Alpena weekly argus. [volume] (Alpena, Mich.) 1871-1893, 1892-05-04
He Wanted TO Die.

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Hamlet he was little afraid.
When his best girl went back OH
him, however, nervousness gave way
to sombre resolution. He certainly
must die now, even if he had TO kill
himself. As he was in the best of
health, and weighed one hundred
and eighty pounds, it looked very
much as il he would have to assist
Death little if he looked for that
grim parsonage to comfort him with
oblivion.
But he must be buried in style.
He had a patrician horror of cheap
coffins, tawdry burial clothes, and
an unappreciative undertaken. As
his salary was moderate, he began
to save up money. 1t was weary OF
work, waiting for dollars to accum-
ulate in order that he might place
himself where, in all probability,
there are no dollars.
His first purchase was coffin.
None of your epemeral wooden at
fairs, but aleaden casket, so fancifully
carved that he Immediately stood it
up in the corner Of his room and
hung his Sunday clothes therein.
Friends wondered at his taste, but
he would warp the edge Of their cur
iosity with some such remarks as:
"Well, you know, | always was
original in my tastes"
The next sepulchral item was a
shroud. Penurious people might
have asked:
"Why not be buried in your best
suit? You won't have to take it off
again, it's bound to last as long as
you will need il"
But he had come to the conclu-
sion that shroud was the proper
caper. The old Greeks wore them
and he was Harvard graduate. So
shroud he purchased. 1t was a
silk one, dead white, so white III fact
that it was CHASTITY. He quite fell
in love with it's appropriateness, and
before going to bed would wrap him.
self in it and stand before the glass.
"By Jove! III make fine look
ing corpse he would say. IF |
can only keep proper expression"
After the shroud was bought, he
kept OH saving money for various
other post -mortem expenses attend
ant upon tasty and genteel funeral.
There must be carriages, flowers,
Grape, black gloves, and what not.
All these he provided for, and at
length, all the expenses attendant
upon doing away with ones self
were, so to speak, liquidated.
One more consideration remained,
an important one to him, if to no
one else. This was the way by
which he should take himself off.
Hanging was vulgar and criminal,
electricity was awfully mysterious.
Why not try poison? Here the
range was very, very wide. Prussic
acid, strychnine, arsenic, were OBJ
jectionable in view of the prelimin-
arypains inflicted. An nopate! All!
That was the thing.
So he provided himself with plen-
ty of morphine, and made up his
mind that if the sun dawned upon
his corporeal existence one more time,
it would not be his fault.
That night he went to bed, firmly
convinced that he would be a dead
man in less than ten hours. While
making these ant-mortem reflections
he unfortunately forgot himself 80
far as to fall asleep.
He awoke with thrill, as the
story tellers say, and remembered
that he had not, as yet killed HIM
self. So he got up, lighted the gas,
and carefully measured out enough
morphine to kill small sized regi-
ment. So far not a nerve quivered.
He was in fact SO much in love with
the dramatic after-effects of his idea
that the usual fear Of death had not
visited him. He was absorbed in
thinking of the notoriety of which
he would be the centre.
He held the death-dealing powder
in one hand and turned to take
last look at his precious coffin and
shroud. Then, his eyes dilated, a
sudden tremor shook his form. He
staggered back like drunken man,
and the poison fell from his trembl-
ing fingers.
The coffin and shroud were gone!
At the far end of the room was
an open window. Herushed thither,
looked out and saw a step ladder be-
low. The truth forced itself upon
him, and with, as it were, sickcn-
ing thud.
Burglars. And of all things in
| the world to be stolen! To steal a