"What on Airth's the Matter?"

His Unselfish Love found a Melancholy Recompense

The Editor of "The Windmill"

"Git up and Foller!"




THE MYSTERY OF METROPOLISVILLE.




WORDS BEFOREHAND.


Metropolisville is nothing but a memory now. If Jonah's gourd had not
been a little too much used already, it would serve an excellent turn
just here in the way of an apt figure of speech illustrating the growth,
the wilting, and the withering of Metropolisville. The last time I saw
the place the grass grew green where once stood the City Hall, the
corn-stalks waved their banners on the very site of the old store--I ask
pardon, the "Emporium"--of Jackson, Jones & Co., and what had been the
square, staring white court-house--not a Temple but a Barn of
Justice--had long since fallen to base uses. The walls which had echoed
with forensic grandiloquence were now forced to hear only the bleating of
silly sheep. The church, the school-house, and the City Hotel had been