The Wichita daily eagle., 1893-12-06

er end of the cot, and there was a
crack in the floor right under them
| Of course the carpet had been taken
up, so when the wind came around to
the north it blew straight up at nv
feet. hadn't very good assortment
of bedding Most of our stuff had been
sent over TO Wenner's barn. / had a
sheet folded lengthwise, in the form of
one OF those sleeping bags which ex-
| plorers use. Then had an old blanket.
| and, for coverlet, one OF pair of fine
| pourchairs. At two o'clock l got up
and secured the other pourchair They
were still attached to the poles, but
| that was rather an inconvenience. I
put the poles across under my head
and thus slightly increased the af-
fective length of the cot
"a little after two arose again and
secured a fur rug. 1t was a tigers
skin with the head of the beast on one
corner of it There seemed TO be some
warmth in that tigers skin, for 1 Sc
cured a little sleep almost Immediate
ly after spreading it over me. / had
left the lamp burning because
thought it might warm the room a lit
tie. Well. sir, as l say, slept few
minutes-just long enough to dream
that | was one of the early Christian
martyrs in the arena-and then
woke to find this tigers head, with its
cleaning glass eyes, staring me in the
face. Say, what do you think / did?
l yelled so loud that the concussion
put the light out. My wife and her
sister thought there were burglars in
the house. What did they do about it?
don't know, but my opinion is that
they crawled into pile of carpets and
hid there till morning.
''As for me, the shock of nv fright
made me shiver. And when got over
being frightened | couldn't stop shiv-
ering. How | could be cold with all
those things over me, / couldn't under
stand, but it was true. | arose and Sc
cured the stair carpet. 1t went up
and down me five times, l remember,
but it didn't raise my temperature one
degree.
Then made the important discov-
cry that it didn't make any difference
how much l had over me, so long as /
had only one layer of canvas under
me. And the wind still whistled up
through the bare boards. l decided to
put the tigers skin OYER the cot and lie
down on it. Thc1 a new inspiration
came over M Way not go down and
sleep in the kitchen? Good idea. /
picked up the cot, the pourchairs, the
fur rug and the stair carpet and
started for the kitchen. At the head
of the back stairs | stepped on the
fringe of one of the pourchairs. en-
deavored to step off it, but there were
five apertures in the fringe, and each
one of them had secured one of my
toes. Therefore, | just calmly fell
over forwards. and slid downstairs
with the cot for a toboggan.
- reached the kitchen in this easy
and unconventional manner: and dis
covered almost immediately that the
fire had gone out. This was not what
/ had fallen downstairs for. The
kitchen was perhaps shade warmer
than my room. but it was cooling
rapidly: and kitchen in the morning
with no fire in it is the coolest room in
the house, as every married man
knows.
"There wasn't any fuel at hand. but
between you and me, just had to have
some. There were two or three con-
venient pieces of light woodwork
which belonged to my late landlord
and not TO me. With these I kindled
fire and then | broke up two of our
kitchen chairs, and piled them In a
handy spot. Ny cot | placed close by
the stove, SO that could feed the fire
without getting out Of bed. There
lay and kept her agoing with selec-
tions from my furniture, till by and by
got real warm and snug, and then
went 10 sleep. The last things ! re-
member putting in were the pour
chair poles.
These brass balls are the orna-
mental knobs from the ends Of those
poles They wouldn't burn. Of course,
and didn't dare 20 put them IL the
stove for fear my wife would find them
and suspect me. so ! simply nm
screwed them as / lay there, with the
Of throwing them away az
my leisure.
Have yen followed my story? Have !
you got an idea Of how much walking +.
around ! did in my robe der nooit, as
the French say, on that interesting oc-
casion? II ~as enough 10 kill a man.
But she says-hoId on, are yoH mar /
ried maD?''
L am"
Then maybe you'll bclieve my
story She says got this eoid playing .
billiards with the boys tgTo weeks
ago" HOWARD FKEIDIsa.
1t is estimated that ia New York
mtg are found about s.eeo Chinese. OF i
whom 800 are Christians, and not less
han 2 800 eongregsts from all dir-e-