But there are fish that should be propagated in the interest of the people. There is a species of fish that never looks at the clothes of the man who throws in the bait, a fish that takes whatever is thrown to it, and when once hold of the hook never tries to shake a friend, but submits to the inevitable, crosses its legs and says “Now I lay me,” and comes out on the bank and seems to enjoy being taken. It is a fish that is a friend of the poor, and one that will sacrifice itself in the interest of humanity. This is the fish that the State should adopt as its trade mark, and cultivate friendly relations with, and stand by. We allude to the bullhead.
The bullhead never went back on a friend. To catch the bullhead it is not necessary to tempt his appetite with porter house steak, or to display an expensive lot of fishing tackle. A pin hook, a piece of liver, and a cistern pole, is all the capital required to catch a bullhead. He lays upon the bottom of a stream or pond in the mud, thinking. There is no fish that does more thinking or has a better head for grasping great questions, or chunks of liver than the bullhead. His brain is large, his heart beats for humanity, and if he can’t get liver, a piece of a tin tomato can will make a meal for him. It is an interesting study to watch a boy catch a bullhead. The boy knows where the bullhead congregates, and when he throws in his hook it is dollars to buttons that “in the near future” he will get a bite. The bullhead is democratic in all its instincts. If the boy’s shirt is sleeveless, his hat crownless, and his pants a bottomless pit, the bullhead will bite just as well as though the boy is dressed in purple and fine linen, with knee breeches and plaid stockings. The bull head seems to be dozing—bulldozing we might say—on the muddy bottom, and a stranger might say that he would not bite. But wait. There is a movement of his continuation, and his cow-catcher moves gently toward the piece of liver. He does not wait to smell of it, and canvas in his mind whether the liver is fresh. It makes no difference to him. He argues that here is a family out of meat. “My country calls and I must go,” says the bullhead to himself, and he opens his mouth and the liver disappears.
It is not certain that the boy will think of his bait for half an hour, but the bullhead is in no hurry. He lays in the mud and proceeds to digest the liver. He realizes that his days will not be long in the land, or water, more properly speaking, and he argues if he swallows the bait and digests it before the boy pulls him out, he will be just so much ahead. Finally the boy thinks of his bait, and pulls it out, and the bullhead is landed on the bank, and the boy cuts him open to get the hook out. Some fish only take the bait gingerly, and are only caught around the selvage of the mouth, and they are comparatively easy to dislodge. Not so with the bullhead. He says if liver is a good thing you can’t have too much of it, and it tastes good all the way down. The boy gets down on his knees to dissect the bullhead, and get his hook, and it may be that the boy swears. It would not be astonishing, though he must feel, when he gets his hook out of the hidden recesses of the bullhead, like the minister that took up a collection and didn’t get a cent, though he expressed his thanks at getting his hat back. There is one drawback to the bullhead, and that is his horns. We doubt if a boy ever descended into the patent insides of a bullhead, to mine for Limerick hooks, that did not, before his work was done, run a horn into his vital parts. But the boy seems to expect it, and the bullhead enjoys it. We have seen a bullhead lay on the bank and become dry, and to all appearances dead to all that was going on, and when the boy sat down on him and got a horn in his elbow, and yelled murder, the bullhead would grin from ear to ear, and wag his tail as though applauding for an end core.
The bullhead never complains. We have seen a boy take a dull knife and proceed to follow a fish line down a bullhead from his head to the end of his subsequent anatomy, and all the time there would be an expression of sweet peace on the countenance of the bullhead, as though he enjoyed it. If we were preparing a picture representing “Resignation,” for a chromo to give to subscribers, and wished to represent a scene of suffering in which the sufferer was light hearted, and seemed to recognize that all was for the best, we should take for the subject a bullhead, with a boy searching with a knife for a long lost fish hook.
The bullhead is a fish that has no scales, but in lieu thereof is a fine India rubber skin, that is as far ahead of fiddle string material for strength and durability as possible. The meat of the bullhead is not as choice as that of the mackerel, but it fills up a stomach just as well, and the Sun insists that the fish commissioners shall drop the hatching of aristocratic fish and give the bullhead a chance. There’s millions in it.
WHY NOT RAISE WOLVES?
You devote a good deal of time and labor to the raising of sheep, and what do you get for it. The best sheep cannot lay more than eight pounds of wool in a season, and even if you get fifty cents a pound for it, you have not got any great bonanza. Now, the state encourages the raising of wolves, by offering a bounty of ten dollars for a piece of skin off the head of each wolf. It does not cost any more to raise a wolf than it does to raise a sheep, and while sheep rarely raise more than two lambs a year, a pair of good wolves are liable to raise twenty young ones in the course of a year, if it is a good year for wolves. In addition to the encouragement offered by the state, many counties give as much more, so that one wolf scalp will bring more money than five sheep. You will readily see that our wise legislators are offering inducements to you that you should be thankful for. You can establish a wolf orchard on any farm, and with a pair of good wolves to start on, there is millions in it.
THE SUDDEN FIRE-WORKS AT RACINE.
One of those Fourth of July accidents that are always looked for but seldom occur, happened at Racine, Monday night, which struck terror to the hearts and other portions of the bodies of many eminent citizens, and that none were killed we can all thank Providence, who tempers the fire-works to the sweaty citizen in his shirt sleeves. The enterprizing citizens had contributed a large sum of money, which had been judiciously expended in all kinds of fire-works, and one side of the public square was given up to the display.
Thousands of citizens had gathered there, from city and country, and bright Roman candles shone o’er fair men and brave women, and sixteen thousand nine hundred and twelve hearts beat happy, while music arose with its voluptuous swell, and soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again, or words to that effect. At least that was what a young fellow from Racine told us, who was here to see a specialist to have a splinter from a rocket stick removed from his ear.
A few pieces had been shot off, a few bunches of crackers had had their tails tied together and been hung over a wire clothes line, like cats, to fight it out, and the crowd was holding its breath for the next boom, when there was an explosion; the earth seemed to tremble, and the air was full of all kinds of fire-works. The whole supply of fire-works had become ignited, and were blowing off where they listeth, without regard to anybody’s feelings.
The crowd became panic stricken, and there never was another such a scene, and never will be until the last great day, when a few thousand people suddenly find that they have got into hell, by mistake, when they thought they were ticketed through to the other place. It was perfectly awful. Prominent citizens who usually display great pluck, became fearfully rattled.
A man named Martindale, a railroad man who weighs over two hundred pounds, was standing near a telegraph pole, and as the firing commenced he climbed up the pole as easy as a squirrel would climb a tree, and when it was over they had to get a fire ladder to get him down; as his pants had got caught over the glass telegraph knob, and he had forgotten the combination, and besides he said he didn’t want to take off his clothes up there and come down, even if it was dark, because it would be just his luck to have some one fire off a Roman candle when he got down.
The Hon. Norton J. Field was another man who lost his nerve. He was explaining to some ladies one of the pieces that was to be fired off, which was an allegorical picture representing the revolution, when the whole business blew up. He thought a
t the time, that the explosion was in the programme, and was just reassuring the ladies, by telling them it reminded him of battle scenes he had witnessed when he was on the military committee in the assembly, when he noticed a girl near him whose polonaise had caught fire, and he rushed up to her, caught her by the dress, intending, with his cool hands, to put out the fire.
The girl felt some one feeling, as she supposed, for her pocket-book, and she started to run, yelling, “pickpocket,” and left the burning polonaise in Mr. Field’s hands. He blushed, and was about to explain to his lady friends how the best of us are liable to have our motives misconstrued, when somebody threw a box of four dozen of those large firecrackers right at his feet, and they were all on fire. Ten of them exploded at once, and he grabbed the polonaise in one hand and his burning coat tail in the other, and started west on a run.
The steward of the Gideon’s Band Club House, at Burlington, said he arrived there at daylight on the morning of the 5th, and he still held the pieces of dress, but the whole back of his coat was burned off, and the suspenders just held by a thread. He said the comet struck the earth at Racine, at 9:30 the night before, and knocked the town into the lake, and he and another fellow were all that escaped.
The narrowest escape was that of young Mr. Oberman. He is a small man, all except his heart and feet, and when the air began to fill with patriotic missiles, he started to run. On passing the News office he had to jump over an old coal stove that stood there, and while he was in the air, six feet from the sidewalk, a sky rocket stick passed through his coat tail and pinned him to the building, where he hung suspended, while other rocket sticks were striking all around him, Roman candle colored balls were falling on his unprotected head, etc. and one of these negro chasers that run all over the ground, climbed up the side of the building and tried to get in his pants pocket.
Mr. Oberman begged Mr. Wright, the postmaster, to cut him down, but Mr. Wright, who was using both hands and his voice trying to disengage a package of pin-wheels from the back portion of his coat, which were on fire and throwing out colored sparks, said he hadn’t got time, as he was going down to the river to take a sitz bath for his health.
The man that keeps the hotel next door to the News office came out with a pail of water, yelled “fire,” and threw the water on Mr. Curt Treat’s head. Mr. Treat was very much vexed, and told the hotel man if he couldn’t tell the difference between an auburn haired young man and a pin-wheel, he’d better go and hire somebody that could. Friends of Mr. Treat say that he would be justified in going into the hotel and ordering a bottle of pop, and then refusing to pay for it, as the water took all the starch out of his shirt.
Those who saw the explosion say it was one of the most magnificent, yet awful and terrible sights ever witnessed, and the only wonder is that somebody was not hurt. What added to the terror of the scene was when they went to the artesian well to get water to put out the fire and found that the well had ceased flowing. On investigation they found that Mr. Sage, the assembly man, had crawled into the pipe.
By the way, Mr. Oberman finally got down from his terrible position by the aid of the editor of the Journal, to whom Mr. Oberman promised coal enough to run his engine for a year. Very few men displayed any coolness except Mr. Treat and Mr. Sage.
LA CROSSE NEBECUDNEZZER WATER.
It is the great ambition of our life to bring to the notice of the people of the world the curative powers of the La Crosse water, that all who may be suffering from any disease, however complicated, may be cured, and all men may become healthy, and women too, and doctors will have to go out harvesting. The La Crosse artesian well, was begun last fall, and completed as soon as the contractor found he couldn’t make any money at it. It was rumored that he struck granite, and in fact several little specks of granite were found in the stuff that come from the hole, but it is pretty generally believed now that the granite particles got in from the top, unknown to the contractor. The water came to within ten feet of the surface, and struck. It never would come any further, and the world would have remained in ignorance of its curative powers, only for Powers, who put in a hydraulic ram, and the blockade was broken, the water now flows to the surface, and all is well.
Attention was first called to the curative powers of the water, by a singular incident. A teamster whose duty it was to haul stone, was in the habit of stopping at the well to water his mules. One of the mules was in a sad state. He was blind in one eye, had a spavin, a ringbone, the heaves, his liver was torpid, his lungs were badly affected, and his friends feared that he was not long for the stone quarry. He had no family. Soon after the mule began to drink the water, the driver noticed a great change come over him. Previously he had seemed resigned to his fate, but latterly he was ambitious. One day while playfully mashing the mule over the head with a sled stake, the driver noticed that a new eye had grown in the place of the former cavity, and as the mule kicked him with more than his accustomed vigor, he noticed that the spavin and ring bone were gone, and the former plaintive melody of his voice gave place to a bray that resembled the whistle of the Alex. Mitchell. When it was known that the mule had been cured, others tried the water, men who had never drank it before, until to-day there are thousands who will testify to the benefits arising from its use. We could give the names of many who have been snatched from the grave—the La Crosse water is a regular body snatcher—but we will first give an analysis of the water.
Believing that the water was destined to play a prominent part in solving the great question of how to euchre death, we sent a quantity of it to the eminent Prof. Alonzo Brown, M.D.V.S. of Jefferson, Wis., with a letter of transmittal authorizing him to analyze it thoroughly, and give us the result, at our expense. The following is Prof. Brown’s analysis:
LABRATORY JEFFERSON LIVERY STABLE,
August 3, 1877.
Lieut. GEO. W. PECK,
4th Wis. Cavalry,
Dear Sir:
Yours of July 25th, received. I should have attended to the water before, but have had several cases of blind staggers in my barn, which has kept me busy. I have examined the water by every process known to science, and pronounce it bully. I took it apart at my leisure, and find that it contains to one U.S. washtub full, of 741 cubic inches, the following stuff:
Chloride, of Sodium, (common salt)
Chloride of Pilgarlic
Bicarbonate of erysipelas
Bicarbonate of pie plant
Blue pills
Bicarbonate of soda water (vanilla.)
Sulphate of Potasalager beer
Bicarbonate corrugated iron
Mustang Liniment
Boneset and summer savory
Dow’s Liver Cure, (6 bottles for $1.)
Bromide of Alcock’s Porous Plaster
Flouride of Pain Killer (for cucumbers,)
Paris green
Spruce gum and Vinegar Bitters
In submitting this analysis permit me to say that I find traces of mock turtle soup, and India Rubber. I consider the La Crosse Nebecudnezzer water the most comprehensive water that I have ever analyzed, and I would recommend it for any disease that human beings or animals may have.
Very Respectfully,
ALONZO BROWN,
Prof. of Chemistry in Jefferson Livery stable, and late Veterinary Surgeon 4th Wis. Cavalry.
* * * *
We have known Mr. Brown long and well, and his statement in regard to the water can be relied upon. Citizens should retain a copy of this analysis for future reference.
Mr. E.W. Keyes, of Madison, writing under date of August 1st, says: “The La Crosse water you sent me has caused an entire new crop of hair to grow upon my head. I had been bald for years, and offered five hundred dollars, for any medicine that would cause hair to grow. Enclosed find five hundred dollars, and send me more water. I want to try it on Murphey, of the Sentinel. I think it would be a good joke on Murphey.”
But wait till we get all the letters written from prominent men who
have been cured.
THE INFIDEL AND HIS SILVER MINE.
It is announced in the papers that Colonel Ingersoll, the dollar-a-ticket infidel, has struck it rich in a silver mine, and is now worth a million dollars. Here is another evidence of the goodness of God. Ingersoll has treated God with the greatest contempt, called him all the names he could think of, called him a liar, a heartless wretch, and stood on a stump and dared God to knock a chip off his shoulder, and instead of God’s letting him have one below the belt and knocking seven kinds of cold victuals out of him, God gives him a pointer on a silver mine, and the infidel rakes in a cool million, and laughs in his sleeve, while thousands of poor workers in the vineyard are depending for a livelihood on collections that pan out more gun wads and brass pants buttons to the ton of ore than they do silver.
This may be all right, and we hope it is, and we don’t want to give any advice on anybody else’s business, but it would please Christians a good deal better to see that bold man taken by the slack of the pants and lifted into the poor house, while the silver he has had fall to him was distributed among the charitable societies, mission schools and churches, so a minister could get his salary and buy a new pair of trousers to replace those that he has worn the knees out of kneeling down on the rough floor to pray.
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