The Head of the Family.
Our story begins with the death of our hero.
The manner of it was decapitation, the instrument
a mowing machine. A young son of the
deceased, dumb with horror, seized the paternal
head and ran with it to the house.
“There!” ejaculated the young man, bowling
the gory pate across the threshold at his mother's
feet, “look at that, will you?”
The old lady adjusted her spectacles, lifted the
dripping head into her lap, wiped the face of it with
her apron, and gazed into its fishy eyes with
tender curiosity. “John,” said she, thoughtfully,
“is this yours?”
“No, ma, it ain't none o' mine.”
“John,” continued she, with a cold, unimpassioned
earnestness, “where did you get this
thing?”
“Why, ma,” returned the hopeful, “that's
Pap's.”
“John”—and there was just a touch of severity
in her voice—“when your mother asks you a question
you should answer that particular question.
Where did you get this?”
“Out in the medder, then, if you're so derned
pertikeller,” retorted the youngster, somewhat
piqued; “the mowin' machine lopped it off.”
The old lady rose and restored the head into the
hands of the young man. Then, straightening
with some difficulty her aged back, and assuming a
matronly dignity of bearing and feature, she
emitted the rebuke following:
“My son, the gentleman whom you hold in your
hand—any more pointed allusion to whom would
be painful to both of us—has punished you a
hundred times for meddling with things lying
about the farm. Take that head back and put it
down where you found it, or you will make your
mother very angry.”
