Peck's Sunshine: Being a Collection of Articles Written for Peck's Sun,; Milwaukee, Wis. - 1882Peck, George W. (George Wilbur)
General
Peck's Sunshine: Being a Collection of Articles Written for Peck's Sun,; Milwaukee, Wis. - 1882
Peck, George W. (George Wilbur)
American wit and humor
Well, it is all over; but while we write there is a little fellow
sleeping on a tear-stained pillow, dreaming, perhaps, of a heaven where
the woods are full of King Charles' spaniel dogs, and a doorkeeper
stands with a club to keep out policemen. And still we cannot blame
policemen--it is the law that is to blame--the wise men who go to the
legislature, and make months with one day too much, pass laws that a
dog shall be muzzled and wear a brass check, or he is liable to go mad.
Statistics show that not one dog in a million ever goes mad, and that
they are more liable to go mad in winter than in summer; but several
hundred years ago somebody said that summer was “dog days,” and the
law-makers of this enlightened nineteenth century still insist on a wire
muzzle at a season of the year when a dog wants air and water, and wants
his tongue out.
So we compel our guardians of the peace to go around assassinating dogs.
Men, who as citizens, would cut their hands off before they would injure
a neighbor's property, or speak harsh to his dog, when they hire out to
the city must stifle all feelings of humanity, and descend to the level
of Paris scavengers. We compel them to do this. If they would get on
their ears and say to the city of Milwaukee, “We will guard your city,
and protect you from insult, and die for you if it becomes necessary;
but we will see you in hades before we will go around assassinating
dogs,” we as a people, would think more of them, and perhaps build them
a decent station house to rest in.
The dog law is as foolish as the anti-treating law, and if it were not
enforced, no harm would be done. Our legislators have to pass about so
many laws anyway, and we should use our judgment about enforcing them.
But the dog is dead, and the little man meditates a terrible revenge. He
is going to have a goat that can whip a policeman, he says; then there
will be fun around the parsonage.
AND HE ROSE UP AND SPAKE.
As a general thing railroad men are “pretty fly,” as the saying is,
and not very apt to be scared. But a case occurred up on the La Crosse
division of the St. Paul road last week that caused a good deal of hair
to stand.
The train from St. Paul east runs to La Crosse, where all hands are
changed, and the new gang run to Chicago. On the trip of which we speak
there was placed in the baggage car at St. Paul a coffin, and at Lake
City a parrot in a cage was put in. Before the train got to Winona other
baggage was piled on top, so the coffin only showed one end, and the
parrot cage was behind a trunk, next to the barrel of drinking water,
out of sight, and where the cage would not get jammed. At La Crosse the
hands were changed, and conductor Fred Cornes, as 6:35 arrived, shouted
his cheery “All aboard,” and the train moved off. The coffin was seen
by all the men in the baggage car, and a solemnity took possession of
everybody. Railroad men never feel 'entirely happy when a corpse is on
the train.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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