Nothin’ wuz too good for his children. He adored ’em, and tried to be father and mother both to his motherless boy and girl. And money, so fur as they wuz concerned, flowed as free as water.
P. Martyn didn’t stay but a few days this time, but left the children two weeks and come back for ’em.
He stayed right to our house, and his eyesight, so fur as the other relations wuz concerned, wuz jest the same. He rode round considerable with his children, and writ about five thousand letters, and sent off and received about the same number of letters and telegrams, and said and assured us at the end of the three days he wuz there, that “it wuz so sweet for him to have sech a perfect rest.”
He didn’t tell us much about what wuz in the letters, though the last day that he wuz there he got sech a enormous batch of ’em that he daned to explain the meanin’ of ’em to Josiah and me, for we both had helped him to carry ’em in. Sez he, “There is no such thing as satisfying the masses.
“Now,” sez he, “I’ve built a line of trolley cars, that are the means of saving no end of time, for my drivers, if they don’t come up to the swift schedule time I have marked down for them, I discharge them at once.
“They are economical, much cleaner and swifter than horses, an invaluable saving of time. They are convenient, rapid, and cheap. Now you would think that would satisfy them, but no; because they run through the most populous streets of the city, and because once in awhile an accident takes place, what do they want? They want me to add further to the enormous expense I have already been subjected to, and buy some fenders to prevent accidents.”
“Wall, hain’t you goin’ to?” sez I.
“No,” sez he, “I am not. If I do, they will probably want some sashay bags to hang up in the cars, and some automatic fans to fan them with as they ride.” But I had been a-readin’ a sight about the deaths them swift monsters had caused, and I sez—
“Martin, life is dear, and it seems as if every safeguard possible ort to be throwed round the great public, between ’em and death.”
“But,” sez he, “it is impudent in them to demand anything further than what I’ve already done. Horses were always causing accidents.”