Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About The Athena press. (Athena, Umatilla County, Or.) 18??-1942 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 15, 1909)
X THE SUMMONS. One whose time wai spent As the shadow fllokered o'er him From the clefts where It is pent Summoned the Sphinx before him: "Intimate pulse of my heart Nearer than child or wife Now that our ways must part. What can you do for me, Life? "What are the things you have done? Tou cast me out on the sands, Meshed In a blind web spun By dead, unthinking hands. "Fettered here In the dark Yet drawn to the spheres afar, Tou give us the glow worm's sprk And mock us with the star. "Tou take the rose of love And crush It In your hand; In hard, cold ways you move We can not understand. "To our last dim lurking' place Tou bring the spoiler Death." Over the Sphinx's face Fluttered a smile's wan breath. -New Tork Sun. : A Thorough Victory ; Allan had to face a fierce opposl tlon. The landlords opposed him as a wrecker and robber. The politicians looked upon him as an intruder and meddler. He rather liked this opposl tlon. It developed his fighting re sources. One day Laura Edwards passed an angry man on the stairway. She knew he was angry by his mutterlngs and his heavy tread and his fiery face. "Did you Just have a caller?" she asked Allan. He laughed. "Yea. That was the great McCool." "The boss!" "Yes. He came here to have It out with me. He warned me to keep off the grass. He even used threats." The girl's face suddenly grew pale. "You mustn't be rash," she said. "kvkbythi.no wax he done for him." Then she hastily added, "The league can't spare such a valuable official. He laughed again. "The great McCool Is a good deal of a bluffer," he said. "Besides, I fancy T. have trimmed his fangs." "How?" "There Is a certain man who feels Indebted to nie. I hnve helped him at times helped him when his need was urgent. In some way he has come Into possession of certain facts regarding the great McCool, facts which are not to that eminent politician's credit. used a little of this material in my talk with him, and he straightway col lapsed. In fact, I don't expect he will trouble me again." "Why, that's splendid!" Laura cried, "He was such a stumbling block." Allan glowed at this praise. "And I have more good news foi you," ho said. "I am to have an in terview on Thursday morning with the dreadful Cilmmlns. It Is the first time he has consented to see me." "e careful," said Laura. "He is called a revengeful man. May I come on Thursday afternoon and hear the result of the meeting?" "May you comer' echoed Allan. "I shall feel much hurt if you fall to come." When Laura entered the office of the league that Thursday afternoon, Allan was sitting at his desk with a bandage about his head." She gave a little gasp. "Wh-what has happened?" she cried. "Nothing serious," he answered. "Merely a bump with Mr. Crlmmlns" nompllnients." "Tell me about it." "There ts little to toll," Allan an swered. "After Mr. Crlmmlns pre sumed upon our brief acquaintance by handing me this souvenir, the discus sion became absorbing. It ended In my favor. Mr. Crlmmlns seemed to accept his defeat with a poor grace. This obliged me to use an argument That I had hoped to hold in reserve." "What was the argument?" "It was based upon my ability and willingness to hunt up Mr. Crlmmlns at any tUne and beat him to a frazzle if he persisted in annoying us." Laura was a little horrified, and yet could not help smiling. "And what was the result of this heroic form of persuasion V "The wreckers will begin to demol ish the Crlmmlns tenements next Mon da niornla." 'Splendid!" cried the girl. Allan was a busy man. while the dreadful old buildings gave up their horde of lodgers. There were homes to be found, there were hungry mouths to be fed. And then one morning a man in a blue uniform came to the Edwards home. I m a sanitary officer, miss," he said to Laura, "and I bring you message from Mr. Merllng. He has been taking care of a sick boy, miss, and we find it's smallpox, and they've both, been sent to the hospital for con tagious cases." He saw that Laura's face suddenly blanched. "Everything will be done for him, miss, that can be done. He sent you his kindest re gards and asked you to visit the office occasionally, if convenient, miss. If you wish it, miss, will let you know how he is faring from time to time." He paused on the steps. "He is a fine young man, miss, and has done splendid work, and we all hope it will go light with him." He saw that Laura was crying and said no more. The weeks that followed were anx- ious ones for others beside the girl. The story of Allan's labors, of the good he had accomplished, of the sacrifices he had made, was told throughout the busy city. So the weeks went by and then a letter came to Laura. Allan was no longer in the hospital. He was at sanitarium where they were trying to build him up so he could go away to Colorado or Arizona, the doctor wasn't sure which. "I am coming to see you before I go, although it will hurt my pride," ne wroce. i m not scarred up so much, but bony, painfully and unpleas ant to look upon. But I want to see you, I want to tell you what you have done for me. I had a lot of time to think it over there in the hospital If it hadn't been for you I would have gone on In the old profligate way. You saw something in me that nobody else knew I possessed. I didn't know it myself. They tell me I've done a few worthy things, but it is to you the credit Is due. In all thlnes I have inly been your agent." Three days later he followed the let ter. Laura heard the carriage and ran to meet him, and drew him into the library and put him In the big easy chair. He was Just a little overcome by these attentions, but tried to conceal it. "This is fine," he said. "Everybody Is so good to me. Such funny things happen. That carriage driver out there asked me if he might shake hands with me. And do you see this little bunch of flowers. A woman was waiting at the door of the sanitarium. She gave me that. She's the mother of that sick boy, you remember the one I helped. You are looking very well, Miss Laura only a little pale." She didn t answer him. She couldn't quite control her voice. He was so woefully thin and pale, but the old smile was still there. "They are having such a time," he said, "finding the right sort of nurse to go with me. I'm quite fussy, you know, and need such a lot of care. Why, what's wrong?" She was looking down at him, and her eyes were filled with tears. "Don't," he whispered. "I shall be sorry I came. Can't you see how I'm trying to brace up? Don't you realize how it hurts me to go away from you?" She suddenly stopped and put her loving arms around him and kissed his scarred face. "Oh, my dear," she murmured, "you will take nie with you and let me care for you always." W. It. Rose in the Cleveland Plain Dealer. A Hare Opportunity. When the circus came to Bushby the large attendance was a surprise to Squire Beml3, and he said so to William Hamlin, the postmaster. "It Is natural that men and chil dren should wish to go," remarked the squire In his formal tone, "but I must confess to a feeling of amazement on hearing that the ladies of the town had flocked to see wild beasts, and that young woman who leaps from one wire to another, with no regard for her personal safety." "Tell you just how 'tis, squire." said Mr. Hamlin, confidentially. "I don't think many of the women folks planned to go till Jed Potter came in here one mall time and told Miss Emma Bolles he understood the show was enough to scare anybody out of ten years' growth. "Miss Emma's getting on, and you couldn't expect her to let a chance like that go nor any of the other women, now could ye?" A I.lttle "Worthy." Eve herself could not have been sweeter than the little Princess Anne, of whom Thomas Fuller tells in his "Worthies of England." Born in 1637, this daughter of Charles I died in her infancy, when not full four years old. "Being minded by those about her " writes the old chronicler, "to call upon God even when the pangs were upon her, I am not able," salth she, to say my long prayer' meaning the Lord's prayer 'but I will say my short one. Lighten mine eyes. O Lord, lest I sleep the sleep of death." ' 'This done, the little lamb gave up the ghost." POLLY'S CLOSET. She Thought Its Disorder Affected No One bat Herself. Its my closet," Pdlly began, with a shrug, sitting down by the couch, where her adored big brother was nursing a broken ankle. "Jamie met me with a long story, and I must say I don't consider it as a matter for Aunt Sarah to stir up the whole family about. It doesn't affect any one but myself." Dan slipped a hand under his pil low and drew out a paper. "I've been lying here taking notes to-day,1 he said; and Polly read: 9 a. m. Ted made himself late at school hunting for the sweater he had lent Polly to wear to the football game last Saturday. Finally found it, fallen down on the floor of her closet, pretty dusty, with a lot of shoes and things on top of it. Made such a fuss that father took notice, and told Aunt Sarah Polly should be kept home from her toboggan party to-night. 10 a. m. Nora came up to clean Polly's room. Said she didn't know what to do to the closet so many things on the floor. Aunt Sarah said she needn't touch It; Miss Polly had promised to pick up things herself be fore it was cleaned again. Nora got off some sauce about having been told that for three weeks running, and about Polly's needing some one to make her mind. Aunt Sarah told her she mustn't speak like that. The end ts that Nora's to leave next week.' "No!" Polly whispered, for she knew that Aunt Sarah must have endured all that self-respect could before de priving herself of Nora's efficient serv ices. 11 a. m. Jamie was playing with his ball, and it bounced to the back of Polly's closet. Before he got it out his brown corduroy suit looked as if it had wiped an acre of dusty floor. He trotted down to the parlor, where Aunt Sarah had a caller, and explained how he got so dirty. Pleas ant for Aunt Sarah, as housekeeper, but she didn't tell me. I got it out of Jamie. '2 p. m. Plumber telephoned that he'd be here after three to see about extending that waterpipe to the third story. Aunt Sarah knew he'd have to go into Polly's closet; so she put it in order, Jamie standing by and calling off the articles that were discovered on the floor with all the glee of an- excavator in Egypt. There were blue kid slippers, skates, a mountain of shoes, theme paper, waist hangers, an upset work basket with a tangle of thread, needles, buttons and so on a missing fan, several long-lost hand' kerchiefs ' "Dan, you made up half!" "I didn't put down half." " '3 p. m. Aunt Sarah telephoned father at office to beg Polly off about the toboggan party. Asked him not to reprove her In a way that would humiliate her so before outsiders. Guess father was impatient about be ing Interrupted, but Aunt Sarah kept gentle and gained her point.' " "Walt," said I, as Polly reached this period. Taking the paper, he wrote: '4 p. m. Polly came home from school. Said it wasn't a matter for Aunt Sarah to stir up the family about; it affected no one but herself." "Oh!" cried Polly, her face the color of shame. "Dan, I've been a horrid " "Right you are, sis!" But his tone made the ungallant words a compli ment. "Skip and "tell Aunt Sarah that before you wink." Youth's Companion. COLLEGE MEN AND FADS. Would Do III. Fart. Caller Sir, I am collecting for the Poet's hospital. Will you contribute anything? Editor With pleasure. Call to-night with the ambulance and I will have ome poets ready. Stray Stories. Student! Instead of Following Lead Procession of Fashion. It is said that the term "fad" is de rived from the initials of the phrase 'for a day." If so, Its meaning could not be better illustrated than in stu dents' clothes out at the University of Pennsylvania and In the neighboring college communities, the Philadelphia Record says. Fashions change In the student world with a rapidity that even bewilders the professional haber dashers and clothiers, who theoretical ly ought to know several laps In ad vance which way the coin will flop on a new fad. The prevailing impression that students docilely follow the men's fashion Journals is not borne out by the facts, Studonts in a large measure lead the procession, Instead of bringing up the rear. It was college men who popularized the soft Btraw, the stock, pumps and the broad cuffs on trousers. The custom of wearing necktie, shirt and socks of a harmonious shade was In full swing out on Old Penn's cam pus before Chestnut street fully woke up to the fact that there was some thing new In style, Of course, univer sity men quite generally affect a style that is too extreme to be serviceable. But young men in the business world seem quite content to follow in their footsteps at a modified pace withal. The use of green peak caps this spring started in this way, and the present resurrection of bow ties and plccadlllj collars. Fraternity hatbands on broad brimmed straws, as might be expected, are reflected in the meaningless fancy hatbands downtown. The typical fop that serves to point the moral of use fulness of a four-year collegiate course may never be heard of after gradua tion, but he can have and actually does have one title to distinction he leads the fashion parade. Homemade Ditch Digger. A complete homemade ditch digger may be made by following the de scription here given. The bed piece, five and a half Inches long, is cut out of a hard plank two and a half Inches thick, bolted at each end and in the middle to prevent split ting. The rear half is nine Inches wide and the front half six Inches wide. The diggers are made of steel bars two and a half inches wide, three- quarters of an inch thick and twenty- four inches long. They are fastened to the plank by a right angle turn and bolted. The two rear diggers are held firmly by a rod with nuts inside and THE DIGGER EQUIPPED. out, the points being spread out so that the bed piece can easily drop Into the space when the ditch is two feet or more in depth. The front digger is the same size, but set in the middle. All are held firmly by brace rods and sharpened like the flat end of a pickax, A wheel is set-under the front end to steady the movement and Is braced backward. An adjustable draw iron is placed above, through which the rod may pass at any height suited to the depth of the ditch. The handles are also adjustable, raising them as the digger drops lower. In hard subsoils one wil save the cost of this simple device in digging seventy-five rods of ditch. In our hardpan sections of the east, which al ways need drainage, one does not feel encouraged to dig ditches with pick and shovel when more than half the energy is required to loosen the dirt With this machine the toughest sub soil when dry handles as rapidly as loose sand. Keeping Cream Sweet. The first step in keeping cream sweet is to keep it as clean as pos sible. Clean cream cannot be produced by filthy methods of milking nor by handling the cream or milk in unclean utensils. Milk cans, stirrers and pails should be thoroughly scalded in hot water and dried and exposed to the sunlight and pure air. The next step is to remove the ani mal heat from the cream as soon as possible after separating. Run the cream from the separator into a con venient utensil for cooling. A 3 or 5- gallon shotgun can is most conveni ent. Cool the cream in well water by stirring. In a few minutes it can be reduced to the temperature of the water. After the cream Is cooled it can be added to the cream contained In the supply can used -in delivering cream to the station. The cream sup ply can, while being filled and held for delivery, should be kept in water at as near the temperature of freshly pumped water as possible. The aver age temperature of well water in Kansas is about 66 degrees. With it cream can easily be held at 68 or 60 degrees, and at this temperature will remain sweet for delivery in good shape at the station. Kansas Farmer. Help Others to Help Themselves, The Talmud: It is better to lend than to give. To give employment Is better than either. There is apt to be something wrong with the man who is continually nuk ing explanation. Red Clover T. Alfalfa. Some of the old-time dairymen are coming around to the belief that red clover such as was grown around Den ver twenty -five or thirty years ago, Is better forage for the production of milk than Is alfalfa as grown nowa days. Certain it is that we are not now getting the quality of milk that was produced a quarter of a century ago, when nearly everybody had a little patch of clover. It was quite natural, however, that we should have exchanged the old friend for the new, for the reason that red clover is bien nial in its habit of growth and under the most ideal conditions will not fur nish more than two cuttings of hay in a season. On the other hand, al falfa i3 a perennial plant, and when once established will continue to pro duce four and frequently five crops in a season for several years In suc cession, and this is why our dairymen have clung to it through all these years like a pup to a root We are loth to concede that red clover is the better forage in the production of milk, but it does look that way, and we know farmers in different parts of the State who are taking up its culture quite extensively. Denver Field and Farm. , A Frnlt Tree Doctor Fake. The latest fake practiced on farm ers is done by a man who visits the place and claims that he has been sent out by the State to examine fruit tree diseases, says an exchange. The fellow will go over the orchard and mark all trees which he claims are af fected. Shortly after his visit a con federate will appear and say that he has a preparation which will cure the disease for which the tree is con demned and will contract to inject a fluid into the roots for a certain price. Both men are swindlers and should be run off the place with a shotgun. The only men empowered to Inspect orch ards are the county inspectors, who ire known to most fruit growers. reaches that Stand Rot. Teaches are more liable to rat In damp and muggy weather than when cool and dry. Some varieties are more subject to rot than others. That all varieties with fuzz on them are less liable to rot than the smoother varieties does not agree with my ex perience. Neither can correct conclusion be drawn from one or two season's ex perience, for soil, location, fertilization and culture also are factors in the rot problem. Fruit on a rankly-grown tree is much more subject to rot than on one more moderately grown. Yet I think the weather has more to do with it than any one factor. One year all our early peaches were quite subject to rot, while the next year there was very little rot. Yet with un favorable weather Champions were practically a total loss, Crosby, stump and late varieties practically free. I do not think the matter of fuzz vs. rot worth considering as a factor in setting an orchard, except people do not wish to buy fuzz. In regard to hardiness of bud, a good frost peach well grown will stand more cold than any other peach tree we ever had on our grounds. And varieties of the frost type (if I may call them so), Crosby, Pratt's, Hill's Chill, etc., are more hardy in bud than many other varieties, especially of the Crawford class, but with the varieties of the Chinese type, which bear young and have a hardy bud, what little hardiness, if any, the fuzzy varieties possess above them Is much more than offset by their failings. H. Mead, Massachusetts. Gasoline vs. a Hired Man. Then there's our gasoline engine. 1 kept track of it once for three weeks. It pumped water to the house and to the barn, separated the cream of twen ty cows and churned and worked all the butter on 6 gallons of gasoline at 15 cents a gallon. It saws the wood and works the corn-shredder and makes itself generally more useful in its way than the average hired man and at a small fraction of his cost Then, the barn is a great comfort There's a cement basement under the stable the only one of its kind in this part of the State. The manure falls through traps in the stable floor and Is preserved intact and put out on the land at least four times a year. That's another thing that gives us no end of advantage over our neighbors. They pile their fertilizer in their barnyard and let the best part of It bleach and drain and wash away with out returning it to the soil which ab solutely demands it. We have 150 acres of level, black soil that plows like soft putty. Be sides corn, oats and wheat, we raise hay, flax and" enough vegetables for our own use. But we have found that we can make far more money from our pure bred cows than directly from the soil. Success. Old Favorites Ventilation of Stable. -1 soil b This diagram shows method of con structing a fresh air intake where the soil conies to or near the top of wall as found in many bank barns. An ex cavation is necessary and a retaining wall is built around the open spac marked C. v Weed Seed In Manure. It is well known that there is con siderable risk of introducing new weeds by the purchase of manure and hay and other feeding stuffs. E. I. Oswald, of the Maryland exrjeriment station, undertook to obtain more def inite Information on this point, espe cially as regards dissemination through manure, by studying the ef fect of the fermentation of mannr handled in different ways and of pass ing through the digestive systems of animals on the vitality of various seeds, including seeds of about fifty of the worst weeds found in Maryland. In experiments in which the mann remained for six months in a barn yard heap and for a short whii in piles, as when shipped in carload lots rrom cities, it was found that In the first case there was no dane-er and in the second case little danger of dis- iriouting live weed seeds. To Cnard Agalast Cnt Worms. Tar DaDer Dlacea and tomato plants will keep off cut worms. Insert tha r'-ri iu me ground, making a circle about 4 Inches m uiaiucier ana o mcnes oeep. Handling Milk. It must not be forentten that w -- ucau- iiness and coldness th . uv vnu great principle In handling milk. The Fatal Wedding. - The wedding bells were ringing on a moonlight winter's night, The church was decorated, all within was gay and bright; A mother with her baby came and saw the lights aglow, j She thought of how those same bells chimed for her three years ago. !Td like td be admitted, sir," she told the sexton old, "Just for the sake of baby, to protect him from the cold." He told her that the wedding there was for the righ and grand, And with the-eager, watching crowd, outside she must stand. Chorus While the wedding bells were ringing; while the bride and groom were there, Marching down the aisle together, as the organ pealed an air Telling tales of fond affection, vowing never more to part, Just another fatal wedding, Just anoth er broken heart She begged the sexton once again to . let her pass Inside, "For baby's sake you may step in," the gray-haired man replied. "If any one knows reason why this couple should not wed, Speak now or hold your peace forever more," the preacher said. "I must object," the woman said, with voice so meek and mild. "The bridegroom Is my husband, and this is our little child." "What proof have you?" the preacher -. asked. "My Infant," she replied. She raised her babe, then knelt to pray, the little one had died. Chorus The parents of the bride then took the outcast by the arm, "We'll care for you through life," they said, "you've saved our child from harm." The outcast wife, the bride and par ents quickly drove away, The husband died by his own hand be fore the break of day. No wedding feast was spread that night, two graves were made next day One for the little baby, and in one the father lay. The story has been often told, by fire sides warm and bright, Of bride and groom, of outcast, and the fatal wedding night - RECORDS OF OLD KASKASKIA Oldest and Moat Authentic Docu ments Now at St. Louis University. The members of the Mississippi Val ley Historical Society visited the St. Louis University en masse recently and inspected the old historic trove, of which the university has lately be come the custodian a set of docu ments concerning the history of this vicinity which are among the oldest and most authentic records of the ptst In America, the St. Louis Republic says. They are the Kaskaskia records in which the first entry is dated 1695. They continue, with but a few gaps, down to the present time. Few rec ords in the east antedate these and none in the west. They were begun in Illinois, near Peoria, before some of the thirteen original colonies were planned. . The records have been a gold mine to historians for years, but their rich es will never be exhausted. John Gil mary Shea came west to see them thirty years ago; Edward G. Mason wrote a minute description of them, which is one of the publications of the Chicago Historical Society. Prof. C. W. Alvord, president of the Mississippi Valley Historical Associa tion, wrote of them in a work which has just been published by the United States government. At the time he wrote he could not locate them. They were then at Fort Gage; but the bish op of Belleville, in order to better pre serve them, has placed them in the archives of the St. Louis University. They are kept in a great iron, fire proof, combination safe. The records are those of the bap tisms, marriages and burials of the people of old Kaskaskia, near Peoria; and of the later Kaskaskia, sixty miles down the river from St. Louis. Bridge Builder's Career. Anybody standing on the Brooklyn bridge and looking northward up the East River will see three striking ex amples of the genius and ability of Gustavus Lindenthal, who, a matter of thirty years ago, was a mason and carpenter doing journeyman's work in Philadelphia, the Bookkeeper says. The three examples of his later de velopment are the Manhattan bridge, which is nearing completion and is about 1,500 feet north of the Brooklyn bridge; the Williamsburg bridge, and, finally, the enormous Queensborough bridge, that was opened to traffic re cently. But this is not all. Far to the north of these three huge spans between Manhattan and Long Island there is another creation of Mr. Lin denthal's brain the Hell Gate bridge, designed to carry the heaviest loads of any bridge in the world, connect ing the mainland lines of the New York, New Haven & Hartford Rail road with the Long Island Railroad, and thus, by way of the tubes under the North River, bringing about a direct rail route from New England into the west Breaking- It Gta. " Jack Perhaps you don't i:v mr style of dancing. u Orme (in distress) Well, there la rather too much sameness about It jack ,r how may I vary it? Orme Suppose you tread on mr left toot once in a while.