Pa himself impressed it on the men to look out
that they didn't get into any trouble. Gee, but the fear of a public
whipping makes men good.
Twenty years ago some hold-up men from New York robbed a bank in
Delaware, and were caught, and given 50 lashes apiece on the bare back,
by a big negro, and there has never been a burglary in Delaware since.
We thought we would play a joke on pa, so the manager told pa that
constables were looking for him to arrest him for cruelty to animals,
for kicking a camel in the stomach, and hitting the camel with an iron
bar, and that if pa didn't want to be publicly horsewhipped on the bare
back he better skip out for Washington, D.C., where we would show in a
couple of days, and wait for us.
Pa was so frightened he couldn't get supper, and everybody talked about
cats of nine tails, and how prisoners were cut to pieces, and every time
pa saw a jay with a slouch hat he thought it was a constable after him.
After dark he put on an old suit of clothes and said he was going to
Washington. They told him if he went to take a train he would surely be
arrested at the depot, so pa put a saddle on one of the mules, and rode
out of town and rode all night, and all the next day he bought oats of
farmers to be delivered at Wilmington for the circus.
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