Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 February 1891 — FOR LITTLE CHILDREN. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

FOR LITTLE CHILDREN.

Mexican contractors are importing 'thousands of Chinese laborers to work on railroads in course of construction in that land. Maine men do some strange things. The owners of an unsuccessful “pants factory” are converting it into a maple syrup factory. ’? Bull Head, who shot Sitting Bull, is dead. Luckily there are no scalpingknives or tomahawks in the happy hunting grounds. 1 The bachelor cokers at Scottdale are -going to marry in order to secure steady employment. They are sure to have it once they are married. The big nations are recognizing Brazil. Brazil recognized the United States by taking the constitution of this country as a model. A tusk seven feet long and a tooth weighing over seven pounds, supposed to been part of a mastodon, have been unearthed at Manson, lowa. Two women in Philadelpha cracked a safe and stole $3,000. Women have thus invaded another line of industry heretofore exclusively held by men. In two of the London clubs, where the chief butlers have been in office for forty years, all gold and silver change is washed before being given to the members. The production of metal aluminum by electrolysis at a cost of a little above that of tin is what some French chemists are sanguine of being able to accomplish. “Thebe is no foundation for the report,” says Mr. Labonchere, “that Buckingham Palace and Marlborough House have been hired by an American millionaire.” Columbia College has a landed estate of about twenty acres in the best part of New York City, worth now $lO,000,000, and likely to double in value in the next decade. By counting the Indians, the population of the country is brought up to 63,000,000; and certainly we have a right to count them, considering how much they us. According to Chinese legend, the virtues of tea were discovered by the mythical Emperor Chinung 2737 B. C., to whom all agricultural and mechanical knowledge is traced. Lord Wolseley has stated before a parliamentary committee that if only 100,000 could be landed in any part of England be would not be able to prevent their capturing London. Uruguay has a healthy climate, and, according to its tables of mortality for 1882, out of a total of 9,640 deaths, forty-five were of persons over one hundred years of age. Its death rate is only 16.510 per 1,000.

S. F. Hershey says in a recent article: “Woman lives longer than man, goes insane less numerously, commits suicide one-third as often, makes one-tenth the demand on the public purse for support in jail, prisons and alms-houses. ” Remark by the Kansas City Star: “A Green County farmer who deeded all his property to his children is hauling rails for a living. A father can support twelve children, but twelve children sometimes find it difficult to support one father.” Out of nine hundred foreign missionaries at present in India it is said that the oldest is an American—Rev. John Newton, of the Presbyterian Church,the veteran missionary at Lahore, who, at the age of seventy-eight years, is still a worker in his chosen field. This country is reported to have 300 colleges and universities, against nine-ty-four in Europe, but the latter are far higher in rank, have 1,723 more professors than over three times as many institutions here, and 41,814 more students than our 69,400. Dueling continues very frequent in Italy. During the last twelve months 2,759 duels were fought and fifty of the combatan ts succumbed. Some of the duelists were wounded several times in tke same conflict, for 3,901 wounds were inflicted and over 1,000 of these were serious. Here is something to be thankful for: The Rio News says the coffee crop of Hayti this year is unusually large and that the generally good news from coffee producing countries this year promises to cause much lower prices for the next year or two. - f Bismarck’s inseparable companions are two large Danish hounds. At dinner thqf eat beside their master, and he occasionally feeds them with his own hands. After dinner the Prince smokes three pipefuls of tobaccco, that being the amount allowed by the doctors. Pierre owns a wooded island of 2,000 acres just below the city and will convert it into a park. The young capital begins business with a proper spirit. Wise provision for the wants of a metropolis will go a great way towards making a metropolis of the thriving town. Hindoo widows still continue to attempt suttee, notwithstanding it is prohibited by law under severe penal-

ties. Only a short time since a rich widow was forcibly removed from a funeral pyre after she had been badly burned, in her desire to join her husband in the next world. Gentlemen have been very lucky on the French race courses this year. M. Maurice Ephrussi won $85,000, Barons Alphonse and Gustave de Rothschild about $70,000 each, Baron de Schlickler, SIOO,OOO, and M. Pierre Donon, Baron de Saubeyran and M. Michel Ephrussi between $60,000 and $70,000. A very expensive fad is having your portrait cut as an onyx cameo. The work is very slow, difficult and laborious. The image when done is permanent and will last for centuries. There aro enough people in New York who enjoy this kind of extravagance to give constant employment to five cameo portrait carvers. An English paper states that one of the lecturers at Owens College, Manchester, has put forward the assertions (1) “that no Jew or Jewess has ever been known to suffer from cancer,” and (2) that “the immunity of the Hebrew raoe from this frightful scourge was attributed to their abstinence from swine’s flesh. ” Benjamin Butterworth, the secretary of the world’s fair, is a man of about fifty, in the prime of physical vigor and health. He is tall, solidly built and powerful, and his large head is covered with closely clipped, snowwhite hair. He is frank and direct in manner and likes a joke. His father was a Quaker. An Italian nun, Sister Maria Caprini, has just returned to Verona after eight years’ imprisonment among the Soudanese. She was taken captive at the siege of El Obeid by the Mahdi, together with several companions and some missionary monks. Two of the siters and one of the monks died from want and ill-treatment. The daughter of a naval officer in Baltimore bestowed her affections on a man whom her father did not approve. He offered her a pleasure trip to China if she would discard her lover. She refused, as any other American girl would have done, and eloped with the ,raan of her choice. Love laughs at other things than locksmiths. The custom of throwing a slipper after a bride is said to come down from ancient times. Long before the Christian era a defeated chief would take off his shoes and hand them to the victor to show that the loser of the shoes yielded up all authority over his subjects. Therefore, when the family of the bride throw slippers after her they mean that they renounce all authority over her. Miss Sarah Orne Jewett, the magazine writer, is the daughter of a country doctor. She was born and brought up on the sea-coast of Massachusetts, and the impressions of her childhood, obtained by contact with sea-faring persons, are the great storehouse from which she draws her stories. She is not exactly a pretty woman, but her manner is most attractive, and Ijkmton worships her.

Gen. Sherman’s oldest sou, Thomas who was ordained to the priesthood a few years ago, is now putting the finish to his theological studies in the Isle of Jersey. When the Jesuits were driven from France they got a place in that classic island, bought a big hotel at St. Heller and turned it into a house of studies. And there is where Thomas Sherman is now, rounding his long term of studies at the Maison St. Louis. At Mehama, Oregon, when George P. Terrell’s little twelve-year-old daughter went down to the pasture to drive up the cows she found a pretty little two-year-old deer feeding with them. She drove the cows to the barnyard and the deer rau along with them as sportive as a calf on a June morning. When they were all secured in the barn the deer was caught with but little trouble and is readily submitting to domstication. It is fresh and hearty and will make a nice pet for the children.

It is nearly twenty years since John W. Keely announced to the world that he had discovered a new force which was destined to revolutionize the whole system of locomotion. The inventor is now fifty-four years old, and it seems probable that his secret, whatever its value, w ill die with him. The original capital of the companv formed to develop the discovery was a million dollars, and after this had become exhausted Mrs. Bloomfield Moore supplied the inventor with funds to proceed. Now she proposes to retire from the concern, and its finances will suffer accordingly. A colored couple called on a wellknown clergyman in Boston recently to be married. They were accompanied by another couple, who came to “standup” with the bridegroom and bride. The quartet stood in line,and by a queer misunderstanding of the requirements of the occasion the “contracting parties” got separated, the mau standing at one end of the line and the woman at the other. The clergyman, supposing they were properly stationed, said:. “You take this woman to be your lawful and wedded wife ” “Sav, hold on boss! de woman ft dat I’m goin’ to marry am at de oder end ob de line; I’m not goin’ to marry dis yer gal. ” The extremes met and the ceremony was begun again and finished without interruption. f

A COLUMN EXCLUSIVELY FOR THEIR READING. The House That Maude Boli fc

I TOOK a piece of shingle for my spade, and by v patting the sand down hard and smooth I made jlguthe floor of my /J§§] house. Then ffesj/with the fingers Ego 1 ' of my left hand resting on the >. Vy floor, as a wall V against which to ’ make the end of

the house, and the back of my hand as a support to the roof and sides, I took my spade and packed the moist sand carefully over my hand until I had a round, smooth house which was like a mound in shape, then I very carefully drew out my band, and there was the inside just as it should be. The next thing in order after finishing a house is the garden; and so I made the garden around my house with flower beds and walks, and inclosed it with a fence which was also made of sand. I picked flowers and leaves and planted them in the flower beds, and set out little stems and twigs the walks. I could not make a fountain, but I did make a fish pond. I ran into the house and took a patty tin, filled it with water and sunk it in the sand. Then I put pnisies around the edge. Now was finished, and how pretty it looked! If was ready for some one to live in. But where could I find anybody small enough who would want to rent my little house ? At that moment there came hopping that way just the right person. A dear littie toad went to the gateway, walked into the garden, looked at the lake and trees and flowers, and then went straight to the door of the house and took possession. Oh, how happy I was to have such a cunning little tenant for my little sand-houee. —Little Men and Women.

Youthful Prattle. “Hullo, Johnnie! How do you like living in a flat?” “Pretty well. I miss the banisters, though.”— Harper’s Young People. School Boy—“I want a racer.” Stationery Dealer—“ Racer?” School Boy —“Yes, one o’ them rubber things to rub mistakes out quick ’fore th’ teacher sees ’em.”— N. Y. Good News. One night in August Jennie noticed for the first time the noise of the insect world. She suddenly turned to her father, saying: “Papa, I never knew the stars sang before.” — Youth’s Companion. A couple of twin boys were taken into their mamma’s room the other day to welcome a new arrival. They gazed upon their new little brother with great earnestness for a time, aad then inquired, with one voice: “Mamma, where is the other one?”— Boston Advertiser. Rita was riding one day on a very crooked road that went winding and dodging up hill and down dale in an eccentric fashion of its own. At last little Rita folded her small hands, with much resignation, saying: “Well, I never did see such a curly road.”— Courier-Journal. Mother —“ What makes you cry that way?” Johnnie—“ Our poor teacher has been sick so long, and—and ” “What! Did he die?” “No—no—he is getting well—boo-lioo.” — Texas Siftings. Horsemanship of Mexican Hoys. One of the finest and most inspiriting sights of small town life in Mexico is the horsemanship of the boys from 8 to 17—perfect young Centaurs, as much at home in the saddle as Arabs. How they go thundering through the streets, what marvelously short turns they make, and how instantaneously they copne to a short, sharp stop in a headlong gallop! These country towns of Mexico are the nurseries, so to speak,Vf the national cavalry, an arm of the service in which Mexico excels. The finest sight in the world, one on which the gods must look down is a highspirited lad astride a good horse. A Mexican boy takes to the back of a horse as a Cape Cod boy does to a boat. At no age is a rider bolder than in that efiehanted period of existence lying between childhood and manhood. A Mexiean lad, in default of a saddle, will enjoy himself hugely bareback. He early learns to use the rope or riata, and, beginning with lassoing dogs and pigs, he advances to mules and cows, and finally essays the roping of a lively bull. So expert do they become that in war they frequently drag their enemies from their saddles fay a skillful cast of the rope. Some of my younger friends here seem to me to live on horseback. They come home at noontime to snatch a bite, as most boys will, but off they are again on their tireless horses. They have the good fortune to live in a country which enjoys a climate which makes out-of-door life possible all the year round, and the country lad, continually on horseback, grows up straight, robust and daring.— Boston Herald Mexican letter. Unpopular Children often use words for their sound rather than for their sense—a fault of which older persons are of course never guilty. Lizzie, a small maiden of 5 years, was not careful of her clothes, and frequently came in from play with rents in her skirt, or with the 'trimming hanging from her hat. One day her gown was torn in a particularly nglv manner, and her mother said, “Lizzie, I shall have to punish you if you are so careless.” “Oh, no, mamma!” she replied, earnestly. “Indeed, I am careful, but something's always happening to this dress, it’s so unpopular.” Doing IVol'. lAs it was in Emerson’s youth, so it is now: the best things that a boy learns at school are those which the

matter does not teach. Such, at all events, is the boy’s opinion. “Well, Tommy,” said a visitor, “how are you getting on at school ?” “First-rate,” answered Tommy. “I ain’t doing as well as some of the other boys, though. I can stand on my head, but I have to put my feet against the fence. I want to do it without being anywhere near the fence, and I guess I can after a while.— Jewish Messenger .