The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1907-04-04
THE EVENING STOR Y
The Professors Way.
(By Henry LewiS,)

|
tie man. He was round-shouldered.
He was awkward on his legs. He wore
goggles for his weak eyes. and he had
arrived at the age of So without hav-
| ing loved. AS between bugs and
beetles, and women, the bugs and
beetles were ahead. 1t was only on
rare occasions. and when under the
/ stress of excitement, that he took the
| slightest notice of the other sex. Even
when he did sit up and take notice of
them he could not have recalled half
an hour later what he said or whether
| they had red hair or black.
On certain day it came to the ears
| of Prof. Sweetzer that portion of the
vertebrae of a whale had been found
on farm in Connecticut. He ar
rived on the spot next day and veri-
fed the find. On an occasion, thous-
| ands of years before, an old bull whale
had decided to take a trip inland, and
through some error of judgment had
left his bones in gravel pit A piece
Of his backbone six feet long had been
uncovered. The professor wanted to
excavate for the rest. Where there is
six feet of whale you can take 1t that
there is more. He engaged board at
the Widow Webb's and hired q man to
WELD the pick and shovel, and thus
went to work
The Widow Webb was fat and forty
and chlldless. She was worth a stony
farm and $500 in cash. A still older
sister lived with her, and the farm
work was done by a hired man with
the good old-fashioned name of Hiram
StebbiIs. Hiram was 35 and drank
nothing stronger than cider, but he
thought deeply. One of them was that
If he married the widow he would be-
come the possessor of the farm and
$500. He had been thinking of this
and taking the farm work easy when
If anyone had told him that within
week he would be Jealous of that lit
tie, drled-up and humpbacked speci-
men of humanity he would have roared
with laughter.
AS soon as the professor had inspected
the bone and become enthusiastic, he
was changed man. He became a
fluent talker. He became fatherly
toward the widow. He called her my
child" and often took her hand and
held it while he tried to make her un-
derstand that whale was a cachelot,
and that cachelot could stand on his
tail in the water as we'll as on his head.
When Hiram witnessed the handhold-
ing act he quit grinning. He was mad
all that day as he hoed corn. He was
mad when he came up to supper. He
was mad when one of the cows kicked
him at milking time. While the profess
sor took a ramble in search of beetles,
Hiram carried the milk into the kitchen
and began:
Wilder Webb. how does 1t feel to
have a baboon holding your hand?'
Hiram, what do you mean?" was
demanded
Il mean that I have seen you and
that little runt of man squeezing
hands dozen times and neither of you
seems to care who stands by. Fell in
love mighty quick, didn't your"
Look here, Mr.. Stebbins, you have no
right to talk to me in this way. You
know who the professor is. He's
great man. He has taught me more
about whales in the last three days
than knew in all my life before. He
also knows all about birds and bugs and
bees. It's twice as interesting to hear
him talk as it is to hear sermon"
Has a Teller got to squeeze your
hand to talk to you about whales?"
asked Hiram.
He hasn't squeezed it. That's simply
his way. He is a fatherly man. When
he gets to talking he don't know wheth-
er he has got hold of my hand or the
leg of chair. You ought to be ashamed
of yourself to talk as you do. 1 always
thought there was a mean and Jealous
streak in you, and now it's come out"
'Oh, it has, eh?" muttered Hiram.
Perhaps If 1 went around looking for
the bones of an old whale, I'd be all
right"
II guess it would be better than
grunting around. You don't care for
educated folks. but I do. was born
that way. If was to ask you about
whales, you couldn't tell me anything"
But the professor could?"
Yes, sir; he could. Hiram Stebbins.
do you know that the Latin name Of
whale is physeter macrocephalus? Do
you know that we get spermaceti and
ambergris from its body? Do you know
that he sometimes reaches the length OF
70 or 80 feet? You stand there with q
mean look on your face, and yet let
me tell you that the sperm whale can
swallow a man at gulp. There are
no teeth in the upper jaw, but the low
IN al ed
The eyes are small and placed far back
in the head"
"Well?" grunted the hired man.
'Well, the cachelot feeds upon fishes
and cephalopodous mollusks. You pro
baby thought he fed upon turnips.
The whale is gregarious Five hundred
or more have been seen in single
herd. Terrible conflicts often take
place among the males. and it is Tot
unusual to find the lower jaws deform-
ed. The left eye is said to be smaller
than the right, and the whale clnnot
see behind him.
Hiram as he bowed and walked out
to fasten the hencoop for the night.
When the professor wasn't assisting
his men to dig for bones he was huns-
ing bugs and bees and butterflies. To
his great Joy he discovered a seven
spot bumblebee. AS all of US know, a
bumblebee is of dark color with yellow
spots on his back. There are often
a seven spotter. This bee, along with
a dozen others, was placed in paste
board box, and when the house was
reached the box was deposited on a
window sill of the veranda. The pro-
lessor had todd the widow all about
whales AS soon as he had a little
spare time he meant to tell her all
about bumblebees. Two days had gone
by when the moment came. The bune-
digging Iabors of the day were over
and supper disposed of when the
nrofessor and the widow took chairs
on the veranda. He had found the shell
of small turtle in the gravel that day,
and h set out to first explain about
that. Hiram Stebbins was greasing his
boots and chewing the rag in the kitten