds of manner
less youths within the town-youths
who laughed law and order to scorn
and had since filed the majors nights
with a hideous unrest. That he, the
| hero of a hundred battles, should be
routed by such an enemy to his peace,
that he should pull up stakes and fly be-
fore so pulling, SO inane a foe was as far
from his thoughts as that the majors
ire was that adversary's chief joy In
every way possible, innocently or
maliciously, these tormentors sought to
arouse the majors wrath, dcsisting
only when they had won for themselves
the dear delight of seeing his quick
Irish blood fly to his scowling brow,
and hearing his quick Irish tongue
berating them with the choice invective
he had, with seeming forcthought, gath
native land.
In the college town, therefore, tie
ma Or had remained, pestered and en-
joyed by youths who grew to manhood,
graduated, and, as the years flew by,
began sending on second editions of
themselves to their beloved Alma Mater.
During this passage of time the
ma ors sister-the sole idol of his heart
had married and, after several years of
married bliss, had found herself a
widow, with two little children to care
for. Although she realized their great
need of her, and fought bravely to live
for their sakes, her efforts We're of no
avail, and each day saw her more and
more the shadow of her former self In
vain her, brother tried to comfort her
the fond heart was broken, and before
the winter frost had melted above the
grave wherein lay all her hopes, there
was another mound to he covered by
the soft white mantle of the snow, and
the major, filed with that mournful
tenderness felt only by lamenting Irish
hearts, led the two little ones back to
his own fireside, accepting them as a
sacred legacy. He gave them his name
and his undivided care and attention,
and joyed in the sense of his ownership
of two charming children, who were
now as much his own as though he had
suffered sleepless nights during their
infancy, and been fretted by a wife of