El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1898-03-19
THE BUNS" WE'RE BULLS.
A Joke OH the Telegrapher who Mixed
Up his Dashes.

The episode of the telegraph
operator whose name WAS Rsth, but
which cognomen, owing to the loss of
telegr .phic dot from the letter Ssh. -
refreshing of memory among some of
the local men of the icy aud SCUM Ter
One of these relates that he had a
somewhat similar experience. only
that the trouble in this instance
rose out of dashes rather than
dots.
81 was working in yard Office on
the Baltimore and Ohio,'' he s3id
land one night received message for
the yardmsster which read, as copied
it: Lookout for two buns in car No.
1851, G. W. and B , AMI give them
proper TREATMENT The message was
signed by the division superintendent,
at the other end of the line, and we
naturally supposed that the conductor
had complained by wire of the tramps.
and the order from headquarters
meant that we were to yank the in
terlopers out, beat them h alf to death,
and throw them into Jail. Tramps
had been giving great deal of trou-
BILE lately,
well, the train rolled in about mid
| night. We had the crew of switch
ing engine, the yard watchman, two
constables, and the car inspector,
along with the yardmaster and myself,
| lined up to receive the unwe come pas-
sengers. 1t was dark and fpggy, and
the lanterns gave scarcely any light, so
to fEd the car. AT last we located it,
a single-deck stock car, and the yard
master yelled through the foY:
Come on out of ttere. We've got
you surrounded and you can't get
away"
The only reply was contemptuous
sniff and the sound of movement with
in the car. We could not see past our
lamps, so the yardmaster and the fore
man of the switching crew decided to
climb in from the trap opening in
the roof, not wishing to break the seal
on the door. The yardmaster went in
first. He had a lantern, link and a
pick handle in his hands, and as soon
| as he got in he called to the buns to
surrender or he would beat their heads
off Instead they apparently-for we
could only Judge by ear-took to the
far end of the car.
"'Come on, JACK" yelled the yard
master; 'we'vesgot to make fight of it.
So be threw the link in the direction
of the noise.
"rben came the most uuearthlv
sound 1 ever heard. 1t was like moan
and rOar, and l Was certain the yard
master had killed one of their, but sud-
denly another yell, this time from him,
showed that there was life in the enc
my yet.
"'Ow! I'm murdered" bowled the
yardmaster. He had been crashed
against thes side of the car like q
tin toy. Falling, he was stepped on
and rolled in the sawdust bedding and
his lantern was knocked from his hand
and fell, broken into fragments. The
foreman was found by something mys-
the muck. We outside knew the fight
must be fearful one, for the planks of
the car creaked and groaned as the
strugglers bore against them.
'I'll shootv' called the watchmau.
"Don't! Don't!' howled the ysrdmas
ter. You'll kill US. These tramps
are giants, and they're deaf and dumb.
| Ow! this time from near the roof. I'm
| being killed. I'm getting out of thisu
| And the next we heard of him he was
on top of the car, whittier the switch
man had already preceded him.
"At this moment we heard a strange
noise in the midst of us: Who's going
| TO water and feed those two bulls? l
understood you be ready to take care
of 'em here 1t was the conduct
He had just come up, AID didn't knew
| what was happening,
well that was what was in the car.
Two bulls. You know the telegraphic
letter ~" is one longe dash: The
double ''l'' is sort of amplifed en-"
And because the division superintend
ent had warned US to take care of those
two bulls, pair of good railroad men
had been nearly killed "-Chicago Re
cord