Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 February 1891 — Page 4

W genwcratk Sentinel RENSSELAER. INDIANA. f. W. McEWKN, - - - Puss—.

Good-will, like a good name, is got by many actions, and lost by one. The people of Mexico have taken to drinking beer. Breweries are springing up in every city of importance. The crawfish are so numerous at Ramos, St. Mary Parish, La., that they stopped a train recently by crawling on the track. The British canteen system has been adopted in the barracks of Germany, with a view to keeping the soldiers away from the liquor shops. Dr. Schaffranek, of Palatka, Fla., has recently sent to Europe a handsome bouquet, composed of wild flowers, the handle being an alligator’s tooth. One cent will mail tins paper to your friend in any part of the United States, Canada or Mexico, after you have read it and written your name on the corner. Washington County, Georgia, produces annually 35,000 bales of cotton, worth about $1,500,000. This is one of the largest cotton producing counties in the State.

Rider Haggard’s w ife is a plump and rosy little Englishwoman, the personification of energy, and in that repect, as well as in stature, the very opposite of her talented husband. Let grace and goodness be the principal lodestone of thy affections. For love which hath ends will have an end; whereas, that which is founded on true virtue will always continue. The number of school children in Ohio between the ages of six and twen-ty-one years is 1,124,748; of these 576,526 are boys and 548,222 girls, being an increase over last year of 4,211. “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” is playing in the English provinces with a ballet of negro girls. They dress entirely in black and send the audience home feeling as though they had attended a funeral. In India little girls wear gold rings in their noses. One of the advantages of this fashion consists in the fact that the ring wearer does not have to take off her gloves to parade her jewelry. Fraudulent divorce mills are still busily at work in New York City. The authorities are doing their best to break them up, but the victims are usually uneducated people who decline to prosecute.

’ Every year a layer of the entire sea fourteen feet in thickness is taken up into the clouds. The winds bear this iMirden out over the land, where the waterfalls as rain, and flows back to be taken up. If the Turk should sell off everything in order to escape taxation he would yet be taxed on what he expected to hold in the future. Nothing but death or leaving the country can stop taxes in Turkey. Mrs. Langtry’s favorite relics of America are the hunting and Indian trophies that she picked up in Denver and other Western cities. Her most valuable article of this nature is an Indian medicine sash. A peculiarity about , *1891” is that adding the first figure to the second makes third, and subtracting the fourth figure from the third gives the second. Adding the four figures together gives us the number of the century. W. S. Fulton, one of Clayton County’s (Georgia) oldest and best citizens, died the other day. Just as he«drew his last breath the old clock, which for forty years had faithfully kept time, stopped and has not run since. In Natal, Africa, unchristened natives are forbidden the use of liquor, but a Christian native can get as drunk as he pleases. If Sam Jones but knew it Natal can give him cards and spades and beat him at his own game. A Chicago man, who for five years had slept with a revolver under his pillow as a protection against burglars, found that it was not loaded in all that time. But it is the pistol that isn’t loaded that is often the surest to kill.

In Austria women are employed to carry the mortar and brick to the builders. They work from 7in the morning till 6 at night with -one hour at noon, and receive 20 cents a day. Most of these female hodcarriers are unmarried and homeless. Blankets are loaned to the poor, during the winter months, free of cost, by a kind-hearted citizen in Brunswick, Germany. They are stamped to prevent them from being sold or pawned, and they are returned ait the close of the cold weather. Miss Laura Burns, of Martinsville, Ind., is probably the only woman in the United States whose natural hair has attained a length of seven feet. It is very heavy, and is of a light brown color. The lady is well known, and the Uolbotu™ statement is attested toby many of her friends, Miss Burns is 5 feet and 8 inches high, and when stand-

ing erect her hair reaches to the floor and forms a trail almost two feet in length. The story of great purchases of land in Mexico by the Mormpns is repeated. The statement is that BvOOChbOO acres have been acquired in Northern Mexico, and that it is designed to remove the Mormon population of the United States thither. The strength of spider silk is incredible. Size for size it is considerably tougher than a bar of steel. An ordinary spider’s thread is capable of bearing a weight of three grains, while a steel thread of the same thickness would support less than two. A man was recently sent to prison in New York City because he could not furnish SSOO bonds to keep the peace. As there was no one to furnish it for him this was practically imprisonment for life, so after a couple of months the man was called up and discharged. Japan has a rapid-transit style of divorce which must excite the envy of Chicago, A citizen of Bizen has been divorced from his thirty-fifth wife, and there are indications in the neighborhood where he lives that he is getting ready to marry his thirty-sixth.

The French troops in Africa lately took 1,400 prisoners in battle, and among them were 163 wives of a big chief, who had come along to see him do up the Johnnies. The old man got away with seventeen other wives, but he’ll be the loneliest man in Africa until the prisoners are paroled.

The merciful man who is merciful to his beast must be Dick Walker of Jesup, Ga. A pig belonging to him had the misfortune to meet with an accident which caused the loss of a leg. The humane and ingenious Dick constructed a cork leg to take the place of the missing member, and the pig limps contentedly around on it.

Those who contend that the Indians cannot kill game without their rifles are answered by the Indian himself when he says there is no longer any game to kill. His only need of pony or rifle is to make the settlers trouble, and until both are taken from him it is no use to hope he will remain long quiet, no matter how well treated.

A man who has been annoyed for years by the fact that one side of his mustache about twice as fast as the other side claims to have found an explanation in the circumstance that he sits all day at his desk with one side of his face turned to the window, the light from which stimulates the growth of the hair on that side. Gold while in circulation is handled less than any other medium. It is usually kept in the vaults of banks for demand rarely male, and for this reason the loss by abrasion is but onehalf of one per cent, in twenty years. In a 20-dollar gold piece, the standard weight of which is 516 grains, the Government allowance for loss by abrasion is 2.58 grains. The Home Reading Union hm rfbre than six thousand members scattered about the world, some of them in Turkey. They take certificates, not of knowledge acquired, but of books read, and the courses of reading which the union arranges seem to be very pleasurable exercises as well as productive of ' an acquaintance with the best things in English literature!

An interesting heathenish usage exists am mg the Polieshooki (a Riitheriian tribe) in Volhynia. A bride being led to the church to be married must pass through the fire. A small fire is built for the purpose on the road, and • the relatives of the groom dispose themselvei in files on both sides to see the bride pass over it. They believe that if the girl is not virtuous the fire must harm her. Barney Frickers, a jolly old fellow, of Alliance, Ohio, aged seventy-five, derived great pleasure from sleeping in a coffin. For twenty-five years he had continued the practice, and a ghastly smile usually illuminated his features as he nightly surveyed himfelf in the glass, before crawling into his strange bed, arrayed in a shroud for a sleeping-robe. Some days ago Barney failed to make his appearance at breakfast, and the discovery was made that he had died in his coflin.

It would be an excellent thing if the young man who is just beginning to go into society would before each party or reception provide himself with two or three general remarks with which a conversation may be opened. It is easy enough to think these things up in cold blood, and the advantage of getting started is too obvious to need argument. In small talk it is emphatically the first step that co its. The fact that one thinks of good things too late might be made to help in this matter. With a little ingenuity the remarks which a man reflects after one social gathering that he might have said may be utilized for the next occasion. It may seem too formal, but it will be too useful to the social beginner if he once tries it for him to be troubled by that consideration. All this is theory. Practically the editor has his doubts whether a social novice could arrange his good things beforehand; and yet the fact certainly remains that if he could it would be a a most excellent thing!

CHINESE CUTTHROATS.

DARE DEVILS WHO ARE THE CURSE OF TONKIN. Freebooter* Who Swoop Down Upon Villages in the Dead of Night—Their Depredation* Moat Frequent When Harvest* Are Poor.

Chinese pirates who infest the large archipelago known as the Robber Islands, near the of Tonkin. These bands, in their little vessels, have preyed for many years upon commerce, but they have been at last nearly destroyed by the persistent efforts of the French and Chinese govern-

CHIEF OF CHINESE BANDITS.

ments to root them out, and now the French have an opportunity to turn their attention to the hundreds of bandit bands who terrorize the mainland.

Piracy and other forms of outlawry have existed for ages, not only in Tonkin, but also in the whole of Annam. These bands do not commit so many depredations when the harvests are good and the country is tranquil and prosperous; but in times of war, or when poor crops or epidemics afflict the land, they are the curse of Tonkin. Since the French occupied CochinChina in 1858 they have waged incessant war upon the bandits, and have at last nearly exterminated them in Annam. The native governments have always been powerless. They have often been obliged to negotiate with the robber bands, giving their officers dignities and money and apportioning lands atpong the robber soldiery. In 1885 these armed bands overran Tonkin, living at the expense of the natives and killing hundreds of them. The bands belong to two distinct categories. One class is well disciplined and armed with rapid-firing guns. >lt is composed almost exclusively of Chinese or of savage Muongs recruited in the mountains, who never visit the low, flat lands, and consequently the delta region, where the enormoua crops of rice are raised, are free from them. They infest only the hilly and mountain regions of the interior, where they have hidden retreats, and can ea-ily get out of sight after a raid and defend themselves when attacked. Their little settlements are strongly fortified on all sides, and it is believed the forces sent against them have

ONE OF HIS GANG.

never taken them by surprise. From these fortified centers they spread over the country and live at the expense of the people. If the suffer their depredations in quiet, none of them is killed. All the robbers want is a good living. If any resistance is made, however, the bandits are merciless, and their revenge is terrible. When armies are sent against them, if they consider the advancing force too large to resist, they do not await its approach, but are usually far away in the mountain fastnesses before the avenging forces reach their fortified places. The bandits of the second\ category are less warlike but more numerous than the others. There is scarcely a district in Tonkin that is /lot troubled with them. The French are finding that they

kOR over a year the French in Tonkin have been trying to destroy the bandit bands that infest the country. Bandits and pirates are the curse of the Indo - Chinese peninsula. The story has often been told of the hundreds of

have a big job on hand to break up this established institution of the country. Within the last few months they have captured two or three hundred of these bandits, have put the robber chiefs to death, and are keeping the humbler bandits in custody. Th§ prospect is that their vigonraa etforti will, in the course of time, make outlawry of this sort so unpleasant that the bandits will take to other pursuits. Then the people of Tonkin will be able to go to bed without the fear that they will be at the mercy of bandits before morning.

Automatic Time Recorder.

A device has been perfected for recording time automatically. It fills a want that has long existed in factories, shops and stores, where a faithful register of the time at which employes begin and leave their work is all-im-portant both to the employer and the employed. The method heretofore adopted, the employment of a special time-keeper, is open to the objection that it not only entails expense, but also gives rise to frequent disputes as to the accuracy of the time-keeper’s record. The new system practically makes every man his own time-keeper. Each workman is given a number, and when he goes to work he takes his key from the keyboard, inserts it in the keyhole of the recorder, turns it half way round, takes it out and passes in to his work. This action records on the paper ribbons within the machine the number of his key and the exact time of day. If it is desired to register when going out the workman holds down the lever on the outside of the recorder while registering, which prints a star in front of the record. It is said that one hundred men can thus register within five minutes, and the time of each employe can be read off at a glance, without a chance of a mistake. The slips of paper can be removed daily, twice a day or weekly and filed away and the workman’s time is practically in his own handwriting, but is entirely beyond his control. There is no possibility of one man registering for another, as a bell rings when each register is recorded, so that a man registering twice could be easily detected. An additional safeguard against abuse or tampering is that the recorder is supplied with a device by which the key, after a partial turn, is locked in and cannot be taken out until it registers. The machine is the most complete and effective apparatus yet devised for the purpose.

Er Bully Sawt er Wife.

“Whut yer all er doin’ er settin’ yere like buzzards on er dead pine?” asked a young sunburned countryman as he approached five men sitting in a row on the gallery of an Arkansas store. “We ain’t er doin’ nuthin’ an’ we wanter nuther feller fu,r ter he’p us. Air yer lookin’ fur er job?” replied one. “Naw,” said the young fellow, “I ain’t. I got much ez I kin ten’ ter now. Es I

’uz marri’d like yer all, I dunno whut I’d do.” “Yer er lookin’ fur er wife?” some one asked. “Not yit. I hain’t got fixed fur ter take keer uv one yit. I jist knows though ’at hit’s er bully thing fur ter have er wife, es she’s er good one. Whut put all this yere in mer head wuz whut happen vistiddy. Yer all knows Dick Lewis an’ ’is wife. She b’lieves Dick’s ther buliiest feller ever wuz. Dick he got drunk yistiddy at Stringville, an’ ’e walked roun’ sw’arin’ ’at he could whup any man whut wo’ ha’r. Er laung, keen, hon-gry-lookin’ feller sum ther mount’ins come er laung. He had wil’ eyes like er varmint an’er huntin’ shirt outsider ’is pants ’ith fringe on hit. Dick seed ’im an’ made er lunge fur ’im an’ s’s’e, ‘Yo’ time’s come. I’m er go’n’ter eat yer plum’ up.’ ’En he lit inter ther feller. Some how hit wuz n’ like Dick s’posed hit would be. Ther feller clum’ up an’ come down on Dick. They ketched injun hug an’ wallop! erg’in ther groun’ they come. Hit wuz rough twell both uv ’em wuz tired out. They laid still er minit ’en Dick grabbed fur ’is th’oat an’ run ’is thum’ in ther feller’s mouth. Ther feller jist had stren’th lef’ fur ter shet down on hit, an’ ’e did. Dick hollered an’ done hit quick. Ez 1 rid home I passed Dick’s house. ’ls wife seed me an’ s’she: ‘Whar’s Dick?’ ST, Tn town'’ an’ I tol’ her er bout ther fight. ’Etn black eyes er her’n jist snapped an’ popped twell I got ter wher Dick hollered. ’En she jist ’gin ter cry, slapped her han’s over her eyes an’ screeched, ‘Ei Dick hollered, he wuz drunk.’ Now, es that ain’t er bully sawt er wife whut is? Huh?” Hugh Blake Williams.

Paternal Approval.

■ “You have been fighting, my son,” ! said the aiderman from the ’Steenth I Ward, severely. “Yes, sir,” replied the boy. “The ’ dirty little scoundrel on the other side • of the street told me you’d sell your ■ vote in the Council anv time for a . hundred dollars, and I chugged him on I the jaw.” “That was right, my son,” said the aiderman. “One hundred dollars”— and he spoke with emphasis and decision—“would be no temptation.” •‘Tltanatopsig’* as She Is Quoted. In breaking up the ghost dance : every soldier will doubtless “chase his i favorite phantom.”— Courier Journal.

A PRINCELY SCULPTOR.

Statue of the Princess of Wales Executed by Victor of Hoheulohe. A life-size statue of the Princess of Wales has been executed by Prince Victor of Hohenlohe, and is to be placed in the vestibule of the Royal College of Music, London. The Princess, who holds a degree as Doctor of Music from the University of Dublin, is represented in her college cap and gown. Her right hand, the wrist encircled by a plain gold bracelet, holds back the heavy embroidered folds of the gown

STATUTE OF THE PRINCESS OF WALES.

and discloses the plainly plaited French merino dress which she wears when in academic costume, while the left hand grasps a roll of music. The only other ornament is a small harp-shaped brooch which fastens the neck of the gown. Prince Victor is a sculptor of some ability, and many of his works have been exhibited at the Royal Academy and the Grosvernor Gallery, where he takes the name of Count Gleichen.

Bismarck’s Fall and Old Age.

Never has history furnished a better illustration of the uncertainty and instability of place and power than in the case of the great ex-Chancellor,, Prince Bismarck, of Germany. Bismarck’s fall is complete. His ruthless genius consolidated seemingly incoherent states into a great empire whose reigning monarch refused him the scant courtesy of a perfunctory message of congratulation on New Year’s Day. Bismarck’s fall is as complete and pathetic, viewed only as to himself, as was Wolsey’s. This stroke only was spared him—the hand that signed his warrant of banishment was not the king’s he served. Bismarck was the mightiest monarch in Europe. The old Kaiser who in the fullness of years went to his account master apparently of the greatest military power of Europe was Bismarck’s figurehead. It was Bismarck, not William, nor William’s great captain, Von Moltke. who, conquering at Sedan, destroyed the French Empire, and crytallized the German aspiration, long expressed, for German unity. He was in name Chancellor of the empire. In fact, he was its master spirit. Greater than Wolsey, or Ximenes, who saved Spain to Charles V., or the Cardinal of Henry VIII.’s reign, his fall is complete, humiliating, and, if it differs from Wolsey’s, it is only the difference of the customs and manners of the nineteenth from those of the sixteenth century. He has felt the “killing frost” of kingly ingratitude. He has bitterly experienced “how wretched is that poor man who hangs on princes’ favors.” And having fallen he has fallen “like Lucifer, never to hope again.” Like the English Cardinal Bismarck “trod the ways of glory and sounded all the depths and shoals of honor,” and may well exclaim with him upon the verge of the grave: Had I but served rny God with half the zeal I served my king, hj would not In mine age Have left me naked to mine enemies, Bismarck’s proud heart is broken. There is nothing for him now but death. Were he of the ecclesiastic order he might now seek his conventual brethren, the humble monks whence he sprang, saying, with the neglected and disgraced Englishman: An old man, broken with the storms of stale. Is come to lay his weary bones anion; ye; Give him a little earth for charity, Nothing is left to Bismarck but a grave. The grandson of the Emperor whom he created and ruled frowns upon him. An eager generation, impatient of the check of the elders, pushes him from his stool. Yet a little while, and the melancholy end. And if people will say, “ His faults lie gentlv on him,” well and good. That is all he can hope for now. He is as dead to the world of activities as any of the mighty who have passed from earth. “No sound can awake him to glory again.”— Chicago T ivies.

A Tall Tiger Story.

In speaking of the minute parasites that are found in the hairy part of a tiger’s foot, a scientist says: “They constitute one of the most wonderful curiosities I know of in the animal world. The parasites are so small as to be almost invisible to the naked eye. and yet, each is a perfect counterpart of the tiger—head, ears, jaw, legs, claws, body, tail—all are there. You may think this a big story, but look the subject up and see if it is not so.”

The Hornet the First Paper-Maker.

“The nest of the hornet is the first article of paper manufacture that ever saw the light of day, "'said a papermaker recently. “The hornet takes the wood of a tree, grinds it assiduously into pulp, and forms sheets of paper, out of which he constructs his nest. Although, as you can see. the paper is gray in its present condition, it is undoubtedly paper, and one of the finest kinds.

A GHOST SHIRT.

VFofrn by Sitting Bull's Daughter at Time of the Old Man’s Death. The Military Service Institution on Governor’s Island, New York, has received an interesting relic of the fight in which that famous old warrior, Sitting Bull, was killed. It is a “ghost shirt,” and was taken in the capture of Sitting Bull’s village on Dec. 15, by troops F and G of the Eighth Cavalry. It was worn by Sitting Bull’s favorite daughter, Wakau-Nojin (Standing Holy), who was the priestess of the ghost dances. Judging from the size and general form of the shirt, WakauNojin must have been a priestess of

healthy avoirdupois. It is, however, very skillfully put together. A fringe around the border has been formed by cutting slits in the canvas with a knife and then coloring the streamers thus" formed with blue chalk. The only decorations are blue-chalk pictures dancing medicine men and small clusters of feathers here and there.

QUEEN OF THE DUTCH.

Little Queen Wilhelmina of Holland is obliged to give some attention to affairs of state while other girls of her age are busy about their dolls. She is only in her eleventh year, and the time which at that age is spent in play she has to put in learning how to demean herself as a queen. She has already mastered many of the details and has been stuffed by her tutors with a number of accomplishments which must be a burden to her. She began to lisp French in early infancy and the first lessons of her French nurse have been supplemented by the careful training of a clever Paris governess. The latter has been replaced by an Englishwoman, who has made the little queen a proficient in the language of Shakspeare. She also talks Italian and, of course, is well acquainted with the language of her own country. The one language she does not know is that of her mother. Her aged and cranky

HER MAJESTY OUT FOR AN AIRING.

father hated the Germans, although he married one, and forbade his daughter learning a word of their language. Her mother, now that the old king no longer stands in the way, will doubtless have her daughter put through a thorough course of German. The high court of Holland has made the strange decision that the little ruler is to be addressed as the “King of Holland,” and all official acts will be done in the name of the king. The queen’s household is composed of two chamberlaiws, of four professors, of an equerry and of two ladies’ maids; this is her immediate entourage, but, of course, she also has a military household whose place, for the present at least, may be considered in the light of a sinecure. She spends her days happily at the old castle of Loo, where she has remained with her mother ever since her father’s death. Het-Lob, as it is called in Dutch, is a very beautiful place, surrounded by green meadows and shaded by century-old trees, which gives the place a very English aspect.

The White Rhinoceros.

The largest known mammal except the elephant is the white rhinoceros, and it is believed to be all but extinct. In 1883 a pair were shot on the River

A WHITE RHINOCEROS.

Le-whoi-whoi, a confluent of the Umniati, in Southern Mashuna-land, and if there are still one or, two survivors they are likely to be found there orin ■ Matabele land. If you want to see worldly ambition struggling with a righteous desire to b<. good take a woman to church with an old hat on.