You are caught in a net she has woven for you—a net from which have escaped a few; and if on the whole she offends your taste, being forty-five inches about the waist, and if you don’t fancy that seven shoe, never mind; she’s the one for you. You’ll forget and forgive if she has a past; you think you’re her first real love, and her last. You are hot all over, your heart beats fast. You’re in love.
AN ISTHMIAN WOOER.
AY, girl, I admire your shape, an’ I want to take you to ride. I’m goin’ to get a coach closed in, so they won’t know who’s inside. An’, say, I wish you lived down the line, but you live like a speakitty. Wouldn’t you like a little time with a lovin’ guy like me? Straight goods, I like your style; I told a feller so; I admired you for quite a while, an’ I bet you didn’t know. I said to a guy, “I’m goin’ around an’ I’ll bet I’ll make a hit.” I won’t never breathe a dog gone sound—let me love you up a bit. How could I squeal, when I have a wife that thinks me the finest thing that ever drew the breath of life, an angel without a wing? I’d like to bring you a bottle of jam, some day from the commissary, livin’ alone without a man.
Say, kid, ain’t you free to marry? Class! What’s that got to do with us? Say, that puts me on the bum. Education, your foot! Don’t make such a fuss; see, I brought you some chewin’ gum. You’re just a little too touchy, see! I don’t understand your way. The wimmin I know are easy an’ free, an’ just a little bit gay. If I was just a man about town, don’t you believe I’d look it? I like you, girl; don’t wear such a frown! Do you think I’m a guy that’s crooked? I’m not of your class? Oh, that’s it, eh? Some chump that pushes a pen, that gets but a hundred a month for pay, is more in your line of men. Do you know what the Colonel said to me? an’ I think he’s always right. Education ain’t worth a darn, says he; ’tis a man that puts up the fight. Well, so long, kid, since you prefer a guy that pushes a pen, who has his little hundred per, but ain’t my class of men.
PRESERVED PEACHES.
HE chumps in Panama were glad to do the turkey trot, and other stunts not quite so bad that folks call tommy rot. When Morton with his peaches came, the cavaliers made bids, preserved them up in dry champagne, and acted just like kids. A banker now is bankrupt, and the guy in the Elite is selling out his socks and pants to put him on his feet. Raul E. has a broken limb, he capered so each night. The peaches all looked up to him because his heart was light.
We hoary heads came from the Zone, in force, to see it done, and spent our coin, lest it be thought we didn’t like the fun. Our wives and mothers thought that we were at a mission church, listening to a sermon by the Rev. Baldhead Birch. And when we sought our peaceful homes with sanctimonious airs, and knelt beside our babies’ cots and taught them little prayers, we felt a sort of sneakish, like other hypocrites, and worried lest our wives hear, and have a thousand fits. But now these spasms are all gone; we’re quite ourselves again; our wives have never yet caught on, and therefore have felt no pain. The Morton Peaches were so wise, they took our coin away, and told us we were silly guys, like those along Broadway.