Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 39, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 June 1884 — THE BAD BUY. [ARTICLE]

THE BAD BUY.

“Ah, good-morning,” said tho grocery man to the bad bqy, as he was going by with, put looking toward the store. “Come in, and let’s us talk over the state of the country.” “Well, what part of the country shall we begin on?” asked the boy. as he came in and basked a few strawberries from tho box, and complained because the grocery man did not put cream and sugar on them. “Shall we toqch on finances, politics, religion, or agriculture?”

“Finances,” said the grocery man, as he laid down a paper in which he bad been reading of the Grant failure, took off his spectacles, wiped them on a piece of manila paper, and pat thorn in a tin case. “What do yon think ol the trick Grant’s sons played on the old man? That's about as bod air any of the tricks you have played on your pa, Hennery. 1 should not be surprised to see the New York papers accuse yon of being responsible for the downfall of the Grant boys, as they accuse yon of ruining all the toys that gc wrong.” “O, the Grant boys are like lots of other boys all over the country, and Grant is like many fathers, of less busi ness sagacity. Grant is a good man to Bit around and draw a pension, and wait for another war. He is entitled ~to live like a king, and have all his expenses paid by the Government he perpetuated by his military genius, but ho is not equal to running a peanut-stand. There should be a law to prohibit him from trying to go into business, and no one should be allowed to kanoodle him into the use of his name to eatch snekers. Grant made the mistake that nearly all fathers make, in thinking his sons are smarter than other boys. Because Grant was a successful soldier, it was no evidence that his boys were above the average. They were ordinary boys, had an ordinary education, and would have stood as good a chance as most boys in running a grocery, reporting on a daily paper, or braking on a freight train, and in any of these positions they might have failed, and they might have been successful, and come to the front. But because their father was a good soldier, the boys thought they could run a business that would paralyze the ablest financier in this country, and the poor old father was induced to believe his boys were made of better material than other boys, and he lent hi* name to their wildcat, foolish enterprises, and they at once owned the earth. Borne one else owned the earth under them* hut they owned it on top, and they got the big head, and competed with mill; ionaires who had more money than they could possibly spend, and for a year or. two y m have read more about the stylo the Grants were putting on than yon have of the Asters and Vanderbilts. Now that it is over, anybody can see what fools they were, and what a weak old father Grant was, and they will drop down to their level; and if they ever amount to anything again, it will be from what they earn, unless they are weak enough to help spend the money that a grateful people contributed to their father, and I should think they wonld be about equal to that emergency. It is a clear case of bur head on the part of the whole family, and nobody is sorry for any of them except the pa and ms. And great men, from the President down, have many heartaches, and pass . many sleepless nights, thinking of sons who are doing their best to bring the gray hairs of their parents in sorrow to the grave. I tell yon parents that only have a few jokes played on them are in luck. If Grant’s boys had initiated their pa into a Masonry, and given the goat degree, as me and my chum did my pa, Grant would have picked himself up and felt a good deal l>etter than he does to be initiated into the ‘One Tonsand and One,’ where the first degree is ‘petit larceny,’the second degree obtaining money on false pretenses, and the third degree highway robbery.” “Weil, that is about the way I look at it,” said the grocery man, as he spilled a little cayenne pepper on a tug strawberry on top of a box. “But I noticed your pa out in the back yard with a handkerchief tied over bis eye, and bis nose seemed quite red. He nas not been drinking again, has he ?” “No, pa is a reformed man, bnt he is nervous. He can’t stand still. The other day he was at the depot waiting for a train, and he walked up and down the platform all the time. Yon know them posts on the platform that hold( up the roof? Well, pa was walking along jabbing the point of his umbrella at the posts. He had walked for qniW a while, jabbing the posts, and not thinking of anything, and unconscious that there was anybody around, when the point of the umbrella slipped off the post and run into the pocket of a woman's dress, who was standing on the other side of the post, talking with a man. Well, she was scared, and Gabbed the umbrella, and when she >ked np at pa, she was mad. Pa hara’t got no sense about such things. He tried to smile, as though it was ah accident, but when pa tries to smile, when it ain’t a natural smile, but forced, lie looks as though be was grinning, and he looks erazy. The woman screamed when she saw pa smile, and thought he was trying to stab her, and pa pulled the umbrella to get it away, she pulled to keep from getting stabbed again, and the man with her, he hit pa, and struck him on the nose, and a baggage man grabbed pa from behind, and they called a depot policeman, and be was going to kill pa. If pa had tried to exElam, it would have been ail right, but e kept on smiling, sad pulling at the umbrella, and he thought they were trying to rob him. and be kicked, and they had to put him on a baggage truck and wheel him away. He lost his Umbrella, and when they turned him loto* he run up an alley for home. It is Km absent-mindedness that catlaps all the trouble. Jewhiilikeiasy wh.t’s the matter with that strawberry ? It feels a* though it bad been warmed by the store. Whoosh!" and the boy got a drink of water as quick as he could, and be chewed the ice, while the grocery man went to dusting the cans of fruit ae though nothing had happened worthy of liptkw.—Peck’s Sun.