The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1895-11-09

a poor farmer Had she not done so 1t is
Iproba Bile that the contents of more than
one pigeon hole in the big safe would
lhave been added to the adopted daugh-
ter's share.
One evening in March, 1862, John
Steele. who. had been, away with a team
hauling oil, returned home and found the
house in ashes. The chared bones Of the
widow were picked out OF the ruins. 1t
1 was supposed that she had accidentally
set herself abiaze and then the house, by
rashly using petroleum to start the kitch-
en- fire.
| AS John Steele had been legally adopt
ed, he was the natural heir 10 the con-
! tents of the big safe and the river Of rev
enue from the oil-producing farm, his
possession Of which was further fortified
| by the widows will, made before the
change in her fortune This sudden ac-
QUESTION of enormous wealth turned his
| head, not all at once, but speedily. He
wished to find an enjoyment of it, an in
tersified consciousness Of it's reality, but
was too ignorant to do so in any intelli-
| gent way. He married the daughter Of
| one of his workman, and she taught him
| to write his name in a laborious, mechan-
| ical way. and that was ali he ever learned
of the art and mystery Of letters. She
| tried to keep him straight, but he knew
| too little to comprehend self-respect, felt
himself to be too rich to be trammeled by
conyentionalities. or to care for the opin-
| ions of others, and thirsted for a riotous
excess Of sensuous qualification, the high
| est pleasure he was capable of.
| Only a few months, after his marriage
he went away to Philadelphia, taking
with him boon companion named Slo-
cum, whose assigned duty was the car
| rying of his money and paying it out as
he chose to squander it. The life Of
prodigality and uncontrolled dissipation
! into which he had plunged was SO wild
| as to be almost beyond belief. He or
dered champagne, not by the bottle, but
by the basket. He gave a $4,000 dia-
| mond to negro minstrel for singing a
song that pleased him. He frequently
bought carriages and the teams attached
when he wished to ride few blocks and
then present them to the drivers. On
one occasion he wagered a bottle of wine
that he would spend, actually paying out
'tfor fun" and not giving away, 1000 a
day for go days, and won the bottle. At
another time he received a large sum of
money from the rentals on the farm
when he was on the street and quite
drunk. 1t was in bank notes, as he al
ways required it, checks being objects Of
suspicion with him, and when he had
stuffed it into his pockets they bulged
| out like those of an urchin after raid
on an apple orchard. His coat could not
set well on him padded with money as he
| was, and he was Disguised. Just then he
caught sight of a bank, and rushing into
it with the airy formality off, Here, take
care of this ID stuff for me; it's a
nuisance dumped the whole pile before
| the receiving teller and went away ere
| that functionary could take breath or
gather his wits sufficiently to give any
evidence of the deposit. And when Coal
Oil johnny, as John Steele was by this
| time known, tried in a brief spasm of So
briefly, to remember where he had left
all that money, he was quite unable to do
so. And he decided to hunt it up would
involve more trouble than it was worth.
| It's loss did not worry him at all.
Suddenly his wealth came to an end.
| He had succeeded in squandering even
| more than his vast income, and was in
| DEBT OF course he had been plundered
merci!essly, right and left, but had liter
ally thrown away several fortunes, and
| creditors seeming his downfall, were
| pressing him. He mortgaged the farm
| for a large sum and plunged afresh into
| even wilder extravaganza and more reck-
less dissipation than before, but with less
| to so upon, and the end came quickly.
! His mad career was over.
| After, a short time of abject restitution,
| in which he was deserted by all who had
preyed upon him he went to work driv-
ing the Girard House stage, in which
guests were carried to and from the rail-
road depots. Soon he wearied of that, and
somebody paid his fare back to Oil Greek,
| where he obtained employment as a
| freight handler at the depot, in which
| capacity he earned $25 month. That
| was not enough to support himself and
his family, and there was nothing more
remunerative that he could find there tc
! do.
His wife raised, by the sale of her
! iewelry, sum sufficient for the transpor-
| tation of the family out to Nebraska,
and there, in Lincoln, Coal Oil Johnny
settled down. They were very poor, but
| managed somehow to live, for Johnny
was willing worker at any labor he
could procure Realizing the evil fortune
of such Limitation as had been put upon
| mis- capacities by his ignorance, he took
care that his son, a bright lad, should
receive as good an education as was at
| tainable under the existing circumstan-
ces. When the boy was old enough, he
obtained employment as a ticket and
freight agent at the Ashland, Neb., rail-
road station, and there his father. Coal
Oil Johnny that was, plain John Steele,
! as everybody about there knows him,
| works steadily and patiently for the rail
road company under the sons direction,
handling freight, taking care of the sta
| ton, and SO on. And he is a hale, hearty,
a well-preserved man, apparently about
So years of age, seemingly we'll contented.
! But he is by no means dependent now
upon his labor for the maintenance of
his family, or upon his steady and indus
trious son. At time when his situation
| seemed most miserable and his prospects
least hopeful, while he was still seeking
days work at any hard labor in Lincoln,
| fortune again smiled upon him, q CLEAN
1 of his old luck gilded his life once again.
In seine way the directors of that Phil
| adelphia bank in which he had male his
1 informal deposits thirty years before
learned of the unhappy condition Of the
| Steele family away out in Nebraska. of
the total reformation in Coal Oil Johnny's
habits, and the manly struggle she was
/ making to atone for the past. Having
assured themselves of the Identification Of
/ their erratic depositor, they madegup his
account and forwarded to him the sum
left in their charge, with interest from
the date OF deposit. How much it was is
II, .5xs.. -