Abbeville progress. (Abbeville, Vermilion Parish, La.) 1913-1944, 1916-12-23

would want you to wait till his Christ
mas rush was over. Also people didn't
| give no orders because ii was around
| Christmas, Birsky, and just because Ii
was near Christmas and they claimed
| they could use all the money they
| could get, your creditors wanted you to
pay bills which you hardly knew you
owed on account of not receiving the
second monthly statement yet. Fur
thermore If you owned q tenement
house, you'd got difficulty collecting
the November rent because the ten
ants said ii was so near Christmas, and
that's the way it went, Birsky. People
treated Christmas not as holiday, but
as an excuse. The wonder is it amt
died out altogether"
1.-The wholesaler wouldn't miss IL if
1t did," Birsky commented. Believe
me, Zapp, for every child that lays
awake the night before Christmas
thinking what his parents are going
TO hand him the next morning. there is
fifty manufacturers counting sheep
jumping over fences, trying not to
think what some of their customers In
the retail drygoods trade is going to
hand them after the second of Janu-
airy. 1t don't require much water to
drown a shaky drygoods retailer. He
can sink like stone in two days rain
during the week before Christmas"
Don't 1 know it?" Zapp said. IF
the Christmas presents that the whole
salers give by mistake to shaky retail
drygoods men was put on trees the
way other Christmas presents are, they
would cover all the redwood groves in
California. But 1t amt the retailers
fault, Birsky. Sometimes the Teller is |
playing in hard luck like q merchant |
like L used to sell goods to by the name |
Felix Immerglick out in Cincinnati,
which couple of years ago last /
Christmas he specialized on sleighs, |
skates and cheap furs, and from De- |
10 on they got such a warm |
spell in Cincinnati that the hotel keep
ers figured should they or should they
not open the roof gardens again. So |
the following year Immerglick cut out |
the sleighs and skates and laid in
bicycles, children's books and a very
attractive line of umbrellas, and I'm
merglick says that it's wonder with
his luck he didn't also buy stock in
chain of artificial ice factories, be-
cause on the day he received the goods
in November the thermometer goes
down to zero on him and stays that
way till week after his next spring
millinery opening. Can you blame such
a Teller that he settles with his cred
tors 30 cents on the dollarP
Listen, Zapp." Birsky said "a 30
cent-on-the-dollar Teller could always
pm his bust-up on either warm
Christmas. cold Easter or an invalid
wife, whereas the figures show that
the average of real cold Christmases
amt no more than the average of real
sick wives"
Sure l know, Birsky, but figuring
out the average is what has done the
most harm to poker, pinochle. the
Fourth of July, Christmas and all them
things that former time people enioyed
chances on. Take, for in
stance, the Fourth of July, and a lot
)f people which considers even safety
matches gefahrlich goes to work and
1gures that out of every million people
hat shoots off firecrackers, one and
seven hundred and fifty-two one tbou-
'andths people gets burned. so they
)ut the fireworks manufacturers ont
If business, and now instead of setting
III fireworks people goes to the shore
'r trolley parks on the Fourth; and as
'oon as it gets figured out that of ev-
'ry million people that goes to trollevi
'arks and Coney Island, six and nine v
y-seven three-thousandths gets Ma
from eating frankfurters and c
un over by trolley cars on the Fourth e
# July, all the frankfurter factories r
md trolley companies go quick me. b
@
"Aber, what's that got to do with .
Birsky asked.
I'm coming to that" Zapp said Il
PEOPLE are commencing to figure aver t
ges on Christmas also. Take Miss 7 C
: Morgan. and she figures that ont of C
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