The west shore., May 01, 1884, Page 153, Image 29

THE WEST SHORE.
country semi-civilized. They are still as barbarous as
their ancestors who blew up Petaa. He suggested an-
otner course, jean might report to the ProDacanda
might attend the council if he could gain leave; and that
august body would send a mission of devout priosfq with
just guard enough to meet the dangers to be encountered
11. TT IJ .
on mo wuy. u8 woum prepare the Jung's mind to
receive them.
Next day Jean started in a hammock, reached his
home near Petan in due course, and sent back word.
Thence he proceeded to the capital and drew up his
report to cue rropaganda. The Archbishop relieved him
from duty pending a reply, which did not arrive.
should think it probable the dispatch lies unopened
now,
As for the truth of the tale I must say only this: The
tradition of a civilized Bravo kingdom in Guatemala runB
without a break from the seventeenth century to our
time. Hundreds of matter-of-fact people dwelling in
Chiapas, Vera Paz and neighboring districts have noted
incidents that support the legend. No man can author!
tatively deny it When Mazariegos discovered Petan.
now called Flores, he did not doubt that this city was the
Itzimaya. His official report is published. It did not
strike him as wonderful when every inhabitant disap
peared, not from the town only, but from the cultivated
land3 about. Mazariegos supposed they had 'fled into
the neighboring woods, and he did not remain long
enough to perceive that this was certainly not the ex.
planation. They were never seen again, and we know
now they must have retired much further. They went
beyond any districts of which we have even report in
detail. It iB to the last degree improbable that a race so
advanced could have fallen back into barbarism within
the space of one generation. The popular notion is that
somewhere in the remoter wilds betwixt Petan and
Mexico, the Indians whom Mazariegos conquered rebuilt
their city and re-established their civilization. No man
can contradict the wildest story whereof the scene is laid
in those parts. Lequeu's report of the traditions linger
ing among those tribes the Indians must have passed
through from Fetan, makes it at least consistent with
probability that he has rediscovered the inhabitants of
the famous inland city.
Next day after telling Barbachella this story Lequeu
rode into Mosquito, and no more have I heard of him.
But a prudent man is safe enough along the frontier, and
he did not intend to venture far. James Boyle.
A most beautiful and fragrant growth for a window
may be obtained by soaking a sea sponge in warm water
and sowing in its cells the seeds of umbrageous grass
and wild flowers, with here and there a delicate fern and
creeping wild berry, known as mock strawberry. The
hanging may be done by a gilded rod or ornamental
cords. The sponge may be kept moist and distended by
daily sprinkling with blood-warm water, lhe sponge
thus treated is much lighter, prettier and more surely
verdant than any other spring basket
BUSINESS HABITa
WHERE iB probably not one farmer in ton thousand,
X says an exchange, who keeps a Bot of accounts from
which he can at any moment learn the cost of anything
he nwy havo produced, tr tu ILo uvmi, o his real
property. Avery few farmers who have boon brought
up to business habits keop such accounts and are ablo to
tell how their affairs progress, what each crop, each kind
of stock or each animal has cost and what each produces.
Knowing these points a farmer can, to a very groat ex
tent properly decide what crops he will grow aud what
kind of stock he will keop. He will thus be able to apply
his labor and money whore it will do tlte most good. He
can weed out his stock and retain only such animals as
may be kept with profit For the want of such knowl
edge farmers continue, year after year, to fowl cows that
are unprofitable, and frequently sell for loss than hor
value one that is the best of the herd, bocause sho is not
known to be any better than the rest Feed is also
wasted upon ill-bred stw-k, the keop of which cohU throo
or four times that of woll-brod animals, which, as have
boon proved by figures that cannot be mistaken, pay a
large profit on thoir keeping. For want of knowing what
they cost poor crops are raised year by year at an actual
loss, provided the farmer's hilor, at the rates current for
common labor, woro ohargod against thoui. To loam
that he has boon working for fifty cents a day during a
number of years, while he has boon paying his help twice
as much, would open the oyos of many a farmer who has
actually boon doing this, and it would convince him that
there is some value in figures and lxxik accounts. It is
not generally understood that a man who raises twenty
bushels of corn per acre pays twice as much for his plow
ing and harrowing, twice as much for lalxr, and twico as
great interest upon the cost of his farm, as a neighbor
who raises forty bushels cr acre. Nor is it understood
that when he raises a pig that makes 150 pounds of pork
in a year that his pork costs him twice as much, or the
corn he feeds brings htm but half as much, as that of his
neighbor, whose pig weighs 300 pounds at a year old If
all these things were clearly sot down in figures upon a
page in an account book, and were studied, thoro w.ould
be not only a sudden awakening to the unprofitableness
of such farming, but an immediate remedy would m
sought
THE WOMEN OF ROME.
11HE women of Ilomo, says a letter writer, liavo corn
. plosions like white wax, which are very lovely by
gaslight but unhealthy Wking by day. Hoe one Iloman
face and you see them alL The same waxen face, the
same nose, the same large black eyes, the same long
black hair, the same opulence of flesh and the same
walk, dangling from side to side like poor lame ducks.
Whatever the reason may be, Iloman women walk loss
gracefully than any other women under God's firmament
and they wear the ugliest shoes, and they have the largest
feet I ever saw on women. The way a liomau girl bows
to you, also, is very funny. She shrugs up her loft
I shoulder to her loft ear and nodi to you.