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Show j - " : GAY OLD MEN Q AM JATvVAV vt;s trying to he O funny, lias morniug," related the Iior-e dui-tor. "He saw fine buys mrniii handsprings, and undertook to show them how the trick used to be done in the halcyon davs, and the doc- ' ! " '1 S V. . - i U - 1 I fc, . tor says h e w r e n e h e d his ! back so he'll be in bed for several days." "Disasters of that sort usually happen to the graybenrd who tries to demonstrate demon-strate that he isn't any older than he was forty years ago," commented com-mented the village patriarch. "I'm always being tempted to do some idiotic thing, and have to suppress such impulses with a mailed fist. It's all the outcome of vanity. A man hates to admit that he's a back number. He wants to assure the plain people that, notwithstanding notwith-standing his gray whiskers and string-halted string-halted legs, he's a four-horse team with a dog under the wagon, when it comes to athletic skill. "I was in the livery barn the other evening, when young Fretsinger began be-gan explaining that he had been taking tak-ing boxing lessons from one of the old masters. lie had learned all the tricks of the game, and was just suffering suf-fering agonies because there was nobody no-body present who would stand up and exchange scientific swats with him. "In my younger days, if I do say it myself, I was a star performer In the ordinary knock-down-and-drag-out form of combat, but I never was worth shucks at boxing. Nobody knows that better than I do. Why, then, did I inform Fretsinger that I would be glad to spar a few rounds with him? It surely was vanity 'and nothing else. I had nn idea that, while he might have plenty of the fancy stuff on hand, I might land one of my old-time haymakers ; in which case I felt sure the town would soon be ringing with the story of an old man's prowess. "So I took off my long jimswinger coat, and my vest, and stood up for battle. If anybody tells you, my friends, that Fretsinger doesn't know how to wield his hands, you may regard re-gard the story as a roorback. I never saw fists so numerous as on that occasion. occa-sion. I couldn't see anything else for a while, and they landed on me in many unexpected places, and I don't remember a time when I was so embarrassed. em-barrassed. "Fretsinger explained afterward that he merely tapped me gently because be-cause I was a venerable man, old enough to be his grandfather. In that case I never want to become involved in an argument with him when he is in earnest. I had a black eye for a week after this recital, and my nose has never satisfied me since. Every time I came downtown, I had to explain ex-plain to a thousand people that I blackened black-ened my eye while splitting kindling, or that I dropped a sad-iron on it. There Is nothing more humiliating than a black eye, and I made up my mind that I'd try to realize my advanced ad-vanced age thereafter, and behave myself my-self like a grave and reverend man. "But no sooner had my eye recovered recov-ered than I was in trouble again. I saw some young men wrestling, and paused to point out that they didn't know the rudiments of the game. 1 assured them that in my younger days I was a holy terror, and I didn't think that my hand had lost its cunning. It would afford me genuine happiness, I said, to show them how wrestling was done in the palmy days of Mul-doon Mul-doon and Whistler. "So I removed my coat and vest and went into executive session with a husky young man who had no respect for gray hairs. I am not sure about what followed, but I think he must have thrown me over his head. Anyhow7, Any-how7, I made a great dent in the earth : with my person, and I was so sore for j ; two weeks that I had to take myself around in a wheelbarrow. Of course, I am determined to make no more had breaks of the kind, hut I haven't much confidence in myself, and tomorrow you may see me climbing a tree half a mile high, to show some boys how to rob birds' nests." |