The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-12-29

only when he is caught out in the rain. He owns a little butt headed, measly bull which he htches to a ricketty wagon with hickory bark harness. Last Tues day he dunned me for two loads of wood which he had hauled and dumped up to my house, and l paid him two silver dol lars l was late getting to dinner that day, and when l arrived l found my wife fuming the cook mad and no dinner in sight. Wife said the wood Jim had brought wouldn't burn l went out to the woodpile and there lay about three shirt tails full of wet, green persim- mon wood, that sort of fuelstuff would choke the best blast furnace in the Bir- mirgham District. Kerosene oil and tur- pentine poured on 1t wouldn't faze it!
 When ] next saw Jim l took him out to one side and thanked him for his great aid in the cause of religion. l told him the Religious World had been fighting the Devil and trying to abolish Hell for ages, without much success, but that Jim had at last hit Hades a deadly blow, for, says I:
 Jim. that wood wouldn't burn in Hell, even with blower on
 "Ever hear about Old Dad Conner g Grindstone?" interiected the Coroner.
 Mean anl stingy was terms that 1t would be base flattery to apply to that citizen; nothing in the Century Die ticnary would be a fit adjective to de- scribe the hidebound parsimony the skin tight closeness. and the miserly skimping of that Ancient Reuben of the Hills. The bark on tree was fiabby looseness as compared to old Dad
 He had all the members of the Tight wad Family backed a mile upstream old Dad sold bale of cotton to the Cross Roads merchants, Mitchell & Co.,, and when that cotton reached Liverpool the Factors there wrote back to Mitchell that a 50 pound grindstone had been packed right in the center of old Dads bale. Mitchell knew it was no use fooling with Conner trying to get back the price of that rock, so he just bided his time. Along in the Fall Conner bought hun dred pound sack of coffee from Mitchell at 22 cents per pound. Coffee was the one luxury that the old miser allowed him. self, and he bought it at wholesale be- cause it was cheaper and because he could use the sack for towel. It was two months before Dad Conner discoy- cred that there was a Fifty pound grind stone in the middle of that sack of cof- fee, it being the same rock that had journeyed to Liverpool and back The old man took to his bed on making this discovery and made his will. One of le provisions of the will was a bequest to
  stamped as containing 250 pounds, more or less. worth $1 per pound, with a clause that Mitchell should sign an obligation, before receiving the roots, that he would devote the contents of the barrel, over 100 pounds, at the rate of Sl a pound, to erecting gravestone over old Dad, but that he must guarantee the barrel as con- taining 100 pounds of roots When the barrel was opened there was 9 pounds of Ginseng root in there and 150 pounds of Grindstones. Mitchell placed a grind stone at the head and foot of the grave. with a marble tablet inscribed: These Grindstones Need Water, and So Does Deceased I tell you, fellows. Mitchell himself was sharper than a razorback hog; he would-'
 Talking about razor back hogs" has tily interrupted the Drummer. that ani- nal is the most amphibious reptile in the Western Hemisphere. Of course. 1 know that all the Fairs, and in all the books, ether breeds like the Berkshire, and the Worcestershire and the Essex and the Polind-C -Chineybery. and all these swell Society breeds. has the edge on the tackey razor-hacl<s, but for continued perseycr- ance. keen enthusiasm. and root-a- tabiI- itv they have no peers A properly raised razor hack will root all day in a slag nile