n and a dog drowned here yesterday--it almost
makes one afraid to go near the tub.

The man who sits on my right at the table, says he's here for
nervousness. First time I ever heard a divorce called that, but anyway
we all know that he gets out of jail on December, and I will be glad,
for the way he plays the anvil chorus with his soup makes me get out of
my skin backwards. Hope some day that the Devil will play dominoes with
his bones.

The lady on the other end, chews with her lips and of course I'm always
excited for fear her dinner will fall overboard. The way she juggles
food would get her a job in the vaudeville game any day. She sits up as
tho' she'd been impaled, and the shaft broken off in her body.

Long ago--a being, desirous of unhitchment could come here, rent a room,
hang her pajamas in the closet and fade away back to Broadway, but times
are changed, and you must serve six months or the Judge's wife will not
let you have a divorce. The Judge's house is next to mine and the way I
look demure when I pass, is a heathenism hypocrisy. But he is under
petticoat tyranny and I dread ruffling the petticoat.

Formerly the law was three months, but the Cataract Hotel had the
Legislature change it as they could not make enough money.

We had chicken last night and asparagus tips--did you ever notice what a
lot of skin a boarding house chicken has? And the tips just missed by
one, being tip. The meals are an unsatisfactory substitute for something
to eat, and I find myself filling up on bread to keep my stomach and
backbone apart.

I am up against old timers that are always to be met at boarding
houses--the dear old soldier and the lady "too heavy for light
amusements, and not old enough to sit in the corner and knit," as George
Ade puts it. She is simply ubiquitous; she is everywhere; she does not
gossip! Oh no! Still she wonders if they really are married, you know,
and if that strange man is her brother or not? Oh you know the whole
tribe! Dear old parasites on the body politic! I have also had sudden
paralysis of the jaw from looking into a country mirror and was not
again convinced, until consulting my own hand glass during the night
that one of my eyes had not slipped down below my nose. I can get along
very well if my hair is not parted at all, but I insist upon my features
remaining in the same locations.

I am copying down some of the stories that I hear as they are well worth
it, and may come in han