WE had bin havin' a good deal of argufyin' about the school house. You see it had got to be a sort of a tumble-down ram-shackle sort of an affair, and when it wuz bad weather we couldn't have school in it, 'cause you might jist as well be a sittin' under a siv when it rained as to be a settin' in that school house. Wall, it wuz a-cummin' along the fall term, and we wanted our boys and girls to git all the schoolin' an' eddication what they could; so we called a meetin' of the school directors to devise ways and means of buildin' a new school-house without stoppin' school. Wall, we all met down at the school-house; thar wuz Deacon Witherspoon, Ezra Hoskins, Ruben Hendricks, Si Pettingill, old Jim Lawson and me. Before we commenced debatin' and argufyin' on the matter, Si Pettingill alowed he'd sing a song. Wall, he got up and sang the durndest old-fashioned song I calculate I ever heered in my life; went somethin' like this:
Oh a frog went a courtin' and he did ride,
oohoo—oohoo.
Oh a frog went a courtin' and he did ride,
With a sword and a pistol by his side,
oohoo—oohoo.
He rode till he came to the mouse's door,
oohoo—oohoo,
He rode till he came to the mouse's door,
And there he knelt upon the floor,
oohoo—oohoo.
He took Miss Mousey on his knee,
oohoo—oohoo.
He took Miss Mousey on his knee,
Said he, Missy Mouse will you marry me?
oohoo—oohoo.
Wall, we headed Si off right thar; I guess if we hadn't he'd bin singin' about that frog and the mouse yet. Wall, jist then old Jim Lawson he sed, "I make a moshen;" and Deacon Witherspoon, he wuz chairman, and he sed, "Now look here, young feller, don't you make any moshens at me or durned if I don't git down thar and flop you in about a minnit. You take your feet off'n that desk and that corncob pipe out'n your mouth, and conduct yourself with dignity and decorum, and address the chairman of this yere meetin' in a manner benttin' to his station." Wall, Jim he got right smart riled over the matter, and he sed, "Wall, you gosh durned old gospel pirate, I want you to understand that I'm a member of this body, a citizen, a taxpayer and a honorably discharged servant of the government, and I make a moshen that we build a new school-house out of the bricks of the old school-house, and I do further offer an amendment to the original moshen, that we don't tear down the old schoolhouse until the new one is built."
Wall, Deacon Witherspoon sed, "The gentleman is out of order;" and Jim sed, "I ain't so durned much out of order but that I kin trim you in about two shakes of a dead sheep's tail." Wall, before we knowed it, them two old cusses wuz at it. The Deacon he grabbed Jim and Jim he grabbed the Deacon, and when we got 'em separated the Deacon he wuz stuck fast 'tween a desk and the woodbox, and Jim had his wooden leg through a knot hole in the floor and couldn't get it out, and they've both gone to law about it. Jim says he's goin' to git out a writ of corpus cristy fer the Deacon, and the Deacon says he's goin' to prosecute Jim for bigamy and arson and have him read out of the church.
Wall, we've got the same old schoolhouse.
Justice—Those who hanker fer it would be generally better
off if they didn't git it.—Punkin Centre Philosophy.
The Weekly Paper at Punkin Centre
WALL, t'other day, down in New York, I wuz a-walkin' along on that street what they call the broad way, when I cum to the Herald squar noospaper buildin', and it wuz all winders and masheenery. Wall, I wuz jist flobgasted; I jist stood thar lookin' at it. On the front thar wuz a bell and a couple of fellers standin' along side of it with slege hammers in their hands, and every onct in a while they would go to poundin' on that bell, and folks 'd stand 'round and watch 'em do it; they reminded me of a couple of fellers splittin' rales. And all 'round the edge of the buildin' they had hoot owls sottin', with electric lites in their ize, and thar wuz no end to the masheenery in that buildin'. If anyone hed ever told me thar wuz that much masheenery in the whole world durned if I'd a-beleeved them; biggest masheen I'd ever seen before wuz Si Pettingill's new thrashin' masheen. Wall, I jist stood thar a-watchin' them printin' presses a-runnin'; paper goin' in to one end and cumin' out at t'other all printed and full of picters and folded up ready to sell; it jist beat all the way they done it. Wall, we never had but one paper down home at Punkin Centre; we called it "The Punkin Centre Weakly Bugle;" old Jim Lawson he wuz editor of it. You see Jim he wuz sort of a triflin' no 'count old cuss, so to keep him out of mischief we made him editor. Wall, Jim he had his place up over Ezra Hoskins' grossery store. He never got any money for the noospaper—always got paid in produce, and Ezra's store wuz a mighty good place fer him to take in his subskriptions. Wall, things went along pretty smooth fer quite a spell 'til one day a feller he cum in and give Jim a keg of hard cider fer a year's subskription to the noospaper, and we all calculated right then that somethin' wuz a-goin' to happen; and sure enough it did. You see 'bout that time Jim had got two advertisements; one wuz fer Ruben Jackson's resterant and the other wuz the time table of the Punkin Centre and Paw Paw Valley Railroad. Wall, Jim he got to drinkin' the hard cider and settin' type at the same time, and when the paper cum out on Thursday it wuz wuth goin' miles to see. Neer as I kin remember it sed that: "Ruben Jackson's resterant would leave the depo every mornin' at eight o'clock fer beefstake and mutton stews, and would change cars at White River Junkshen for mins and punkin pise, and cottage puddin' would be a flag stashen fer coffy and do nuts like mother used to make, and the train wouldn't run on Sundays cos the stashun agint what done the cookin' would have to run en extra on that day over the chicken and ham sandwitch divishion."
I believe that wuz the last issu of the Punkin Centre Weakly Bugle.