The Wit and Humor of America, Volume X (of X)
a single night, from excess of fear; then he went into a fit of melancholy, and while it lasted he did nothing but sigh, and sob, and snuffle, and slobber, and say "he wished he was in the quiet tomb;" finally he said he would commit suicide—he would say farewell to the cold, cold world, with its cares and troubles, and go to sleep with his fathers, in perdition. Then rose up this young man, and threw his demijohn out of the window, and took up a glass of pure water, and drained it to the dregs. And then he fell to the floor in a swoon. Dr. Tjader was called in, and as soon as he found that the cuss was poisoned, he rushed down to the Magnolia Saloon and got the antidote, and poured it down him. As he was drawing his last breath, he scented the brandy and lingered yet a while on earth, to take a drink with the boys. But for this he would have been no more—or possible a great deal less—in a moment. So he survived; but he has been in a mighty precarious condition ever since. I have been up to see how

   he was getting along two or three times a day.... He is a very sick man; I was up there a while ago, and I could see that his friends had begun to entertain hopes that he would not get over it. As soon as I saw that, all my enmity vanished; I even felt like doing the poor Unreliable a kindness, and showing him, too, how my feelings toward him had changed. So I went and bought him a beautiful coffin, and carried it up and set it down on his bed and told him to climb in when his time was up. Well, sir, you never saw a man so affected by a little act of kindness as he was by that. He let off a sort of war-whoop, and went to kicking things around like a crazy man; and he foamed at the mouth and went out of one fit into another faster than I could take them down in my note-book....

   I did not return to Virginia yesterday, on account of the wedding. The parties were Hon. James H. Sturtevant, one of the first Pi-Utes of Nevada, and Miss Emma Curry, daughter of the Hon. A. Curry, who also claims that his is a Pi-Ute family of high antiquity.... I had heard it reported that a marriage was threatened, so felt it my duty to go down there and find out the facts of the case. They said I might stay, as it was me.... I promised not to say anything about the wedding, and I regard that promise as sacred—my word is as good as my bond.... Father Bennett advanced and touched off the high contracting parties with the hymeneal torch (married them, you know), and at the word of command from Curry, the fiddle bows were set in motion, and the plain quadrilles turned loose. Thereupon, some of the most responsible dancing ensued that I ever saw in my life. The dance that Tam 
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