Decatur Democrat, Volume 40, Number 2, Decatur, Adams County, 27 March 1896 — Page 8

®he democrat DECATUR, IND. S. BLACKBURN, - • • Punuimim. It is estimated that the Nansen expedition will cost $125,000. Rather stiff pole tax. There is reason to believe from the ease with which they go through their victims’ clothing that highwaymen are of the cathode variety. The president of a bank in Ardmore, Mont., has married an Indian girl. His financial training evidently teaches him to look out for the coppers. ‘•The Future of the Horse” was discussed at a banquet the other day. It was the consensus of opinion that the horse would eventually get there. A dispatch from Philadelphia says that the mind of a man in that town has beA a complete blank for seven years. But how did they ever discover it? A Philadelphia baby has slept six Sveeks. That child gives every indication of becoming a representative citizen of that community if he lives. A special dispatch announces that an editor in Ontario County, New York, his been swindled out of a large sum of money 1 , but the dispatch fails to state whose money It was. In the United States 800,000,000 onecent pieces are in circulation, and the call upon the mint for more is lively. It is plain that the little coin has an Important mission to perform in America. ' It has cost Fayette County, Ohio, $25,[)f)0 to find out that Colonel Coit, who fired into a mob of lynchers at Washington Court House and killed several persons, did his duty. TluiJesson is well worth all it cost, however. “A refined Parisian widow” advertises in a New York paper that she “would like to marry an elderly professional or business widower.” It strikes us that a “professional widower” is a matrimonial partner to be ■I voided. The naval program submitted in the British Parliament calls for an expenditure of $47,500,00Q jn one year for newwar ships. This sum will pay for four first-class battle-ships,, eight cruisers and seventy torpedo-destroying gunboats. The next flying squadron will probably be an armada. Vi Who says that there is no real humor In this country? The faculty of the Ohio Wesleyan University at Delaw-are, Ohio, asked the students to condemn cheating at recitations and examinations. The matter was submitted to a vote, and was defeated by aaypte of 426 to 194. There’s Spartan bravery for you! The American Consul at Leipsic, who has been inspecting tfie electric agricultural machinery manufactured in Germany, is under the impression that the United States is not up to date in this field of progress. He considers the electric plow a success and the digging of potatoes by electricity the best and cheapest plan. We talk of forgetting. As a matter of fact, we never forget anything. An impression made upon the mind remains there for ever. The romance is gone that the young man adored, the illusion has perished tjiat deluded the maiden; but th'e impress has in each case remained, and will remain beyond any effacing alchemy. Open a IdugIgcked drawer and run your eyes over a letter which you have not read for years, and see how readily the voices of the dead and songs of other years come back to you. In many other ways the impressions of the past are easily reproduced. A number of leading citizens of New York City have become interested in a movement to turn the surplus population of cities toward the country, and at the same time, to improve rural conditions. The work will be confined at first to Westchester County, New York, •where the first agricultural university school was opened March 4. It is assumed that thereis need of greater skill and knowledge on the farm, and therefore the aim in. the instruction will not be so much to increase the production as to obtain maximum yields on less acreage, reducing lhe cost and improving the quality. The lectures by professors of agriculture will be given at convenient points throughout the country, and when the course is completed another county will be taken up. A great many farmers who are quite ready to spend money on labor-saving implements to be used on the farm do ' not see the matter in the same light when it comes to conveniences for the dairy which save the labor of the women folks. It should be the right of every farmer’s wife who keeps three or more cows to insist on having a creamer, or if the dairy is larger, a separator. It is not merely labor that will be saved by these utensils. They make it possible to secure a larger/portion of the cream product, while yet leaving the milk in better condition for feeding to pigs and other stock tian that which has had its milk skimmed from it in pans. The saving of cream by either the creamer pf separator will pay larger interest on their- cost than the farmer can make from most of his purchases to aic| hiffi on the farm. It is therefore a wise Investment of money. With a separator run by a light steam power the use of the latter can be applied to : _ B • * *.•*•'" ' 1. ...

mapy kinds of work, such as running sewing machines or turning the grindstone, the latter a job that has made more than one boy so disgusted with farming that he never got over it. Chicago Times-Herald; The coflin trust, which has been engaged In the grave business of cornering all things funereal, and whose operations have been largely shrouded in mystery, has at last struck an obstacle. The impediment presents itself in the shape of an outraged and indignant farmer down at English. Ind. The coffin in question was not the one in which the complainant was buried, but one which ho purchased for another member of the family. Be it said to the credit of the rugged and common sense son of Hoosier soil, he did not violate any of the proprieties that usually obtain at the obsequies. Ho did not. desecrate the solemn and sacred sentiments that appertain to the last sad rites by any unseemly controversy over the price of the coffin. He did not jar the tearful sensibilities of the bereaved relatives of the deceased by any observation to the effect that he regarded the undertaker as a highway robber. He did not precipitate/a vulgar wrangle in the presence of/the sombpr trappings of woe. The InSlana husbandman may not know how to use his fork at a pink tea, but ho knows how to behave himself at a funeral. He simply did his share of weeping and bottled his wrath, knowing that his day of revenge would come. Ho got the coffin and the other habiliments of sorrow on credit. Now that the obsequies are ended he proposes to go into court and prove that the coffin trust made a net profit of 200 per cent, out of the transaction. And there is little doubt but that he will prove it. And when ho does thousands of families all over the land that have been invaded and plundered by this sad-visaged robber will rise up and call the Indiana farmer blessed. An Eastern inventor has experiment ed successfully with a device for obtaining motive power from the ocean itself and the movement of the air. His device is a swinging apartment inside the boat. In a vessel of 3,000 tons burden this occupies one-third of the interior, holds one-third of the cargo, and is made of steel, being hung on trunnions in such away that it meets every motion of the waves. At each rock the ship, whether pitching or oscillating, the swinging portion of the cargo acts upon air compressors, the condensed air is conveyed into an ordinary upright boiler, and thence passes to an engine which drives the screws or propellers. The cargo thus provides a part or the whole of the motive power needed to transport it, and when the vessel does not contain a cargo the compartment is filled with water. The inventor does not claim that his scheme is available for use by ocean greyhounds, but says it would be valuable for the slower Atlantic steamers and coasters, as the cost of fuel would be reduced to the minimum in the running of a freight steamer. It would not need to go into a coaling station, little fuel would have to be carried, and the services of an engineer could be dispensed with, as a common seaman could manage the new power. In the absence of arrangements for storing the compressed air, towing would be necessary in smooth water. The invention has been applied to other uses. It has shown at a recent trial that the force thus obtained can be utilized to run a dynamo, to light the boat by electricity, and to run the donkey engine. Evidently the power obtained in this manner will be valuable <fr not according to the cost of the apparatus and the loss of room per unit of available force developed. It is easy to understand that a slight swing would give little power, but it is a grave question how much a heavy roll would endanger the safety of the vessel and the lives of all on board. It may be these points have been taken into consideration, but it is also possible they will present practical difficulties for which sufficient allowance has not been made by the ingenious inventor. A Peculiar Custom. It is difficult to say wfiat form Ox burial service is the greatest indication of civilization. Almost any act jwSJch would be ludicrous takes on a dignity when connected with such a service, so difficult is it to rob these rites of solemnity. Margaret Stokes, in “Three Months in Forest’of France,” tells of a peculiar funeral service she witnessed at St. Fursa’s Monastery. She says: When the coffin is supplied, the pieces of wood which remain are cut into small crosses about two feet in height. They are painted various bright and incongruous colors. They have jointed shafts, one of which is to be planted at the bead of the grave, and is laid upon the coffin. The procession bears the others, and at the cross-road nearest the.cemetery, there is always a tree at the f,oot of which the funeral train pauses, and the crosses are lifted to the branches where they fix and leave them. An Order om. Postage Stamp? - H. E. Dunlevy, a Philadelphia traveling man, tells this: “A friend of mine sent an order for goods to a Western j firm recently, whieli he had written on the back yf a .postage stamp. It will go, piriefes it gets lost in transit. It was something like- the man who mailed a hickory nut, addressed on one side, and with a one-eent stamp on the other. ■ The hut was'held, as It was claimed that sealed packages,, the contents of which could not be readily examined,, required two,.rents postage. All of which is jots of fun—for the sender only,” 1 5.Trapping in Vermont. One Houghtonville, Vt„ trapper call show for one season’s work the of 1,600 skunks, 175 foxes, seventy minks twenty muskrats, and 100 coops-

THE JOKER’S BUDGET. JESTS AND YARNS BY FUNNY MEN OF THE PRESS. Childish Ingenuity—They Overdid It— Caution to Parents—Very Consider-ate-Scientific Farming. Childish Ingenuity. Our youngest is struggling into his stockings. “ See what you are doing,” says his mamma. “You are putting your stockings on the wrong way.” “ I do it on purpose, mamma, I’ve got a hole on the other side.”—Boston Transcript. They Overdid ItHazel—Say. haven’t you and Jack been engaged long enough to get married ? Mabel—Too long. He hasn’t got a cent left—Truth. Caution to Parents. “ I'd like to hear you play the violin, Mr. Tilllnghast,” said seven-year-old Tommy Dillingham; who was entertaining the caller. “But I don’t play the violin, Tommy.” “Then papa must be mistaken; I heard him tell mamma that you played second fiddle at home.” —Detroit Free Press. Very Considerate. “Well, John,” said old man Jordan to his young friend, “you have just been married, I hear.” “Yes. sir,” he answered with a spring morning smile; “just a month ago, and I want you to go up to dinner with me to-day.” “Have you got a cook?” "No.” . “Well, my boy, s’pose we go to a restaurant this time. You must remember I had a young wife once myself.”—Texas Siftings. Scientific Farming. Mrs. (’orntassel—lt ’pears to me, Hiram, that you ain’t making the most of your time. Mr. Corntassel—Haven’t I been improving my mind lately? Look at them books. Mrs. CorntasseprThat’s jist it, Hiram. They’s a lot of folks that keeps improving their minds when they orter be improving their farms.—Washington Post. Thoroughly Drilled, Husband (airily; they had just returned from their wedding trip)—lf I am not at home from the club by—ah—--10, love, you won’t wait— Wife (with appalling firmness) —No, dean; I’ll come for you. He was home at 9:40 sharp.—Pick-Me-Up. , Under Consideration. Mrs. Newlywed—Before we were married you said that my slightest wish should be your law. Mr. Newly wed—Exactly, my love, but you have so many vigorous and welldeveloped wishes that I am as yet unable to decide as to which is the slightest.—Judge. Somewhat Similar. Wick wire—Sometimes I think it would be a good idea if a man could be treated like a horse—shot when he gets too old to work. * Yabsley—lt is pretty near that way how. When a man gets too old to work he is fired—lndianapolis Journal. His Bad Habit. “De Smythe has only a single fault.” “What is that?” “His habit of being a bachelor.”— Detroit Free Press. Vale, Lamb. Mary had a little lamb, But now ’tis ancient mutton; And what it did, or where it went We needn’t care a button. ■ '■ ' " 'A ■’ a- - and Effect. . “Now,” said lhe photographer, (Mechanically, as lie posed himself before the camera, “look pleasant, please.” But he failed jo obey the directions, and the result showed what his friends had long sqspected, that he took himse’." seriously.- Indianapolis Journal. No Chicken. Mrs. Taddells—Let’s see! Susie Dimming is about twenty years old, isn’t she? _ 11 ’ Mrs. Wjfiles— Susie _Dimling_ twenty! Susie Dinfling will never see twenty again if she lives to be eighty.—Judge. Different. Griggs—When Ethel marries the Count will her father give her away? . Killson—Giye her? Well, I guess not. He has to pay the Count a cool million to take her. ■ f~' I ■ ' A Good Remedy. Gus De Smith-- Is there any way to keep an old hen from sitting? Hostetter McGinnis—Yes; wring her neck and sell her for a spring chicken. —Texas Sifter. A Great Political Fact. “Grandma,” asked Johnnie Chaffie,

“are all presidential candidates musicians?” “Not that-1 know of,” replied the old lady. “Why do you ask?” ‘ Oh, because I heard Pa say that they all had organs,” was the response. He Would Have to be Thin. “Somebody.” she faltered, “may eotuo between us,” His breast heaved. “Who over would do such a thing,” he fiercely exclaimed, “would be contemptibly small.” And with that he moved even yet nearer to her. —-JDetrolt Tribune. Vicarious Sufferers. Mrs. Wiggles -Doesn’t your husband suffer dreadfully with rheumatism? Mrs. Waggles —Yes, but its nothing to what the rest of us have to endure. —Somerville Journal. Fixing the Blame. “It doesn’t seem to be settled whether Perrine’s comet will hit the earth of not.” “And if it should, will we sue Mr Perrine for damages, or will he sue us?” —lndianai»>lis Journal. MOTHER CAREY'S CHICKENS. Real Facts About the Uncanny Bird the Stormy Petrel. It is qo wonder that seafaring men all reganl the stormy petrel as a forerunner of disaster. Not only do the queer, low-flitting, dusky birds seem to love the tempestuous weather, but they come out in the greatest numbers just Irefore and during the particularly violent hurricanes. When no other bird, large or small, is in sight, those weird fowl, like so many imps, skin low across the whitecaps and hover close by a ship until its superstitious crew are well-nigh frantic with dread. Many of the older jack tars, indeed, believe that the petrels, instead of coming with the storms, actually call them up or still them at pleasure. They weave many wild yarns about “Mother Carey's chickens,” and tell you how they never rest and never fly to shore. The English Channel islanders oven contend that the eggs are held under one wing till hatched, and that the young learn to fly the instant they emerge from the .eggs. The real facts concerning the petrel’s life and ways are full of interest. One reason why nothing of its nesting habits was known until about forty years ago was because it chooses only the remostest and most lonely strands for its home. On the deeply indented shores of Nova Scotia thousands of them nest every year. Cape Sable, and the Mud, Tusket, Shag, Gannet, Johns and Negro Islands swarm with their clumsy young in June. A eleft in the wave-washed rocks, a waterworu niche, the deserted burrow of a rabbit or woodchuck or a muskrat, or any sort of a scooped place, is good enough for the petrel. It is abundantly able to dig a suitable cavity for Itself, however, if no Mzier way out of the difficulty presents itself. Only twelve or fourteen inches deep are these hollows, just deep enough to hold Mother Petrel and her babies and protect them from the gales that sweep the coast. The mother lays but a single egg,.of a dull, lusterless white, very large for the size of the bird. She sits on it almost constantly for three weeks, while the mate brings her food from the sea. Only at night does he feed hqr, and after the young one is hatched, it, too, only receives nourishment after dark. All day long the birds are winging over the sea, searching for something to eat,often flying miles off shore. Carefully do the old birds watch over and feed the Cottony, tumbling, weak little baby petrel for four or five weeks. Nearly six months elapse ere the youngster can shift for himself. The parents ; feed then! witli a rich oil which they, i secrete in their own stomachs, and so thick and line is this fluid that the savages of the far north use the poor birds as lamps. Killing them, they thrust a hempen wick into the throat, and pushing it down as far as possible, light the loose end, which will burn for hours with a clear, bright flame. In reality, when the seamen fancy the poor waifs are following tire ship to bring her bad luck, they are really looking for the things whi<h the cook may throw away. Any sort of refuse is eagerly gathered up and.taken home to the lonely baby. Silently they pursue the vessels for a whole day, waiting in patience for a morsel. Only at night do they cry, and a most weird and plaintive note is theirs. Pitifully it rises above the low roar of the wind and the booming of the breakers on the shore. The solitary lookout in the lx>w at night often draws his oilskins closer and whistles loud when he hears that fateful wail. He shades his eyes with a big, rough hand and peers more anxiously into the blackness ahead, for it bodes his ship no good to be followed by Mother Carey’s chickens. The Destruction of Trees. Attention is called to the fact that a great many trees through which electric wires pass are dead. After heavy rains many of these trees begin to droop and die. The leaves/ saturdted with moisture, lead the current down into the body of the tree. The companies claim that all of the wires are insulated, but constant swinging among the branches eflts off the covering, and the wire becomes bare. A great deal of complaint is being made and suits are to be brought against the electric companies. Certain it is that if there is gpod ground for complaint, something ought to be done at once, as our beautiful shade trees should not be sacrificed In this wa’

NOTES AND COMMENTS. Free Cuba will be prosperous and progressive Cuba. Spanish Cuba is never likely' to be either prosperous or progressive, sententlously observes the New York World. A chorus of 4,000 voices Is now In process of organization at Washington to form the leading musical feature of the National Christian Endeavor Convention there - in July. This chorus is to be known as “The '96 Convention Chorus.” Newspaperdom is fairly well represented in the United States Congress—by those engaged in makng law as ■•ell by those whose duty it is to report the proceedings of the lawmakers. There are twenty-seven editors, nine who have been engaged in the profession at one time, and tour others who followed the printer's calling in former days. As soon as it seemed likely that the ' newly discovered Rontgen rays might prove to be of value to the medical profession experiments were begun by many physicians and photographers with a view to determining the uses and limitations of the rays in surgery. The results in.many cases have shown that the profession will reap great benefit from the X rays, especially in the direction of surgical diagnosis. The French Government's new budget shows that a step has been taken in the direction of State socialism. Six hundred thousand francs have been voted to societies for the sick and aged, and 400,000 to societies for the relief of children. This foots up a million francs, the same sum voted to the missions that will represent France at the coronation of the Czar, as the previous vote of 975,000 francs has been increased. The followers of Menelek, King of Shoa, while not so large as the fierce Zulus are about the toughest warriors in the world. They do not know physical fear. A New York Press writer has seen a man jab a burnt stick several inches in his flesh without wncing. This apparent insensibility to pain is accompanied witli a religious frenzy in battle that renders the soldiers unconscious of bodily harm. They have no fear of death and their happiness is to kill. A curious application of the Rontgen rays has been made in France by Professor Buguet, of Rouen, and the chemist, M. Glscard. They took true and false diamonds for the experiment , and obtained entirely different results. When the rays were applied to the false diamonds only indistinct images appeared on the photographic plates. The real diamonds, however, allowed the rays to pass, and as a result, much darker pictures were produced on the plates. Thus a certain metfifod of discovering the quality of dijjjjnonds Is assured. The attempt of the Italians to get possession of Abyssinia is not colonization at all, even if it succeeds, but conquest. It may not succeed. The population is only about three or four millions, but when a population of that size puts 100,000 fairly armed troops into the field in their own country, they’re hard to beat. The Abyssians live in the 7 mountains and love liberty. The height of their land keeps it cool and healthy, even under the equatorial sun. They are racially mixed. Some of them are descended from the old Coptic kings and from the Phoenicians, who once ruled all the Mediterranean. Others are the ordinary Ethiopians. According to lhe New York Times, which prints a partial list of them, with the names of their owners, the number of their occupants and their street numbers, so far as they have any right to have such a number, there are about 2,500 rear tenements in New York city, occupied by over 50,000 people. These, says City ahd State, are peculiar breeding places of disease and crime. The law now forbids the building of any more of these rear or back lot houses, but the real problem is how to get rid of those now in existence. They are a terrible menace to the health and well-being, physical and moral, of the great city wherein they are found. “A goodmany of the ignorant country people in Spain,” says The. Boston Transcript, “are very Touch more courteous to Americans than to English people, for the curious reason that they consider them subject also to the»crown of Spain. It lias been found in out-of-the-way villages near Gibraltar especally, where the English occupation of that fort is still looked upon as a temporary and offensive intrusion of foreigners on Spanish soil, that the whole tone of the people will change when it is found that a tourist is not English but American. ‘Ah, I have a brother in Havana,’ a grim-browed villager will say, with an inflection that implies that his American interlocutor must of ne-. cessity be from Cuba too.” Never let your passions get the better of your judgment. The following story will explain the propriety of this advice: A German farmer took a load of potatoes to the .city to sell them. The jobbers offered him seven cents a bushel. That made him mad. So he drove down to the river front, backed his wagon into tire water, pulled out the back board and dumped the whole load into the stream. Now, while this relieved the farmer of his wrath, likewise his team of their Jpad, and made it unnecessary to haul the potatoes tjack many miles to his farm, the act of depositing vegetable matter In the river was in violation of a city ordinance. ’The farmer was arrested and fined sls and costs, and went home a wiser man.

Dr. W. H. Dall, a member of the party of scientific men recently sent to Alaska to Investigate the mineral re* sources of the qountry, has prepared a report on the subject, which will soAl be published by the Geological Survey. Dr. Dall says that many valuable and extensive seams of coal exist about^» the harbors in Cook’s inlet «nid elsewhere, so that it is easy to mine enough to run a steamer in a few minutes. The Alaskan coal Is what is known as the brown variety. Its color is not brown, but when scratched It exhibits a brown streak. The finer qua}-, ities of this coal are much like anthracite and the broken edges are brilliant. The difference between the brown coal and the anthracite Is that the former has a larger per cent, of volatile matter. Dr. Dall says that there is a great field for a mining company, for the cost of transportation from the mines to the steamers would be very small on account of the nearness of the mines to the coast. The amount of money handled by the Post Office Department in its money order business last year amounted to nearly $325,000,000. The Government allowed postmasters fees aggregating $450,000 on domestic and $3,000 on International business, and their incidental expenses were $148,000. The Government lost $1'4,000 through lost remittances and burglaries and SIB,OOO through bad debts. And still the money order business paid a net profit of $812,000. Twenty-two million people bought domestic money orders, and nearly a i million people bought international money orders. The people of New York ' State shipped $13,000,000 through the Post Office department the people of Pennsylvania. $10,000,000; the people of Illinois, nearly $11,000,000. The people of the United States shipped more than $4,500,000 to England through the Post Office department; and more than $2,500,000 to Germany. Altogether the people of this country sent nearly $13,000,000 abroad by postal order, and received less than $6,000,000 through the same channel. But it is worthy of note that we sent nearly a million dollars less abroad last year than we did tno year before. The “Musical Glasses.” In the quaint old town of Nuremberg some instruments are preserved, known now as harmonicas, which played with the moistened finger; but I think the instrument best known is that which the composer Gluck is said to have invented, and which, by the name of the “ musical glasses,” was all the rage in England in 1746. Gluck ar-, ranged twenty-six glasses irregularly filed with clear spring water, and upon these he played a variety of music with his fingers slightly moistened. In the “Vicar of Wakefield” the fashionable London ladies are described as able to “ talk of nothing but high life, pictures, taste, Shakespeare and the musical glasses,” while Horace Walpole, writing the same year, 1746, to his friend Mann, refers to Gluck’s performance, but says lie thinks'he has heard of something of the same kind before. But it was to our Benjamin Franklin that the improved or perfecttsl harmonica is due. He- was in London eleven years after performing on M these musical glases, very well, it is true, but Franklin an once said something better could be done. Accordingly he put his scientific wits to work, and the resiilt was nn instrument he called the armonia, to which an “ IT” was added, as being more appropriate, and on the many celebrated musicians performed. It consisted of basin glass strung on an iron spindle, the lower edge dipped into a trough of water. As an improvement on Gluck's method, Franklin regulated the pitch of the tone by the size of the. glasses, not the amount of water in or under them. Mozart and many other well-known composers did not disdain to write for the harinonia, and in 1788, a “Method” for students was compiled The very simplicity, however, of the instrument made it easy of imitaton and improvement. Wood and glass with straw were combined under various names. 4 <> Buttons. The first buttons were very expensive. They were made chiefly of gold and pearl, rich in design, and inlaid with f other precious metals and jewels.- Following these came the cloth-covered buttons, which were made entirely with the needle. These brought a high price, , and the worknp n received the largest wages paid ijf those days for needlework. As derntind for buttons increased and man’s invbntive genius was taxed, machines were produced for the making of steel, brass, inlaid, plated and lacquered buttons, and later for the rapid manufacture of covered buttons. These last were made by covering with silk, lasting, brocade, twist, velvet, mohair and various cloths metal disks which have been previously cut ' out of sheet-iron and molded with dies. The frame of this button consists of two pieces of sheet-iron, the under piece being slightly convex and having a small round hole in the center, through which a tuft of canvas is pressed. This is for sewing the button to the cloth. The upper disk is also slightly copvex and made a little larger ‘ than the lower piece. The edge of the upper disk is turned down about a sixteenth of an inch in the medium-sized buttons. These disks are cut from the sheet, formed and made ready for covering by one motion of the “fly-press” or punching machine. For covering another machine is used simple in construction, but capable of turning out a great many buttons in a day when operated by an expert.-? Chicago Record. The minute hands of Big Ben, la T.nnrfnn Is sixteen feet Ion?.