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Michigan Modesty

Michigan Modesty image
Parent Issue
Day
17
Month
August
Year
1883
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

"Talk about yer f ast time on riv stearners! Guess you Evansville critters don't begin to know what running means, churning along with yer sternvvheels like a fleet o' lopsided washin" machines vith the flappers a runnin' out behind." 'You have faster steamers where you come trom, í presume," meekly inquired the Evansville, Iud., Argus reporter. "Faster! Well Ishould smile! Faster! Why one of our river boats "ud run all day long round them tubs an takeitso easy as the passengers 'u 'gin talkin' of lynchin' the cap'n fur crawlin'. Not as I mean ter say even our clippers could make their time in these waters." Why not? Do you mean on account of the stream?" "Sirearu? Not much. But our rivers is lilled ehuck full o' water - clear as the sparkling di'monds of Peru - not pea-soup stuff like this. 'Taint water, its only liquid. I ofter wonder how a fish can wadethrough such slush, an' t stands by consequence as a ship can't rjake the same headway agin sicb a puddle as is so thick yer can almost take the waves up on a pitchtork and pile 'em up onaheap." "Whcre niay jou come from, stra ger?" '¦From Michigan. Did you ever hea of the Detroit River, Lake St. Clair, the River St. Clair and Lake Huron?" "Why, yes. Beautiful waters, those." "Beautiful! Yer may say so! An' ao good as they look. Seventy feet deep all the year round, steady stream in the middli; andslack at the sides, more nor a mile wide in the nearest point and don't never run over in them big üoods as splashes over the country so as No ah's little dampness wasn't a circumstonce to them." "But how about your river steamers? Are they very fast?" "Yer may sayso! We'vea side-wheel steamer called theldlewild as '11 knock the spots off anything you ever heer'd on. She goes so fast es the guv'ment was obliged to pass alaw fur herto run on check within five miles o' the 'canal fur fear her wash 'ud sweep the huil consarn out intothe lake an' lose it " "Indeed!" "Yes, indeed, And we've a little narrer boat called the Mary, es jist goes along like a streak. D'ye know what 'lappened the other day? I was down at Lampton, a little onc-hoss village on the Canady shore, a layin' in my surumer stock o' - well, say tea- when thet Mar-ry passed down the river. Go! Gracious Joseph! She flew!" "Well?" "Well, whenshe'd passed about seven minits we seed somethin a flickerin' au' flutterin' on the top of the water, and what d'ye think it was?" "How should I know?" "Wel!, Iwouldu'tbelieveit, only Jem Hathawav passed clean over it with his skiff." "What was it?" "It wer the shader o1 thet boat ,i tiumpin' along to catoh up. Never saw anything so carious in all your life." "Must have been. Have anotber glass?" "Well, yes, since ye are so kind. But no water, thank ye. Water s a tirstrate element for transportation, an' washin', an' tca, an' sich;but my stomick's kind o' too raak to take it neat- needs suthin' a little more meaty."

Article

Subjects
Ann Arbor Courier
Old News