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BOWSER SEES 'EM _____ ( fiats? Not a Bit of It; Only Big Cockroaches. i HE SCOLDS WIFE AND COOK. ! t j Man of the House Angry That the Women Had Been Seared by Rodents. ' ? Has Unpleasant Experience In Cellar, ' but Stands by His Guns. Ig?; v i By M. QUAD. ] ICopyright, 1911, by Associated literary Press.] evening two weeks ago Mr. B Bowser came home from the m W office to find Mrs. Bowser seat- 1 i ed on the piano and the cook standing up on the sofa. One was nrmed with the broom and the other 5 uWith an old curtain pole, and on the ( face of each was a look that she would ' sell her life dearly. j "What in thunder does all this ^ mean?' shouted Mr. Bowser as he paused in the door of^the sitting: room. /: . "Batsf answered Mrs. Bowser. ' "What sort of an answer is that? Come down from that piano! By the great John Henry, has my house been \ turned into an insane asylum?" 1 "Mr. Bowser, there are rats in the j house," explained Mrs. Bowser as she j got down. "Cook saw three of them { in the kitchen an hour ago." 1 * "And one of 'em snapped at me like a. mad wolf," added the pride of the 1 kitchen as she also reached the floor. * "I don't believe a word of it! There isn't a rat within a mile of the house 1 and hasn't been for twenty years. * Come right downstairs, both of you. 1 Now, show me a rat Go right at it 1 and show me a rat.1" 4 "I think they came up out of the eel- i iar," said Mrs. Bowser. "I didn't see 3 one myself, but I heard them pattering i across the floor." < Sure There Were No Rats. . Pattering nothing! Cook never even ^ Sho micrht nossihlv have I can ? wvuovi wuv ....0? v L-~~??? - . seen a cockroach strolling about, but ? X doubt that Get dinner on the table < jwtthin ten minutes or there'll be something worse than rata around the r house! By George, but what fools " iwomen can make of themselves V t At the dinner table Mrs. Bowser said: T "I am sorry you talked so bluntly to cook. She isn't a girl easily frightened, ? and I am quite sure she saw at least t one rat She says three. She came running upstairs and said they were ' after her, and so I got scared." "Mrs. Bowser, didn't you hear me j ill I /r\ , jft vM. MR. BOWSER WAS BATTLED. 1 1 eay there wasn't a rat within a mile 1 of this house ?" demanded Mr. Bowser < as he knocked on the table with the handle of his knife. "Yes, but"? "There are no buts about it What T ] say about rats goes. Cook saw water < bugs or cockroaches. They might even have been ^asshoppers that jumped i in from the back yard." "But other houses have rats. "I >. 4 McLain was telling me"? ] "Mrs. McLain and Mr. Bowser are two different persons, madam. If Mrs. McLain has rats in her house she is welcome to them. I have none in mine < and never had and never will have, 1 and if I come home and find another circus performance going on somebody ] will suffer!" i Agrees to Whitewash Cellar. "I'm sure that cook"? began Mrs. Bowser, when he cut in with: , 'That will do. The subject is closed. J 1 have told you what will happen if < any more rats are seen around here." J A week passed without another rat < being seen. Then two made their ap- ] pearance, but disappeared before the < cook had time to get scared. On the next day there were four rats and on the next day one. Not a word was said to Mr. Bowser until the other ?? Wlun Um Pact. eftaiag mer uuavi. xucu <uo. sec carelesely asked: "Don't you think the cellar ought to be whitewashed again T* "Might be a good thing," wag the rePiJ "Would yea pay a man $3 to do It?" Three dollars! Three dollars! Not by the tomb of Allah! The man that charges $3 for snch a little job is a horse thief and a swindler." "Bat if it takes him a day and a half?" "He ought to do it in four boon. I did it in three. FU go down and take a look at things, and If there Is need of another coat 111 put it on tomorrow evening. I believe the pail and the brush are down there." Screams From- the Cellar. Mrs. Bowser had accomplished a part :>f the conspiracy she had entered into with the cook. She had got Mr. Bowser to go down cellar of his own ac:ord. He got a match and went down and lighted the gas and went looking iround for the whitewash outfit. He was heard to whistle a few bars of a popular air. He was heard to hum. He was heard moving about, then a long, wild bloodcurdling scream?such i scream as a woman utters when she Is thrown over a precipice 6,000 feet high because she will not marry the LeadiDg man in the Boston Ideal Comedy company. A vnicK or?/1 a fall nn tha npilflr stairs ,?3L iUOU UJUU Up *.w** v** v?v ? -? ?another yell. Then Mr. Bowser, with face as white as the dead and his eyes rolling. < "Will you tell me what on earth is the matter?" asked Mrs. Bowser as 3he came forward. "I?I saw something down there! Some?something ran over my foot!" tie gasped. "Oh, something did, eh? Well, you've t>een told there are rats about." "Of course there are rats," added the look. Would Not "Own Up." Mr. Bowser had taken a decided stand on the rat question. He had postively denied that there were rats ibout He must now own up or bluff t through. Mr. Bowser is a man who las never "owned up" over three times n his life and was then sorry for it vithin five minutes. He had got a bad jcare, but he got hold of his nerve and urned on Mr3. Bowser to shout: "Rats! Idiots! Lunatics! What I jaw down there was some stray cat. She took me by surprise and rattled tn+tr" nnmo Jit; J.U1 it 1UUU1CUU JLtlllJi UUJ, I.V1UV lp here. She won't come, but she's iown there." "But If it should be rats?" queried Urs. Bowser. "If it should be Satan himself, why ion't you ask? You are just like all >ther women. When you get a fool dea into your head nothing can drive t out I say it's a cat" "Then you ought to do down and ffloo her up. We can't have a strange rat down cellar." "I'll have her out in five minutes. That is, we will leave the door open md she w 11 come up and take a skip." "But if there are rats they will come lp." "Woman, haven't I said there wasn't m infernal rat within four miles of he house?" whooped Mr. Bowser. "Yes, but"? Finds Big Cockroaches. He turned about and went down celar. It was the only thing he could do. Ele must hunt the cat or let the rats mn^him. The gas was still burning, md he armed himself with the furiace poker and went scuffling around md calling out "Kitty" and "Shoo :herei" Nothing developed for five minutes, rhen four big rats made a dash for aim from behind a barrel. He struck it the nearest and fell down and rolled >ver, and there was another wild yell md a scramble up the stairs. The four ' -1 -1 L!.l 3 i. :ats ronowea ana wmsneu uui ui mtdtchen into the back yard before jither of the women could open her mouth to scream. "Didn't I tell you there were rats liere?" asked Mrs. Bowser. ' "You did. but where are they?" was replied. I saw three cockroaches scurrying out, but where were the rats? I told you there were none." "But why did you yell and rush then?" "To hump 'em along and give theru the scare of their lives, of course. Now. then, let's hear no more cf the rat matter. I don't propose to have this house turned into an idiot asylum because four cockroaches happened to Irop in on us for a peaceful call!" Not on Her Side. A little boy who was very much puzzled over the theory of evolution questioned his mother thus: "Mamma, am I descended from a monkey ?" "I don't know," the mother replied. T never knew any of your father's people."?Cotton Seed. J A Little Girl's Importance. Grandma (impatiently) ? Dorothy, I lo wish yon would keep quiet for a little while! Dorothy - I'll try, grandma, but please don't scold me. Just remem^pr that if it wasn't for me, you wouldn't be a grandma at all.?Chicago RecordSerald. ? Many Caught. x ? Matrimony Is like a rainstorm 3> x ?only bad when you're caught $ |> in it?Detroit Free Press. % Honeymoon Over. Mrs. Xewedd (pouting)?You are not like Kate's husband. He won't let his wife do a bit of heavy lifting. Newedcl?But I can't always be at home when you take your bread out of the oven.?Boston Transcript. The Way It Qeee Now. The (greatest novel of the oreWonder of the notion; All the rage, sir, all the ra*e? Daises the whole ereetlonl Crittoe praise on every handSpeed the author's mission; Hundred thousand oopiee and 'Nether biff edition! Authors?publishers rejoice? Live on milk and honeyt *T? K genius?" pipes a voice. "Gsmiue? No, It's moneyr ?Atlanta Constitution. Good Money After Bad. It is a curious fact that many men, level headed enough about other things, seem to lose their wits entirely when they become involved in lawsuits. In one case recently concluded in the German courts a Berlin merchant paid out over $900 to recover the value of a five cent postage stamp. He had written a letter asking for an address and inclosing postage for reply. Failing to get an answer, he sued for the stamp. The famous Missouri watermelon case was jnsc as uuu cvcu more disastrous. The seed was planted on one farm, but the vine crept through a crack in the rail fence, and the melon grew on the other side. Both farmers claimed it, and instead of perceiving the humor of the situation they went to law. To add to the puzzling features of the question of ownership there was the further complication in that the fence stood on a county line, whereupon a question of the jurisdiction of the courts came up. The farmers bankrupted themselves without obtaining a decision as to the ownership.?Green Bag. Liquid Dynamite. The Mexicans have a native brandy cailed aguardiente, which is a species of liquid dynamite, as palatable as corrosive sublimate and as full of potential deviltry as an egg is of meat. When you find a Mexican gentleman adorned with a belt full of deadly weapons decorating and deluging his interior with aguardiente it is the part of prudence to retire to a bombproof. rr"?-- nnAftini. Hnnla a Tfh i to inn A XUfi t; is auuiuci u ! utwi ? cent looking fluid called mescal, which is distilled from a cactus of the same name, which has in it all the combined energy, activity and homicidal possibilities of a volcano mixed up with the gable end of a mule. In former days the Apache Indians made a crude distillation of the same stimulant, which they called tis-win. and as a preliminary to a raid among ranches and settlements it was a great success from an Indian point of view.?Boston Herald. The Crocodiles Dived. The cunning of wild animals in concealing themselves in moments of danger is well known. A party, spending a week on the Nile, were watching eight or ten crocodiles sunning themselves on the surface of a small lagoon. It was determined to trap these monsters, if possible. The water was breast deep, including about two feet or more of heavy mud. Four nets were tied together, so as to make one long enough to reach across the lagoon, and this was weighted on the bottom. This net was drawn with long poles from each shore, and behind the net came a line of men a yard apart, prodding the mud with poles. The scheme looked like an admirable one, but the crocodiles sleepily dived, and that was the last seen of them. The water was dragged backward and forward, but they had burrowed so deeply in the mud that not one could be found. A Political Genius. Congressmen sometimes adopt queer expedients to gain the good wiil of rhoir pnnsHhipnts. Y-ears aso a mem ber from a western state was afraid that his first term would be his last, as he had not managed to make himself a power in congress. While he was debating what he should do a friend said, "You lire near the center of the United States, don't you?" "Yes." "Then why don't you introduce a bill to have the capital moved to the principal town in your district?" The congressman introduced the bill, and the people of his district at once concluded he was a great man and sent him back for anotlipr term. He reintroduced the bill in the next congress, and, although it was promptly pigeonholed in committee, his constituents gave him a third term as a reward for his genius. The Blushing Octopus. The octopus frequently changes in color like a marine chameleon. It would appear, from studies of this creature, that the colored pigment whereby this change in color is effected is contained in envelopes iD its skin, in the tissue of which are muscular fibers actuated by nerves. Should these fibers become relaxed a dark pigment appears. The phenomenon is said to be analogous to blushing.?Harper's Weekly. Corrected Him. A reporter was once interviewing Thomas A. Edison. "And you, sir," he said to the inventor, "made the first talking machine?' "No," Mr. Edison replied, "the first one was made long before my timeout of a rib." I ? I ? Three Not of a Kind. BIr Henry Maine's famous political diagnosis is worth quoting. The king of England reigns, bnt does not govern. The president of the United States governs, but does not reign. The president of France neither reigns nor governs.?Boston Herald. Usual Reason. "He used to be a straight enough joung chap. What made him get crooked?' "Trying to make both ends meet, 1 believe."?Toledo Blade. His Btrong Fao* "Bilkein's la a strong face or Tm no judge of physiognomy." "It ought to be. Be and his whole family are living on It*'?Buffalo Courier. j Obedience Is net truly performed by the body of him whose heart hi dissatisfied.?Saadl ' i . i .. Our Salesmen Will 1 Themselves in the f ? O 11 tl 1 llie long experience ox ail tne salesmen m tently aid the young folks in their home-fui and attentively. 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