Show N HELPED OUT THE FAT sympathetic townsmen always ready to do their part toward 1 V I enabling giants to shake hands speaking of fat men said the major the two fattest men I 1 ever knew were fellow townsmen of mine when I 1 was living in west ton ark they I 1 I 1 ceri certainly lilly were big men and they were no pun intended the stoutest friends they never met without shaking shaling hands it if they could find a medium of communication they boulant couldn t shake without one what they used to do was to get a man of reasonable thinness to stand between them and extend his arms and the two big men would take one ot of the intermediary s hands and the other the other one and thus they d shake by proxye proxy I 1 of town knew of this and everybody humored the big men humored them more than that everybody every bod that was eligible used to feel it his duty to help these two great again po no pun intended these two great friends shake hands more than once I 1 have seen a man who was hurrying into the postoffice post office on main street stop short on the steps when he saw the big men approaching each other and turn back and go and stand between them and raise his arms like two extended wings with hands bands far outstretched tor for the two tat fat friends to grasp that was their handshake and this duty to his fellow men performed the man who had stood between them would hurry up the post postoffice office steps once more and this time go in and get his mall mail put of this observance of a corn core won custom arising naturally from the delay involved in it some curious experiences came to individual ob servers I 1 remember well the he case of a man whose great aunt was sick in a town just over the line in missouri this man was hurrying to catch the train and there were only two trains a day when he saw the two friends coming together I 1 his its duty was plain and he was a man ol 01 scrupulous punctiliousness there was nothing for him to do but to stop which he did waiting with no out vard v ard trace of his inward feeling while the two men exchanged their usual friendly greeting he missed his train this man did and a legacy that he would otherwise have got for his great aunt was dead when he did get there and by reason of his delay she had cut him out of her will but on the other hand this same man not a month later was stopped again in the same man ner and again he halted without a moment s hesitation but the train he missed this time was wrecked with a 0 loss of life that has made this ac aident a tradition in that part of the country 4 so while tn in the one in stance his politeness had cost him a legacy in the other in every pro proba b a ability it had saved him hia his life and I 1 have no doubt whatever that the lesson of thoughtfulness courtesy and self denial taught by the conduct of all the these so considerate inter ies lets was of benefit to the whole corn com new york sun |