Atchoo! Sneezes from a Hilarious Vaudevillian. Niblo George

ages he has groveled

      In superstition dim

      But now we'll help his progress

      By making gods for him.

      No seven-handed figures;

      No gods with coiling tails:

      No birds, no bugs, no serpents,

      No animals, nor whales —

      No, sir! He'll have our idols:

      A shovelful of coal,

      A meter, and an oil can

      To terrify his soul.

      A bonnet and a ribbon:

      A bargain ad. – the strife

      They'll cause will make the heathen

      Yearn for a better life.

      The poor benighted pagan

      Will come out of the dark

      And bow before our idol —

      The mighty dollar mark!

      Mr. Carboline, our druggist at the corner, has troubles of his own, though I never realized the fact until I saw a perspiring individual rush in upon him with a thermometer in his hand the other day, and in an excited tone exclaim:

      "Here, take back this darned machine before I freeze to death."

      He looked so heated just then that we began to imagine he must be a little out of his mind, but Carboline ventured to ask humbly enough what was the matter with the mercury register.

      "It's out of whack somehow, and won't register correctly. Darn it, I've been shivering in my room for a week, and just couldn't keep warm. I had the thermometer over my writing desk, and the other morning when the steam went down a little I looked at the mercury. It showed forty degrees.

      "I knew nothing less than a polar bear could work in that temperature, and went hustling after the janitor.

      "He shook up his furnace, and the steam began to sizzle, but the room wouldn't get warm enough to raise that mercury above 50.

      "We ran short of coal for a day, and she went down to 40 again, and I went over to stop with a friend till we got more coal.

      "Then the steam sizzled once more, but the north wind seemed to come in through the window cracks and the shivers had me all over.

      "I struck for window strips, and had a row with the landlord.

      "The mercury showed 50 degrees right along, and though I made it hot for the janitor I couldn't get any of it into the blamed thermometer.

      "Yesterday I gave notice that I would get out if they didn't keep me warm. I'm a bachelor tenant paying a good price and generally no kicker, and they didn't want me to leave.

      "About an hour ago the janitor came in to see how I was getting along.

      "He found me at my desk with a blanket around me. He asked if I were sick. I told him I was frozen.

      "He said he thought the room was very warm. Before licking him I showed him the thermometer and told him that was the real test.

      "The mercury stood at 50.

      "The janitor swore and went out.

      "He came back in a minute with another thermometer and hung it alongside of mine. It was a fine one, guaranteed to keep perfect records.

      "It marked 65 degrees when he brought it in, and in a minute or two it showed 71. Mine stood still at 50.

      "The janitor looked at the two machines and began to grin. I began to unwind the blanket that was around me. The janitor looked scared, but I told him not to run; that I wasn't going to lick him. The only man that I felt like licking was the one who sold me a thermometer that wouldn't go.

      "You're the one.

      "Now, it's up to you to apologize, give me a machine that is true, or be licked. I've paid my money and you can take your choice."

      Mr. Carboline preferred to make the change.

      By the way, before I forget it, let me tell you about young Charlie Suitz, a friend of mine, who is really as modest a chap as you would care to meet.

      Charlie has a girl upon whom he calls very frequently, and, they tell me, at the most unexpected times.

      That was probably how it happened he dropped in one afternoon and was informed by her mother that she was upstairs taking a bath, so he told the old lady he only wanted to speak to her for a minute; and she called out:

      "Mamie, come right down, Mr. Suitz wants to see you down here."

      So Mamie called back, "Oh, mother, I can't; I have nothing on."

      "Well, slip on something right away, and come down."

      And what do you think? Mamie slipped on the stairs, and came down.

      Talking of your level-headed young Lochinvars of to-day, who use automobiles in their elopements instead of horses as in the old times, there was Charlie's brother who fell in love with the only daughter of old Squeezer, the richest skinflint in Stringtown, and was bound to have her, even if he had to resort to strategy.

      "Oh, Bob," she whispered, sliding down into the outstretched arms of the lover who stood at the bottom of the ladder, "are you sure the coast is clear?"

      "To a dead certainty," he replied, bitterly. "I succeeded in boring a hole in the water pipe. Your father has discovered it, and will keep his finger over the hole until the plumber arrives. Come!"

      I dined at the Waldorf the other night, and somehow in the long list of courses found my mind wrestling with an item that had caught my eye in one of the yellow sheets, where a certain well-known doctor declared that the simple cooking of savage tribes was far superior to that of the present civilized races.