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Show SmoKe From the WeeKty Vipe. , PHONOGRAPHS. (HIC.) I have heard tho pibroch, doleful scream, on Scotia's rugged isles, I've heard the curlew's mournful note o'er wood-lands wood-lands wreathed in smiles; I have listened to Apollo's lays, when musically inclined, in-clined, To the whimper of the whip-poor-will and whistle of the wind; But the fount of music's rhapsody, incomparably sweet, Is the phonograph the boy manipulates across the street. The strains of "Harvest Jessie" come cavorting o'er the way, Intermingled with "Miss Shannon" and a South- em roundelay; And "Mamie Riley's" lungs are strained with Sousa intertwined, The Sewanee's course diverges ana the Rhine is "Bingen-Rhined"; And O the vocal changes are bewildering and fleet, Enacted by that boy and phonograph across the street. But when soft nature's drowsy eyes droop in the twilight hush And my uncertain steps despoil the roses' morning morn-ing blush, And Somnus naively beckons me O, what unearthly un-earthly joy, To hear the phonographic shriek and that flend-fashioned flend-fashioned boy; I'd barter all the kingdom come for one steel armoured ar-moured staff, To crush that imp of darkness and his drunken phonograph. N In tho olden days of the Horn Silver, whea some cf the old timers smote the reluctant glebe jH in search of white wealth, tho maker of practical H jokes waxed and flourished, even as he did in ye H antique - days of the Aztecs. Even, feo, Horn Sil. H ver lore records how Matthew Culldn, the" droll, H enacted a plot against one Major Galligher, the H immaculate, whereby the major acquired, to the jH astonishment of all Horn Silverville, a beautiful jH and dazzling cluster of brand new and refluent H hirsute. H Major Galligher had a weakness for patent H Hair restoratives, and in the course of long years H of experiment had acquired a whole pharmacy of 9H restorers capable of bringing out a beautiful col- H lection of golden locks on a zinc roof. The major H was so fastidious about his diminutive supply of H hair that he would lay awake nights wondering H whether there would be a deficit in his hirsutal H possessions on the morrow. Every new man the H Major met suggested a new remedy, which the H Major forthwith added to his pharmacy. H An old miner one day suggested boiled white JM sage, as the panacea for all hair disorders. The jH nearest sage was twenty miles away. The next H morning at dawn the Major was mounted and JM speeding towards sageland. jH For the next two days all the pots in the cull- fM nary department of Horn Silver were hissing and H bubbling with white sage. The juice therefrom H the Major deposited in an eight- gallon keg. It H was here that Matt Cullen, observant of the Major a and not knowing the utility of the brew, emptied t a can of condensed lye in the keg. H That night the Major applied the new restorer fl to his pate with vigor and slept as the angels Sleep. The next morning the Major's head was covered with blisters r -'by noon his head was M swelled up to the dimensions of the eight gallon H keg. In great consternation Matt sent for the H Tmckboard and the speediest team in. Horn Silver- M ville. The nearest doctor lived at Beaver. The M Major refused at the last minute to go without !H the keg of hair restorer. It was loaded on the M buckboard. H All the way over Matt tried to kick the plug S f out of the keg, but it was closely guarded by the major and his efforts at despoliation were futile. The doctor's diagnosis indicated that the Ma-: Ma-: jor's dome had been burned or scalded. While the examination was in progress Matt gave a boy ten cents to pull the plug out of the eight-gallon keg. Two weeks later all Horn Silverville received a vital and nerve-shattering shock. The Major returned to the camp, with pompous and chesty mien, and endowed with the most I prodigal and magnificent array of glossy and flow- ing locks that ever embellished the cupola of age or gladdened the volatile heart of a gaysome young Lothario. |
