PECK’S BAD BOY ON FIREMEN.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1172, 1 May 1884, Page 3

PECK’S BAD BOY ON FIREMEN.

«That’s a good boy,’ said the grocery man, as he shaded his eyes to look at the bad boy’s diamond, and then wet his finger and touched the diamond and put the finger on hi* tongue to see if it tasted of alum, ‘ But there is one thine I want to talk to you about. I saw you jump on a hose cart and ride with the firemen at the fire last night, and your pa said you was hanging around the engine house a good deal. Now, you want to I t up on that. Those firemen are pretty rough, and you will be spoiled if you go with them. I wouldn’t have anything to do with them, or you will bring your father’s grey hairs in sorrow to the grave. Firemen are hard citizens.’ * When was this that firem n were hard citizens ?’ asked the boy indignantly. ‘ 'lhey are just as good citizens as you are. If your grocery gets on fire d >wn cellar from the kerosene barrel, what do you do ? Do you go down cellar and put it out? Now, you don’t. You grab your insurance policy and light out, and the firemea coma ard they go right down into your subterranean hell of burning kerosene, and squirt water till they are overcome by the smoke, when their partners drag them out by the legs, and other* take their places, an! they keep up the fight undl your property is sived, wheo you ome back and kick them because they tipped over a barrel of apples. They rush into burning buildings and save the live* of women and children. Do they do it for pay ? Naw ! All they get is seventy-five dollars a month, and you pay that to the man who drives your grocery waggon. There is not a fireman 'ho gets as much salary as a street car conduct >r, in any city in the country, and the firemen are the bravest men that live. Why, got darn you, you haven’t got ss much tense as a calf.’ ‘But, hold on, He >nery. Hear me,’ and the grocery man tried to stop ih* bad boy. I ‘ Q-et out. I am ashamed to know you,’says the boy. ‘You and i.a have always told me that ws should honor the brava. How do you do it ? You pay a fireman, who lists hi* life every time he runs to a fire, just enough to board and clothe him, and when he is played out and is sick, ho is discharged, and you forget him. Every time an alarm sound* a iSremaa takes his chances of not getting back to the enginehouse alive. He protects your property and your lif ■*, and now you tell me he is a bad man. I would like to fee y, u jump up at an alarm of fire, slide down a pole w.th jour pants half on, and get on an engine and be driven over a rough pavement half a mile. Your hair would turn gray with fright the first time. I tell you a city ought to p iy firemen four hundred dollars a month, and pension them when they get their lungs

busted, or got broke up. and support their famil es. Firemen ought to be loved ani respected, lioniz 'd, inroad' of haying old old idjms cdl toern b d mm,’ and the bad boy took out Ids handkerchief and rubbed up bis diamond and stood on the front step to flab it in the ores of his girl as she name in after a mack ""el, but she didn’t «*e it and he went off fe-li* g hurt. while the man m-.de up bid mind to s--nd a to (key (o every fireman for New Year’s Day.— Pe :k’= *on. About four years ago (states an American paper) the wife of J. C. Welch, living near Pomeroy, W.T., United States, died. Recently the husband caused her body to be exhumed for removal to another cemetery, and fcund the remains hod turned to solid stone. The hair had grown several inches, and turned snow white. The body looked like a beautiful marble statue. ‘Rough on Eats.’ —Clears out rats, mice, roaches, fhes, ants, bed-bugs, beetles, insects, skunks, jack-rabbits, giphers. Druggists. New Zealand Drug Co., General Agents. 2 Two girls, daughters ofj a resident at Starborough, in Marlborough district, are reported to have, with the assistance of a pack of dogs, killed seventeen thousand rabbits in three months. ‘ Buchu-Paiba.’ Quick, complete cure, all annoying Kidney, Bladder and Urinary Diseases. Druggists. New Zealand Drug Co., General Agents. ‘ 2 The N.Z. Schoolmaster ‘ offers a 'prize of 3 guineas for the best time-table for a country school, where the master his no assistance. This is a pressing want which is to be hoped will soon be supplied. Remedy tor Hard Times. Stop spending so much on fine clothes, rich food, and style. Buy good food, cheaper ami better clothing, and stop the habit of using expensive or quack doctors or humbug medicine that do*» you only harm, but put your trust in tbe greatest of all simple, pure remedies, Hop Bitters, that cures always at a trifling cost, «nd you will see better times and good health. Bead Advt,