UP TO HIS BUSINESS.

Kumara Times, Issue 1372, 23 February 1881, Page 2

UP TO HIS BUSINESS.

A widow who was going to leave the city held an auction of her household effects Yesterday} and everything wenb at prompt sale linijil little but the bedstead Was left.,. Jiist before this was* put lip some of tHe .women went to spying around, and discovered that it was infested by bed-biigs. This fact was noised around until it came to the ears of the auctioneer, who nioiinted his box, and said i " Words cannot express the poignancy, of my sorrow over the bate canard which has has been put in circulation in this crowd. I have sold goods in this town for twenty-nine long years; and this is the first instance in whicli bugs have been permitted to step between me and the purchasing public. Ladies and gentlemen, if there is a bug in or about that bedstead I want to see him. I cannot and will not believe there is. It would be a slander—a most foul slander on the character of this worthy widow, who is about to remove to the State of Ohio." Being invited to step down and view the bugs for himself, he rriade an inspection. They were there. They were galloping in and out, up and down, and it was no use to dispute the fact. "Ladies and gentlemen," said the* auctioneer, as he. resumed his po'st, "I found bugs. I don't exdctly remember the Latin" name for them, but they are there. And now let me talk to you ag a friend. Bed-bugs w'erd not made for gaudy show, nor were they made for a 1 life of ease. It is a law of nature thafc they should inhabit bedsteads': They can rto more go out under a barn and make a living than a ddg can become an eagle and float through space. THe aversion among you to this insect is founded on false principles. His bitd scarcely irritates the sleep&r, bitt it cleanses and purifies the blood. But for the b'ed-bitgs of this country we shook! all have boils and carbuncles; They keep down warts.' They cause moles to disappear. Give them' a chance' and they would renlove doms without pain. The great " " Fifty emits ?" called an a\i wonrari who remembered that she' had a remedy dt Home. " Fifty cents ( I am offered s'of cents for a lOddl. bedstead, and as I waß going td s'jty'; tite great tfapoleon always aaked for a bed with bugs in it. lam offered 50 oiMitS, aud yet Cse'stfr had his hugs. lam -'* " One dollar." " I am offered one dolkr"; rirtd" yet the poets of Greece the insects before yon. This widow tells me that she has not had an ache Of a pain since the first bug made its Appearance. How many of yon have redd what wrote of them 1 Whdt was the fountain of Mozart's Twelfth Mass 1 And yet I " " Two dollars." " And yet I hear'only two dollars ! Do you have headache 1 Are you afflicted with giddiness ? Do you have roaring in the ears ?" " Three dollars!" " My friends, let me go home and get my copy of Paradise Lost, and read to you one short chapter. What did Milton ?" " Four dollars." "Ah! I begin to see that art and culture are not unknown to the audience. Did Alexander the Great have boils 1 tfever, not a one. And why I" " Five dollars!° "I am bid five dollars. I would like to quote one verse from a wellknown Latin poet, but time presses and this bedstead is sold, for five dollars, cash on the nail. I will now direct your cultured attention to that cookstove with the cracked oven."