The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1891-10-06
THE ARIZONA KICKER.
An Editor Possessed with a Very Worthy
Motto.

RETROSPECTIVE The first night we
entered this town we slept under a
wagon IN Apache avenue. We felt
tough, we looked tough, and we had
just Is cents cash capital. Wed walked
twenty eight miles that day to get some
where, and after getting there the pros
poets didn't seem to improve. We we're
sustained, however, by a determina-
ton to come out on top of the crowd
if we lost both legs in the hustle. That
determination carried us through.
From the very first issue of the
Kicker we took for our motto, 'Exdono
fama semper vivat,' which used to
mean in neighborhood in New
England, Tell the truth without fear
or favor, even if you never get an
office or own a dog We have stuck
to that motto, and while it has made
us some enemies it has also made us a
host of friends and a power in the land.
In pursuance of our policy wenow wish
to say a word about The Great Ari-
iona Home Provider Company which
is advertising extensively in the East.
Its latest scheme is to advertise city
lots in Blue Hill City at $50 each.
The city is represented as a hustl-
ing young tOwn-three railroads, two
banks, n theater, 5000 people and
bound to be the Chicago of the West
We rode out to the site the other day.
When we returned the company offered
us $25 to keep still.
GA POINTER FOR THE BOYS.-There
r three or four tough men in this
town-'way-back toughs, with cart
loads of sand in their systems-but
there are four hundred wOuld-be tOughs
who are not a bit tough, and never
can be. 1t isn't in them, and they are
not in it. They go around splitting
over their shoulders and bluffing the
Cinnamon and half breeds, but they
take good are not to run up against
the man whose father owned the spring
which was the fountain-head of Fight
ing Creek. In a fatherly way we want
to say to these boys: Don't. It's a
waste of time and raw material. The
goods are cotton-mixed and the dye
won't stand. Come off the perch and
drop your claims, and let everybody
size you up for what you really area
lot Of old dead-beats who ought to be
driven to tie sand-hills.'
"In this connection we wish to brief
ly refer to the little affair of Sunday,
which contemporary will no doubt
misstate in his usual fashion. We were
sitting on the steps of the post Office
waiting for the place to open at the
usual hour, when an Individual known
around town as Holy Smoke Bengal
Tiger Steve Johnson came along. No
one knows where he came from, and
some folks are very much afraid Of
him. He picked his teeth with a
grizzly's claw, carried a bowie knife
and claimed to shoot two-handed.
I'm writing up The Buffers of this
town a few weeks ago we asked this
Smoky Tiger, or whatever he calls
himself, what prison he had run from.
He's been promising the boys to slice
off our right ear, have it broiled in Bill
Taylor's restaurant, and then publicly
feed it to Steve Aker's Virginia fox
hound. We haven't been greatly wor-
ried, and we didn't skip a cog when we
saw the Tiger rolling along toward us.
| He came to a halt in front of US and
tried to look awfully wicked-real old
Rocky Mountain wicked, with the gore
thrown in as a chrome.
eve didn't SILVER.
"Then he smiled-a fac-simile of the
grin Kit Carson used to put on as he
counted up the dead %Iniuns and
whistIed for the buzzards to begin
work.
1--WE didn't unwind or lose any
buttons.
"Then he sent his deep-base roar
down to his feet and brought it up
again to tell us that our ear was his.
He reached for it, but he never got
there. WerOse up and knocked Smoky
off his pins at one punch, and then we
walked on him and sat down on him
and hammered him from head to heel
until he roared like a calf and whined
like a coyote. We have his two re-
volvers and bowie-knife on our table
as we write. We are waiting fer him
to prove property and take them away.
perhaps it would be appropriate to
observe in this connection that there
will be a little bee or gathering or con
~vention or some such a thing on Paw