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OLD CLIPPINGS.

         Judge Tuthill is noted throughout Iowa—aye, wherever books are known and appreciated—for his love of books; and he has gathered around him the largest and best private library anywhere between the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers, and that is saying a good deal, for the neck of land between these two mighty water courses is an empire in extent as well as in wealth. Of this library, a detailed mention is made elsewhere. With his love of books, Judge Tuthill is something of an antiquarian in his tastes and inclinations, and has hunted up and preserved a good many incidents and happenings of early times that are eminently worthy of a place in a printed history of Cedar County.

          Some years ago, the Judge published a series of articles in the Tipton newspapers, under the non de plume of “Anti Quary,” from which we make a few selections. The articles were entitled“Anti Quary’s Manuscripts,” number two of which related to an elegy on the untimely death of “Bobbie,” and is herewith presented:

         As an untimely death of “Bobbie” occurred in the Spring of 1848, it may be considered advisable and proper to make a brief statement of the subject matter which gave rise to the elegy.

         Rev. Ebenezer Alden, Jr., a lineal descendant of John Alden of the May Flower, was the first settled minister in Tipton. He came from Massachusetts in 1844, and organized the First Congregational Church in this place, which continued under this pastoral charge some three years, when, having received a call from Marshfield, Mass., he left Tipton for that place, where he has remained in the ministry up to the present time, with eminent success. He has always borne the reputation of a sincere, devout man, and possessing more than ordinary talent and ability as a preacher. He delivered the funeral address at the obsequies of Daniel Webster, at Marshfield, in 1852.

         While living in Tipton he was highly respected and beloved by all who knew him; affable and courteous in his deportment, with a kindness of heart rarely equaled, but with, at that time, little experience of the sharp practice of Western horse dealers, he was induced to trade off a good, young animal, that was somewhat too spirited for his use, for a spavined, halting, bob-tailed nag, that, as Bill Knott said, “could have trot half a day in his own shadow,” and was absolutely worthless.

         Our reverend friend, however, appeared to prize “Bobbie”, notwithstanding his defects, fully as much as though he had been a “steed of Araby,” and his grief and sorrow at the sudden demise was attempted to be sympathized with and condoled in the elegy, which appears to have been written and presented to him at the time.

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THE ELEGY.

The sounds of woe, alas! Alack!

Our feelings rend, our heart-strings crack!

Think how our Pastor’s mind ‘twill rack

To hear it read:

“Hung be the hemisphere with black,”

Poor Bobbie’s dead.

Not that the loss of paltry pence

Could e’er create such sorrow dense;

Banish the thought forever hence,

Nor be it said:

For truth is aye the best defense,

Poor Bobbie’s dead.

Sad cause of grief! For ne’er again,

From Walnut Fork to Tipton’s plain,

Will Bobbie, with a loosened rein

And drooping head,

In buggy draw the youthful Jane;

Poor Bobbie’s dead.

Guiltless of tricks, sedate and slow,

Ne’er was a nag so prized below,

With many a friend and ne’er a foe,

Green be his bed;

Posterity his worth shall know,

Poor Bobbie’s dead.

No blooded sire, or dam, indeed,

Nor Ishmaelitish Arab breed

Did Bobbie boast—that did not need

His praise to spread:

He was a faithful, honest steed—

Poor Bobbie’s dead.

Take him for all in all, in vain

We’ll look here for his like again,

His shortened tail and roughened mane

And mincing tread,

Dwell in our memory’s greenest lane;

Poor Bobbie’s dead.

Tune, then, your harps, ye sisters nine,

A requiem sing, that all may join

And hymn his praise—the task be mine,

By sorrow led,

To write his epitaph in one short line:

Poor Bobbie’s dead.

         It is reasonable to suppose that Judge Tuthill was the author of this elegy, as his pen and fertile brain have been known to furnish more than one communication from the realms of poetry and fancy.

         In this third contribution to the Cedar Post, a very enterprising sheet, and one that ought to have been kept alive because of its enterprise and devotion to the affairs of Cedar County, “Anti Quary” furnishes some legal reminiscences that are rich, rare and racy. He says, addressing the editors:

         GENTLEMEN: I give you another specimen of the MSS. Collection, being a communication addressed to the “Spirit of the Times, New York,” and published in that popular paper on the 31st of May, 1851, as a letter from their Western correspondent. It does not seem necessary to append any notes or explanations, save that the author was unknown at the time, and doubtless would have remained so had not the original MSS. been discovered.

          TIPTON, Iowa, April 26th, 1851

         DEAR SPIRIT: I was very comfortably and cosily seated, a few days ago, in Cook & Sargent’s office, in Davenport, enjoying a fine Regalia with Eb. Cook, the prince of smokers, when who . . .

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. . . should bolt in but old Judge Grant, who, in his off hand manner, proposed that I should accompany him on the Circuit, and see life in the courts of the back counties, where the laws of Iowa were administered secundum artem, according to the best lights in this prairie country, as radiating and scintillating from a certain refulgent body of expounders of Blackstone and Kent, I acceded to the proposal, knowing by the peculiar twinkle of the Judge’s eye that there would be fun on hand. We arrived safely at the flourishing little town of Tipton, the county seat of Cedar County, on the day previous to the commencement of the term, and found the place crowded with expectant suitors, witnesses, officers and jurors.

         The legal profession was well represented. John P. Cook, the ex-State Senator and young lion of the Whig party; William H. Tuthill, whose poetical squib of “Hummer’s Bell” has given him some celebrity as a satirist; Samuel A. Bissell, too, was on hand in ordinary costume, having divested himself of his buck-skin garments—together with Stephen Whicher, of Muscatine, and William Smyth (Smith with a y) from Linn County, thus making an olla podrida which promised much for the forthcoming week.

         Monday morning came at last. The Court was duly opened and the grand jury empaneled and sworn. The cases were called over, and about one-third of them were dispatched, nolens volen, by the ominous expression, “Judgment by default.”

         The first cause set for trial was “The State of Iowa vs. Mathews,” for an assault with intent to inflict great bodily injury on a poor, old, decrepit Indian, whose name was unknown, supposed to be one of the principal chiefs and braves of the Sauk and Fox nation, sometimes called Musquakees.

         The evidence was full and explicit, the defendant, Mathews, a tall, raw-boned specimen of the Hoosier genus, being most emphatically corned, “cut a hickory as big as a broom handle” and laid it about the old Indian’s head with an accompaniment of awful cursing and swearing, far surpassing that of Uncle Toby’s army in Flanders.

         For the defense, insanity was pleaded, but Bissell, the district Prosecutor, replied that the defendant was at Iowa City, in attendance as a lobby member from Rochester, during the whole of the last session of the Legislature, and consequently must have been in his right mind.

         Cook, for the defendant, rejoined that even were he a veritable member of the august body itself, he had high authority to show that would not prevent his being considered a lunatic in the highest degree. “Why,” said he, giving, at the same time, an oblique and knowing glance at his Honor on the bench, “it is well known that one of our most learned, influential and talented Judges was at Iowa City, during the whole of the session, about one of his railroad projects, when one of the members who opposed the favorite hobby of the Judge, was somewhat irreverently said by him to be non compos mentis, to which, when exceptions were taken, the Judge (oblivious for the time of his position) exclaimed: ‘Sir, could you produce any better evidence of insanity than being a member of the Legislative Assembly of Iowa?’”

         The joke took with all but the jury, who could see nothing in it, and found the defendant guilty—he was immediately removed to durance vile.

         The next case was John Maury vs. Peter Dilts, an action for certain swine taken up as strays by the defendant and claimed by the plaintiff. After a long and tedious examination of witnesses to prove the genealogy, marks and macadamization of the porkers, and their identity and non-identity, the evidence becoming so entangled and mystified, that it would puzzle a Philadelphia lawyer to understand it, and the case had about drawn to a close, when Tuthill arose and said that on the part of the defendant he had a paper to submit, which would perhaps remove all doubts, and clear up the latent obscurities that seemed to envelope the cause. Leave being granted to read it, the following rich morceau was produced, which you now have verbatim et literatim, as he read it forth, with due emphasis and singular discretion:

         Ceter county, Iowa
         Decem the 21 1850.


         “This da cum John Maury and Pruved buy Edwud Sitinger a cording to law that dose hoks which Peter dils has takin up on the 7 day of November 1850 and had dam prast buy Tomas Wilkerson and Bill Dolan and John Maury him salve tuk oath before mi that the buv hoks war his and all so pays all cost be fore mi excep for the Kiping thar of I have pinded George Bare and Jacob Hardager to prays the same providing yo cand A gree A pon such mount.

         John Dolan a Justis
         Of the Pice

         A visible sensation was manifested upon the reading of this document—all seemed to be taken with a shaking of the sides, and when it was concluded, one of the jurors came very near fainting.

         Order being restored, counsel suggested that it was a Dutch document, and should be translated, which being done, it proved to be a transcript from Justice Dolan’s docket, and by “intendment” meant thus:

         CEDAR COUNTY, IOWA
         December 21, 1850.

         This day came John Maury and proved by Edward Sietsinger, according to law, that those hogs which Peter Dilts has taken up on the 7th day of December, 1850, and had them appraised by Thomas Wilkinson and William Dolan.

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         And John Maury himself took oath before me that the above hogs were his; and also pays all cost before me, except for the keeping of the same. As to the keeping thereof I have appointed George Bair and Jacob Hardacre to appraise the same, providing the parties cannot agree upon the amount.

         JOHN DOLAN,
         Justice of the Peace.

         That case was soon disposed of, and next followed a slander suit between the same parties, on the same subject matter, i.e., Maury claiming damages because Dilts had said “he had stolen hogs, and he could prove it.”

         The defendant justified, and poor Maury had to take a general piling up of the agony—the whole neighborhood seemed to be cognizant of his porcine reputation.

         

         Reuben Long, one of the jurors, was called upon by Whicher, who was the attorney for Maury, and was asked the question, "What is Mr. Maury’s reputation in the neighborhood as to hog stealing?”

         Reuben was extremely nice and particular in giving his testimony, beating around the bush most extensively, considering, doubtless, that as a juror he might have to chalk down in the box.

          “Well, Mr. Whicher, there is considerable talk in the neighborhood, among the neighbors, about Maury—a good many talk kind a hard about him—they say Maury is a __________ rather suspected of being inclined to take a little too much bacon—and I think if I expressed an opinion it would be, that his character in that respect is a little tainted—in fact, Mr. Whicher, salt would not save it.

         Et tu brute, was faintly murmured by the plaintiff’s attorney, who sat down in despair, abandoning the case to the tender mercies of the jury, who mulcted Mr. Maury in the sum of fifty dollars cost.

         John Kelso vs. Harvey Hatton, an appeal case, was then called, but Harvey having neglected to notify the plaintiff of his taking the appeal, the cause was continued at the cost of the appellant.

         This same Harvey Hatton is an erratic being; he never fails to have a law suit at every term, and scarcely fails in getting beat. In fact, he has been beaten so often, and so used up by law suits and whisky, that his habiliments, a la frontis et posteriori, are literally stove up. Harvey, several years ago, became apparently quite penitent (he was under indictment for assaulting an officer, and professed teetotal reformation). He joined the Mormons, or rather the Hinckleite branch of the Mormons located at Moscow, at that time, and was by Hinckle appointed an elder of the Church. Harvey felt called upon to preach, and on the Sunday evening before his trial come on he preached by his own appointment at the Court House.

         Now, as Harvey can neither read nor write, the announcement of his preaching brought a crowded auditory, and Harvey done it up brown. He possesses a most retentive memory, and actually delivered a sermon that Hinckle had preached about a month before, almost word for word, with only, as the Methodist Class Leader said, “a little variation.” One laughable one was when speaking of Paul’s (as he called him) conversion, he undertook to recite one passage, which he rendered thus: “Paul! Paul! It is hard for thee to kick agin natur.”

         Of Judge Grant, mentioned above, the following “stories” are told:

         The first one is told of the encounter between Judge Grant and the bully at Tipton, that is somewhat characteristic.

         The Judge, it is well known, is a small man, and, to a casual observer, would not appear to possess much bodily strength; but appearances are often deceptive, for, with a constitution of iron, muscles and nerves like steel and whipcord, and active and agile in his movements, he would have been found an antagonist exceedingly difficult to be handled.

         The Tipton bully, a quack doctor, named Harvey Whitlock, a renegade Mormon, from some fancied injustice manifested to him by the Judge in a case tried before him, threatened to whip him as soon as the Court adjourned.

         Now, as Whitlock was a much larger man than the Judge, and had shown his prowess by a ferocious assault upon a neighboring ‘Squire, it was supposed that in all probability there would be a little unpleasantness between them.

         The Court adjourned in due course, the Judge paid his bill at the tavern, ordered out his buggy from the stable and was on the sidewalk in front of the house preparing to leave, when Whitlock, who had been hanging round the bar room, muttering imprecations and threats against Grant, stepped hastily up and accosted him in an insulting and violent manner, evidently with the intention of provoking a conflict.

         The result was anxiously looked for by a number of the citizens, who, having heard the threats made by the bully, anticipated a knock down at least, if not a free fight.

         But the expectant bystanders were doomed to be disappointed. Grant seemed to be coolness personified—simply turning to the hostler who held the horses, said he had changed him mind about leaving, and the team could be taken back to the stable, and then deliberately walked back into the tavern without apparently taking any notice of his would-be assailant.

         This conduct seemed to infuriate Whitlock, who followed him, continuing his abuse, until Grant, having entered the building, turned round quickly and faced his antagonist, and in an instant, as if by magic, off came his heavy cloth cloak, and the sonorous, emphatic declaration . . .

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. . . came ringing out: “You cursed scoundrel, I will lay aside the Judge for a few moments for your especial benefit,” and he went for his opponent.

         But the bully, believing in the time-honored maxim that discretion is the better part of valor, or that it was not a good day for fighting, ingloriously fled from the battle field in hot haste and was laughed at and derided for his cowardice.

         Some years after the close of our national “unpleasantness,” Judge Grant made a tour of Arkansas. While lounging about a hotel at which he was stopping in one of the interior towns or villages of that State, he noticed a countryman—coonskin cap, butternut clothes, and all—trying to sell a cow that he had driven in from his farm. The vender was recommending the milking qualities of the animal, and, among other things, remarked to the bystanders that she would give four quarts of milk per day, if well fed. The cattle of Arkansas are not noted for either size or beauty, and, used to a better breed of cattle, Judge Grant was attracted to a closer examination of the animal, and succeeded in getting the Arkansan to repeat his recommendation—this time that she would give five quarts of milk per day, if well fed.

          “Why, said Judge Grant, with his characteristic suavity of manner and speech, “I have a cow on my farm that gives twenty-five quarts of milk per day, and we don’t think she is much of a milker, either!”

          “Whar mought you be from, Mister?”

          “Iowa”, replied Judge Grant.

          “Wa’ll, thar was a right smart sprinklin’ of Iowa soldiers down here durin’ the war, and they war reckoned the biggest liars in the world, and may be you was a Colonel in one of them Iowa regiments!”

         The laugh was at Judge Grant’s expense, and it followed him to Iowa.