The Complete Works of Artemus Ward (HTML edition)Ward, Artemus
General
The Complete Works of Artemus Ward (HTML edition)
Ward, Artemus
American wit and humor
"Is Mr. Greeley on board?" asked the chairman of the committee.
"He was, a few miles back!" said Mr. Monk; "yes," he added, after
looking down through the hole which the fearful jolting had made in the
coach-roof--"yes, I can see him! He is there!"
"Mr. Greeley," said the Chairman of the Committee, presenting himself
at the window of the coach, "Mr. Greeley, sir! We are come to most
cordially welcome you, sir--why, God bless me, sir, you are bleeding at
the nose!"
"I've got my orders!" cried Mr. Monk. "My orders is as follers: Get him
there by seving! It wants a quarter to seving. Stand out of the way!"
"But, sir," exclaimed the Committee-man, seizing the off leader by
the reins--"Mr Monk, we are come to escort him into town! Look at the
procession, sir, and the brass bands, and the people, and the young
women, sir!"
"I've got my orders!" screamed Mr. Monk. "My orders don't say nothin'
about no brass bands and young women. My orders says, 'git him there by
seving!' Let go them lines! Clear the way there! Whoo-ep! Keep
your seat, Horace!" and the coach dashed wildly through the procession,
upsetting a portion of the brass band, and violently grazing the wagon
which contained the beautiful young women in white.
Years hence, gray-haired men, who were little boys in this procession,
will tell their grandchildren how this stage tore through Mud Springs,
and how Horace Greeley's bald head ever and anon showed itself, like a
wild apparition, above the coach-roof.
Mr. Monk was on time. There is a tradition that Mr. Greeley was very
indignant for a while; then he laughed, and finally presented Mr. Monk
with a brand new suit of clothes.
Mr. Monk himself is still in the employ of the California Stage Company,
and is rather fond of relating a story that has made him famous all over
the Pacific coast. But he says he yields to no man in his admiration
for Horace Greeley.
_______________
VIII.
TO REESE RIVER.
I leave Virginia for Great Salt Lake City, via the Reese River Silver
Diggings.
There are eight passengers of us inside the coach--which, by the way,
isn't a coach, but a Concord covered mud wagon.
Among the passengers is a genial man of the name of Ryder, who has
achieved a widespread reputation as a strangler of unpleasant bears in
the mountain fastnesses of California, and who is now an eminent Reese
River miner.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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