Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 25, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 July 1892 — Page 3

-OR—THE HEIRESS of MAPLE LEAF FARM

CHAPTER XVll—Continued. “Shall we go to the hotel?” queried Prescott. “What for?” demanded his companion, eharply. “To divide the money, of coarse.” “Eh?" frowned the other. “Oh, yes; ■certainly. We divide, as agreed. No, I am not going to venture near the hotel. lam afraid ” “Of a woman!” sneered Prescott. “With the money gained, never fear the rest. ” “You don’t know her!" gasped the impostor, with a timid glance all about him, as if fearful that some wraith would suddenly block his path. “Anyway, we will shake the dust of the viliae from Our feet, sure and fast. I wwnt to meet my friend, Paul Daltpn’s jailer, at a cabin in the woods. Come ■on. Soon as we roach a retired spot I’ll divide the money.” Ralph Prescott’s heart beat high with hope and avarice. He had failed in hsost of his plans, but the very material fact'of money, at least, was tangibly in eight at least. Just beyond the village, near a little grove, the imposter halted. “It’s moonlight,” he said, “and we can see to count the money. You demand half, eh?” “We agreed on half.” “All right.” The impostor peered sharply about •them. He made a feint as if to taW-the wallet from his pocket. “Hene you are,” he said, between his •teeth, his breath quickening. Balph Prescott put forth his hands, as if to receive the money he had so coveted. The next minute they went to his Bead, he uttered a wild cry and staggered back. For, with the swiftness of lightning, the man he had made an accomplice had drawn some blunt instrument from his pocket. A heavy blow on the temple .repeated stretched Prescott senseless at his feet. “Lie there!” he hissed malevolently. “Half! ha! ha! I have plotted too deeply for the fortune to give it away. No, mine, all mine! Such sneaks as you deserve a traitor’s reward!” He knelt and drew Prescott’s watch from his pocket—even his purse he took. Betrayed, robbed, deserted, Ralph Prescott would awake to find that orime had Brought him its own true recompense. Then the shallow-hearted villain •darted through the thicket, carrying with him the results of evil scheming, making off with the booty, to obtain Which he had ruthlessly trampled on .human lives and human hearts. CHAPTER XVIII. AT LAST. Lawyer Drew filed away his papers, • closed Up his desk and lit his pipe, ready lor a comfortable smoke, after his two visitors, Balph Prescott and the impostor, had left him. He felt very complacent, for the assured .heir ,of the Forsythe legacy had paid him an extra large foe to expedite, matters. A ring at the door-bell, followed by the hurried parley of some new visitor with the servant, interrupted the lawyer’s pleasant reveries, however, a moment later, and almost immediately tramping footsteps down the hall preeeded a rude intrusion into the room.

There stood a man, pale, unkempt, Wild-eyed—6o closely the prototype of the man who had just left that room with a royal fortune surrendered to his charge that the lawyer stared in amazement. “Why, Mr. Dalton!” he ejaculated, rising abrvyptly and staring wonderingly at his visitor. “You have returned? something has happened?” “Returned? No!” exclaimed the intruder, excitedly. “ I have not been here before to-night.” “What! Did I not just pay you ” “Too late!” gasp.d the new comer. “Ho has been here. I feared It. Ain. Drew, do you not know, me?" “Why! yes, I—stammered the lawyer. “lam Paul Dalton; not the Paul Dalton who has taken my place and represented my identity for the past week, but the Paul Dalton you knew of old—the superintendent of Maple Leaf Farm." , “Then the other?” “Was an impostor.” Lawyer Drew’s jaws fell. The awful truth suddenly dawned upon his astounded mind, and it paralyzed his faculties completely. “Yes,” went on Paul Dalton, rapidly, “you have been made the viotim of a deep plot, a scheme to wrongfully secure the Forsythe fortune, while I have been a drugged, bound prisoner. To-night I overpowered and bound my jailer and burned here, but too late to prevent the •onsummation of an iniquitous project between Balph Prescott and the man who r< sembles me. ” “Remarkably. He must be a brother, a close relative?” “It matters not. I cannot expose him here now. Quick! how much of a start has he got of me! He must be overtaken, he must disgorge his ill-gotten booty, he must tell me what he has done with my wife—my darling, precious Buth!” “I ean answer that question!” A clear, confident voice uttered the words. Just about to advance toward the door, Paul Dalton recoiled as a dark-eyed, sad-faced woman crossed its threshold. The lawyer, too, regarded ber in open-mouthed wonder, “Isabel!” exclaimed the startled and bewildered Paul Dalton, “Isabel!” “Yes, Paul, the wronged, persecuted wife of your enemy, the woman who, at last realizing all the noble sacrifice of your life, has determined, be the cost what it may, that you shall wreck your happiness no further, to enrich and shield a consummate scoundrel, my husband though he be!” “What does thief mean?" gasped the overwhelmed lawyer. “I will tell you,” rang out the woman’s voloe. “Isabel, I forbid you!” interrupted Paul Dalton, sternly. “No, I shall disobey you,” returned the woman, firmly. “Too long you have

BY GENEVIEVE ULMER.

suffered in silence. It means this, sir,” to the interested and curious lawyer, “there are two Paul Daltons—this one, and my husband, the man who has just swindled you out of a fortune. The one good, the other bad, remarkably alike in looks, but in soul—ah! this man’s noble sacrifices and life of sadness shall shine bright in the judgment day before the blaok-hearted cruelty and sin of that other Paul Dalton—my husband.” “They are brothers?”

“No, cousins—the children of sisters who, fondly hoping to win the favor of rich old Paul Dalton, the banker, each named a child after him. ’ They grew up. My husband was the favorite. He was the acoepted heir of his uncle, but he broke his mother’s heart with his evil ways. On her death-bed she made this noble-hearted man here promise to shield his cousin from harm. Hoping he would reform, this Paul Dalton did all he could to help him retain his uncle’s favor. But, why Continue the story? Its end tells all. My Paul Dalton was convicted of forgery when this Paul Dalton was out West. He served his term, but, returning home, reversed the real position of affairs —charged this Paul Dalton with being the oonvict and he the man out West. He wedded me to a life of misery, and for my sako after old Paul Dalton had died, and my husband had squandered his fortune, this noble man mutely -accepted the stain of a convict reputation, gave up all his ambitions and disappeared. That is the story. My husband was the forger—this man’,s soul is white as snow.” The old lawyer sat overcome at the strange revelation. “When Paul Dalton left Eidgeton ten days ago,” continued the woman, “to find my husband, and demand that he explain, at least to Buth Elliott, the truth which he was sworn not to divulge, my husband learned of the fortune left to him. He made a prisoner of this Paul Dalton, and—the rest you know. I hurried on his track, determined that no further injury should como to this man. I warned him; he refused to heed me. Now he shall suffer the consequences of his crime. Paul Dalton, I rescued your wife to-day—there she is!” Ruth Dalton appeared at the library door. There was a mutual cry of joy, and husband and wife were reunited in one another’s arms. “Wait here!” ordered Isabel. “I know where my husband has gone. I will find him—l will right the great wrong of the pa3t—if I follow him half the world over! ”

CHAPTER XIX. IX THE WHITE MOONLIGHT. • Ralph Prescott lay where he had been left robbed and insensible in the white moonlight, while his assailant sped away from the spot with the fleetness of a deer, and the guilty bearing of a criminal escaping from the hands of justice. The false Paul Dalton’s breath came quick, and his manner showed that he was not yet altogether sanguine of leaving the country without some trouble. He feared Prescott, revived and hot on his trail with all the vengeful persistency of a baffled accomplice; he dreaded the anger of his deserted wife, whose written warning and subsequent silence were more impressive than spoken words. But he had arranged for dll that. The bearded man, Newcombe, whom he had employed to act as jailer to Paul Dalton, was an old-time confederate in crime, and he had arranged to meet him at a dilapidated cabin a mile distant, that night. “I’ll see Newcombe and we’ll t fly the country together,” he as he hurried over the moonlit landscape. “He is too old a friend to desert, but as to that fellow Prescott, he handled edged tools and got cut —he got all he deserved. ” The impostor threaded a forest maze, and at last came to a dismantled hut. He paused in the bushes to whistle several times. There was no response to this evidently agreed-on signal, and he entered the doorless structure and proceeded to light a lantern, which, with a lot of other traps, lay on the floor in one comer of the gloomy place. From among' these he selected a suit of clothes, a false beard, a pair of blue spectacles, and other articles likely to be of use in making up a disguise. When he had donned them they gave him an appearance soarcely according with the fugitive of a few minutes previous. “I fancy no one will recognize me in this disguise even if pursuit is made,” he chuckled confidently. “The money? Yes, that is all safe. Ah! it was worth the battle, and victory perches on my banner, and I have won the day. A royal fortune! With Newcombe to cooperate with me, we oan double it at some foreign gambling place.” He gloated over the well-filled pocketbook for some time, then, securing it in an inner pocket, he paced the floor of the hut restlessly. An hour went by, and he glanced at his watch —Balph Prescott’s—his timepiece now, he told himself, with a hilarious laugh, as he pictured the discomfiture of the plotter when he regained his senses.

“Strange that Newcombe does not come!” he murmured, impatiently, at last, extinguishing the lantern, and going to the door of the hut Another hour went by, and he started from the spot. “I can’t, I won’t risk trouble by remaining here or going in search of Newcombe,” he muttered, determinedly. “He had his cue to be here. He is not here, bo I leave the country alone. With an abundance of money I can find an equally shrewd partner in Europe." Utterly selfish and heartless to the last, the impostor hurried through the woods. He had his plans formed to cross the country to a railroad, take an eastbound train, reach New York, and thence by steamer, Europe. Just where a narrow ravine lined the path he was traversing, he paused suddenly. ‘Like a flashing meteor, a woman’s form crossed his vision and blocked his path. “Stop!” Clear as a clarion note the mandate rang forth. “Isabel!” gasped the storied plotter. “Yes—l have found you; “What—what do you want?” stammered the abashed impostor. A white, shapely hand was extended from the folds of the long, dark cloak that enveloped the woman’s form. “I want the .fortune you have stolen from the mau you have so cruelly wronged, Paul Dalton!" was the impe- j rious reDlv.

CHAPTER XX. CONCLUSION. -**■ The hand of the impostor clqtched the breastpocket containing the precious wallet at the peremptory words of hia deserted wife. Then, with a wild glance about him, he made a movement of precipitate flight. The woman never moved. She simply repeated the ominous mandate. “Stop! I warn you, Paul Dalton. You know I never tell a lie. Take one more step, and— lam prepared to prevent a new wrong. I will kill you before you shall reap the reward of your awful wickedness!” The hand under the cloak moved significantly. The man shuddered; his hair crisped; his blood chilled. He knew she was a broken-hearted, desperate woman. His eyes were lurid with baffled hate as he gazed at her. “Then take it!” he hissed, as he drew forth the wallet. She reached out her hand, but uttered a startled cry as she realized in a flash that the acquiescent words of tlya scoundrel were employed solely to throw her off her guard. For he gave her a violont push back toward the edge of the yawning ravine. The woman did not, however, lose her presence of mind. With one hand she clutched the wallet and tore it from her husband’s grasp. With the other she stayed a fatal descent into the cavernous darkness of tin yawning void, three feet away. Her would-be executioner was less fortunate. His violent movement caused him to lose his balance; his wild struggle to gain the coveted pocketbook cost him dear.

He stumbled and fell. A cry of horror rent the woman’s lips as his struggling form disappeared over the edge of the cliff and was swallowed up in the black darkness of the ravine. She listened with bated breath for some sound or cry, but none came. Then, thrilled, appalled, she sped from the spot. Beaohing the first cottage, she summoned help. An old farmer and his hired man accompanied her to the ravine. There, lying across a mosscovered rook, they found the broken body of her husband. He was still alive, and they bore him to the village.. Placed under a dootor’s care, he was nursed by his wronged but faithful wife until morning. At earliest dawn, a bedraggled, limping form stole into Eidgeton and to Maple Leaf Farm. It was the baffled schemer, Balph Prescott. Before noon, taking with him the entire contents of Farmer John’s strong box, he sneaked out of the village.

' That village never heard of him again for two years, then it was to learn that he had died in a fight in a far Western gambling saloon. The man Newcombe, whom the real Paul Dalton had overpowered at the cabin, was brought to town by the sheriff and imprisoned. As Paul Dalton did not wish to make his own affairs public, however, he was released later, and disappeared. But on the morrow all Eidgeton knew the story of one man’s noble sacrifice and another man’s vilo plottings. They know, too, that to the last Isabel had clung to the battered wreck of humanity, who died deploring, if not repentant. It was a week later, after the burial of her husband, that Isabel returned to Eidgeton. Paul Dalton and his wife welcomed her at the old homo of Geoffrey Forsythe, where they had begun life anew, as husband and wife. “I have come back to stay with you, as you wish,” said Isabel, sadly. “I know you want mo, and, with my life wasted and broken, I will feel happiness to bo near you. My father has forgiven me.” “You have blessed our lives by lifting the dark veil of my past,” returned Paul, affectionately. “You recovered the fortune we would have lost. You shall have it with us here, as friend, adviser, sister.” “Not here,” answered Isabel, softly, “but at your proper home —Maple Leaf Farm. Buth, I have told your father all the story of your husband’s nobleness, of the evil deeds of his favorite, Balph Prescott, and he is brokenhearted over the injustice he has done. He is here to ask forgiveness and take you and your husband back to Maple Leaf Farm.” Bugged old Farmer John was a contrite, tearful man in that room a minute later. A happy man as, with his daughter and her husband, he returned to the old home that had been so cheerless without them. He know the true from the false now, the poor metal from the dross, and knew, too, that his future would be bright and peaceful, assured of the love and devotion of Hearts of Gold. Once more the golden grain is waving over the broad, fertile acres; once more Ruth’s happy face beams from the homestead door, and once more, blessed by the love of Paul, the sisterly devotion of Isabel, and the tender care of old Farmer John, she is the Heiress of Maple Leaf Farm. [the end.]

Midnight Music.

Whoever has listened to a Boston fire-alarm on a summer night, say through the open windows of a house on Beacon Hill—first, the hells in the immediate neighborhood; then, farther and farther away, fainter and fainter strokes from the South End and North End, and at last some almost inaudible, echo-like peals from across the river in Charlestown, or even from East Boston—whoever has heard this will be ready to appreciate a story told in the New York Tribune:

When the Rev. Brooke Herford first came to Boston, several years ago, he was the guest of Rev. Edward Everett Hale over night. In the morning he came down stairs with a look of pleased surprise on his face. “What a delightful custom you have here,” he said, “of chiming the bells at midnight!” His host and hostess looked at him in silence, wondering if he had taken leave of his senses. “Yes,” continued the guest, “I got up and leaned out of the window to listen. It was a pretty air they played, although I did not recognize it.” “This,” said Dr. Hale, telling the story afterward, “was the first time I ever heard of a fire-alarm being taken for a symphony. ” A lens for seeing under water gives a distinct vision of objects twenty or thirty feet off, the loss of extended sight under water being because an entirely different focus is required. The spectacles which provide this can be made by putting two watch glasses of threequarters of an Inch diameter and an inch radius back to back, or with the concavity outward. Many inanimate things appear to be endowed with reason. For instance, a collar button knows when a fellow has a sore thumb, and improves the occasion to refuse to do ijoty.

DEMOCRATIC PLATFORM

HOW THE PARTY STANDS ON IMPORTANT QUESTIONS. Republican Protection Declared to Be a Fraud on Labor to Benefit a Pew—A Tariff Tor Revenue Only—The Coinage Question. Text of tlie Resolutions. The following is the full text of the platform adopted by the National Democratic Convention at Chicago: The representatives of the Democratic party of the United States, in national convention assembled, do reaffirm their allegiance to the principles of the party as formulated by Jefferson and exemplified by the long and illustrious line of his successors In Democratic leadership from Madison to Cleveland. We believe the public welfare demands that these principles be applied to the conduct of the Federal Government, through the accession to power of the §arty that advooates them; and we solemnly eelare that the need of a return to these fundamental principles of a free, popular government, based on home rule and individual liberty, was never more urgent than now, when the tendenoy to centralise all power at the Federal Capital has become a menace to the reserved tights of the States that strikes at the very roots of our government under the constitution as framed by the fathers of the republic. Federal Control of Elections. We warn the people of our common country, Jealous for the preservation of their free institutions, that the policy of Federal control of elections, to which the Republican par ty has committed Itself, is fraught with the gravest dangers, scarcely less momentous than would result from a revolution, practically establishing monarchy on the ruins of the republic. It strikes at the North as well as tho South, and Injures the colored citizen even moro than the white; It means a horde of deiluty marshals at every polling place armed with Federal power, returning boards appointed and controlled by Federal authority, the outrage of the eleotoral rights of tho people in the several States, the subjugation of the colored peoJSle to the control of tho party in power and the reviving of race antagonisms now happily abated, of the utmost peril to the safety and happiness of all; a measure deliberately and justly described by a leading Republican Senator as the “most infamous bill that ever crossed the threshold of the Senate.” Such a policy, if sanctioned by law, would mean the dominance of a self-perpetuating oligarchy of officeholders, and the party first intrusted with its machinery oould bo dislodged from power only by an appeal to the reserved right of the people to resist oppression which is inherent in all self-governing communities. Two years ago this revolutionary policy was emphatically condemned by the people at the polls, but in contempt of that verdict the Republican party has defiantly declared in its latest authoritative utterance that its sucoess in the coming eleotlons will mean the enactment of tho force bill and the usurpation of despotic control over eleotlons in all the States. Believing that the preservation of republican government in the United is dependent upon the defeat of the polloy of legalized force and fraud, we invite the support of all citizens who desire to see tho constitution maintained in its integrity with the laws pursuant thereto which havo given our country a hundred years of unexampled prosperity, and we pledge tho Democratic party, if it be intrusted with power, not only to tho defeat of the force bill, but also to relentless opposition to the Republican policy of profligate expenditure, which in the short spaco of two years has squandered an enormous surplus and emptied an overflowing treasury, after piling new burdens of taxation upon tho already overtaxed labor of the country. Declaration for Tariff Reform.

We denounce Republican protection as a fraud on the labof of the great majority of the Amorioan people for the.beneflt of the few. We declare it to be a fundamental principle of the Democratic party that the Federal Government has no constitutional power to impose and collect tariff duties except for the purposes of revenue only, and we demaud that the collection of such taxes shall be limited to the necessities of the Government when honestly and economically administered. We denounce the McKinley tariff law enacted by the Fiftyfirst Congress as the culminating atrocity of class legislation; we indorse the efforts made by the Democrats of the present Congress to modify its most oppressive features in the direction of free raw materials and oheaper manufactured goods that outer into general consumption, and we promise its repeal as one of the beneficent results that will follow tho action of the people in intrusting power to tho Democratic party. Since the McKinley tariff went into operation there have been ten reductions of the wages of laboring men to one increase. We deny that there has been any increase of ‘prosperity •to tiro country slhce that tariff went into operation, and wo point to the dullness and distress, the wage reductions and strikes in the iron trade, as the best possible evidence that no such prosperity resulted from the McKinley act. We call the attention of thoughtful Americana to the fact that alter thirty years of restrictive taxes against the importation of foreign wealth in exchange for our agricultural surplus the homes and farms of the country have become burdened with a real-estate mortgage debt of over $2,.100,000,1)00, exclusive of all other forms of indebtedness; that in one of the chief agricultural StatoH of the West thore appears a real-estate mortgage averaging $lO5 per capita of tho total population, and that similar conditions and tendencies are shown to exist in the other agricultural exporting States. We denounce a polioy which fosters no industry so much as it does that of the Sheriff. Tire Question of Trade Reciprocity. Trade interchange on the basis of reciprocal advantages to the countries participating is a time-honored doctrine of the Democratic faith, but we denounce the sham reciprocity which juggles with the people’s desire for enlarged foreign markets and freer exchanges by pretending to establish closer trade relations, for a country whose articles of export are almost exclusively agricultural products, with other countries that are also agricultural, while erecting a custom-house barrier of prohibitive tariff taxes against the richest countries of the world that stand ready to take our entire surplus of products and to exchange therefor commodities which aro necessaries and comforts of life among our own peoplo. / Trusts anil Combinations, We recognize in the trusts and combinations which are designed to enable capital to secure more than its just share of the joint product of capital and labor a natural consequence of the prohibitive taxes which prevent the free competition which is the life of honest trade, but we believe their worst evils can be abated by law, and we demand tho rigid enforcement of the laws made to prevent and control them, together with such further legislation in restraint of their abuses as experience may show to be necessary. Lands for Actual Settlers. The Republican party, while professing a policy of reserving the public land for small holdings by actual settlers, has given away the people’s heritage, until now a few railroad and non-resident aliens, individual and corporate, possess a larger area .than that of all onr farms between the two seas. The last Democratic administration reversed the improvident and unwise policy of the Republican party touching the public domain and reclaimed from corporations and syndicates, alien and domestic, and restored to the people nearly one hundred million acres of valuable land to be sacredly held as homesteads for our citizens, and we pledge ourselves to continue this policy until every acre of land so unlawfully held shall be reclaimed and restored to the people. Th# Coinage of Sliver. We denounce the Republican legislation known as the Sherman act of 18!X) as a cowardly makeshift fraught with possibilities of danger in the future which should make all of its supporters, as well as its author, anxious for its speedy repeal. We hold to the use of both gold and silver as the standard money of the country and to the coinage of both gold and silver without discriminating against either metal or charge for mintage, but the dollar unit of coinage of both metals must be of equal Intrinsic and exchangeable value or be adjusted through International agreement or by such safeguards of legislation as shall insure the maintenance of the parity of the two metals and the equal power of every dollar at all times in the markets and in the payment of debts; and we demand that all paper currency Bhall be kept at par with and redeemable in such coin. We Insist upon this policy as especially necessary for the protection of the faimers and laboring classes, the first most defenseless victims of unstable xnuliey and a fluctuating currency. We recommend that the prohibitory 10 per cent, tax on State-bank issues be repealed. Relorm of the Civil Service. Public office Is a public trust. We reaffirm the declaration of the Democratic National Convention of 1876 for the reform of the civil service, and we call for the honest enforcement of all laws regulating the same. The nomination of a President, asin the recent Republican convention, by delegations composed largely of his appointees, holding office at his pleasure, is a scandalous satire upon free popular institutions and a startling illustration of the methods by which a President may gratify his ambition. We denonnoe a policy under which Federal officeholders usurp control of party conventions in the States, and we pledge the Democratic party to reform these and all other abases which threaten individual liberty and local self-government The Nicaragua Canal. In support of national defense and the promotion of commerce between the States we recognize the early construction of the Nicaragua Canal and its protection against foreign control as of great Importance to the United States. An Honorable Foreign Policy. The Democratic party Is the only party that has ever glyen the country a foreign nollcy consistent and vigorous, compelling respect aiiroad and inspiring confidence at home. While avoiding entangling alliances It has aimed to cultivate friendly relations with other nations, and especially with onr neighbors on the American continent, whose destiny is cldsely linked with our own; and we view with alarm the tendency to a policy of irritation

mid blunter which in liable at any time to confront or with the alternative of humiliation or war. We favor the maintenance of a navy strong enough for all purposes of national defense and to properly maintain the honor and dignity of the oountry abroad. Oppression in ltussla and Ireland. This oountry has always been the refuge of the oppressed from every land—exiles for oonsclenoe ,sakq—and In the spirit of the founders of our government we oondemn the oppression practiced by tho Russian Government upon Its Russian and Jewish subjects, and we call upon our national government. In the interests of Justice and humanity, by all right and proper means, to use its prompt and best efforts to bring about a cessation of these cruel persecutions in the dominion of the Czar, and to secure to the oppressed equal rights. We tender our profound anil earnest sympathy to thoso lovers of freedom who are struggling for home rule and the great cause of local selfgovernment In Ireland Restriction of Immigration. We heartily approve all legitimate efforts to prevent the United States from being used as the dumping ground for the known criminals and professional paupers of Europe, and we demand the rigid enforcement of the laws against Chinese immigration and tho Importation of foreign workmen under oontract to degrade American labor and lessen Its wages, blit wo condemn and denounce any and all attempts to restrict the Immigration of the Industrious and worthy of foreign lands. Pensions for Soldiers and Sailors. This convention hereby renews the expression of appreciation of the patriotism of the soldiers and sailors of the Union In the war for Its preservation, and we favor Just and liberal pensions for all disabled Union soldiers, their widows and dependents, but we demand that the work of the pension offloo shall be done Industriously, Impartially, and honestly. We denounoo the present administration as Incompetent, corrupt, dlsgraoeful, and dishonest. Waterway Improvements. Tho Federal Government should care for and improvo the Mississippi River and other groat waterways of the republto so as to secure for tho Interior States easy and cheap transportation to the tide-water. When any waterway of the republic is of sufficient Importance to demand the aid of the Government, such aid should be extended upona doflnlte plan of continuous work until permanent Improvement Is secured. The World’s Fair. Recognising the World’s Columbian Exposition as a national undertaking of vast Importance, In which the General Government has invited the 00-operatton of all tho powers of the world, and appreciating the aooeptanoe by many of such powers of the invitation so extended and the broad and liberal efforts being mado by them to contribute to the grandeur of tho undertaking, we are of opinion that Congress should make Buoh ncoesßary financial provision as shall be requisite to the maintenance of the national honor and public faith. Tile Common Schools. Popular eduoatlon being the only safe basis of popular suffrage, we recommend to the several States most liberal appropriation for the publlo schools. Free common schools are the nursery of good government, and they have always reoelved tho fostering oare of the Democratic party, which favors every moans of Increasing Intelligence. Freedom of education, being an essential of civil and religious liberty as well as a necessity for the development of intelligence, must not he interfered with under any protoxt whatever. We are opposed to State interference with parental rights and rights of consolonoe In tho education of children, as an Infringement of the fundamental Democratic doctrine that the largest Individual liberty consistent with the rights of otherß Insures the highest type of Amorioan citizenship and the best government. Admission of tho Territories.

We approve the action of the present House of Representatives In passing bills for the admission Into the Union as States tho Territories of New Mexico and Arizona, and we favor tho early admission of all the Territories having the neoossary population and resources to entitle them to Statehood; and while they remain Territories we hold that the official's appointed to administer tho Government of any Territory, together with the District of Columbia and Alaska, should ho bona-flde residents of tho Territory or distrlot in which their duties are to bo performed. The Democratic party believes In home rnle and the control of their own affairs by the people of the vicinage. Protection of Railway Km ploy ea. We fnrvor legislation by Congress and State Legislatures to proteot the lives and limbs of railway employes and those of dtherhazardous transportation companies, and denounce the Inactivity of the Republican party, and particularly the Republican Senate, for causing the defeat of measures beneficial and protective to this clasß of wage-workers. The Sweating System. We are In favor of the enaotment by the States of laws for abolishing the notorious sweating system, for abolishing contract oonvlot labor and for prohibiting the employment In factories of ohlldten under IB years of age. Sumptuary Laws. We are opposed to all oumjituary laws as an interference with the Individual rights of the citizens. Upon this statement of prlnolplos and policies tho Democratic party asks the intelligent judgment of the Amerioan people. It asks a change of administration and a change of party, in order that thero may be a change of system and a change of methods, thus assuring the maintenance, unimpaired, of institutions under which tho ropubllo lias grown great and powerful.

Miles and Miles of Salt.

One of the natural curiosities of Asia is the Great Salt Desert of Persia, which covers a largo territory about seventy miles south of Teheran. C. E. Biddulph, who recently visited this place, says that Darya-l-Namak is an extensive tract of ground, sloping on all sides toward the center, covered with an incrustation of solid salt several feet thick in most places, while in some parts it is of unknown depth. According to Goldthwaite’s Geographical Magazine, it must have taken many centuries to form. As he saw it from the mountain top it stretched away for many miles, appearing like a vast frozen lake. It extended as far as the eye could reach toward the south and west and glistened in the sun like a sheet of glass.His party finally approached the margin of the salt plain and decided to cross it. They found swampy ground for a mile or so and then entered upon the sheet of salt itself. Near the edge the incrustation was thin and the salt she<s was soft, sloppy and mixed with earth. At a distance of three or four miles from the edge the salt looked like solid ice as it is seen on any pond in northern latitudes during the "winter. The surface was not quite level but resembled that of ice which had partially thawed and then frozen again after a slight fall of snow. Of the solidity of this incrustation there could be no doubt, for camels, horses and mules were traveling over it without a vibration of any kind being perceptible. After marching for about eight miles upon this unusual surface the party halted to examine its composition. They tried, by means of a hammer and an iron tent peg, to break off a block of salt to carry away as a specimen. The salt, however, was so very hard that they could make no impression up it. They managed at last in another place, to chip off a lot of fragments which were of the purest white. In two or three days had absorbed so much moisture that they became soft and slately blue in cdlor.

Thebe are few more nigged figures among the Scotch scholars of the present generation than is Prof. Blackle, of Edinburgh. Though 83, he has never worn a pair of spectacles, and for thirty years he had no need of medical advice. He attributes the vitality of his old age to his custom of living by an unvarying system, and it is noteworthy that Oliver Wendell Holmes, who is of about the same age and equally well preserved, told an some time ago that his own good health was due to his habit of living strictly by rule, even to the temperature of his bath. It is interesting to know that Prof. Blackie does not go to bed until the clock strikes 12. He rises at 7:30, and always after his midday meal he takes a nap. Eliza Spabbow, of Martha’s Vineyard, has given a large tract of land to the Marine Hospital.

The Glant Dolls of Doual.

For two ceriturifes or more, th« quiet. little French town Doual has had the custom of waking up ouce a Fear to witness a scene which has not Its parallel anywhere in the world. The spectacle is a procession of gigantic dolls. ! \ At eleven o’clock on the first Sunday after July 6, Gayant and his family leave tho museum gardens, while the chimes in the beltry ring tho march of Gayants, and crowds of Douai citizens and visitors from all tho neighboring towns wait to welcome them with enthusiastic applause. Gayant wears a knight’s costume and a helmet with white plumes, lie is tweuty-two feet high, and liia skeleton is a wicker frame. He is carried by men concealed in the framework of hi? legs. Behind him walks his wife, Maiio Cagenon. She is twenty feet high, and wears the costume of a lady of tho court of Marguerite do Valois. She, likohor husband and children, has a wicker anatomy. The children are Monsieur Jacquofc, twelve feet high, who wears a velvet cap and Spanish cloak; Mademoiselle -Fillon, ten feet high, and dressed like her mother; and little Blnbln, eight feet high, who wears a child’s cap and carries a rattle.

The Gayants arc followed by a chariot. On a high platform at the back of this is a figure of Fortune. In front of Fortune, on a revolving platform, is a Spanish gentleman, a lady, a Swiss soldlor, a hanker, a peasant carrying a chicken, and a lawyer with a pocketful of documents.. As this platform revolves, it ke*eps the position of an incllnod piano, first one end and then tho other being raised to tho height of Fortune. This illustrates, as the “Song of the Gayants” explains, that fortune changes, and overy one, from tho gentleman to tho peasant, lias His vicissitudes. The origin of the festival Is not known. In 1745, a company of gunners from Douai, who were encamped at Tournal, suddonly deserted in a body, with their arms and haggago. The provost wished to search for them and wns very indignant, but their captain said: “Be calm. I know where they aro. They had to go and see their grandfather Gayant at Douai. Thoy will come back.” And in a few days they returned, well pleased with their h dlday, and bringing with them a largo number of recruits.

Appearances Are Deceptive.

Up Union avenue yesterday there trotted a brindle bulldog of large dimensions. Ho was particularly ferocious of aspect, with a tail that had been cut so short that it was a mere reminder of a tail, cars choppod close to his head and the picturesque frescoing of scars that freely adorned his massive frame boro mute testimony to tho ninny battles in which lie had takon a leading part. He was evidently looking for trouble—for a “scrap”—and he found It. Across tho street, sneaking demurely along, was a small black dog of tho cur species, with decrepit tail, a liberal crop of “whiskers" and that air of careless abandon so often scon in the tramp species of both tho human and the brute family. Tho bulldog spied him. “Aha!” said lie, “there’s an easy game. I’ll Just take a fail out of that fellow. ’’ And without more ado Bully leaped across the street, fell on tho other dog like a thousand of brick, and, cheered on by ills master, he proceeded to do up that little dog in Just the way Mitchell says he’ll do Sullivan. And then that little dog with the whiskers and tho air of abandon woke up. He grabbed Bully by the throat ,jmd downed him, hit a hunk out of ills neck, and then a large portion of Bully’s nose disappeared In the fracas. By that time Bully’smaster interfered and saved his pet from total annihilation. The little dog, still demure, licked his chops, smiled broadly and trotted on off up the street, while his opponent was taken home for repairs. And the moral is plain: Don’t Judge of a book by its cover.— Kansas City Times.

Anclent Dogs.

A paleontologist says that in that part of this country which is now called Colorado and Dakota there were several kinds of dog-like animals, about the size of foxes, which were nocturnal In their habits, having ”ery large eyes with which to see in thp night-time. They had great ears also, and long, sharp noses. All these things can be told from their skulls. -There was a huge species of true dog In Nebraska, but comparatively little Is known about It, because only very Incomplete remains have been discovered up to the present time. Another true dog was the aelurodon, which had some of the characteristics of the cat. It was abundant in Nebraska, had powerful crushing teeth, and is supposed to have been the ancestor of the hyenas of to-day. Probably it was a scavenger in its habits, devouring the small bodies of the antelopes and small camels which then browsed numerously on the plains and In the valleys of this country.

Screw Machine.

C. M. Spencer, of Windsor, Conn., the Inventor of the original screw machine and the Spencer repeating shotgun, has been at It again. This time he has made a device that turns out eight screws a minute, with slots and threads cut all ready for packing. One peculiarity of the machine is that It requires little or no attention. After the apparatus Is started it will go on making screws until the material gives out. Sometimes Mr. Spencer starts it up and goes to Hartford. He stays all day, and upon his return at night the machine Is still grinding out screws.

Strange Fortunes of Brothers.

When Savoy was annexed to France thirty-three years ago, one of the two brothers Pellona elected to become a French citizen, the other to remain Italian. To the former his new fatherland has offered the position of a bailiff in La lioche-sur-Foran, a very small place In the central part of France. The other brother at present holds the office of Minister of War in the Italian Government for the second Uw»e.

HERE’S ALL THE NEWS

TO BE FOUND IN THE STATB OF INDIANA. Giving a Detail**! Account of tlie Ntuneron- Crimes, Casualties, Fires* Suicides, , Deaths, JEto., Etc. Minor State Items. Tiios. Miller, an old settler near Goshen, is dead. & The saloonkeepers of Crawfordsvlllo have organized. Mrs. Caroline Weaver, a. Cicero pioneer, Is dead. New Alrany is raising a howl for a new railroad depot. It is estimated that Montgomery County has 2,149 dogs. Covington lias contracted for electric light and water works. A raskkt factory Is tho latest enterprise booked for M uncle. i 1 Seed Riggs. at Mitchell, had his back broken by driving under a tree. Montipello lias organized a military company with forty-seven members. Clifford Hendricks was badly burned by a natural-gas explosion at Muuote. Work on the new I uildings on tho site of tho burned glass works in Mancie has begun. Portland has a curiosity In a chickon with four wings, four legs, and one head. It has boon preserved. Lightning struck tho rosideneo of S. C. Allen, at Hammond, and rendered hta daughter blind lor life. Martin County has manv valuable springs that would coimhaml attention, If properly Improved. The extension of'thn ”Thrco I” railroad from Knox to Goshen, via Plymouth, Is being talked of. Wm. Vornhort, a prosperous farmer near .Seymour, was struck by lightning while atacking wheat. Dead. Baptists of Franklin aro making arrangements for an eight days’ meeting in the fulr grounds at that place. A stranger, supposed to bo William Cain of Turre Haute, died and whs burled In the potters’ field at Bloomfield. Albany, In Dolaware County, has socured a large paper-mill and a plant costing $100,090 will be erectod at once. Two tramps assaulted a railroader at Porn, and In eighteen hours thoy woro on their way to tho pen to do two yoars* time. Monroe Citv has called an Indignation meeting to protest against ’’so much indiscriminate lawlng" around there. Horace Peacock of Wheat field, was found dead In his bod at the house of a relative, near Itonssolaor, whore ho was visiting. A Peculiar dlsoaso allllctlng Wilson Cruder of English, has caused a scare In that town by some people calling It leprosy. The Anderson glass workers’ union is kicking against non-union made glass Doing used In Indiana’s World's Fair building. Prof. George C. Hubbard, rocontly principal of tho Madison High School, has accepted the chair of sdenco at Moore's Hill Collogo. Elsie Lkaoiiman of Hall, Morgan County, was standing under a tree a few days ago. Lightning struck tho tree, killing him and his dog. A wall gave way at Lafayette, dropping tho stock of throo Hours of tho Dlonhart Harness Company Into a cellar filled with water. Loss $4,000. A PETITION Is In circulation In Davies Connty for tho pardon of Ledgorwood and llarbln, who woro convicted of trying to burn the Court House. A steamboat has boon built In Lafayotto for service on tho Wabash River that Is eighty feet long, a double docker and will carry 300 passengers. At llnwpatch, near Goshen, a sixfoot splinter in a saw mil) was drlvoft through Hummer Dowell’s Intestines Into his left arm. It is thought ho will live.

Miinoik “tanirlofoot” has such a peculiar effect on Andorson men that they can’t turn around on tho commons after making a deposit of it under their vests. A 12- year-old daughter of John Brandt was drowned in the Wabash, near Huntington, by’a wagon overturning in which tuo lamlly was fording the stream. Vernon and North Vernon aro to bo connected by a street railroad, tho line passing through a picturesque strip of country along the banks of tho Muscatatuck. Evansville has had five of her inhabitants drowned In one week wbils they were bathing. The people there should Vie warned against tho evils of bathing. Mbs. Mahoabkt 800 an, of Marlon, has brought suit against the electric street railway company, of Kokomo, asking 810,000 damages for tho killing of her husband recently. While breaking a colt to drlvo, Scott Richardson, a wall known larmer and stockman, of Stockwel), received fatal injurlos from a kick by tho animal. He died soon after the accident. While Mavor Zern, Peru, was watching a race at tho track, his horse started down tho borne strotch. Tho crowd expected to see him killed. The buggy was wrecked," but the Mayor was unhurt Albebt Touy, a boy, escaped from the Reform School at Plainfield, and was discovered at Gosport. Officers attempted to arrest him, but he evaded their grasp and ran. They pursued him and tho lad, becoming overheated, fell dead. While returning from Chicago, Dr, J. T. Mercer of Arcadia, was Instantly killed at that place in attempting to alight from tho cars before they stopped. He struck the platform and roiled under the train, the wheols passing over his body Just belbw the shoulders. The Evansville and Indianapolis passenger train collided with a freight at Brazil and W. P. Davis of Brazil, received several painful bruises and ancthcr passenger was badly cut about the head and face. Katie Smitil an 8-year-dld girl, an inmate of Worolee Orphau’sHorae, Richmond, was instautly killed by the failing of a swing. The little girl was sitting in the swing, when one of tho posts supporting it broke off just below the ground. It fell, striking her on the head, crushing the skull and causing almost instant death. She was a native of Fort Wayne. Lightning struck a short telegraph circuit in Roachdale and set fire to several barns, whereuDon, it is reported, the alarmed citizens cut down all remaining private wires in tho town. Township Trustees at Crawford9ville have decided to increase the salary of teachers holding twelve, twenty-four and thirty-six months’ license from 82, $2.10 and 82.25 per day to 82,10, $2.25 and 82.35. At Farmington, south of Seymour, a bullet crashed through the window of a car on a P., C., C. & St L. passenger train and struck William Porter In, the breast, but contact with the glass lessened the force, so that the gentiemaa was not seriously hurt