A PREMATURE CELEBRATION.
THE firemen had a parade Saturday. It was a fine affair; but the absence
of Mr. O'Clarence was deeply felt, not only by the department, but by the
public. His long and faithful services at the business-meetings and festivals,
and his splendid bearing on parade, have given Mr. O'Clarence an enviable
position in the hearts of his countrymen. We are sorry he was not present
Saturday; but an unlooked-for and very painful accident deprived him and
us of a great pleasure. The night which preceded the last anniversary of
our national independence, he took home twenty-five dollars' worth of fireworks
for a splurge on the next night. He calculated he had glory enough in that
package to
fill with gratitude, and admiration every tax-payer on North Street;
and his wife, after carefully examining the lot, was equally confident that
the neighbors would see something that would "make their eyes bung out,"
as she pensively expressed it. The next morning, O'Clarence took out the
bundle to look it over again, and feed on the anticipation. There were these
cannon-crackers,—several packs;—and Roman candles, and blue-fire, and
pin-wheels, and rockets, and the like; a very creditable assortment for any
family. Mr. Wickford's boy, from the next house, was in, and sat on the floor,
holding a piece of lighted punk in his hand, and had both his eyes and mouth
wide open, enjoying the sight. O'Clarence was sitting on his haunches, holding
a pin-wheel in his hand, and explaining to Mrs. O'Clarence how cheaply they
could be made in China, and how superior in ingenuity and industry were the
Chinese to all other races. None of them know how it happened; but O'Clarence
remembers that there were two open packs of cannon-crackers just under him,
and thinks Wickford's boy must have in some way dropped the punk in among
them, and, in the general interest, forgotten that it was afire. At any rate,
there was a sudden siss right under Mr. O'Clarence, followed in the next
instant by a tornado of sounds and sparks; and that gentleman at once shot
toward the ceiling in a blaze of various-
colored lights, while the air became
thick with sparks, blue-lights, blazing balls, industrious pin-wheels, insane
sky-rockets, and screeching crackers. Mrs. O'Clarence fell over a chair that
cost eight dollars when new, and struck the back of her head against the
stove-hearth with a violence that added materially to the display of fireworks
already going on. Wickford's boy was struck in the mouth with a sky-rocket,
and had two-thirds of his hair taken off by a Roman candle, and was knocked
through a doorway by a piece of ordnance just introduced this season, and
which will undoubtedly become popular when understood better. He was afterward
fished out of a rose-bush, and taken home in a table-cloth. O'Clarence remained
during the entire exhibition, looking at it from various positions; and,
when it was over with, he was put in a sheet by the neighbors, and saturated
with oil, and then covered with molasses and flour. We learn that new skin
is already forming on parts of him; and, if no unfavorable symptoms set in,
he will be out again in a fortnight, although it is not likely he will mingle
much in society until his hair and eyebrows commence to grow. He thinks
Wickford's boy is dead; and they dare not tell him to the contrary, until
he gets stronger. Singularly enough, Mrs. O'Clarence escaped injury by burns:
but the blow on her head was so severe, that she cannot bear to have her
back-hair drawn up as
high as it was before; and missing her church-privileges
is a sore trial to her.
