The Kinsley graphic. [volume] (Kinsley, Kan.) 1890-1940, 1897-01-01

just two short hours after reading
this advertisement in the London
Times, L, George Harland, librarian
of the goodly city of Boston,
Mass, was tenant of the afore-
said 'drawingroom floor" with
my wife-to whom l shall allude in
this veracious narrative as mother
and her trusty waiting woman, Ruth
Martin.
1t was near the British museum, and
/ had come 1000 miles to collate ma
terial from the archives of that ancient
and very useful institution.
Mother" had come to take care of
me, and Ruth had come to take care of
'.mother," and l in the end had to take
care of both of them
The lodgings were all right, but
there was one awful insurmountable
drawback.
q. The children!
The whole neighborhood swarmed
with them. Pretty little wcll-dressed
boys and girls, 1 confess, but to me
utter and abominable nuisances. They
out-babeled Babel, and in addition to
their screams and laughter the clatter
of their rubberless-tired tricycles on
the stone pavement nearly frcnZied me,
for, in spite of the lateness of the sea-
son, the weather was quite Sultry at
times. and we could not always close
the windows, so |, who thought that l
loved children. longed for the power
of a Herod and the immunity to ex-
ercise it.
O.. We had been there nearly month
when Ossa was piled on Pelion and
Pelion on Olympus, and next door was
let to a family of nine.
Mothers tongue, generally so glib in
consolation, ceased to murmur soft
platitudes and pluvial signs were in
her eyes half the day long. Now, my
wife had found distant connection in
the shape of gay, rollicLing young
fellow named Jack Wilders-or rather
he had found her-and the two had be-
come exceedingly great cronies, not
understanding the disparity of their
ages.
Il sent for Jack" she briefly an
nounced. 'Something has got to be
done"
So Master Jack duly put in an ap-
pearance.
why. l VOW, you two are as blue as
moonstones," he declared. as he tossed
his hat on a sofa and coolly seated him
self on mothers work table. Are you
'pining for the pumpkin pies and cream
sodas of your native land?''
Then mother, with touch of pa
thos, which would have pierced any
thing less obtusc than Jacks sensi-
tiveness, told how was distracted with
the. racket of the children, how 1 was
growing so irritable-which was not
true-that she expected me to become
nervous wreck and a fit candidate for
q retreat"
"Oh, Jack. Jack" she walled, what
must we do?"
And Jack oracularly answered. as
though he had been bordering for hours
over the questions:
Pull up sticks and go to Melcomb
'Regis!"
"What and where is Melcomb Regis ="
I gasped.
: Well" Jack continued. pensively.
nnheeding my thirst for Typographical
information, II think that is Just the /,
place for you. There isn't an able
bodied infant in all that blessed parish.
Fact, 1 assure you"
oh, Jack, how can you jest at our
misfortune?''
Jest, indeed! I'm just rs serious as
Mumbo Jumbo. You see the hamlet of |
Melcomb Regis, lovely spot 40 miles
away In Essex, belongs in toto to Sir
Hugh McGregor, an old baronet, rich |
as 'Croesus, and mad as a March hare.
who has such a persistent hatred of
children that he will not allow one on
his estate, and inserts in his leases that /
u one OF his tenants knowingly and
wiilfully harbors child, he shall for
1eit his holding; and as the rents are