Anger and Enumeration.

Thames Star, Volume XIV, Issue 4372, 8 January 1883, Page 4

Anger and Enumeration.

A Danbury man named Reubens recently saw a. statement that counting one hundred when tempted to speak an angry word would save a man a great deal of , trouble. ~Tbis statement sounded a little singular at first, but the more be read it over the more favorably be became im- . pressed with it, and finally concluded to adopt it. Next door to Reubens lives a man who had made fire distinct attempts in the past fortnight to secure a dinner of green peas, by election day, and •every time he has been retarded by Reubens' hens. The next morning after Beubens had made his resolution, this man found his j fifth attempt to hare miscarried. Then j he called on Beubens. He said: " WHat in thunder dp you mean by letting your hens tear up my garden ? " Eeubens was prompted to caH him a mudsnoot, a new name just coming into general use, but he remembered his resolution, put down -his ; ra^e, and meekly ohaerred—-■ \, ,:i .a;., ■'■■:-:'.-.■'; ' . • " One, two, three, four, fire, six, seven, eight—" « , . Then the mad neighbour, who had been eyeing this answer with a great deal of suspicion, broke in again,— " Why don't you answer my question, you rascal ?" But still. [Reubens maintained his equanimity, and went on with the teak " Nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen —' The mad neighbour started harder than ever. -•'■..'. " Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty-one—" " You're a mean skunk," said the mad neighbour, backing towards the fence. Reuben's face flushed at this charge, but he only said— . "Twenty-one, twenty-two, twentythree, twenty-four, twenty-five, twentysix--" At this figure the neighbor got up on the fence in some haste, but suddenly thinking of bis peas, h& opened his mouth— "You mean, low-lived rascal; for two cents I could knock your cracked head over a-barn, and I would—-" .•'Twenty, seven, twenty-eight," interrupted Reubens, " Twenty-nine, thirty, thirty-one, thirty-two, thirty-three—" Here the neighbor broke for his house, and entering it, violently slammed the door behind .him, but Reubens did not . dare let np on the enumeration, and so be stood out .there alone in his own yard, and kept on counting, while his burning cheeks and flashing eyes eloquently affirmed his judgment. When he got up into the eighties his wife came to tho door in some alarm. .; " Why, Reubens, man what is the matter with you ?" she said, " Do come into the house." But he didn't let up. She came out to him, but he only looked into her eyes, and said— " Ninety-three, ninety-four, ninety five, ninety-six, ninoty-BeTen, ninety-eight, ninety-nine, one hundred—go into the house, old woman, or I'll bust ye!" And she went. —American paper. '