The Denison review. [volume] (Denison, Iowa) 1867-current, 1902-02-28
THE DEACON'S ADVICE

| man from the back country came into
kyserike one day and sold load of rye
He got 30 cents bushel for it. After he got
his money he dropped in at the tavern to
take the chatf out of his throat before he
started home. There was no chatf in Dea-
con Blimber's throat, nor in the throat Of
Sam Bowler, but the man from the back
country asked them both to step up, AMI
they stepped up. The bill was 80 cents,
and the man paid it and was going out,
when Deacon Blimber said to him:
Its kind O queer that it takes the
price of a bushel O rye in the bulk to pay
for less than half a pint of its juice, now,
ein't it,"
The man from the back country thought
about it minute and said:
IN be dlnged if that lain't so, dea-
con! l never locked at it that way
afore"
Mop said the deacon. well it's
worth thinkin' about But don't YOU 90
an do what Joe Fonda done once, after
he'd been thinking about it. Bill Simons
KEEP little place up at Shinhopple, and
Joe used to drop in at Bills when he'd
come in with a load o rye or somethin',
an sort o stren't then himself with ieetle
O. the juice.
"A teller that was Temperance lecturin'
| got around that way one time, and hep
| forth in the red school house. Joe was in
town an he dropped in to hear the lecture.
Joe never knowed jest whether the man
was lecturln to him or not, but from what
he heerd O the lecture he thought maybe
he was. What Joe heerd O. the lecture was
somethin' like this:
70 plow,' the man said, AN YOU sow.
an you reap an you drag your rye to
market by the sweat O. your brow, an YOU
sell it for 80 cents a bushel Jest look at It
for a moment he said .Foller a bushel
O. your rye. You've sold it for 30 cents,
| The a!l-absorbng distiller takes it, He
drains out o that bushel O. rye Jest four
gallons O raw whisky. Some says he gifts
little more than that, but four gallons is
nigh enough. What does it cost him to git
that four gallon O whisky out o your
bushel o rye? 1t costs him Jest 40 cents
gallon, or SLIGO for the four These is
plain fggers, said the man, AN tiggers
won't lie.
There you are!' said he Your bushel
O. rye stands the distiller in jest $l9O up
to date. Then he has to fork over 80
cents for each one of them four gallons to
pay the goverment tax, 900 cents bein' the
tax, time this man was lecturin) an a
def an dumb blind man kin figger it up
that this makes $3.50 that has to be added
to that $l.90, and there's your bushel O rye,
representa- cost o $3.50, an 80 cents of
it was your'n,' said the man. Now said
he, jest look leetle furder.
"'Your bushel o rye is handed over to
the jobber The jobber he hands it to the
wholesaler. The wholesaler hands it to the
retailer, and by the time it is ready for the
retailer to hand it over to you an to others
that is waitin' to plank down your money
for it, ten cents at plank, its four gallons
has swelled up to be eight gallons, sure
nothin' less, mebbe more. Call it eight
Your bushel O rye has cost the retailer $l2,
! and you got 80 cents for it, after all Your
plowin' an reapin' an sown' an draggin'
1T to market by the sweat O your brow Do
you know how many drinks there is in a
gallon? You ought to- But maybe you
wanted to git 'em into you so quick that
You didn't stop to count 'em. Well. I know
There's 60. Ten cents a drink amt too
big price to fgger 'em at. Sixty drinks
to the gallon makes $50 drinks in your
bushel O rye. Consequently, at ten cents a
drink, the retailer gifts S4S for your bushel
o rye. 1t costs him S12. Accordin' to
tiggers, then, an tiggers won't lie, he
makes jest $50 clean profit on the bushel
O rye that you got 80 cents for.
Now, then!' said the lecturer, poundin'
the desk, will you keep on raisin' rye to
dump into the awful nav O. the devilfish
rum power, till it rolls in silver and gold
and fine linen, and grinds you into the
dust, or will you rise up like the sirocco O.
the desert an sweep it from the land?'
"Joe Fonda didn't say which he'd do, but
he went home a-thinkin' hard, an the up
shot of it was that he made up his mind ia
quit raisin' rye.
8 The rum power don't git no more O my
rye for 80 cents bushel,' said Joe; but ]
won't rise up like the sirocco of the desert
and sweep it from the land I'll join it my
self, and let somebody else sell rye at &c
cents bushel in bulk, while I sell it's Juice
for $4S.'
$50 what does Joe do but sells his farm
and buy Bill Simons' place at Shinhop
pie, and settle down to clean up $50 or
every bushel O rye he sold He was at il
six months. He sold good many bushels
durin that time, and fggered an proved
his hggers every night, an found that
they came out on paper jest as the temper
ance lecturer had laid it down, but some.
how the cash on hand didn't seem to tally
; up with the fggers. Then one day he was
fggerin' away when a stranger dropped in
Stranger said Joe, what do you
think o fggers? Do you think they'll
lie?'
''The stranger said that the fggers he
had on piece o paper he took out of his
pocket wouldn't lie, because they was made
out in the sheriff's office, an was for a
bill that Jake Fry had ag'in Joe for quite q
good many bushels o rye in the juice, an
which the sheriff had sent the man to gel
the money for or take the place He tool
the place, and Joe SEARCHED the country
quite spell for that temperance lecturer
who had laid it out to him SO plain that
fggers wouldn't lie. But he didn't find
him, and so Joe went to raisin' rye ag in
an sellin' it for 80 cents bushel, and
seemed to get along good deal better n
he did when he was sellin' it for $4s a
bushel. 3d. said Deacon Blimber to ths
man from the back country, come and
take some more chaff out O your throat
but don't do like Joe Fonda did, an quit
raisin' rye in the bulk to go sellin' it il
| ~