The semi-weekly messenger., 1907-10-29
4 FAMOUS GAME OF SEVEN UP
The Oracle and Central Figure of
the Country Store
1he SicEioriple oct-Io Oh captain
iiarclson AHA SANDY 3lcLeod-IAe
i,ootnlis. EncCL- OF feaon anu
I1oneS--xsaIiIc - Draw.

i,O0Iilnfss l1HcGL- oI Icd1A oio
l1oneS--SaIiIc ~ Draw.
tior me 4Iessea5er.
Cards are sa4u to nave been inve AtsG
about the BEGINNING OF the tilt zenith
century for the amusement Oh crazy
KING Charles Vi OF France, whose
daughter. haln.AIine, married tLe great
King Henry Y. Oh Englard. but, aS
usual. il Gl-G 1Icn aScer Gained since
that the Chinese were playing "seEea
I'D" and set back one or two thous-
and years before that. time. Talley-
rand, the French statesman and diplo-
matist, hearing young man remark
with d good deal OF complacency that
he had never taken the trouble 70
learn one card from another. impress
sively exclaimed: Young man you
.have~sIn empty and desOlate old age
before YOU" Thackeray's novels are
full~of harridan gamblers, like old
Countess Kew, BECKY Sharp and Bar
'oness Bernstein, who was the beautifW
Beatrice CaStlewoodr lover of the
Cheyelier ST. George, brother of Queen
Anne of England. Mr.. Pickwick was
utterly routed by the dowager whist
fiends at the famous resort, Bath,
whittier he went to take the water,
and expressed himself much benefited
after drinking it, but, as Dickens
naively remarks, nobody had ever pre-
Tpiously known that there was anything
: the matter with the dear old fellow.
Cards wrecked the life and fortune
, of Grandfather Trent, in the "Old Gu
-fosity Shop" oy Dickens, and sent
Little Nell on her dark, stony path to
the grave. IN the same delightful
story we find the poor little Mar
chioness" playing one-handed 'cribbage
by the bedside Of Dick SWiveller, whom
she had nursed back to life from a
long and dangerous illness.
So much for the preamble. One
sunny afternoon Capt. Sam Harelson
was smoking his pipe, with his back
comfortably settled against the wealth
er-boarding, and his feet up on a,
bench, on the piazza of Dan Boards
country store at F'ry's Cross Roads IL
fact in the pleasant September weather
and the Indian summer of mellow
October, the captain was a frequent
visitor to the Cross Roads, and a
welcome one for ne was something of
an oracle and the central figure in the
conclave of solons of the settlement.
His supremacy was yiefded without
question by all the knot of wonted
loungers, save by Sandy Mcleod,
big-jointed, lean Scotchman, with Il
red head and An obstinate mouth and
jaw, who put up no claims to leader
ship in sight of the gifts and qualities
which rendered Capt. Sam Harelson
man Of mark, but was just constitu-
tionally opposed to playing second
fiddle" to anybody.
Fortune had in truth been very
wish, turning d face 'heaming with
smiles on the captain; and, il he was
little "set up" IN his own opinion, it
was because he was only mortal, and
had his limits. In the first place, If
he had been sporting man he could
have backed his talk and his judgment
with his money, for he was well-to-do,
having money in the town bank and
one of the best farms in that section,
which he cultivated we'll and indus
triously-for he was 'loafer'' only
when he had nothing else to do.
Then too, Capt. Harelson was a man
who had touched elbows with the
world, had seen things, had Travelled.
lie had been to New York once, and
to Baltimore and Washington twice;
and his stories of those great cities
were not the less interesting to his
listeners because they did not under
stand them, and did not believe many
of them. They were simply too won-
3derful to believe-for instance, that
many of the houses in New York were
built entirely Of steel and stone, and
higher than Shooters Hi11," an ele-
vation of about two hundred feet, and
the only mountain owned by Fry"s
Cross Roads.
Besides, he had seen two presi-
dents of the United States-for one.
Franklin Pierce, whom he always call
ed Our President because he had
been nominated at the democratic ma
tional convention at Baltimore in ar
eloquent speech by James C. Dobbin.
Of Fayetteville, who was afterwards
secretary of the navy in the Pierce
cabinet. He had not only seen but
had shaken hands with President
Buchanan at his levee-"1evy" the
captain called it-and had been bowed
to by Miss Lane
But the event in the life of Capt.
HARRISON, which invested him with q
tragic, almost mysterious, interest,
was the fact that he had once been a
prisoner of wari Just to look at a
man with such an experience was the
next thing to fighting battle; it was
almost as good, or as bad, as facing
the enemy yourself. The way of 1t
was this: When Sherman's army
passed through that section, squad
of troops raided the captains place on
Cane Creek, about mile above Fry's