The Lumbermen Who Worshipped a Black Cat

The Concatenated Order of Hoo-Hoo, or the Biographical Degree of the Playful Kitten, is the name of a lodge organized at the Masonic temple last evening by a number of bon vivants, who entered into the spirit of the affair in a manner to make it heard outside the lodge room. This is the second branch of the order on the Pacific coast; the first was organized in San Francisco two weeks ago.

The Hoo-Hoo is a new secret organization that is said to have found its origin on a railroad train, in the brain of a witty newspaper man connected with a lumberman's journal, who, to while away the time, originated the order and its ritual, which proved so excruciatingly funny that it captured the hearts of lumbermen throughout the Eastern states, and 'Hoo-Hoo' branches grew up in every lumber district until their number has become legion. From an accidental burlesque the Hoo-Hoos have grown to be a power unto themselves.

The emblem adopted by the order is the figure of a black cat in an extremely spiteful attitude, with its tail curled up over its back in a manner to form the mystical figure 9. The emblem and the name are strongly suggestive of what a candidate has to undergo when passing the ordeal of initiation.

Some further insight into the solemnity of the order can be gathered from the titles assumed by the officers who took part in the cat-like, dark and snarling proceedings: Charles Edward Fatten, senior high hoo-hoo; Dempsey Boswell Hanson, junior high hoo-hoo; Frank Beach Cole, scrivenoter; Edward Henry Lewis, holy bojum; Benjamin Franklin Cobb, bander snatch; Jacob Edgar Fox, custocatian; Isaac Pendleton Armstrong, gurdon; Victor Henri Beckman, arcanoper.

This array of formidable officers, clothed in weird costumes of black robes with the mystical black cat on a white shield on each breast, after transacting business initiated the following victims of misplaced confidence: S. F. Manchester, W. D. Means, J. F. Armstrong, V. H. Beckman, S. H. Lewis, F. B. Cole, A. Llewellyn, S. Soute, E. Verd, C. L. Roy, J. A. Loggie, T. L. Williams, J. W. McDonald, James Perkins, F. O. Ehrlich, Thomas Sanders, W. H. Welborn, D. H. McHullin, S. H. Crane, T. Cashing, F. Boch, Charles Towne.

They all survived the effects of the rugged path over which they were forced, and it seemed to have no perceptible effect on their appetites at the banquet that followed the lodge meeting, which was served to as jolly a crowd as ever put their feet under a 'mahogany.'

The poetical origin of the order, as taught by the lecturer, is to the effect that unwritten history tells of the wonderful Hoo-Hoo emperor of happiness, health and longevity who lived ages ago on earth but chose to leave this mundane sphere and take up his abode in the clouds, choosing always the densest and bleakest. Being annoyed by the silver linings he decided to return and again set up his empire on earth. He appeared to a few chosen disciples in the form of a great black cat in a dream in New Orleans and instructed them to go out and preach the doctrines of the Hoo-Hoos, and since then even the Coreyites can show no more rapid growth than the Hoo-Hoos, while the formerly poor and despised black cat, teased and otherwise, figures as an object of reverence by all well-informed Hoo-Hoos.

The first call was made to lumbermen, but since then the cat has reached its back and has extended its protecting claws to members of other trades. Much good is being done by the Hoo-Hoos, and many a man in telling his experience can testify to the fact when hearing the midnight back-fence serenader of his springing out of bed, grabbing his bootjack and throwing open the window, intent on throwing the missile, when he is reminded of the welcoming sign of the order and quietly returns to his couch, a better man, more kind to his wife and a better judge of midnight music.

'The cat, the cat, the old black cat, Just hear the darling wail; And if you know the building once, You will never tell the tale.'