The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1896-07-01
FEISEATHALS' GUN.
PALE OF A CHICAGO FAMILY OF AN
GENT LINEAGE.
How They Celebrated the Glorious Fourth
Firing Begun 1T Sun Up-For Eighteen
Hours . Fat Bellied Cannon Reared De-
nance to Ravishers Of Liberty.

nance to Ravishers Of Liberty.
The Felsenthals lived IN Desplaines
street, patriarchal family OF lineage
30 ancient that they might have claimed
relationship with the crepuscular forms
of life, own kinsmen to the ampbae
and their fellow aristocrats. They kept
a rag shop, and it was their purpose to
conciliate at times, to placate more often,
occasionally to bewilder the products Of
another race-a very old and honorable
race, TO be sure-which crossed the orbit
of civilization TO the lasting terror Of
the stars some 2, 900 years after Moses.
There was Solomon Felsenthal, pa
triarchal as TO beard and mien, slow but
sure of speech, TO whom all the tene-
ment looked up as If his queer old hand
had guided the way to the tablets of
stone. There was his young brother Da-
vid. There were Solomon's David and
David's Solomon and Solomon S David s
Solomon and David's Solomons David
and Roses Rachel and Rachels Rosy
and Lewis and Jacobs and Isaacs until
the Irish neighbors, skilled enough in
discriminating Mikes Paddy from Pad
dy's Mike and Big Mike from Little
Mike, were in distress TO properly differ
entiate, but classed the ragman 8 family
as "thim Filsinthals, and made de-
scriptive particulars as 1.-THE Filsinthal
that lost his ear" or 1.-THE Filsinthal
that belongs to the Sicond regiment.
1t was David's Solomon's David who
owned the Fourth Of July cannon, as
much as any one of that pastoral family
could own anything as an individual.
The cannon was curious contraption,
long as it was broad, with huge belly
resting on a wooden carriage, a gaping
mouth and general appearance Of sui
len ferocity, in which it was challenged
by nothing else under the heavens ex-
cept the pictured ella monster. 1t
would hold as much powder as a man
could carry in his hat. 1t was touched
off with q slow fuse. In its commissions
it leaped upward and bounded as much
as ten feet. 1t had come TO the Felsen-
thals i'll the course of business, and the
use of IL for patriotic purposes had been
suggested by the cannon of the Quinn
boys across the street. Thereafter the
Quinn cannon spit and parked in vain.
1t is the Fourth of July-the morn
ing. There have been various trivial
outbursts of explosive patriotism in the
barrooms along Madison street. Sundry
bibulous persons have set off crackers in
the street Us and met with reproaches
from their fellow passengers and the
top of the handle brake from the con-
ductcr But at last silence comes The
city lies asleep and the blanketing hush
of the hour before dawn has settled up
on its chimneys. Suddenly
Crash! Bang!
Little boys and young men awaken
and rub their eyes. Feverish older peo-
pie toss over in their beds and cry,
Cd those Felsenthals " A thrill of
life runs through the west side. A
cracker starts, another, bunch in a
Darrell The saloon keeper on the corner,
with his suspenders hanging from his
hips, blunders TO the door, and, sighting
with an eye like slit in poached egg
fires both barrels of his shotgun into his
neighbours windows. The Husher boys
have exploded the anvil in their father S
smithy. The fire wagons are scurrying
to Strunk' barn. Herman Fink, tapster
under Toms lodging house-he and his
hired help are wrestling out the trees in
tubs that signalize a holiday to West
Madison street Brief, another indie
pendence day has dawned on the west
side.
But are the Felsenthals moved by the
Importance of their situation? Are they
concerned because they have awakened
100, 900 of their fellow citizens TO an
adequate appreciation of American indie
pendence? Not they. If Felsenthal had
put his name to the Declaration of indie
pendence or bawled his defiance at Lord
would have learned of il from other
lips Not from theml What have the
scions Of race that blinked in the twi-
light of history to do with the day be-
fore yesterday? Their business is at
hand. 1t consists in firing the fat bellied
cannon for Is hours.
Thus soberly and orderly proceeded
the Felsenthal celebration in the alley
back Of the rag shop, one shepherd sue
ceeding the other in superintendent OF
the cannon. The cannon itself was true
to its employers. 1t belched out flame
and coughed and roared and leaped
across the alley and hurled his frozen
fat against the clapboards of the under
takers house next door. Other weapons
might fail The roar of crackers and
firearms would pause, would fiutter,
would break out in crazy discord, would
pause again. But with the punctuality
Of cosmic cause the Felsenthals' cannon
renewed its sullen defiance to the ravish-
ers of liberty.
Evening came and it was still bray
ing. The, Felsenthals gave no heed to
the geegaws Of celebration. Red fire
burned from Fischer's -four mill to the
new hay market and the balls of roman
candles burned around the spires of st.
Patrick's church and rockets ran a fiery
course above Maskell's hall But no
light CLEANED in front Of the rag shop.
Nevertheless every rocket that blazed
along the curtain Of heaven, splitting its
cinders across the arch, quavered in the
reverberations of the Felsenthal cannon,