Bismarck weekly tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1884-1943, 1891-10-30
CHARMING RATTLERS.
Mr.. JAGGERS, OF PIKE COUNTY,
AND HIS CURIOUS STICK.

Means of u Little Rod-He Says That
All His Power Lies in the Wood.
George Jaggers is we'll known on both
sides of the Delaware river. He comes
from Dingman's Ferry, in Pike county,
Pa, where he has a rattlesnake farm. He
raises a few vegetables for himself and
farm produce sufficient for the needs Of
the horse which drags him and his snakes
around the country in the summer. But.
his livelihood comes mainly from his snake
show. There is not a hamlet in all New
Jersey I'M Pennsylvania too small for
Jaggers to exhibit in. If there is nothing
in sight but a tavern, he can at least get a
supper, a few dimes and Il nip or two of
apRlejack. In towns. however, he fares
better, and from the numerous small sum-
mer resorts which line the west side of the
Delaware he often joys off with a consid-
cradle weight of silver in his pockets.
So strongly are most people impressed
with the personality of a RATHER that when
aver "a dead one is brought to town it is
sure to attract a crowd So when Jag
gers ties his detected horse to the tavern
rail and proceeds to scatter some thirty or
forty big and very lively rattlers in the
road there is a sensation.
, Jaggers' methods vary with circum-
stances, but when he can he takes posses
sion of a barroom. Sometimes he charges
a dime or five cents for admission. More
often he passes the hat after the show is
over. The show itself is simple enough.
He lifts his snakes from the box with a
stick and starts them wriggling all over
the floor. He guides them about with the
stick, picks them up with it, hangs them
over his outstretched arms, and places
them in his lap. 1t is his stick, not he,
that the snakes obey. 1t seems to exert
a strange influence over them.
He turns them at will by touching their
heads with it, causes them to coil and In
coil, to rise in the air, lie fiat, strike or
cover. The stick is always moving and
the %rattlers are always sensible of it and
apparently under it's influence. All through
the maneuvers, which Jaggers conducts
with the volubility and manner of a Coney
island Snowman, he showers challenges
right and left:
'Twenty-five cents to a nickel, gentle.
men, that | can make Pocano, the big 'un
there with the fourteen %rattles, jump over
the stickl What, no takers? Then | think
I've got the drinks on you, gentlemen, and
after we AVE them, if any one wants to
bet me that old Blue Piz'n, him over there
with the yaller belly and eleven ~rattles,
can't dance a jig on his button, let him
make me a proposition. Or I'll bet any
man in the crowd ten dollars to one dollar,
and repeat it MS often rs he likes, that he
can't mann the wood in this stick.
"This stick, gentlemen, is endowed with a
singular power over the rattlesnake, by vir.
tue of which the biggest and ~nastiest can
be s%ubjugated. will also lay you a SINH
lar wager, and repeat it as often as you
please, that no one in this room ever saw
this kind of wood before, though | assure
you on my word of honor that | cut it
from it's parent tree NJ further off Than
Pike county, Pennsylvania. What, no
takers? Gentlemen, you lack sand. Here,
Blazes, you're too fresh by half. Take a
smell of this here stick and keep quiet"
When the show is over and Jaggers has
lured all the small change possible from
the pockets of the wondering countrymen,
he puts his snakes back in the box, lifting
each from the floor by its tail. and sits down
in the barroom o .talk.
He is a potentate, and is looked on with
wonder by all. Now he produces his stick
agAn, and dilates Upon it's astonishing
virtues. He declares that it has an all
powerful influence over rattlesnakes, as
indeed it apparently has. Then he an
nounces that there is only one tree in the
country of the sort, and that he is the only
mar in the world who knows where that
tree grows. 1t is a certain lumber of miles
and rods and feet in q certain direction from
a certain point near Dingman's Ferry.
There are no rattlesnakes to be found for
miles around it, so much do they dread it's
power.
He starts the farmers and mountain peo-
pie to guessing what the wood is. Most
people say it is white ash, for all through
this country it is believed that white ash
possesses a mysterious power over rattle
snakes, and white ash bark isalways bound
on rattlesnake bites in the belief that it
has virtue to suck the poison from the
wound. But Jaggers declares solemnly
that it is not white ash, and as u matter Of
fact it does not look like it.
Many of the country people believe Jag
gers story about the mysterious tree grow
ing in isolation from it's kind in that spot
near Dingman's Ferry. Others refuse to
believe it. and think that Jaggers has dis.
covered some drug which subdues rattlers,
and has stepped a stick of ordinary wood
in it.
A few doubters believe that the snake
"a removes the poison sacs from the
snakes before he exhibits them; but the
care he uses in handling them and the
reliance that he places on his stick, seldom
touching them with his hands before first
tapping their noses with the stick, seem to
c]orroborate his assertion that they are just
as venomous as when he first CAPTURED
them.
The fact that he has been bitten by a
rattler does not detract from his reputa-
ton. 1t shows that he had at least one
poisonous snake in his collection, and
makes it presumable that all are poisonous.
Besides, he got we'll, and that in itself is
something of a feat. Jaggers says his stick
cured him.
Not the least interesting part of Jaggers'
show is his horse. He is the embodiment Of
eternal apprehension. He appears happy
only when he is painfully dragging his
rheumatic limbs over the mountain roads
with Jaggers behind him, alternately rap.
ping him over the hips and punching him
in the back with his snake stick. Then
the horse knows that the r~attlesnakes are
safely slowed AWAY in a covered hoy Az