Image provided by: Morrow County Museum; Heppner, OR
About Lexington wheatfield. (Lexington, Or.) 1905-19?? | View Entire Issue (Oct. 26, 1905)
4- Office Worn By This is a parable. He who runs may read; or, to use the modern ver sion, he who travels per Mercedes will see the world. There was once a too-old-at-forty merchant. He had toiled toiled unto grayness. But fortune had not come. He pared the point of a quill pen (he remembered his father using one in that very room), and gazed gloomily at an ancient inkstand filled with a viscous, tarlike mass. And the spirit that was in him evaporated and dried up like his ink, with only the dregs of gall and iron left behind. He thought of the days of fret and worry, the nights of cramping pen work, when he had set till the small hours checking Eiffel Towers of fig ures and writing letters which an office boy had smudged into gray inde cipherability with the aid of a copying book and a brush charged with solid sloppiness. He thought of the headaches and the restless nights in which he lived again through the petty annoyances of the day, and as he dispatched a boy with a message (he had always hated telephones) he decided to end it all. So he retired and lived economically in the suburbs, and another man reigned in his stead. This is the pro logue. 5 Six months passed. The too-old-at-forty merchant again visited his old office. It was in the same room, but The new manager was seated at a roll-top desk. Before him was a pho nograph with a neat recording mouth piece. Into this he was speaking quickly: "I want two thousand cop ies of the follow ing letter posted to our regular cus tomers in time for the four o'clock mall this after noon. Take down: 'Dear Sirs Owing to our having new labor saving ma chinery in all our factories, we are able to quote lower for all our goods, which you will note are now ten per cent cheaper than those offered by foreign compet itors. A glance at the following fig ures will ' " For thirty sec onds he continued to talk into the phonograph. ' Then he removed the addbessoqraph. wax cylinder and handed it to a boy who carried It into the next room where the patter of many typewriters sounded like hail on the roof. The too-old-at-forty merchant looked on with smiling toleration. "I think you made a mistake in that letter," he said. "I heard you dictate that you wanted two thousand copies. I suppose you meant two dozen." The return smile was of tender com passion. He was informed that two thousand was correct. "But you said they were to be sent off by the four o'clock mall, and It is one-thirty now. However big your staff may be you can hardly have two thousand letters typed and the envel opes addressed and stamped In two and a half hours." "I shall employ exactly one girl clerk and a boy on that Job," remarked the new manager, leaning back lux urlously in his chnlr, "and if they tried they could do double the quantity in the time." He rose. "Perhaps you would like to see the miracle?" he said as he opened the door next to his room. A girl typist was taking down In shorthand the words of the letter as they were dictated from the phono graph on which she had placed the wax cylinder. This was completed In one minute forty-five seconds by the watch. She then adjusted a sheet of wax paper on her typewriting machine and typed the letter. A few minutes later the waxed pa per was fitted to a rotary duplicator, and an office boy was reeling off eighty .copies per minute. "Bate of 4,800 an hour," commented tb new manager. The too-old-at-forty merchant looked thoughtful. Meanwhile the girl clerk was feed ing envelopes into the addressing ma chine, which was printing them (each with a different name and address) at the rate of 2,000 an hour. The t-o-a-f merchant seemed to want to 'aBk questions. "Quite simple," said the new man ager. "Every customer on our books has his name and address set up in rubber type. The boy does this in his spare time. The address, set up In a little metal galley, Is then attached to one of these endless chains which pass through the machine. Each time an envelope Is printed by the machine the chalu moves round so as to bring an other address Into position for the next envelope. Simple, Isn't it?" "In my time It would have taken a man about four days to do what that machine does In one hour," said the merchant, musingly. "But this isn't your day; It's ours," said the new manager. "What next?" asked the merchant of the past. "Next comes the envelope sealing machine," said the new manager re- THE ARITHMOMETER. morselessly. "Now In your day one office boy using single tongue power would probably stick down about forty envelopes in an hour. This little ma chine seals nine thousand in that time. You see, it is quite small. You Just put the pile of letters in at the top and turn this handle. Then the letters (now typed, duplicated, addressed and sealed by machinery) fall out on the table. Oh! I wouldn't try to count them. It might strain your arithme tic to keep pace with the machine." The rotary duplicator and the "Ad dressograph" were still working mer rily. "Would you like to see the other things?" asked the new manager. "Now this machine," he said, mov ing over to another instrument in a neat-looking case, "not only prints let ters in exact imitation of typewriting, but it also prints a different name and address on each and adds a perfect imitation of your signature In black Ink at the bottom." "I begin to feel very old," said the former owner of the business. "I sup pose your chief cashier is made of levers and sprockets and your confi dential clerk is driven by a main spring?" "Well, I think there are cog wheels and spacing gears In them, too," said the new manager. "Now, here Is the book typewriter, with which w keep our ledgers, and, In fact, all the books in our firm. We only use pens here as pipe cleaners. You lay the book on the table, so, draw the machine over It, and make your entries cleanly and neatly, j "But bound books are now out of date. The loose leaf book is the mod ern idea. Dr. and Cr. sheets are of different colored papers, and the leaves can be removed and reinserted In the binder at a moment's notice." "Then all you have to do is to cast up the figures," said the old merchant. "Pardon me, we do nothing of the . ' IOUALITY iydf ' Evidently Mr. Cleveland Never Expects to Run for Office Again Chicago Tribune. , kind." With calculating machines thai will tell you in ten seconds what 9,750,834 multiplied by 450,873 amounts to. and which will extract the square root of 587,807,001 with a few turns of a handle, the human brain becomes too slow for practical purposes. "Now, If you will look at this 'Arith mometer' for a moment, you will see that all you have to do Is to place the pointers at the figures which you wish to multiply, subtract from or add to gether, then turn this handle, and the result will appear in that row of spaces at the top." An office boy now came up and re ported that the two thousand letters had left the office at 3:80. "It .aeenis to me that brains are quite obsolete," said the antediluvian merchant. "And that is the biggest mistake of all," returned the twentieth-century manager, "brains are what we want, and all we want. We are freed of the old grinding routine that business men used to break their hearts over; now we have time to think. Our clerks have shorter hours and are better paid; but those we do employ have brains, otherwise we should have no use for them. 1 "No, brains are not at a discount, but brainless handwork is." Montreal Star. FISH RE8TAURANT& A Feature of London and Pari Life that la Leae Common Here. Returning travelers from London, Paris, and Berlin describe with pleas ure the "fish restaurants" in those cities, and express some wonder that there are not similar restaurants here. A "fish restaurant" Is not oue at which fish Is served exclusively, or even chiefly, but a restaurant at which a specialty is made of the service of fish, and at which usually some spe cial fish dish Is offered to patrons each day. In London and Paris such restau rants make as their chief specialty sole, as popular in England as In France. The Paris restaurants, in ad dition, make a feature of crayfish, cod, and mussels, and the London restau rants, of whitebait and shrimp. The variety of fish procurable in these two cities Is almost without lim itation, but a different fish each day re quires, in fact, only seven varieties, in the preparation of which there are many specialties. Washington has a larger variety of fish than either London or Paris. The oysters, lobsters, and crabs In the market here are superior to those to be found In large European cities, and the general demand for fish is in ex cess of what it is in the big cities of other countries. But the custom pre vails for the most part here of making fish or sea food a part of the meal furnished at a restaurant, and not a feature of it. Washington Post. Geordle'a Kevenge. A certain butcher in a village in the north of England was standing before the shop of Oeordle, the baker, whose loaves of bread were rather small, when Qeordle came up the street. "Just been In your shop, Geordle, buy in' a loaf," said the butcher. "Where is it?" asked Geordle. "In my waist coat pocket," said the butcher. No more was said, but Geordle thought for & long time how he could pay the butcher back In his own coin. A few days later, as he stood before the butcher's shop,' an idea came to him. Meeting the butcher on his way home from market, Geordle said: "Been In your shop buyin' a calfs head!" "Where is it?" asked the butcher. "Un der my hat!" said Geordle, with an an nihilating look. A man's mental balance Isn't syn onymous with his bank balance. 'Uadar. HOW TO SLEEjP AND WHEN. " A. rhyalclan'e Advice on the Subject UxercUe, Bathing and Bating. The following brief quotations are from "Sleep and Its Regulation," by Dr. J. Madison Taylor, in The Populur Science Monthly: During childhood and exhaustive states too much sleep Is rarely possi ble. For those In full tide of vigor too much sleep Is often distinctly hurt ful. The action of narcotics presents none of the characteristics of normal sleep except, the temporary arrest of consciousness; hence narcosis is not true sleep. The best position to assume in sleep to Invite the least disturbance of the functions of the great organs la on the abdoment, or nearly so. Many obscure forms of digestive or circulatory disorders may have been Initiated In infancy through lying too long upon the back. To secure the most perfect repose the temperature of all parts should be equalized before retiring. Cold feet induce delay In securing sleep, and it is then shallow when attained. It Is most unwise to overfill the stomach before retiring; thus disturbs sieep almost as much as hunger, but moderate eating before sleeping is not hurtful, and Is often salutary. , Body clothing at night should be loose, not dense, permitting the ready passage of air, never of wool next to the skin. Bed clothing should not be too close of texture, blankets being preferable to dense "comfortables" and not "tucked In" too closely. Air should be allowed to pass occasionally under the sides at least as one turns about more or less freely. Early rising Is a salutary custom, especially when the duy comes early, not otherwise. More sleep Is required In winter than In summer. The best sleep is had dur ing the hours of darkness. The sleeping room should be cool, abundant air being always admitted. This should not be Interoreted to mean that the room may safely remain In tensely cold. In the modern treatment of tuber culosis fresh air Is recognized to be Imperatively needed all day and all night. Artificial heat can, and should, be supplied along with the fresh air, till the temperature of the room be at or near 60 or 65 degrees Fahren heit, for some even 'to degrees Fahren heit THE TRAGIC ISLE. Some of the Abnaea Which Priaonera on Sakhalin Buffer. . Sakhalin, the Island which Japan is taking, or rather, retaking, from Rus sia, is the place to which Russia sends her violent convicts. The convict at Siberia has some liberty to console him for his detention, but the convict at Sakhalin none. When a party of convicts (having been pronounced "vlo lent" by the governor at the Siberian station) is landed at Sakhalin the pro cession to the Jail is as follows: First among the prisoners come men with fetters on their legs and linked togeth er in pairs, the clanking of their chains making a lugubrious noise. Next come half a dozen men each without fetters, but secured by the hands to a long Iron rod. Then follow female prison era and after them the most affecting part of the whole the wives and cbll dren who have elected to accompany into exile their husbands and fathers Benina tnem rum Die "telegas," or rough wagons, wherein are transport ed baggage and those children who are too young or infirm to walk When on the march the prisoners are allowed three pounds of bread and one-half pound of meat each day, and they are not forbidden to receive alms. But when they arrive at their destination their lot Is a pitiful one, Their cells are damp and fungus cov ered, their food is less than the allow ance during the Journey and their work in the salt mines is most ex hausting. Many of the prisoners are very ignorant Few of them can read excepting the Caucasians, but they are all put to the same laborious work and In the event of their being physically unable to perform their allotted tasks their punishments are very cruel. The English "cat-o'-nlne-talls" is nothing to the terrors of the "bodlga In this instrument of torture the prls oner Is so fixed that he can neither move nor cry out and wire thongs bound at the end with pointed tin strike his back at frequent Intervals, Other tortures to which prisoners are subjected are too dreadful to write about and during all these tortures the prisoner Is prevented by gags from obtaining the poor relief of a scream Surely the horrors of the salt mines of Iletskayav are nothing compared with the abominations of Sakhalin. Pall Mall Gazette. .1 Wise and Wealthy Treasure. "Well, you married a wealthy worn an. Ia she the treasure you hoped forr "Can't say she Is. She won't give me any of her money." "Then, by George! she is a treas arc She not only has money but common tenae, . too!" Cleveland MRS. EMMA FLEISSNER. Buffered Over Two Years Health Was In a Precarious Condition Caused by Pelvio Catarrh. 1EALTH and STRENGTH RESTORED BY PE-RU-NA Mrs. Emma Fleissner, 1412 Sixth Ave., Seattle, Wash., Worthy Treas urer Sons of Temperance, writes: "I suffered ever two years with irreg ular and painful periods. My health was in a very precarious condition and I was anxious to find something to restore my health and strength. "I was very glad to try Feruna and, delighted to find that it was doing me good. I continued to use it a little over three months and found my troubles removed. "I consider it a splendid medicine and shall never be without it, taking a dose , occasionally when I feel run down and tired." Our files contain thousands of testi monials which Dr. Hartman has re ceived from grateful, happy women who have been restored to health by his remedy, Peruna. The Young Philosopher. " 'Nother piece of pie, please, pa." "But you haven't finished your first piece." 'No, pa. But you know you tola me not to eat fast. And If you give me a second piece now I shan't eat so fast because I won't be afraid that tne second piece will be gone when I get through with the first piece. Please, ca." Cleveland Plain Dealer. - Stats or Ohio, Citt or Toledo, I LUCAS COUNTY, Fbame J. Cheney makes oath that ha la senior partner ol the firm of Y. J. Cheney A co., aoing Dusmess in me city onoieao, coun ty and State aforesaid, and that said firm will Day the turn of ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS for each and every case of Catarrh that cannot be cured by the uae of Hall's Catarrh Cure. f KAMI J. (JtltftHI. Sworn to before me and subscribed in mv presence, this 6th day of December, A. P., 1886. A. U, ULiUADUPI, Notary Public seal Hail's Catarrh Cure is taken Internally, and acts directly on the blood and mucous surfaces of the system. Send for testimonials, free. it, j. chji.mii a cu., loieao, u. Bold by Druggists, 76c. Hall's Family fills are the best Strenuous Llfd. "Say," roared the irate citizen as he rushed into the office of the village week ly, "where's the editor?" "Want to see him personally?" queried the office boy. - "You bet I do," answered the i. c. "I'm going to thrash him within an inch of his life. See?" "Oh, all right," answered the boy. "Just have a seat, please. There are three others ahead of you." St. Jacobs Oil for many, many years has cured and continues to cure RHEUMATISM NEURALGIA LUMBAGO BACKACHE SCIATICA SPRAINS -BRUISES . SORENESS . STIFFNESS FROST-BITES Price. 25c. and 50c iff ElemietlUsfW.l: Cms WHIM All LSI FAIL. Coos a Syrup. Tula Good. Ci Bold by drugtlnU. tMoo. JlllillIP V