The Irish standard., 1898-08-06

aissey. They always borrowed. but they
never paid. The colonel, among his
other proclivities, aspired to be gam
bier. but his difficulty in keeping track
Of his chips and the amount they repre-
sented was such that everybody around
the faro table noticed it. This fact be-
came SO humiliatlng to Morrissey that it
was with great difficulty he could be pre-
vailed upon to take hand ut the favorite
game, and when he did he was sure to
be shorn lamb when be left the table,
The temptation to put up brace game
ON him was so great that the most con-
scientious dealer in the Carbonate camp
could net resist it.
Soon after Morrissey became a mill
ionaire he bought $500 gold watch, but
so illiterate was he that he could not tell
the time by looking at it. When any
one asked him what time it was, the
colonel, in the most ostentatious manner
possible, would pull out his watch,
throw open the case, and holding the
face SO that his friend could see, say:
Loox fer yerself, so you II know I'M
not lyin' IL yez.'
One of the greatest troubles that the
colonel had was his inability to write
his name. He frequently was called on
to sign papers of various kinds, and the
way this had to be circumvented was a
sore trial to him. When he went to
hotel and the clerk asked him to register
he would say:
Write me name in the book; me
hand Is cold,' or I have me CLOSE on
The boys around Leadvillo noticed this,
and they saved him this modification
Whenever they could. The colonel final
ly decided that he ould learn to write
his name at least. He got friend to
wrtte 1t on piece of paper for him, and
took the paper to his room and practiced
Initiating it until he could make some
thing that looked like his signature. He
did not know single letter of it, but
he had learned that certain comhina-
ton of certain characters represented
his name, and by hard work he finally
became able from memory alone to make
this combination.
After dickering around Leadville and
Aspen in mining property with more or
less bad luck-generally more - the
colonel took it into his head to be a
turfman. He had seen the success with
which Ed Corrigan had been crowned in
his career from section boss on the
Denver & Rio Grande railroad to king
Of the turf, and he thought that he could
go and do likewise So he bought at an
unconscionable price-the kind of price
he paid for everything he bought--a
string Of race horses. But the colonel
was not made Of the sort Of stuff that
succeeds as turfman. He was too
simple-minded. OF course he was nopu-
lar; any man with $3,OO0,O0O is bound to
be popular; and besides, he was jolly,
good-hearted man, generous to a fault,
open-handed to all who came his way.
"But he was like dove among hawks
in his intercourse with the hangers-on
of the tracks, He was plucked clean.
Surrounded by sharpers and parasites,
it did not take long to despoil the big
hearted Irishman of the wealth he had
20 suddenly acquired. lie was proud to
be regarded as one Of the boys aud the
boys worked him for all he was worth.
Three millions is a good deal Of
money. It SENS almost impossible for
man to sink it unless he engages in big
speculations, which the colonel never
did. But Morrissey was constantly sur
rounded by gang Of harpies who preyed
upon him continually. Big and little.
from dollar to hundreds, they sucked
his financial lifeblood, till he was as
bloodless as a turnip, and then threw
the now useless hulk from which they
had abstracted the substance, to die in
penury and want. There are hundreds
of people in Denver and Leadville who
were the recipients Of his unreuuited
generosity, who drew on him for money
as regularly as if he had been bank.
But Col. John Morrissey Of the open
hand, to whom an appeal for help had
never been made in vain, died friendless,
in penury and want. Tile funeral was
quiet affair. There was no train of car
riages, no retinue of weeping mourners,
The only attendants were the county
undertaken, his two assistants and the
sexton who dug the grave"