The citizen. (Honesdale, Pa.) 1908-1914, 1910-01-14
AN AWFUL EXPERIENCE WITH
AN OSTRICH EGG.

Great Notch, n. j., Jan. 9.-For
the first time in the history of poul-
try culture in this countryside an os-
trich egg has been incubated in it's
very midst. Historians must ascribe
the feat to Newt Notter, breeder of
the whirlbird. Unlike the case of the
whirlbird, Mr.. Notter did not pre-
meditatedly incubate the ostrich egg
In the presence of seven deacons he
swore tonight that he would never
incubate another struthionoid bird s
egg, not if it Matched forth a golden
ibis that breathed diamonds through
it's bill and laid 200-carat emeralds.
What that ostrich egg was sent
to me from Texas by my cousin, Will
bur Swabb," said Mr.. Notter tonight,
''he didn't say word in his letter
about there being any disposition
toward Matching on the part of that
egg. AS there were Merry Christ
msaes' and fancy writings all over
the shell l took it for to be present
in the bric-a-brac line.
My wife Sally didn't much ad-
mire the pictures and writings on
that egg, so she took it down to Miss
Evelyn Easel, the Great Notch artist
lady, and asked her to paint some
high class scenery on it, Paint on
something cozy an homelike,' says
Sally, and while she waits Miss Easel
paints on that egg picture of our
living room, with the big open fire.
place blazing with logs. It's the
most lifelike painting | ever saw done
on egg, for when Sally got it home
she found that her fingers was burn
ed from holding that egg by the open
fireplace.
my father-in-law, Ned Gristle,
took the egg from Sally and dropped
it quick, yelling that his fingers is
most burnt off of him. No, it didn't
break and by using a pair of tongs
and shovel | got it up on the mar
BILE mantelpiece in the parlor.
My father-in-law wanted me to
chuck the egg down the WELL saying
it wasn't natural, but as we had to
drink that well water | wouldn't
hear of no such suggestions. Then
l liked the look o. the thing as an
ornament, and believed that after a
day or so the heat would go out of
Miss Easels painting.
But it didn't, by ding. Fact is,
it kept getting hotter and hotter un-
til it had the slab of that mantel-
piece heated so you couldn't lay your
finger on it. | got it down just in
time, lowering it into a bucket of wa
ter to cool it off. That egg hadn't
been in that water eight minutes be-
fore it begin to boil. / took it out
in the backyard then, where it was
freezing cold, but in less than an hour
that water had all boiled off and the
bucket caught fire. Looking close
at that egg the flames seemed to leap
out of that fire Miss Easel painted.
II went down to Miss Easel and
told her about it, whereat she smiles
all over like she been asked to
marry a couple of kings. She says
to me, chuckling and giggling, THAT
only shows, Newt Notter, that l am
a great artist. Then she named
some Greek artist that had painted a
pump so natural 1t flooded a whole
country and drowned about a mil
lion people. | told her then kinder
sharp that l wasn't going to let the
painting on that egg burn up Great
Notch whether it made her reputa-
tion or not.
Don't you worry, she said then,
that egg'll hatch before 1t burns
much more
How kin that egg hatch?' /
snapped at her. My cousin, Wilbur
Swabb. wrote on 1t that 1t was laid
three years ago. Then went back
home boiling mad. When / got
found my father-in-law piling up the
Ice around that egg.