The Newport miner. [volume] (Newport, Wash.) 1899-current, 1908-11-19
Crude TO Throw
~ Off an Influence.

a bright fellow, but without good judg-
ment His wife was exactly the Oppo-
site. She was not bright, but possess
ed an enormous amount Of horse
sense" For twenty years she kept her
husband on the track and when he
showed signs Of "breaking would
speak to him in no uncertain tone,
pull strong on the curb and now and
then give him sharp cut with the
whip. The consequence was that Here
ford, being smart, by the time he was
forty had secured a competency.
Now, the thing without which sue
cess Is not to be attained is often IN
recognizable, especially by the achiev-
or. Hereford attributed it in his case
to his talents, arguing that If he were
not pulled back by his wife he would
be a millionaire. His most intimate
friends knew that his wife had put
those talents to their proper use and
prevented his wasting them. Perhaps
If any Of them had told him this it
might have neutralized this story. Per
haps he would have received the In
formation as false The latter suppo-
sition is the more probable.
One day Hereford disappeared. 1t
was found that he had taken $4,000
and left 100000 for his wife, with no
explanation whatever. This is the
most practical thing he had ever done
without her assistance. Almost any
one would pronounce the money pref
cradle to the explanation. But the act
was just like Hereford He was a
mixture Of the sublime and the ridicu-
lous.
He hadn't been gone long before his
wife received letter from an Ameri-
can gentleman in COnstantinOple
named Tarbox stating that Hereford
had died there. He had left instruc-
tons with Tarbox to send what money
he had left-some $1O,OOO-and his in
cinerated remains to his wife. Her
friends said that SO long as he had sent
the money he needn't have troubled
himself about the ashes. Mrs. Here
ford deposited the former in bank and
wept over the latter. When it came
to sentiment she had her weaknesses,
the most pronounced Of which was a
sincere affection for Elisha Hereford.
She was too sensible to keep her hus-
bands dust in her own house, so she
spent 500 on a marble tomb, placed
1t in a cemetery and locked the dust
in it. Not that the 500 represented
her love for her dead husband. The
tomb was plenty large to contain the
ashes, and Mrs. HerefOrd's sentiment
economy.
Before proceeding any further with
this story wish to say that there Is a
feature In it that won't be believed.
You can invent a lot Of imaginary non
sense, and it will be gulped down, but
give people real coincidence such as
happens every day and they will laugh
at you. l am sure. however, that any
one who knows Elisha Hereford on
hearing what l refer te would say,
That's just like him for all the world"
As I have said, Mrs. Hereford was
prone to indulge a sentimental sorrow
SO long as it was not expensive. She
went once q week to the cemetery took
out the urn, busted it, probably b.n use
she had been used to periodically .ust
the marble clock on her mantel at
home, wept over it and put it back
One day just after having done the
busting she turned the key and with
bowed head was mutely Offering a
prayer for the repose Of her husbands
soul when she was aroused by crash
1t seemed she had heard some wood
en- structure knocked into kindling
WOOD. Starting up, there in a lot not
a hundred yards from her she saw a
promiscuous mass Of slender timbers
jumbled with some light woven tex
ture. From beneath it a man strug-
gled to free himself and after doing so
stood upon his feet. The widow went
toward the fragments, and when the
mans head appeared above the wreck
age she caught at an iron rail inclos-
ing a burial lot
She saw him whose ashes she had
been weeping over.
WELL" he exclaimed petulantly, sur
veying the wreck, Its all up, and Im
glad Of it."
Mrs. Hereford, who saw a medium
for wasted money, breathed hard.
Elisha she said sternly, what
foolishness have you been guilty of
this time?'
Il own up, my dear. 1t was this
way: I heard of all these fellows try
Ing aeroplanes, and l had plan that
l wanted to try myself. 1 knew you
would never consent to spending the
money to build it, so I concluded to
take the job into my own hands, first
eliminating you from the experiment.
Jim Twinkler was going abroad, and /
charged him to take care Of you from
there under an assumed name. telling
him what to say and what to send.
This left me $4,000 with which to-
Elisha
MY dear"
Have you sunk $4,000 in that-that
heap?'
I've sunk $4,000"
where is the rest?"
I'm bank"
a.