The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1900-03-04

n
family. No doubt of it. They tried
u everything from the newest kind
/, Of shoe polish to transcendental the
osophy. Athletics they took up this
season when they moved into their new
house, and Arthur, the 15-year-old hope
of the family, entered the freshman
class at the college. The college boys
had soon discovered that Arthur was a
youth designed to shine in football cir
cles, and that lad was very shortly deep
in the intricacies of gymnasium prac-
tice. Every evening he came home with
glowing accounts of the feats he had
performed on trapeze, ladder and hori-
zontai bars. The astute boy would wind
up his account with the plaintive re-
mark:
And the professor says If I could
practice at home I'd get along so much
faster; but told him we had no ap-
paratus."
What do you need?'' inquired Mr..
Brown after one of these harangues.
"Of course. I want you to get the best
out of your college course that you
can"
"Oh," joyfu1ly exclaimed Master Ar
thur, "a punching bag, one of those
home exercisers that you fix to the wall
and some dumbbells would do. Mother
is always talking about growing too
stout, and I am sure if she practiced
every day with dumbbells she would be
as thin as Miss Scatterwit, whom she
thinks looks lean and intellectual"
Mrs. Brown beamed on the proposition
Miss Scatterwit was a literary friend
whose attenuated frame she had long
admired because it was such a contrast
to her own too solid flesh.
So the home exerciser and the punch
ing bag and the dumbbells were bought.
Now, although the gifted devotees of
football practiced daily in the college
gymnasium, his knowledge of these spe-
ciaI pieces of apparatus was not so COM
pIete as he had led his family to believe.
The exerciser and the punching bag
were put up in the basement, which
was warm, dry, well aired and we'll
lighted. although it had originally been
consecrated to the use of a coal cellar
and storeroom.
Mr.. Brown is a man OF severe energy
and exactness. The rest of the family,
NAL ignorance in regard to the appa-
ratus. Arthur and his elder brother
Tom undertook to put the punching
bag and exerciser up. Mr.. Brown
watched them get the apparatus in
place with growing Impotence. direct
ing all the time, or at least when he
could be heard above the general buzz
of excited conversation.
L. iy1 hn owl Ioxp fC
put it up properly, and the following
evening the Browns took their first home
exercise. It was a weird sight. Arthur
and Tom INDUCED in mutual recrimina-
lions, and Mr. Brown 1oftily advised
and commanded. while Mrs. Brown and
the girls giggled Little Willie Brown,
a serious child. regarded the adjourn
ment to what he called the "celly' (cel-
lar) as a vast testivity, and. unobserv-
ed. INDUCED himself in his favorite for
hidden amusement of climbing up the
coal pile and sliding down from the top,
an exercise which left large black spots
on the seat of his little gray trousers
and proved double exercise for him, as
he was spanked when discovered.
After watching the boys and listening
to their wranglings for about five min
utes Mr.. Brown lost patience and said:
Get away from that bag, both of
YOU You don't know anything about
it. Let me show you how this is done"
AS Mr.. Brown had never before prac-
ticed with a punching bag. for about
five minutes after he attacked the in
nocent looking leather spheroid he saw
stars, or, rather, the whole milky way,
with innumerable planetary systems
and comets thrown in. Whenever he
struck out at the bag with studied neg
ligence il came back with a resCuHding
whack. perchance to hit him in the
forehead. The next blow would be
trife indignant and land thump upon /
his nose. An angry pound at the bag +
closed up one eye, while the next fren- /
lied hammer sealed up the other optic. /
Then. exhausted, he stumbled over lit