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Show CAST OFF THE GLOOM ANDSMILE. No long face for Walt Mason. That author of Joy draws humor from tho "flu," and he pleases us because he brings a smile In dwelling on a subject sub-ject which is supposed to be morbid. To the survivor of the "flu," he says: If you've survived the frightful "flu," don't talk, with lungs of leather, about the pain you struggled through, but chat about tho weather. I dread to meet the pallid jay, the convalescent duffer, who wants to talk for half a day of all he had to suffer. I want to talk about the war, or sabering and shooting; I want to tell how I abhor the Tout and all his tooting; but when I pause to draw a breath, the jay Bays, In his frenzy, "I coasted down the edge of death, when I had influenzv. The doctor battled with the ill. arid from me tried to drive it, but said, as he produced pro-duced his pill, 'He simply can't survive sur-vive it. So many die,' he cried, 'alack! It is a shame to lose 'em,' then put a poultice on my back. another on my bosoni. The fever macle my blood to boi,, the heat was like Sahara; thev flooded me with castor oil, and flushed me with cascara. They poulticed mo by day and night, my sneezes still grew louder; they fed me pills of dynamite, and chunks of giant powder. The doctor doc-tor said at last, 'I beg to doff mv coat and sweater; I'll have to amputate a l?. and then he may grow better.' They put a poultice on my brow, thev pumped me full of bitters, and I'd be dead and buried nenv, if I -were like the quitters." For clays and days he drools away, until the moon's senescent; I dread to meet the sickly jay, the boastful boast-ful convalescent. |