The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1910-08-28
LIVE TALKS WITH DEAD ONES
The Sea Serpent Tells of Wasted Summer
BY IRWIN s. COBB
sat on the Atlantic seaboard

WYE sat on the Atlantic seaboard'
w hard by the well known and
w popular ocean of that name, the
Sea Serpent and L The Sea Serpent rear
ed his mighty bulk upon the beach and
gazed up and down its damp and sandy
reaches with a sad and humid eye. l sat
under an umbrella which had provident-
Tally borrowed at the life saving station
nearby from a life guord who always
kept one handy because he had perfect
horror of going out to save somebody IN
bad weather and catching his death OF
cold
Except for us two the entire north At
latte coast was deserted. Nobody was
using the ocean for bathing purposes
Not a single German was committing
suicide off the recreation pier that loom
ed in the distance, bare and dripping. one
of those dismal rains that bring the first
moist threat of coming autumn beat down
steadily From summer hotel far M
the beach came drifting down upon us
the strains of the kind of orchestra music
that they always have at a summer hotel
mingled with notes of forced laughter
from a lot oe vacationists who had been
cooped up together just long enough to
hate one another with great heartiness
but hardly long enough yet to begin con
templating the idea of committing muir
der. Except when you're camping out
and it rains I know of no place where
you can learn to hate your fellow man
with such intensity. in the shortest given
space OF time, as at a summer hotel IN
the latter part Of August.
The Sea Serpent continued to contem-
plate the prospect with wistful and
watery mien and shook his sea weed
whiskers sadly His gills worked up and
down plaintively and it seemed to me
that he choked a sob in his throat, TOT
about nine feet down the neck about
where / judged his Adams apple should
be, there was a slight eonvulsi5e move
.ment
ITS too bad, too dummsd bad he
said at last in a throatw kind of a voice.
'Summer is almost over. Labor Day Will
soon be at hand, when the honest toller
will celebrate his day Of rest by walking
"A or IA miles over rough streets While
carrying on his brawny shoulder trans
parency weighing upwards of 10 pounds;
and when Labor Day looms in the inn
mediate distance it's sign that summer
10 on its last legs and in its last lap which
is hard place for anybody but summer
or a contortionist to be.
And not once all season have | showed
in the money. All the rest of the old
standbyes were on the job long before the
end of June The Belled Buzzard was re-
ported several times in Arkansas, Texas
and Oklahoma. Miss Kate Bender of
Kansas died again in Chicago where for
the last Is years she has pursued the con-
genial calling of conducting a delicates-
sen store under the name of Mrs. Spieg-
enheimer. The Oldest Living Mason met
eight or nine others of the Oldest Living
Mason in a fraternal reunion. The last
surviving widow of revolutionary sol
der gave out her regular annual inter
view stating that she had chewed, dipped
snuff and smoked a cob pipe constantly
for "a years and didn't think that tobacco
hurt anyone unless used to excess. The
lady down in Tennessee, wife of a minis
ter of the Southern Methodist church,
who absently swallowed a card of but
tons and hank of thread at the age of
seven, felt the customary tickling sensa-
ton Just under the right shoulder blade
and after a severe spell Of coughing,
coughed up a lingerie shirt waist. 1t
seemed that all of them could come back
all but me and Jim Jeffres especially
Jim.
Sea Serpent gloomily. There was a time
and not so very long ago either when no
seaside summer resort was complete
without at least one visit season from
the Sea Serpent / was kept so busy
humping up and down the coast that
sometimes for weeks and weeks 1 went
without the proper sleep. I was as much
a part of the scheme the beach, the
sand and sandflies, the life guard who al
ways guards his own life so well, hence
his title, the clam-bake and the dam bake,
the shore dinner that tastes of the shore,
the board walk and the bored walkers.
And out in the interior where people Of
ten get to be Is years old before they
found out that an oyster doesn't grow in
a can and where tales of the sea al
ways went best. I was featured in all the
papers regularly. But this summer I
wasn't sighted once, not once. Not even
any obscure hotel that couldn't make the
prices high enough and the service bad
enough to draw patronage in the regular