The Cook County herald. [volume] (Grand Marais, Minn.) 1893-1909, 1896-08-22
q r. FISH WERE FRESH.
But the Purchaser Was : Great Deal
FEesher. " 1850

But the Purchaser Was Great Deal
q Fresher. #
Up 10 the 18th ward thrifty Ger
nan an makes = ak good living peddling live
carp. says the Philadelphia Inquirer.
The fsh are hauled about the streets in
a. small tank set upon wheels, the
whole outfit being propelled ~ the
| energy generated from the Germans
| muscles. # there is one thing more
than another the peddler prides him
self 4 on, It is that his wares, being alive,
are necessarily fresh.
Yesterday morning the carp mer-
chant chant was stopped by woman who, if
| the we'll filled baskets which hung
from from her fat arms were any indication
was on her way home from market.
me me woman c "a leaned over the cart and
SIZED up the swimming fish carefully.
Are they fresh?" she finally asked
Inc look OF disgust that spread over
the Germans countenance would have
fitted well upon the features Of a sound
money democrat who is being told that
Tree coinage candidate is sure to be
nominated at the Chicago convention.
but ne choked down his indignation.
ali; dey ish freshr' he replied.
Then he reached down into the tank
and pulled out a sample. which he
h ' up for the woman to see. She
gazed Upon it for a moment, her nose
nlgh IN the air. She wasn't satisfied,
however, and the next moment showed
on9 CT her own fair hands into the tank
and grabbed a carp by the gills. She
yanked it up in the air after the man
ner OF one who doesn't propose to be
Iooled IN so important a matter as
buying a fish, and held it out at arms
length for inspection. At least, she
started to hold it out. Unfortunately
she mad picked up the biggest fish in
the cart. 1t was carp that didn't care
much about women, anyway, and par
tlcularly a woman who considered her
sell we'll enough acquainted to run her
myers through his breathing ap-
paratus. He at once began to go
through a contortion act of the most
intricate and vigorous description, his
mouth wide open and his tail marking
out three-foot circles at the rate Of
forty a minute. The suddenness with
which the fish started in on this pro-
gram was too much for the woman.
IN her hurry to let go of the carp she
Io1 cot ABOUT her baskets and their
contents. AS her arms flew up the
baskets flew down. In the 18th ward
the sidewalks are as hard as, if not
harder than, in any of the other wards,
and eggs have very little show in
contest with them. There were eggs
IN one of the baskets-two dozen of
them. Unless the rain has washed
them away, those eggs are down on the
llth ward sidewalk yet They wouldn't
have been of very much use to the
woman after they struck the walk, ex-
cept as scrambled eggs. In the other
basket there were strawberries and
steak and roll of butter All of these
were saved from the. general wreck,
however, with the exception Of S the
steak An enterprising 11th-ward dog
Toasted upon that The woman didn't
stay to buy any fish. Perhaps she had
lost her appetite for carp. Anyway,
she gathered up the remnants of her
marketing and sailed majestically
down the street. The fish peddler
gazed after her a moment. Then he
chuckled to himself: "Yah; dose carp
ish fresh-but not so fresh as dot vom
ans, py chimminy!' r.. III