Decatur Democrat, Volume 39, Number 1, Decatur, Adams County, 22 March 1895 — Page 10

Blfe ggmorrat OMdecatuti, INU. TOMKBOBN. ... PCBLUHBU. 'Tfl Nye hss Been something that £ not funny. It was the wreck of || Ttalfuegos. Bill was a passenger. a Sioux Indians are close to clvlllKwFthey opened a subscription list KKonument to one of their great | of Alaska says A veiling business is practically dead. Subject less to quarrel oyer with fen nations. 'piano pounder went insane while Ing in a concert In New York the r night. This Is better; hitherto as been driving others Insane. K . —--- ' «$y Green has $60,000,000 and . on $" a week,” says a New York taftge. Well, If she had only $7 she ably would live on S6O a week. | ank H. Truesdell, who has been Bted for trying to swindle an EmS bank, saye he is a journalist. I Ik heaven, he is not a newspaper if iwn in Texas the railways grant rslon rates to prize-fights and ge full fare to Brother Moody’s big ! tings. The gospel doesn’t get a fair , ice in Texas. , your religion is based on knowlas well as feeling, on conviction k< i«ellais emotion, you are beyond the h of harm in this world and close * le joys of heaven. ■'white men will understand the I ngs of the old ex-slave who won’t »hls little farm near Mr. Vander- . } grand North Carolina estate be- | e he did always want to live near ®>h man. 1 ss Driscoll, a typewriter, has rep ed from the sheriff’s office In New because she says the sheriff used , . vear at her in Holland Dutch. She f right. English is none too good for '■''A purposes. Keen Victoria is about to make 500 fi baronets out of journalists, ar- ■ and actors. The “journalists” J rve it, but there is danger that an ®tice may be done to some really ■lrving artists and actors. — ®St Paul man who eloped with his I'.• four years ago has eloped with ®e other women since then. Wives g jot be too careful about leading J r spouses into temptation, as a bad once formed can be broken off K difficulty. |e take great pleasure in being the ■ to announce to the people of New ■age and vicinity that we confidentKpect to have electric street Effing through our midst within me ■F sixty days.—New Portage (Ohio) Ktte. horrible' Jt-Governor Peck, of Wisconsin, In parking In a private business venI|L says to an interviewer: “We shall liberally in the newspapers IB we will have our hands full of | Iness." The “Bad Boy” still has a appreciation of the value of prinPi ink. a banquet of lawyers in Edinburgh long ago a toast was drunk to “The Attest benefactor of the professionman who makes his own will.” j seems to imply that wills drawn '•ywyers are' not successfully conJfi in Scotland. A better toast would o the man who wants to be a bene or and executes his own will. — ” E ae Boston Transcript says that “a I -spaper man Is a person who can r rpen his pencil with a pair of scis- ®, while a journalist has to have bis sharpened for him. Again, a K-spaper man walks over to the subj'S. walk restaurant for a 10-cent lunch ■he a journalist takes a cab for din- ( K at the club.” A newspaper man K>ws ifito the waste basket what the Knalist writesK'jlliam T. Adams, who is practicalHanknown by that name outside a U'ited circle, says he soon tired of his K> de plume of “Oliver Optic"—under I ; .ch he has written 126 books and ||jo newspaper stories—and endeav- | ,1 to change it, but his publishers | 'ildn’t listen to the proposition, as ■I name had too big a start of him. Lis 73 years old, and lives in Dorr. Ater, Mass. K-the South is to thrive she must Hfae less cotton and more corn and H»r things that can be marketed to Ker advance. The fact that she can Ko if she will has been indisputably r iblisbed. She is at the beginning of ■fa? |l*Moes not neglect to improve the opKtunity and to heed the lessons of Bctical experience. It is simply a Station of making proper use of her ■tensive and valuable resources, and Ksing to follow the one-crop policy. ■feat is a fearful church row that has Eton out at Zanesville, Ohio. Stories Be been circulated about the pastor ■the Presbyterian Church, and the ■tor has turned loose a flood of earKm in reply. The charges made are ■mini too. The sin; according tc Ku. Is not one of commission, but fission. No immoralities are alleged ■ it fi admitted that the pastor Is a K thi&logian and scholar. But ht ■ 1 ■ I

has never spoken a kind word to A child. He does not say “tootsey-woot-sey" to the babies of his flock, nor does he pat the heads of the children and call the boy who threw a brick through the church window an “angel.” Hence the row and the accompanying sarcasm. The whole matter Is to be taken up at a church meeting, too, and no one can foresee the end. Possibly It would be well in the future to have some stipulation made as to the quantity and quality of kind words that are due to children from a minister, and then hold him to strict accountability under whatever agreement may be made. It would be a matter of nauseating Interest to examine under the microscope the fruit, the candy and the bread handled by unclean fingers on all the streets of the great cities. The grocery clerk as well as the baker should be required to handle with clean gloves bread and all other food substances that cannot be washed before eating. I The unwashed brigade that sells fruit and candy especially, should either be made to wear clean gloves or wash. Where is the Parkhurst that will bring about this reform? A New York clergyman enlivened his sermon Sunday by sharpening a carving knife in the pulpit with a steel in order to illustrate to the as- . sembled congregation how as steel sharpens steel minds are enlightened by contact with kindred minds. He might continue his picturesque pulpit methods and at the same time show how easy It Is for a good man to refrain from profanity by utilizing his newly sharpened carver next Sunday to carve a duck in the pulpit.

Mobs have of late years been so frequent in the South that they can be incited by almost any plausible cause. The attempt to throw the City of Savannah into disorder and violence on account of the appearance of an obnoxious religious sensationist is a nat--1 ural outcome of the toleration of mob | outbreaks on other pretexts. Whatever may be thought of sectarian tramps who go about Inflaming bigotry, the principle of freedom of speech must be maintained at all hazards in every part of the United States. That it should be used by the unworthy, or that its use by the unworthy should tend to exasperate others, Is not a valid argument for the violation of the principle. The country will applaud the firmness and patriotism of the Mayor of Savannah, who neither parleyed with a committee assuming to speak for a mob, nor hesitated to call out the militia to preserve the principle of freedom of speech even when morally abused. It would be well for the South if every time constitutional doctrines were assailed by violence public officers should have the nerve and the Independence of the Mayor of Savannah. The Savannah mob, like every other mob, refused to listen to the counsels of even those representing authoritatively the doctrines the mob itself professed to be defending against blackguard assault. No mob can be reasoned with. It makes no difference what its avowed purpose, or on what motive it professes to act. It Is to be dealt with as a lawless horde and subjected to the rigorous treatment which civilization demands against unreason and fury. It is a wholesome thing for the South, and thelesson should be taken home In every part of the United States—that the peace of communities must be held paramount to any factional, sectarian or political Interest.

LIGHTNING’S WORK. The Damage from Electric Storms Constantly Increasing. Statistics prove beyond question that damage by lightning is increasing at a startling rate both in America and abroad. Scientists are divided in opinion as to the cause of this phenomenon, some holding with much plausibility that it is due to the vast quantity of ■tificially produced electricity employed for lighting and other purposes, which establishes a connection with the reservoirs of the fluid in the atmosphere. Others hold that the cutting down of forests and altering the natural balance of air currents is to blame. Others, again, assert that the trouble lies in the immense amount of coal ash and other finely divided solid matter suspended in the air from burning coal ( whlefr, saturated with atmospheric moisture, serves as a good conductor. . The number of fires actually known . to have been caused by lightning has ! been quadrupled in twenty years, while deaths from the same source have In- , creased in alarming proportion during . a single decade. The attention of sai vants and electrical engineers has been ’ called to the subject, and various propositions looking to some means of averting the danger to life and property have been made, but thus fat none I appear to be of practical value. Cotton Conductors. Raoul Picket has been experimenting r with cotton, wool and other bad conl ductors at very low temperatures to test their power to prevent radiation, f Copper cylinders were called down to j 170 degrees below zero centigrade and r packed Jn layers of Cotton wool of varlj ous thicknesses. The cylinders rose to. 80 degrees l&low zero very quickly, whether naked or packed in cotton s wool twenty inches thick, the cotton g wool acting like a perfect conductor of r heat. Above 80 degrees, however, the e Influence of the packing made itself ._ felt, the rate of wanning varying with e the thickness of the layer. “ ' <j — - —-r-— — it When you think how many church 1, socials it took to build and pay for a a church, you must wonder that people e] are not better acquainted.

FOR THE YOUNG FOLKS. OVBR THE RIVER OF DROOPING BYBB. Over the Elver of Drooping Eyes Is the wonderland of Dreams, Where lilies grow as white as the snow, And fields are green and warm winds blow, And the tall reeds quiver, all In a row— And no one ever cries; For it’s a beautiful place for girls and boys, Where there’s no scolding and lots of noise, And no lost balls or broken toys— Over the River of Drooping Eyes In the beautiful Qand of Dreams. Over the River of Drooping Eyes In the wonderland of Dreams, There’s horns to blow and drums to beat, And plenty of candy and cakes to eat. And no one ever cleans their feet, And no one ever tries! There’s plenty of grassy places for play, And birds and bees, they throng all the day— Oh, wouldn’t you like to go and stay Over the River of Drooping Eyes In the beautiful land of Dreams? THE QUEEJf’s AUTOGRAPH. A student in Syracuse university, who is deeply interested in autograph collecting, penned a polite request for an autograph, inclosed a postal note for twenty-five cents, and addressed the envelope, “Victoria, Queen of Great Britain, London, England.” He waited three months for a response. Then he wrote again, making the same polite request, but adding a postscript to the effect that in his opinion either the autograph or the quarter ought to be forthcoming. At the end of a little more than a month he received the autograph. I would not encourage this sort of thing among American boys and girls. The Queen never knew, of course, that the student made such a request, yet the autograph was genuine. Did ybu ever see Queen Victoria’s autograph? I have seen it many times in the British museum, among records of Parliament in Somerset House, London, and on exchange copies of treaties in the State department, Washington. Queen Victoria writes a coarser hand now than she used to do, but it is still firm and full of c haracter. She now signs herself, “Victoria, R. I.”—the letters on the same line with her name. Before she added the “I” she used to write the “R” oeneath her name, connecting it with the final stroke of the “a” in her name by a rather stiff flourish. Os course the “R” signifies Queen of Great Britain and Ireland, and the “I” Empress of India, the Latin initials being used. A BLOODLESS BATTLE. After the battle of Missionary Ridge the Confederate army under General Bragg retreated to Dalton, Georgia, and there went into winter quarters. The winter of 1868-4 proved to be a very severe one for the latitude, and at one time there was a heavy fall of snow The division commanded by Major General W. B. Bate, now a United States Senator, was composed of 3 brigades. These were the famous “Breckenridge” brigade of Kentucky ians, General Bate own old brigade of Tennesseeans and a Florida brigade commanded by General Stovall. Each of the brigades occupied its own encampment and was separated from the other two by at least half a mile. The snow fell at night. On the following morning, as soon as the regulation camp duties were performed, the “corncrackers,” as the Kentuckians were called, began to “snowball.” They had often seen snow in their native State, and knew how to get amusement from it. But their Southern comrades, particularly the Floridians, shrank from any personal contact with “the beautiful.” . Early in the day one of the companies of the Ninth Kentucky regiment made an attack upon its next neighbor in the encampment, and after the battle victor and vanquished united to attack a third. Each company was in turn forced to capitulate. Then a party made up from all the companies attacked the fourth regiment, and afterward the sixth. About noon an expedition, numbering several hundred, from the Kentucky brigade, set out to attack the cainp of the Tennesseeans. As the time was the dead of winter, and there was no enemy within many miles, the usual camp discipline had been relaxed, and visiting between she different camps was unrestricted luring the day. This enabled the ittacking party to take the Tennesseeans unawares. Notwithstanding the surprise, the defense of the camp was vigorously maintained for half an hour or more. Finally it was yielded, and then many of ther’Teiinesseeans joined the expedition in its attack, upon the Florida brigade. Owing to the suddenness of the onset, and the novelty of the weapons used, the Floridians made no resistance, but retired precipitately to their cabins. General Stovall hastily summoned his staff officers, gave orders to have the entire brigade turned out without arms, and mounting his horse, took personal command. The Floridians soon learned that they could throw snowballs about as well as their assailants. Smarting under the reproaches of their commander, they fell upon the little band of adventurers with irresistible impetuosity.

Seeing themselves outnumbered 5 to 1 the Kentuckians and their allies began to beat a retreat, and at the same time sent messengers back to their camps to ask for reinforce- , ments. Some of the Kentucky regl- ' mental officers mounted their horses and hastened to the front, In command of the reinforcements. Step by step the four or firs hun--1 dred allies had been forced back by the two or three thousand , Floridians. Only a few hundred yards or so from the out- , skirts of the lfentueky camp the retreating forces ascended a rather precipitous ridge. Here they determined to make a last desperate stand, in the hope that assistance would soon arrive. Heroically they stood their ground, but the Floridians wore by this time i thoroughly aroused and seemed determined to carry the war into the enemy's camp. In the face of a perfect storm of missiles they ascended almost to the very crest of the ridge. 1 But even as the defenders were beginning to give way loud cheering in their rear told them that reinforcements were at hand. Now the battle began in earnest Fully two thpusand men on each side were now engaged and perhaps no grander spectacle of the kind was ever witnessed anywhere. Neither Florida nor the allies would yield an inch. For fifteen or twenty minutes the sides seemed evenly matched. Gradually, as the men became exhausted from their violent exertions, they fell away to the rear and soon the battle was ended. Neither side claimed a victory; and as there were no dead to bury nor wounded to be cared for, neither coveted the empty honor of camping on the field of battle. The Kentuckians ever afterward entertained a greater respect for the Floridians, and during the closing year of the war the two brigades were engaged together in many a battle less bloodless, alasJ, than the battle of the snowballs. A SEVERE STRAIN. The Brooklyn Bridge’s Greatest Crush. The great crush on the Brooklyn bridge in the early evening of Jan. 21 was undoubtedly the most severe strain the bridge has ever received from dead weight „ For nearly two hours there were fully 2,500 tons of people distributed along the structure at a given time. No greater strain from foot traffic will ever be known probably on the bridge. All the bridge authorities declared that it was the largest throng in its history, and a reporter in describing it said that the people were “packed as close as dried apples in a barrel—only they weren’t dry.” A dense winter fog had fallen over the city and harbor. The ferryboats to Brooklyn for nearly an hour had ceased running. It was after 5 o’clock in the afternoon and thousands turned from the ferries to the luicker transit of the bridge. Accients at either end of the bridge had completely suspended the service of the cars, and then the thousands and tens of thousands turned to the promenade and began a march that was slow and really as dangerous as transit by boats in the * thickest weather. ? i? Up around the New York tower the crowd turned and twisted. The women were pale; scores of men were laughing, half boisterously, as a boy whistles to keep up his courage, and there seemed to be a nervous dread akin to hysteria pervading the entire crowd. Out on the center of the bridge the throng was ominously gllent. Really weird was the situation. The crisis was reached at the Brooklyn tower. There the crowd had to go down a flight of steps and there was the greatest danger of falling. Had one woman become hysterical there and fainted nothing could have prevented a trampling to death. That throng could not be stopped any more than a river can be stopped when any one falls into it. Noone did faint and no one fell. Superintendent Martin, of the bridge, was asked whether he had made any special computation of the strain the bridge had undergone in those two hours from 5.80 o’clock until 7.80 and he said he had not, because there seemed to be no necessity for it. Each cable of the bridge is able to withstand a strain of 12000 tons, and the strain from this crush, estimating the 40,000 persons on the bridge at one time at an average weight of 125 pounds, would be only 2,500 tons. He said, however, that the conduct of the people illustrated wonderful self control, and he had no doubt that if the crush had come in the early days of the structure a panic would have resulted and the loss of life would have been greater than on the opening day of the bridge.

My Typewritist Has Reformed. “I refuse to be discharged,’* said my typewritist, calmly, after having pretended to shed tears in a corner of her pocket handkerchief. “I know I shouldn’t have stayed home yesterday if the snow was twice as deep, and I'" admit that I was not sick and had no excuse whatever for not coming downtown, except that I wanted to keep warm and snug. I wasn’t happy, though, for the lecture you have given me was ringing in my ears *ll day long. I know ,1 ought to act more like a business woman and I will try to after this. That’s why I refuse to be discharged Q ow. I insist on my right to have another chance.” “This is either your thirty-second 1 or thirty-third chance,” I made *n- " 7 ,

swer, solemnly, “and there are plenty of girls out of work who would appreciate the advantages that you cast away.” * ‘Maybe there are, but how many of them, I should like to know, would say the funny things that I do that you print in the paper? I’vs heard lota of people say that they bought the paper just to read what I said. I’ll promise to be good, and I’ve decided to stay for’your sake as well as mine, and if you’ve got that syndicate story ready I’ll take it now and pound it out” The sublime audacity of the young lady’s point of view so excited my admiration that I relented. Somehow, though, I don’t feel a glow of satisfaction over a duty performed. I may not be firm enough for this young woman. VILLAGE IMPROVEMENT. How Stockbridge Was Beautifies and Enriched. A sketch of the Laurel Hill association, of Stockbridge, Mass., the first incorporated village improvement society in the United States, is suggestive. At the first annual meeting the treasurer reported that the amount paid in in labor or cash was $1,396. The number of trees planted the first year was four hundred and twenty-three. At this meeting Cyrus W. Field and E. W. Pomeroy together ■ gave $250 to be used for prises. Fifty cents were given for every thrifty tree planted of kinds specified; $lO, or a silvei cup of equal value, to the planter oi the best 15 trees, to the second best $6, to the third best $4. All the trees were to be planted within certain specified limits. Another prize of $lO was offered for the largest number and the best trees planted along any public roads of the town. A prize of $lO was given to the person who made the longest and best sidewalk, and another $lO to the person who ' made the greatest Improvement in the grounds around his dwelling anywhere in the town. A reward of $lO was offered for evidence which should lead to the conviction of any one injuring the trees and foot bridges under the care of the ? association. About 4,000 trees have now bees planted, and the association has the income derived from about $4,000 ol Invested funds, supplemented by individual subscriptions. When $2,000 were given for a free town library by a single benefactor this amount was nearly doubled by individual contributions. The library building, a fine stone edifice, with reading room and lecture hall costing $25,000, was the gift of the late J. Z. Goodrich. Mr. Cyrus Field gave SIO,OOO for a park, and Mr. David Dudley Field, in the last year of his life, gave to Stockbridge 58 acres of land, including the romantic “Ice Glen,” for a mountain park, together with $5,000 for its improvement. The Laurel hill association with an offer to pay one-half the expense induced the railroad company to add an acre and a half to the grounds about its station and to erect an elegant building. This association has beautifully adorned these grounds. Its anniversary,fitly observed on the fourth Wednesday of every August, commemorated last summer forty years of successful work. Every acre of land and every homestead in Stockbridge has appreciated in value by reason of this soCiGty’ / South African Kaffir Choir. When in the course of their singing the words become especially deep and full of meaning the bodies of the singers sway from side to side and the hands beat the time. This swaying is especially noticeable in the Song of the Bell; the body seems to imitate the motions of the tongue that strikes the bell, then falls back quivering and plunges down on the other side. Another song is in narratiw, describing the progress of a family of natives from the forest on a journey to the coast. The listener is supposed to be at a house on the side of the road upon which the procession is to pass. At first he hears them faintly, then louder and louder, until the singing family reach his door; then he too, with all the members of the household, joins them with his voice and hands until the party passes away from sight and hearing. During the entire journey this singing and clapping of hands are kept up. Although you cannot understand the words of the song it is so vividly pictured that you catch its meaning without a conscious effort on your part.

The Arrogsnosof Rlohss. 41/ 01 Mrs. Van Stryver—Do you believe that Mrs. Goldmore’s husband is really worth sixty millions? Mrs. De Style—My deat, It must be true; look how shabbily sht dresses

A GENUINE BLIIZARB. A Nerthwesterner DlseaMOs the Weather es That Region. '£ < “Your use of the word blizzard hen in Chicago is amusing to me,” said J. W. Elkins, ofjMlnnesota, as he sat in the Victoria and looked out through the clouds of snow over the frozen waters of the lake and noted the warmly clad pedestrians go hurrying by, their great coats and wraps making invisible their faces. Up and down the street an occasional nobby outfit with bobtalled horses and jingling bells scurried through the snow, as if to hasten the unpleasant mission and escape as soon as possible from the piercing wind alia bitter cold. “Now there la nothing unusual about this weather. It’s cold t to be sure, and it’s windy, and there is some snow —the three elements which go to make up a genuine blizzard, but in so modified a form as to make the use of that word entirely out of place. “A blizzard,” continued Mr. Elkins, as his face became serious with the recollections the theme brought to his mind, “a blizzard is something which the man who has been out in one will never forget, and they impress one with the awful power of nature, as the slow moving, funnel shaped cyclone does, and one who knows these dreadful winter storms will no sooner encounter them than he would the cyclone. '‘M was up on the Northern Pacfic in the early days of March, 1882. The winter had been remarkable for its openness and the whole northwest had been bathed in sunshine for months. Some cold weather had been experienced, but the old settlers were congratulating themselves upon their comparative i mmunlty from extreme weather, when Friday, March 8, I think it was, just about noon the wind swung into the north and northwest and one of the moat dreadful storms that ever swept the western prairies came howling and shrieking down upon the unsuspecting folk. The wind blew a gale, fully sixty miles an hour, the snow filled the air like a fog and obscured all Objects as a curtain would do, and the mercury dropped out of sight, the spirit thermometers registering 45 degrees below zero. It was impossible to live in the storm. A young telegraph operator had taken charge of the Northern Pacific station at Jamestown that very day. In the early evening he started down the principal street to deliver a message to the Roman Catholic priest. A man stepped out on the street for a moment and through the shrieking of the storm he heard a call for help, and following the direction of the sound came to the young operator frozen nearly to death in the snow not twenty feet away. Ihelped restore the fellow, but he was dreadfully frozen and it was long before he recovered. “That was only one incident, but it illustrates how completely at its mercy the blizzard holds its victims, even in the thoroughfares of towns of considerable size. Out upon the prairies the effects are infinitely worse. How many a poor devil caught out in one of them has traveled round and round in a circle until overcome with exhaustion and exposure he has sunk doyn in the dry snow to his death I Li the storm of which I speak I recall that one mother at Sunborn, a few miles east of Jamestown, went out that day to feed the stock in the barn, taking with her a small child. The distance from the house was but a few hundred feet, but when the storm was over and the sun shone forth again mother and child were found, the latter clasped close in his mother's last embrace, a few feet from the sheltering barn. They had wandered perhaps for hours, witji the stinging Snow in their faces, every flake like a needle prick, blinding them and hiding from view the warm places of shelter so near at hand.” The Omnivorous Italian To the Italian everything is edible; it is a nation without a palate. It steeps a hare in fennel ar.d eats salt with melons. The craze for devouring birds of all kinds is a species of fury from the Alps to Etna; they crunch the delicate bodies between their jaws with disgusting relish, and a lark represents to them a succulent morsel for their spit or pasty. The trade in larks all over the world Is enormous and execrable and is as large in England as in Italy. It should at once be made penal by heavy fines on the trappers, the vendors and the eaters, or ere long no more will the lark be heard on the earth. It is admitted by all who know anything of the subject that agriculture would be impossible without the aid of birds, as the larvae and developed insects of all kinds would make a desert of the entire area of cultivated land. This is well known, yet all over the world the ,destruction of birds rages unchecked and no attempt is made to protect them, to interdict their public sale and to enable them to nest and rear their young in peace. A scientific writer has said that the destruction of the individual is unimportant, but the destruction of the type is a crime. (He was speak’ing of the auk.) As matters go now, unless some stringent measures are taken, the birds of Europe will in th« next century be as extinct as is now the dinornis.. The orhlthophil societies of France and Switzerland have more than once written to me that unless birds be protected in Italy they must perish all over Europe, since so great a variety of races wing 1 their way to the south in winter i and there are ruthlessly murdered. —Nineteenth Century. I Velvet and plush capes that are of a rainproof finish are new novelties. r. _ * • V ■« ■■