Daily Kennebec journal., 1914-01-03

was copied all over the country, and
as that was the only notice the out
side world had ever taken of our viii
lage everybody naturally felt grateful
to Mr.. Bagley, as we'll as afraid of
him, So in the course of time he be-
came a feared and respected institu
tion, which was proper enough, for
Daniel Webster himself got drunken
and roared louder than our esteemed
townsman when he unbelted. On these
accounts he gave our prosperous little
city a warlike and literary atmosphere,
the same as having Jesse James and
Bertha NJ. Clay in our midst would
have done.
Doubtless I'd have been fooled along
with all the rest by his bluff if 1t had
not been for an uncle of mine who had
been a boy along with Simon Bagley
in their old home hamlet. According
to Uncle Dud, the real reason back
of Simons behavior was that while on
his sober moments he was what Ma
ture intended him to be, poor, little
skinny coward. when under the infiu-
ence of whisky he temporarily threw
off the handicaps that fate had loaded
on him and became for a brief season
what he had hungered and thirsted all
his life to be- 1t was then that he
dropped his timidity and humility, his
cowardice and weakness, and tore
loose and went on a rampage with the
heroes of old. All his gray life as
Uncle Dud explained it to me, Simon
Bagley had aspired to be brave and
bold and valiant, but never had the
necessary nerve. He didn't, said In
Gle Dud, have the physic-meaning
.fea- -zeek, I judged. He was born with
the soul of a conqueror in the body
of a postage-stamp collector. In his
dreams he was a sir knight in armor
bright. and when he woke up he was
a secondhand dealer headed for the
poorhouse. His ambition was ever with
him. and when he couldn't suppress it
any longer he blew up and for a little
while blazed and thundered his rabid
old war songs, and was for the time
being what he had always yearned to
be. Many of us have something of
much the same sort carefully conceal
ed about our persons, but as a rule we
don't so as far as did friend Bagley,
which is very likely the reason we
don't make our bluffs stick as we'll as
he did.
We'll, as time went on and he grew
older his attacks naturally hurt him
worse, and at last came an occasion
when the doctor warned him that just
about one more able-bedied hooraw
would finish him. So after that for a
year or so the worst he did was to
soak up about half way and stay in
his store and talk to. himself. People
began to think that he would never
erupt again and the little boys took
to making snoots at him behind his
back. Then one evening when he had
grown quite feeble he was taking one
of his solitary walks down the jack
oak lane, listening to the birds twit-
tering and watching the w-hanging
sun getting ready to go out of business
over the western end of the lane Bye
and-bye there was a snap off to one
size as If somebody had popped a
whip, then another. and presently two
more, ard sort of humming, groan-
ing mutter. And then a poor simple
ton by the name of Smith tumbled
over the fence out of the woods and
into the lane, down toward the sun
set, and came tapping up the road
with his mouth open. He fell down
a couple of times and then came
stumbling forward and collapsed in the
dust and crawled toward Bagley and
grabbed him around the knees, and
lay there painting like a lizard with
his foolish face IN the dust betwixt
old Bagley's feet.
There had been a crime committed
and as the simpleton was handy a
mob put chase to him. People are
pretty particular about some things.
but when party of our best citizens
set out to lynch somebody if they can't
catch the right feller most anybody
who amt armed or influential will do.
The mob nearly filled the lane after
they had swarmed over the fence, and
they had guns and a rope or two and
one thing and another. They rolled
up to Bagley and the simpleton like
a tidal wave and then they rolled back
again like another tidal wave The
little old man looked at them as they
came on, and then looked quickly over
his shoulder. and then down at the
poor simpleton sprawling in the dust.
His bent old form Strengthened up
and he took off his hat He held up
one thin hand commandingly and un-
folded that great voice of his and told
them to stop And remembering what
dangerous man he had always been
they stopped and stood while he roar
ed. He broke all his previous records.
for this time he was shouting for a
human life. No member of that mob
was ever able to tell afterward what
he said. He blaZed at them with
words and lines from all the ferocious
old poems he had ever recited in the
past. He beat them back with Sc
lections from all the famous orators
he had ever known. He ragged and
thundered denunciations. defiance and
vituperation, all mixed and mingled
and as furiously and frenziedly and
fast as he could talk. He put his foot
on the simpletons neck in his fury
and stood like st. George, or some
such felier, tromping the dragon, and
ground him farther down into the dust
and didn't seem to know it and neither
did the simpleton. And talking against
time he stood the mob off until the
Sheriff came charging up with the
word that the poor simpleton had