Decatur Democrat, Volume 35, Number 13, Decatur, Adams County, 19 June 1891 — Page 2

DECATUR, IND. *« BLACKBURN, - - - Pxnusan. The man who talks in his sleep is not as much of a nuisance as the man who sleeps in his talk. German papers express serious alarm at the spread of irreligion in the fatherland. The number of Germans in the large cities receiving neither baptism nor confirmation amounts to hundreds of thousands. In Prussia alone there are 30,000 irreligious persons who have never been baptized. The Panama Star and Herald says a Chilian resident in Tacna is 150 years old, according to his own statement, but his neighbors claim that he is older, and a document is in existence Which he signed 142 years ago. He still works in his garden and is in good health. He attributes his long life to his simple, frugal habits. At a pigeon shoot near Newark, N. J., a pointer dog owned by a resident of Harrisburg, Pa., caught a wounded bird by springing into the air after it. The bird was six feet above the ground when the dog’s jaws closed on it, and the old trap shooters entered in the sweep-stake shoots said that it was the finest catch ever seen. ' A horse in San Francisco has a large and well-shaped mustache. If men will persist in the barbarous practice of docking horses’ tails they may expect to see this sort of thing become general. It has every appearance of being nature’s sarcastic intimation that the docking ought to be done at the other extremity of the animal. In one of our churches at Jefferson City, Mo., the minister’s son comtnanded the young woman who acts as organist to observe a certain rule in relation to the music, and when she refused he struck her. The pastor paid the fine And costs, and a spirit of Christian harmony once more reigns in the choir, j In Kearney, Neb., there is a “world’s fair excursion and investment company.” It invites persons to pay to it $52 in installments of 50 cents a week, and in return promises to take them to and from the World’s Fair in special trains, pay for their meals en route and their living expenses for a week in Chicago at the best $3 per day hotel® and furnish them with tickets of admission, guides, and printed information. Os all the coiners of words, the railroad are the most atrocious offenders. The latest and worst instance is the placing upon the Pennsylvania road of a train which is to be known as the “lllindopeny” special. The hideous monster cf a word is formed by combining the ’ earlier portions of the names of Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania and adding the abbreviation of New York, these being Che States through which the train is to pass. Such a murder of the language should be a felony. —~ '— One of the novelties at the St. Panci«l Exhibition in London, England, Was a sausage machine, driven by electric motor. In conjunction with this machine it has been proposed to employ an electric heating attachment, whereby the savory dish can be delivered cooked and smoking hot to the purchaser. It begins to look as if the shrewd individual who conceived the idea of a universal pig-utilizing machine into which the animal could be put at one end, to emerge at the other as cured Earns and blacking, brushes, was no visionary, but only a prophet a little in advance of his times. A citizen of Stamford, Conn., has been driven insane by his young lady neighbor practicing on the piano, and his mania took a very queer form. When it seized him he went to all the piano dealers in town and ordered them to send costly instruments to the young lady’s house at intervals of half an hour. Ashe was rich his odd orders were complied with, and the young woman, despite her objections, had ten instruments blocking the street in front of her house, besides two in the parlor and one in the hall. Finally the madman was captured and the pianos returned, but the young lady has ceased to practice. The late Major Barttelot was educated at Rugby, where he is still remembred as the hero of a funny school-boy blunder. “What is the meaning of the word ‘adage’?” was the question which was being asked by the master. Various shots were made of the usual wild description, when it came to yoang Barttelot, who, without hesitatation,replied, *A place to put cats into.” Every one laughed; and the master, who was as much mystified as the rest, called him up at the end of the -lesson and asked him what had put such an idea into his head. “Well, sir,” said Barttelot, looking very much injured, “doesn’t it say in Shakespeare ‘Like the poor cat in the adage’ ?” The Oxford University income amounted to £65,000 last year, of which £30,000 came from fees and other internal services, the degree fees alone coming to just £IO,OOO. The university draws about £16,000 from various external sources, £13,000 from trust funds, £6,000 from the colleges, and the profit from the Clarendon Press was £5,000. It speaks well for the administration of the university property that “agency and management” cost only £220. Professors take about £IO,OOO, university officers £5,000, examiners £5,000, and readers £2,500. The Bodleian cost the museum £4,300, the Tayor Institution £2,000, and the botanical gardens £l,lOO, while £6,000 went in various internal expenses, *nd the in*

terest and sinking funds in loans accounted for £5,500. The university income does not now vary from year to year, except in quite small amounts. The tower of a public building now in course of erection at Philadelphia is to be provided with a clock, which, for size alone, will be one of the marvels of the world. The center of the dial (twenty-five feet in diameter) will be 351 feet above the street The bell is to weigh between 20,000 and 25,000 pounds and will be second in weight to the great Montreal Cathedral bell, which weighs 28,000 pounds, and it is calculated that its peal will be heard even to the most distant part of the city. Chimes similar to those of Westminister will be used, ringing at the quarter, half, three-quarters and hour. The minute hand is to be twelve and the hopr hand nine feet in length, while the Roman figures on the dial will measure two feet eight inches in length. While a fair young daughter of York, Pa., was serenely seated in her aerial bedchamber the other night, weary with the toils of the day, about to doff her wrap and lay herself down upon her couch to enjoy the kindly embrace of Morpheus, she suddenly heard a strange noise, which affrighted and almost bewildered her. It was that of an old family clock which had been stored away in the room. Its truthful tones had not been heard for half a century, when all at once its wheels began to vibrate and the old familiar gong sounded out the time of night—ll o’clock. It did not strike or “tick” again, but stopped, not to go again. ( The alarm is a mystery and the timid lassie awaits in breathless silence the sequel of the occasion. A device that will enable a railroad employe to determine when a car is loaded consistent with safety or with economical wear has been a long “felt want” in railroad circles. An apparatus has been invented to supply this demand, and owing to its simplicity it is likely to come into general favor. The device consists of two distinct parts, the upper part being attached to the truck, above the spring on the side of the car, while the other part is fixed below the spring. An adjustable pin is carried by the top part, and the bottom end of this touches an index finger that works over the dial of the bottom piece. When the apparatus is once adjusted the index, as the car is loaded, will indicate on the dial “full load” or “overloaded” as the case may be. No more pitiful ’story has been told in the papers than that of the two little girls lost in the sand hills of Western Nebraska. It is a terrible thing to think of a child lost in the city and scores of mothers have had the most painful experiences over the few hours’ absence of little children wandering half crazed and helpless about the city. The dangers that beset children in certain city districts are very great, and the alarm of parents is always excusable, but with what painful tenderness will the hearts of mothers and fathers turn to the two little wanderers in the almost desert region of a newly settled country ? Who can picture the sufferings of a little 8-year old girl who in the wild wanderings of five or six days made the distance of seventy-five miles. The stoutest men, those most resourceful when lost under such conditions, suffer greatly in mind and body, and what must have been the sufferings of this little one, wandering for days where there was little to sustain life, and where the solitude was as great as though the child had been in the middle of the great desert ? Much is occasionally said of the fortitude and the endurence of the Indian children subjected to privation and danger, but here is a case of endurance and fortitude on the part of a white child quite as remarkable as anything related of Indian children. Carrying the Gospel Into the Enemy’s Camp, Plymouth Church of Chicago is described in a most interesting and suggestive paper in the Chautauquan. In the article is an account of a piece of missionary work which the church lias just started, which deserves serious and general attention. It seems that Dr. Gunsaulus, the popular pastor of Plymouth, realized keenly that his audiences were made up of the select of the city, and that the “neglected” were not reached. He visited the theaters Sunday night, found them full of the very people he wanted to touch, and going to his people asked their help. The result was that the church decided to rent Music Hall, a down-town audienceroom with a capacity of some 3,000 and a magnificent organ,to lead its pastor and choir each Sunday evening, and to say away itself giving the space to the class to be reached. The first service was held in October last and was a great success. The press and the people have caught the spirit that planned these meetings and have fallen into line with wonderful appreciation and enthusiasm. The increasingly large number of people who can not gain even standing room at these services, and the inconvenience of having to go so early to the hall in order to secure a seat, seem to constitute a necessity tor a larger hall. t)r. Gunsaulus has been urged to go to the Auditorium, but as his chief desire is for spiritual results rather than a large crowd he has hesitated to take this step. Viewed from Chinese Eyes. Apropos of Americans, says the Pekin Gazette, it is impossible to understand these barbarous people. One thing is certain, if they do a thing, they do it with all their might. Thirty years ago they had a big civil war. The whole country was turned into military camps and battle-fields, and everybody, even to the women-folk, were engaged in the war in one way or another, and one army numbered 2,000,000, men. And now there are young men old enough to vote who have never seen a company of soldiers in their life. In fact, these people seem to think that another war will never break out, especially in their part of the world. A person can travel clear across the American continent without seeing a soldier, and follow the main lines of travel, too. In fact, at the present time there is only one soldier for every 2,000 persons, while Russia has one soldier to every ninety.

THE BATTLE OF CREED® DR. TALMAGE GIVES A SKETCH OF THE HERESY HUNT. There Is an Exciting Question in Almost Every Denomination — Are the Theologians Losing Temper in the Discussion?—No One Is Bettered by It. Dr. Talmage dealt in this sermon last Sunday, with the very timely topic, “The Battle of Creeds.” His text was taken from Proverbs xxvi, 17, “He that passoth by and meddleth with strife belonging not to him is like one that taketh a dog by the ears.” Solomon here deplores the habit of rushing in between contestants, of taking part in the antagonism of others, of joining in tights which they ought to shun. They do no good to others and get damage for themselves. He compares it to the experiment of taking a dog by the ears. Nothing so irritates the canines as to be clutched by the lugs. Take them by the back of the neck and lift them and it does not seem to hurt or offend; but you take the dog by the ear and he will take you with his teeth. In all the history of kennels no intelligent or spirited dOg will stand that. “Now,” says Solomon, “you go into quarrels or controversies that are not yoiirs and you will get lacerated and torn and bitten. ‘He that passeth by and meddleth with strife belonging not to him is like one that taketh a dog by the ears.’” This is a time of resounding ecclesiastical quarrel. Never within your memory or mine has the air been so full of missiles. The Presbyterian church has on hand a controversy so great that it finds it prudent to postpone its settlement for at least one more year, hoping that something will turn up. Somebody might die or a new general assembly may have grace to handle the exciting questions. The Episcopal church has cast out some recalcitrants, and its digestive organs are taxed to the utmost in trying to assimilate others. “Shall women preach?” “Or be sent as delegates to conferences?” are questions that have put many of our Methodist brethren on the “anxious seat,” and the waters in some of the great baptistries are troubled waters. Because of the controversies throughout Christendom the air is now like an August afternoon about 5 o’clock when it has been steaming hot all day, and clouds are gathering, and there are lions of thunder with grumbling voices and flashing eyes coming forth from their cloudy lairs, and people are waiting for the full burst of the tempest. I am not so much of a weather prophet, but the clouds look to me mostly like wind clouds. It may be a big blow, but I hope it will soon be over. In regard to the Battle of the Creeds, I am every day asked what I think about it. I want to make it so plain this morning what I think that no one will ever ask again. Let those who are jurymen in the case, I mean those in the different ecclesiastical courts, have the questions put directly before them, weigh and decide. Let the rest of us keep out. The most damaging thing on earth is religious controversy. No one ever comes out of it as good a man as he goes in. Some of the ministers, in all denominations, who, before the present acerbity were good and kind and useful, now seem almost swearing mad. These brethren I notice always open their violent meetings with prayer before devouring each other, thus saying grace before meat. They have a moral hydrophobia that makes us think they have taken a dog by the ears. They never read the imprecatory Psalms of Davidwith such zest as since the Briggs and Newton and MacQueary and Bridgman and Brooks questions got into full swing. May the rams of the sheepfold soon have their horns sawed off. Before the controversies are settled a good many ministers will, through what they call liberalism, be landed into practical infidelity, and others, through what they call conservatism, will shrink up into bigots tight and hard as the mummies of Egypt which got through their controversies three thousand years ago. This trouble throughout Christendom was directly inspired of Satan. He saw that too much good was being done. Recruits were being gathered by hundreds of thousands to the gospel standard. The victories for God and the truth were too near together. Too many churches were being dedicated. Too many ministers were being ordained. Too many philanthropies were being fostered. Too many souls were being saved- It had been a« dull time in the nether world, and the arrivals were too few. So Satan rose one day upon his throne and said, “Ye powers of darkness, hear!” And all up and down the caverns the cry was, “Hear! Hear!” Satan said: “There is that American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. It must either be demolished or cripppled, or the first thing you know they will have all nations brought to God. Apollyon the Younger! You go up to Andover and get the Professors to discussing whether the heathen can be saved without the Gospel. Divert them from the work of missions and get them in angry convention in a room at Young’s hotel, Boston, and by the time they adjourn the cause of Foreign Missions will be gloriously and magnificently injured. Diabolus the Yonnger! You go up and get the Union Theological Seminary, of New York, and the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, at Detroit at swords’ points and diverted from the work of making earnest ministers of religion, and turn that old Presbyterian church, which has been keeping us out of customers for hundreds of years, into a splendid pandemonium on a small scale. Abaddon the Third! You go up and assault that old Episcopal church, which has been storming the Hevens for centuries with the sublimest prayers that were ever uttered—church of Bishop Leighton, Bishop White and Bishop Mcllvaine, and get that denomination discussing men instead of discussing the eternieies. Abaddon the Fourth! You go up to that old Methodist church, which has, through her revivals, sent millions to Heaven which we would otherwise have added to our population; the church of Wesley and Matthew Simpson, against which we have an especial grudge, and get them so absorbed in discussing whether women shall take part in hen conference that they shall not have so much time to discuss how many sons and daughters she will take to glory.” What amazes me most is that all people do not see that the entire movement at this time all over Christendom is Satanic. Many of the infernal attacks are sly and hidden and strategic and so ingenious that they are not easily discovered. But here is a bold and uncovered attempt of the powers of darkness to split up the churches, to get ministers to take each other by the throat, to make religion a laughing stock of earth and hell, to leave the Bible with no more respect or authenticity than an old almanac of 1822, which told what would be the change of weather six months ahead and in what quarter of the moon it is best to plant turnips. In a word, the effort is to stop the evangelization of the world. It .seems to me very much like this: There has been a railroad accident and many are wounded and dying. There are several drug stores near the scene of casualty. All the doctors and druggists are needed, and needed right away. Bandages, stimulants, anaesthetics, medicines of all sorts. What are the doctors and druggists doing? Discussing the

contents of some old bottles on the top shelf—bottles of medicine which some doctors and druggists mixed two or three hundred years ago. “Come, doctors!” “Come, druggists!” cry the people, “and help these wounded and dying that are being brought from beneath the timbers of the crushed rail train. In a little while it will be too late. Come, for God’s sake! Gome right away!” “No,” says a doctor, “not until we have settled whether the medicine on that top shelf was rightly mixed. I say there were too many drops of laudanum in it, and this other man says there were too many drops of camphire, and we must get this question settled before we can attend to the railroad accident.” And one doctor takes another doctor by the collar and pushes him back against the counter, and one of the druggists says, “If you will not admit that I am right about that one bottle I will smash every bottle in your apothecary store,” and he. proceeds to smash. Meanwhile, on the lower shelf, plainly marked and within easy reach, are-all the medicines needed for tne helping of the sufferers by the accident, and in that drawer, easily opened, are bandages and splints, for the lack of which fifty people are dying outside the drug store. Before I apply this thought, every one sees its application. Here is this old world, and it is off track. Sin and sorrow have collided with it. The groan of agony is fourteen hundred million voiced. Now, what part shall you and I take in this controversy which fills all Christendom with clangor? My advice is: Take no part. In time of riot all mayors of cities advise good citizens to stay at home or in their places of business,and in this time of religious riot I advise you to go about your regular work for God. Leavh the bottles on the higher shelves for others to fight about and take the two bottles on the shelf within easy reach, the two bottles which are all this dying world needs; the one filled with a potion which is for the cleansing of all sin, the other filled with a potion which is for the soothing of all suffering. Two Gospel bottles! Christ mixed them out of His own tears and blood. In them is no human admixture. Spend no time on the mysteries! You, a man only five or six feet high, ought not try to wade an ocean a thousand feet deep. My own experience has been vivid. I devoted the most of my time for years in trying to understand God’s eternal decrees, and I was determined to find out why the Lord let sin come into the world, and I set out to explore the doctrine of the Trinity, and with a yardstick to measure the throne of the Infinite. As with all my predecessors, the attempt was a dead failure. For the last thirty years I have not spent two minutes in studying the controverted points of theology, and if I live thirty years longer I will not spend the thousandth part of a second in such exploration. I know two things, and these I will devote all the years of my life in proclaiming: God will through Jesus Christ pardon sin, and He will comfort trouble. Creeds have their uses, but 'just now the church is creeded to death. The young men Entering the ministry are going to be launched in the thickest fog that ever settled on the coasts. As I am told that in all our services students of Princeton and Union and Drew and other theological seminaries are present, and as these words will come to thousands of young men who are soon to enter the ministry, let me say to such, and through them to their associates, keep out of the bewildering, belittling, destroying and angry controversies abroad. The questions our doctors of divinity are trying to will not be settled until the day after the day of judgment. It is such a poor economy of time to spend years and years in trying to fathom the unfathomable when in five minutes in Heaven we will know all we want to know. Wait till we get our throne. Wait until the light of eternity flashes upon our newly ascended spirits. It is useless for ants on different sides of a mole hill to try to discuss the comparative heights of Mount Blanc and Mount Washington. Let me say to all young men about to enter the ministry that soon the greatest novelty in the world will be the unadulterated religion of Jesus Christ. Preach that and you will have a crowd. The world is sick to regurgitation with the modern quacks in religion. The world has been swinging off from the Gospel, but it will swing back, and by the time you young me,n go into the pulpits the crywill be coming up from all the millions of mankind, “Give us the bread of life; no sweetened bread, no bread with sickly raisins stuck here and there into it, but old fashioned bread as God our mother mixed it and baked it!” You see God knew as much when he made the Bible as he knows now. He has not learned a single thing in six thousand years. He knew at the start that the human race would go wrong, and that would be the best means of its restoration and redemption. And the law which was thundered on Mount Sinai, from whose top I had the two tables of stone in yonder wall transported, is the perfect law. And the Gos- 1 pel which Christ announced while dying on that mount from which I brought that stone in yonder wall, and which Paul preached on that hill from which I brought yonder granite, is the Gospel that is going to save the world. Young man put on that Gospel armor! No other sword will triumph like that. No other . shield will protect like that. No other hemlet will glance off the battle axes like that. Our theological seminaries are doing glorious work, but if ever such theological seminaries shall cease to prepare young men for this plain Gospel advocacy, and shall become more philosophical schools for guessing about God and guessing about the Bible and guessing about the soul, they will cease their usefulness, and young men, as in olden time, when they would study for the Gospel ministry, will put themselves under the cate of some Intelligent and warm hearted pastor, and kneel with him in family prayer at the parsonage, and go with him into the room of the sick and the dying, and see what victories the grace of God can gain when the couch of the dying saint is the Marathon. That is the way the mighty ministers of the Gospel were made in olden times. Oh, for the great wave of revival to roll over our theological seminaries, and our pulpits, and oiir churches, and our eccleastical courts and over all Christendom! That would be the end of controversy. While such a deluge would float the ark of God higher and higher, it would put all the bears and tigers and reptiles of/aging eccleslasticism fifteen cubits under. Do you know that I think that if all ministers in all denominations would stop this nonsense of ecclesiastical strife and take hold the word of God, the only question with each of us being how many souls we can bring to Christ, and in how short a time, the Lord would soon appear for the salvation of all nations? When the young queen of England visited Scotland [many years ago great preparations were made for her reception. The vessel in which she sailed was far out at sea, but every hill in Scotland was illumined with bonfires and torches. The night was set on fire with artificial Illumination. The Queen, standing oir-ship’s deck, knew from that that Scotland was full of heartiest welcome, and tffe thunder of the great guns at Glasgow and Edinburgh castle woke up all the echoes. Boom! they? sounded out over the sea.

Boom! they sounded up among the hills. Do you know that I think that our King would land if we were only ready to receive Him? Why not call to Him from all our churches, from all our hospitals, from all our homes? Why not all at once light ill the torches of Gospel invitation? Why not ring all the bells of welcome? Why not light up the long night of the world’s sin and suffering with bonfires of victory? Why not unlimber all the Gospel batteries, and let them boom across the earth, and boom into the parting heavens? The King is ready to land if we are ready to receive Him. Why cannot we who are now living see His descent? Must it all be postponed to after ages? Has not our poor world groaned long enough in mortal agonies? Have there not been martyrs enough, and have not the lakes of tears and the rivers of blood been deep enough? Why cannot the final glory rollrfn-now? Why cannot this dying century feel the incoming tides of the oceans of heavenly mercy? Must our eyes close in death and our ears take on the deafness of the tomb, and these hearts beat their last throb before the day comes in? O Christ! Why tartiest thou? Wilt thou not, before we go the way of all the earth, let us see thy scarred feet under some noonday cloud coming this way? Before we die let us behold thy hands that were spiked spread out in benediction for a lost race. And why not let us with our mortal ears hear that voice which spoke peace as thou didst go up speak pardon and emancipation and love and holiness and joy to all nations as thou comest down? But the skies do not part. I hear no rumbling of chariot wheels coming down over the sapphire. There is no swoop of wings. I see no flash of angelic appearances. All is still. I hear nothing but the tramp of my own heart as I pause between these utterances. The King does not land because the world is not ready and the church is not ready. To clear the way for the Lord’s coming let us devote all Our energies of body, mind, and soul. A Russain general, riding over the battlefield, his horse treading amid the dying and dead, a wounded soldier asked him for water, but the officer did not understand his language, and knew not what the poor fellow wanted. Then the soldier cried out, “Christos!” and that word meant sympathy and help, and the Russian officer dismounted and put to the lips of the sufferer a cooling draught. Be that the charmed word with which we go forth to do our whole duty. In many languages it has only a little difference of termination. Christos! It stands for sympathy. It stands for help. It stands for pardon. It stands for hope. It stands for Heaven. Christos! In that name we were baptized. In that name we took our first sacrament. That will be the battle shout that will win the whole world for God. Christos! Put it on our banners when we march! Put it on our lips when we die! Put it in the funeral psalm at our obsequies! Put it on the plain slab over our grave! Christos! Blessed be His glorious name forever! Amen! Bow to Pronounce Clerk. Freeman, the historian, in a readable paper on American speech and pronun.ciatiop published since his return to England, well says: “The words ‘metropolis’ and ‘provinces,’ used in this way, I venture to call slang, whether the city which is set up above its fellows is London or New York. Anyhow this use of them is in no way distinctively American; indeed the misuse of the word provinces is, I fancy, excessively rare in America, and it is certainly borrowed from England. Each side of the ocean unluckily finds it easier to copy the abuses of the other side than to stick to the noble heritage which is common to both.” What he has to say about the pronunciation of the word “clerk” is worth reproduction at length: The word “clerk” is in England usually sounded “dark,” while in America it is usually sounded “clurk.” I say “usually,” because I did once hear “clurk” in England—from a London shopman—and because I was told at Philadelphia that some old people there still said “dark,” and—a most important fact—that those who said “dark” also said “marchant.” Now it is qu’te certain that “dark” is the older pronunciation—the pronunciation which the first settlers must have taken with them. This is prt>ved by the fact that the word as a surname—and it is one of the commonest surnames-—is always sounded and most commonly written “Clark” or “Clarke.” I suspect that “Clerk” as a surname, so spelled, distinctively “Scotch,” in the modern sense of that word. Also in writers of the sixteenth and early seventeenth century, the word itself is commonly written “dark” or “clarke.” But of course “clerk” was at all times the most clerkly spelling, as showing the French and Latin origin of the word. It is plain therefore that the pronundation “clurk” is not traditional, but has been brought in artificially out of a notion of making the sound conform to the spelling. But “clurk” is no more the true sound than “dark;” the true sound is “clairk,” like French “clerc,” and a Scotchman would surely sound it so. “Clark” and “clurk” are both mere approximations to the French sound, and “dark” is the older and surely the most natural approximation. The truth is that we cannot sound “clerk” as- it is spelled; that is, we cannot give the e before r the same sound that we give it when it is followed by any other consonant: We cannot sound ein “clerk” exactly as we sound ein “tent.” This applies to a crowd of words, some of Teutonic, some of Latin origin, in which the spelling is e, but in which the sound has, just as in “clerk,” fluctuated between a and u. The old people at Philadelphia who said “dark” also said “marchant.” And quite rightly, for they had on their side both other English usage and, in this case, the French spelling itself. The sound “marchant” has come in, both in England and America, by exactly the same process as that by which the sound “cl-urk” has come in in America, but not in England. Like all other Italian cities, Venice lives on the glory of other days. She has not much else to live on, in fact. Within less than a hundred years the dty has belonged to three different foreign owners. The last and present owner is Italy. The Vefietians still dream of the days when Venice was greater than Italy, and count the Government of Italy almost as much a foreign power as Austria. The Venetian guide pointed out to us the splendid mosaics, the glorious paintings, the unrivaled marbles from the hand of one and another gifted son of his beloved native city. Then he says with a sigh, quite unaware how he is confusing sexes: “But one man come, and strip off Venice’s coat. Another come, and he take off another coat. The great Napoleon, he come at last, and he stripped off her vest and pantaloons, everything, and leaves her only one poor shirt.”— “_E. J...” in Cincinnati Commercial. Every twenty-four hours 1,140 trains rush past the signal tower of the Pennsylvania railroad on Filbert street, Philadelphia, a record that can be equaled by no other point on the globe.

THE BANK OF ENGLAND. Dowa la the Money Vaults Amid Almost Countless Wealth. The automatic bodyguard now shows some animation, says the London edition of the New York Herald. Producing a hand lantern from another mysterious recess he bids us follow. We walk in narrow alleys formed of piles of boxes, where not a ray of light penetrates, and find ourselves making a rapid descent, with the latern ahead, like some guardian angel. We descend a steeper incline than,the others, with the defunct bank notes in their sarcophagi all around us, when a chill air striking us proves that we are well underground. Then the figure in front turns and announces to us in a tone calculated to strike terror into nervous persons, “We are now in the labyrinth.” I begin to feel like another Guy Fawkes going to blow up the whole place. But the sudden twist and turns we take always in that bewildering maze of piled-up cases are becoming most trying to the banker, who is not accustomed to dodging a will-o’-the-wisp in a catacomb. I begin to entertain fears that he is leading us to some dungeon fastness when he turns again and solemnly remarks, with a wave of his hand, “All bank notes.” Some idea can be gained of the quantity when it is said that they are 77,745,000 in number, and that they fill 13,400 boxes, which, if placed side by fide, would reach two and a half mil as. If the notes were place in a pile they would reach to a height of five and a half miles, or if joined end to end would form a ribbon 12,455 miles long. Their superficial extent is a little less than that of Hyde Park; their original value was over £1,750,000,000, and their weight over 90| tons. Along another passage we enter a large room—really a vault—which is surrounded from floor to ceiling by iron <ft>ors of safes which at their opening might be five feet high by five feet wide. One of these is opened and shows rows upon rows of gold coins in bags of £2,000 each. One is handed to me to hold, and after doing so for a moment I decide I will not carry it home. The dead weight is enormous. Yet these officials handle the slipping, sliding mass as though it were a book. Another door is opened and we observe a‘ s stack of bank notes. I remark that I have seen a lot already. For answer the manager takes out a parcel of 1,000 £I,OOO notes and says: “Take hold.” Ido so, and am told I am holding £1,000,000. I should have wished to hold it longer, but they want it, so I put it back. “This small safe contains £8,000,000” continued the polite manager, and you are in the richest vault of the Bank of England and of the world. This small room at present holds £80,000,000. By this time my appetite for wealth is nearly gone. I am nauseated with the atmosphere of bank notes. My senses are dulled with the oppressing spectacle and I hail with delight the merry plashing fountain in the courtyard. Here are the quarters of the thirty-four guardsmen who nightly patrol the establishment. A double sentry is posted at each gate, and as they load with ball cartridges it is not a safe place for an enterprising burglar to tackle. The officer of the guard has a bedroom in the bank, and is provided with a dinner and a bottle of the finest old port, and I understand that the guards are also liberally treated. Tbe Farmin Finland. One of the most instructive sights of the country is an ordinary Finnish farm in the interior, say in Satskunta or Savolaks, or in Ostrobothnia, on the verge of the dreary country of the Lapps, which is in truth—“A soundless waste, a trackless vacancy.” It is generally a spacious, oblong building, one story high, resting on a foundation of unhewn stones, frequently on a rock of solid granite. Round about are grouped the outhouses, which are of the essence of all Finnish farms; the cowhouse, the forge, the stable, the pigsty, the granary, the little house for artificially drying the corn, and the bath-house (for the Finn’s notions of cleanliness are extremely advanced, and in summer even the poorest peasant takes a "Turkish” bath about six times a week, in winter once or twice.) The ‘cornfields, which are not divided by fence, ditch, or hedgrow from the wide plain of rolling fern that stretches away to the forests, are studded over with stones and [boulders that look at a distance, like petrified sheep and oxen. The house is divided into three or four rooms, always kept scrupulously clean from the rafters of which the winter’s provision of bread is hung up to dry. This bread consists of round flat cakes, more easily broken with an ax than|with human teeth, with a hole in the center of each, through which a thong or cord on which they hang is passed. These cakes are generally made of barley flour, but they sometimes contain an admixture of Iceland moss or the powdered bark of the pine. Among the other staple articles of consumption are dried salt fish, herrings and cheese. Whenever meat is to be found on a Finnish farm, it generally assumes the form of mutton which has been parboiled, salted and smoked, and which, if appearances are grossly deceptive, may prove a toothsome viand. No house is without a few books and newspapers, among which you can always find a Bible, or at least a new testament and a hymy book. But besides these farmhouses, which are tenanted by middle-class farmers, the traveler occasionally comes across a solitary wooden cabin . standing in the dreary plain scores of miles away from the next house, like a frail boat on a storm-tossed ocean. For the Finn has no aversion to solitude; he likes to be alone with nature and his conscience. Like Thoreau, he feels that our planet being still in theMilky.Way.it would be folly to complain of loneliness. And this love of peace and quiet is no less characteristic of the nation than of the individual. Moreover, it has been strengthened by bitter experience of the results of launching out into the ocean of wars, famine and pestilence, which have often reduced the population of Finland to a couple hundred thousand souls. This experience lies at the root of the desire which they have always manifested to keep aloft from wars, rebellious and political intrigues which were the main elements of the history of Northern countries in the middle ages.— -The Fortnightly Review. An Old Master. A queer purchase was made in London a few months ago. An “old master,” begrimed with dirt, was knocked down for £7. It was promptly resold for £BO, and again for £7OO, and it has now been acquired for £2,000 by a continental gallery, and turns out to be a magnificent Terburg. This artist, it

may be remembered, spent some time in England, and left behind him some of his finest productions. Men for Salle. To navigate a ship in a violent storm, with the danger on tbe one hand of drifting on merciless reefs, and on the other of going down in the vortex of a typhoon, requires a high degree of skill and courage. S. Sewall describes the thrilling experience of the Sartoga when caught in a cyclone off the Gulf of Tonquin, and to windward of that immense tract of reefs and shoals known as the Paracels. As day wore on, all the sails had to be reefed. All this time we were heading to the northward and eastward on the port tack. Though we were forging slowly ahead, we were drifting very much faster toward those fatal rocks. It was decided to get the ship about, if possible, and run her out into wider sea room. She was got round on the starboard tack, and headed about southwest; but she made no perceptible headway. We watched the barometer. Are we nearing the center ? Shall we go down in this horrible vortex ? If the typhoon is of great diameter, or is passing slowly, the wind must hold for a long time, and there will be no escaping the shoals. In any case, we had better be cn the port tack. Accordingly, preparations wore again made for waring ship; but by this tim« she had become unmanageable. She would not mind her helm. In this dilemma an expedient was adopted which I had read of, but had never expected to witness. The ship was under bare poles, and not a stitch cf canvas could live on her for a moment. With a good deal of persuasion,—some of it more force than suasion,—a hundred or more of the men were driven into the weather for rigging, where they formed a dense mass, against which the hurricane drove with tremendous pressure. Drenched with spray, benumbed, whirled and jerked through the air by the writhing ship beneath them, held over the boiling caldron of waters now on one side and the next instant on the other, it was a miracle that every man of them was not snapped off and shot headlong into the sea. The helm was put hard up; but the poor ship seemed unable to make any further effort. Half an hour of anxiety had passed since the men crept into the rigging. At last she began to feel her helm and pay off. Slowly and painfully she swung around into the trough of the sea. It was a perilous moment. Would she roll herself under and go down? But with a few tremendous lurches-she shook herself clear of the immense masses of water on her decks, and rose heavily and wearily on the next wave. When she was fairly round on the port tack, it was found that the change had come. The wind was vepring to westward, the storm was rapidly passing. By 11 o’clock it was safe to make sail, and crippled as she was, the Saratoga did her best to crawl out of the dread neighborhood where she had so nearly met her doom.— Youth’s Companion. Stick to the Smaller Words. “I have often noticed,” said a writer, “that young people have away of poring over dictionaries and books for the purpose of finding hjgh-sounding and uncommon words to use in mystifying and crushing their plain-spoken friends. Nothing more clearly indicates bad taste and lack of education. Ignorant negroes are always listening for new words, but poverty of thought cannot be disguised in a prodigality of long ana luxuriant words. To a man of ideas the use of uncommon words is a detriment. He wants the ability to express himself, but should use only the simplest words, so that his idea can be the more readily understood and comprehended by the greatest number of people. As your language becomes more ‘refined,’ as vulgar people say, your circle of listeners narrows down, and you have not even the,,satisfaction of knowing that you have the very best audience, as many of the brightest and strongest intellects have not received the best educations. A man of ideas has no need of many or attractive words. The ideas —a rarity— are sufficiently attractive in themselves. It is well to know the meaning of many words, because you can assert your own with the pompous and the half-educated people, but the use of any but the simplest words is very bad taste. By ‘the simplest words,’ I mean the words in common use and there is no restriction on the use of the more difficult words if they are the simplest that can. be used to convey an idea or express a sentiment. If you wish to say ‘bad,’ there is no necessity of searching the Greek and Latin dictionaries for a word that no one can understand. ‘Bad’ is good enough for 59,990,000 of the people of this country. Anything else clearly indicates a neglected education or a pedant”— St. Louis Republic. Consultation at Sea. A certain physician in a large New England town had acquired an unenviable reputation for making his bills as large as possible without much regard to the state of his patients’ purses. There were people who furthermore said that it really seemed as if there were “visits” on his bills which had never had existence anywhere else. But he was a skillful physician, and his tendency to overrate his services only served to amuse some of his patients who had plenty of money, and were not especially sharp in looking after it “Why,” said one man to another, speaking of the doctor, “he brought my daughter Jennie up from her attack of pneumonia, when two other physicians had said their was no hope for her; but when she was quite well again he charged me for three calls he made, to ‘inquire in a friendly way how she was getting on!’ ” “That seems a little forced,” admitted the other man, “but it’s nothing compared to an experience I had with him, at the seashore a year ago. “We happened to be in bathing at the same time one day, and I swam up to him, and inquired for his wife. “ ‘She’s very well,’ said the doctor. “ ‘And your daughters?’ I asked. “ ‘They’re perfectly well both of them,’ replied he, rather shortly, I thought So I said, Tm delighted to hear it; remember me to them,* and swam away. “And what do you think I received from him a week or two later? An itemized bill—one item. “ ‘To consultation at sea, five dollars!’ ” Although no one has ever seen that bill, the story clings to the doctor’s name to this day, after a lapse of many years. , Time is the silent barber who mows away man’s top hair.