River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1905-06-22

lar with your head in the basket, you
decide to have run of sickness ard
hire a doctor who will charge you the
price of a trip to Europe.
Well, sir, Naples is dandy, in its
clean part. The bay of Naples is a
dead ringer for Milwaukee bay, in
shape and beauty, but Milwaukee lacks
Vesuvius and Pompeii, for suburbs,
and she lacks the customary highway
men to hold you us. Every man, wom-
an and child we have met makes
living out of the tourists, and nobody
that I have seen works at any other
business.
We woke up the first morning and
dad looked out the window and saw
Vesuvius belching forth flame, and
lava and stone fences, and wanted to
turn in a fire alarm. but | told him
that that fire had been raging ever
since the Christian era, and was not
one of these incendiary barn burnings,
but he opened the window and yelled
fire, and the porters and chamber
maids came running to our room, with
buckets OF water, and wanted to know
where the fire was. Dad pointed out
of the window towards Vesuvius and
said: "Some hired girl has been start
ing fire with kerosene, in that shan
ty on the knoll out the7s, aud the
whole ranch will burn if you don't
turn out the fire department you gosh
blasted lazy devils. Get a move on,
and help carry out the furniture"
Well, they Gained dad, and then l
had to go to work and post dad up
on the geography he had forgotten.
and finally he remembered seeing
picture of volcano or burning noun
tain in his geography so years ago, but
he told me he never believed there was
a volcano in the world, but that he
always thought they put those pictures
in geogra phies to make them sell.
How a man can attain the prominence
and position in tie business world that
dad has, and not know any more than
he does, is what beats me.
OF course you know, having kept
grocery since the war, and having had
opportunities te study history, by the
pictures on the soap boxes and insur-
ance calendars, that Nero, the Roman
tyrant, after Rome was burned, while
he fiddled for dance in a barn, got
so accustomed to fire and birthstone
that he retired to Naples and touched
on Nesuvius, just so he could look at
it. But Vesuvius about 1000 years ago
got TO burning way down in its bow
els, and the fire got beyond control,
and l suppose now the fire is away
down in the center of the earth. and
you know when you, get down in the
earth below the crust, on which we
live and raise potatoes, everything is
melted. like iron in a foundry, and
Vesuvius is the spigot through which
the fluid comes to the surface. You
see, don't you?
Just imagine that this earth is a
barrel of beer, which you can under
stand better than anything else, and
it is being shaken up by being hauled
around on wagons and cars, and is
straining to get out, then bartender
drives a spigot into the bung, turns the
thumb piece, and the pent-up beer
comes out foaming and squirting, and
there you are.
Instead of beer, Vesuvius is loaded
with lava, that runs like molasses, and
when it is cold it is indigestible as
cold buckwheat cake, and you can
make it up into jewelry, that looks
like maple sugar and smells like a
fire in garbage crematory. Besides
the lava there are stones as big as
house that are thrown up by the sea-
sicknoss OF the earth. as il heaves and