A NEW ENTERPRISE.

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 440, 8 September 1904, Page 3

A NEW ENTERPRISE.

BY MAX '*>. "If you only had a little capital to invest," said the young man, as he touk a chair and sat down close to my desk, "I might put you in the way, of a good tuing." "Mine?" "Oh, no. It's a petrifaction company; the Columbia Petrifaction company, of (,'lanou county. 1 coui.il you 100 shares." "What does the company do?" "Why, you know, it owns a limestone spring up here in Clarion county. That spring used to belong to a man named Herkimer Jones. One day, -Wut-n his well ran dry, Jones went off and brought a bucket of water from mat spring end the family drank it. What was the consequence? Next morning M'hen the neigh!: >rs called, Herkimer Jones was sitting at the supper table turned to solid stone. Ik- had half of a sauwgc ia his mouth; that was turned to stone, too. So was Mrs. Jones, and Ellen P. Jones, ar.d iHerkimer Jones, Jr., and the baby. The limestone water did it. The heirs closed the whole lot out to a sculptor named Ferguson, who arranged them in a group and sold them to the British museum as models from the antique. That is, excepting the baby. He nut plaster paris wings on the baby and passed him off as an original design of a Cupid." "What about the company?"

"Well, you see, the company at once bought up the spring property and they intend lo go into the petrifying business upon a large scale. For example, s'pose'n you get a contract from congress to execute an equestrian statue of Gen. Washington. First you find a hors«; you make that horse drink at the spring, and there he is! Perfectly splendid! Then you find a man who bears a sort of general resemblance to Washington. You arrange a picnic; get that man up there in the woods; offer him a drink; and in 11 minutes you can chip spalls off of him with a stone-chisel. Then you mount your man on your horse, and there you have a group of statuary such as Greece in her palmiest days wOuld have given her bottom dollar to get." « "I see."

"The company, you know, purposes to have the country poorhonse located near to the spring; and ae the president of the board of trustee* owns 60 shares, we calculate to solidi-fy paupers right along, without intermission, say 20 or 30 a day. Don't you see what a magnificent prospect it opens up for high art in America ? We can fill any ordc:. Say you want a statue of Gen. Jackson, and the only available pauper is too fat. What do we do? We petrify him, and then we chip him down and touch up his ioui«»nance, maybe, with a chisel. Suppose vo-h want a pair of saints to wc;l: into the frowfc door to a church. We select a couple of venerable vagrant 'inrden them, turn their noses down, to giv;- them dignity of expression, and the bricklayers then can build them right into the door jamb*." "Suppose the demand for that kind of statuary be small?" "Then we come down to n basis of utility it once. S'posin' there's a pauper with inflammatory rheumatism in his leg? We petliiy him. We sell him to a doctor. That doctor cuts off the leg with a marble saw, and there he has that inflammatory rheumatism right before him turned into gran* ite. S'posin' one of them has a torpid liver? [n two hours the doctors can examine that liver just as if it was a brickbat, with the torpidity sticking out all over it. Mind you, if the supply of paupers holds out, IvenUue to say that the day is not far distant when you can take petrified livers, and hearts, ami muscles, and brain pans and build a two-story house with them, with all t*-* mode-n conveniences, a mighty sight cheaper than you can build it out of common etcne. Imagine living in a house made of ostiuVd livers! Be unique, wouldn't it? It would attract attention. "I don't care for such things mysel", but—" •'Gen. Bangs, he tried some curious experiments with the water out of that spring. He threw a bucketful on a cat that was jumping about on his back fence one night; and there she is now, fur up, tail elevated, moti.i open, picturesque and natural as life! Nexi night he soused another one; same effect oJ cinrso; and now Gen. Bangs has 16 exqnUi'e statuettes of cats in various atiiti.de* of grace ranged around on his fence. !''.:■:; usoV). the sculptor, toltf him he couldn't have had those done in Carrara mail's in rVi-opo under $50,000. But. of course, yi u. have to'be careful when you have the ('•> lur.:b:a watci around. Gen. Bangs kept : s in a barrel, and the other day his v.:. ■ .r----in-'aw filled a pitcher from it, accidtn ai'.y, a:».d look a drink. One hour later k i--«--v six man to carry her to the window so they could lower her to the pavement with a. derrick. She weighed nearly a ton, and was so 1... d you couMn't crack her with a sledge-ham-mer. The general was sorry, of conn c; ami ai'.er he had her mounted on a revolving pedeatr.l be kept her in his front parlor for a while, pn'iving her off on his friends as an impo'i t- d *ln tue'of Minerva. But, finally, a« *'<:? e.\ciif.-d unpleasant comments, he had her cut into slabs and put into his cemetery lot as tombstones. . He had the gratify in t| r< 'cjtion that she.is near those who. were dinr to her. ' Let me tell you that if our coiM; any once gets to work, and paupers are ;>!c-!iy, a man who wants a variegated iom'i.-.-. one can get something that will please hi>: ;:•..-:.) at rates that will make the marbleyard . -oplesick." # -ft : .ok- like a good thing, but I believe 1 aon'i (are to go into it." "I'li u\". you what I'll do. I'm a little pressed for money now, and if you'll buy 30 si are«?, you !T*ay take them at half price. ,-, ■ j ; . -, i.n.v of,] our relations you fctij for nothing. How's that?" "II uvc no relations that I want in that • Mo aunt, or grandmother, or anything .that would work up well into a table top, or a s!.ab for a fixed waahstand?" "No/" "And you're going to throw away tnis c'ini:.,• of promoting aesthetic culture and of .en be .'(ring the loye for the beautiful in your .own ■ ■• I'.iry?" '•!' i iM'raid so." . 'v Tin y-.ii'S man shook his head find sighfn, Sl v'-ii : .'■' /,; hai'dlj hear to thing of thede- | ~,, ; :i;e limes :'iid then he said: , «4J O .i you lead ine a quarter, anyhow V ' "Mii ii to him, and he went awry wit'a i ■. x ,_ ;,->-.:■<: to lepay it on the morrow. a:; ': -.<, : .yy go/IB to KulOUe tO .-I'll !'IS l'i' ,i « i:.... never returned.—N. Y, share.--, tor '.'. £ - ... „ Weekly. -1 ~~ ..-f <* JJncliclor. Reflection, of way they Women wo: s statistics 4 . " ~ do dough. *» Mui.ey wakes the mare go, Put miik, 1 ; lie money go. i'ii.-; young married couplesie.trn to quarrel an! ' ! ien not to. It'* Jiiiiiiy, luil black-haired women, want their air io bi red and gray-litaired women want i.-e i - to be black. All t'iiii :. man knows about mechanics is of mighty little use to him whence t*;-.s. to put the lurnace into commission for ti:o winter.—N. Y. Press. k piRISnN HAIH ~i (U'j ;';7T" * An I.nf-il:' "S'e Vairj-HtMh* baldness aud Ur<oy H.nr, ; Ltdii.t b'uiulnit, aoffc, ind gl.sy 'U C, 1 h»irrotso.i, goj.riM, . i-tr<; j i-'.rui-i - ; '/»