HOIST WITH HIS OWN PETARD
Liquid nitroglycerin is still used to torpedo the oil-wells when they get old, in order to give them a new lease of life.
There was one teamster in the old days who had become notorious as a hauler of the dangerous explosive. The law does not permit the shipment of the liquid by freight or by express, and for that reason this teamster had plenty to do in hauling nitroglycerin for long distances. He was a great smoker and his old pipe was always alight, though he might be riding on a ton of nitroglycerin with a few kegs of black gunpowder chinked into the load.
One day he was carrying, on runners, about two tons of nitroglycerin and a few odd kegs of gunpowder, when something happened. There had been a fall of several inches of light snow the evening before, and the scene of the eventuation was an open field which he was crossing.
There was an enormous crater in the ground; the light snow around the crater was besprinkled with a few shreds of horse and harness and a sliver or two of sled, but not a trace of the driver was ever found.