Skiddoo! | Page 6

time here at home on the Fourth, John, with the
exception that another interesting cousin of yours, my young namesake,
Peter Grant, tied a giant firecracker to the cat's tail, and the cat went to
the kitchen to have her explosion.
It took two hours and seven neighbors to get your good old Aunt
Maggie out of the refrigerator, which was the place selected for her by
the catastrophe.
The stove lost all the supper it contained; little Peter Grant lost two
eyebrows and his Buster Brown hair; the cat lost seven of its lives, and
the glorious cause of Freedom got a send-off that could be heard
nineteen miles.
We all missed you, John, but maybe it is better you were not at home
on the Fourth, because the doctor is occupying your room so that he
could be near the wounded--otherwise, we are all well.
I think, John, that when Freedom was first invented by George
Washington the idea was to make it something quiet and modest which
he could keep about the house and which he could look at once in a
while without getting nervous prostration.
But George forgot to leave full instructions, and nowadays when the
Birthday of Freedom rolls around the impulsive American public
wakes up at daylight, shoves up the window and begins to hurl
torpedoes at the house next door, because a noise in the air is worth two
noises on the quiet.
We had a very quiet Fourth at home, John, with the exception of your
second cousin, Hector, who patriotically attached himself to a hot-air

balloon, and when last seen was hovering over Erie, Pa., and making
signs to his parents not to wait supper for him.
Most of our neighbors for miles in every direction have sons and
daughters missing, but what could they expect when a child will try to
put a pound of powder in four inches of gas pipe and then light the
result with a match.
The Fourth is a great idea, but I think this is carrying it too far, as the
little boy said when he went over the top of the house on the handle of
a sky-rocket.
We had a very quiet time at home on the Fourth, John, with the
exception of our parlor which took fire when your enthusiastic cousin,
Randolph, tried to make some Japanese lanterns by setting fire to the
lace curtains.
The firemen put out the fire and most of our furniture.
Your cousin was also much put out when I spanked him.
We hope to recover from the excitement before the next Fourth, but
your Aunt hopes that somebody will soon invent a new style of noise,
which will not be so full of concussion.
Yours with love, UNCLE PETER.
CHAPTER IV
JOHN HENRY ON MOSQUITOES
When Peaches and I were married we were sentenced to live in one of
those 8x9 Harlem people-coops, where they have running gas on every
floor and hot and cold landlords and self-folding doors, and janitors
with folding arms, and all that sort of thing.
Immense!

When we moved into the half-portion dwelling house last spring I said
to the janitor, "Have you any mosquitoes in the summer?"
The janitor was so insulted he didn't feel like taking a drink for ten
minutes.
"Mosquitoes!" he shouted; "such birds of prey were never known in
these apartments. We have piano beaters and gas meters, but never such
criminals as mosquitoes."
With these kind words I was satisfied.
For weeks I bragged about my Harlem flat for which no mosquito
could carry a latch-key.
The janitor said so, and his word was law.
I looked forward to a summer without pennyroyal on the mantelpiece
or witch hazel on the shin bone, and was content.
But one night in the early summer I got all that was coming to me and I
got it good.
In the middle of the night I thought I heard voices in the room and I sat
up in bed.
"I wonder if it's second-story men," I whispered to myself, because my
wife was away at the seashore.
She had gone off to the shimmering sands and left me chained to the
post of duty, and I tell you, boys, it's an awful thing when your wife
quits you that way and you have to drag the post of duty all over town
in order to find a cool place.
Wives may rush away to the summer resorts where all is gayety, and
where every guess they make at the bill of fare means a set-back in the
bank account; but the husbands must labor on through the scorching
days and in the evenings climb the weary steps to the roof gardens.

"Ping-ding-a-zing-a-boom!" exclaimed the voices on the other side