Democratic Sentinel, Volume 7, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 May 1883 — The Baggage-Check Racket. [ARTICLE]

The Baggage-Check Racket.

A new trick of thieves to get possession of a traveler’s baggage is to borrow a baggage check of a man in a passenger car for the purpose of opening the catch of a seat, so that the seat can be turned, over. The unsuspecting traveller lends the check, and the borrower fools around the seat with it, and hands back another one in its place, and the owner of the check never knows that he has been fooled until he gets to his destination and goes after his trunk, when he finds the other man has got it. Then he goes out on the platform to get a breath of fresh air and swear half a string at himself. When a man wants to borrow a baggage cheek in a car give him a soft answer. Tell him to go to Cheyenne.— Peck’s Sun. Jb you think it is right to differ from the times, and make a stand for any valuable point of morals, do it, however rustic, however antiquated, however pedantic, it may appear; do it, not for insolence, but seriously, as a man who wore a soul of his own in his bosom, and did not wait until it was breathed into him by the breath of fashion*

& BAB BOY#/® 4, “There, you drop that ’’ eery man to the bad caire limping into the store arrß begmr fumble around a box of strawberries. “I have never kicked at your eating my codfish, End crackers, rind cheese, agd herrings and applea, but there; hae flft to be a dividing line somewhere, apCI make itfsfc strawberries at 6, a box, and only two layers iff » b<fe. *n only bought one box, ' hoping «ome plumbet or gaa man would come aloag and buy and, by guim everybody that has been in the store has s sampled ,a strawberry out of that bdt, *fehivered as though it was sour, fflhd*goha4ff without asking the price,” and the grocery man looked mad, took a hatchet and knocked in the head of a baia?el of apples, and said “There, help yourself to dried apples.* “O, I don’t want your stmwberrief or dried apples,” said the boys as he Parted against a showcase and looMtedKatW bar of red, transparent soap. “I trying to fool you. Say, that bar of soap is old enough to vote. I remember seeing it in the show-case when I was about a year old, and pa came in here with me and held me up to the show-case to look at that tin tobacco box, and that round zinc looking-glass, and the yellow wooden jiboket-comb, and the soap looks just the sfime, only a little faded. If you would wash yourself once in a while your soap wouldn’t dry up on your hands,” and the bdy sat down in the chair Without any back, feeling that he was even with the grocery man. “You never, mind the soap. f lt is paid for, and that is more father can say about the soap that has been used in his house the past month,” said the grocery man, as he split aip a box to kindle the fire. “But ,we won’t quarrel. What was it I heard about a band serenading your father, and his inviting them in to lunch?”

let th£geLQßt qr p& will kfll me deacL It a joke. <sT!B7JWnese Bohemian bands that goes about town some of his friends who had neara we had a baby at the house had birMLd band and was coming in a few miniMf to serenade him, and he better prepwre to make a speech. Pa is proud of Be* ing a father at his age, and he thought it was no more than right for the neigh* bors to serenade him, and he went to loading himself for a speech, in the library, and me and my chum went gut/md told the leader of the band there was a family up there that wanted to have some music, and they didn’t care for expenses, so they quit blowing where? they was and came right along. None of them could understand English except the leader, and he only understood enough to go and take a drink when he is invited. My chum steered the band up to our house and got them to play ‘Babies on Our Block’ and ‘Baby Mine,’ and I stopped all the men who were going home and told them to wait a minute and they would see some Inn, so when the band got through the second tune and the Prussians were emptying the beer out of the horns, and pa stepped out on the porch, there was more nor a hundred people in front of the house. You’d a dide to see pa when he put his hand in the breast of his coat and struck an attitude. He looked like a Congressman or a tramp.' The .band was scared, ’cause they thought he was mad, and pome of them were going to run, thinking lie fvasgoing to throw pieces of brick-house at j them, but my chum and the leader kept them. Then pa sailed in. He commenced, ‘Fellow-citizens,’and then went back to Adam and Eve, and

worked up to the present day, giving al history of the notable people who had; acquired children, and kept’ the crowd interested. I felt sorry for pa, ’cause V knew how he would feel when he came to find out he had been sold. The Bohemians in the band that couldn't understand English, they looked at each other and wondered what it was all about, and finally? pa wound up by stating that it was every citizen’s duty to own children of his own, and then he invited the band and the crowd in to take some refreshments. Well, you ought to have; seen that band come in the house,. They fell over each other getting in, ami the crowd went home, leaving pa and my chum and me and the band. Eat? ; Well, I should smile. They just reached for things, and talked Bohemian.’ Drink? O, no. I guess they, didn’t pour it down. Pa opened a dozen hot-* ties of champagne, and they# fairly bathed in it, as -though they had a fire inside. Pa tried to talk with thqm about the baby, but they couldn’t understand, and finally they got full and started out, and the leader asked pa for $3, and that broke him up. Pa told the leader he supposed* the gentleinen who had got up the serenade had paid for the music, and the leader pointed tdmfe 'and said I was the gentleman that got ft up. Pa paid him, but he had a wicked look in his eye, and me and my chum lit out, and the Bohemians came down the street bilin’full, with their horns* on their arms, ana they were talking Bohemian for all that was out.. They stopped in front of a vacant house and began to play, but you couldn’t tell what tune it was, they were go full, apd a .policeman -came , along..and drove them home. I exy stable to-night, cause pa is offqjunreasonable when anything costs Jiim $3, beside the champagne.” . “Well, you have made a pretty mess of it,* said the grocery .man. “It’s a wonder your pa does not kill you. But what,is it I hear about the trouble at the church ?, They lay that foolishness to you.” , [: “It’s all a lie. They lay everything to me* It was some of them dupksJhaX* sing in the choir. I was, just as surprised as anybody whgn it occurred. * You see, our minister is laid *up from" the effect of the ride, to the funeral' when he tried to run over a stn® et. can, and an old deacon, who had- symptoms of being a minister in ink youth, iwas‘ invited to take theminister’S place, and talk's little. He is an absentimihded old party who don’t keep"-up with the events of the day, and whoever played it on him knew that he was too pious to even read the daily papers.. There, was a notice of a choir meeting to be read, andl thinkthe tenor Smuggled in tile other notice between that and the one about the weekly prayer meeting. Anyway, it wasn’t me, but it like to bvoke Up the meeting. After the deacon read the choir notice he took up' the other one and read, ‘I am. requested td announce that the Y; M. C. Association will give a friendly entertainment with soft gloves, on Tuesday evening, to which all are invited. J Brother John Sullivan, the eminent Boston revivalist, will lead the exerrrjtfl?, assisted by Brother Slade ( the Maori missionary from

.ygr •" ( Australia. .There willJje ng. slugging, but a collection will betaken, up at the door to defray expenses.” * Well, I thought the people m would sink through the floor., JThere was not a person in church, except the poor old deacon, but what understood that some wicked wretch had'deceived him, and I know by the way the tenor tickled the soprano that he did it. I may be mean, but everything I do is innoeent, and I wouldh’t be as fiiean as a choir singer for $2. I felt real sofry’fiM? tie old deacon, but he never knew wtht he had done, and I think it would be ireal mean to tels him. He won’tbe atthte slugging match. That remark a collection settled the deacon. I mhst go down to the stable noW to help greast a hack, So yi>u wffl hive to excuse me. lipa comes here looking for me, tejl hmryou heard I was going to drive a picnic parta out to Waukesha, and jnay ngt be back in a week. By that get over that Bohemian serenade,” and the boy» filled hi J pistok pockfit with dried apples, ana went out and hung a sign in front of Aha grocery, “Strawberries two skillin a smell,* ancif one smell is Peck’s Sums ~ ; b-