Waterbury evening Democrat., 1894-05-09

son in the mark down coffin, so he sharp ened up his old bucksaw and actually | sawed off his sons feet to make him fit his bargain counter casket. This is historical fact. Artemus Ward used to tell of two brothers from his state who greeted each other in the street one day after sepa- ration of two years and asked each other the news.
 "Waal, don't know of nawthin in par ticker" said George, "only I sold the old black hoss.'
 'No!' ejaculated Henry.
 ''Yiss," says George. ''Who did yesell him tew?" said Henry. "Waal, guess.'' "I never'd guess in the world," says Henry. "He wasn't wuth a cuss, was he?'
 'No."
 "Balky and blind and 27 years old, wasn't he?"
 "Yiss."
 "How much did ye git for him?'
 Hundred and fifty dollahs."
 "Waal, you must have picked up a suckah. Who did ye sell him tew?"
 "Well, sir, by George Harry, sold him to mothah."
 lectured once under the management of a man named Hampstead in Indiana. He was too close to get tickets printed, so he wrote them-about 800 of them-in longhand and shorthand on same ticket, so that they could not be counterfeited. It took him three days. Then he adver- tised with marking pot and brush on the fences and had it announced in the churches.
 When o'clock came, I started out for the opera house, but when within block of the door ] ran up against a procession of people which extended to the box of- flee. I walked around the crowd tickled to death with the outlook for standing room only.
 After waiting till o'clock and getting no word to begin I inquired of an usher what we were waiting for. He said that early in the evening some one had rung if plugged quarter on Hampstead, and he was holding back the crowd till he could find who did it.
 He fed horse on the straw he got from a c-ockery firm and that had been used for packing china and glassware until last October, when the woods were gay with happy nutters and the ripe corn gleamed like gold in the rustling sheath of gray shuck-
 When the frost was on the punkin And the fodder in the shock. Then he gave a gentle moan and passed away. (The horse, I mean.)
 MT. Hampstead bought a pound of crackers once and allowed the bill to run till the grocer asked him for the price of them. MT. H. said he would settle the bill as soon as he could have a settle ment with his mother. It seems that his mother had used a part of the crackers, and he was waiting till she settled fo1 her share.
 These are facts.
 Last year he slipped on bad sidewalk and sprained his ankle and foot so badly that he could not walk for some days and appeared then with his foot done up in bedquilt artistically fastened with tarred rope.
 AS soon as he could get about he brought suit for the value of the foot on the grounds of negligence on the part of the town authorities.
 The case hung fire, however, and was thrown out of court on the suggestion of the county surveyor.
 "How can we make change, your hon. or" asked the surveyor one day, Gin case of verdict, for Hampstead, soul, body and bedquilt, is only worth the fraction of cent? How can we make change and pay him for his footF'
 The case was then abandoned.
 Let me say in justice to MT. Hump stead that one report regarding him is false and wicked. do not wish to see him wronged by an minimizing public or sensational press. He did not as re- ported use his mothers coffin lid to slide down hill on last winter.
 There wasn't snow enough last winter for that purpose where he lived anyway, and his mother is still living.
 Ssn Ax