shens 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;