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A DEBATE ON INTEMPERANCE.
Last Tuesday evenin’ the “Creation Searchin’ Society” argued on this question.
“Resolved; It is right to licence intemperance.”
Cornelius Cork, the President, got up and give the question out, and then a stern majestic look swept over his face, some like a thunder cloud, and says he, pintin’ out his forefinger nobly:
“Brother ‘Creation Searchers,’ and friends and neighbors promiscous. Before we tackle this momentous subject to-night, I have got a little act of justice to preform, which if I shirked out of doin’ of it, would send my name down to posterity as a coward, a rank traitor, and almost a impostor. The public mind is outraged at the present time, by officers in high places provin’ traitors to their trust: traitors to the confidin’ public that have raised ’em up to their high stations. The public of Jonesville will find that I am not one of that kind, that I am not to be trifled with, nor will I be seduced by flattery or gifts, to permit them that have raised me up to the height I now stand on, to be trifled with.”
Here he paused a moment, and laid his forefinger on his heart and looked round on us, as if he was invitin’ us all to take our lanterns and walk through it, and behold its purity. That gesture took dretful well with the audience. The President realized it, he see what he had done, and he kep’ the same position as he proceeded and went on.
“Every one who was present at the last meetin’ of our ‘Creation Searchin’ Society’ knows there was a disturbance there. They know and I know that right in the midst of our most searchin’ investigations, some unprincipled villain in the disguise of humanity outraged us, and insulted us, and defied us by blimmin’; in other words by yellin’ out ‘Blim! Blim!’ every few minutes. And now I publicly state and proclaim to that blimmer, that if he blims here to night, I will put the papers onto him. I will set the law at him. I’ll see what Blackstone and Coke has to say about blimmin’.”