The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1894-11-22
THE INSULTED GORILLA.
How He Took "A Unique Vengeance UpoI
His Annoyer.

uSCd W COlllt III L W as a y ACllON
then, just starting in business, and
junior clerk for one of the big paper
warehouses there. One of the firm was
great friends with the captain of big
India liner, and on one of the home
voyages the captain brought back big
gorilla that he had picked up at some
port on the way He gave him to our
boss, and as Mr.. Boulder did nSt have
any room for ''Gooro," that was what
they called him in his own house, he
left him down at the paper warehouse,
where he was chained in the engine
room, principally because it was hot
down there.
He had a nasty temper when they
first got him, so that there were very
few people who could handle him, but
after he had been in the house for near
ly year he seemed to get used To his
surroundings so that he was given the
liberty Of nearly the whole establish
ment. and some of us younger fellows
struck up quite an intimacy with him,
sharing our luncheon with him at noon
and treating him pretty much as one of
us. for he smoked and drank, and did
everything but swear in English. He
could swear tiuently enough in his own
tongue when he got mad He would
get mad occasionally when any of the
boys leased him, and would wat a
month if necessary to find i GS&ncs to
get even. And he would not istop at
anything in the way of a mean turn to
a man he disliked, from upsetting a
bucket of engine grease on his head to
turning steam jet on him, which last
he did to the engineer once and nearly
parbOilcd him.
But we put up with these little &C.
centricities for the sake of having such
a strange pet about, and everything
went all right until Ned Hannah, my
particular chum in the store, put big
lump of shoemaker's wax down on the
seat where Gooro was in the habit of
sitting, and glued him down. He near
ly tore the place up, and we had to
fairly cut him loose with a hammer and
cold chisel. Ned kept shy of him for
some days, and we thought the affair
had blown over. But we did not know
Gooro's capacity for harboring a
| grudge.
There was big paper cutting ma
chine in the warehouse, such as you
can find in almost any big paper store,
| only a larger one than usual. 1t had a
siX-foot knife like a guillotine, that
travelled up and down in grooves with
big hy-wheel attachment and multi
plying gear that gave force its stroke
so that it would cut through a pile of
paper two feet thick, like slicing
| cheese.
We had taught Gooro to run this ma
chine and used to make use of him
often, saving ourselves a good deal of
work by putting him up on the iron
table and letting him twist the cutting
wheel while one of us arranged the
| piles of paper on the table below. He
used to enjoy it, and got so that he
would twist the wheel like Sandwich
| Islander, and raising or lowering the
| knife as we told him.
One evening we had lot of big, six
foot MANILA paper to cut, just about as
big as the machine would take, and as
it was long job Ned and I~stayed
]
to finish it up We let Gooro work the
wheel, and got along beautifully. We
had nearly finished the job when we
ran out of tobacco, and Ned told me to
run up and look in his desk, where l
would find some. We were down in
the basement. and it was rather long
trip up to the front Office, and when |
got up there | found some odd work on
my desk to put away, so that | must
have been gone nearly a quarter of an
hour.
When l came back | paused at the
basement door. and you can imagine
my surprise to see Ned stretched out
across the table of the cutting ma
chine. pinned down by the knife and
the big ape dancing around him and
occasionally running over to pinch him
or pull his hair or turn the wheel and
tighten down the knife a trihe. 1t was
an awful scene, almost as though one
had dropped into the torture chamber
of the lnquisition, where the fanciful
cruelty of the priests was devising new
and grOtesque tortures for their victims
Ned told me afterward how it hap
pened. He had been changing the sci
of the gauge on the cutting table, and
after loosening up the screws on the
side where he was standing, haC
thrown himself across, without think
ing. under the blade of the knife, tC
loosen those on the opposite side. Thai
was apparently just what Gooro hat
been looking for, and he spun the
wheel around and caught Ned with tn,
knife right across the back. The ape
could have cut him in two just as easy
as not, and he doubtless would hav,
done it before he got through, but hC
seemed to want some fun out of the
performance first, and he sat down OF
the end of the table, jabbering anC
chuckling and pulling Ned's hair. ant
every now and then taking another
turn on the wheel.
Then he would loosen up the knit,
till there was almost chance for Nee
to wriggle out, but the first move Net
made the hairy devil would pin hin
down to the table again. As | say,
could not have been gone from tn,
room more than a quarter of an hour
but Ned declared it seemed like TIVE
days, and when | came back Gooro haC
just about made up his mind to finisl