The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1905-06-30

stand better than anything else, sand
it is being shaken up by being hauled
around on wagons and cars, and is
straining to get out, then bartender
drives 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 a
cold buckwheat cake, and you can
make it up into jewelry, that looks
like maple sugar and smells like a
fire in a garbage crematory. Besides
the lava there are stones as big as a
house that are thrown up by the sea-
sickness of the earth, as it heaves and
pants, and then the ashes that come
out of the crater at times would make
you think that what they need there
is to have a chimney sweep go down
and brush out the lues.
TO get an idea of what a nuisance
the ashes from the crater are to the
cities on the plain below, you remem-
Der the time you were out in your
back yard splitting boxes for kindling
wood, and my chum and l threw a
pail of ashes over the fence, and &C
cidentally it went ali over you, about
four inches thick. That time you got
mad and threw cucumbers at us, when
we ran down the alley. Keep that in
your mind and you can understand
the destruction of Pompeii, when We
suvius, thousands of years ago,
coughed up hot ashes, and covered the
town 40 feet deep with hot stuff, and
killed every living thing, and petri-
fed and preserved the whole business,
and made prairie on top of town,
and everybody eventually forgot that
there had ever been a.town there, for
about 1000 years. If my chum and
l had not run out of ashes we would
have buried you so deep in your back
yard that you would have been petri-
fed with your Ratchet, and when they
excavated the premises thousand
years later they would have found your
remains and put you in museum.
Well, couple of hundred years ago
peasant was sinking a we'll down in
the ashes and he struck petrified
barroom, with bartender standing be-
hind the bar in the act of serving
some whisky 1000 years old, and the
peasant located a claim there, and the
authorities took possession of the
prairie and have been digging the town
out ever since, looking for more OF
that 2,000-year-old whisky.
When l told dad about what they
were finding at the ruins of Pompeii
and how you were liable to find gold
and diamonds, and petrifed women
he wanted to go and dig in the ashes
as he said it would be more exciting
than raking over the dumping grounds
coal, and so we hired hack and went
to the buried town, but dad insisted
on carrying an umbrella, so if Vesu
vius belched any more ashes he could
protect himself. Gee, but from what
l have seen at that old ruin man
would need an umbrella made Of cor
rugated iron to keep from being bur.
led
Well, when we got to Pompeii dad
was for going right where they were
digging, but l got him to look over
the streets and houses that had beer
uncovered first, and he was paralyzeC
to think that town could be covered
with ashes all these thousands OF
years, and then be uncovered and FIND
town that would compare, in many
respects, with cities of the present day
with residences complete with sculp
ture. paintings and cut marble that
would skin Chicago to finish
We went through residences thai
looked as rich as the Vanderbilt houses
in New York, baths that you coulc
take plunge and swim in, if they
had the water, paintings that would
take premium at any horse show to-
day, pavements that would shame the
pavements of London and Paris. anC
petrified women that you couldn't tel
from a low-necked party in Washing
ton. except that the ashes had eaten the
clothes off, I guess most of the PEG.
pie in Pompeii got away when the
ashes began to rain down, for the,
, must have seen that it wasn't going tt
be light shower, but a deluge, cause
they never have found many corpses
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