The Wadsworth dispatch. [volume] (Wadsworth, Nev.) 1892-1899, 1893-04-19
A SHOES HISTORY.
BUT A SHORT STEP FROM SOCIETY
MAN TO TRAMP.
The Ambition Of Shoes, Like That Of Men
Leads to Discomfort.
BY MISS MARIR FREEMAN.


month in the year eighteen hundred
p~inety-two.
2. Place: Metropolis of the Golden
West.
3. Scene: An alley whose chief at
fractions are an ash pile and a few de-
ceased felines.
A. Dramatis P~ersonae: A street scav-
enger.
s.. Plot: Too small for microscopic
view.
But now to the wonderful tale of an
antiquated pedal covering.
Let the author be happy in the thought
that the reader, whose intellectually
must be above the average or he will not
reap the benefit of this pathetic story,
thoroughly rouse his Imagination to the
poetic plane, aud picture, by the help of
the above items, one of these cold bleak
days when the winter wind awakened
from its long sleep %mournfully walls its
tale of woe sweeping angrily down this
deserted alley.
Pause, reader, in this lane which
formed by the back entrances of dilap-
idated lodging houses is dismal enough
and admire the street scavenger.
He is old, lean and ~cadaverous; in one
hand he grasps q sack flung over his
shoulders, in the other a long stick. The
wind blows him along slowly and he APP
proaches the ash pile. His vocal cords
have long ceased to unsteady vibrate
the melancholy cry concerning rags,
glassware etc. His eagle eyes spy a.
midst the ashes, a sole, the only recog-
nizable feature belonging to a shoe.
With this carefully deposited in his
menagerie he reaches home (of whose
elegance and comfort, reader, supply
the author confines himself to his topic)
and startes to assert his collection.
On taking the Shoe he is astonished to
have it wrench itself out OF his hand
pull itself to the fire and exclaim: "And
to this the last member of my honorable
family is brought"
Let me pause and describe our hero.
A rusty old shoe-toeless, heelless and
almost soleless. 1t looks as if life with
it was a dismal failure, it being well run
down at the heel.
A squeaky asthmatic voice pipes forth
from the very toe of the shoe.
Il am a gentleman | came of an il
lustrious family If / should tell YOU
you would but sneer-this is such an
unbelieving world. My history is a sad
one and though it costs my pride a strug-
gle to relate it, still you will profit by it.
l really did not begin to enjoy myself
until | was. in the prime of life. People
cannot be truth-tellers if they insist thai
youth is a season OF pleasure, for my ex-
perience was nothing but pulls and
stretches. So when life was a pleasure
to me | was a number nine in size, in
width double f, and the very neatest
pair of gents glove-ftting pumps. My
home was an artistic shop window,
where my partner aud l enjoyed a con-
.spicuons position. My partner who
though he did bear a slight resemblance
to me but there the resemblance stopped.
In intellect he was far more stupid than
the generality of people and sat there
day after day, with no thought but OF
enjoying life il even to the ruination of
his soul SC we were not great friends.
He was foolish enough to satisfy a young
man OF the world-and ha, Mr.. Scaven-
ger-thus the brain power OF one OF
these is not sufficient to choose a good
shoe! We became his property and
then such a ronnd of destination Of II