The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1903-10-25

SCHOOLS OF natural born neSlta-
tors as I met with during this
last inland lubber- gathering cruise
that I've just finished" said a pretty
officer of the navy who has been at
tached for some months to a naval re-
cruiting outfit operating In the mid
ole western and a few of the more
northerly southern states. Most of
them nuBged so close 10 the life on
the ocean wave that they could feel
the spray and smell the scouse, and
then. becoming stampeded all Of
sudden, ducked for the tail and uncut
like bunch Of seminary girls with
red sunshades crossing a grazing field
and hiking for a fence upon seeing d
COW gazing that them three furlongs
away.
And the bigger and huskier the lab
hers were the more scared they seemed
10 be at the last minute. One of them
an Illinois zap as high as a Manhu
mandarin on street-fiOOds stills and
strong enough 20 play jack with ten
pound dumbbells wired together. made
g. DackdOWn and a gateway that gave
the officer in charge OF our shipping
outfit the fantods for three days.
He passed the surgeon as easy as a
racing turbiner slips by a dump scoW.
He was so good when he shed his
haydn duds and went before the ply
sician examiner that the surgeon only
smiled and said. What's the use?
You'll do. after taking little more than
peek or two at the big lummox
but some of us that were looking
on could see that his gizzard was about
the size Of a sand gnats There was
hunted look in his eye after the sur
geOn told him that he was all right.
and YOU could almost hear the cOgita-
tons in his maintOp while he was put
ting on his clothes preparatory TO To-
inc in before The ehfnnfrrr officer
putting his name to the enlistment pa
.pers.
Dodged the Hook.
Take brace maty.' we said to
him, encoUragingly, seeing that the big
Zeke was edging close to a collapse,
What's three years2 A mere bag O.
shellsi And think os the haydn yOull
dodge while you're gOnel Look at the
run you're going to havel Think OF
Paris and Port Said, Just one grand,
lOlly dreamy smoke for three years.
Unship that thiuk-it-over look and take
a reef I'm your fOrked guessing stick.
The deep waters the thing for you,
jack
"I dunno so much bout that.
bgosh now th't I've got this far the
big Cy said. scratching his head.
'Mebbe it wouldn't suit me and
wouldn't suit it-and then what2 Say,
I'd sure like { talk it over with NAV
ag'ir before 1 put my hand L them
binding papers
I'VE had a hard time cugger-mUg-
gering him out of that notion and we
finally, one of us at each side of him.
nursed him along through the door or
the Office where the shipping officer
had the enlistment papers spread out.
He had the linked pen i'm his shaking
hand and was just leaning over the
desk with his tongue lolling out and
his eyes rolling to scratch his sigma
ture at the bottom of the made-out
form that would hold him tight for
three years when there was a clatter-
ing and a creaking on the road down
below. The zap seemed TO recognize
the sound.
with the pen stin in his hand he
clomped to the window and looked
down. A little old woman in a Pals
ley shawl and a poppy-Httered bon
net was just climbing out Of the farm
wagon. which she had been driving
herself
ITS maw!' gasped the Rube with
an expression Of intense relief on his
fece. Z guess nav wants me
The office door flew open.
d" Nav
-" Micah,
And he was I'm her arms and she
was I'm hisn.
"Th' idee O. my Micah wantin' e go
f'r a rowdy, drunken scan'alous sailor
TIL very ideeN said the Old woman.
addressing the tired-lOoking recruiting
officer. An him tn youngest o. eight
boys. all o. 'em as happy an content
as can be on their paws farm-an
Micah never haVin' been no further
wy from hum than Pee-Or-iai Don't
YOU dare l. tell me that my Micah $
already been an gone an jined them
scan'alOus sailors, or that it's too late-
I'm a-gOin' q take my Micah hum with
me right now
" Madam. said the shipping officer
getting up at his desk and making
Nlicah's mother a low bow, hes all
yours. You can have him.
"She took Micah by his hamlike hand
and led him down the stairs TO the
wagon. and I never saw a more de-
lighted looking Micah ashore or afloat
than that one was when he climbed
into the wgOn alongside his nav. Fact,
is as the wagon sheered off Micah
twisted around I'm his seat grinned and
stuck his fingers to his nose at us who
were watching his getaway from the
window.
An Iowa Experience.
we had another close thing Of it in
q little Iowa town. He was q town.
ship tease who wore store clothes,
banged his straw-cOlored hair SOS it
would prOtrude i'm a real cute way IN
front of his chip stray hat, and
spOrted "a hand knit green. blue and
red four-in-haud necktie. An in all, ne
was about as pregacious a specimen Of
q meadow madcap and country cut
up as 1 got "A binOcular on during the
overland cruise.
He gave us to understand that the
reason he contemplated shipping was
that there was a deep. dark cark can
kering away his life. and when he got
this Off myself and all the rest of the
Old fiat feet looked each other over
and felt real pathetic, so we did But
the shipping officer, who overheard
him looked up I'm some alarm.
" You re not married, are yOu2' he
inquired of the tease. The recruiting
officers have got TO be careful not TO
ship fellows trying to duck responsible
ties Of matrimOny on a landsman's or
Coalheaver's pay.
THE village cut-up replied that he
waant not jis' yit. but that
oh. well. If it's only that you'll
get over it all right when you go 10
sea said the officer. looking relieved.
a lot of us have carks. but forget all
about em when we go 10 sea. The
seas the greatest canker destroyer you
ever heard tell Of and the officer
winked solemnly over the hoyden's
head at us.
well. we almost had that fellow
snagged-he passed the doctor without
my bother and was eligible In an
other respects for a deck swab, and he
was shipping as a landsman-when, at
the last minute, he made a brush out
CT reckon. the siIo-and-ensilage
kind o. dreamy-like. when we bega
sport with the cark in his madrim said
T~oa NV TfLa WHOM We hnua n