"Ding!"
"Naw, we don't take no transfers, needer! Aw, chase yerself!"
"Naw, we don't take no transfers, needer!"[Illustration: "Naw, we don't take no transfers, needer!"]
"Naw, we don't take no transfers, needer!"[Illustration: "Naw, we don't take no transfers, needer!"]
"Ding, ding!"
For my part I haven't been able to figure it out, but Uncle Peter is the lad who has made a profound study of that street car proposition known as the End-Seat Hog.
I'm going to pass you out a talk he handed me a few evenings ago on that subject.
Pipe!
Suffering crumpets, John! I don't know anything about this end seat business, and the more I try to find out the more complex becomes the problem.
I've been up and down and over and across in the surface cars, John, and my experience is ornamented by ripped trousers and discolored shins, but my intellect blows out a fuse every time I try to dope out the real way not to be an End-Seat Hog.
Last Monday I jumped on an open-face car and it seemed that all the world was filled with joy and good wishes.
I was smoking one of those Bad Boy cigars. I call it a Bad Boy cigar because as soon as it goes out it gets awful noisy.
It was away uptown and the car was empty with the exception of a couple of benches.
Two blocks further on the car stopped and a stout lady looked over the situation.
I think she must have been color blind, because she didn't see the empty seats ahead and decided to cast her lot with me.
It was a terrific moment.
"Peter," I said to myself, "don't be a Hog—move over!"
And virtue was triumphant.
I moved over, and the stout lady settled squashfully into the end seat.
Her displacement was about fifteen cents' worth of bench.
After we had gone about ten blocks more every seat in the car in front and behind us was crowded, but nobody could get in our section because the fat lady held them at bay like Horatius held the bridge in the brave days of old.
People would rush up to the car when it stopped, glance carelessly fore and aft until their eyes rested on the vacant seats in our direction, and then they would see the stout lady sitting there, as graceful as the sunken ships which used to block the harbor at Port Arthur.
The people would look at the stout lady with no hope in their eyes, and then, with a sigh, they would retire and wait for the next car.
No one was brave enough to climb the mountain which grew up between them and the promised land.
After a while I began to get a toothache in my conscience.
"Peter," I said to myself in a hoarse whisper, "perhaps after allyouwere the Hog because you moved over! After the lady had climbed over you she would have kept on to the other end of the bench where now there is nothing but a sullen space."
I began to insult myself.
"Peter," I exclaimed inwardly, "what doyouknow about the etiquette of the street car? According to the newspapers it is only a Man who can be a Hog on the street cars, and since you are the original cause of blockading the port when you moved over,youmust be the Hog!"
Then I got so mad at myself that I refused to talk to myself any further.
The next day I was riding downtown on the end seat with my mind made up to stay there and keep the harbor open for commerce.
"Never," I said to myself, "never will anyone become a human Merrimac to bottle up the seating capacity of this particular bench while the blood flows through these veins and the flag of freedom waves above me."
At the next corner a very thin little gentleman squeezed by me with a look of reproach on his face the like of which I hope never to see again, but I was Charles J. Glue and firm in the end seat.
Then a couple of Italy's sunny sons by the names of Microbeini and Germicide crawled over me and kicked their initials on my knee-cap and then sat down to enjoy a smoke of domestic rope which fell across my nostrils and remained there in bitterness.
After I had been stepped on, sat on, clawed at and scowled at for twenty minutes, I began to discuss myself to myself.
"Peter," I whispered, "do you really think that the general public appreciates your efforts to keep the Harbor open?"
And then myself replied to myself with a sigh of exhaustion, "I don't think!"
"Peter," I said to myself, "no matter what your motives may be the other fellow will always believe you are trying to get the best of it. If you move over and give the end seat to another gentleman he will consider it only what is his right. If you don't move over he will think you are a Hog for keeping that which is as much yours as his."
I began to grow confidential with myself.
"Civilization is a fine idea, but Human Nature can give it cards and spades and then beat it out!" I told myself. "The Human Hog was invented long before the open-face street car began to stop for him, and there isn't anybody living who should stop to throw stones at him, because selfishness is like the measles, it breaks out in unexpected places. All of us may not be Hogs, but there is a moment in the life of every man when he gets near enough to it to be called a Ham Sandwich."
Just then the Disinfecti Brothers, Microbeini and Germicide, walked over me backward and I had a short but exciting visit to the slums.
Since that eventful day I have moved over 36 times, and out of the 36 people I gave the end seat to all but three of them belonged to the Mucilage Family, and stayed there.
Thereafter I made myself a severe promise not to worry any more about my Hog qualifications when movable or immovable on an open-face car.
I will do as my conscience dictates and walk downtown as much as possible.
And speaking of street cars, John, Uncle Peter resumed after a long pause, I was in one of those cities recently where some of the cars stop on the near side of some of the streets and some stop on the far side of some of the streets.
Honestly, John, they had me up in the air.
I left the hotel to attend to some business downtown and went over on the near side of the street to wait for a car.
When the car came along I held my thumb out in the atmosphere warningly, but the motorman kept on to the far side and stopped.
By the time I ran over to the far side he was gone again and another car had stopped at the near side.
When I rushed back to the near side the car passed me going to the far side, and now the near side looked so much like the far side that I went back to the other side, which should have been the near side, but how could it be the near side when the car was on the far side and I could not get near the near side in time to catch the car before it was far away on the far side?
Just as I rushed back again to the far side the near side became the nearer side to catch the car, and when I rushed over again from the far side to the near side the nearer I got to the near side the clearer I could see that while the far side was far away it was nearer than the near side, which was always on the far side when I hoped to take a car on the near side.
Then I began to grit my teeth and made up my mind to anticipate the action of the next car by standing half way between the near side and the far side, so that I could run to either side the emergency called for.
I was standing there about a minute much pleased with the idea, because the near side was now about as far away as the far side, when just then an automobile sneaked up behind me and one of the forward turrets struck me on my own personal far side and hoisted me over to the near side just as a car left for the far side.
I reached out my hand to grasp the far side of the step, but I missed it and caught the near side, and by this time the car was on the far side and the motorman grabbed the near side of the electric controller and pushed it over to the far side, whereupon the car started for El Paso, Texas, at a speed of about 3,000 miles a minute, and there I was with the near side of four fingers holding on to the far side of the step and the rest of my body sticking straight out in space like a pair of trousers on a clothes-line in a gale of wind.
Then suddenly the near side of my fingers refused to hold on to the far side of the step, and with the near side of my face I struck the far side of the tracks, and the near side of my brain saw every individual star on the far side of the universe.
Then I went back to the hotel and crawled into the far side of the bed while my wife sent for a near side doctor who lived on the far side of the block.
That will be about all for Uncle Peter.
Last year Bunch and Alice spent several weeks doing the society stunt at the fashionable seaside resorts.
I must put you next to a letter Bunch wrote me from Newport:
Dear John:
With a party of our society friends we have been Newporting all this week.
Next week I hope to Bar Harbor for a few days, and the week after that I hope to Narragansett for a short period.
In the party with us here are Clarence Fussyface, Llewellyn Shortbrow, Harry Pifflemind, Cecil Vanwigglevandoozen, Mrs. George Plentycash and Miss Clorinda Fritters.
Mrs. Plentycash is accompanied by a friend of her husband's by the name of Murgatroyd Mutt; and Mr. Harry Pifflemind has his own private bartender, so there is nothing to mar the beauty of the visit.
During our first day at Newport we played bridge until two o'clock, then we jumped in our automobiles to see if we could run across a few friends.
Llewellyn Shortbrow made a mistake with his machine and ran across a stranger, hitting him just between the wish-bone and the Casino.
The stranger's leg was broken, which put the laugh on Llewellyn.
The next evening Cecil Vanwigglevandoozen gave us one of the most delightful experiences I have ever known.
It was a monkey dinner.
A monkey dinner consists of a happy mixture of Society and monkey—with just a trifle more Society than monkey to give it the proper flavor.
The idea of the monkey dinner originated in a fertile spot in the southeastern part of Vanwigglevandoozen's brain, which up to then was supposed to be extinct.
The eruption of such a gigantic idea from a brain supposed to be extinct came as a great but pleasant shock to Society.
Originally it was Vanwigglevandoozen's idea to have Clarence Fussyface play the monkey, because Clarence's intelligence is built on a plan to suggest such mimicry, but a hand-organ proprietor by the name of Guissepi, who is summering at Newport, came to the rescue with a real monkey by the name of Claude.
Claude has acted for many years as a second-story man for Guissepi, and is one of the very best ice-cutters in the whole monkey business.
A full dress suit was made for Claude, and when he entered Society you could tell at once that he was not a waiter.
Claude was placed at the head of the table, and as he sat there smiling at his friends it made one of the sweetest pictures of family contentment I have ever witnessed.
There were no set speeches.
Vanwigglevandoozen gave Claude a glass of champagne, which the guest of honor politely refused by spilling it down the neck of Harry Pifflemind in such an artless monkey way that the other guests roared with delight.
With monkey signs Claude gave the signal to rush the growler, which was accompanied with a true spirit of goodfellowship by the butler.
The conversation during the dinner hour was altogether of a zoological nature.
Claude displayed an acrobatic appetite and went down the line, from soup to nuts, in a manner which was captivating in the extreme.
After completely filling the large inside pocket originally built for him by Mother Nature, Claude began to put the knives and forks in the pockets of his full dress suit.
This was greeted with ringing cheers from those present.
The only break that Claude made during the dinner was trying to put his feet on the table before the ladies left the room, but Llewellyn Shortbrow remedied this by hitting Claude on the chest with a table spoon.
When the other young men began to smoke their cigarettes Claude grew uneasy.
After they had consumed about seven sticks apiece Claude buried his face in a foaming stein of beer, and there it remained until a happy unconsciousness put him down and out.
Eight footmen, six coachmen, twenty-seven valets and the butler carried Claude to his bed-chamber, and the monkey dinner broke up with loud cries of "Author! Author! Author!"
Vanwigglevandoozen is now the hero of the day, and great things are expected of him.
But I have my doubts.
It is too much to expect one brain to think up another idea as good as that.
Yesterday afternoon at 2:30 a loud shriek emanated from the "Bungalooza Villa," followed almost immediately by its publisher, Mrs. Shinevonboodle.
Both the shriek and its author came out as far as the gate and attracted the ears of a policeman.
"My diamonds have been stolen!" exclaimed Mrs. Shinevonboodle, excitedly.
"For publication purposes or for pawning?" inquired the policeman.
"Must I tell you the details without first being introduced to you?" said Mrs. Shinevonboodle, angrily.
"Not unless you don't care to meet me," answered the policeman.
"Mercy!" said Mrs. Shinevonboodle, "must I cross the social chasm to get those presents back?"
"What kind of diamonds are missing?" inquired the policeman. "Are they sparklers or shines?"
"What is the difference?" asked Mrs. Shinevonboodle, haughtily.
"The difference is about $95 a carat," whispered the policeman.
"The best that money can buy is none too good for me," said Mrs. Shinevonboodle, with proud scorn.
"Yes, I noticed that by your hair and complexion," replied the policeman, politely.
"Will you find the missing diamonds, or must I shriek again?" inquired Mrs. Shinevonboodle.
"Is your photographer present?" demanded the policeman.
"Do you suspect him?" gasped Mrs. Shinevonboodle, with a shudder.
"The photographer generally takes things," answered the policeman. "Otherwise, how could the pictures get in the newspapers?"
"Heaven forgive me for this oversight, but my photographer neglected to take the jewels before I lost them," said Mrs. Shinevonboodle, with bitter tears in her lamps.
The policeman turned away to conceal his emotion and to take a pull at his two-for cigar.
"What, oh! what is to be done?" wailed the helpless woman.
"Nothing," responded the policeman, after a miserable pause. "Without pictures of the jewels to put in the newspapers the sensation will be weak and will wobble at the knees."
Mrs. Shinevonboodle leaned against the fence and groaned inwardly.
"It is too bad," muttered the policeman, as he bit into the two-for cigar and walked silently away.
Mrs. Shinevonboodle sat down in her most expensive flower bed and wept bitterly.
Just then the policeman came running back.
"Perhaps you remember the jewels well enough to get a photograph from memory?" he suggested.
A smile chased itself over the face of Mrs. Shinevonboodle, and she picked herself up from the geraniums.
"I remember them perfectly," she whispered, "because when my husband got the bill for them he had four different styles of fits in four minutes. Three of these fits were entirely new and original with him, so I remember the jewels perfectly."
"Good!" said the policeman. "I will have 18 detectives and 219 reporters up here in ten minutes. Calm yourself, now, calm yourself, because what is lost will soon be found in the newspapers."
The policeman rushed away to the telephone, and with a glad cry of thanksgiving Mrs. Shinevonboodle ran in the house and began to beat Mozart out of the piano.
That's all the Society news I have at present, John.
Yours as per usual,BUNCH.
I pulled a wheeze on Bunch Jefferson a few weeks ago that made him sit up and scream for help.
Bunch is the Original Ace all right, all right, but it does put dust on his dignity to have anybody josh his literary attainments.
Bunch can really sling a nasty little pen, but he isn't anybody's John W. Milton.
Not at all.
He can take a bunch of the English language and flatten it out around the edges till it looks quite poetic, but that doesn't make him a George O. Khayaam.
Not at all.
The trouble with Bunch is that his home folks have swelled his chest to such an extent by petting his adjectives that he thinks he has Shakespeare on a hot skiddoo for the sand dunes, and when it comes to that poetry thing he thinks he can make Hank Longfellow beat it up a tree.
Bunch lives out in Westchester County in one of those hand-painted suburbs where everybody knows everybody else's business and forgets his own.
Bunch and Alice joined the local club, of course, and when Bunch read some of his poetical outbursts at a free-and-easy one evening, Society got up on its hind legs and with one voice declared my old pal Jefferson to be the logical successor to Robert H. Browning, Sir Walter K. Scott, Bert Tennyson, or any other poet that ever shook a quill.
Bunch began to fancy himself some—well, rather!
When Peaches and I went out Westchester way a few weeks ago to spend a week-end with Bunch and Alice, all we heard was home-made poetry.
When Bunch wasn't ladling out impromptu sonnets, Alice was reading one of his epics or throwing a fit over a "perfectly lovely" rondeau—whatever that may be.
Even at meal times Bunch couldn't break away.
With a voice full of emotion and vegetable soup he would exclaim:
And now the twilight shadows onThe distant mountain flutter,And thou, my fair and good friend John,Wilt kindly pass the butter!
What are you going to do with a man who has a bug like that?
What would you do, if while sitting at breakfast with an old chum, he suddenly yelped in accents wild:
The palpitating Elsewhere shrinksBefore that glamorous host,Eftsoon, aye, now, good friend, methinksThat thou would'st have more toast!
It was clearly up to me to hand Bunch a good hard bump and wake him up before that poetry germ began to bite his arm off.
Bunch told me that in response to the urgent demands of his Westchester friends, he contemplated getting out a little book of his poems, and this was my cue.
I figured it out that the antithesis of a book of poetry would be a cook book, so I hustled.
In a few days I had the book framed up; a few days later it was printed, and before very long Bunch's Westchester society friends were grabbing for what they supposed was his feverish output of poesy.
This is what they got:
In presenting these Cuckoo Recipes for the Chafing Dish to his friends Mr. Jefferson wishes it distinctly understood that all doctors' bills arising from a free indulgence in any of the dishes suggested herein must be paid by the indulgee, and he wishes to state, further, that while this book may contain many aches and pains no ptomaine is intended.
Take as many buttons as the family can afford and remove the thread. Add pure spring water and stew gently till you burst your buttons. Add a little flour to calm them and let them sizzle. Serve with tomato ketchup or molasses, according to the location you find yourself living on the map. A quart bottle of Pommery on the side will help some.
Place the white of a newspaper in the frying pan, and then cover the centre with an Italian sunset picked fresh from a magazine picture. This forms the basis of the egg and it tastes very realistic. Be sure to get a fresh newspaper and a fresh magazine, edited by a fresh editor, otherwise the imitation egg will be dull and insipid. Now add a few slices of pickled linoleum and fry carelessly for twenty minutes. Serve hot with imitation salt and pepper on the side. This is a daylight dish, because the sunset effect is lost if cooked after dark.
Saw away three chops from the face of the kitchen table and put them in the broiler. Be economical with the sawdust, which can be forced into a cottage pudding. When the chops begin to sizzle, add a red necktie and a small bunch of imitation butter and stir gently. Now let them sizzle. If the chops crack across the surface while cooking, it is a sign you were cheated when you bought the kitchen table. Let them sizzle. Serve hot with imitation water cresses on the side. Nice water cresses can be made from green window blinds cut on the bias.
Always be sure to get a fresh Hamburger. There is nothing that will reconcile a man to a vegetarian diet so quick as an over-ripe Hamburger. They should always be picked at the full of the moon. To tell the age of a Hamburger look at its teeth. One row of teeth for every year, and the limit is seven rows. Now remove the wishbone and slice carefully. Add Worcester sauce and let it sizzle. Add a pinch of potato salad and stir gently. Serve hot and talk fast while eating.
Coax a few feet of garden hose into the kitchen and then kidnap it. When it is finally subdued, chop it into sections and stuff it with odds and ends. Nice, fresh odds and ends may be bought by the wholesale at any first-class junk shop. Place the result in a saucepan without adding any water, because if you put water in with the garden hose it will get up and go out on the lawn. Now let it sizzle. When the imitation clock points to an hour and a half the sausage is done. Serve hot with a Yarmouth bloater and some crumpets on the side. Be sure to have a gold safety pin in your flannel collar before eating.
Take an old whisk broom and remove the handle. If the handle is made of wood keep it, because it can be turned into a breakfast food the first time you see a sawmill. Now remove the wire from the broom and sprinkle with baking soda. Serve cold with a pinch of salt on the northwestern end.
Take the white of an egg and beat it without mercy. When it is insensible put it in the teapot and add enough hot water to drown it. Let it drown about twenty minutes, then lead the yolk of an egg over to the teapot and push it in. Season with a small pinch of paprika and let it simper. Serve hot, and always be sure to put a piece of lemon in the finger-bowl.
Go out in the garden and catch a young mock. Remove the pin feathers and place the mock in a skillet. Catch an onion when it isn't looking and push it in the skillet. Add water and let it sizzle. Add more water. Be sure there are no chemicals in the water. Add more water. Always wash the water before adding. Now upset the skillet into the soup tureen and add imitation Tabasco sauce. Imitation Tabasco sauce can be made from pickled firecrackers. Serve hot and keep the lips closed firmly while eating it from the left-hand side of the spoon.
Draw from memory the outlines of a cow and remove the forequarter. Place the forequarter on the gridiron and let it sizzle. Now brown the wheats and draw one. Add boiling water and stir gently with an imitation spoon. After cooking two hours try it with the can-opener. If it breaks the can-opener it is not done. Let it sizzle. When the supper bell rings serve hot with imitation pickles on the side. Nice pickles can be made from green trading stamps, but be careful to squeeze out all the premiums from the green trading stamps before using, because the premiums are full of ptomaine.
Find a copy of a Thanksgiving-Day newspaper and select therefrom the fattest turkey on page 3. Now, with a few kind words, coax the turkey away from the newspaper in the direction of the kitchen. Care should be taken that the turkey does not escape in the butler's pantry or fly up the dumb-waiter, because the turkey is a very nervous animal. Once you get the turkey in the kitchen lock the door and prepare the stuffing. The best stuffing for a turkey is chestnuts, which you can obtain from any author who writes musical comedy. Now remove the wishbone carelessly and make a wish. Add twenty-four, multiply by nineteen, and sprinkle with salt. Then rush the turkey over to the gas stove before it has a chance to change its mind. Let it sizzle for four hours and serve hot with jib cocktails and Philippine napkins on the side.
Get mad at a piece of bread and soak it. Chop it up fine and add liquid water. Let it sizzle. Stir it caressingly with a wooden spoon. When the spoon becomes a brunette the coffee is done. Serve without splashing it and add a little cold water, painted white, to look like milk. If you have any tame cheese in the pantry now is the time to whistle for it.
Take two rubber-neck clams and, after stuffing them with peanuts, fry them over a slow fire. Now remove the necks from the clams and add baking soda. Let them sizzle. Take the juice of a lemon and threaten the clams with it. Serve hot with pink finger-bowls with your initials on them. Some people prefer to have their initials on the clams, but such an idea is only for the wealthy.
Take a hatful of pine shavings and remove the hat. Add a little sherry wine and sweeten to taste. Let them sizzle. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and other cosmetics. Let them sizzle. Serve cold with shredded onions on the side.
Carefully remove the laces from an old shoe and put them away, because they can be used for shoe-string potatoes just as soon as the potato trust gets started. Beat the shoe with a hammer for ten minutes until its tongue stops wagging and it gets black and blue in the face. Then put in the frying pan and stir gently. When it begins to sizzle add the yolk of an egg and season with parsley. Imitation parsley can be made from green wall paper with the scissors. If there is no green wall paper in the house speak to the landlord about it. Let it sizzle. Should you wish to smother it with onions now is your chance, because after cooking so long it is almost helpless. Serve hot with a hatchet on the side. If there are more than four people in the family use both shoes.
Remove the jacket and waistcoat from a potato and put in the saucepan. Add three quarts of boiling water. Get a map of Ireland and hang it on the wall directly in front of the saucepan. This will furnish the local color for the stew. Let it boil two hours. When the potato begins to moult it is a sign the stew is nearly done. Walk easy so as not to frighten it. Add a pint of rhubarb and serve hot with lettuce dressing. If the lettuce isn't dressed it ought to be ashamed of itself.
Take a dozen knot-holes and peel them carefully. Remove the shells and add a cup of sugar. Stir quickly and put in a hot oven. Bake gently for six hours and then add a little Jamaica ginger and some pickled rag-time. Serve hot with tea wafers on the side.
I haven't seen Bunch since the book came out.
But I know he will get back at me good and hard some of these fine days.
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