, 1892-03-20
A FREAK INTERVIEW
QUAD TALKS WITH THE FAT WOMAN
AND THE oSSlFleD MAN.

Amer Years of Mental Torture All His
Doubts and Fears Are Settled at Last
The Fat Woman Says It's All Right and
the ossihed Man Backs Her Up.
Copyright, 1889, by Charles B. Lewis.l
More than twenty years ago Ifellin with
Professor Somebody or Other, who was
= Professor of Something or Other, and he
brought up the subject of transmigra-
sion. We were travelling in a stagecosch,
and expected to be held up at every mile,
md 1 also had the jumping toothache.
For these reasons 1 didn't argue the mat
ser with him, and because 1 had no chance
% argue / WAS more than half satisfied
II the correctness of the theory as ex-
pounded by him.
Eyes, gentlemen" said the professor, as
We took a short cut over a windfall to
avoid three agents waiting at a bend in
the road with bated breath, every one Of
US will simply take on a new form after
death. There is a man right here among
Us who will probably be changed into n
fat woman or an-ossifed man, and you
will see him exhibited at a dime museumF'
knew he meant me. Everybody knew
it. He was looking right at me as he said
il. 1 didn't believe it at first, but as time
went on the idea became stronger and
stronger, and for the last seventeen years
Ihave felt that l had that fate in store for
me. l have dreamed that / was a fat wom-
an advertised as weighing $50 pounds, and
have dreamed that / was an ossified man,
with the public feeling Of my toes and
fingers and asking me for a leg or an arm
As a relic to label and lay away in a parlor
cabinet. Many a morning 1 have awoke
under the impression that i was ten min
utes late for the first forenoon exhibition,
and many an evening / nave started up
from my chair with a feeling that l had
been lined five dollars by the manager for
absenting myself from the platform before
the show was over.
However, i am relieved at last. 1 have
taken more real comfort in the last week
than for a dozen years before. went over
into the Bowery, in New York, several
days ago, with a determination to know
the worst and prepare for it. and the result
was a gratifying surprise. / found the
champion fat woman on a museum plat
form. She looked exactly as / had dreamed
that | would look. Those 750 pounds Of
fat were draped about her in the most
artistic manner, and a stranger from Troy
was asking her how she managed to climb
the trees in harvest apple time. For five
minutes / felt that l had died and been
transmigrated Then the Troy man went
wandering around to see II he could find u
Troy laundry among the curios, and ]
stepped forward and told the fat woman
the whole story from beginning to end.
Don't yur believe It'll" she emphatically
replied when 1 had finished. IF such a
thing were possible, how is 1t, with so
many hundreds dying around us every
day, that there are only six Of us champion
fat women now in the businessi II there
was anything in the theory there'd be 49,
coo of us looking for engagements and sal
---I .--al ia ---.
couldn't earn her salt"
l thanked her from the bottom OF my
heart. and she kindly continued:
But even If it were possible, which i
give you my word of honor it isn't, you
wouldn't be so badly Off. There's lots OF
things worse than being a fat woman at q
humping big salary. You are the star at