[Dan De Quille, Nevada Ideas of Divorce: How the "Mountain" Came to O'Hoolahan, Salt Lake Tribune, October 5, 1891]

 

NEVADA IDEAS OF DIVORCE.

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How the "Mountain" Came to O'Hoolahan.

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            In Nevada, as in other lands, there are found those who "marry in haste to repent at leisure." In Nevada also are "widders," of whom it is well, if not "Weller," for all susceptible "Samivels" to "beware."   Their motto is, "Get a husband, honestly if possible, but at all events get a husband." Even in the Comstock mining region marriageable men are not at present so plentiful as in the early days, and now that many young and handsome ladies from the East are in the field the woman of a certain age and of a certain degree of embonpoint who has caught her man is inclined to hold on to him and fight it out on the matrimonial line.  This was well illustrated recently in the court of Justice Kehoe, in Virginia City.

            It was a bright and calm September day, and so warm that it seemed a day in the middle of July.  The courtroom was almost deserted.  All the business of the morning had been dispatched and even then the Justice was not ready to cry: "Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof."  There had been before the Justice only one or two cases, and they were very tame ones.  Now the courtroom was deserted save by two or three loiterers — old and chronic haunters of the courts to whose presence the judge gave no heed.  He gave no more attention to their droning as they laid their heads together or yawned in their seats on the side benches than he did to the half dozen fat green flies  which had awoke from their winter nap to buzz and tumble about the dusty, cob-webbed windows.

            Suddenly this reposeful scene was rudely broken in upon.  Two sons of the "Ould Sod," in full view of "chain-lightning" and law, rushed in and advancing to where the justice was seated behind his little "law pulpit" at the rear of the courtroom, both began talking at once.

            "One at a time, please," cried the Judge.

            "Jedge — yer honor — will I shpake thin?" said one of the men.

            "Silence, Michael O'Hoolahan !" roared his companion.  "Silence, sor !  Didn't ye bring me wid ye as yer lagal advisor and counsel ?  Let me talk.  Phwat do ye know about law ?  Divil a bait !"

            "Keep still yourself, sir," said the Justice.  "Let him tell me what he wants."

            "Well, I wants me naime off the paiper.  That's phwat I wants," said the man.

            "Off what paper ?" asked the Judge.

            "Well, off the paiper ; shure ye ought to know phwat paiper.  Ye married me, they say."

            "To whom ?" asked the Judge.

            "Some faimalle, sor, and I don't want her, sor.  It don't go !  I want me naime off the paiper."       

            "Silence, Michael O'Hoolahan ! Silence sor !" roared the friend, taking his blackthorn  from under his arm and bringing it down upon the little law pulpit just under the Judge's nose with a tremendous thwack.  "Silence, Michael O'Hoolahan !  I am here as your lagal adviser, sor.  Phwat do you know about law ?  Sure yer honor, it was Tim McCloskey's wife that he married — his widdy, I main.  You married thim, yer Honor ——"

            "And I was drunk at the time, sor.  Yes, sor, an' I was not a free aigent, and I don't know a thing about it at all, sor — divil roawst me !  I wants me naime off the paiper — I redudiates, sor !"

            "Silence, sor !  Let me shpake.  Phwat do ye know about law ?" cried the legal adviser, flourishing his shillalah about O'Hoolihan's head, and then bringing it down upon the Judge's desk.

            "But I was dhrunk," cried O'Hoolahan — "I was not at the time a free aigent !"

            "Silence, sor !" roared the legal adviser.  "I am here to shpake !  It does not depind on that at all.  It depinds — and there is the whole pint, both in law and equity — it depinds, I say, whether was the woman a sole thrader or not at the time this marriage was solemnated.  That is the pint, yer Honor, both in law and equity !"

            "But I was dhrunk at the time, Jedge.  Divil roawst me, yer Honor, if I knowed I was gettin' married.  I wasn't a free aigent.  It won't go !"

            The Justice now tried to make the man understand that, drunk or sober, he was married to the woman fast enough, and, if he wanted a divorce, he must go to another court.

            "Divil burn me !" cried O'Hoolahan, "if I go to another coort.  Ye married me, Jedge, and ye can unmarry me.  Ye've only got to take me naime off the paiper."

            "Silence, Michael O'Hoolahan !" cried the legal friend, bringing his cane down in close proximity to the Judge's nose.  "Phwat do you know about law ?  I admit, Jedge, that he must go to a higher coort ; that is (down comes the blackthorn) if the woman can prove (whack) that she was at the time this marriage was solemnated (whack) a regularly ordained and constituted free thrader (whack).  On this pint it depinds, both in law and equity.  In case, yer Honor, this woman — the widdy as she was o' Tim McCloskey — in case she ——"

            "I have had enough of this," cried the Judge.  "I cannot divorce you, Mr. O'Hoolahan.  You are married, and married you must remain, for all I can do !"

            "Ye won't taik me naime off the paiper thin ?"

            "It would not mend the matter," said the Judge.

            "Ye won't taik it off ?"

            "No I won't !" fairly yelled the Judge.

            "Silence, Michael O'Hoolahan !" cried the legal adviser, bringing his shillalah down on top of the law pulpit and raising a cloud of dust under the Judge's nose.  "It depinds, yer Honor, whether, at the time this marriage was solemnated and consummated, it depinds whether this woman was a regular sole ——"

            Here the legal adviser happened to glance toward the front door.  His under jaw dropped, his eyes rolled wildly, and without another word, in a half-stooping posture, he passed round the desk of the Justice and went out at the back door of the office like a shot. 

            This sudden and undignified retreat of his valiant friend and legal adviser caused the unwilling husband to turn his face towards the front door.  A single glance and he, too, doubled up and scooted by the back way.

            A look at the front door showed it to be darkened by a woman about six feet in hight and so broad that she almost filled it from side to side.  The face of this giantess was purple from over-exertion and rage.  From under a diminutive hat perched far back on the top of her head a tangled yellow lock fell in a sort of a spray over her right shoulder.  She seemed for the moment quite out of breath, but giving utterance to a blowing noise that sounded like "Ah-woo-uf !" she advanced.

            As the mountain of flesh approached the Judge doubled up, and was about to take the back track, but thought the better of it, and sought refuge in the chair behind his little law pulpit.

            The "mountain" moved ponderously forward and as it rolled on gave vent to an ominous internal rumbling, and then, amid fire, smoke and burning lava, belched out "Did I or did I not see Michael O'Hoolahan sneak out at your back dure ?"

            "I believe O'Hoolahan is the name of one of the gentlemen who just retired," said the Judge.

            Advancing upon the pulpit — behind which the Judge settled lower and lower — the "mountain" belched:  "Ye belave ! Ye be-e-lave !  Ye know it was Michael O'Hoolahan, me husband ! Now what is all this plottin' and colloguin' in here about ? Am I a widdy again ?  Did ye taik his naime off the paiper ?  Did ye taik it off ?"

            "N-No," stammered the Judge.

            "Ye didn't ?  Don't ye decaive me !"

            "No, I give you my word and honor that I didn't.  I couldn't — I had no right to."

            "It's well for ye — well for ye that you didn't.  I'll taich him to be runnin' around wid that blaggard O'Toole, colloguin' and connivin' to lave me a lone widdy agin', jist when I'm makin' a jintleman of him.

            With this she roiled and rumbled back to the door.  There she turned and shaking her fist thus addressed the tip of the Judge's nose, which alone was visible over the top of his little pulpit : "Now, sor, do ye mind that you lave his naime on the paiper.  I'll have no meddlin' wid a man, waust I gets him.  No more colloguin' and connivin', d'ye mind !"

DAN DE QUILLE.