THE TKAMP'SSTORY.

Waikato Times, Volume XVIII, Issue 1556, 24 June 1882, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE TKAMP'SSTORY.

\Dr experience has gold in it (as discerning folks agree), Then there's quite a little fortune stowed away somewhere in me, And I deal it out regardless of a regular stated price, In rough-done-up prize packages of common-sense .advice ; The people they can take it, or ran around it, as they please ; But the best thing they'll find in it is some words like unto these : Worm or beetle — drought or tempest — on a farmer's land may fall ; But for first-class ruination, trust a mortgage 'gainst them all. On my weddin'-day my father touched me kindly on the arm, And handed me the papers for an eighty acre farm, With the stock an' huildin's for an independent start; Saying, " Here's a wedding present from my muscle and my heart ; And, except the admonitions you have taken from my tongue, And the reasonable lickin's that you had when you was young. ' And your food and clothes and schoolin' (not so much as I could wish, For I had a number eatin' ftom a some at scanty dish), And the honest love you captured when you first sat on my knee, This is all I have to give you — so expect no more > from me." Peopled said I couldn't marry tho sweet girl I tried to coiirt, Till we smilingly submitted a minority report ; Then they laid their theories over, with a quickness queer to see, And, said they, we'd many, but we never could agree; But she did not frame and hang up all the neigh* bours had to say, But ran our little heaven in our own peculiar way; We started off quite jolly, wondrous full of health and cheer, And a general understanding that the road was pretty clear. So wo lived and toiled and prospered ; and the little family party That came on from heaven to visit us were bright and hale, and hearty ; And to-day we might ha' been there, had I only just have known How to lay my road down solid, and let well enough alone. But I soon commenced a-kicking in the traces, I confess ; There was too much land that joined mo that I didn't yet possess. When once he gets laud-hungry, strange how ravenous one can bo 1 'Twasn't long before I wanted all the ground that I could see, So 1 bought another eighty (not foreboding any harm), And for that and some down-money put a mortgage on my farm. Then I bought another forty — hired some cash to fix up new — And to buy a covered carnage, and of course the mortgage grew. Now my wifo was square against this, 'tis but light that you should know (Though I'm very far from baying that I think it's always so); But she went in hearty with mo, •working hard from day to day, For wo knew that life was business, now we had that debt to pay. We worked through spring and winter — through summer and tin ougli fall — But that mortgage woiked the hardest and the steadiest of us all ; It worked on nights and Sundays — it worked each holiday — It settled down among us, and it never went away. Whatever wo kept from it seemed a'most as bad as theft ; It watched us every minute, and it ruled us right and left. The rust and blight were with us sometimes, and sometimes not ; The dark-browed, scowling mortgage was for over on tho spot. The weevil and tho cut-worm, they went as well as came ; The mortgago stayed for ever, eating hearty all tho same. It nailed up every w indow — stood guaid at every door — And happiness and sunshine made their homo with us no more. Till with failing crops and sickness we got stalled upon the grado, And there came a dark day on us when the interest wasn't paid ; And there came a sharp foreclosure, and I kind o'lost my holQ, And grew weary and discouraged, and tho farm was cheaply sold. The children left and scattered when they hardly yet were grown ; My wife she pined an' perished, an' I found myself alone. What she died of was " a mystery," an' tho doctors never know ; But I knew she died of mortgage — just as well's I wanted to. If to trace a hidden sorrow were within the doctors' art, They'd ha' found a mortgage lying on that woman's broken heart. Two different kinds of people the devil most assails : One is the man who conquers — the other he who fails. But still I think the last kind are soonest to give up, And to hide their sorry faces behind the shameful cup ; Like some old king or other, whose name I've somehow lost, They straightway tear their eyes out, just when they need 'em most. , When once I had discovered that the debt I could not pay, I tried to liquidate it in a rather common way : I used to meet in private a fellow-financier, And we would drink ourselves worth ten thousand dollars clear ; As easy a way to prosper as ever has been found ; But one's a heap sight poorer when ho gets back to tho ground. Of course I ought to ha' braced up, an, worked on all the same ; I ain't a tryin' to shirk out, or cover up from blame ; But still I think men often, it safely may be said. Are driven to temptations in place of being led ; And if that tyrant mortgage hadn't cracked itsirhip at me, I shouldn't have constituted the ruin that you see. For though I've never stolen or defaulted, please to know, Yet, socially considered, I am pretty middlin' low. lam helpless an' forsaken — I am childless an' alone ; I haven't a Bingle dollar that it's fair to call my own; My old age knows no comfort, my -heart is scant o' cheer, The children they run from me as soon as I come near. The women shrink and tremble — their alms are fear-bestowed — The dogs howl curses at me, and hunt me down the road. My home is where night finds mo ; my friends are few and cold ; Oh, little is there in tliis world for one who's poor and old ! But I'm -wealthy in experience, all put up in good advice, ' To take or not to take it — with no difference in the price ; You may have it, an' thrive on it, or run around i it, as you please, 'But I generally give it wrapped in some such words as these : Worm or beetle — drought or tempest — on a farmer's land may fall ; ■But for first-class ruination, trust a mortgage 'gainst' them all. Frotkfarm hdttads by Will Carleton.

Rapid Tbansit.-— Unless a man has travelled •on' the Texas Central,' he can have no possible* idea- of how slow the train's go.'. The slow- 1 ness of the 'trains r has become ;A few days ago several gentlemen were' seated in the s baok t'room.pf - f an Austin saloon,) spitting'tobacco juice on the stove and'tftlking^abdut old-age.*' One man 'said/ thatt-his faQier^was'SO'years'of kge^bat wae^o^active the',c^uld2'tra;yel".*3O i miles in a'-dWy- without^ ;gettmg^lia:r I "Hefc'Vtildn!t ! do it pn^the)' Te^as?Oentralrnot'if^hef^astlBo y&trs-'oldp ;dr^ly*#^arl£e^^l6le^MMng ■> man^iif