Crawfordsville Review, Crawfordsville, Montgomery County, 29 December 1894 — Page 4
THE REVIEW.
SUPPLEMENT.
CRAWFORDS VILLE INDIANA
"Br reason or trie murntuae or oppressions they make the oppressed to cry: they cry out by reason of the arm of the mighty."
NEW HAMPSHIRE legislators are proposing to experiment with a prohibitory law, and will strike at the •root of the matter by endeavoring to place upon the statutes a measure to make the manufacture of both spirituous and malt liquors illegal.
As USUAL "the man who knows it all is at work very industriously these days, at Washington, explaining to the ubiquitous reporter his own peculiar ideas as to "what done it. As usual, also, these ideas ar6 as variegated as Joseph's coat of many colors.
THE war in Brazil is not over after all, if private advices from that unfortunate country are. to be believed. A letter from Capt. Alincar, late commander of the famous rebel cruiser Aquadabau. to a relative in Philadelphia, makes the assertion that the revolutionists will vet succeed if foreign nations do not interfere, at least so far as to separate Rio Grande do Sul from the rest of Brazil. Those South American Republics certainly are in hard lines.
THE pork packing industry of the country at large appears to be in an extremely active condition. At the leading centers, collectively, two million more hogs have appeared than at the same date last vear. This from a known total supplvof nearly six million less. The weight is below the average and the qualitv inferior. The export demand is large. The southern demand for bacon is also in excess of former 3"ears. No radical change in values can be expected until there is a falling oil' in hog receipts, Meats of all kinds are likely to be comparatively high while grain remains at present figures.
EST INDIANAPOLIS was recentlv incorporated as a city. Mayor Tole'n is the first chief executive of the new municipality. Recently the mayor granted a city liquor license on the installment plan, the vender of intoxicants, being short of cash. The Marshal arrested the saloonman for selling without a city license. The Council overhauled the mayor for his illegal action. The mayor acknowledged his error, but asked that the case in question be allowed to go by default. Refused. The saloonman asked for a refunding of •the sums paid on account. Refused. Saloonman closed up and brought suit. Council adjourned, one member making a vigorous speech, in which he said the august asseinbU' collectively acted like a lot of school boys. The muddled municipality don't appear to have any idcu "where it is at."
JOHN BURNS, M. P., now traveling in this country on a lecture tour, stopped off in Chicago the other day long enough to be interviewed and expressed his disapproval of Chicago thoroughfares, which he denounced as "vile, That i.-i just what tha business streets of that metropolis are. but the leading citizens of tho World's Fair city were not particularly pleased with the Englishman's bluntness. They always expect compliments from foreign visitors on the vastness of their vanity and the colossal cheek of their business men. It makes little difference to Chicago, of course, what Mr. Burns may think, but it is pleasant to note that the first sight of the modern Babylon failed to inspire the hard headed labor leader with anything like the gushing admiration which Chicago always deems her simple due from great and small
JTINDNKSS to the "loved ones at home" is a trait of human nature that can not be too strongly commended, and is also one which as time goes by will bring a larger reward in grateful recollections than can be obtained from any other source. Many people metaphorically .embrace the world with their charitable impulses, yet "just behind, the scenes," in the privacy of their own homes, they are a "holy terror" to all the household—a standing' menace to the peace and quiet of their own firesides—their presence chilling every semblance of the lovn and kindness that should reign supreme into black and dismal embers of bate and discord. Kindness to all human beings is commendable, but all will do well to recollect that the future has a terrible retribution in store for every person capable of human feelings who disregards the adage that "charity begins at home."
Coldness to and neglect of those who are bound to us by ties of kindred blood will bring in time a sure reward of unavailing remorse thai naught but death can cure.
AUTHORITIES appear to agree in tho opinion that American agricul~ ture is not at all likely to be permanently harmed because of the inCreased productiveness of India, Russia and the Argentine. Th{ rapidly increasing population of th* United States, as well as the constantly augmented millions of the already overcrowded countries ol Europe, must be fed. Again a market for agricultural products is constantly making increased demands in the shape of corn for feeding stock for meat producing purposes, for which output there is an almost undisputed outlet, Flour for foreign shipment, in the near future, will absorb our surplus wheat withoul difficulty. The process of readjustment under which the commercial world has been laboring for the past five .years must soon cease, and in the very nature of things the United States must again resume its oldtinre ascendancy and prosperity.
THE killing of Riordan by the Australian pugilist, Fitzsimmons, a fe^ weeks ago, was an unfortunate affair that was believed at the time would have a tendency to interfert with the alleged manly art of pugilism. Such, unfortunately, does not appear to be the probable result. Fights continue to come off, while other "mills" are arranged for. It is needless to moralize. While money can be made by,and public sentiment is not sufficiently strong to suppress, these exhibitions, it is safe to say they wille be continued. A "plu» ugly" knocked to "kingdomcome" now and then by a mislick is 'a matter of trifling consequence to the great public that delights in these brutal encounters. Riordan is the fourth man to be killed in sparring Exhibitions in the past four years. All of the men who inflicted the fatal blows were acquitted except one, a "pug' in St. Louis, who received a sentence of imprisonment for several years.
THE colored labor organizations of this country have appealed to John Burns, the English labor leader now in the United States, to use his influence in their behalf with kindred societies whose membership is restricted to the Caucasian race. Mr. Burns is "getting on to the curves" of the United States pretty fast and finds himself iu the position of the Dutchman who exclaimed: "The longer I lif the more I find efery day owit." The hard headed M. P. is said to have been more astonished at this appeal than any feature of the labor situation that has so far come under his observation. He had supposed that the colored man was accorded every right and privilege that his white brother enjoyed and had not dreamed that a down-trodden laboring man would himself deny to the black man even the few rights that he enjoyed. The color prejudice as it exists in the United States is an unknown quantity in England—largely, perhaps, for the reason that the colored population is a very small percentage of the whole.
W-.SCELLANEOUS NOTES. I
•Russia has 2,058 liquor distilleries, The bicycle craze is greatest in 'France.
There are eight Methodist congregations iu Salt Lake City. More than 1,000 forms of snow crystals have been observed and copied.
The Duluth Imperial mill "pro•duced 7,700 barrels of (lour Oct. 23, beating the world's record."
San Francisco's municipal ticket ballot was afoot and a half wide and only two inches short of a yard long.
The War Ministry of Turkey has promulgated an order, that hereafter army officers must always wear clean uniforms in public.
If the Archbishop of Santiago is made a cardinal, as rumor now says is probable, he will be the first cardinal in South America.
The first piano ever owned in the iState of Maine is said to be yet on duty in Knox county. It formerly belonged to Gen. Knox.
Many of the people who know how to write shorthand correspond with each other in shorthand. Thus they save time, strength and paper.
A beggar who died a few weeks bgo in Auxerre, France, was found to have a million francs in bonds in a trunk, and in his cellar 400 bottles of wine of the vintage of 1700.
A Maine newspaper speaks of a "strong anti-foot-ball sentiment which is rapidly gaining ground" in that State, and predicts "the death of the rowdy game" in a season or 'two.
The tunnels of the world are estimated to number about 1.142, with •a total length of 514 miles. There are about 1,000 railroad tunnels. 12 subaqueous tunnels, 90 canal tunnels aD'I 40 conduit tunnels.
FIRE WORSHIPPERS.
Among the Parsees in Bombay.
.Heathen IIurial Cuitomi nnl Matrimonial Festivities—I)r. Tnlxnagti'H Sermon for tho Tress.
The Rev. Dr. Talmage, continuing his series of round the world sermons through the press, chose, last Sunday, for his subject, "Tho Fire Worshippers,"the text selected being Matthew ii, I, "There came wise men from the East to Jerusalem."
These wise men were the Parsees, or the so-called fire worshippers,and 1 found their descendants in India last October. Th-ir heatheuisin is more tolerable than any of the other false religions and has more alleviations, and while in this round the world series I have already showivyou the wors
Worms of heathen ism, today
I show you the least offensive. The prophet of the Parsees was Zoroaster of Persia. He was poet and philosopher and reformer as well as religionist. Ilis disciples thrived at first in Persia, but under Mohammedan persecution they retreated to India.
The Bible of the Parsees, or fire worshipers, as they are inaccurately called, is the Zend A vesta, a collection of the strangest books that ev came into my hands. There were originally twenty-one volumes, but Alexander the Great, in a drunken fit. set fire to a palace which contained some of them, and they went into ashes and forgetfulness. But there are more of their sacred volumes left than most people would have patience to read. There are many things in the religion of the Parsees that suggest Christianity, and some of its doctrines are in a"e cord with our own religion. Zoroaster, who lived about 1,400 years before Christ, was a good man, suf fered persecution for his faith and was assasinated while worshipping at an altar. He announced the theory: "lie is best who is pure of heart!" and that there are two great spirits in the world—Ormuzd," the good spirit, and Ahriman, the bad spirit- and that ail who do right are under the influence of Ormuzd. and all who do wrong are under Ahri man, that the Parsee must be born on the ground floor of the house and must be buried from the ground floor that the dying man must have prayers said over him and a sacred juice given him to drink that the good at their decease go into eternal light, and the bad into eternal darkness that having passed out of this life the soul lingers near the corpse three days in a paradisaic state, enjoying more than all the nations of
1
earth put together could enjoy, or in apandemoniac state, suffering more than all the nations put together could possibly suffer, but at the end of three days departing for its final destiny, and that there will be a resurrection of the body. They are more careful than any other people about their ablutions, and they wash and wash and wash. Tliev pay great attention to physical health, and it is a rare thing to see a sick'. Pat-see. They do not smoke tobacco, for they consider that a misuse of fire. At the close of mortal life the soul appears at the Bridge Chinvat, where an angel presides, and questions the Eoul about the thoughts and words and deeds of its earthly state. Nothing, however, is more intense in the Parsee faith than the theory that the dead body is impure. A devil is supposed to take possession of the dead body. All who touch it are unclean, and hence the strange style of obsequies.
And now, the better to show you these Parsees. I tell you of two things I saw within a short time in Bombay. ,It was an afternoon of contrast.
We started for Malabar hill, on which the wealthy classes have their embowered homes and the Parsees their strange temple of the dead. As we rode along the water's edge the sun was descending the sky, and a disciple, of Zoroaster, a Parsee, was in lowly posture, and with reverential gaze looking into the sky. He would have been said to have been worshipii«* the sun. as all Parsees are said t-. worship the fire. But. the intelligent Parsee does not worship the fire. He looks upon the sun as the emblem of the warmth and 'light of the Creator. Looking at a blaze of light, whether on earth, on mountain height or in the sky, he can more easily bring to mind the glory of God—at least, so the Parsees tell me. Indeed, they are the pleasantest heathen I have met. They treat their wives as equals, while the Hindoos and Buddhists treat them as cattle, although the cattle and sheep and swine arc better off than most of the women of India.
This Parsee on the roadside on our way to Malabar hill was the only one
:of
that religion I had ever seen engaged in worship. Who knows but that beyond the light of the sun on which he gazes he may catch a glimpse of the God who is light and "in whom there is no darkness at all?" 1 We passed on up through gates into the garden that surrounds the 'place where the1 Parsees dispose of their dead. There is on all sides 'great opulence of fern and cypress.
The garden is one hundred feet above the level of the sea. Not far Prom the entrance is a building where the mourners of the funeral procession go in to prav. A light is here kept burning year in and year out. We ascend the garden bv some eight stone steps. The body of a (deceased aged woman is being carried in toward the chief "tower of silence." There are five of these towers. Four persons whose business it is to do this carry the corpse.
They are followed by two men witl
long, beards. The tower of ailencj to. which they come cost $150,OOf and is 25' feet high and 275 fee around, without a roof. The carrien of the dead and the two bearded mei come to the door of the tower, entei and leave the dead, There are thref rows of places for the dead—tin outer row for the mon, the middl? row for the women, the inside row for the childx-en. The lifeless bodiej are left exposed as far down as tin waist. As soon as the employes re tire ^frorn the tower of silence th» vultures, now one, now two, now many, swoop upon the lifeless form These vultures fill the air with theij discordant voices. We saw them i$ long rows on the top of the white* washed walls of the tower of silence In a few minutes they have taken the last particle of flesh from th bones. There had evidently beec other opportunities for them thai day, and some tlew away as thougk surfeited. They sometimes earrj away with them parts of a body, and it is no unusual thing for the gentle, men in their country scats to havfc dropped into their doorways a bonf from the tower of silence.
Iu the center of this tower is a well, into which the bones are thrown after they are bleached. The hot sun and the rainy season and charcoal do their work of disintegration and disinfection, and then there are sluices that carry into the sea what remains of the dead. The wealthy people ol Malabar hill have made strenuous efforts to have these strange towers removed as a nuisance, but they remain, and will no doubt for ages remain.
Starting homeward, we soon were in the heart of the city and saw a building all a flash with lights and resounding with merry voices. It was a Parsee wedding, in a building erected especially for the marriage ceremony. We came to the door and proposed" to go in. but at first were not permitted. They saw we were not Parsees and that we were not even natives.
Gradually we worked our way inside the door. The building and the surroundings were illumined by ,-iundreds of candles in glasses and lanterns, in unique and grotesque holdings. Conversation ran high, and laughter bubbled over, and all was gay. Then there was a sound of an advancing band of music, but the instruments for the most part were strange to our ears and eyes. Louder and louder were the outside voices, and the wind and stringed instruments, until the procession halted at the door of the temple and the bridegood mounted the steps. Then the music ceased and all voices were still.
The ceremony wen ton interminably. We wanted to hear the conclusion. but were told that the ceremony would go on for along while— indeed that it would not conclude until 2 o'clock in the morning, and this was only between 7 and 8 o'clock in the evening. There would be a recess after awhile in the ceremony, but it would be taken up again in earnest at 12:30. We enjojred what we had seen, but felt incapacitated for six more hours of wedding ceremony. Silently wishing the couple a happy life in caeh other's companionship, we pressed our way through the throng of congratulatory Parsees.
A fellow traveler in India told mo he had been writing to his home in England trying to get a law passed that no white woman could be legally married in India until she had been there six months. Admirable law would that be! If a white woman saw what married life with a Hindoo is, she would never undertake it. Off with the thick and ugly veil from woman's face! Off with the crushing burdens from her shoulders! Nothing but the gospel of Jesus Christ will ever make life iu India what it ought to be.
Thus I have set before you the best of all religions of the heathen world, and I have done so in order that you might corne to higher appreciation of the glorious religion which has put its benediction over Christendom.
Compare the absurdities and mummeries of heathen marriage with the plain "I will!" of Christian marriage, the hands joined in pledge "till death do you part." Compare the doctrine that the dead may not be touched with as sacred and tendeiand loving a kiss as is ever given-, the last kiss of lips that never will again speak to us. Compare the narrow bridge Chinvat, over which the departing Parsee soul must tremblingly cross, to the wide open gate of heaven, through which the departing Christian soul may triumphantly enter. Compare the twenty-one books of the Zend A vesta of the Parsee. which even the scholars of the earth despair of understanding, with our Bible, so much of it as is necessary for our salvation in language so plain that "a wayfaring man,though a fool,need not err therein."Compare the "tower of silence," with its vultures, at Bombay, with the Greenwood of Brooklyn, with its sculptured angels of resurrection, and bow yourselves in thanksgiving and prayer as you realize that if at the battles of Marathon and Salamis Persia had triumphed over Greece instead of Greece triumphing over Persia, Parseeism, which was the national religion of Persia, might have covered the earth, and you and I, instead of sitting in the noonday light of our glorious Christianity might have been groping in the depressing shadows of Parseeism, a religion as inferior to that which is our inspiration in life and our hope in death as Zoroaster of Persia was inferior to our radiant and superhuman Christ, to whom be honor and glory and dominion and victory and £o~p\ world without end. Amen!
§"Welldid.October
A NEW YEAR VOW.
BY 1IARKI.BY DAJIKKR.
NEW YEAR. My last glass yesterday, so help me
"On your birthday you said
kthe
same."
"So I Well?" you?" was the response of the
cooler of the two young men. "That is," rejoined the first speaker, his glass still untouched, "you take exception to my repeating so solemn an oath?" "No. It is a man's privilege and safety to make an oath soiemn. But you ask God to witness so triflinglv. I never say, 'so help me God.' "How so? Come and sit down in the hotel rotunda," said the one called Bob. "For I certainly shall not drink with you tonight, nor ever again, if God will help me."
As they walked away, the other fellow, whom 1 heard him address as Gus, stroked the liquor from his mustache, and laughed over Bob's last remark. "Ah, you jewel of a fellow, I've heard you sav ali that before. You are a charming companion, except when you .mother and sisters have had you up home for a and I lost the rest of the sentence.
I finished my glass of ice water— and, by the way. isn't it an outrage that so many country hotels compel a gentleman to enter the bar room for a glass of water?—and passed out. 1 sat smoking so near to those two commercial travelers, that 1 could not but hear them. "But 1 tell you 1 mean to stop."
Tiiis Bob. "And I tell you it is only the resolution of a moment.".
This Gus. "No, sir. sai l, so help me God." "True Boh, and trifled with the name of the Deity.'' "Confound you! I did not trifle. It is only God who can help me. Why, I have twice promised you I'd never drink again. But you are like a wisp of grass to tie a'boat, to in vonder Niagara. I have vowed it to lots of bar-room fellows, but they only laugh. 1 have vowed it to my mother, but even she is not strong enough to hold me my hand slips off. Then just grasp at the strongest stay 1 can think of. I say, so help me God! Well, three or 'four times I have broken even that pledge. But what shall do? 1 am just like a man in a whirlpool. His boat swings round once, and he snatches at grass and bushes round again, and he grasps at the rock, holds a little, anl then gets swept away, Round he comes again, and again grapples the rock. That's what I did tonight. Do you suppose the rock is displeased because the drowning wretch makes another reach for its solid sides? Do you think that God is insulted that 1 reach for Him again? Ah, no! Ho never laughs over ray vows, nor taunts me with my failures. He just stands and waits for my hands. If God cannot help me, who can?" "Quite a sermon," sneered the handsome young auditor: and I lost the rest of this conversation as they moved away restlessly and went out.
But 1 sat. still, thinking on this much-vexed question of pledges. Shall a free man make them? Good resolutions of New Year's Day. shall a young man of spirit assume them? Certainly he may, and ought. For look at it. If a thing is right, a true man is hound to do it, whether he pledges himself to or not. One is no more free to kill himself because lie has declined to agree not to. If the love of liquor is ruining a fellow, by every consideration of honor, bv duty to himself, to those who love him, to his God, he is bound to stop. What, ihen. is the pledge but an agreement to do what he must do in any event?
Men decline to pledge themselves because, they wish to be "free." Free to do what?
To engage in wrong doing? Then men should decline to sign checks or notes of hand, or their marriage certificates. "Oh, no. We must pay our debts and be true husbands."
Why ''must?" Because it is right because it is the eternal right made into law because there is no escape consistent with honor. And so a man does not hesitate to sav, with pen and ink, that he will do right, and here goes my cheek for it. Very well, then. If it is right for you to save your life by stopping dram drinking, a pledge omitted will not make you free to continue destroying yourself.
The fact is, that you are not convinced that it is wholly right for vou to continue sober and to keep out of a drunkard's grave. You are experimenting. You want to see how far you can cheat nature and nature's God. You are not the soul of honor, but. an nxperimontor. If you were the man you sometimes boast yourself to be, you would not have got into this fix. It would have been enough for you that you saw your hand^ begin to shake, and detected suspicion in the faces of honest men as you breathed close to them. It would have been enough for you to have made one bad trade because "a little set up enough to have cursed your young wife a single evening, and befouled her with a thick, unruly tongue. If you were a true man you would have turned on vour heel then you would have needed no other pledge than the one you then whispered to your own soul"
But how few of us are the soul of honor I We need to grasp some one'n
haad, WcnewJ to fence ourselves aboot with a spoken word. We need to compel ourselves, bv a fear of being called liars by others. Who has not, OVST and over again, lied to himself? Whose heart has not whispered to MB head, "Thou art a liar"" But we know ourselves. We get used to ourselves. Wis break vows made to ourselves—-if DO one else knows them-—a thousand times a year.
Then let us vow to others. Yet, if we vow to others, we ought to take tho noblest spirit we can find in all our circle of acquaintance. You "shake hands" with a weak fellow, and he will frequently "let you off this time," because he wants to be let off himself. As if he had any privilege to permit you to turn liarl Is he a priest, to absolve your sin? As if you might turn false because he has broken the hand shake! Does a pair of liars make one honest man? Yet so the world goes. Hence, do not tie up to a rotten wharf.
And, for that matter, one's- best friends will not do. How frequently even a good mother will laugh in sad regret, but yet find excuses for a son who has turned liar, and broken his good resolution to her. She mitigates his offense, "not counting this time." It is impossible almost for her to look him in the face, and say, "Nevertheless, my child, it is a lie, and you are faise at heart." Otir nearest friends are like our own excusing hearts. I think many men would break a promise to a fond wife which they would keep to a stranger, if they died for it.
Therefore it is better to say, "so help me God." If you really want and mean to do the thing If it is right to do, pledge to the Changeless and the Holy. Be sure He will not let you off. If you stumble, be sure He will forgive. Yet hold you to the old vow. A vow to God is always good. The contract never is outlawed.
You hesitate? It is too late You have made vows to God by the thousand 'Noman'lives whojhas not prom ised God in many crises. You vowed in sickness, vowed when in peril of your life, vowed on the staggering deck of a castaway ship vowed when out of employment, and praying for His help vowed in financial peril vowed over the pale face of your little child gasping for life, "If God will be merciful, I will." What righteousness you agreed upon! Has He not kept His part of the pledge? Have you? Why, if a man or a woman were to profess to you that he or she had never mado a promise to the Great Father, you might politely smile, but iu your heart you would say, "I do not believe it."
Why. then, hesitate at the beginning of this New .Year? Pledges or no pledges, you are in God's power You live in llis world. You- are hound to try to keep His Laws. Nay, if you breathe His air, if you exist,' you become a party to an agreement to serve Him. And you cannot escape from existence. The suicide is a fool, for he"rushes into the very throneroomof the Deity.
And now may that merciful Friend, the Saviour of the world, take your hand and mine, dear reader, in a new covenant. As to the flag the staff and halyards are— as to the sail the yard is, that the gales shall not float it to seas as to green fruit the bough is the hope of ripening so is God the Great Friend to man. And it is the vow that makes us one with Him. Hail New Year! It shall be abetter one than the last, So hoin inRnl1
Ijiicrui-y n.
Julian Ralph says that in Yokohama he found the steps of his hotel littered with Trilby circulars, and the reading public in that city not less in love with the book than are its readers in all parts of America and England. In Shanghai it was the same story: applications for the next available copy of Trilby at tho libraries resembling petitions, in the number of signatures attached.
The more or less sad plight of people who live in the suburbs of New York City, and must come to town each day is considered by Julian Ralph in a valuable article which he contributes to Harper's Young People. He estimates that iiOO.OOU people come in in the morning and go out at night 130,000 go over Brooklyn bridge each day 100, 000 come in throngh the Pennsylvania and Grand Central stations. All this takes no account of the enor mous army that moves down town and up town morning and evening— sometimes eight hundred thousand iu one day on the elevated.
The Order of the Garter.
London Truth.
An evening journal, in a dissertation on the Order of the Garter, states that it consists of thirty-five ordinary knights and thirty-five extra knights, which is quite wrong. There is no fixed number of extra knights, who are all royal personages, and there were only six of them when the Queen's reign commenced, whereas there are now twenty-three. During the last two linancial years £1,M20 has been paid by the public to the dean of the chapter of Windsor and to the Garter officers in respect of fees and expenses in connection with the creation of three extra knights. In all other countries such payments are made by the new knights themselves, but here the taxpayers find the money, and last year the Lord Chamberlain received £2,800 to provide and repair insignia of the various orders of knighthood.
S. R. Crockett, of "Stickit Minister" fame, is a man whose fine physique and impressive size surprise the stranger. He laid thr foundation ol his robust health io his boyhood, when lie had to walk four miles across the moors every day to schoo.