Democratic Sentinel, Volume 8, Number 46, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 December 1884 — Metallic Soap. [ARTICLE]

Metallic Soap.

Porter—“ Did yon ring, sah?” Hotel Guest—“ Yes; I want some soap.” “There is the soap on the washstand. sah.” “This? Do yon call this hard ball soap ?” “Best castile, sah. Don’t it feel like castile, sah?” “ Well, no; rather more like cast iron. —Philadelphia Call. The New York Medical Tribune calls attention to the fact that since the production of cider in New England had almost ceased, there has been a marked increase in rheumatism and stone. European observers have called attention to similar facts abroad. M. Dumont, while examining the statistics of a hospital in Normandy, found that in fiftynine years only four cases of stone had been admitted. The ordinary beverage !n Normandy is cider.

It’s a pretty difficult thing for a highschool girl to think of something to say when she goes to write a composition, but as soon as she gets out of school and while on tine way home she can say a whole newspaper full without thinking. Next to sound judgment, diamonds, and pearls are the rarest things to be met with.— De la Bruy ere. All children are wealthy at a very early age—that is, they have the rocks.

A returned "Western gold miner I came np to the counter of the Miners Arms, on Front street, New York, a •day or two since, and received S9OO in English sovereigns for a fifty-ounce bar -of gold. It was the result of twenty*six years’ mining in Nevada and Montana. The man was a native of Penzance, in Cornwall, and was about to ■ sail for home.

Sib Thomas Gresham, who built the Royal Exchange in London, was the -son of a poor woman who, while he was an infant, abandoned him in a field. "The chirping of a grasshopper attracted a boy to the spot where the child lay, and the life of the latter was pre;served by this means. After Sir Thomas lad, by his great success as a merchant, arisen to the pinnacle of commercial ■wealth, he chose a grasshopper for his -crest.

Dr. Lehnman, chief rabbi of May*ence, in congratulating Sir Moses Montefiore upon his 100th birthday an--Ttiversary, noticed the fact that in the Hebrew lesson for that week it was mentioned that the eminent men of old -attained extraordinary age; also, that -in the Kabbalah, the authorship of which is ascribed to Rabbi Simeon Ben -Jochai, 150 B. C., it is predicted that -A similar phenomenon will occur as the harbinger of the Messiah. The Director of the Mint has prepared a statement in regard to the present money circulation of thirty-nine -countries of the world as compared f with the circulation as reported a year Ago, which shows a decrease in the gold circulation of about $52,000,000, -an increase in the silver circulation of $42,000,000, an increase in paper circulation of $112,000,000. He attributes the loss in gold circulation to a reduced production, and to the increased use -of that metal in ornamentation and Arts.

Thirty thousand dollars a year ■ would be considered a fairly liberal allowance, even by the most exigent of -school-boys; But the guardian of the Marquis of Camden, aged 12, thinks -the amount insufficient, and wants it raised to $40,000. The Judge of Probate before whom the application came .♦refused to grant it. He intimated that as the total income of the youthful IMarquis did not exceed $50,000 a year It would be better, at present for him to get along by exercising a strict economy with the $50,000, adding that hope 'might be cherished of an increase of .the allowance when his lordship should Ibe sent to Eton or to a university.

Doubtless the late Postmaster General of England owed his success largely to the ability, energy, and demotion of his excellent wife. But -there is no truth in the current story ■that she once had her finger crushed in -the carriage-door hinge as she was riding to the House of Commons with him, and bravely endured the torture in silence rather than disturb him with the knowledge of it, and thus imperil the successful delivery of the great speech he was about to make. Such instance did, indeed, occur, but Mrs. Benjamin Disraeli was the heroine of it, and but for her fortitude then her husband perhaps never would have become Earl of Beaconsfield. The story was first told to the American public many years ago by the late N. P. 'Willis. The oldest and most celebrated dealer in wild animals in the world, Mr. Bernhardt Kohn, died in Kassala at the beginning of August last, in his seventysecond year. Mr. Kohn was the first to import animals into Europe direct irom Nubia. Quite lately he had procured a large number of giraffes, lions, antelopes, ostriches, monkeys, etc., and had them brought to Kassala. *For eight months Kassala has been besieged by the adherents of the Mehdi, and, since the death of Mr. Kohn, the Mudir of Taka has been in great embarrassment what to do with all the animals, lit was thought probable that they would be slaughtered by the inhabitants, who were said to be in danger of famine. Lord Chief Justice Coleridge, in an address to the Grand Jury, at the •opening of the autumn assizes, at Bedford, England, the other day, spoke at length on the character of the punishment which justices of the peace frequently indicted. He strongly condemned the passing of heavy sentences ior trifling offenses, such as pilfering and the like, believing that such a method was but manufacturing criminals instead of correction them. In illustration he cited a case where two urchins were sent to prison for three months, with hard labor, for ’the paltry theft of a few apples from an orchard, an offense pf which, perhaps, many of the magistrates themselves were guilty when they were boys. If heavy sentences were awarded in such cases, there were no others adequately

severe for the far graver crimes which frequently came before judges at assizes.

The low price of wheat for the past year has led to the determination among many American farmers not to plant that cereal hereafter. It is argued that we have a practical monopoly of cotton and corn, both of which are very profitable crops. These cannot be raised in any larger quantities in other parts of the world. "Wheat and other small grains can, however, be grown in almost any land where the soil is reasonably fertile. The extension of steam transportation to every available country under the sun is opening up competing wheat fields in all quarters. Russia has just borrowed $75,000,000 to be exjiended during the next few years in developing the railways of that country, with a view to utilizing new wheat regions. Australia as well as East India are doing the same thing. The Argentine Confederation in South America is spending $28,000,000 in constructing four trunk lines from Buenos Ayres, her principal seaport, into the wheat fields and cattle ranges of the interior. This cheapening of wheat is a very serious matter in England. There are 30,000 acres in the county of Essex, England, for which there are no tenants. A farm of 170 acres, only thirty miles from London, sold recently for £2,400, for which £5,000 was refused only ten years ago. Wheat was never cheaper than it has been in many parts of the world during the past year. Our farmers like to grow it, however, because it involves so little labor. After the field is plowed and the land sowed with seed, wheat calls for no attention until the harvest comes. But cotton and corn require incessant labor the season through. Cattle raising and dairying also demand cheap labor, which as yet we have not got. But the competition of the extreme Northwest of itself threatens to keep down the price of wheat. The Northern Pacific, the Canada Pacific, the Manitoba, and their feeders are opening up a wheat country of illimitable extent. This now almost unsettled region could supply the whole human race with the staff of life.

There is a movement on foot to put the British West Indies under the government of the Dominion of Canada. The matter is being discussed by all the parties interested, including the British Cabinet, the ruling powers of the Dominion, and the representatives of the various West India islands. In 1881 the territory controlled by the Ottawa Government contained 4,350,000 inhabitants, while the West India islands, including Jamaica, Barbadoes, Trinidad, the Bahamas, and the Bermudas, have about 1,250,000 inhabitants. This consolidation of authority, if effected, may have very important consequences. It would give the Dominion of Canada great maritime importance, with more ships at sea even than the United States. The exports of the British Antilles are about $31,300,000, and the imports $29,000,000. It has long been the dream of some of the most far-seeing people of the United States that the Dominion in time would be annexed to the Union. Its extent in territory is greater than the United States, though much of it is laud that can never be other than a wilderness; but its people are our own kin, and would make excellent America citizens. It would gratify our national aspirations if the whole of North America was under our sway without war, and with the acquiescence of every section of the northern continent. The proposed consolidation with the British Antilles may postpone this much-desired union, for it would give Canada new interests and a greater sense of her own importance. Annexation to the United States would then be a somewhat more difficult matter, for we have no governmental machinery to take charge of communities, such, for instance, as Jamaica. So far the American people have declined to annex regions that cannot be self-gov-erned. We might have had Cuba or Santo Domingo long since, but no administration dare to propose it, as we have no precedents in our history for taking care of people who cannot take care of themselves.