Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 May 1892 — NOTES AND COMMENTS. [ARTICLE]

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

One of the most beautiful of Patti’l possessions, which she showed to severed of her friends during her recent viiiit to Cincinnati, is her watch. Its size is not larger than a ten-cent piece. It is completely studded with diamonds,' so that the case is -one mass of brilliant, sparkling gems. Experts value it at not less than SI,OOO. It is a foreign, open-faced, stem-winding watch. There is no European country in which women clerks are more employed than in France. Indeed, it is rare to enter a French shop and find a man serving as an accountant. Bookkeepers are paid from £4O to £l2O a year, and accountants much the sameT In the commercial houses, where the women clerks are also employed, they often have an interest in the business. The British Government spends about $2,865,000 annually in -supporting the royal family. Of this sum Queen Victoria receives $1,425,000; the Prince and Princess of Wales $250,000; their children together, $180,000; the Duke of Edinburgh and the Duke of Connaught $125,000 each; the daughters, Princesses Christian, Louise, Beatrice and the Duohess of Albany $30,000 each. The publio schools in Deming, N. M., had to be closed recently because a violent sand storm prevailed. Little incidents like that indicate the inconvenience, distress and positive danger, not easly comprehended by Eastern dwellers, caused by the miniature simoons in the dry, sandy prairie and the hot-plain districts of the West. The storms come up suddenly, the sky is darkened as by a thunder storm, everything is enveloped in a dlinding whirl of tine sand, and seeing is impossible. The worst lasts for a few minutes only usually, but for hours the sand is wisked about in u most distressing manner.

The air-shaft, which was originally devised for the purpose of improving the ventilation and sanitation of the huge apartment and tenement houses, in New York, where scores and even hundreds of families are gathered together under one roof, is gradully being diverted from its original use. Instead of remaining an instrument of health and life, it is becoming an engine of destruction. It is by degrees taking the plaoe of po'son razors and pistols as a meane of suicide. The number of men and women who have sought the repose of death by hurling themselves down the air-shaft of the houses in which they resided is becoming akirming.

The disastrous effeot upon shipping of the storms that have been so frequent this past winter on the British coasts, and of such unusual violenoe, have suggested to the proprietors of the Daily Graphic, of London, to offer a prize of one hundred pounds for the dest means of establishing communication between a stranded Bhip and the shore. Many sketches and plans have been submitted already, but a few weeks have still to elapse before the various proposals will be submitted to the three judges, one of whom is an Admiral in the royal navy. In the mean time there is an excellent opportunity for Yankee ingenuity to enter the competition, which is generously open to the whole world, and perhaps to capture the prize. “More has been done in the way of irrigation in California than in any other State or Territory. That it does pay there can be no question. Large areas which, in their arid condition, could not be sold for more than from $1 to $5 an aore, have been made in the highest degree productive, and are worth to-day from S2OO to SI,OOO per acre. Figures clearly show that irrigation has added millions upon millions of dollars to the tand value of California. In some cases there are complete waterworks establishments, owned by corporations, which, by ditfehes'and conduits, supply water to the turrounding region at an average cost of only from $1.25 to $1.50 each acre per year. For orchards, vineyards and grain lands this is not a great cost. Irrigation is making thousands of men rich. As nearly as can be ascertained, the irrigated lands of California comprise three and one-half million acres. Irrigation has oost $20,000,000, but it has increased the value of the land $500,000,000, perhaps twioe that. The superintendent of the United States census has sent to press a bulletin on artesian wells for irrigation, prepared by Mr. F. H. Newell, special agent in charge of statistics of irrigation. The total number of artesian wells on farms in June, 1890, in the states and territories forming the western half of the United States numbered 8,097, representing an estimated aggregate investment of sl,988,461. Of that number 3,990 are employed in irrigation. The average depth per well is 210,41 feet, the average cost per well is $245.58, the discharge of water per minute is 440,719 gallons, or 54.43 gallons per well, per minute, the average area irrigated per well is 13.02 acres, and the average cost of water per aore irrigated is $18.82. Over one-half of these wells are in the state of California, where 38,378 acres of agricultural land were irrigated by artesian water. Utah stands second in the number of artesian wells used for irrigation purposes, and Colorado in the area of land thus irrigated.

It is well known that the United States are fast crowding Switzerland out of the watch market, and .there is no part of the world, no matter how remote, where the tick of the American watch cannot be heard. To-day American factories turn out 35,000 watches a week. Almost the only time -pieces imported are repeaters, stop-watches, and those having ipecial movements which bring a high price. Comparatively few key-winders are now manufactured in this country, the stem-winder being easily the favorite watch. The farming population in some parts of the country, however, still sticks to the old style. The size of watches has diminished, and only in the West oan the big watches of our fathers be •old. A leading dealer was asked the other day if there was a watoh trust. “No” he said, “only a combination between the larger concerns to maintain prices. There would hot be so many watches made or such ruinous competition if there was a trust, as the word is understood.”