Skiddoo! | Page 5

had told her to stuff it with chestnuts, but Ollie thought
chestnuts too much of an old joke, so she stuffed it with peanut brittle.
Ollie had noticed some other things about the kitchen which looked
lonesome, so she decided to put them in the turkey, too.
One of these was the corkscrew.
When I went to carve the turkey I found a horseshoe which Ollie had
put in for luck.
It made my wife extremely nervous to see the can-opener, a pair of
scissors, and nine clothes-pins come out of that turkey, but Jack Golden
said that their last cook tried to stuff their last turkey with the garden
hose, so my wife felt better.
The next round was some salad which Ollie had dressed in the kitchen,
but the dress was such a bad fit that nobody could look at it without
blushing.
Then we had some home-made ice cream for desert.
The ice was very good, but Ollie forgot to add the cream, so it tasted

rather insipid.
Every time there was a lull in the conversation Charlie Swayne kept
yelling for a Bronx cocktail, and the only thing that kept him from
getting it was the fact that Riley Hatch wanted to tell the story of his
life.
Anyway, the dinner came to a finish without anybody fainting, and the
guests went home, a little hungry but unpoisoned.
The next morning my wife spoke bitterly to Ollie and she left us,
followed by the Thanksgiving prayers of all those present.
The only thing about the house that loved Ollie was a pair of earrings
belonging to my wife, and they went with her.
CHAPTER III
JOHN HENRY ON PATRIOTISM
Uncle Peter spent the Fourth of July at his old home in Ohio. I must
show you a letter he wrote me a few days after that noisy event.
Dear John:
We had a nice quiet time on the Fourth with the exception of my ankle,
which was somewhat dislocated because my foot stepped on an infant
bombshell which same exploded for my benefit.
I like the idea of the Fourth with the exception of the noise.
I believe that if our forefathers had suspected that their
great-grandchildren would make such an infernal racket on the Fourth
of July they would have waited for a snow storm on the 16th of January
before signing their John Hancocks, because then it would be too cold
to explode firecrackers under your neighbor's eyebrows when he least
expects it.

We had a nice quiet time at home on the Fourth, John, with the
exception that little Oscar Maddy, who lives next door, presented me
with a Roman candle which joined me between the third button on my
waistcoat and the solar plexus.
I acknowledged the receipt by falling off the front step and barking my
shoulder.
You should always remember, John, that the Fourth is the day when
your patriotic voice should climb out of your thorax and make the
welkin ring, but it isn't really necessary to get up a row between a stick
of dynamite and a keg of giant powder to prove that you love the cause
of liberty.
You will find that some of our best citizens--men who love liberty with
an everlasting love--are hiding in the cellar with both hands over their
ears from July 3d to July 5th.
We had a nice quiet time at home on the Fourth, John, with the
exception that your second cousin, Randolph, tried to explode a toy
cannon and removed the apex of his thumb and about half of the
dining-room window.
It may be necessary to celebrate the birth of freedom by bursting forth
into noise, but my idea, John, is that Old Glory would like it much
better if we were more subdued and kept our children on the earth
instead of letting them go up in the air in small fragments.
We had a very quiet time at home, John, on the Fourth with the
exception of your distant relative, Uncle Joseph Carberry. Uncle Joe
annexed about six mint juleps and then went to sleep on the front porch
with five packs of firecrackers in his coat pocket.
Full of the spirt [Transcriber's note: spirit?] of liberty, your interesting
cousin, Randolph, set fire to your Uncle's pocket, and when last seen
your Uncle Joe was rushing over hill and dale in the general direction
of Hartford, Connecticut, with the firecrackers cheering him on.

[Illustration: With the firecrackers cheering him on.]
Liberty, John, is the only real thing in this world for a nation, but just
why the glorious cause of freedom should be slapped in the face with
an imitation of the bombardment of Port Arthur is something which I
must have misconstrued.
We had a very quiet