CHAPTER XXX.
_MR. BANGER'S AUNT_.
There are two families of Bangers in our neighborhood, the heads ofwhich have the same name--Henry Banger. The Henry who married thewidow, heretofore mentioned, is a lawyer in the village, while theother, having no relationship to the former, is a "professor," and helives on the opposite side of the river, in a hamlet that has grown upthere. One day Henry Banger, the lawyer, received a telegram sayingthat his aunt had died suddenly in Elmira, New York, and that the bodywould be sent on at once by express. Mr. Banger made preparations forthe funeral, and upon the day that the remains were due he went downto the express office to receive them.
They did not come, however; and when the agent telegraphed to askabout them, he ascertained that Mr. Banger's aunt had been carriedthrough to Baltimore by mistake. Orders were sent at once to reshipthe body with all possible speed; and accordingly, it was placed uponthe cars of the Northern Central Railroad. As the train was proceedingnorth a collision occurred. The train was wrecked, and Mr. Banger'saunt was tossed rudely out upon the roadside.
The people who were attending to things supposed that she was one ofthe victims of the accident, and so the coroner held an inquest;and as nobody knew who she was, she was sent back to Baltimore andinterred by the authorities. As she did not reach Mr. Banger, heinduced the express company to hunt her up; and when her resting-placewas discovered, they took her up, placed her in a casket and shippedher again.
During that trip some thieves got into the express car and threw outthe iron money-chest and Mr. Banger's aunt, supposing that the casketcontained treasure. On the following morning a farmer discovered Mr.Banger's aunt in the casket leaning up against a tree in the woods.He sent for the coroner; and when another inquest had been held, theywere about to bury the remains, and would have done so had not atelegram come from the express company instructing the authorities toship Mr. Banger's aunt back to Baltimore.
Mr. Banger, meantime, endured the most agonizing suspense, and beganto talk about suing the express company for damages. At last, however,he received information that the departed one had been sent on uponthe Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad. So she had. Butas the train was crossing Gunpowder River the express car gave alurch, and the next moment Mr. Banger's aunt shot through the doorinto the water. She sailed around in the bay for several days,apparently uncertain whether to seek the ocean and move straightacross for Europe, or to go up into the interior. She chose thelatter course, and a week afterward she drifted ashore in the LowerSusquehanna.
As soon as she was discovered the coroner held an inquest, and thenput her on the cars again. This time she came directly to Millburg,and Mr. Banger was at the depot waiting for her with the funeral. Bysome mistake, however, she was carried past and put out at the nexttown above, and the agent said that the best thing he could do wouldbe to have her brought down in the morning. In the morning she came,and Mr. Banger was there with the friends of the family to receiveher.
When they reached the cemetery, Rev. Dr. Dox delivered a mostaffecting discourse; and when all was over, and Mr. and Mrs. Bangerhad wiped away their tears, they went slowly home, sorrowful, ofcourse, but somewhat glad that the long suspense was ended.
As Mr. Banger entered his sitting-room he saw a lady reposing in frontof the fire, with her back toward him, toasting her toes. Before hehad time to speak she looked around, and he was amazed to perceivethat it was his dead-and-buried aunt. He was a little frightened atfirst, but in a moment he summoned up courage enough to ask,
"Why, how did you get here?"
"I came on the train, of course."
"Yes, I know; but how did you get out of the cemetery?"
"Cemetery? What cemetery? I haven't been in any cemetery!"
"Not been in the cemetery! Why, either I buried you an hour ago, or Iam the worst mistaken man on earth."
"Mr. Banger, what do you mean? This is a curious sort of a jest."
Then Banger explained the situation to her; and as she solemnlyprotested that she had not been in Elmira, Banger was about toconclude that he had been the victim of a joke, when it suddenlyoccurred to him that maybe it was the aunt of Professor Banger. Hesent out to investigate the matter, and found that the conjecture wascorrect. And when Professor Banger heard about it, he became veryangry, and he entered suit against the lawyer Banger for embezzlinghis aunt. Then Lawyer Banger sued the professor for the expresscharges and the funeral expenses, and for a time it looked as if thateccentric and roving old lady would be the cause of infinite trouble;but the difficulty was finally compromised by the lawyer Bangeraccepting half the amount of his expenses.
* * * * *
Professor Banger was originally a telegraph-operator, but some yearsago he saved up a small sum of money, with which he constructed aballoon. Then he tacked "professor" to his name, and began to devotehimself to science and the show business. His account of one of hisrecent excursions is not only entertaining, but it proves that he isan ardent student of natural phenomena. He said to me,
"We went up at Easton, Pennsylvania; Conly, Jones and myself, andit was the finest trip I ever took. Perfectly splendid! We got theballoon full about twelve o'clock, and the crowd held her down untilwe were ready. Then I gave the word and they let go, and we wenta-humming into the air. One man got caught in a twist of the rope asshe gave her first spurt upward, and it slammed him up against a fenceas if he'd been shot out of a gun. Smashed in three or four of hisribs, I believe, and cracked his leg.
"But we went up beautifully about fifteen hundred feet, and while wewere looking at the charming scenery we ran into a cloud, and I toldConly to throw out some ballast. He heaved over a couple of sand-bags,and one of them accidentally fell on Major Wiggins' hired girl, whowas hanging clothes in the garden, and the other went into his chimneyand choked it up. He was mad as fury about it when we came down. Noenthusiasm for science. Some men don't care a cent whether the worldprogresses or not.
BALLAST]
"Well, sir, we shot up about a thousand feet more, and then Jonesdropped the lunch-basket overboard by accident, and we went up nearlyfour miles Conly got blue in the face, Jones fainted, and I came neargoing under myself. A minute more we'd all've been dead men; but Igave the valve a jerk, and we came down like a rocket-stick. When theboys came to, Jones said he wanted to get out; and as we were only alittle distance from the ground, I threw out the grapnel.
"That minute a breeze struck her, and she went along at about ninetymiles an hour over some man's garden, and the grapnel caught hisgrape-arbor snatched it up, and pretty soon got it tangled with theweathercock on the Presbyterian church-steeple. I cut the rope andleft it there, and I understand that the deacons sued the ownerbecause he wouldn't take it down. Raised an awful fuss and sent thesheriff after me. Trying to make scientific investigation seem like acrime, and I working all the time like a horse to unfold the phenomenaof nature! If they had loved knowledge, they wouldn't've cared ifI'd've ripped off their old steeple and dropped it down like anextinguisher on top of some factory chimney.
"So, when we left the grape-arbor, we went up again, and Jones gotsicker and said he must get out. So I rigged up another grapnel andthrew it over. We were just passing a farm near the river; and as thewind was high, the grapnel tore through two fences and pulled the roofoff of a smoke-house, and then, as nothing would hold her, we swoopedinto the woods, when we ran against a tree. The branches skinnedConly's face and nearly put out my right eye, and knocked four teethout of Jones' mouth. It was the most exciting and interesting voyageI ever made in my life; and I was just beginning to get somesatisfaction from it--just getting warmed up and preparing to takesome meteorological observations--when Jones became so very anxious toquit that I didn't like to refuse, although it went fearfully againstthe grain for the reason that I hated to give up and abandon myscientific investigations.
"So I threw out my coat and boots, and made the other fellows do thesame, and we rose abo
ve the trees and sailed along splendidly until westruck the river. Then she suddenly dodged down, and the edge of thecar caught in the water; so the wind took her, and we went scuddingalong like lightning, nearly drowned. Conly was washed overboard, andthat lightened her, so she went up again. I was for staying up, butJones said he'd die if he didn't get out soon; and besides, he thoughtwe ought to look after Conly. But I said Conly was probably drowned,anyhow, so it was hardly worth while to sacrifice our experiments onthat account; and I told Jones that a man of his intelligence ought tobe willing to endure something for the sake of scientific truth. AndJones said, 'Hang scientific truth!'--actually made that remark; andhe said that if I didn't let him out he'd jump out. He was sick, youknow. The man was not himself, or he would never have talked in thatway about a voyage that was so full of interest and so likely toreveal important secrets of nature.
"But to oblige him I at last got her down on the other side of theriver, and a farmer ran out and seized the rope. While we were talkingto him I was just telling him that, as the gas was running out of theneck of the balloon, maybe he'd better put out his cigar, when all ofa sudden there was a terrific bang. The gas exploded and wrapped us ina sheet of flame, and the next minute some of the neighbors picked upme and Jones. Jones was roasted nearly to a crisp. Exciting, wasn'tit?
"And they took him over to the farmhouse, where we found that they hadfished out Conly and were bringing him to. When he revived, they sentthe invalid corps back to town in a wagon, Jones groaning all the wayand I arguing with him to show that science requires her votaries togive up a little of their personal comfort for the benefit it does thehuman race, and Conly saying he wished he was well enough to go outand bang the inventor of balloons with a gun.
"As soon as we got back to Easton a constable arrested me for chuckingthat ignorant opponent of scientific inquiry up against the fenceand wrecking him. When I was let off on bail, I began to build a newballoon. She's nearly done now, and I'm going to make an ascensionearly next month in search of the ozone belt. Won't you go up with me?The day is going to come when everybody will travel that way. It's themost exhilarating motion in the world. Come on up and help me makescientific observations on the ozone belt."
But the invitation was declined. The _Patriot_, however, will have agood obituary notice of the professor all ready, in type.