The Ward County independent. [volume] (Minot, Ward County, N.D.) 1902-1965, 1921-09-15
IN LIGHTER VEIN
Preface To A Collection Of Suffrage
Tracts


than men?
Our own impression, we hasten Il
announce, is that women will make
quite as good jurors ~ men. And
yet we cannot forebear relating an in.
cident, concerning a heroic friend OF
ours whom we will call Higgins, in
which evidence purely circumstancial
. influenced female jury to an undue
; degree.
Higgins arrived at his home early
one Sunday morning-at a quarter
past precisely, he told US afterwards
.. to find his wife, his wife's aunt,
; his wife's married sister, his wife's
|. unmarried sister, the cook, the house
maid and the children's nurse all
waiting up for him. The female
relatives had been arriving in relays,
; it appears, since midnight.
They all demanded in angry chorus
how he dared to come home at that
hour and (they said) smelling of al
cohol.
j Their anger increased when it was
seen that Higgins was wearing a.
round his neck q baby's blue and
white bib and that he carried in one
hand long stocking Of pink silk and
in the other hand . cocktail shaker.
When he sat down something
squawked, and it was discovered that
he had an auto horn in his hip pocket.
On the evidence Of these trifles,
which might innocently and logically
attach themselves to any man, the
female jury condemned Higgins; nor
would q plain and simple recital Of
the facts influence the jurors to re-
verse their verdict that he was a
wretch.
And yet, as Higgins explained to
them at the time, and to us later, he
had in reality acted hero's part
that night.
He had been walking through Gen.
trail Park about dusk when he had
seen gang of ruffians climb out of a
taxicab and attempt to steal a baby
from. its preambulator. The baby's
mother "a plain featured young wo-
man of type that had never made
any appeal to him, Higgins was care
full to state) fought desperately and
screamed for assistance.
Higgins-soul of chivalry that he
is-rushed to the aid of mother and
child. But the desperadoes flung
him to the ground and choked him
into Inconsistencies by tying the
baby's blue and white bib tightly
around his throat. They also rub
bed into his eyes crumbs from an
oatmeal cracker the baby had been
eating, which explained the redness
of his eyes.
The snow into which he fell revived
Higgins, and when he reRained con.
seriousness he pursued the taxicab,
guided by the outcries of the mother
and child. AS he came abreast of
the machine he made a grab for the
baby.
He missed the infant, but caught
the mother, who had never ceased to
fight, by the foot, and her long, pink,
silk stocking came off in his hand.
What had beome of her shoe Higgins
never knew; likely, he thought, she
had been wearing slippers and one of
them had been kicked off in the strug-
gle.
Hastily apologizing, Higgins wrap
ped the pink stocking around his left
wrist, to assist him in parrying, IN
so far as he might, the blows that the
bandits were raining upon him with
the butts of their rifles and revolvers.
And, still running at top speed, he
made another plunge and grabbed at
the child again. Again he missed
the baby. This time he caught the
horn on the taxi and wrenched it of,
bulb and all. As he ran, he placed it
methodically in his hip pocket.
The machine was by now emerging
from the park at the south end. At
Columbus Circle truly frlEhtful
combat occurred.
Higgins might have been killed had
not noble bartender rushed from .
cafe and given him timely help. The
bartender thrust into our hero's hand
q heavy cocktail shaker and babe him
strike violently with that weapon.
It seems that the cocktail shaker
happened at the moment to be filled
with gin, vermouth and bitters Of
some sort, together with particles of
ice and very little bit of sugar.
Perhaps, Higgins says, there was q
bit Of the peeling Of some sort Of
never known definitely. But as
Higgins struck at his foes the mix
ture was sprinkled over his clothing.
1nlS accounts, higgins DelleVeS, 1Of
the charge brought against him later
that his breath was scented with
liquor. It is possible, he said, that
he really did inhale some of the fumes
from the cocktail shaker in his ex-
citement. He has never been quitei
certain on this point.
During the battle at Columbus
Circle Higgins was struck savagely
and Repeatedly on the head. He
must have wandered about the streets
for hours and hours, in semi-dazed
condition, with the bib around his
neck and the silk stocking in one hand
and the cocktail shaker in the other.
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