The Forrest City times., 1897-03-05
THE SURVIVAL.
nv PATTI SHOUT,

to lis old dimensions. We could see the stars lodging back and forth behind ,be tops of the pines, and the lone coyote who had a monopoly of noises down the gulch was indulging us with . temporary rest. The Patriarch oc- ,upied the seat of honor, camp-stool, and the rest of us were ranged on a tree-trunk
 The Patriarch looked at me. "Fll do you the favor," he said, "of filling my pipe with your tobakky. Speakin' of sea-yarns, that story of Jim's about the lcebergs that hunted in pairs, l,eepin' keen lookout to squeeze a ship caught without a breeze, while the polar bears sat by and laughed, was tol'bly good; and the one you told about the Thing that could stand on it's head on the floor of the ocean and flap the face of heaven with it's tail, was purity fair, yes, purty fair. But they war just yarns, plain yarns neatly unraveled. And that makes me think of what old Absalom Biggs used to say: Always tell the truth, my lad, if you're master smart hand at it.
 "Absalom had a distant relative-he lived in Nantucket. and his brother was anchored in Jamaiky-who bought and sold everything, from queer shells to queer money. His brother was d smart man. nigh as smart as Absalom himself, and he might have lived to be great one if they had given him plenty of rope. As it was, he war leetle too high 5trung to make success of life. It's queer how the furriners acquire all of our improvements, even the art of lynchin.'
 "Absalom was master and sole pro- prietor of the good old tradin' brig. Keep Mum. They war two of a kind, Ab- salon and the brig. Absalom wore a suit of homes pun that hung on him like a sail wrapped around windmill. and the brig was all right if she was only as black as she was painted, for she needed sprucn' up badly; but they war both hard to beat in their deceptive lines, I reckon. The Keep Mum was one of the best of her kind that ever faded out of sight of revenue cutter, and Absalom was entitled to a patent right on lots of the tricks of his trade. He was quiet kind of man. though he had a good command of language. re- sultin' from hard study of circus-post- CTS when he was lad. and the Keep Mum sailed so stilly that the wind couldn't whistle through her riggn' even.
 Now, Absalom was temperance man from principle and interest, though he wasn't particularly religious and worshiped nothin,' so far as I know, except savins banks Never taste the intoxicatin' cup, young man. be used to say; you might miss a chance to make dollar But just the same, after his brother came aboard at the end of my first trip to Kingston. bringin' with him a mysterious air (kind of strongly scented), Absalom loaded the Keep Mum up with rum. And such rum! In barrels, with rusted hoops and cobwebs clingin round 'em. they hosted it on board. The pirates that hid it a century before stored nothin' weak, and every year added to Its strength Our second mate, who was a man of much liquid experience ashore as we'll as at sea, took a cargo of one cup. It was just three days before he could navigate, and-would you be- heve it.-for two weeks after that whenever he dreamed of that rum at night he'd wake up in the mornin' tipsy.
 "Absalom was a man who glanced over newspapers from curiosity and read trade journals for profit So knew somethin' extremely uncommon was up when he spent whole forenoon porin' over newspaper, with his elbows on the table and his fingers clutched in his hair; and when I heard his chuckle, I was interested. Absalom Riggs never wasted chuclSle. I heard him say, as he went out of the cabin: They're strong in the body, but weak in the head
 of course I picked up the paper. It told story of an awful tribe of connybals who resided on the west coast of Afriky. It seemed they war a tribe of reglar bunkosteerers, for all the missionaries who went there war invariably taken in. Then the queen of England sent down gunboat, and the captain of the gunboat sent a man with white flag and a proclamation in violent language to these cannybals. But there was some misunderstandin' about the matter. for the cannrbals ate both the gallant tar and the proclama- tlon. It hurt the captains feelin's very much, so he landed most of his force and went after the heathen Alas! he oldnt know 'em. disremember all of the atfectin' lines the poet larryate wrote about em, but the centerpiece of Inc work run somethin' like this:
 They war an awful hungry lot
 And havin' nothin' much to do,
 inVaygled the tars-the sun was hot
 into nice, seclooded spot,
 Then ate that gallant crew
 Her majesty missed reception on account of that, and the foreign secre- ary missed two first-class races. Then cruiser went down there on business, put the captain, not bein' onto his job,