The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1912-10-08
A WIDOWS HOG.

when you strike the village you
strike the hog" is an old saying
among those who drive about There
may be ordinances against him, but
they can not be enforced. The hog is
turned loose to make the village pic
furesque, and he never quits his job
until called upon to fill the pork
barrel.
The village of Stamford had it's
hogs and its mudholes to comfort
them. Sam Harris was one of the SO
hog owners, and when he died he left
his widow a house and lot and hog.
1t wasn't a porker in a pen, but a
hog that was running at large around
the streets of the village. 1t was
against the ordinance for live stock
to run at large, but everybody felt
sorry for Sans widow, and the hog
was not disturbed. 1t was only when
Josiah Flint was made village mar
shall that the old black porker was
driven off to the pound one day.
There were folks that said it was
right and folks that said it was
wrong, and there was so much feel
ing about it that after two or three
days public meeting was called.
There was big turnout, and the first
speaker was Squire F'latbush. The
squire always starts every one of his
speeches with the landing of the pill
erims and gradually works down. 1t
was so in this case and he worked
hogs and pilgrims in pretty good
shape. He was for the law. He was
sorry for the widow and sorry for her
hog, but law was law. If the Widow
Harris black hog could run at large,
then the same privilege must be
granted a widows cow He had no
personal feelings in the matter at all,
although he had stumbled over that
hog on a dozen different dark nights,
but he must range himself on the
side of the law.
Abraham Fuller came next. Abe
had an undelivered Fourth of July
address that he had been holding on
TO for several years, and he had de-
termined to ring it in on this occa-
sion. He began with the battle of
Lexington, and he got down to Bene-
dict Arnold before he brought IN the
hog. From that time until the colo
MES won their independence, liberty
and the Widow Harris, the American
eagle and that black hog were sand
WICKED in to make a powerful speech
of it, and when he closed it was
amidst applause. Had a vote been
taken then the hog would have been
released, but there was delay of
two or three minutes and it was fatal
Moses Taylor got his feet under him
and rose up and began on that speech
of his about the rise and fall of the
Roman empire. He had got it off a
dozen times before, and it had always
weighed a ton. Moses was the only
man who was way up on the Roman
empire and he knew it and made the
best of it. In IL minutes he created
and destroyed the empire and knocked
out the widows hog, and his own ora
torical effect was decided to be equal
to anything of Clay's.
Philetus SehemerhoTn was next to
plead for the hog. He said he didn
want to mix hogs and widows nm 80
gether, but on this occasion it was diff
ferent to separate them. On the one
hand we had widow setting by her
desolate heartLstone and weeping over
the loss of q pOrker, and on the other
hand porker in the village pound
grunting and wailing over its lost lib
erty. He went back 5000 years to
prove that widows had always been
objects of public sympathy, and had
been given more latitude than other
folks, and he took the early history
of Egypt to prove that hogs had been
allowed to run at large without pro-
teStation. The carriages of queens
and expresses had turned aside FOR
hogs lying in the roads. and kings and
emperors had stumbled over them as
they lay stretched out on the side
walks. 1t was telling speech, and
public opinion wavered again.
Ebenezer Schoolcraft had ranged
himself with the anti-hog anti-wid0sv
party. He had resurrected a political
speech he made when General Grant
was q candidate for a second term,
and when Philetus sat down Ebene-
ger rose up. Everybody was wonder
ing how he could swing the hog into
the speech, but he did it as handsome
as you please and made it tell. Tt
was over half hog, and had there
been a campaign on it would have
elected the whole county ticket When
he had concluded and sat down with
a broken suspender there was a gen
eral feeling that the widows hog
would never emerge from the public
pound until the fees had been paid in
cash.
It was then that the pro-hogs put
forth their last card. They had got
hold of a barbed-wire fence man who
could take the top off a liberty pole,
and he rose up with his ears working.
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