The Columbian., January 02, 1885, Image 1

THE COLUMBIAN.
THE COLUMBIAN.
PtTBLISHKD EVEKT FRIDAY,
AT
ST. HELENS, COLUMBIA CO., OIL.
BY
. G. ADAMS, Editor and Proprietor
Published Every Friday,
at
ST. HELENS, COLUMBIA CO., OR.,
by
E. 0. ADAMS, Editor and Proprietor.
Subscription Hates:
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VOL. V.
ST. HELENS, COLUMBIA COUNTY, OREGON, JANUARY 2, 1885.
NO. 22.
THE
CO
M A I A
1 V II II V H A A M 0
THE BURNING OF THE ."WOULD.
Franklin E. Denton in The Current.
The morning clontb the Eat as young as
when
Adam and Eve, pure as their Paradise,
Did hail its advent with their orisons.
Fleets were upon the oceans, armies fought.
And countless marts sent up their smoke and
din;
Lovers did clasp, and there were funerals,
Men laughed, and wept, and their own shad
ows chased
There came no warning of the final day.
Hurried the hours, the sun plunged to hi
rest.
Drenching the West in blood ! Outsprang the
stars,
But changed their asrect for the grief di
vine. The god-like pity of their golden eyes
Was gone, and each became a sneer of fire!
The Even was afraid, and there did come '
.A paralyzing terror in the air.
A horrid roaring of the brazen Eastl
And, line a lightning-sandaled Hell, the fire,
The avenging tire, rushed round the recreant
globe:
Rich provinces were shriveled as if leaves!'
The rousting nations robed the earth with
shrieks!
The emerald Andes of the oceans writhed
Above the el uds in their green agony.
But all was over soon.' The radiant earth,
A ghaitly cinder, a stupendous coal,
"Wandered upon its ancient path. And then
The bright orbs sparkled, and the great sun
shone.
And all the universe was pesc and joy! j
For Discord is Time's illegitimate,
But Concord, daughter of Eternity.
WASHINGTON MONUMENT.
The roil, 4ppearance and Construc
tion Iu the Klevator.
George Alfred Townsend.
It is a majestic thing to stand below
and look upon this wonderful shaft,
which has, even at the lop, the extent
of a considerable house, and at the base
is, I think, sixty feet square. It has
tost about $ 1)00,000, but more
than a fifth of this was spent
fixing the old foundations, so
as to. render it sure that the
weight of the shaft could be supported.
One almost regrets to see this monu
ment finished when he' thinks of the
musical clatter made by the innumera
ble workmen with their wooden mallets
and cold chisels cutting away at the
stone. The "Anvil Chorus" was hardly
more pleasing to the ear. Ihe monu
ment is not situated on very high ground.
It is probably not more than forty or
fifty feet above the tide. But it is in
the very eye of Washington, inclosed by
all the hills, and there are some beauti
tiful effects from this noble shaft, which
is, I think, over 500 feet high.
As you go into Washington from the
north you can see this shaft, now rising
behind the capitol, which is on a hill,
and the monument is about a mile
further off. Yet the shaft clearly rises
to the eye above the dome of the capitol
when the passenger is some t wo miles off
from the dome. TVe - slr-t is scn to
move nearer and nearer tne dome, and
finally stands right behind it, like a tall
man looking down on a kite. Slowly the
shaft passes off to the left,
and seems to be working through
the air. It is all made of
a very nice quality of American mar
ble from a little way out of Baltimore.
This monument marks rather a new
era in the building of great shafts. No
other shaft now existing that I
know of was constructed by the aid of
bteam. When this monument was be
gun the work of building it was either
done by hand or by some small hoisting
engine. The stones when put into the
base of the monument were Very irregu
lar in size, and that part of the work
which proceeded somewhere letween
1840 and 1855 is the worst portion of
the monument.
When th work was taken up by a
direct government appropriation the larg
est and best elevator was immediately
purchased and st up in the center of
the monument, where it is to remain
perpetually and carry up passengers.
This elevator runs between trussed iron
uprights, all open, leaving a frightful
chasm between the open elevator and
the sides of the monument. As you go
up higher and higher, and begin to real
ize the stupendous descent in case of an
accident, a feeling very like hor
ror ocurs to even a courageous
man. The elevator seems to grow
small and lean. The supports at the
corners looks like straws. It goes up
rather slowly, carrying the prodigious
stone, generally about sixteen feet long
by eight feet thick and wide, and when
the top is reached there are four cranes
of iron which seem to have the sagacity
of the human hand. They reach for
that stone as a blind man finds his
bread on the table. When they take
hold of it, in a perfectly noiseless way,
it is lifted up into the air and brought
down, aud then the crane seems to feel
for the spot in the wet hydraulic cement
where the stone is tnaily disposed al
most without tho inti rv ntion of human
beings. In this way the monument has
litcrallv walked into the air.
How Tobacco I Ilurnt.
Exchange.
Tobacco raisers and producers of other
plants whose dried and curled leaves are
of value in the market, will be inter
ested in the latest explanation of the
cause of tho brown discolorations
spots of small diameter, in which the
tissue is neatly destroyed that so often
impair the value of their products. It
appears that rain drops, after a shower
of a hot summer day, act as condensing
prisms to the nearly vertical beams of
the sun, concentrating the ray upon the
surface of the leaf just beneath the cen
ter of the drop, and thus producing a
I unit spot of diameter corresponding
with that oi the drcp itself and of depth
pro; oriionate to the intensity of the
Leaf.
For Ouildlng Partitions.
Scientific Journal
A composition of sand, cork, and lima
molded into blocks is now on trial in
Germany for building light partitions.
It is said to have the advantage of ex
cluding sounds better than ordinary
brickVork, while being light and a good
non conductor. But a composition of
hard-wood sawdust applied to lath like
common plas.er is eiicfipcr than the
German method of const r.ictiug parti
tions, is much lighter, and has other
desirable qualities.
One of the good old crusted jokes of
the bicycle club-room is: "When a man
Incomes a good bicyclist he say, 'good
ty, sick lit.' "
THE COLORADO WOOD-RAT,
Xliat I.es Low by Day and Plays
Practical Jokes by Mailt.
New York Sun.
I don't know whether people out in
Colorado are bothered yet with what we
used to call wood-rats." said a formci
resident of that state, "but a few years
ago, when I first went out there, they
kept us in a perpetual stew. The wood
rat is about the size of our com
mon house-rat, with a tail nine
inches long. It is gray on the back
and white on the belly. There's dev
iltry enough in 'em to fill a wood-chuck.
You seldom see one of them, plenty as
they are, for they lay low in the day
time, and wont come fooling around at
night if there is any one. stirring about,
the house. The wood-rat is a natural
born, irreclaimable thief. - What he
steals for no one had ever found out
while I was there, for he don't crib
things to eat, and he distributes his
booty throughout the country without
regard, to his personal benefit. When
lie steals something from one spot he
will put in its place some article he has
filc-lu d from another.
'1 remember once I was building a
shanty out in Pueblo, and had a keg of
nails sent m from Denver. Work had
been at a standstill for a day or so for
,want of them. I knocked the head out
and left them in the shanty over night.
Next morning there wasn't, a nail in
keg, but in their place was a miscellane
ous collection of articles, consisting of
table knives, spoons, a tin saucer, sev
eral stones, a number of chips, a buck
skin glove, and, worst of all, a set of
false teeth.
"We knew at once the mischievous
rats had been at work, and I set out to
see if I could gather up at least a por
tion of the nails about the neighbor
hood. I found a man who had lost a
spoon and had found a pile of nails in
his kit. The owner of the buckskin
glove had not been renumerated for
his loss with nails, but some
one's woolen sock lay in its place. By
ami by the whole community was out
looking up missing things' and dumping
nails at my shanty. I got back about
half of them, and the articles that had
been left in their place were all restored
to their owners except the false teeth.
No one in the whole neighborhood had
lost any teeth. The finding of the teeth
came to be the talk of the country, and
in a few weeks a judge over in a town
twenty miles away sent a man over to
look at them, as he thought they might
be a set of teeth of his that had mysteri
ous!'' disappeared, stating that they
had been taken from a tumbler of water,
in which they had been placed over
night, and that a dead bird had been
left in their stead. The teeth proved to
le the judge's. These rats must have
had a high old time with the judge's
teeth before they reached ray place and
dumped them in the nail k g.C """"
"It used to be a favorite" pastime with
the wood-rats to carry all sorts of refuse
and garbage into the houses and scatter
it about. I have waked up more than
once to find some moist and sweet
smelling morsel from the swill tub lying
across my face, or a numlier of them
piled on the bed covers. This peculiar
ity of the wood-rat naturally led to con
stant annoyances and misunderstand
ings, and newcomers in the region, un
acquainted with the ways of the animal,
were frequently mystified, and some
times frightened by occurrences. An
Irish family once came to the neighbor
hood, where they had purchased
a little property. They had not been there
a week before the wood-rats paid them a
visit. Denny Ryan, the head of the family,
placed his pipe on the table as usual on
going to bed one night. When he arose
in the morning his pipe was gone, and
lying where he had left it was a tallow
candle. Denny had no such thing as a
tallow candle in his house, and no one
in the house had touched the pipe. This
aroused his superstitious nature. He re
lated the circumstances with much awe,
to some acquaintances, who, seeing
some probable fun in store for them,
did not hi form him as to the cause of
the mystery. One morning, a few days
later, Denny found his lost pipe in his
boot, and the sock he had left there when
he went to bed was gone. Denny de
clared that there were ghosts in his
house. He was thoroughly frightened,
and wanted to sell his property.
"A number of eastern men had got
possession of some land next to Denny's,
and his holding, they believed would in
time be highly valuable to them. Un
known to any of Denny's acquaint
ances, they made him an offer for his
property. It was less than he had paid,
and in spite of his suj er. titious fear, he
refused to take it. A day or two after
that Denny found his stove half full of
potatoes, not one of which had been in
the house before, and the kindling
wood he had placed in the stove the
night before was piled on a
table in the dining-room. With
out waiting to entirely dres.v him
self, he hurried to the parties who
wanted to buy his, property, and closed
and clinched the transaction at once.
When his friends, who had been keeping
Denny in ignorance of the ways of the
wood-rat for the joke of the thing, heard
of what he had been induced to do by
the sharpers, they attempted to force
them to cancel the sale, but as every
thing they had done was regular, they
refused todo it. Denny's friends, how
ever, chipped in and made up quite a
sum of money for him. If the wood-rat
hadn't bothered Denny he would have
been a rich man in a year or so, for his
property became worth thousands of
dollars.""
Ciettlns Ahead of the Boy.
, Texas Siftings.l
"What is tho meaning of that red line
above tho fourth story of your house?"
asked a stranger of a man near Pitts
burg. "That is a water mark. That mark
shows how high the water was during
the great overflow about a year ago."
"Impossible! If the water had been
that high the whole town would have
been swept away."
"The water never was that high. It
only came up to the first story window,
but the cursed boys " rubbed
it out three or four times so I put it
up there where they can't get at it. It
takes a smart man to circumvent those
boys." j
Goldsmith: The first fault is the
child of simplicity, but every other the
offspring of guilt. j
Hotels In Foreign Land.
"IchaboJ" in Inter Ocean.
The most expensive hotels are in the
far east, where $3, $4, and 5 per day
are the prevailing rates. There is no
reason why this should be so, since sup
plies are not extraordinarily expensive in
Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore, and
Yokohama, and labor is almost nothing.
It is because public sentiment justifies
such exorbitant charges. In most of the
cities there are temperance halls and
sailors' homes,' which are open to the
general public, and will take travelers
in for 1.25 or $l.r0 a day. Some of
these are admirable institutions regular
hotels, with reading-rooms, drawing
rooms, etc.
Next to those hotels of tho far east, I
Bhould say that those of Egypt are the
most expensive. The cheapest hotels
are in India, Palestine and Syria. The
most you can pay at a hotel in India is
7 rupees per diem, and that means
the best accommodations which the
Great Eastern at Calcutta and tho
Esplanade at Bombay can afford. These
same hotels will store you away on the
top floor for 4 or 5 rupees. Of
course in this statement I do not include
the mountain resorts, such as Darjeel
ing, Simla and Mussoorie, where you
may pay 7 or 8 rupees per day,
another rupee for your fire, and another
for your khitmutgar, or private servant.
The truth is that in India, Syria, and
Palestine, there is no fixed price for
hotel accommodations. The best hotels
in the up-country of India will come
down to 3 rupees, and those of the Holy
Land to 6 or 8 francs. They expect to
make their money out of you in other
ways. They recommend you to curio
dealers, guides, bazaars, and livery
establishments, and get a commission
on all these services unbeknown to you,
which really comes out of your pocket.
When the traveler strikes Greece,
Italy, Turkey, and the European states
generally, the hotel prices begin to bo
established by tho room, exclusive of
food, service, lights, etc.
Oriental Wood-Carvem.
New York Commercial Advertiser.
The East Indians are naturally free
handed carvers. Long before the Chris
tian era the Hindoos beautified tho in
teriors of their temples and homes with
the most intricate work of the kind. The
facility of carving has not left them,
and a block of teak wood under their
chisels soon becomes the bed of the most
beautiful traceries and reproduces the
flora of the east in all its variety of
forms.
The Oriental wood-carvers in one re
spect are unequaled they have origin
ality of conception united with a power
of execution which is wonderful. They
receive simply the suggestions of the ar
tists on draughting paper with none of
the hundred minutiae of background
supporte and the like, which are neces
sary to the workingmen here. There
they in truth use their chisels as
brushes, for their hands are firm. They
are acquainted simply with the idea
which is conveyed, and with one or two
scoops of the chisel a lily or a passion
flower or a pomegranate lies imbedded
in the wood as though it had been wait
ing simply to be picked and enjoyed.
But while they are unsurpassed in what
is known as emotional carving, they are
at a loss at the broad sweeps which are
required in the decoration of large
apartments or halls.
The Helplessness or Littleness.
Pittsburg Chronicle.
"Sometimes as I gaze into the great
starlit girdle of earth and try to fathom
the mystery of space, I am lost in the
utter helplessness of my littleness," re
marked Mr. Jarphly. "How impossible
it is for the human mind to comprehend
anything without a beginning and an
end! It is beyond its capabilities, how
ever cultured or brilliant that mind may
bo. For what, then, are our little petty
ambitions, spites, malices, struggles,
and exertions? For what do we exist?
For"
"Got that wood chopped yet, Jere
miah?" called out Mrs. Jarphly from the
kitchen.
"I'm a-chopping it' replied her hus
band. "Well, you'd better hurry; I reckon it
you have to go without your supper you
won't bo wondering what you exist
for."
The Gulf" Stream Abnormally Warm.
New York Herald.
A comparison made in the London
meteorological office of Atlantic temper
ature returns from twenty-eight ships,
containing 116 recent observations, with
data for previous years, reveals the fact
that during last summer the ocean in
the gulf stream's course was abnormally
warm. In tho area between 45
and 55 degrees north latitude, ex
tending from theEuropean coast almost
to the mid-Atlantic meridian, the tem
perature of the ocean water during June,
1884, was about 3 degrees above the
mean, and during July and August the
half of this marine track lying nearest
the British lines, was from 1 to 14 de
grees above the mean.
The Proof-Reader's Triumph.
Chicago Herald .
In 1827 Charles Babbago superin
tended tho printing of a set of trigono
metrical tables for the ordnance survey
of England and Ireland. Only thirty
copies were printed. The tables con
tained ti, 000, 000 figures. They were
prepared and corrected with the utmost
care, and when completed were hung
up in the hall at Cambridge university
and a reward offered to any one who
could find an " inaccuracy. Since their
first issue in 1827 no error has been dis
covered, and it may reasonably be con
cluded that they are absolutely correct.
Emerson' Knlet,
Ralph Waldo Emerson had these rules
for reading:
1. ' Never read any book that is not a
year old.
2. Never read any 'but famous books.
3. Never read any book but what you
like.
It is probable that the last rule was
formed when tho writer had acquired
critical tastes. It would hardly be safe
for all readers to follow.
Kx-ICmpress Eusenle.
The ex-Empress Eugenie now appears
through much suffering to have become
almost insensible to pain. Her face is
pallid, her hair white, and the light i
gone from her eyes."
THE GOOD TIME COMINQ
When Cheap Electricity Shall Hare
Superseded Steam. '
Chicago Tribune.
While the spokesmen of "the age of
steam" are ringing all the changes on
the glories of Watt's invention the pio
neers of science aud invention are hard
at work to displace it. Edison is now
engaged in a search for a means of gen
erating electricity directly from the
consumption of coal. In a conversation
with a New York reporter ho gives an
interesting glimpse of what he is
after and what he thinks are his chances
of success. What he desires to accom
plish is, to do away with the intermedi
ary boilers, furnaces, steam-engines and
dynamos that are now used in the pro
duction of electricity. 'and to procure
that powerful force directly from the
fuel as electricity is now gotten from the
combustion of zinc in the battery. In
consequence of the complicated methods
by which the coinbu tion of coal
is now converted into electricity
this agent cost ten times as
much as it should. We now, as is well
known, get from coal but one-fifth to
one-tenth part of the power it contains.
Edison reports that he has found no
trouble in obtaining a slight current of
electricity directly from the combustion
of fuel, but he has struck as yet an in
superable barrier to further, progress.
Before this barrier his experiments, like
the similar successes of Jablochkoff and
some German investigators remain mere
laboratory curiosities. He will give
himself five years to unlock this secret
of nature and will think himself lucky
if he succeeds in that time.
The description Edison gives of the
happy results that would flow from the
realization of his dreams of cheap elec
tricity justifies his enthusiastic declara
tion that tho inventor who succeeds in
getting at it will do the world the great
est material service yet rendered to man.
The unscientific world, he says, has no
conception of what such a discovery
would mean. It would put an end to
boilers and steam engines; it would
make power about one-hint h as
cheap as it is now; it would en
able a steamship to cross the Atlantic at
a nominal cost; it would enable every
poor man to run his own carriage. It
would . revolutionize the industrial
world. The electric motor is the ideal
motor for all kinds of work. What we
want is some means of producing the
current cheaply. Now it costs ten
times as much as it ought to. When we
discover the short cut from the com
bustion of coal directly to electricity wo
can heat and light houses, do all tho
cooking, move all kinds of machinery,
vehicles and boats do all the world's
work, in fact, for almost nothing com
pared to what it now costs us. There is
a good time coming for somebody.
There is another possibility in this
possibility of cheap electricity which
Edison does not refer to. Babbage, the
great English mathematician and philos
opher, predicted that if a power was
ever discovered which could bo c heaply
distributed from a common center to tho
houses and shops of the working classes
it would completely revolutioniza the
tendency of fsieam to mass capital and
labor in great factories and swarming
hives of industry. "The de
serted village would live again.
Tho efficiency of production gained
by the consolidation of multitudinous
home forges, home shuttles, home shoe
benches of the old regime into the
steam-driven mills of to-day has been
paid for at a ruinous social price. Happy
villages have been swallowed up in
murky factory towns, and the division
of labor has been carried so far that
every laborer is but the fractional part
of a man. If cheap electricity will do
all that Edison claims for it on the
purely material side, and will, as Bab
bage prophesied, reduce the inflamma
tory evils of our congested industrial
centers, its discoverer will certainly do the
world tho most important material ser
vice yet rendered unto men.
Genilemeu at Larg-C
Boston Bu "g?t.
We have among us a class of men who
deserve neither our commiseration, sym
pathy nor pity, who are miserable by
choice, and of no value in society. We
allude to those who have lived a "life of
penurious celibacy, until the property
amassed by niggardly savings and self
mortifying deprivations hovers over
them by day and by night in visions of
distrust, disquietude and fear. These
are they who never listen to the petition
of the widow nor tho cry of the orphan,
whose charities end where they began, at
home, if he may be said to have a home,
who has no feelings in community with
the world nor its families.
We have one such in our mind's eye
at this moment; he is a man who neither
indulges in the vicious nor the innocent
pleasures of the age; his life is as regular
and monotonous as an eight-day clock;
he is punctual in waking and rising,
punctual in lying down and sleeping,,
punctual at breakfast, punctual at his
desk and tho performance of his regular
duties, punctual at church, except when
there is to be a collection, and then he
is suddenly indisposed; punctual in his
appearance at another's dinner table,
most dilatory in making a return. He
leaves the city in the spring, to avoid
high taxation, having first bargained
with tho selectmen of some county
town that they will only assess him for
about one-quarter of the value of what
he really owns. He was never known
to give candy to a child or to "tip" a
servant. In short, he is a selfish, miserly
fellow, but nevertheless a gentleman at
large.
Under Alaskan Glaciers.
Exchange.
After a visit to some of the Alaskan
glaciers, Mr. Thomas Meehan states that
beneath the Muir glacier, said to be 400
miles long, flows a rapid torrent, which
he estimates to be 100 feet wide and
four feet in average depth, and which
runs summer and winter without inter
ruption. At its termination the glacier
hangs over the sea, and gives off ice
bergs. Mr. Meehan remarks that the
great ice-sheets have their lakes, rapids,
waterfalls, hills and valleys; that the
water ways change their courses at times
through the melting; and that melting
progresses freely in the sun's rays, but
not in the shade.
Philadelphia Call: Laugh at trifles
but do it behind their backs, for the
world is made up of trifle.
Tea-Cup FortuneTellIng.
St. Nicholas. i
I have a friend who is quite renowned
for her success as a fortune-teller
through her skill in shaking and tapping
a teacup until the grounds or tea-leaves
in the bottom of the tea-cup assume in a
rude way certain shapes or forms repre
senting people, animals, and various
other images which she professes to
understand as referring in some way to
the person whose fortune sh . happens to
be telling at the time.
I was present once when she told the
fortune of a young lady. The prophecy
and method of making it seemed to me
to be very vague; but the gist of it all
was that in a short time a young gen
tleman of extremely prepossessing ap
pearance would arrive, and exert a
powerful influence on the future pros
pects of the young lady. Wishing to
discover what was in the cup to warrant
such a forecast, I obtained possession of
it without being observed. In the bot
tom of the cup I discovered that the
leaves had assumed a form which, with
a little aid of the imagination, might be
accepted as resembling a very spare,
delicate and altogether debilitated
young man. i
With the aid of a teaspoom, and using
a few other grounds of leaves that were
lying on the bottom of the cup, I quickly
changed the young man into a disreputa
looking old tramp, with a big bundle on
his back, and accompanied by a ferocious
looking bulldog. Then I awaited the
result. Presently the young lady whose
fortune had been to'd took up the cup,
with a blush of pleasure, to examine its
contents. The moment she saw the
dreadful figure of the old tramp she
exclamed, "What a horrid old fright!"
Then there was a great commotion,
which was only quelled when I acknowl
edged iy guilt. But I learned some
thing, which was that with a little
management and a teaspoon pictures
of amy kind could be made in a tea cup.
Personality In Handwriting.
The Coun ting-Room. '
Persons writing naturally do so with
out thought regarding the peculiar con
struction of their writing. The hand
operates the pen as it were automati
cally through the sheer force of habit,
by which all the innumerable personali
ties are unconsciously imparted to writ
ing. Learners and forgers think re
specting their writing, and hence, the
more stiff and formal style of their work;
there is wanting the easy, graceful flow
apparent in thoughtless or habitual
writing. Lines show more of nervous
ness and hesitancy while the whole con
struction of the writing is more exact
and formal; and, besides, every different
handwriting abounds in wellnigh num
berless habitual peculiarities, of which
the writer himself is unconscious, and
cannot, therefore avoid.
Thus, two other insurmountable diffi
cuties are placed in the way of the
forger: First, to observe and imitate
all the characteristics of tho writing he
would imitate; and, second, to note and
avoid all the habitual characteristics of
his own hand. Habit in writing be
comes so fixed and arbitrary (not to
mention the great artistic skill 'required
to exactly imitate an unpracticed hand),
that I do not conceive it to by possible
for any one to similate the writing of
another, or to so dissemble his own
writing, in any considerable j quantity,
as to defy detection through a really
skilled expert examination. !
The Japanese "Treaty Box."
Boston Budget
The pr- cipal object of the mission of
the Japanese embassy, which lately ar
rived at Washington, was to get a copy
of the treaty between Japan and the
United States signed by the j president.
The original was burned in the great
fire at Jeddo in 1858. The copy in Jap
anese was saved. This they brought
with them, and a copy of it not signed,
and a letter from the Tycoon to tho pres
ident, j
The box containing these documents
was looked upon by them j as almost
sacred. It was called the "treaty box,"
and was never allowed to be out of their
sight. It was a box three feet ! long,
twenty-six inches in depth and eighteen
inches wide, covered with red morocco
leather and neatly sewed around the
edges. There were three japanned boxes
placed together and then covered.
Around the box was a light frame, and
when carried was borne on the backs of
four men by poles. The embassy brought
with them $80,000 cash for the purpose
of making purchases. Their money was
all brought from Japan in Mexican dol
lars and American half dollars, stamped
with the Japanese mark. They brought
an immense amount of baggage, over
eighty tons, which made four full car
loads over the Panama railroad. ; They
had fifteen boxes containing valuable
presents for the president of j the United
States. I
Emperor and Worklngmao,
Chicago Herald.
A favorite amusement of j Dom Pedro
II, of Brazil, is to leave his gorgeous
turnout in a side street, and, accom
panied by a gray-haired chamberlain
and a stalwart lifeguardsman, walk the
distance of a square or more to a manu
factory or other establishment and sur
prise the proprietor and employes by his
sudden and unannounced j appearance
among them. Of course he; is given the
liberty of the establishment, and he
takes his time in examining the ma
chinery and modus operandi. With a
kind word of encouragement and com
mendation, he goes away, perhaps to
pay a similar visit to another establish
ment. These visits he makes impartially
to the mechanical and mercantile estab
lishments, controlled by foreigners as
well aj natives. I
The Oldest Dynasty In the World.
Chicago Times.
The present reigning dynasty of Japan
is the oldest in the world, j It dates back
2,346 years, and its records are accu
rately preserved for that time, j During
this period the reigning houses of China
have several times been changed, and
all the nations now civilized, i without
exception, have had thejr beginning. It
is sometimes marvelous to reflect that
any house could preserve! its integrity
and occupy the throne forj such a period
of time.
An attendant in the treasury depart
ment who can count 4,000 new notes an
hour for seven hours a day is considered
uniKiiallv dftxtarona.
FLORIDA SULPHUR POOLS.
Natural Phenomena In the Peninsu
lar State Explained.
Jacksonville Fla.) Times-Union.
The Apalachicola Tribune explains the
gr at smoke which has been puzzling
observers for years, and which could be
seen on any cloudless day ascending
from the vicinity of Ancilla river, in
Florida. Various efforts have been
made to discover the supposed volcano,
while, on the other hand, some have
concluded that the smoke came from the
camp-fires of some remnant of the Semi
nole Indians. The Times-Democrat ex
pedition threw no light upon the mys
tery, the tall grass, bogs and dense un
dergrowth impeding the progress of the
curious.
One .Capt. Asher is the hero who ar
rivtyl in Apalachicola,! wiih thr follow
ing information, which puts out the
Florida volcano, and the romance is lost
of the poor Seminole lingering in the
land of his fathers. At the same time
it adds to the attractions of the lovely
land of fruits, flowers, and wonders.
Perhaps from the sulphuric pools came
the healing virtues which laid the foun
dation for the legend that in Florida
flowed the waters of eternal youth.
Capt. Asher was in search of palmetto
logs on the Ancilla river when he de
scried the smoke or cloud from a point
in the ; distance. Remembering the
many reports he had heard about
this smoke, he determined to un
earth this mystery, if possi
ble. So, calling his crew to
gether, and picking up their traps, the
party pursued their way in the small
boats up the Ancilla river. They trav
eled up the river, or creek, for it hardly
deserves the name of river, for miles.
After ascending from itsmouth twenty
five or thirty miles, he fudges, he was
brought to an abrupt halt by a rock bar
rier in front. Upon investigating he
found' that the river ended and was lost
underneath tho ground. Seeing that
the smoke became more distinct at this
point, and seemed straight ahead, he had
the boat hauled up to tho bank and
sprang ashore, determined, if possible,
to pursue his investigations on foot. As
he sprang on shore he gave an exclama
tion of surprise. Scattered at various
points were huge rocks, towering many
feet above his head a thing unheard of
in Florida.
Mr. Asher describes some of the rocks
as being as large as an ordinary dwell
ing and apparently hollow, containing
much water. He describes them as
being of a flinty appearance, and when
struck with an iron or steel instrument
to emit thousands of sparks. A mile or
two further on were seen numerous
rocks that were formed into round
basins, their sides being smooth and
beautifully polished. Mr. Asher sprang
upon the top of one of these basins. As
his foot came in contact with the flinty
substance a hollow sound was
emitted from tho rock. Calling
for a pole, and it being handed to him.
he placed it in the center of the basin.
What was his surprise on drawing the
pole to the top may be easily imagined
when he discovered that the rock, being
hollow, was filled with a strong sul
phuric water. Pursuing their way
through the bog, sometimes up to their
knees, again on hard ground for some
distance, then again scratched and
bruised by the underbrush, and fighting
musquitoes that seemed to resent this
intrusion of their dominion, the little
party had a hard time of it. Presently
they" came to where the river issued from
its underground covert and pursued its
way onward, to again disappear in the
bowels of the earth.
Mr. Asher states that every few hun
dred yards those pools would make their
appearance, and from them would issue
white, misty clouds that wouid ascend
heavenward, seeming in the distance
to be clouds of smoke. He stated that
the water in these pools was as clear as
crystal and filled with beautiful fish,
both fresh and salt. He caught a great
many of the flsh, and attempted to drink
some of the water, but It was unpalata
ble nauseating to the smell and taste.
He spent several days wandering around
these points, and he says he
never before thought there was such a
place in Florida. He discovered several
rocks that he presumed would have
answered very well for houses, being
quite as large, hollow, and the walls as
smooth as glass. Ho appeared to think
it very strange that these monster rocks
should be found in such a low, flat,
marshy section. He says that the
rocks are separated by a distance of 200
feet, and rear their black, grimy heads
to heaven from a level plain of marshy
soil. There are no indications of there
having been a hill, much less a volcano,
in this fection. and the smoke or cloud
seen so often is simply the vapor rising
from the sulphuric pools.
Dress Kefbrm for Tien.
(t r Ta.l Mall Gazette.
Now, to my mind the dress, not of the
time of William the Conqueror, or of the
seventeenth century, butof just 100 years
ago, was tho most suitable and mo3t
manly tliat was ever worn by the male
population of these islands. By revert
ing to it, we should get rid of two incon
venient and ugly portions of our present
attire namely, the cylindrical hat and
the almost eqaally cylindrical trouser.
Tho man of to-day is too cylindrical
altogether to be a satisfactory object to
himself or to artists. That a hat (to say
nothing of its shape) should be made of
a delicate material, which requires to be
carefully protected from the weather
and ironed and brushed if rained upon,
is clearly ridiculous; that a man's legs,
in this moist and muddy climate, should
be clothed in tubes of cloth which reach
to his heels and form admirable con
ductors of mud' and dirt, both inside
and outside, is equally so. By simply
going back to tho conical felt (not
beaver) hat and tho breeches and boots
of our great-grandfathers, we hould free
ourselves at once of this inconvenience.
And their caped frock-coat for riding and
walking why not that too? It saved
the shoulders from the wet, and was a
warm and sensible garment in every
way. -
Keenness.
A. M. Arn mid.
Keenness in a man is not always to be
taken as a sign of capacity, for :t i
generally observed most in "those whr.
are selfish and over-reaching; an 1 his
keenness generally ends in that kind of
penetration into other people's inteivsi
which will tend to beneJt his own.
PERSONAL AND IMPERSONAL.
Senator Bayard is a man of family.
He has nine daughters and three sons.
AT. Y. Sun.
A colored girl at Saratoga wears ten
thousand dollars' worth of diamonds
when she is dressed up. Troy Times.
Rube Allen, the oldest engineer on
the New York Central, has completed
his forty years as a passenger . locomo
tive driver. Buffalo Express.
Ulysses S. Grant, jr., has turned
farmer, and moved to the farm of his
brother Jesse, in Pennsylvania, where
he will goin to the business of raising
horses. A". 1. Times.
D.'L. Moody denies the report that
Ira D. Sankey, his co-laborer, will never
be able to sing again. He reports tho
physicians as saying that the singing
evangelist will be nlrnhtHgaJ&after a
rest. Chicago Journal.
The Rev. Edwards, the sailor
preacher, contemplates writing- a his
tory of his forty years of evangelistic
work throughout, t lie United States, dur
ing which he baptized several thousand
people. Chicago Inter Ocean.
There is a family of three brothers
and three sisters in Auburn Me., whose
aggregate ageg are five hundred and
five years. Their ages respectively are
seventy-three, seventy-seven, .eighty
four, eightj'-six, ninety aud ninety-five
years. Boston Post.
"Steve Meek, the pioneer hunter and
trapper of California," who first went
to that State in 1831, is now at Reading,
Col., eventy-nine years old, full of
rheumatism, and, like most of the Cal
ifornia pioneers, not overburdened with
this world's goods. Denver Tribune.
A Chinese physician in this country
says that a very small portion of China
men die of consumption, ' because, three
hundred years ago, T'san Loo, a
learned doctor, discovered that people
become afflicted with the disease by
breathing through the mouth instead of
the nose.
Five out of the twenty-one Presi
dents were of Scotch-Irish lineage
Jackson, Polk, Buchanan, Johnson arid
Arthur; two of Scotch Grant and
Hayes; one of Welsh JefYers u; and
one of Dutch Van Buren; th remain
ing twelve being of English descent.
ATI. Tribune.
Poor Rice the photographer of the
Greely expedition, who died while on a
journey to find some meat which had
been cached while on the way to Lady
Franklin Bay, said, as his last words:
"Tell Lieutenant Greely that I tried
very hard to get the meat, but could
not succeed.'1 Ar. Y. Post.
Franklin was married at twenty
one. Mozart at twenty :five. Byron,
Washington, Wellington and Bonaparte
at twenty-seven. Peel at thirty-two.
Wadsworth at thirty-three. Wilber
force at thirty-eight." Luther at forty
two. Addison at forty.four. And old
Parr, for the third time, atoue hundred
and two.
A LITTLE NONSENSE.
When a girl refers her lover to her
pa he finds that it is harder to question
the pop than it is to pop the question.
A Burlington mother has a special
room for administering corporal pun
ishment to her children. She call it
her box office. Burlington Free Pres.
Clausa writes to inqure "What has
given woman the reputation of being
such a great talker?'' We do not know,
Clausa, unless it is her mouth. Yon
kcr't Statesman.
"What wud Oi want wid a bicveh'?"
said the ancient Irishman to the bays
who had been dialling him. "Bcdad.
Oi'd as soon walk afoot as ride afoot!"
Chicnjo Times.
Little Nell Oh, mamma, you
musn't let. the baby lie in the suu.
Mamma Whv uot. pet? Little Nell
'Tans' it'll' melt. Mamma -Melt?
Little Nell Yes; mine iVtd. Phi'aiL'l
phia Call.
Papa's -woe
They M no nvire In the parlor where
Thfy h' ly tin' Klowtnjr jrriite.
But they Piaiid uu I talk in thu xiurlitfbt fair,
As tii'-y pwinjr on the old front jr;Ue.
And the old man worps. hut 111- hitler ti.-ara
lirinir never a biilm to his foul;
It will cost him more for rut, ho fars.
Than it did lust month for cohI.
"The man "born tired,'' who is now
too lazy to keep both eyes open at one
time, lives but a short drive from the
Twin Mountain House. Lat week a
party lost their way. and hailed before
his primitive dwelling in a c.ive. While
directing them he kept one ey closed.
"What ails voureye?'' asked one of the
party. othin" replied the tired
man"; "sometimes I keep one eye shut,
and sometimes t'other." A'. Y. Post.
They sat upon the shelving rock,
while before them was spread out the
rich and grand panorama of nature.
"How awful! How sublime!" thought
Miss Pensive; "and Charley's soul, like
mine, is in sympathy with tho scene.
He, like me, is lost in admiration. He,
like me, feels that it were profanation
to break the stillness with a sigle word."
Involuntarily she turned her head.
Charley whs fast asleep. A sudden and
strange emotion tilled her bosom. List!
She speaks: "Charley, you great duuee!
Come let's go into the house!" Boston
Transcript.
m
Food Talues. ,
Persons who fancy that in order to do
a great deal of work it is necessary to eat
a great deal of food, have only to look at
the pedestrians in walking matches.
The actual foot-pounds of work done in
lifting the body and carrying it six hun
hundred miles, or five hundred mile,
in six days, far exceeds any labor ex-
r ended in the same time by a craftsman,
t is the most arduous, fatiguing and
irritating task conceivable, and it is all
done upon the least possible allowance
of food which the trainers deem essen
tial. Food values show their utter in
significance here, for there is no recog
nized diet for a pedestrian. His indi
vidual likes and dislikes are, to some
extent, consulted If our information is
correct but as to "hygienic" methods,
or nutritious values, so-called, the train
ers ignore them. The facts are, the hu
man stomach is a capricious and pecu
liar organ. What one converts into
bone, muscle and tissue, another rebels
against, and no tabular statement can ,
be made which represents the value of
certain food to the Individual. Meehan
ical Engineer.