Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1894-12-14
THE TURNING OF START.
Or How the Leading Citizens of Nj
trate Danced.
a Very Lively Story OF the wild and
WOolly West.

a Very Lively Story OF the wild and
Woolly West.
He hoated into Nitrate one day, just
like any other wanderer, and put up at the
Binford house for supper. After supper
he strolled out il front and talked to Pop
Binford, the landlord, for half hour or
so. Next day he was mixing drinks be-
hind the hotel bar-was in possession of a
job that half the men in Nitrate would
have jumped at. 1t was Shorty Longman's
job but the stranger did not know that,
nor did he know Shorty either. Pop Bin
ford did, though. He had been getting on
to Shorty for some time, and when it dawn
ed upon him as an established fact that
that young mans ability as drink mixer
was becoming secondary to his mastery of
the intricacies of the cash register, he sug-
gested to him the advisability of getting
along for a time without work. This sug
gcstion Shorty took as a hint that his res
ignation was wanted; he therefore went
off and got drunk, and the next day the
cadaverous looking, mild-voiced stranger,
with his soft southern drawl, was filling
the place of Mr.. Longman and his cockney
accent.
His name he gave out as Van Sttart,
which, for convenience sake, speedily be-
came abbreviated to "Start." That was
all we knew of him, and we weren't sure
of even that much. Binford knew no
more about him than any one else did
The man had asked him if he knew of a
vacant job, and, liking his looks, he had
given him one. That was ALL For the
rest, Start was twenty-five or so, but looked
younger, and was one of the peasantest
most gentlemanly, and obiging "bar-boys"
that ever threw together the insidous
cocktail, and he became duly popular, ac-
cordingly, on the shortest kind of notice
He did not have Overmuch to say to any
one, but that was nothing against him; so
inside of three or four days the customers
of the Binford house bar voted him
"white."
He was in a way TO become one of the
best-liked men in Nitrate, when something
happened that caused a shock of surprise
not to say grief, to those whose hearts had
warmed toward him-and his peculiar
style of mixing drinks-at the outset.
Shorty Longman, the loudmouthed Shorty,
the buffer, had 'called down" his success
sor before a large audience, and that with
out display of arms!
Shorty it seems, had gone down to Den
yer to look for another job, which failed to
appear, and, after an unsuccessful search of
two weeks, he filed up on Seventeenth
street whiskey and took the train for Nj
trate, wherein he sat himself down to
brood over his wrongs, the result being
that when he arrived in camp he burned
with the desire to make it disagreeable for
the man who took his job. This he pro-
ceeded to do by going in and ordering
drink for which he declined to pay, and
adding insult to injury by fusome appli
cation of his extensive vocabulary of vile
epithets, couched in Bow Bells English
TO all of which, according to all citizens
there present at the time, the new bar boy
, replied in hOneyed accents and in words
Y devised to turn away wrath. He did not,
it was conceded, appear to be badly ter
rorized, but there could be no doubt that
he had "taken water" and Start stock
dropped several points.
'IIit pizens my cup o joy-hit sho'
does" murmured Mr. Calhoun Kerry of
Arkansas, who was sitting on a soap box
in front of the livery stable whiting a
stick. "Hit do grieve me hull lot," he
went on, looking sadly at his handiwork
whats troubin' Cal?' asked another
lounger. "Whatall's breakin' yr gentle
heart today?'
\ Mr.. Kerry sighed ponderously, shut one
\ eye, and spat, with unerring aim, at a fly
a few feet away.
"I'm grieved, l am, at what we-all' jests
c'nferrin' about-the falin' firm grace O.
this yere new barkeep at Binford's. My,
my! An aSouthehn gentlem'n, too! An
firm clost anigh of Aukansaww
"Seen i'm this mawnin.' IS |: 'Staht,
I'm man O. sorruh, am IS he What's
tn mattah?' IS l, real solemn-like:
'Staht, I'm grieved copious, am, t year
of a Southern gentlemn a-strkin' of lis
colahs to a bloomn' British bloke as CANT
even talk United States, an is knowed as
bluffah on any proposition firm bettin'
two deuces in jack pot L selin' a sailed
mine"
as Staht: 'R'ferrin, pehsoom, t that
leetle episode o. last evening".
eyes, S l. An he grins, kind o.
p'culiah, and leans ovah tn bah, an says :
"'Mistah Kerry, did 'yo evan year tell
O. the wOhm th't tuhned, or tn wounded
doe bein brought t bay? They's limit
t. everything IS he An that's all l got
out o. him.
In about two hours the camp was APP
prised of the fact that Start had given out
that he was likely to "turn," and that he
had set limit to the amount of indignity
he would put up with-whereupo large
number of philosophical citizens set
forth to find said limit.
They would refuse payment for drinks,
throw cards and poker-chips all over the
floor, poke hoes in the cloth of the bill
lard table, break glasses, and insist on
staying in the barroom long after hours
and singing ribald songs-and never did
he any more than mildly protest. How he
squared things with Binford was mys-
terry until it leaked out that he paid all
DAMAGES ont of his not OVer-larpe salary.
then some of the boys let up on him, but