Doctor Pendleton St. Clair Smith, a patron of the fine arts, best tailors, barbers, boot blacks, and the newspaper press, was a tooth operator of some skill and great pretension. He lived and moved in modern style, and though no man could be more desirous of indulging in "short credit," no man believed or acted more readily upon the principle--
----"base is the slave that _pays_."
Dr. P. St. C. Smith "slipped up" one day, leaving the _well done_ community of Boston and the environs, for fields more congenial to his peculiar talents. He _stuck_ the printer, of course. His numerous subscription accounts to the various local news and literary journals, in the aggregate amounted to quite considerable; and the printers didn"t begin to like it! Now, it takes a Yankee to head off a Yankee, and about this time a live, double-grand-action Yankee, named Peabody, possibly, happened in at one of the offices, where two brother publishers were "making a few remarks" over delinquent subscribers, and especially were they wrought up against and giving jessy to Dr. Pendleton St. Clair Smith!
"How much does the feller owe you?" quoth Peabody.
"Owe? More than he"ll ever pay during the present generation."
"Perhaps not," says Peabody; "now if you"ll just give me the full particulars of the man, his manners and customs, name and size, and sell me your accounts, at a low notch, I"ll buy "em; I"ll collect "em, too, if the feller"s alive, out of jail, and any where around between sunrise and sunset!"
The publishers laughed at the idea, sensibly, but finding that Peabody was up for a trade, they traced out the accounts, &c., and for a five dollar bill, Mr. Peabody was put in possession of an account of some twenty odd dollars and cents against Dr. P. St. C. Smith.
Now Peabody had, some time previous to this transaction, established a peculiar kind of Telegraph, a human galvanic battery, or endless chain of them, extending all over the country, for collecting bad debts, and _shocking_ fugitives, or stubborn creditors! By a continuation of faculties, causes and effects--shrewdness and forethought peculiar to a man capable of seeing considerably deep into millstones--Peabody couldn"t be _dodged_. If he ever got his _feelers_ on to a subject, the _equivalent_ was bound to be turning up! It struck him that the collection of newspaper bills afforded him a great field for working his Telegraph, and he hasn"t been mistaken.
The scene now changes; early one morning in the pleasant month of June, as the poet might say, Dr. Pendleton St. Clair Smith was to be seen before his toilet gla.s.s in the flourishing city of Syracuse,--giving the finishing stroke to his highly-cultivated beard. The satisfaction with which he made this demonstration, evinced the sereneness of his mind and the _confidence_ with which he rested, in regard to his newspaper "bills in Boston. But a _tap_ is heard at his door, and at his invitation the servant comes in, announces a gentleman in the parlor, desirous of speaking to Dr. Smith. The Doctor waits upon the visitor--
"Dr. Pendleton St. Clair Smith, I presume?"
"Ye-e-s," slowly and suspiciously responded that individual.
"I am collector, sir," continued the stranger, "for the firm of Peabody, Grab, Catchem, and Co., Boston. I have a small (!) bill against you, sir, to collect."
"What for?" eagerly quoth the Doctor.
"Newspaper subscriptions and advertising, sir!"
"I a--I a, you a--well, you call in this evening," says the Doctor, tremulously fumbling in his pockets--"I"ll settle with you; good morning."
"Good morning, sir," says the collector,--"I"ll call."
That afternoon, Dr. Pendleton St. Clair Smith vamosed! He had barely got located in Syracuse, before they had traced him; if he paid the printer, a cloud of other debts would follow, and so he up stakes and made a fresh _dive!_
"Now," says Dr. P. St. C. Smith, as he dumped himself and baggage down in the beautiful city of Chicago, "Now I"ll be out of the range of the duns; they won"t get sight or hearing of me, for a while, I"ll bet a hat!"
But, alas! for the delusion; the very next morning, a very suspicious, hatchet-faced individual, made himself known as the deputed collector of certain newspaper accounts, forwarded from Boston, by Peabody, Grab, Catchem, & Co. The Dr. uttered a very severe _anathema_; he looked quite streaked, he faltered; he then desired the collector to call in course of the day, and the bill would be attended to. The collector hoped it would be attended to, and left; so did Dr. P. St. C. Smith _in the next mail line_.
About one month after the affair in Chicago, Dr. P. St. C. Smith was seen strutting around in Charters st., New Orleans, confident in his security, smiling in the brightness of the scenes around him; he had just negotiated for an office, had already concocted his advertis.e.m.e.nts, and subscribed for the papers, when lo! the same due bill from Boston appeared to him, in the hand of an _agent_ of Peabody, Grab, Catchem & Co. The Dr. was almost tempted to pay the bill! But, then, perhaps the _agent_ had a hat full of others--from the same place--for larger amounts! The next day the Doctor _put_ for Texas! planting himself in the pleasant town of Bexar, and cursing duns from the bottom of his heart--he determined to keep clear of them, even if he had to bury himself away out here in Texas. But what was his horror to find, the first week of his hanging up in Bexar, that an agent of the firm of Peabody, Grab, Catchem & Co., _was there!_ The Doctor _stepped_ to Galveston; on the way he accidentally _met_ a travelling agent of Peabody, Grab, Catchem & Co. The Doctor took the _Sabine_ slide for Tampico; there he found the "black vomit." He up and off again, for Mobile; his nervous system was much worked up and his pocket-book sadly depleted! There were two alternatives--change his name, size and profession, and live in a swamp; _or settle with the firm of Peabody, Grab, Catchem & Co_. Dr. Pendleton St. Clair Smith chose the latter; he sought and soon found in Mobile, a veritable _agent_, duly authorized to receive and forward funds for Peabody, Grab, Catchem & Co., and hunt up and down--fugitives from the printer! The Doctor paid up--felt better, and learned the moral fact that delinquent subscribers are no longer to be the printers" ghosts.
Ambition.
A person never thinks so meanly of ambition as when walking through a grave-yard.--To see men who have filled the world with their glory for half a century or more, reduced to a six foot mudhole, gives pride a shock which requires a long stay in a city to counteract.--The gentlemen who are now "spoken of for the Presidency," will in less than a century, have their bones carted away to make room for a street sewer. Queer creature that man--well, he is.
Way the Women Fixed the Tale-Bearer.
"I dunno where I heer"d it, but I know it"s true. I expected it long ago. I told Jones it"d come out so."
"Why, Uncle Josh, you don"t pretend to say that Miller"s wife has run off with Bob Tape, Yardstick"s clark, do you?"
"Yes, I do, too; hain"t it been the talk of the neighborhood for a year past, that Miller"s wife and that feller--Bob Tape, were a leetle too thick?"
"Well, Uncle Josh," says his neighbor Brown, "I don"t recollect anybody saying anything about it, but you, and for my part, I don"t believe a word of it."
"Why, hain"t Miller"s wife gone?" says Uncle Josh.
"I don"t know--is she?" says Brown.
"Be sure she is; I went over to the store this morning, the fust thing, to see if Bob Tape was about--he wasn"t there--they said he"d gone to Boston on business for old Yardstick. O, ho! says I, and then I started for Heeltap"s shop; we had allers said how things would turn out. He was out, but seein" me go to his shop, he came a runnin", and says he:
""Uncle Josh, theer gone, sure enough!--I"ve been over to old Mammy Gabbles, and she sent her Suke over to Miller"s, on purtence of borrowin" some lard, but told Suke to look around and see ef Miller"s wife wur about; by Nebbyknezer, Miller"s wife wur gone! Marm Gabbles couldn"t rest, so she sent back Suke, and told her to ax the children whare their marm wus; Miller hearing Suke, ordered her to scoot, so Suke left without hearing the facts in the case, as "Squire Black says."
"But Heeltap swears, and I know Miller"s wife and Bob Tape have _sloped_, as they say in the papers."
"Well," says Brown, "I"m sorry if it"s true--I don"t believe a word of it tho", and as it"s none of my business, I shall have nothing to say about it."
Uncle Josh was one of those inordinate pests which almost every village, town and hamlet in the country is more or less accursed with. He was a great, tall, bony, sharp-nosed, grinning _genius_, who, being in possession of a small farm, with plenty of boys and girls to work it, did not do anything but eat, sleep and lounge around; a gatherer of _scan, mag_., a news and scandal-monger, a great guesser, and a stronger suspicioner, of everybody"s motives and intentions, and, of course, never imputed a good motive or movement to anybody.
You"ve seen those wretches, male and female, haven"t you, reader? Such people are great nuisances--half the discomforts of life are bred by them; they contaminate and poison the air they breathe, with their noisome breath, like the odor of the Upas tree.
Uncle Josh had annoyed many--he was the dread and disgust of seven-eighths of the town he lived in. He had caused more quarrels, s.m.u.tted more characters, and created more ill-feeling between friends, neighbors and acquaintances, than all else beside in the community of Frogtown. Uncle Josh was voted a great bore by the men, and a sneaking, meddling old granny by the women. So, at last, the young women of the town did agree, that the very next time Uncle Josh carried, concocted, or circulated any slanderous or otherwise mischievous stories, _they would duck him in the mill-race_.
Now, Brown--old Mister Brown--was the very antipode of Uncle Josh; he was for always taking matters and things by the smoothest handle. Mister Brown never told tales, backbited or slandered anybody; everybody had a good word to say about Mister Brown, and Mister Brown had a good word to say about everybody. The gals thought it prudent to give old Mister Brown an inkling of their plans in regard to the disposition they intended to make of Uncle Josh; the old man laughed, and told them to go ahead, and to duck old Josh, and perhaps they would reform him.
"Now, gals," says old Mister Brown, "Uncle Josh has just this very day been at his dirty work; by this time he has spread the news all over the town, that Miller"s wife has gone off with Yardstick"s clark. I don"t believe a word of his tale, and if Miller"s wife ain"t really gone off, Uncle Josh ought to be soused in the mill-race."
Next morning Miller"s wife came home; she had been down to her sister"s, a few miles off, to see a sick child; her husband had been away at a law-suit, in a neighboring town, and so Miller nor his wife knew nothing of the report of her elopement with Bob Tape, until their return.
Miller was in a rage, but couldn"t find out the author of the report.
Miller"s wife was deeply mortified that such a suspicion should arise of her; she had been making Bob Tape some new clothes to go to Boston in, and here was the gist of Bob and Miller"s wife"s intimacy! There was a great time about it--Miller swore like a trooper, and his wife nearly cried her eyes out.
A few evenings afterwards, it being cool, clear weather in October, Polly Higgins and Sally Smith called in to see Miller"s wife, and asked her to join them in a little party that some of the neighboring women had got up that evening, for a particular purpose. Miller"s wife not having much to do that evening, her husband said she might go out a spell if she chose, and she went, and soon learned the purport of the call--old Uncle Josh was to be ducked in the mill-race! and Miller"s wife, disguised as the rest, was to help do it. When she heard that old Josh had circulated the report of her elopement, Miller"s wife did not require much coaxing to join the watering committee.
It was so planned that all the women, some ten or twelve in number, were to put on men"s clothes and lay in wait for Uncle Josh at his lane gate, about a quarter of a mile from the mill-race. Old Josh always hung around the tavern, Heeltap"s shoe-shop, or the grocery, until 9 P. M., before he started for home, and the girls determined to rush out of a small thicket that stood close by old Josh"s lane gate, and throwing a large, stout sheet over him, wind him up, and then seizing him head, neck and heels, hurry him off to the mill-race, and duck him well.
Mind you, your country gals and women are not paint and powder, corset-laced and fragile creatures, like your delicate, more ornamental than useful young ladies of the city; no, no, the gals of Frogtown were real flesh and blood; Venuses and Dianas of solidity and substance; and it would have taken several better men than Uncle Josh to have got away from them. It was a cool, moon-shiny night, but to better favor the women, just as old Josh got near his gate, a large, black cloud obscured the moon, and all was as dark as a stack of black cats in a coal cellar.
Miller"s wife acted as captain; dressed in Bob Tape"s old clothes he had left at her house to be repaired, she gave the word, and out they rushed.
"Seize him, boys!" said she, in a very loud whisper. Over went the sheet, down came old Josh, co-blim! Before he could say "lor" a ma.s.sy,"
he was dragged to the mill-race, tied hand and foot, blindfolded, his coat taken off, and he was _ca-soused_ into the cold water! Fury! how the old fellow begged for his life!
"O, lor" a ma.s.sy, don"t drown me boys! I--a, I--" _ca-souse_ he went again.