The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1893-05-06
Copyright, 1898, by
the Author.

! FIR "N> house In tn
Il Y y/t3own Of a,,. XII !.
would not be
| prudent if you wished to curry favor
with Mr.. OReilly to refer to his place
of business as public house. He
termed it Spirit Store; and who
should know the proper appellation bet
ter than the holder of the license?
/ Mr.. O'Reilly was q stout, forid man,
little above the medium height. He
owned pair of merry blue eyes, and an
| exceptionally affable manner He was
the proprietor of two sons, aged respec-
lively twenty and eighteen, and he
ruled the boys with an iron rod They
assisted him in his business flor which
business they privately had feeling
of contempt), and were very dull and
very dutiful youths.
The most remunerative portion of
O'Reilly's business was that which
concerned itself with the farmers who
visited Killogue periodically to dispose
of their produce. Killogue lay in the
center of q flourishing agricultural
ers dealt for their malt liquor with
John O'Reilly.
The shrewd, good-natured publican
was a pleasant man to talk to; he
could enter readily into all the joys
! and sorrows of his farmer friends, he
was fairly good judge of the weather,
and superlatively good judge of but
ter he knew all about top-dressing and
subsoiling. and pig feeding; and his
special Irish whisky was unadulter-
aed nectar.
OReilly also knew-but this knowl.
edge was a secret locked up in his own
breast, except when he had occasional
ly to take his sons into his confidence
the palates of every customer of his
whose palate was worth studying. He
could tell, almost without stopping to
think, which of his farmer friends
liked "a bite" in their whisky, which
of them liked it with tang" and
which of them liked 1t without tang;
which of them preferred it with the full
flavor of fusel oil, and which of them
liked it as mild as mothers milk;
which of them coveted it with ''littlc
drop" of ginger cordial, and which of
them preferred taste" of port Wine
with the hard stuff When the
whisky reached John O'Reilly's store
from the bonded warehouse it was of
uniform strength and quality, but il
was arranged in casks of at least half.
a-dozen qualities ere it left his prem
ises.
Christenings, weddings and wakes
were events of serious Importance to
Mr.. OReilly, and he could be full Of
sympathy or of congratulations as oc-
casion required.
Wakes were a special feature with
him, and in connection with them he
had a set system for showing publicly
the depth of his sorrow. He did not
measure his mourning by the ordinary
standards-by the width of his hat
band or the black border on his note
paper, but nevertheless, his display of
sympathetic grief was-as all such dis
plays must be-regulated by sliding
scale.
When a family ordered a gallon of
whisky for n wake and paid cash, Mr..
0Reilly spoke words of tender con-
dolence. When three gallons were
ordered he put up one shutter on his
shop window on the day of the funeral,
in addition to speaking the words of
sympathy. When five gallons were
ordered he put up three shutters, and
went very near to the brink of tears
when receipting the bill. When ten
gallons of whisky We're ordered Mr..
O'Reilly made it his business to go a
bit of the way with the funeral. if the
place of interment was not outside the
limits of a reasonable walk When
twenty gallons were ordered for 4
country wake-no jewellers in the town
ever reached the twenty gallon STAN
Gard-he attended the funeral, accom-
panied by one of his sons, on an out
side car. And on few rare occasions
when forty gallons-the extreme limit
were ordered, Mr. O'ReilIy put UP all
his shutters, closed his store for por-
ton of the day. and attended the
funeral, accompanied by his two sons,
on an outside car, or in q covered car
If there was any excuse lin the shape
Of rain) for employing covered
vehicle.
1t so happened that for six long
weeks of the summer which is con-
cerned with this veracious narrative
none of Mr.. O'Reiliy's agricultural
friends had any necessity for wake;
neither, during the same period, had
there been any marriages, and conse-
quently Mr.. O'Reily's business was
not rs nourishing as the worthy spirit
merchan: could wish it to be. Tho
H1l" country orders for any special
purpose were 4 few odd gallons for
christenings and some cheap sherry for
the same suspicious events
But it is a long lane that has no turn
ing; aud one rainy Saturday morning
Mr. O'Reillv received from different
parts of the country two wake orders"
orc for paltry FIVE gallons and one
for the sunu,um bonum-forty gallons.
Mr.. O'Reillv was in ecstaSies-''It's
an i'll wind blows nobody good" said
heat the forty-gallon order, which
had been delivered by a ''servant-bo
early in the morning.
us fifteen months row" said he 10