Decatur Democrat, Volume 35, Number 20, Decatur, Adams County, 7 August 1891 — Page 2

©he democrat ' decaturTind. M BLACKBURN, • Pubustmb, The jeweler makes the wedding ring; the screech owl makes the welkin ring. They are talking of using molasses for fuel in Louisiana. It would be appropriate for the parlor fire Sunday evenings. With a family of forty-four charming nieces it is no wonder that Uncle Sam is having so much trouble over hat trimmings and sealskin sacques. An authority states that “the average laborer.” It would be interesting to know the amount of nerve tissue daily destroyed by the walking delegate. The attention of the Chicago Stock Exchange is hereby called to the fact that ‘the Salvation /Army people are selling “shares of Paradise” in France at a large profit. Indiana claims to be the greatest eggproducing State in the Union, as if the figures sustain the claim Indiana has the natural and inalienable right to eackle over them. No Wonder that the “Missouri River has eut a new channel and moved east.” It is a wonder that it did not move eastward long ago. It runs through “a fever and ager" district. Having bluffed off the Italian gunboats the American people should be encouraged to bluff the Italian handorgan off the streets, which they make hideous with their wheezing music. Paper hats are now made for ladies. They can be made in the most fashionable shapes and colors and present a very stylish appearance, but as they cost but a few cents they will never become popular. Among the disastrous ventures of Manager J. M. Hill appears “The Clemenceau dltse,” which cost him $7,000. It is gratifying to note that that piece of naked inaneness was its own Nemesis. A traveler says that Japanese elections are always conducted with the utmost good order and politeness. We should hurry up and send a lot more missionaries to that benighted people. Manifestly there is little civilization there. The little King of Spain has a very large ambition to grow a very large mustache, and “can not understand,” it is said, “how the King of Spain can bo so small”— a thought not at all royal, but familiar to most people in contemplating kings in general. The spillability of the modern balloon shows that a good sound clamp is the one thing needed to make aeronautics a success. When the balloon does not tilt on the aeronaut he generally manages to spill himself when a mile and a half high. New York is apparently beginning to realize that the World’s Fair will be the biggest event of its kind in history, and is undecided what to do or say about it. Recognizing the hopelessness of any further attempt to belittle the undertaking, the city yet lacks grace to laugh and join the procession. The fact that the Queen met the Prince of Wales with special cordiality at the Montgomery-Ponsonby wedding suggests that Her Majesty does not disapprove of gambling and dishonorable tattling so much as has been supposed. Rovalty stands together right ©r wrong —especially wrong. “All’s well that ends well,” even if it takes 1,600 tons of coal and costs $25,000 to do it, like ifie return of the Itata to her original moorings. Under escort of the Charleston, she steamed into San lifeego Harbor, we being wiser, the Chilian*insurgents sadder, and both poor so? the howling farce of which this was the last act. It is certainly only just that if the circulars and other papers of native lotteries are to be seized in the mails of the United States those of other countries should be seized also; and the reeent decision that foreign lottery documents may be suppressed in the mails will commend itself to the public as a measure of justice. The Warden of the Sing Sing Penitentiary believes in observing the letter of the law which prohibits detailed accounts of execution by electricity. It is perfectly safe to say that the accounts, though delayed, will yet be complete, and that a law so foolish* and ao dangerous will yet be a dead letter. If there be horrors connected with such a mode of death the people have a right to know—that a reform may be insured. Louisiana is in danger of another revolution, but this time the revolutionists have morality on their side. They propose to drive out the New Orleans lottery by force, if necessary, and pledge themselves “to fight to the bitterest end the horde of gamblers and bribers who infest our beloved State; we pledge you even in revolution, bloody, stern and terrible, rather than submit to the shame and degradation proposed by the lottery company; we pledge you the best blood of the land to maintain the honor of the State.” This is strong language in a good cause. Alexander S. Carrut hers and L. P. Bouby, two New Orleans editors, fought a duel on Mississippi soil with rapiers. When Mr. Carruthers had received a alight wound under the eye the seconds ’ declared honor satisfied. Mr. Bouby went back to his office and Mr. Carruthers went in search of a slab of raw beef for his injured optic. Does New J 4 . -A

Orleans aim' 1 to pose as the rival of * Paris in the dueling line? The Warden of the penitentiary at Sing Sing now tests certain of his . prisoners every morning and in addition to his health, weight, pulse, and the usual items of the routine report registers each man’s volfage, so ’tis said. Gentlemen contemplating murder woyld save themselves a heap of unpleasantness and the officials a lot of trouble by kindly keeping tab on their conditions as electrical conductors. We do not allow a man to commit suicide, if we know of his intention. We tak# him and lock him in jail or in an asylum; in some states the attempt is a felony and he must serve a long term of imprisonment for making it Why, then, shofild not the deluded people who persist in refusing proper medical attendance when they are sick., and instead rely upon faith cure or some other long-haired crankism, be compelled to submit to treatment? It should be possible, when such a case is reported, for the City Physician to make domiciliary visits, with the power of the police behind them, and, if necessaxy, summarily remove the patient to a hospital. - Talk about bad luck! Here is CapL, Godard brought his $5,000 balloon all the way to Chicago from Paris, and just as he gets it in running order a spear of lightning goes through it and explodes like a soap bubble when pricked with a pin. Os course it is a complete wreck. The covering is burned up, and as for re-collecting the gas, that isn’t to be thought of. There is probably nothing, unless it be a conceited man, that shows such marked difference in size before and after a disaster as a balloon. It is to be hoped that the captain has imbibed enough of Chicago’s spirit not to be daunted by one misfortune, and that he will soon have another wind bag in readiness. Captive balloons would be quite a feature at the World’s Fair. The postage-stamp now in use is made of paper so flimsy that it is easily torn in separating it from its fellows on the sheet. The perforation, which is supposed to make this task easy, is very imperfectly done—much worse than at any time since the perforating machine was invented. The colors used upon many of the stamps are “fast” only in the sense that they “run” when moistened, and this entails great annoyance upon those who must affix many stamps to mail matter. Finally, and as a crowning fault, there is some radical defect in the gum used for adhesive purposes. It readily absorbs moisture from the atmosphere and sticks to itself or to anything else it touches with the pertinacity of a scandal. He who undertakes to carry utamps in the pocket-book finds a considerable percentage of them useless after a few hours, and even the handling of a fresh sheet of stamps is a disagreeably sticky job. The plain truth is either that the contract for making the stamps has been let too low, or that the contractor is making too much money by cheap and careless manufacture. In either case the condition of things is a serious annoyance to the public which the Postoffice Department should speedily remedy. “And What, Again!” A man who has been insulted till his veins are ready to burst with anger, may sometimes be excused for expressing himself in somewhat picturesque language. A* Japanese boy who works in a San Francisco club-house is reported by an exchange to have sent the following complaint to the officers of the club: “To-day I went to the club to get my wages. The steward, Mr. John, ordered me to leave, with many repetitions of abominable oaths which a man of some honor can’t restrain his passions from revolt on such a violent shower of curse. Anger was beyond my control, and involuntarily I returned my share of compliments, upon which he snatched the potato-masher and was brutal enough to give me two severe blows on my person, and inflicting quite painful injury. “Through all this affair I was never offensive. When I went there to demand the money to which I was entitled he unjustly to get out That is an unreasonable movement and cannot fail to hurt a man’s feelings. What! Without being satisfied with that insult made my blood boil and the veins burst with successive onslaught of ignominious swear. “My returning was completely excusable, for to be indifferent to such an ignoble treatment denotes that one is a stranger to the sense of honor; and so he ought to have relished it with abashed submission. And what, 'again! The tongue,—the countenance was not capable enough to wreak his savage fury, —and then he resorted to that final step of violence as though I was a mass of clay, insensible to disgrace and pain.” Good Leavings. Three thousand dollars for an old tin roof would be a pretty steep price, but the man who gets the battered roof from the old Tabernacle Church, at Broad Street and South Penn Square, which is now being torn *way, for that sum will be in great luck. Some years ago the paint was scraped off the old roof and yielded $5,000 in fine gold. It <ds almost certain to yield as much this time. The gold comes from the Mint. When gold is being coined a considerable quantity of it volatilizes with the smoke through the chimney, and as soon as it falls on the air it falls. Much of it strikes the roof of the Mint; so much of it that the officials save even the water that falls upon it during a shower. All the drains from the roof are connected with large vats in the cellar of the Mint. Before the water finally gets into the sewer it is strained through many blankets and sieves which retain the gold. Notwithstanding all these precautions, the gold that is annually washed into the Delaware from the Mint is worth thousands of dollars. Every particle of dirt swept up about the Mint is carefully stored away with the washings from the roof, and once every year it is | sold to the highest bidder, as it cannot be used at the Mint— Philadelphia Record. Old Forlorn, who was never married, compares a shirt button to life, because it often hangs by a thread.

' THEIR GAME BAULKED. \ t OUR QUININE MANUFACTURERS 3 AND THEIR COMBINE. 1 * 3 They Wanted to Form a World’s Quinine Trust—An Agent Sent to London—Failure of the Scheme—A World’s Trust lm- ■ possible. r The protectionists are not willing to . confess that the tariff tends to encourage , trusts and combinations to control prices. 1 Nothing, however, can ' be clearer r than that the smaller a market the more easily it can be controlled. Prices can easily be manipulated in a single market t where all producers have excellent means for finding out whether their rivals are living up to their “gentlemen’s 1 agreement. ” In such a narrow market i meetings of manufacturers can be frei quently held, and the offenders who sell below the combination’s prices can be ’ diciplined. 5 But when wide oceans separate manuL facturers it becomes almost impossible . to maintain prices through combination. , An international trust is next to an im- • possibility, The most remarkable vent- > ures of the kind, the two French syndi- ) cates to corner the market for copper ancLtin, ended most disastrously to those 1 concerns. A most interesting illustration of the > principles here set forth is furnished in the case of our quinine manufacturers. Everybody remembers how the price .of quinine has gone down since the duty was taken off in 1879. This was partly due to the abolition of the duty, but ■* still more to the fact that the cinchona ■ tree, from the bark of which quinine is [ made, is now cultivated largely in the L British and Dutch East Indies. The low price of quinine, brought ■ about by these two causes, has not been i a pleasant thing to our manufacturers; k and when everybody was rushing to Congress last year to get higher duties in order to charge higher prices the > quinine, manufacturers —we have only > three—put in an appearance to ask for . a duty on quinine. One frank German among them, when asked by Mr. Carlisle 1 whether a duty would not increase the i price of quinine, bluntly and innocently [ replied, “We hope it would. ” j But the quinine men failed to get their duty, and so they cast about for other means to raise prices. A recent number of the London Chemist and Druggist reports that near the end of last year the quinine manufacturers contemplated forming a syndicate to corner the market and raise prices. “The first suggestion of these negotiations,” says ’ this paper, “proceeded from that great r prolific race of ‘bosses’ begotten by greed t out of monopoly. ” The Chemist and Druggist goes on to ’ speak of “an important-looking trans- ’ atlantic visitor.” who “haunted the i druggists’ headquarters in London for several days, the expositor of a scheme for setting at naught the laws of sup--1 ply and demand. ” A representative of i the paper ouoted made efforts “to ex- . tract some drops of information from this grave seignior, *but fqund the source 1 of his knowedge hermetically sealed. ” i But this attempt to form an internaj tional quinine trust fell through, and , the “grave seignior,” it-is reported, “recrossed the Atlantic an altogether un- > successful negotiator.” i Does anybody beiieve that our three f quinine manufacturers would have cared a snap about this international trust if ’ they had succeeded in getting a duty on > quinine? They would have had the s home market so completely under their thumbs that' they would never have dreamed of sending this “grave seignior” r to London to negotiate a world-wide l quinine trust. , But a world trust is an impossibility; and our people will continue to buy 1 cheap, untaxed quinine; for if our three i manufacturers put up prices to an un- • reasonable point, foreign quinine will at once come in and bring them to their senses. • Foreign free goods mean death to i home market trusts. ’ Senator Sherman and the Sujar Bounty. ' Senator Sherman is quoted as saying that in twelve years we shall be making at least three-fourths of all the sugar we consume. If this prediction should be i verified, how much will the people of . this country have to pay in bounties’ , Our consumption of sugar last year was j j 1,522,000 tons, three-fourths of which would be 1,141,500 tons. The bounty of J 2 cents a pound on sugar is equal to ’ $44.80 a ton. If we were now producing I three-fourths of our sugar, the yearly bounty would reach over $51,000,000. But our consumption has been grow- • ing at the rate of over 5 per cent a year, : and if this rate of increase is maintaini ed, we shall pay a bpifiity of over $90,L 000,000 in the yearl9o2. On the crop of the year 1894,Jtlie last crop on which the the McKinley bounty is to be paid, the I bounty would amount to over SIOO,000,000. If Senator Sherman is right it is going to be a costly business to hire people at public expense to grow sugar. If the sugar industry grows as he predicts, the total bounty to be paid on fourtoen crops will amount to at least $650,- . 000,000. 1 Higher Wool Prices in England. ' It is a curious fact that while our growers of wool are selling their wool this year at lower prices than last year, ' English farmers, without any McKinley 1 tariff to help them, are actually getting ■ better prices. A recent number of the Kidderminster Shuttle, a leading organ of the British carpet trade, has this to say as to the market for domestic wool: t “There is practically no alteration in , the position of the raw material. The, country fairs show that, as a rule, grow-' ers are expecting and in many instances obtaining better prices for their wool than spinners and manufacturers are 1 able to give, the dealers having appar- ' ently more confidence in the future than t manufacturers. Hence there is some speculation shown in the purchase of the new clip, which tends to keep prices decidedly firm, and in some cases a hardier tone is shown. ” ; Our protectionists are all the time asi suring the farmers that “British free I trade” has ru.ned the farmers In Eni gland; yet, it is in England, with her t free trade, that farmers are getting , higher prices for their wool; while in ! protected America, with its recently imposed McKinley wool duties, farmers have seen their wool sink in a most dis- ' couraging way. Success of the “Whaleback.” I There is general rejoicing over the i successful trip of the American “whalei back” steamer Charles W. Wetmore > from Detroit to Liverpool with a cargo ! of 95,000 bushels of wheat As a result b it is predicted that Chicago and other j lake ports will at once develop a large foreign trade by direct shipment. , But there is one serious obstacle in the : way. Owing to the McKinley wall a 1 much smaller bulk of goods comes into 1 this country than goes out. What will our “whalebacks” find to bring back to . Chicago and Detroit? They cannot as- > ford to cross the ocean with an outgoing i freight if they can,get no return cargo, f That would make the freight charges on . our wheat far too great There must be , a cargo both ways to enable the lake , pom to trade profitably with Liverpool. What shall the return cargoes be? ’ Our farmers need woolen cloth, but Mc--1 Kinley has tried * prevent any coming in from Europe by imposing duties run- . ning, tn many cases, above looker cent. . The entire population of the West and Northwest would be glad to take window

glass, but a duty averaging. 109 per <m ink* ’ or mqjre makes it very expensive business to buy foreign glass, and the ho nei made glass is equally dear. Tin-plate would certainly make good return cargoes for the “whaiebaclcs,” and is 'certainly needed for fruit and • vegetable cans, as well as for roc flag ■ and household purposes, but McKi aley ■ slapped a duty equal to 76 per cent., in order to prevent futjiife imports of tin- > plate. z > And so it runs through nearly the entire catalogue of commodities-r-the un- ■ reasonable and foolish attempt to break i up foreign trade by high McKnley l duties. ; If McKinleyism were a true system, ; thefi Chicago aud Duluth would never • have been built on the lakes, where they ; are so ex posed, to the dangers of foreign ; trade: they would have been built off - behind some mountain on a v inter I brook to escape foreign trade. i Why not use dynamite on that Welland Canal? i Hocus “McKinley Prices.” A protectionist organ points out that . the price of calicoes has declined since the McKinley law took effect. It c aims, far example, that the kind of calicoes • known .in the trade as “Eddystone i fancy’’ fell from 6% cents last year to 6 cents this year; and this the orgs.n has the effrontery to claim as a “McKinley price. ’ It is nothing of the kind. The McKinley law left the duties on calicoes as they were under the old law, and it could therefore have had no effect on prices. But the price first quoted shows a fall of only 7.7 per cent., while cotton at the same time has fallen from 25 to 30 per cent The manufacturers could stand even a greater fail in the price of goods. This fact is amply proven by the following figures: July 18, July 18, 1890. 1891. Price of cottonl2 3-160 8 5-16 c Fall, per cent. 31 Price of printing cloth for making calico $3.37 $2.91 Fall, per cent 12 Cost of cotton in four „ yards of printing cloth, -weighing one p0und....12 3-160 8 5-16« Selling price of four yards, at above $13.48 $11.64 Proat.s to capital and labor in making one pound of cloth $1.30 $3.33 Increase, per cent 256 When an organ talks about the fall in . the price of cotton goods—which is by no ‘ means general—and does not on ce men- ! tion the great fall in the price of cotton; . when it labels the price of calicoes, ' “McKinley Prices,” and supnresses the ’ information that, the McKinley law makes no change in the duty on the grades of cloth of which calico is made, the , organ may be strengthening the faith of the weak and ignorant in the protcc- , tionist household. But men wio know the facts will not be misled by the palpable falsehood. In these hot dog-days the McKinleyites are cooking their figures with a desperation which beats their previous high record in the art of arithmetical jugglery. How It Hits the Wrong Mtn. One of the meanest things 1 about a protective tariff is that when it stirs up retaliation in other nations this retaliation hits the wrong fellow. The men who are protected by the tariff go free, while others who have no interest whatever in protection have their foreign markets restricted by retaliatory tariffs. France, it seems, is about to have some such reta'iation administered to her as the fitting medicine for her high ' tariff law soon to go into operation. For , some months France has been engaged ' in making a high tariff of the McKinley kind, laying very heavy duties on the products of Belgium and othei neighbor- ( ing nations. As the result ol this Bel- ' gium now proposes to withhold copyright privileges from Frene h authors. ‘ Thus the literary men of France will bear the burden of protecting French manufacturers. ' In the same way, if the great Continental Customs Union of Europe carries out its reported purpose to retaliate upon us for the McKinley lavs by putting heavy duties on our grain, our farmers , will suffer the loss of a part o! their market in order to Insure large profits to our manufacturers. London Wool Price ii. The fall in the price o’ wool has brought out some curious explanations ' from the Republican press. The AmerEconmnist, the mouth >ieco of the American Prote tive Tariff League, has put forth the most plausible explanation, and it is being used in the columns of the protectionist country papers for all it is worth. The explanation of the Economist is that the large production of wool in Australia has caused the price of Ausi tralian wools to decline in the London market. This is partly true in the statement but very false in the use made of it. > Some Australian wools are lower in i London this year than last, but not the kind that our manufacturei s buy. In speaking of purchases by American buyers at the recent sale. l in London, Wade’s Fiber and Fabric, a journal published at Boston in the interests.of our woolen manufacturing industry, says: “All accounts that we have seen, including a number of private letters, agree that for such light shrinkage foreign wools as American buyers can afford to bid for at last sales, figures, if not a slight advance, are filly sustained; but that for other heavy conditioned parcels, although equally good staple, prices are materially lower ” Cheap Sugar m Canada, Too. Canada removed the duiy on raw sugar several weeks ago, and already the Canucks are revelling In cheap sugar. The Montreal Trade Bulletin says: “Owing to cheaper sugar, people are putting down more th in double the amount of preserves they have been ac- , customed to In former years, and the fact that we are now in the height of the preserving to create an abnormally excessive inquiry. Never ! before in the history of the sugar trade of Canada has there been such a heavy . demand as that now being experienced, , and buyers would theres ire do well to exercise a little patience until the large aggregation of orders at the refineries , is worked off. ” They are learning in Canada, too, that the removal of a tariff tax saves money to the consumers. , The protectionist organs are jubilating over the prospect of France remov- , ing her restrictions upon American pork, , and imposing a duty of SI.BO per 100 pounds instead. But why all this rejolcing, If it be true thvii the foreigner pays the tariff tax? Will not our farmers have to pay SI.BO on every 100 pounds of pork sent to F ance? That is , the protectionist theory: let them stick , to it now. Since the McKinley law went into effect, a dealer in hardware has informed his customers that wire of which clock springs are made was. t ixed 3 cents per pound under the old tari flt, but under the McKinley law the same Is taxed $1.63 ' per pound, an advance ever the old rate 1 of 5,300 per cent This is the biggest , piece of McKinleyism yet reported. If a tariff does not raise prices, how i does it protect? If it raises prices, how • does it benefit the country? The love of other p tuple's money is ’ the root of the tariff evil.

THE RESTLESS WORLD OF LABOR. Points oflnterest to .Every Wage Earner In the Country. MfA . EW York has 3,000 sweaters. Armour employes 7, 90 0 Irit ■- P ersonß - Chicago has A 6,000 union bricklayers. ® Eranoe has fSI'K established a g Labor Bureau. Blacklisting wK# ‘* s a “isdemea'B' Ji nor in Missouri. Chicago will erect a twentyfive story building. Kentucky has a colored State Teachers’ Association. Stores at Toledo that do not close early are boycotted. Rochester has opened a free labor bureau and library. The Boilermakers’ Union gained 4,250 members in a year. New York Typothetse will fight the demand for nine hours. New Haven railway hands work eighteen hours for $1.83. Boston hat and cap makers have opened a co-operative shop. At Boston seamen on steamers get $25 a month; firemen, S3O. West Virginia employers are not observing the Weekly Payments law. A co-operative printing company in New York has adopted nine hours. San Francisco carpenters say a few bosses are trying to drop eight hours. Knights of Labor will erect monuments to founders Stephens and Fennimore. Miss Sarah Shea is the manager of the K. of L. co-operative shirt factory of New York. Over SBOO was raised at a Chicago mass meeting for the striking architectural iron workers. Brooklyn Central Labor Union is seeing that schoolhouse repairs are being made by union men. No workman can secure employment on the streets of New Bedford, Mass., until he shall have been naturalized. The Denver Hod Carriers’ Union has 700 members, and a physician is ih the employ of the union to attend their families. The San Francisco cigarmakers have issued a circular containing the names of dealers who do not sell Chinese made cigars. x New York framers won eight hours,* seven on Saturday, forty-five cents an hour, and double pay for overtime and Sunday work. The Musicians’ Union of San Frau? cisco gained its point in protesting against the Fifth Artillery Band playing below union rates. Illinois has a larger railroad mileage than any other State in the Union. It has 10,163 miles of main lines and 2,928 miles of sidings. An electric type-writer is said to have been invented by a Philadelphian, by means of which the operator can transmit his type-written manuscript hundreds of miles. The State Inspector of Shops and Factories of Ohio ordered a number of cigar manufacturers in Dayton, Ohio, to discharge minors in their employ, as required by the new law. At present there is a decided movement* in New England in the direction of utilizing water powers for the generating and transmitting of electrical force over long distances. The glassblowers’ convention in St. Louis has decided to withdraw from the Knights of Labor by a considerable majority. It is supposed the organization will affiliate with the Federation of Labor. The increasing solidarity among workingmen is witnessed by the action of the Central Labor Federations of New York in sending a delegate to the International Labor Convention at Brussels. The Mutual Life Insurance Association of the Locomotive Engineers has 10,900 members at present, of whom 6,500 are insured for $1,500. Last month eighteen death claims from sl,500 to $4,500 were approved. In Cincinnati overalls and trousers are being made at three and five cents each. Women are making from $1.25 to $3 per week, and many children are working for six cents per day, subject to fines that often equal their wages. Insurance against accident has been provided in Germany for nearly 18,500,000 workmen, it is stated, of whom over one-third are operatives in ‘ shops and factories, and somewhat less than two-thirds are agricultural laborers. Hitherto all the fuel used on the Italian railways has been imported, but ah attempt is now being made to use the lignite of which the country possesses large beds. Very satisfactory results have so fa? attended the experiments. Spandan workingmen have petitioned the German Minister of War to erect homes for working people at government expense. The petition says that rents are going higher and that tenement Jiouses, as a rule, are dangerous to the health. The French Government has adopted a policy in regard to abandoned mines that may have far reaching consequences. It has ordered that the sixtythree mines in France which have been abandoned are to be transferred to any person willing to start them again. Os these mines, twenty-one are iron ore mines, nine are coal, eleven are lignite and the remainder consist of copper, lead and zinc mines. The salaries of teachers at the public schoola in Germany are so low, espeoi- , ally in smaller towns and villages, that the number of candidates has fallen off remarkably during the last few years. The income for a male teacher is about $l5O a year. The highest salary is about s6so, but few of the teachers ever reach it. The statistics of the average size of families in the various countries of Europe are the following: France, 3.08 members; Denmark, 3.61; Hungary, 3.70; Switzerland, 3.94; Austria And Belgium, 4.05; England, 4.08; Germany, 4.10; Sweden, 4.12; Holland, 4.22; ‘ Scotland, 4.46; Italy, 4.56; Spain, 4.65; Russia, 4.83; Ireland, 5.20. The French Minister of the Interior has introduced a bill for providing pensions for laborers. All workmen having served for thirty years and having complied with the provisions of the bill will be entitled to an annual pension of not less than S6O nor more than $125. Every workman will be considered to have accepted the terms of the pension law unless he sends in a disclaimer to the competent authorities. The pension

fund will be supported to the extent et two-thirds by the State; the other third will be borne equally by employers and workmen. A man’s contribution will be one cent for every working day for a pension of S6O, and two cents for pensions of $125. Foreign workmen will be excluded from the benefits of the law, and their employers will have to pay on their behalf two cents a day, to go to a special pension fund for French workmen prematurely disabled. Too Late. The justice of the peace had just finished the ceremony which made two young people, whose appearance was unmistakably rural, man and wife, when a middle-aged man appeared on the scene. The bride murmured “Par!” and theu cast her glance toward the floor. The young man shifted his weight from one foot to the other, and exclaimed, in away that would have seemed quite hearty if his voice had not faltered so: “Evenin’ to ye, neighbor; even’!” By this time the girl had recovered her balance, and smoothing a lock of reddish hair from her temple with the palm of her hand, she said: “I’d like fur to know whut brings you all these here miles, interferin’ with other folks, when the Lord knows there’s nuff hoin’ an’ things to do to keep any man busy if he’s got ord’n’ry ambition.” Without noticing her comment the old man turned to the bridegroom and said: “I’m too late, ain’t I?” “If you mean that we’re married, there ain’t no doubt but what ye air,” replied the youth, who was also recovering firmness. “An’l mus’ say,” he went on with a smile at his own sarcasm, “as how we haint got you to thank for help much, neither.” Her father pulled at his untrimmed, grizzled beard, and, looking steadily at the sky through the open door on his right, said slowly and in*a monotone: “Jim Smithers, I bin a neighbor o’ your’n ever sense you was born, hain’t I?” “Yes, ye have.” “An’ I alius spoke of ye as a likely young man. Your father an’ me was the best kind of fren’s, and I alius acted as if I had your welfare at heart Leaded ve money and everything; didn’t I?” “Yes.” “An’ I done pay best to keep ye from marryin’ this gal, didn’t I?” “You did, sure.” “Why?” and he made a rhetorical pause. “’Cause I knowed her. I brung her up, an’ it was all me an’ her mother an’ the rest of the family could do to manage her.” The girl tossed her head and sniffed. “Au’ I tell you,” the old man went on, “that without no one to help you but yourself, you’ve got a mighty big contract on your hands. I’d uv saved you if I could, and now, things bein’ as they air, I’ll stand by you best I kin.” He extended his hand to the young man, and after the grim semblance of congratulations the party passed &rwn the street toward the depot.— New York Suri. Concerning the Moon: There are one or two things about the moon that.every one should know. Let me mention them. How bright is the full moon, do you think? Suppose you look up at the moon on the next clear night. The sky is a pure pale blue, and the moon is.almost dazzlingly bright against it If the whole canopy of the sky were made up of full moons, and if one were in the center of such a shining shell, one might think that the glare would be intolerable. But let us see. This very same moon you have often seen in the daytime as a pale white disk just barely visible against the background of the sky. In fact, unless you know exactly where to look you may require a minute or two to find it That means that the daylight sky is not so very different in brilliancy from the nearly full moon, or it means that you could very well live under a sky whose every part was just as bright as the moon itself. We may say, then, that the brightness of the moon is not so very much greater than the brightness of the same area of sky. The total light of the full moon can be compared with the total light of the sun, though it is a very difficult problem, and the result will be that the sun is as bright as 680,000 full moons. Once again you ought to know and remember how large the moon is. Its diameter is about 2,000 miles—onefourth of the earth—and its angular diameter is about half a degree. As there are 180 degrees from the east point to west point of the horizon measured through the zenith, there is room for 360 full moons in an arch spanning the heavens from east to west, each one touching the rims of those next it. Another thing, too, you Should notice and understand. The moon looks larger near the horizon than it does when it is overhead. The common explanation of this fact is essentially the true one—that js, the low moon is near enough to the horizon to be compared with hills or trees or houses, and consequently it looks large, while the high moon is isolated and one has no term of comparison. In both cases the angular diameter is about half a degree, as you can prove for yourself with a little ingenuity.— Youth’s Companion. Why He Objects. The following is from an unpublished letter by Rudyard Kipling: “I arrived in this town yesterday. The people are all savages. The atmosphere is murky, and the streets are covered with black mud. I never saw so many white people before. I met a cabman and said: ‘Take me to the most attractive place in the city.’ He took me to a saloon. I drank a cooktail. Then I met a man who looked like a bunco steerer. That’s what he was. I never saw so many white people before, except in London, and I never was in London. Everybody was jabbering about money, and what was most objectionable to me was that everybody appeared to be well fed. You can’t have a great and gentlemanly country without an occasional famine. I like famines. They remind me of home. I never did see so many white people, but that’s another story. “I went to a butcher shop and saw a woman. Think of it, a woman in a a butcher shop. She bought a lot of meat. Disgusting. She l doubt* less took it home and cooked it for her children. Monstrous. There is •no gentility outside a land of famine. There is Snake Hole for instance. It is situated on the Frog Slime road in India. No town in America can compare with it. There is no smoke at Snake Hole; there are no fifteen story buildings, no million of people, but what people you meet there are gentlemen and ladies, for they ,are hungry. They don’t talk about money; they have none to talk about. They don’t go to butcher shops—they have not the means to buy meat. But that’s anothsi story,”— Arhaneaw Trovsler.

“ Bad* Sam’s First Mtat, The subject of a new mint, so long and earnestly discussed, is once more being agitated at Washington. Should the proposed legislation be effected, and the present mint building be abandoned, the change cannot be made before the centennial anniversary of the founding of the mint will have passed, and it is worthy of note that in an entire century only one such removal has taken place. The act establishing the United States mint was passed April 2,1792, and steps were at once taken to erect a suitable structure in which to domicile the new department. The seat of the Federal Government was in the State House and other buildings in Independence square, and it was desirable that the mint be located as near that spot as possible. A site was secured on the east side of Seventh street, above Sugar alley, afterward called Farmer, and now known as Filbert street. Here a plain brick building was erected in the summer of 1792. The coining presses arrived from England in September, and operations began in the early part of October, the material foDstarting coining, six pounds of old copper, having been purchased a few days before. The machinery of the mint was run by horse power. The first regular return of coins to the Treasury was made March 1, 1793, and consisted of 11,178 cents. The renowned scientist, David Rittenhouse, was appointed director of the mint April 14,1792, within a fortnight after the passage of the act referred to above. He was eminently qualified for the position, and was thoroughly imbued with a sense of the responsibility attaching to his office. It is related that upon more than one occasion he paid bills for mint supplies out of his private funds because he considered them exorbitant. His spacious residence was at the northwest corner of Seventh and Arch streets, but a short distance from the mint, Rittenhouse died in 1796, and the second director of the mint was another prominent personage, Dr. Elias Boudinot, whose name is still a well-known one to Philadelphians. The famous Rose Hill estate in Kensington, where the patriot lived, is now being rapidly hidden from sight under thousands of dwellings, but the Bourdinot School House, at Indiana and D streets, perpetuates the memory of the family. t As the nation grew older and richer, enlarged facilities for coining money became imperative, and. accordingly, a site was procured on Chestnut street, west of Juniper street, and here the present structure was begun in 1829. / The new buildiug was occupied in 1831. The architects engaged upon the plans, William Strickland, John Haviland and others, endeavored to design a structure as nearly classical as the purposes of building would permit. With the various changes and additions made of late years, particularly the mansard roof put on by Superintendent Fox, the effect has been in a great measure destroyed, and the tiny building is overshadowed "on every side by. lofty structures which dwarf its appearance and make the most important Government office in the country seem mean and insignificant.— Philadelphia Times. She Downed and Punished a Thief. One dark night, not long since, a slender blonde young lady, who has gone in for gymnastics work till her slender limbs have muscles like steel springs, was walking along a dark street alone. It was only Bor 8:30 o’clock, and the young lady Wasn’t timid, anyway. One particularly dark place on her way home was where there was a dead wall all along one side of the street for nearly a square. As she was passing the dead wall a half-grown negro jostled against her, and before she knew what he was after he grabbed her pocket-book and started to run. For all her good sense and good muscle she carried her portmonnaie in her hand, as nine-tenths of the gentler sex do. But before the negro had time to get out of reach she sprang at him and had her strong fingers hooked into the collar of his ragged coat. A quick jerk threw the negro on his back on the brick pavement. Then she dropped on her knees on the scared negro’s chest, and seizing his head between her gloved hands she bumped it up and down on the bricks till he prayed for mercy. Then she picked up her pocketbook from where the negro had dropped it and went on her way home, her cheeks very red, but the glorious light of an athletic victory in her blue eyes. This particular young lady, by the way, can jump and catch the top of a cornice over an open door, and, clinging to it merely by the strength of her dimpled fingers, raise herself up till her chin is on a level with her hands eight or nine times without stopping.— Washington I'ost. 1 Taking Down an Ostentatious Bost. A story is told of a certain New Yorker whose splendid country seat has not always housed himself and family, and whose plethoric bank account is o 2 comparative recent date, says the New York Times. There was, not so very long ago, as a guest at the house, a man whose usual courtesy was greatly taxed by the ostentation of his host. Did lie admire the view of a distant river, he was told what it cost to cut the vista through; when the stables were visited an estimate was given of the expense of building and stocking them; a fine painting was commented upon only to have its value in dollar and cents proclaimed, and so on in the most trying manner. At length dinner was announced, and beyond giving the amount of the wages he paid his French cook the host was fairly quiet. At dessert, hefwever, whose fruit included some hot-house peaches, he pressed a second upon his guest, who took it with the remark that such lucious peaches at this season were a tempting delicacy. “Yes,” said the host, “they are, and an expensive delicacy, too. I estimate that these peaches cost me about 35 cents apiece right here in my own hothouse.” 'Whereupon the guest, taxed beyond his endurance, reached over and took a third peach from the dish, produced a dollar bill from his vest pocket, and, saying calmly, “I suppose you are willing to say three for a dollar,” laid it down and left the table. Electricity for a ftelon. By electrioty used as follows, a felon is destroyed by lightning speed: Use a good galvanic battery with ordinary power, then §ll two glass dishes or cups with water, place the finger effected with the felon in Me cup, in which you have placed the positive end of the electric wire; then place the next sound finger in the second glass cup, in which you have inserted the negative pole; continue passing the current from twenty to thirty minutes and, if required, repeat this case in four or six hours. The pus that is exosmosed ■’ through the periosteum will appear as a pimple at the skin in a few days, and may require to bepnoked withaneirib, * v