New York to Yonkers

Maud S. was sold to Robert Bonner for $40,000 by William H. Vanderbilt, 1885. Maccaroni was sold to Pythagoras Pod for $25 by James Flannigan, 1895. The names of both sprinters are synonyms of the opposite extremes of equine and asinine speed.

I left the Bartholdi Hotel, New York, at the appointed hour, 2 p. m. Friday, Nov. 27, astride my donkey, and the night of Wednesday, Dec. 2 I find myself no farther than Tarrytown, more ass-tried than ever, having traveled only twenty-eight miles in five days time. At this rate of condensed velocity I calculate I shall require two years to reach my destination, and I shall have lost my wager. To say the least, my steed is an elephant in my hands, both literally and metaphorically speaking. He is as fat as oleomargarine. I have lost ten pounds since election day, while Mack has gained thirty, for the very good reason he doesn't know what is before him and I do.

For three days the air had been laden with rain and mist. It seemed as thought the very heavens were weeping over my pathetic departure, while the earth with a white handkerchief of fog endeavored to absorb the tears. Everybody of no account and three people of a little, warned me of the traditional evils consequent to a Friday start; yet in spite of their superstitions the fates were propitious and gave me a glorious day. I had been granted the freedom of the Bartholdi for a public reception. Ere I arrived the parlors swarmed with pretty girls and convalescent creditors, a commingling, as it were, of honey bees and hornets, awaiting their prey. Mr. Lillard, my co-bettor, finally came, and helped me into my saddle. Then with 99 cents in my pocket, I labored back to the parlors and began to sell photographs at 25 cents each to pay for my jack-ass, according to the terms of my bet. I was surprised that the pictures of the two donkeys should find quarters so easily. I made up my mind I should have greater difficulty in obtaining them before I reached Frisco. For an hour the fist of Pythagoras Pod swung a mighty quill, and left on the back of each photograph a name that would go into his story. Silver jingled on the table, countless hands got mixed in the shuffle, some got two pictures, others got none; the ink flew about and there were no blotters, and Pod's breast palpitated, and by mistake he kissed a girl not his sister, and then stole his sister's handkerchief instead of the other girl's (which I only last night discovered), and still he lacked the price of his steed. Cries rent the air that the wager was a hoax and Pythagoras Pod a fraud. Less than hundred thousand people blocked the Broadway pavement, and the flags of the metropolis were beginning to be lowered at half-mast, when suddenly appeared a newsboy and saved the man of the hour. His papers recounted the phenomenal news that I had left the city on my donkey an hour before, and while my mystified guests were marveling over the puzzle, I purchased his wares and sold them at 1,000 percent profit.

The climax was over. I sent the Irishman Flannigan the price of Maccaroni, and, though the stable was a block distant, in less than a half-hour my prancing steed was at the door. The ordeal had been too much for me. I collapsed in a fit of ecstasy, from which only the odors of a white chrysanthemum could arouse me. My co-bettor's daughter pinned on the blossom. Mr. Lillard again assisted me into the saddle, and amid a deafening tiger from the multitude, the lion waved a graceful adieu, and -- well, this descriptive effort is just about as trying to my nerves as the ride I had through the city. To stint the account of my momentous start on my long pilgrimage would be to cheat posterity. My first hair-breadth escape was within a rod from the hotel, ten minutes after I left.

It so happened that Mack wished to hold up a cable car, but he only succeeded in leaving a lock of his hair with the gripman, the first souvenir we gave away.

It was dusk before I reached West End avenue. The residence of Mr. Lillard was decorated in my honor, and there his daughter gave me a reception. There, too, a bevy of sweet girls received me with closed arms, and there we all drank from a loving cup. Rare wines and flowers, ice cream and tripe, tears and best wishes, all got mixed up together, while my jackass was seized with his first attack of indigestion outdoors. The news struck me like a thunderbolt. It seems that in looking through his green glasses he had mistaken the iron fence that guarded a young shade tree for cornstalks, or other verdant fodder, and had already destroyed two teeth. I would say lost two teeth, but he swallowed them. This threw a damper on my reception, and with more adieux I resumed my journey. It was 7 o'clock when I drew rein at the Hotel Minot, Harlem. And it was noon next day, when, with 13 cents in pocket, I set out for Yonkers, sixteen miles away, and left New York and my sweethearts and creditors behind. Good friends had called at the hotel and purchased my pictures and books, and Professor Pratt, who had ridden horseback across the continent within several feet of his death, pointed out the perils of the deserts and mountains, with their Indians and prairie dogs, and begged me to give up my journey.

Dear old professor! How little I then realized the wisdom of your advice! I'm sorry I did not take it, but I shall not give up now, but I am looking backward; 'tis best I should look ahead. The Palisades loomed against a shrouded sky, and the mules on a string of canalboats answered my donkey's bray. The gamins of the suburbs marched behind us, an escort of doubtful honor, and a Dutch vixen hit Maccaroni with a potato, almost causing me to leave the saddle. That paradox of donkeyism chased the potato and ate it. He no doubt thought the missile might hit him again, so he put it out of his way.

Finally, my staff of honor had dwindled to three small boys, who, conscious it was the event of their lives, asked to escort me to Yonkers. My Winchester rifle enchanted them. They wanted to help me fight robbers. But the shades of night were falling, so I bade them return to civilization. After pointing out to me the wrong road, which they believed right, they shook hands with the great traveler, paused, trembled and stammered. They wanted to utter a great remark befitting the occasion. I knew it and pitied them. Finally, the superlative degree in age said that he hoped when I came back I would be alive, and the other two quoted him. It was too much for me. I could not be less great than they. I asked them to write their names in my album. One wrote his name, another painted his, and the third asked his brother, number two, to do the act for him, as he couldn't. No doubt the spell was too much for him. It was for me. I watched them fade in the darkness and blessed them in my heart, the first friends to help me on my long and weary journey.

At 2 o'clock I had crossed McComb's Dam Bridge, at 5 o'clock I was crossing another. It was so low and narrow, and Mack was so afraid of water, I had to throw dust in his eyes to get him across. I carried a pocketful on hand for emergency, and on account of the rain. Then occurred our first real disaster. On nearing a little hamlet that had reached the horse-car stage of progress, a breeze sprung up which soon developed into a howling hurricane, and a beer wagon with dragons, or flagons of beer, or other evil spirits, wheeled down upon us. They only wanted to scare us; and they did. The wheels got into the car track, and slew, and hit my donkey in the vicinity of the tail, and sprinkled us over a quarter-acre of ground. I can say without vanity that I traveled some distance on my face, but with a saddle on my back. When I got up Mack was turning hand-springs. My gun stuck in the lot, dressed in my hat and coat, the awfulest looking scarecrow I ever looked upon, and the stony soil was well sown with pistol cartridges, which, according to the little shoots, had immediately sprouted. I repeat it was my first calamity; and I feared it wad my donkey's last.

It took us a half-hour to again get under way. The fire of wrath illuminated the earth and enabled me to collect my belongings. But finally, with a degree of patience that would have overtaxed Job, I dragged my beast of burden into Yonkers and anchored at the Getty House door. It was 8 o'clock. I thought it must be nearly morning.

The genial hotel proprietor said I had arrived at a bad time. The town was dead, the factories were closed, and a thousand stomachs were empty. I corrected him. There were a thousand and one, and, ascertaining the direction of the dining room, I proved to him I was right.

On inspecting Mack next morning, I found him stove up badly. I had Dr. Skitt bandage one leg, cover ten square inches of him with courtplaster, and strap a boot on his off forefetlock. Then I informed Proprietor Malling that I should be delayed two or three days, and resolved to give a lecture Tuesday night.

"I hope," said he, "that you may take in enough people to pay your hotel bill."

Then he gave me several addresses. I went to bed at 9 a. m. and slept till 8 next morning. It positively was the quietest day I ever experienced. My rest was neither broken by nightmare nor somnambulism. I not so much as dreamed of a creditor. I first saw the manager of the Opera House, who was shifting scenery from an ice wagon, but I found I could cut no ice. Said he:

"We only allow operas, cat shows and baby fairs in this house."

"Mine is no child's play," said I, "so that knocks me out, but as for my leading bass, he has the strongest, deepest voice that ever was heard from an American stage, not excepting the stages of the days of '49."

I next called at the Female Institute. The charming president was in the chair, and while I had the floor, moralized on the evils of betting, purchased a photo to send to a young nephew as an "object lesson," and declined to let the hall. Then I returned to the hotel and engaged the dining room for my lecture.

"Can you fill the hall?" asked the landlord.

"Full as a kit of mackerel," said I.

"I have only a hundred chairs," said he.

"Hire two hundred of an undertaker," said I, "and I agree to defray all other expenses of the funeral."

It was a go. I worded a hand bill and hurried to a printer. This is what it said:

The printer's proof-sheet awoke old memories: On the anniversary of this day, Dec. 1, the statue of Washington was unveiled in 1811 -- the man who never told a lie.

The town was thoroughly advertised. Even Maccaroni took a hand, and paraded the streets with a pasteboard sandwich on his back. The residents of Jaundice avenue were crazed with excitement. The police force being overpowered, called the fire companies to the rescue, and the windows of the hotel were saved from the crash. The populace, I was told, with nine cents in one hand and their lives in the other, crowded about the closed doors. It was an event in my life. My first lecture was to be a success. With the hotel clock in hand I stood in the butler's pantry until my manager bade me enter the stage -- the second stage of insanity.

I had been drinking kerosene to inflame my audience and do justice to my hair-breadth escapes. My hands trembled, my hair throbbed, and my heart leaped in the ecstasy that comes from a man's first great triumph. I was so excited I could not distinguish the audience. It was one confused mass. I had agreed to divide the receipts with the hotel proprietor, and the visions of wealth got confused with my discourse. But I talked for two hours with all the eloquence I could muster, though I should have talked a half-hour less to a smaller house, and then retired from the stage. My manager handed me twenty-seven cents. I had an audience of three; the proprietor, the head waiter, and the printer, whom I owed $3. I retired at once, but did not say "good night."