Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1895-07-17
SHE IS A HERCULES.
WONDERFUL FEATs OF A LITTLE
 FlVE-YEAR-oLD GIRL.
Can Lift More Than Twice Her Own Weight Without Apparent EGort-Hss Father, a sisty-year-oId Veteran, Thinks the Spirit of Giant Soldier Is In Her.

tns SpiFae of 8 Giant Soldier Ks 1n Her.
 Up in the hills and health giving at mosphere of Sullivan county lives vet eran of the civil war named John H. Laird. He had rather more than a full share of southern hospitality shown to Union soldiers at Libby and Anderson vile prisons, and when at the end of the war he left the army he was broken in health and to all appearances prema- turely aged
 lie settled on a small farm in Sulli- van county. When he took the farm, it was with the expectation of speedily dy- Ing there. He had lost sight, however, of the fact that nobody ever dies in Sul- hvan county except by accident, and at the end of r years, when he found he couldn't die, he did the next best thing and got married.
 If he hadn't, this story would never have been written, for there would then have been no brown eyed, rosy checked, dimple faced beautiful little Jessie Maud Laird to throw the whole of Sul- hvan county into state of admiration and wonder, as she is today doing
 It was tho fame of 5-year-old Jessie Maud that dragged a reporter over the interminable hills to Hurd s Settlement. When he met the veteran, he took him quite naturally for the grandfather of the infant prodigy. That he is the child s father, although rapidly nearing 60, seems to lend an added interest to the remarkable gift of physical strength possessed by the girl A man apparent ly wrecked ill health by years of con- hnement in rebel prisons, who tries ill vain for IT years to die, who then mar ries woman 20 years younger than himself and in the course of the next 13 years becomes the father of six children, the last of which even in tender infancy gives promise of becoming a female San dow or Samson, would seem to merit some form of recognition from a grati- fled and grateful government.
 This little girl, who was years old last December, weighs exactly 40 pounds. Her mother declares that she has never had a sick day ill her life. She began to go to school when she was 415 years old. The schoolhouse is Q mile from the farmhouse, and Maud walked both ways every day.
 It was with great surprise that Farm CT Laird learned the mission of the re- porter. He has no idea of foisting the little girl upon the public as an infant prodigy, and it was with some difficult ty, increased by the bashfulness of lit- tie Miss Hercules herself, that an exhi- bition of her strength could be had. 4 bribe of unlimited candy finally induced her to come out from behind the shelter of her mothers ehair-the mother, by the way, being comedy but uncom- monly fragile looking woman-and ex- hibit her muscle.
 The old veteran, who couldn't con- ceal the pride he felt in his interesting flock of youngsters, led the way toward the barn, followed by the six children. Maud, although she was barefooted, walked more like the pupil of danc- ing master than country girl of 5,
 In the yard, near the entrance to the barn, was coil or spool of barbed wire weighing 69 pounds.
 Lift it, Cal" said the farmer to his oldest boy. The 11-year-old lad laid hold of the crosspins which stuck out at the end of the spool, and with big tug, which visibly frightened the cords in the calves of his bare legs, raised it a few inches from the ground.
 "Now, Maud, :" said the farmer, and the little girl planted herself squarely behind the big spool, which reached up to about midway between her knees and her thighs. Without any perceptible ef- fort she raised the spool and held it up for several seconds.
 If there had been any reckoning of the face or puffing out of the veins the spectacle would not have been an edify- ing one, But there was nothing of the sort
 Mir Laird then placed stones which weighed 90 pounds on top of the spool and asked Maud to lift again. The re- suit was precisely the same, and all evil of violent exertion were missing The combined weight of the spool and stones was two pounds more than dou- ble the weight of the little girl herself. The average man weighs perhaps 150 pounds, but the man who can raise from the ground and hold in the air 302 pounds of dead weight is great way above the average.
 "I don't know how much Maud can lift" said her father, "but won't let her try more than that. '
 At this moment, however, the amaz- ing little Hercules threw her plump arms around the legs of her eldest broth CT and lifted him into the air, thus de- her ability at all events to go as high in the lifting scale as 88 pounds.
 Farmer Laird has theory that the spirit of his father who was a Scotch .nail and q sergeant in the English army and who was famed for his prodigious strength. has entered into the grand daughter. If that is so, no British sol dier ever assumed lovelier or more at- tractive disguise. New York World.