LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume VII, Issue 726, 17 October 1876, Page 3

LITERATURE.

A SCENE IN THE WATERMELON DAYS. By Hugh Moore. “ The watermelon days have come, The saddest of the year. ” This is the season when the chief delight of the small boy is to sit on the woodpile, with his legs hanging over the side, and gorge himself -with that aqueous fruit known as the watermelon. A scene like this might have been witnessed in the side yard of an Eighth street house, last Saturday afternoon, the dramatis personae being a very small boy and a very large watermelon. There was but one person in sight, an elderly individual, who was just about to enter the gate. He was a patient-looking man, with a plug hat and a very dizzy, white necktie. In fact, his whole looks indicated the peripatetic philosopher. He entered the yard and quietly moved up to where the boy was sitting. ‘ Pardon me, my son,’ he softly remarked, ‘but, unless my eyes deceive me, you are regaling yourself upon the luscious fruit known as the watermelon ?’ ‘ That’s what I’m a jugglin’ of,’ replied the lad, gazing wonderfully at the questioner. ‘ W ould you wittingly tread upon the tail of the aromatic skunk ?’ ‘ I duuno as I would,’ answered the boy, beginning to edge around uneasily in his seat. ‘ Would you, of your own free will, commit felo do sc by swallowing a handful of arsenic—would you, hey ?’ * I always eats my arsenic with a spoon,’ was the reply. ‘Do you know the terrible danger to which you are exposing yourself ? Has nobody warned you of your impending fate ? Alas ! for the degeneracy of the times, to allow this guileless youth, this innocent cherub, in the full flush of his primeval simplicity, to sink into an early grave through an undue indulgence in the soul-harrowing watermelon. Has not one voice been lifted up to save my son ?’ ‘Nary a voice, captain,’ replied the innocent cherub.

‘Nobody has told you that every bite at that melon is a silver-headed screw in your casket ? Are you not aware that excessive use of the watermelon tends to the undue expansion of the intercostal spleen, causing such sudden death that the coroner’s jury will never know what killed you ? Has nobody ever told you this, eh ?’ ‘ Nope, never,’ answered the boy, still munching away at the melon, and amusing himself by blowing the seeds at the cat. ‘ What! do you mean to tell me that your mother has never held you on her knee and told you that if your alimentary canal ever got mixed up with your duodenum, you would be obliged to travel around on your head in order to preserve your reputation as a well-balanced member of society ? Are you not aware of this ? Oh, my son, be advised in time, give ear unto the voice of one who is old enough to know, better. Seventeen years ago I had a brother, the youngest son of his father. He was a noble youth. Nine summers’ suns had ripened his golden locks and lingered caressingly upon his snowy bos-er-brow. ft was in the summer of—let me see—yes ! it was in the sum-

mer of—seventeen from from seventy-six makes it the summer of ’59. he too was devouring a watermelon. To him also did I give good advice. I told him to look not upon the melon while it was green, for in the end in would turn around and gripe him like an anaconda ; but all to no purpose. He still persisted in his suicidal attempt, and would you believe it, my lad, the very next day a woman slipped on a melon rind in Duane street, and broke her leg ? This is only one instance out of many. Nothing is more mysterious in its workings than the watermelon ; therefore, my adolescent friend, heed not the seductive wiles of the tempter, but harken unto the admonition of the prophet. The festive bologna, the knot-tying cucumber, and our native American fruit, the indigenuous peanut are mild in their workings when compared with the colicky watermelon. Are you listening my son ? ‘No ! I ain’t a listenin’, an’ what’s more I ain’t a goin’ for ter listen ter any old duffer like you be. Some fellers may listen ter sich talk, but damfiwill; that’s the kind of a gate I swing on.’ ‘ Such garrulity is shocking in one so young,’ continued the sage ‘You have insulted me. Were lan ordinary man, I might rise up in the magnitude of my wrath and crush you, but I am not an ordinary man. On the contrary I am an extraordinary man, you —but we are digressing. To come to the point towards which 1 have been drifting ; would it not, I ask you frankly, would it not be sinful to waste the remainder of that melon ?’ ‘ That’s just what it would,’ was the reply. ‘ Would it not be still more sinful to allow you to eat it V ‘Nope ! I don’t think she would,’. * Well, I do ; therefore, although it will be a great strain on my principles, I feel it to be my duty as a humanitarian and a Christian member of society, to eat the remaining piece myself.’ ‘ Oh, yer do, do yer,’ cried the guileless youth. * So that’s what yuv been a drivin’ at all this time, is it ? Well, by the beard of Dom Pedro yuv got it bad,’ exclaimed he, at the same time throwing it full into the face of our philanthropic friend, and in about seven seconds, all that could be seen about that yard was a very moist-looking man, with his index finger crooked into the form of a letter c, trying to fish out about a pint of melon seeds from beneath his shirt-band, and reciting ‘ Osaian’s Address to the Sun,’ in seven languages, while just outside the gate a boy laid on the grass and kicked his heels, and bit the green sward in an agony of ecstatic bliss.

CHARLIE ROSS FOUND BY A CENSUS GATHERER. A census gatherer called at the back door of a Summer street house quite early the other morning, and asked of the lady who responded to his knock if there were any children living there who attended the public school. She was hard of hearing, and thought he asked if he son was in, so she replied—- ‘ Yesand then going to the foot of the chamber stairs called out in a loud voice, ‘ Bill, there’s a man down here who wants to see you. ’ In a moment Bill oamo down, his hair looking like a yarn mop, his eyes half shut and his feet minus either shoes or stockings. He had been out late the night before, and when he found that he had been awoke out of a sound sleep to answer the questions of a census gatherer he was somewhat vexed in spirit. ‘ Do you attend the public schools?’ asked the man with glasses and a big book. ‘Yes,’ said Bill ‘Which school?’ asked the man, preparing to make the entry. ‘ Let me be sworn,’ said Bill, holding up his right arm. * Oh, no matter about that,’ replied the man, * you look like a person of truth. I’ll take your word for it.’ ‘ The same school that Eli Perkins used to attend,’ said Bill. ‘ What is your name ?’ ‘ Charlie Ross,’ replied Bill, * How old are you ?’ ‘Four days older than Susan B. Anthony,’ said Bill, keeping as sober as a deacon. The man saw that Bill was chaffing him, but he decided to hear him out. ‘ What was your father’s name ?’ ‘ George,’ said Bill, scratching his head. ‘ George what, if you please 1 ’ ‘ George Washington,’ said Bill. ‘ How is it that your father’s name was Washington and yours is Ross ! ’ ‘ Why, my mother was a widow, you know. Washington married a widow.’ ‘ Why don’t you go by the name of Washington ? ’ inquired the man. ‘ Well,’ said Bill, ‘ I never thought much of Washington. You know he was a terrible liar, he lied very early in life about a cherry tree.’ ‘ Yes,’ said the man, trying to smile, * I do remember now. Where were you born ? ’ ‘ In Danbury,’ said Bill. ‘ Know Bailey of the News 7 ’ ‘ Oh, yes, well acquainted with him ; he’s going to London soon.’ ‘ Ah, indeed,’ said the man, closing his book and preparing to go. ‘ What for may I ask ? ’ ‘ He’s going to lecture in England from a back window next winter,’ and Bill shut the door and went upstairs to bed again. The man with the big book departed, feeling that his ability for reading character was not as perfect as it might be. FOUND AT LAST. To say that he was mad with rage is a term of speech hardly strong enough to express his true condition. He had purchased a garment that proved to be very different from what it was recommended to be by the seller. For a man to buy an undershirt and have it shrink so after one washing that he could barely get it on, but not be able to remove it again without being obliged to cut it clean clown the back and thus convert it into a morning sack, when he is well supplied in that direction already, is enough to ruffle any ordinary temper, and this was the cause of his being worked up to the frenzy he now enjoyed. Could he lout have found the miscreant who sold him the article of apparel it would have acted like a safety-valve to his enraged spirits. But he could not. He had searcied for him behind a dozen counters, and was in pursuit of him. Entering a Market street store he glanced wildly at the several clerks, then walking up to the counter in Iront of a lady attendant, demanded —

* Have you any undershirts that will not full up in washing ?’ With a look embodying timidity and bashfulness, she replied in a trembling voice ‘ No, sir, we don’t keep them.’ ‘ Then it couldnjt have been here,’ said the man with a shake of his head. And he passed out. When he reached the sidewalk it occurred to him for the first time that the person of whom he bought the garment had red hair. Going into another store, farther up the street, he shoved his fist under the nose of a pale-faced clerk, who stood leaning over the show-case, and said in tones of thunder—- * Is there a red-haired counter-jumper here who misrepresents his goods ? If there is trot him out.’ ‘None that I know of,’ answered the young man, turning as white as the cambric handkerchief that protruded from his coat pocket, and getting out of the reach of the man’s digits. ‘None that you know of,’ you villain? ’tisn’t safe to fool with me, I’m dangerous,’ continued the man, his anger seeming to gain strength. ‘ Wouldn’t you know if there was a red-headed clerk here ? ’ ‘No there isn’t,’ said the clerk, with a quivering voice. * Why didn’t you say so in the first place then ? ’ exclaimed the man, making a lurch for the clerk’s nose.

The next place the fellow went into the proprietor, seeing him coming, walked smilingly toward him and said : ‘ What are you looking for ? ’ *A red-headed clerk,’ replied the man, his eyes flashing fire, reminding one of a small Fourth of July celebration. This was such a different answer from what he expected that it caused a smile to play about the corners of his mouth, but as he makes it a point never to be out of anything that a customer may call for, he said : ‘He’s down in the basement eating his dinner. Did you want to see him for anything in particular ?’ ‘ Yes !’ yelled the man furiously, opening and shutting his hands. ‘ I wish to give him a whaling.’ * Ah, indeed, and what for, may I ask ?’ ‘He sold me an undershirt, last week, and said that it wouldn’t shrink, and now I can’t get it off to save my soul.’ ‘You think you can handle him, don’t you ?’ inquired the merchant. * Handle him ? Yes, and two just like him.’ And he pulled his hat down firmly on his head and showed his teeth as cheerfully as though he was to be paid for it. ‘ Wait here a moment,’ said the shopman, ‘ and I’ll speak to him.’ He slipped down stairs into the basement, while the man stood sharply eyeing the door through which he passed, anxiously waiting the entrance of the enemy, the red-headed clerk. Tom, a big six foot ebony-colored individual, who is employed about the premises, came up, and, making a duck at the man’s breast, said: * Yer was lookin’ fer me, was yer ?’ ‘ No,’ exclaimed the man, jumping back, you didn’t sell me the shirt.’ * Lick two just like me, hey ? Come ’tend to biz : ready, aim, fire, bang !’ and the darkey laid the weight of his fist on the man’s nose as unconsiderately as though noses could be pressed into shape again as easily as an old beaver hat after it had been used for a pillow at camp-meeting. It is evident from the time the man made in getting out of that store, hotly pursued by a pair of fourteens, that he expected shortly to be overtaken with the nose bleed and wanted to reach the nearest pump at the earliest possible moment.