Warren sheaf. [volume] (Warren, Marshall County, Minn.) 1880-current, 1897-05-13

| fact that was.in the know. And Par,
dishah went for that particular bird like.
an irresponsible lunatic. At last the
jew diamond merchant got 1t for
El75, and Padishah said 6 1870 Just
after the hammer came downso Pot.
ter declared. AT any rate the Jew mer.-
chant secured It, and there and then
he got a gun and shot it. Potter made
u hades Of fuss because he said It
would injure the sale oe the other three,
and Padishah, Of course, behaved like
an idiot; but all Of us were very much
excited. I&can tell yonaI was precious
glad when that dissection was over,
and no diamond had turned up pre-
cious glad. I'd gone to one-forty on that
particular bird myself. s$
'The little Jew was like most Jews
he didn't make any great fuss over bad
luck but Potter declined to go on with
the auction until it was understood
that the goods could not be delivered
until the sale wasnver. The little Jew
wanted to argue that the case was ex-
ceptional, and as the discussion ran
pretty even, the thing was postponed
until the next morning. We hada live
~ dinner-table that evening, can tell
you, but in theend, Potter got his way,
since itwould stand to reason he would
he safer if he stuck to all the birds, and
that we owed him some consideration
for his sportsman-like behavior And
the old gentleman whose son wasa law
yer said he'd been thinking the thing
over and that was very doubtful if,
when a bird had been opened and the
| diamond recovered, it ought MOTTO. be
handed back to the proper owner. Ire
member suggested it came under the
laws@of the treasure-trove-whic was
really the truth of theTmatter. There
was . hot argument, and we settled it
was certainly foolish to kill the bird on
board the ship. Then the old gentle.
man, going at large through his legal
talk, tried to make out the sale was q
lottery and illegal, and appealed to the
captain; but Potter said he sold the
birds as ostriches. He didn't want to
sell any diamonds, he said, and didn't
offer that as an inducement. The three
birds he put. up, to the bestszof#S his
knowledge and belief, did not contain
a diamond. II was in the one he kept
so he hoped. ~ ~ 81 "% g v
'Prices ruled high next day all the
same. The fact that now there were
four chances instead of five of course
caused a. rise.# u The 3 blessed q birds
averaged two hundred and twenty.
seven, and, oddly enough, this Padisha
didn't secure one of 'em-not one. He
made too much shindy, and when h.
! ought to have been hiding he was talk
ing about liens, and, besides, Potterwas
bit down on him. One fell to quiet
little officer chap, another to the little
Jew, and the third was syndicated by
the engineers. And then Potter seemed
suddenly sorry for having sold them,
and said he'd flung away clear 1000,
and that very likely he'd draw blank,
and that he always had been fool; but
when went and had a bit of a talk to
him, with the idea of getting him to
hedge on his last chance, I found he'd
| already sold the bird he'd reserved to
a political chap that was on board-a
chap who d been studying Indian NOR
ais and social questions in his vacation.
That last wos the & 300 bird. Well, they
! landed three of the blessed creatures
at Brindisi-though the old gentleman
said it was breach of the customs
! regulations Potter and Padishah
landed too. The Hindoo seemed half
mad as he saw his blessed diamond go
ing this way and that, so to speak. He
kept on saying he'd get an injunction
he had injunction on the brain-and
| giving his. name and address to the
chaps who'd bought the birds, so that
they'd know where to send the dia-
mond. None of them wanted his
name and address and none of
them would give their own. lit
was fine row, I can tell you-on the
platform. They all went off by differ
ent trains. came on to Southampton,
and there I saw the last Of the birds,
as 1 came ashore; it was the one the
engineers bought, and it was standing
up near the bridge, in kind of crate,
and looking as leggy and silly a setting
for valuable diamond as ever you saw
If it was a setting for a valuable dia-
mond. - XIV s[sS 81
How did it end? a.. Oh! like that.
Well-perhaps. Yes there's one more
thing that may, throw light on it. A
week or so after landing was down
Regent street doing bit of shopping,