The Somerset herald. [volume] (Somerset, Pa.) 1870-1936, 1897-06-16
Games for Queer Stakes.
From the New York Sun.

From the New York Sun.
az never saw anything like that"
said the gray-haired young-looking
man i'm the club smoking room, Sex
cept once, and that was among the
Indians"
They had been talking of practical
| jokes As some of them were old
enough to remember KeDward Philip,
of course they talked Of him, and one
man had told how Tody Hamilton
one night brought Philip to utter and
complete discontinue. Philip, rs the
story goes, had played some prank up
on friend of Hamilton's, which had
transcribed the limits, and Hamilton
had vowed vengeance.
The two met, one summer night,
near Alderman Lynch's place, and, af-
ter the usual civilities, fell TO match
ing pennies. 1t happened that luck
| ran in most astonishing way in
Hamilton's favor. Philip never could
resist the fascination of any game of
chance, and doubling the stakes again
and again, but losing at almost every
turn, he was soon penniless. Hamil-
ton saw his chance and took Philips
money remorselessly, leaving him
without even llis ferry fare, though he
knew Philip lived in Brooklyn.
Philip proposed to play further, and
put up first his hat, then his coat, vest,
shoes, necLtie and socks. Hamilton
won them all. AS each article was
lost Philip handed it over, and at the
last he stood barefooted, with nothing
on but his shirt, underclothes and
die of secondhand clothing of no
earthly use to him. His resentment of
Philips ill-treatment of the other man,
however, was enough to fill him with
satisfaction when the joker, beaten for
once at his own game, started uncom-
plainingly for home. | wouldn't have
done it to anybody else on earth"
Hamilton says when he tells the story,
''but it was very slight punishment
for what he had done"
That was the story that called forth
the remark from the gray-haired,
yOung-looking man about Indians and
blackberry jam.
avon didn't Enou- fhora ax-ar xros n
town built with the proceeds Of black
berry JAM" ne asked. "Why that's
an old story. It's away up in north
ern part of the Michigan peninsula,
aud it's called, or it was when / was
there, Church's Landing. Church
was Yankee who went west long ago
To seek his fortune, and happening
along toward the Straits of Mackinac
in the blackberry season, was amazed
at the sight Of the wild berries growing
there. 1t was wilderness then, but
it was !, most fertile kind OF a wider
ness, and, better than that, it was right
on the shore of a great natural water
way from the west to the east.
"Church had some money-not n
great deal, but enough to start with.
lie also had Yankee gumption, and
best of all he had wife with Il busi-
hess head on her. Anybody else could
have done what he did, providing he
l., q nd
stumbled on just that opportunity, but
as it happened, he was the man.
That he did was to embark in the
manufacture of blackberry jam, not by
the gallon, but the hundreds of hogs
heads. You see, his fruit cost him
nothing but the gathering, for it was
Uncle Sans land until afterward it
became Church's. There were miles
of it, all covered with line fruit, grow
ing wild. And it seemed As II 1iSIr,oy.. I,y..
dence had made special provision for
the gathering, for there were great
numbers of the most worthless Indians
ever came across living right there,
and although those indians would do
monstrous little to save themselves
from starvation, they would make
their squaws and children pick berries
for just about as little as Church was
willing to ply them.
''The result was, as | told you, that
he built village with the proceeds of
blackberry jam, and il was no slouch
of a village, either, when | was there,
should think it likely that it is city
Church and his wife are still alive they
own the whole of il. There were saw
mills and gristmills and various shops
and general store there when / saw
it, and a couple of good wharves on
the water front; and steamboats,, |
don't know how many of them, ear
ried freight between Church's and
other places on the lakes.
''The Indians never did much except
eat and drink. Church traded with
them some, naturally lie wouldn't sell
them any liquor. Whether it was
moral or business principle that pre-
vented him, couldn't say. But the
dusky vagabonds would get liquor.
sometimes and somehow, and when
they did they wouldn't stop drinking
until it was all gone. I've seen three
or four of them lying dead drunk
alongside of discarded whisky barrel
they had stolen somewhere and taken
TO the waters edge. They would pour
few gallons of water into II and roll
it around until they had weak grog,
and then lie and drink ii by the quart.
When they would get hold of the car
cass of any kind of an animal they
would sit down and eat until it was all
gone. Perhaps they wouldn't eat
again for a week, but they would gorge
themselves like buzzards when they
had food. 1t was then that l formed
my estimate of Indian character, and
/ never saw the noble red man of ira
dition, there or anywhere else.
81 was wrong, though, in saying
there was nothing else they would do,
They were the worst gamblers | ever