The Project Gutenberg EBook of Kid Scanlan, by H. C. Witwer

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Title: Kid Scanlan

Author: H. C. Witwer

Release Date: August 22, 2009 [EBook #29764]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK KID SCANLAN ***

Produced by Al Haines

KID SCANLAN

BY

H. C. WITWER

AUTHOR OF

THE LEATHER PUSHERS, FIGHTING BLOOD, ETC.

GROSSET & DUNLAP

PUBLISHERS

NEW YORK

Copyright, 1920,

BY SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY

(INCORPORATED)

DEDICATED TO

ALLAN HENRY WITWER

MY SIX-YEAR-OLD DESCENDANT
WHO WEEPS BITTERLY WHEN
I READ MY YARNS ALOUD
TO HIS PATIENT
MOTHER

H. C. W.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

I. LAY OFF MACDUFF
II. EAST LYNCH
III. PLEASURE ISLAND
IV. LEND ME YOUR EARS
V. "EXIT, LAUGHING"
VI. THE UNHAPPY MEDIUM
VII. LIFE IS REEL!
VIII. HOSPITAL STUFF

KID SCANLAN

CHAPTER I

LAY OFF, MACDUFF!

Brains is great things to have, and many's the time I've wished I had a
set of 'em in _my_ head instead of just plain bone! Still they's a lot
of guys which has gone through life like a yegg goes through a safe,
and taken everything out of it that wasn't nailed, with nothin' in
their head but hair!

A college professor gets five thousand a year, a good lightweight will
grab that much a fight. A school teacher drags down fifteen a week,
and the guy that looks after the boilers in the school buildin' gets
thirty!

Sweet cookie!

So don't get discouraged if the pride of the family gets throwed out of
school because he thinks twice two is eighteen and geography is played
with nets. The chances is very bright that young Stupid will be
holdin' the steerin' wheel of his own Easy Eight when the other guys,
which won all the trick medals for ground and lofty learnin', will be
wonderin' why a good bookkeeper never gets more than twenty-five a
week. And then, if he feels he's _got_ to have brains around him, now
that he's grabbed the other half of the team--money--he can go downtown
and buy all the brains he wants for eighteen dollars a week!

So if you're as shy on brains as a bald-headed man is of dandr