 | Eli Perkins (at large) |  |
A QUEER MAN.
One day, as the Kansas Pacific train neared Topeka,
I sat down by an old farmer from Lawrence. Corn
bins lined the road, and millions of bushels of corn
greeted us from the car windows. Sometimes the bins
full of golden grain followed the track like a huge
yellow serpent.
Looking up at the old granger, I asked him where
all this corn came from. “Do you ship it from New
York, sir?”
“From what?” he said.
“From New York, sir.”
“What, corn from New York!”
“Yes, sir,” I said. “Did you import it from New
York, or did you ship it from England?”
He looked at me from head to foot, examined my
coat, looked at my ears, and then exclaimed,
“Great God!”
I never heard those two words sound so like “darned
fool” before.
A moment afterwards the old farmer turned his eyes
pityingly upon me and asked me where I lived.
“I live in New York, sir.”
“Whar?”
“In New York, sir. I came West to lecture.”
“What, you lecture?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You!”
“I do.”
“You lecture! you do? Well, I'd
give ten dollars to hear you lecture.”
I never knew whether this was a
great compliment, or—well, or what it
was.
| Eli Perkins (at large) | |