Rensselaer Republican, Volume 12, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 March 1880 — He Won the Bet. [ARTICLE]

He Won the Bet.

Soon after two o’clock yesterday the sash in a fourth-story window of a business house on Woodward avenue was raised and a man’s head and shoulders appeared in sight. Next he thrust out an arm, and pedestrians saw a small rope in his hand. Twenty men halted in less than a minute. A plank was lying at the curb, and the general line of reasoning was that the plank was to be drawn up through the window. “You’ll break the glass if you try it!” shouted one of the fast-growing grotip. * “That cord isn’t stout enough!” yelled a third. “ Why don’t they carry it up by way of the stairs?’’ demanded a man, as he flourished his gold-headed cane around and seemed much put out. The cord came part way down and stopped. Some ten different persons volunteered the information of “ more yet,” and presently it was lowered so that one of the crowd could grasp it. He pulled down and the man above pulled up, and four or five men seized the plank and brought it to the rope. “ Lower away!” yelled the man at the rope. “ Pull down on it!’’ cried a dozen voices. Tbe man above let out more rope and waved his hand. “He wants it over that hitchingpost!” screamed a boy, and it was carried there. “No; he wants it fast to the lamppost!” shouted a man, and it was carried there. “Let that rope alone!” came from the man above. Six men had hpld of the plank, ready to boost on it, and three more had hold of the rope. • “Do you want the plank?” asked one. “ No!” “Do you want the hitching-post?” “Nor’ “ Well, what do you want?” “ 1 want yon to let that rope alone! I had a bet of the cigars that it was long enough to touch the walk, and Tve wtm ’em! What’s the row down there—somebody dropped dead?” The plank was hurled away, cusswords indulged in as toes were trodden' on, and in fifteen seconds the crowd had melted away to a squint-eyed boy and an organ-grinder.— Detroit Free Press. . Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote the other day to the Superintendent of the Cincinnati schools: “I had the Jdeasure of meeting Mr. Longfellow a ew .evenings since, and took the opportunity of telling him that my rhyming machinery was out of gear or I would have sent some lines for the Cincinnati school celebration of his birthday. The truth is, 1 am busy with another kind of work, and it will never do to shift a barrel-organ from one tune to another while it is playing. It must get through ‘ Old Hundred’ before it strikes up * Hail to the Chief I do not mean that I am writing an epic, or a tragedy, or an ode, but that my stated duties and the burdens of an almos. unmanageable „ correspondence are about m-araote M X mb oqual to.”