Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 9, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 March 1891 — Page 4

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Sugar was unknown to the ancient Greeks and Romans. Queen Victoria was born on May 24j 1819, and succeeded her uncle, William IV., on June 20, 1837. A sealskin coat or robe has been “built” and lined with salite for the Duchess of Portland at a cost of 1,000 guineas. London affords for the use of its 5,000,000 of inhabitants nineteen free public and twenty-five commercial bathing establishments. An attempt is being made in London to form a huge ring for the control of the calico printing business. Many of the largest houses are already pledged to the syndicate. An agnostic is a man who vows he knows nothing, and gets wrathy and vexed with you if you believe him. He says he doesn’t know anything, but he really believes he knows everything. A Philadelphia cable-car, turning a street curve, jolted the “bang” off the forehead of a stylish lady and flung it on the newspaper of a gentleman who was reading of a scalping incident somewhere West.

The national powder mill at St. Medard-en-Jalle, in France, has recently been lighted by incandescent lamps, and it is believed to be the first mill of its class on the Continent to use electric lighting. Edouard Detaille’s great military picture, the finest he has ever painted, depicting a charge of the Fourth French Hussars in 1807, and called “Vive l’Empereur!” is soon to be exhibited in this country. Labouchere says that a woman who stands in a car is a nuisance. The truth of this remark will come home to every man who has been made uncomfortable in his seat by the eye 3 of a woman clinging to a car-strap. JuMMNH; claims in Idaho is dangerous business. A man at Wallace named Harris found three men putting up a cabin on a lot owned by him. They refused to leave, whereupon he got his gun, shot two of them dead and dangerously wounded the third. “I propose to die!” said a man as he entered a Sacramento saloon. “Give me a glass of beer in which to take poison!” „It was handed him, his money dropped into the till, and the barkeeper watched him as he sprinkled in strychnine and drank it off, to die two hours later.

The Earl of Devon became a bankrupt in 1872, owing $3,500,000, most of which was “on honor” or for racing obligations. He paid about half a cent on a dollar and didn’t lose much rest over the balance. As he is dead now his patient creditors may strike a balance and call it square. Henry Williams gave a hack-driver $2 to take him to the depot in Savannah in advance of the ’bus, and he got there just in time to be run over by a horse, smashed under a bill board and trampled on by a, drove of mules. When the ’bus came rolling up he was rolled off to a hospital. A New York club recently gave a dinner to all the principal freaks in the dime museums. Living skeletons, fat women, turtle boys, contortionists, magnetic women, Chinese giants, calfheaded boys, tliree-armed and fourlegged both dined and danced with their ho3ts until a very late hoar. Some years ago Lady Assington philanthropically sent twenty-four English families to the Cape to found an improved colony. She bought land for them, but the result wa3 a failure. The men would not work, but hired Kaffirs instead. Some died of drink, and most of those remaining left for the gold fields.

The Archduke Charles Louis, heir presumptive to the Austrian throne, allows each of his sons fifty florins a month ($83.50) for spending money until they are of age. When they have attained their eighteenth year they are free, and each then can “go the pace” if he so desires, with an income of 20,000 florins a year ($33,400). Beds are quite an innovation in Bussia, and many well-to-do houses are still unprovided with them. Peasants sleep on the tops of their ovens; middle-class people and servants roll themselves up in sheepskins and lie down near stoves; soldiers rest upon wooden cots without bedding; and it is only within the last few years that students in state schools have been allowed beds. Prof. Dara concludes that during the glacial period Long Island Sound, instead of being, as it now is, an arm of the ocean twenty miles wide, was for the greater part of its length a narrow channel serving as a common trunk for many Connecticut streams and a few from Long Island. In these circumstances the supply of fresh water for the Sound river would have been so great that salt water would have barely passed the entrance of the Sound. The lace factories of Kursk and Orley are receiving more orders from France than they can fill. At the late exhibition in Paris the Bussian lece

■was bought with avidity by the French ladies. Since then that lace has become fashionable throughout France. The Russian lace manufacturers indulge in the hope that the demand for their ware will steadily increase; they accordingly enlarge their workshops and engage as many/laborers as they can get. Queen Victoria’s family circle now numbers fifty living descendants, including sons and daughters, grandsons and granddaughters, great grandsons and great granddaughters. Besides these she has four sons-in-law, five grandsons-in-law, and one granddaugh-ter-in-law. The Queen has lost one son, one daughter, five grandsons, one great-grandson, and one son-in-law. If these were living her family circle would number seventy-four.

The magnesium flash-light has been recently used experimentally for night signaling at Pottsdam, Germany, with interesting results. It has been found that even in a snow-laden atmosphere the flash from three grams of magnesium powder was visible at a distance of about forty-six miles. By the addition of a small quantity of strontium, or lithium salts, a red light was produced which could be seen even further than the white flash. A short distance out from Buena Vista, Cal., there is a cave literally swarming with spiders of a curious species of immense size, some having legs four inches in length and a body as large as that of a canary bird. The cave was discovered in December, 1879, and was often resorted to by the pioneers, who obtained the webs for use in place of thread. Early and late the cave constantly resounds with a buzzing noise which is emitted by the spiders while they are weaving their nets. Dr. Kellner, director of a cellulose factory, says the Elektrolechniclies Echo, has succeeded in materially reducing the cost of that article. His method is to put the shredded wool into lead-lined boilers, with a 5 per cent, solution of common salt, which is electrolyzed for three and one-half hours, the nascent chlorine bleaching the wool fiber to a snow-white silky substance. The operation is conducted at a temperature of 126 to 128 degrees, and paper made from the product is of a particularly fine texture.

The fair banjoist has struck a new fad which she proposes to pursue until her instrument is all aglow with fluttering souvenirs. Each one of the silken ribbons displays at one end the monogram of the giver, sometimes embroidered and sometimes stamped in gold. These are frequently presented by the young belle’s masculine friends, thus reversing the order of things—the young woman wearing her admirer’s colors. It is pathetic to watch the embarrassment of the color-blind young man when he discovers that he has presented his lady love with a ribbon as green as the Emerald Isle under the impression that it was a divine blue, which is so symbolic of fidelity.

A London magazine states that before 1840 there were no granite pavements in that city. Wood pavements were used in 1839. Asphalt, which now covers so much of London, was not used until 1869, fifteen years after it was first laid down in Paris. Some years ago, it was found by observations of tho number of falling horses that a horse might be expected to travel 132 miles on granite, 191 on asphalt, and 446 on wood without falling. In wet weather granite is nearly as safe as wood when dry. Asphalt is decidedly the most risky of all, for even when dry the estimate of an increased distance is no more than 223 miles, and when damp and wet, 125 and 192 miles are set down as a limit.

The Worcester Spy relates the following incident; “Among the visitors at the court house yesterday was a snow-white pigeon that alighted on the sill of one of the windows of the clerk’s office. The windsw was opened and the bird calmly walked in with all the confidence of a lawyer. He as calmly walked the whole length of the office, quietly observing everything. Pretty soon, as his acquaintance with the officials increased, he perched himseli upon the desks and later on the shoulders and head of one of the assistants. It was not decided by the officials whether he had a case to try or whether he wished to enter a writ. Anyway, he was placed on a shelf among the ancient deeds. The window was opened, bat the inner atmosphere was more congenial to his excellency, so he stayed.”

One is apt to think that the world has been pretty well ransacked for advertising schemes, and that the supply is liable to run out. Experience proves, however, that the mind of the inventor is practically inexhaustible and breaks out into perennial exhibitions of i.s resources. One of these is the new toy-gun for posting advertisements. The gun is used for shooting advertising arrows into trees, fences, buildings or any inanimate objects. The arrow is feathered with light cardboard of various colors bearing in large type any desired inscription. Two sections of the cardboard and the resultant angles are embraced by a cross slit kerf, the rear of the stick being wound with cord and the point being sharpened to increase penetration. The advertising darts can thus be projected out of ordinary reach, but just high enough not to escape the notice of the passer-by. .

CUTE THINGS IN CORK.

HOW CHILDREN CAN HAVE FUN WITHOUT EXPENSE. The Way to Cut Cork—How to Make a Cork 801 l Dog, a Tight-Rope Walker, and Many Other Thing* of Interest to Children. The decoration of a small box in cork costs but little in labor and nothing in cash, particularly if a system of rosettes be devised, such as is here shown, says a writer in Golden Days. Make a couple of hundred of these carved roundels and glue them on in

CUT CORKS.

two rows, and you will hardly believe the result is your handiwork. “Carved roundels” sounds very artistic, indeed. Perhaps a sketch, showing how the roundels are made, may quell any alarm the phrase may have inspired. Take a few old bottle-corks and cut them like this: Hold your knife at half a right angle as you cut the cross-pieces, and then cut it from the sides, also at half a right angle, and in this way you will produce the “incised work.” If you want four rays, make two cuts across; if you want six, make three in the manner shown by the artist where he has put the knife in. The cork tree is said to be an oak yielding a valuable bark. It may not be inappropriate, therefore, to model

BULL DOG.

are made with a red-hot skewer. To stick the head onto the body, use a double-pointed match, and thus give him the power of twisting his head round if you feel so inclined. A comical little fellow is this cork bull dog, and when you get so far as a dozen of them they look very well indeed. Having succeeded with a dog out of cork, try a stork out of cork, or any other bird more or less recognizable. Materials for bird: One bottle-cork

THE WAY TO CUT THEM.

(used), two matches, one hairpin. Average cost, nothing; time, ten minutes. Cut the body first. Cut the head out of one of the body fragments. Stick in the neck; stick on the head with the beak in it; stick on the legs; stick the legs in the stand. Can anything be simpler? Never chop a cork; cut it as if. you were sawing it. Above all, do not use new corks; their roughness is their chief artistic merit. To make a figure that will move, take four sticks for the arms and legs, cut a cork for his body and thrust in his limbs. Cut a round knob out of another cork, mortise in a nose, cut out a mouth, and, with a skewer or hairpin, burn out his eyes and buttons. Then, with a piece of match, fix on his head, and if you can find some feathers, give him a topknot. Cut a nick in the side of his right

A CORK TIGHT-ROPE WALKER.

foot, and iu his waist fix a couple of table forks. Then stand him on a string sloping from one end of the room to the other, and away he will go as gracefully as any live ropewalker.

A Cunning tub. Alice stood at the window, writhing the falling snow. “What’s that ?” she said, as she caught sight of something up the street. “It’s a dog—a woolly dog,” she cried out. “0, no, us not a dog; it’s a little bear!” It was a little bear cub. It stopped directly in front of the window, and, sitting up, nodded to Alice in the most friendly manner. “Oh. you amusing thing.” she cried. “I’m g ang to feed you.” And opening the window, she tossed out a sweet cracker, which Master Bear snapped up in a moment; then, sitting up. he made another bow, and held out his paw for more. So she gave him another, but just as he was stooping to snap it up he suddenly fell at full length on the snow; and with his forepaws over his eyes, lav perfectly still. “Whv, you poor little fellow, what can be the matter?” said Allie. At the same moment she saw a man coming very fast; he had

out of cork an other source of- * bark more or less ' worthless, k Try a bulldog, i His body is one f cork: his head is -another; his legs . are four matches: his tail is another --match; his nose, his mouth, his eyes

a whip. He stopped when he saw* the cub, and snapped the whip. In a moment, Master Bear was sitting up, bowing and offering his paw. Alice was afraid that he would be punished for running away, so she opened the window and said, in a coaxing little voice: “Oh, please don’t whip him; he’s so cunning!” “Well, I won’t, miss, if you. don’t want me to,” said the man. “Come, Ned!” Ned understood by the tone of his master’s voice that he was not to be punished; he immediately got up and clasped his paws around his master’s leg and hugged him tight. “That’s the way he always does when we wake up.” said the man. —Annie L. Hannah, in Little Men and Women.

A Kansas Election in Pioneer Days.

The next day. to their great discom fiture, our settlers blundered upon a county election. Trudging into Libertyville, one of the new mushroom towns springing up along the military road that leads from Fort Leavenworth to Fort Riley, they found a great crowd of people gathered around a log-house, in which the polls were open. County officers were to be chosen, and the pro-slavery men, as the Borderers were now called in this part of the country, had rallied in great numbers to carry the election for their men. All was confusion and tumult, Rough-looking l men, well armed and generally loud-voiced, with slouched hats and long beards, were galloping about, shouting and making all the noise possible, for no purpose that could be discovered. “Hooray for Cap’n Pate!” was the only intelligible cry that the new-comers could hear; but who Captain Pate was, and why he should be hurrahed for, nobody seemed to know. He was not a candidate for anything. “Hullo! there’s our Woburn friend, John Clark.” said Mr. Howell. Sure enough, there he was with a vote in his hand going up to the cabin where the polls were open. A lane was formed through the crowd of men who lounged about the cabin, so that a man going up to the door to vote was obliged to run the gauntlet, as it were, of one hundred men, or more, before he reached the door, the lower half of which was boarded up and the upper half left open for the election officers to take and deposit the ballots. 13 “I don’t believe that man has any right to vote here,” said Charlie, with an expression of disgust on his face. “Why, he came into the territory with us, only the other day, and he said he was going up on the Big Biue to settle, and here he is trying to vote!” “Well,” said Uncle Charlie, “I allow he has just as good a right to vote as any of these men who are running the election. I saw some of these very men come riding in from Missouri, when we were one day out of Quindaro.” As he spoke, John Clark had reached the voting place, pursued by many rough epithets flung after him. He paused before the half-barricad-ed door and presented his ballot. “Let’s see yer ticket!” shouted one of two men who stood guard, one on either side of the cabin-door. He snatched it from Clark’s hand, looked at it and simply said, “H’ist!” The man on the other side of the would-be voter grinned; then both men seized the Woburn man by his arms and waist, and, before he could realize what was happening, he was flung up to the edge of the roof that projected over the low door. Two other men, sitting there, grabbed the new-comer by the shoulders and passed him up the roof to two others, who, straddling the ridge-pole, were waiting for him. Then the unfortunate Clark disappeared over the top of the cabin, sliding down out of sight on the farther side. The mob set up a wild cheer and some of them shouted, “We don’t want any Yankee votes in this yer ’lection!” Noah Brooks, in 'st. Nicholas.

Lady Birds.

Naturalists count more than fifteen kinds of lady-birds, mostly distinguished from one another by the number of their spots, set upon various grounds, red, black or yellow. The two-spotted and the seven-spotted are the most common. One of the prettiest is the seldom-seen twenty-spotted, with eleven black dots on each of her golden wing-cases. Rare sorts, sometimes seen in collections, are adorned with a checker-board pattern of little squares. Like other beetles, the lady-bird keeps her large gauzy wings concealed, except when they are iu use. They fold both lengthwise and across, and pack into an incredibly tiny compass. When spread, they are fully twice as large as those gayly decorated, horny wingcases which protect and cover them, and which are often mistaken for the wings themselves. It is an unsolved mystery whither the insect hosts betake themselves when the frost comes to put an end to their delight. We see the air teeming with gnats, and the ground populous with ants and beetles; the fields are alive with grasshoppers, the hedges full of little moths which sleep amid the foliage. All about us, active creatures in multitudes feast, dance, fiddle and blow their elfin horns; yet these myriads vanish, leaving not a trace behind. The chill autumn wind passes over them and they are gone. Whither? Their disappearance is more mysterious thau that of pins. If they "die, what becomes of their little corpses? And if they do not die, where do they hide themselves? A few, we know, creep into warm corners to sleep till the return of spring, and among this prudent minority are some of the ladv-birds. “We found, last November,” says a pleasant writer on insect lore, “no fewer than seventeen of these redcoated comrades laid up, doubtless, for their winter sleep,, to be broken only in open weather by an occasional stroll in search of some of those hardier aphides, which furnish them with no unwelcome meal between their long abstinences.” _ : r-’SI There are a set of malicious, prating, prudent gossips, both male and female, who murder characters to kill time, and will rob a fellow of his good name before he has years to know the value of it.

PORTABLE PARLOR FOUNTAIN

An Ingenious anil Simple Contrivance Which Ik Very Attractive. The annexed engraving, taken from a Vienna paper, illustrates a fountain consisting principally of two equalsized* basins, each containing a spraying nozzle and an outlet pipe, the spraying nozzles being connected by two rubber pipes with the outlet pipes, as plainly shown in the sectional view. The basins are supported on suitable holders connected with each other by parallel levers fulcrnmed on the flower stand. A weight is adapted to be hung

on the lower end of the holder containing the empty basin to counterbalance and to hold the full basin in an uppermost position. The water flows from the filled upper basin through the outlet pipe to the spraying nozzle of the lower basin, and is projected quite a distance up into the air, to fall back and gradually fill the lower basin. When this is accomplished, the upper basin has run empty and the counterbalancing weight is now hung on the holder of the empty upper basin so as to chapge the position of the levers, and consequently the basins; that is, the filled basin assumes an uppermost position, while the empty one swings downward. The water now flows from the upper basin to the spraying nozzle of the lower empty basin, and is sprayed to accumulate in this basin. It takes about one hour’s time to empty a basin containing about onehalf gallon of water, the opening of the spraying nozzle being one-half millimeter in size. In case the water gets dirty the basins can be readily removed from their holders and emptied, and again filled with fresh water.

THE NAPE OF THE NECK.

Woman's Glory ” Is Sometimes Something Other than Her Hair. There are no more graceful curves in a woman’s body than those which start from the nape of the neck. There is an artist in New York in whose pictures almost invariably appears a female figure so posed as to bring out some one of these charming lines. He turns his model back to him, and sketches

with only a glimpse of face, just where the curve of cheek breaks to the fullness of chin, or he puts a world of coquetry into glandes, whioh one must fancy accompanied by bird-like chirpings over the shoulder. He delights in the white column of a Juno or the clear-modeled, fine reserve of a fugitive nymph, but always he starts with the back of the neck, and tho rest comes as best mav. The back of the neck is not only beautiful, it is healthily beautiful.

HON. CHARLES FOSTER.

Ea ely Chosen Secreta-y ot tlin United States Treasury. Hon. Charles Foster, of Ohio, who has been chosen for Secretary of the Treasury in place of Hon. William Windom, deceased, has had a large experience of public life, principally as Governor of Ohio, and member of Congress for several terms. During his

HON. CHARLES FOSTER.

ages were asked to give their white brother a name, and, because of some peculiarity in his attire, promptly dubbed him “‘Young-man-proud-of-his-tail. ” It is believed that in his new position Mr. Foster will carry on the policy outlined just before death by his predecessor.

career he has gained much repute and two nicknames. His political opponents, having reference to his mercantile career, eall him “Calico Charley.” A second title ;,came to him recently, while serving as member of an Indian Commission. The sav-

Station Master and the Nobles.

An amusing incident occurred on a Southern railroad in England in connection with the Duke of Norfolk and the Marquis of Bute. The duke and marquis were fellow travelers, and when the train stopped at *- station. a companion joined them in the person of the station master himself, who was going for a jaunt some twenty miles further up- the line. The duke and the ‘ station master, who were both diminutive men, and therefore fond of talk, soon got into conversation, while the marquis, a tall, robust man, was inclined to be reticent, until he found his friend, the duke, up to his ears in conversation, when he himself joined, addressing most of his remarks to the stranger. At length the train arrived at B , and the marquis bid a hearty farewell to the duke, and with a kindly adieu and a shake of the hand from the stranger the marquis quitted the carriage, while his dispatch box and wraps were secured, to the surprise of the station master, by a tall, powdered footman, and the train soon glided again out of the station. Silence was not, however, long maintained, the station master breaking out with the question. “I wonder who that swell was?” “That,” replied his companion, “was the Marquis of Bute.” The answer seemed to dumfound the station master for a time, but. presently he exclaimed. “Well, now, I do think it kind of him to talk to two such snobby little chapi as us, don't you?” The duke nodded his assent and had a good laugh. When the train drew up again his grace affably bid his companion “Good-by,” and/ on alighting on the platform, was received with the greatest deference by a throng of Jesuit priests, this incident again setting the station master the task of inquiry, who inquisitively asked a brother official who that little bloke was. “That,” replied the guard, “is the Duke of Norfolk. ” The station master, after this, declared he would never travel first-class again as long as he lived.

He Knew How.

A typical American workingman,, quite browned by the sun, muscular, intelligent and smiling, stood upon a platform of boards supported by barrels in front of the porch of an apartmen thouse just off Fifth Avenue carving a gargoyle from a block of brown stone. He was American,' because he could work while he talked, was master of his plans, his tools and himself, wore clothes that fitted him, and replied courteously to the many questions of an interested group of bystanders. The block of stone from which he was evolving a face was supported by a pillar of polished Scotch granite, and was part of a somewhat impressive entrance of an expensive pile of stone and mortar, but neither the fact that he could not afford to spoil his job, nor that his studio was in the open air and his performance free to all critics, seemed to trouble him. He hammered, smiled and talked, and the chips flew all around the human circle. “Yes,” he said, “I carry the patternin my head. (Chip, chip.) What is this to be? A Venus. (Chip.) Yes, a Haytian Venus would not be a bad one. (Chip, chip.) This is Portland stone, the best there is for cutting and the best in the world for builders, any way. (Chip.) How do I keep from making a wrong cut and spoiling the stone? That’s my trade, sir; that’s knowing how to do it.” Thus he went on chipping at the stone, cutting a deep gash here and hammering off a great chunk of the sandstone there, seemingly reckless of the havoc he was making, but smilingaway until, between his mallet and graving stone, he seemed to have transferred his smile to the face that began to gleam from the rough brown surface of the rock.

Facts About the Internal Revenue.

To collect the internal revenue costs in gross, mainly for salaries, abput $4,250,000 a year. You might suppose that the distilling of fruits, say apples, peaches and grapes, would amount to a good deal, but the internal revenue received only about $1,333,000 from those sources, and from grain distillations it received over $75,009,000. The government taxes retail liquor dealers, and from them we received $4,500,000, and nearly $500,000 more from wholesale liquor dealers. There is a tax amounting to hardly $5,000 upon the manufacturers of stills and worms. Tobacco cuts the aggregate figure of about $34,000,000 per annum as compared to alcohol at $82,000,000. The cigar makers within our country pav the government over $12,000,009 a year ; the tobacco dealers in the chewing and smoking departments pay some $20,000,000; snuff pays $750,009, and cigarettes over $1,000,000. Cigarette consumption increased the mere tax in that department about $41,000 last year .—Gath, in Cincinnati Enquirer.

Whitefish and Trout

At the station of the United States Fish Commission at Alpena, Mich., the total number of whitefish eggs collected during the spawning season was 50,920,001). Of this number two employes of the commission took 1,920,000 from Dec. 1 to 6, at Beaver Island, Lake Michigan. The loss of eggs during December was only six per cent, of the total. About one-third of the eggs were obtained from fish caught in gill nets. The temperature of the water ranged from 33 degrees on Dec. Ist to 324 degrees on the 31st. On the last day of December there were available for distribution from the station at Northville: Lake trout eggs, 2,500,000; brook trout eggs, 140,000; Loch Leven eggs, 120,000; Von Behr (S. fario) eggs, 220,000. If a child chokes in trvirg to swallow a button, a penny or any article of the kind, turn him head downwards, holding him by the neck and heels. If the offending article does not roll out of his mouth, admiuister a dose of castor oil to aid its passage thiough the stomach and intestines. Sitxino IJull was a deeper-dved villain than has been gererally supposed. He could play the accordion.