Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 4, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 October 1875 — A Victim of Circumstances. [ARTICLE]

A Victim of Circumstances.

Yesterday afternoon a lot of horses belonging to somebody on South Hill were strolling down Boundary street, near Angular, at the same time a very dignified clergyman was walking along on the sidewalk. The street is very muddy, and presently the horses got tired of it, and accordingly filed across to the plank walk and promenaded along, single file, right before the dominie. Mares, colts, in all there were just thirteen of the animals, and they walked along very solemnly, but making aterrfiic clattering on the plank, while the clergyman followed, quietly amused at the nonchalant manner with which the horses took possession of the walk. Pretty soon he heard a tremendous shouting and a few screams at the head of the procession, which came to a dead halt, and the minister became aware that two women were trying to “ shoo” the horses into the street by shrieking and making threatening gestures with their parasols, while the shouting came from a man in his shirtsleeves on the other side of the way, and his remarks were addressed to the Gospeler. “ Drive them horses oft"’n that ar sidewalk!” he yelled. “ Ain’t you got no more sense than that, ye son of a rancher? Get them horses out into the road, or I’ll wade through this mud to ye, and bury ye in the gutter!” “My friend,” meekly began the minister, “ you labor under an erroneous ”

“Labor nothin’!” yelled the man. “ Don’t ye know no better’n to drive a lot of horses along a sidewalk, and chase women an’ children off into the mud? Row jest hump them cattle out into the street, or I’ll make it hot for ye!” “ My good sir,” the minister endeavored to explain, “ you are hasty overmuch. I am not driving ” “Oh-h-h! ye outdacious liar,” yelled the man. “As though I hadn’t ben watchin ye ever sence ye came around yan comer, drivin ’em along the sidewalk becaze ye was tbo nice to walk in the mud. A sweet-scented drover you are. Yer too high-toned fer this town, my duck, an’ if ye don’t git them horses into the street and mosey out o’ this before I come acrost to ye, ye’ll never drive another woman and her baby into the mud agin, I kin tell ye.” The astonished preacher began to expostulate once more, but the man was out of patience by this time and strode through the mud toward the terrified gentleman, rolling his sleeves up and swearing terrifically as he came, big with the importance of being the champion of two women and a baby against a foreign drover. The minister had made up his mind to be smashed, but Providence took care of him, as it does of ministers and editors and other good men. A dbg which lives down near the grocery, aroused by the clamor, looked up and saw the horses, which were standing quietly listening to th#quarrel, and ijui. second he was over the fence and snapping at every pair of heels at once. The frightened horses snorted and, wheeling off the sidewalk, charged madly across the street, suddenly pilling up and wheeling in different directions as they met the man, and when they galloped away the preacher saw a sight that filled him with horror. Those horses in their frenzied plunging had slapped chunks of mud as big as nailkegs all over that man. They had plastered him from head to foot; his ears were level-full of blue mud and his shirt was a mass of yellow clay, and he was digging this slimy mud that grows in the wagon-ruts out of his eyes with both hands. Every time he spit he blew out pieces of mud as large as turnips, and he spit, as near as the minister could estitimate, ninety-five times a minute. He was trying to say something, but the angels above could never guess what. There hasn’t been such a muddy man in town since the night dear old Blake chased the policeman. The minister, grateful tor his providential rescue, did not tempt Providence by offering to scrape his enemy off, but he fled in dignified haste, and only heard the women pause, in the midst of their horrified pity for their champion, to speak of the flying minister as a “horrid, ill-mannerly horse-trader.” He only checked his speed one moment to watch the dog which had created the stampede stand for a second on three legs to look in wild amazement at the apparition in the street, and then turn in abject terror and fly to the privacy of his kennel with piteous howls. And the minister marveled greatly on the intricacies and uncertainties of circumstantial evidence.—Burlington (loipa) Hawk-Eye.

—A couple in a town near BostoD, becoming old and losing their teeth, recently concluded that false sets of new ones w T ould be desirable, but, being frugal folks and, moreover* having for some years made one pair of spectacles do double service, concluded that one set would answer all purposes. So one set was bought, and they now eat theinneals by each using the masticators for alternate five minutes. —Joseph Hammerer, of New York, made a provision in his will that after the age of twenty-four his two sons should lose all interest in his estate. He thought that at that age a maq should be able to take care of himself.