The Lexington dispatch. [volume] (Lexington, South Carolina) 1870-1917, 1909-01-13
Of the name can talk with his hands
ND as well as down.

up as we'll as down.
We tried to be entertaining to our
caller. We told him two or three good
Jokes and hoped to see him laugh with
us, but he continued to treat the mat
ter as a serious affair. We had just
started in on the best yarn OF all when
he called time on us and began blaz-
ing away. Why he didn't gather us to
our fathers and leave the only good
weekly paper in this country editor
less is wonder to us, for he was only
eight feet away. Even as the bullets
cut our clothing and whizzed by our
ears we said to ourself that it was
mighty poor shooting for holy terror
to do.
We had a distance Of six feet to go
and then to pull a gun from it's holster,
and our first shot was fred as Mr..
Spooner fired his last. No second was
needed. He went down, and he ex-
pired while breathing out the words:
''Why didn't I come in and attack
him with crowbar?
OF course it was a case for the coro-
ner, and that official was soon on the
spot and his jury summoned. Our Of
fee devil had seen the last Of the
fracas, and the late deceased had
boasted on the street of what he was
going to do. At the end Of half an
hour verdict Of justifable homicide
was rendered and the body removed.
We have had but one policy ever since
the first man was planted in our pri-
vate editorial graveyard. We have
always paid all funeral expenses and
taken a carriage at the head Of the
procession. Later on we have erected
tombstones with lamps on top and
decorated the graves until they were
pleasant and artistic objects to con-
template.
Nothing was found on the body of
the deceased to show that he had
living relative. All that was discover
ed in his pockets consisted Of few
shillings in change, dozen extra car
tridges and poem entitled Bury Me
Meath the Willow" This had been cut
from a newspaper, and it looked as if
the deceased had read it over many
times. It seemed to show that he had
q deep feeling Of sentiment way down
in his heart, after all.
Laid Him to Rest.
On Thursday we saw the mistaken
man laid in his last resting place. He
brought the number Of mounds in our
graveyard up to nineteen, but there
was no feeling Of exrlltation in our soul
as we looked around.
Some editors would have striven to
turn the affair to their benefit IN the
way of increased subscriptions and ad-
vertising, but not so with US. We have
ever kept the two things apart. We
take advertising at regular rates. and
we remove men who seek to remove
us, and even if it does occur under the
same roof we keep the accounts sep
arate.
Mr.. Spooner had q large and liberal
funeral. There was nothing to mar
the harmony Of the occasion. 1t was
a cloudless day, and his coffin cost $50,
to say nothing Of the gravedigging
and the hacks. We also gave the OIL
ciating minister a five dollar bill. and
he was pleased to praise our straight
shooting and to observe at the grave
that the deceased would never more
know WEAKNESS and pain.
A week hence we shall erect tomb
stone over the grave Of our mistaken
brother, and next spring the trailing
arbutus will be taught to trail DER the
mound covering him in.
We don't think he was a bad man at
heart, but was simply mistaken in his
mission here on earth. He thought it
was to remove. an Arizona editor, but
it was more likely to have been to run
q sawmih.
We have no word Of criticism. One
must take this life as one thinks best.
Mr.. Spooner may have decided in his
own mind that the holy terror busi-
ness just fitted him. He might have
made an even greater failure at any
thing else. We are sorry that we could
not bury him under willow, but that
kind of tree does not flourish here. He
shall have a cottonwood in place Of it,
and we shall personally see to it that
it is enriched and watered and made a
thing Of beauty on the landscape.