Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-12-23

Packed His Trunk and Departed.
Il got that come on Telegram on Sat-
urday. Was I going to come onfe Was
the Potomac going to keep on sliding to-
ward the sea?
Il handed my old dad some gnome mar
rative about wanting to get OF early to go
downtown to buy some clothes. drew my
weekly 81 from hin,--I already had sI5
saved Up for such an emergency-and slid
home. knew that I'd find the house
empty at that hour four in the afternoon,
s eeSanse Il was .s eeuple OF hours before
urday afternoon at the market, buying
truck for Sunday. and my sisters were
always at some matinee or other on Sat
when got home had the house to my
SELF slipped up to my little old white
Washed room--and I've never had room
since. fellers. that / remember half SO
kindly / do that one--and threw my
possessions into my first trunk, aszinc box
about two and a half feet long and some
considerable shyer than that In height and
breadth. had 1t packed and locked In
less than fifteen minutes. / dragged the
trunk downstairs. threw 1t on my shoulder
when got outside, tossed 1t onto the rear
platform OF an old 7th street horse car and
made the station, carrying the trunk a
block On my shoulder when I got off the
car. An hour later l was on my way to
Pittsburg. Boy-like, however. L got the
wrong train, as a matter of course. and
instead of getting into Pittsburg at Z in
the morning. 1 didn't land In the town of
smoke till 3 o'clock In the afternoon of
Sunday.
This was late in the fan OF 1873. and I
was bit past fifteen years old But you're
to remember that a big lummox of
a boy, and~looked to be a good twenty.
affected song d-dance-man's clothes. and
I looked pretty trig, with gold watch and
chain and a big cameo ring to give my hot
makeup a tone
s,Id never been farther away from
Washington than Philadelphia before. but
/ guess / didn't have 1t figured out that
was making the SWEETEST getaway from
washington that had ever happened
Il found Murtha, the organizer OF the
Memphis minstrels, at a seedy actors. no.
streets in Pittsburg Murtha was an old
timer at the minstrel gag. a man with gray
hair and mustache dyed black, and the
Jovial camaraderie with which he received
me caused me to initiate and to say TO my
self that home had never been partieie
like that. But I proceeded to try to shoos
the bunk into<the old-timer telling PIN OF
what long time / had been in the DUST
ness and all that sort of boy-1ke lying. l
thought was getting by with 1t, too. Out,
casting back to 1t now, know the mean
ing of the good-natured glances that he
kept passing at me out of the tail OF MS
eve as I went along telling him how
been with the Haverly outfit Tor severai
years, and such demphool boy nonsense.
With the Gods Of His Dreame.
"Ill introduce you to some of the boyos'
Murtha said, after we'd had this talk, ana
there was, hired, and on equal terms with
those gods OF my waking and sleeping
dreams. the bunch of forty-count EN-,
forty-honest-and-truly minstrel men! They
were all great deal older than was and
most of the poor devils looked Ike ouns,
but couldn't see that then. They were
all members of the Presidents cabinet and
bigger'n that, even, to me; and when they
gave me the slap on the back and called
me pal and mate and chum and old moss
and asked me IL ] happened to have
any finecut In my clothes. guess wasn't
peering out at the world through pair of
rose-glass lorgnettes! Those fellows could
all do something, too. / saw that when We
Increased at old Liberty Hall on the fol-
lowing morning. I got by Murtha some
thing easy when did the aged coon thing
for him, and he put me on one OF the bone
ends.
1--WE were to open at GAINESVILLE, Ohio, on
the approaching Thursday, and-weH, We
did open there. I believe there were four
teen people In the house, including the
three town constables that had been staked
to passes. The trail of the panic OF 70 was
yet heavy on the middle western states.
and the one-night shows were all going to
the dump. We went on to the next town.
and to the next and the next, but there was
nothing doing. although the towns had all
been billed with the forty-count EN-
forty posters. The bandsmen OF the Mem
phis Ministries were the first to begin to
fall away from us. They had chance to
get work somewhere or other. which the
rest OF the members of the outfit didn't.
and when the musicians saw that they were
out with a dead one. and that there was
going to be no ghost-walk. they slipped
away In pairs and trios. Their detection
hurt me lot because the street parades
had to be cut out I sure enjoyed those
street parades. A nlne-mile route didn't
seem much more than block to me when
we were parading, with the boom-ta-ra of
the hollow-formed twelve bandsmen up IN
front, and us for-a-fact minstrel men street.
ing out behind, In our silk topperinos and
bulgy cream-colored frock coats. and all the
Rubes and Zekes trailing along, looking at
us In awe. as l thought-the young ones es-
pecially. | knew the inner feelings of the
boys who tagged after the minstrel pa
rades, and how did inwardly gioat at the
thought of how I had it on 'em ali-me,
sure-enough minstrel man that had landed'
Nearing the End.
"When the remaining members of the
bunch began to see that there wasn't going
to be cent of coin In 1t for them the de-
sertions became general, most OF them taxi
Ing the ties for 1t to make Cincinnati. The
finish came when we landed in a bum little
town about SIXTY miles from Dayton. There
were only nine OF us left. with one of the
end men doing piano-thumping gag IN
place of the deserted orchestra. The few
folks in the audience who had come to count
the forty went out during the interniis-
SlOL, taxing E6tutu CHECKS DIS t1ey ~cHls
and they came back with invalid eggs and
passe vegetables. That settled 1t. Murtha
told US that he was all in, and that 1t was a
case Of all hands to cover the best way they
knew how. Wed been pretty shy on the
eat thing for a number of days, and was
a growing boy with an appetite. Somehow
or another. when 1 fell to thinking of the
little old whitewashed room I'd left behind
down on the Island and of the dinners
which my mother knew SO well how to
frame up. and of the Disseminating stunts
that my sisters were pulling off In the
kitchen all the time-well. somehow or an
other the plumbers trade didn't strike me
as being such a bad thing after all
my watch had already gone, and when
went back to the hotel ON the day of
the final bust-up the hotel clerk bought
my cameo ring of me for So, and 1t achei
me to have to pull 1t off and pass 1t over
to him for the three, but there was noin-
Ing else for 1t when he Informed me THAI
Dayton, sixty miles away, was the nearest
Place from which could send a telegram
for money. The next morning / went over
TO Dayton out of the So. and wired my dad
for SIS, saying that / wanted to return
home at once-that being the first word
I'D sent home since my getaway.
THE SIS came along in a few hours, and