Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 4, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 February 1893 — Page 4

GAINS AND LOSSES. Dome *he hours when we sit in the shadow That Alls like the droop of a wing O’er the nest that is naked and empty When the fledglings have learned how to sing, Then woe is the heart for the old time, The time that was busy and gay. With the world and its climor about us, And we in the midst of the fray. In the shadow we count up our losses; We creep wherS we marched with the best. Oh! the ache wheu wo try to walk softly, The cry of our soul against rest. And we grieve for the golden heads vanished Onr children are women and men, And wistful and deep is the yearning To have them but children again. And we fret o'er the fruitless endeavor, The labor that satisfied not, Till the shadow grows thicker an 1 longer, And the blur in our eyes is a blot On tbe lingering splendor of snashia i, That taps with its lances of light At the shut and barred door of onr memory, Au after-glow radiant and bright. Do we see nothing else but our losses. We mourning there, fools and purblind. With the crown and the kingdom before us. The conflict and turmoil behind? Shall the harvest lam out for the seed time, The bud be less blithe than the leaf? Is there joy when the plough breaks the furrow, And none when the hand binds the sheaf? Oh! wings that are folded and drooping, Spring wide in the evening’s uplift; Reach out to the stars that are showing The skies in a silvery rift. No day of our days is so hallowed As that when we see, just before, The light in the honso of our Father Shine out through His half-open door. —{Mar garetE. Gangster, iu Harper’s Hazar.

THE ESCAPE.

BY W. DELAPLAINE SCULL.

The last palisade—over! and limbs long stiffened felt lissom once more with the life of twenty-live. Now for a slow and cautious creep along the gully by which water came into the township; later on he would bethink him of that narrow escape at the third doorway. Whisht! a man’s bead in the road, and he bent down once more behind the earth-ridge and pushed his way upstream with difficulty, showing as little of himself as possible. It was an officer coming into the town late. Very silently; the moon was troublesome to one just escapiug, but, praise the Lord, who watches over bold Englishmen, the guard had not yet discovered their loss, and the water was bearably cold. Never return thuuks too soon! The officer reined his horse on a rising slope, and, turning in hissnddle, glauced back over the shadow-dappled land so that his eye, running up the shiny ribbon o[ stream, suddenly the black dot laboring tnvay against its current. Instincts of destruction ran along the nerves of his hand; he drew a pistol and fired, sending a splash of water over John’s head, while the echoes smote the fortress-walls and lost themselves in the woodlands behind. A low cla (or rose out of San Jago; John rose out of the stream and ran to the copses. The Spaniard spurred after him with drawn sword, eager for the pleasure of slicing him wheu caught up; in a few minutes he was alongside, but this being a shadowed spot he stayed his hand overhead till the stroke should be sure. In that moment John doubled like a hare and rushed desperately at the soldier, who reined up all at once and brought down his blade—vainly. For the cunning Englishman ducked under the horse’s body, then popped out, seized his foe’s leg and foot, and with a sudden tierce heave shot the soldier sideways out of his saddle and on to his head. There he lay brokennecked, while the victor grasped the bridle, bent to earth and snatched the sword, mounted the animal and stuck the weapon’s point into its haunch; off shot the horse with a snort of pain, while the clatter of pursuers arose behind, finally sinking away as the pine trees dew by. Then, as the moon entered a thick cloud bank, they came to an open prairie, and onward into darkness they went without more than the slightest of stumbles. Several miles; the horse began to breathe hard and sob, then settled into a slow trot.

More miles. The trot became a walk, and the walk more difficult; more miles jet, very long ones, and the earth went up and down as the darkness became gray—there were low hills and shallow ravines, then came rocks, and ledges, and cliffs; the gray speedily thinned, the horse stopped at a clill wall. To the right, to the left, John looked for an opening: there was none. He raised his hands, licked a finger of the cleanest, thought he felt a faint freshness on the left side of it, and so turned in that direction. After some hundred yards he came to a crack in the wall; he pushed into it. There was hardly room at first, then it widened into a chasm, and wound along in darkness with a band of light at the top —then came a sudden descent, and the wearied creature he rode stumbled and threw him into a pool of water. The shock of the plunge brought him together again. He struggled beneath the water, came up at last, half choked, and pulled himself upon a rocky ledge with the sword still hanging from his wrist. Looking for the horse, he saw nothing but a violent commotion on the water surface, which presently ceased; a few air bubbles came to the top and

broke, that was all; his rescuer had ended its life in the depths from which he had escaped. Then he sat for a space, and thought; he could not stay there, they would track him to the rock wall and cleft; was there another way to the other side? The cold, shut-in lake was quite still now, the cleft by which he had come in was dimly visible across the dark level; he stood up and looked behind him ; the cleft continued there like a narrow road upward. Then he knew that he had come to the hidden source of the stream that passed mysteriously underground, and came to daylight in the country where the Spaniards had placed Fort San Jago. He went along the chasm and after an hour or two stood on the platform; bare rock and nothing else; he went on higher still, with hunger asserting itself, miles and more miles yet. The sun came out and sent yellow rays across the pinnacles, casting purple shadows as queerly shaped as they. He climbed the highest of these rock-teeth and saw a vmstu pward plain, with an orange-tinted lim; bore and there gray twists, where a slight valley came, and a few lonely ■tones—really great boulders of a primeval -tea; he looked behind and only a faint green tinge on that horizon indicated the grass country of San Jago, but he felt that even now they might be at the cWt in tbe rock-wall, those SDan-

iards who treated captives so hardly, so there was no course but forward. Forward then he went, and the sand became thick and soft underfoot so that he had to use the long, Spanish blade to help him in walking. At last even that beeame an emeumbmnee and he would have cast it away, only the knot had become twisted and would only take a little time to undo, so he kept it out of indolence and ebbing wits. Here and there came a harder surface which was restful to the feet, and then he would sink for a space and try to liopo he might get across this place: then he went on and on. with the glare iu his eyes from below and ahot, gray sky overhead. The sun heated his wet rasrs; they became burning moist; they blistered bis back, sore already from the payment of yesterday’s forced labor in tbe fortress; he had to turn round at times and give his back a relief by being roasted in front. At last the whole place swam round him, there came moments when he seemed treading over a crimson waste under a vermilion skv, and with the first pains of thirst deadening the ache of huuger he lay down iu the shadow of the first rock lie reached. There he stayed till no shadow was left, shrinking away from the hot, encroaching yellow till lie was at last covered by it, then rose again and plodded along through the scorching hours with burnt feet in his crackling old shoes.

His wits were all ablur, but his bodily senses felt that the whole la' 1 lay on a vast upward slope, a continual gentle pressure back, as it were, to each toilsome step he took. In the late afternoon lie felt a slight pulling tendeuev, a sign that he was on an imperceptible descent; then came a delicate long pleat in the sand, the ascent began again, and he fell stupidly down, with some indistinct fancy of staying there till nothing was left of him but bones—baked, dusty bones. But when his face touched the hot sand he got up again and trod on. He had no fear of pursuit now, for he was in the Thirst Land no man entered to return. The Spaniards had spoken of it, and they had let him go into it, knowing it was but taking the labor of liis destruction off their own hands. lie could imagine them cousoliug themselves for the loss of the horse and officer by telling again the tales of the desert; how to go into it for an hour was to be lost, and to be lost was to wander round on one’s steps, which meant death finally. Then he resolved to lie down and bear his pains as a valiant man might, till night should come and he could follow one of the stars. By this time a little shadow lay at his feet, there was a rock not far away, and he went and lay down there, trying to be sensible and steadyheaded. He was glad he kept the sword now, because if his miseries became too .sore he had with it a way to cut them; sleep was denied him by the keen thirst that baked his tongue into wood, but it was much to escape the red-hot fingers of the sun.

As he lay therewith his battered old hat over his face the stillness came terribly on him at times. He thought he heard distant voices calling, and fancied Shiite foe had crept up to the other side of flic slone and was stealing round on him —then it seemed to him as if he was lying on English sand and the sea was foaming round Plymouth breakwater hard by—then he raised his hat for the fortieth time to think for the fortieth time of this great Thirst Land, before his lightheadedness began once more, together with the burning ache for water iu every flesh-atom. The shadow lengthened, the sand in it cooled, the relief was grateful, though small. Later on the sun went down, a red globe in a purple haze; the stars appeared. and he followed one for a long time till he got among rocks and bruised his body against them in the dark. It was of no use going on till moonrise; he lay there on the stony floor, aud his thirst kept him from feeling the hardness of it —for a while.

At last he could bear it no longer, but rose and ran on, then presently struck against one of the ’stones and fell, stunned, as he hud fallen before out in the sand tracks. Still the man was not beaten. When he had recovered he wiped his heavy eyes with the back of his hand and felt his way along through that rocky maze, tapping his sword on each side and following the passages, holding on to his star with all the bulldog instinct of his race. At last the moon came out and lit the plain, showing it mounting up and up in a long, slow slope till the eye lost it in darkness, hut covered so fur with stones, stones, stones, like the graveyard of the whole human race. So he went on, rattling his tongue about in iiis arid mouth, wondering why he did not lie down and die at once, why he did not at once fall down on his blade aird end his portion of life, yet persevering all the time, no unworthy man of his countryside and yoeman name. He had no visions now, in the night; they were reserved for the treacherous day, when the guiding stars should be hidden. So through the long hours he travelled, and at last sh (1 filed out iuto places where the stones, that dreadful multitude all exactly alike, stood in groups only. The moon sped on her course, and the ground underfoot sent a ring from his steel-stall —it was rock. Then the stones ceased altogether and a series of low ridges came; they taxed his shaky legs and arms to their full, low though they were, so that he lay down to rest on each as he got upon it. Then he clime to the long ridge, highest of all this huge inclined land, and saw its edge winding away to right, to left, for miles in the hard moonlight, and the rock floor sloping downward far below him, for miles and miles more.

Looking behind, the sight of the fearful maze of wilderness he had wonderfully come through tilled him with terror, and he fled away from it, down and on, only to fall again like a child. Then for awhile his tortured frame could carry him uo more; there he lay, deliriously mumbling about streams, and lakes, and fountains, till the sun came and struck his bare head with its hot rays. Still he lay there, now awake and, strange to say, not mad, though very Weak, sorely suffering, and hardly able to think it all. Indeed, he did not think, but merely followed up his instinct when he crawled up on to his feet and staggered along, swaying one way for many paces, then the other, hanging his hands and head, moaning in a dry, broken way, like a cut bellows, yet still going on. And then his dim eye received a refreshing momentary coolness—a plant growing green ai his feet 1 Down he sank \ipon it, seized it,chewed the dusty leaves; there were little driblets of earth here and there. Another bit of green caught his eye; he raised his heavy head, and saw that 100 paces away the plateau on which he stood broke off sheer. He had crossed the desert, for down there, 3,000 feet below, were green plains, palms, and a river, and beyond—the blue Pacific! The poor, wasted creature raised his bony, cracked claws and gurgled with triumph. He had cheated the Spaniards and the Thirst Lands; hurrah 1

And there were more plants nearer the edge; to them he hastened, with the blade still dragging from his wrist., to fall prone on a little group of them, and on a huge puff-adder lying almost invisible along an earth-grove. Instantly the beast drew back its head and struck him on the bare leg; then fled. A rage tilled him; he seized the sword in both shaking hands, brought it down nt the marked back, missed it, fell forward, and the steel bent and broke under him as the enemy glided awav. But after it he panted with the strength of revenge; caught it up as it twisted by a large stone, pushing the stone over its neck by an effort, aud, kneeling, cut its writhing body into long strips with the fragment of his blade. Then he got back somehow to the green tufts, and while the poison worked its way to his heart, sweetened his last moments of life with those leaves, till a stupor came over him and he slept with his destroyer the sleep of death on the border of the Sweet Palm Coast, as the Indians called it in their tongue. Such was the escape of John Tisden, whose bones have long become dust, the only man who ever crossed the Tierra dc Sed.—[Black and White.

Twenty-two Billions Insurance.

The enormous increase in the fire insurance business of this country iu recent years is shown, remarks the New York Times, by some figures just collected by a well-known adjuster, who fixes the total amounts insured at the close of 1892 at 122,001,000.003, which represents about 82.5 per cent, of the total property valuations in the United States. In 18G2 the percentage of amounts insured in the total property valuation was only nine. In 1870 it had increased to 10.78; in 1880, to 20.90, and in 1890 to 80.41. The total amounts insured to-day are nearly thirteen times greater than they were in 1860, while the property valuations are only four, or at the most four and a half times greater. C. C. lline, of New York City, an excellent authority on lire insurance matters, said recently that the amount of this increase is not so very astonishing, because every industry enlarges here phenomenally, but that tbe percentage of increase ou the values to be insured raises the inquiry whether the fire insurance mine has not now been exhausted. Whether or not these reductions as to the fertility of the tire insurance field are correct, it is certain that there never was more grumbling among the underwriters than there is to-day. The year that has just closed has been remarkably severe for fire losses, and in Brooklyn and Milwaukee the field men are in a state bordering on consternation. This condition of affairs is the result of numerous causes, extending through a term of years. Increasing rates and decreasing commissions, together with a complicated agency system involving agents, brokers, and middlemen of high and low degree, have each contributed to the general demoralization of which the underwriters complain.

Pottery and Porcelain.

There is a vast difference between pottery and porcelain; pottery being opaque and porcelain translucent. “Faience” is the term applied to all glazed pottery, and “biscuit” to all unglazed pottery or porcelain. Technical terms are troublesome, and therefore will be omitted when possible. InChiua, porcelain was manufactured before the Christian era; but tbe art did not reach Europe until the sixteenth century. Pottery had been manufactured at least two centuries before; but, although constantly searching, chemists were not able to find the necessary materials for the manufacture of porcelain. The art of glazing with salt was discovered at Burslem, England, in 1680, in a rather curious way. A servant while boiling salt for brine, in an earthen vessel, allowed the water to boil away; the pan became red hot, and wheu it was noticed was covered with a beautiful glaze. News of this discovery spread rapidly; and the potters taking advantage of the hint, salt glaze became common. There are two kinds of porcelain, hard and soft; and there are several methods by which these may be distinguished. Tnc soft paste can be scratched with a sharp knife on any part not covered with the glaze. It also has a somewhat soapy, warm feeling to the touch, and the fracture has the appearance of cream. Hard, or, as it is sometimes called, “true,” porcelain is heavier than the soft, is a purer white, and is cold to the touch. When broken, the fracture looks like alabaster; and, as a rule, the rim underneath the plates and other pieces escapes the glaze.—[Demorest’s Magazine.

Ants in Africa.

A correspondent of the London Graphic writing from Umtali, Africa, says: Sir John Lubbock ought to come and live here; he could revel iu ants. There are millions and tens of millions of them. The ground round our huts is riddled with deep holds, the entrance to white ants’ nests. These insects are terribly destructive; a leathern bag will be eaten into holes In one night. I think everything in the country would be devoured by them if it were not for the black ants. These are quite half an inch long, and they prey on the smaller white ants. One suddenly sees a long black line extending for thirty or forty yards along the hospital compound. The line moves with a sharp, rustling sound, like the crisp rustling of dried leaves. One looks closer and finds that the black line is an army of ants going to storm a white ant heap. One ant alone goes at the head of the column, which is about eight inches wide. On each side run single ants, bustling up stragglers and rushing to drag sticks and straws out of the way of the army, which streams down into the nest it liasin view, and in about ten minutes streams home again iu excellent order, each black ant carrying a white one. It is a most curious sight. There are very few birds to be seen; a few golden- orioles and some dear little black and gray birds, the si»e of tomtits, are all that one comes across.

Victoria’s Last Restiug Place.

When the Queen dies her mortal remains will rest in the gray granite sarcophagus with the late lamented Prince Albert’s ashes. < Underneath the arms of the Queen and Prince Albert, on the monument, is inscribed “Farewell, wellbeloved. Here at last I will rest- with thee. With thee in Christ I will rise again.” The white marble recumbent statue of the Prince Consort is in the uniform of a Field-Marshal, wearing the mantle of the Order of the Garter —this is on the right; the left side of the lid and the unoccupied space is where the Queen’s body will be laid. Bronze angels with the outstretched wiDgs and flowing robes are at each corner of the tomb.— [London Society.

CONFEDERATE CASH.

UNIQUE COLLECTION OK PAPER MONEY OWN ED BY UNCLE SAJI. How the Notes Were Made—A Big Business In Counterfeiting—Depreciation of the Notes. Hidden away among the archives of the Treasury Department is a curious volume which few people have ever looked into. Though nothing more nor less tlian a scrap book, it is filled from cover to cover with money. Altogether it holds not les9 than 3200,000. The contents are real currency of legitimate issue, and yet the whole of them would not be aoeepted to-day in payment for a bag of flour or a box of soap. This is because Confederate notes and bonds, which com pose the collection described, are worth at present nothing more than their value as waste paper, save in so far as certain specimens nre in demand hv collectors. Nevertheless the volume is extremely interesting bv reason of the fact that it represents the most complete existing assemblage of the “shinplasters” put in circulation as promises to pay by the government of the South during the Civil war.

Looking over the pages of the scrap book, the various issues of currency being arranged in chronological order, one follows front start to finish the history of the greatest civil conflict that the world has ever seen. The story of a nation is always told most interestingly by its money. “Two years sifter date the confederate "states promise to pay,” reads the inscription on the earliest notes, but very soon this is replaced by a more conservative legend, setting the date of payment at “six months after the ratification of a treaty of peace between the confederate states and the United States,” and this latter fotdn holds up to the end of the war. The money is patterned pretty closely after Uncle Sam’s, but the clear lines of steel engraving are feebly imitated by the processes of photolithography. "Why this method of printing employed is quite an entertaining anecdote in itself.

It will be remembered, perhaps, that Charles 6. Mepiinger of Soutli Carolina on taking office as the first secretary of the confederate treasury made a contract with the American Bank Note Company of New York for a supply of paper notes for SI,OOO, SSOO, SIOO and SSO. The order was filled, a considerable quantity of the currency being shipped to Richmond and safely delivered. The goods being found satisfactory the bank note company was requested to send on the engraved plates. This was done, but the United States government was cfn the alert and succeeded in capturing the plates on board of the vessel which was conveying them to Richmond. A few years later this matter was brought up in Congress very effectively as an argument against employing the American Bauk Note Company to print United States money, its action in lending such services to the confederate government being denounced ns disloyal. Now, nt the time when the war began, the American Bank Note Company had a branch establishment at New Orleans, which was conducted by a man named Schmidt. Subsequent to the event just described plates for SIOO, SSO, $lO and $5 notes were engraved there and printed from. This did not last long, however. Blanton Duncan, lieutenant colonel of a Kentucky regiment, started a private establishment at Richmond for producing paper currency by lithography, obtaining contracts to supply the confederate treasury. Other shops were set up later on for the same purpose, and the rivalry for government contracts being very great, they all united against Schmidt. At this period any northern man residing in the south was an object of suspicion, being regarded as au enemy and presumably an abolitionist. Accordingly the governor of Louisiana, yielding to public sentiment, swooped down upon the branch office of the Bank Note company, and confiscating all the material in the shape of plates, tools, etc., distributed it among the lithograph printers. About half a dozen of these lithographic establishments at Richmond and at Columbia, S. C., continued to print .paper money for the confederate treasury up to the close of the war. From the beginning to the end of the conflict not fur from $1,500,030,003 in shinplasters of various denominations were turned out and pat into circulation. Looking over the curious scrap book described one notices that each note is actually signed in pen aud ink with the names of the treasurer and register of the treasury, the serial number being put on in like manner. This was accomplished by employing clerks to sign for those officials. They were arranged to work in pairs, one signing for the register and the other for the treasurer. The numbers were added by a third person. At the beginning this labor was performed by men, but they were in such demand for fighting purposes that women were substituted later on. Altogether 244 women and'6B men were engaged in this task during the war. They did the signing and numbering of the notes by sheets, which were afterwards cut up.

One complaint that was made against Schmidt was that he was horribly slow, dnd this was a very serious matter where there was an immediate necessity for almost unlimited supplies of a negotiable medium. The lithographic establishments imported the paper and other material in immense quantities by blockade runners from England. They also obtained from Great Britain their workmen, nearly all of whom were Scotchmen. The firm of Keating A Ball, at Columbia, survived ali the other moneyprinting concerns, and toward the end of the war they had all the contracts and were the official engravers for the confederate treasury*. Their factory was destroyed by Geueral Sherman on "his famous raid of 1805. In 1864 because of the continued quarrels among the different people who did the printing of the currency, the treasury appointed an officer with the title of superintendent, whose duty it was to conduct dealings with the lithographic engravers and to superintend all matters respecting the production of the paper currency. As if there had not been other causes sufficient to depreciate the value of the confederate currency that government was still further embarrassed by the counterfeiting on an enormous scale of its issues of paper money. Gangs of accomplished forgers in the Bermudas and in the north devoted much attention to the production in immense quantities of fairly accurate imitations of the notes and bonds of the southern states. It is certain that these criminals actually employed the services of lithographers in the money-printing establishments which supplied shiuplasters for the support of the war, and in this way they were able to secure impressions made on paper matrices from the original lithographic stones. Thus they had no difficulty in reproducing the bonds and notes by the simplest mechanical means in sac simile, the ouly difference being that the counterfeits were apt to be a little bigger than the originals by reason of the stretching of the paper matrix.

At the beginning of the war the coo* federate pajier money was current at par. It soon began to depreciate, however, and by 1803 its market value had fallen to about 50 per cent. Toward the end of the war it was worth so little thatono had actually to be a millionaire in order to live at all. Milk cost S4O a quart, and in one recorded iustancc a southern gentleman with a fair appetite paid $lO5 for a very modest lunch at a restaurantsuch a meal as one could get for about 45 cents in Washington now. At the fall of the confederacy the currency passed for 1 cent and a fraction on the dollar. An ex-colonel of volunteers, located in Washington, told the writer an odd story of an incident which occurred when the army of the Potomac was in full pursuit of Lee’s forces. As fast as the wagon tratus of the enemy were overtaken they were pillaged and in one of them were found the funds of a military paymaster. About $50,000 of the confedrate money seized was crammed into a gunny-sack and delivered to the officer quoted. In response to a request he gave the entire sum to a sergeant, who afterward informed him that lie had been able to dispose of it at the rate of $5 oy SIOO to coufedrates, the presumption being that the latter expected to be able to use it profitably in parts of the south where the currency had not yet dropped to nothing in value, —[Washington Star.

The Great Wall of China.

The scenery front the Great Wall is very fine. The wall is here a dividing lino between the high, rugged hills of China, which tower above us on the one hand, and the great sandy plains of Mongolia on the other, with dim mountainsummits beyond in the far distance. Over these barren, rocky spurs and acclivities, ascending to their very summits, winding about in their irregular curves and zigzags, its serried battlements clear-cut against the sky on the topmost ridges, descending into dark gullies to appear agaiu rising on the other side, the endless line of massive stone and brick runs on and on until lost to sight behind the farthest range. And so on it goes for miles and miles, eastward to the Pechili Gulf, and westward, mostly in two great, rambling lines, along the border of the Gobi Desert and Kansu, until it ends among the foot-hills of the Nan Shanrange. However we may regard it, whether as a grand conception for the defense ot an empire, as an engineering feat, or merely as a result of the persistent application of human labor, it is a stupendous work. No achievement of the present time compares with it in magnitude. But it has outlived its usefulness. The powerful Tatar and Mongol hordes, whose sudden raids and invasions it was built to resist, are no more to be feared. The great Genghis and Kublai could not lead their people to gory conquest now as they did centuries ago. The Chinese civilization has endured, while the onoe couquering Mongols, the people who in their brightest days established an empire from the Black Sea to the China coast, and a court at Peking of such luxury and splendor as Marco Polo described, are now doomed to pass away, leaving nothing behind them but the traditions, and records, and ruins of a brilliant past. The wall stands as a sharp line of division between the tribes of the north and the Chinese. The latter, though repeatedly subdued and forced to bear a foreign yoke, have shown an irrepressible vitality to rise like a phenix and to reassert their supremacy and the superiority of their civilization.—[Century.

Working Days in Different Countries

In these days of ever-recurring labor disputes in almost every part of the globe, says Iron, of theories of the British workmen for the Continental Sunday (but, mind, only so far as pleasure, not labor, is concerned); and, of the weakkneed endeavors of the Continental artificer, in his turn, to have the British resting Sunday introduced, it is interesting to note, from figures furnished by a Polish statistician, the number of working days per annum standard in various countries. As might be expected, the inhabitants of Central Russia labor fewest days in the year—to wit, 237. Then comes Canada, with 270; followed by Scotland, 275; England, 278; Portugal, 283; Russian Poland, 288; Spain 200; Austria and the Russian Baltic Provinces, 295: Italy, 298; Bavaria, Belgium, Brazil and Luxembourg, 300; Saxony, France, Finland, AVurtemburg, Switzerland, Denmark and Norway, 302; Sweden, 305; Prussia and Ireland, 305; United States, 300; Holland, 308, and Hungary 312. Assuming that these figures are fairly correct, it may be considered that in a few instances they afford ground for mild surprise. For example, if the Canadian working man has only to toil, statutablv, 270 days out of 305, why does he cross the boundary line to the United States, where he will be kept at the grindstone, so to speak, for 306 days, or only six less than the Hungarian has to slave? Again, it is curious that Brazil should be bracketed with Bavaria and Belgium at 300 days, these three constituting the only countries mentioned in the initial letter of whose name is “B;” while it is worth noting that the sweatiug Fritz and the downtrodden Pat are in the same category, these gentlemen having legally to delve for some 30 days more in the twelvemonth than their more fortunate Scottish and English colleagues.

Elephant and Locomotive.

The remark of George Stephenson that the result of a collision between a cow and an engine would be “so much the worse for the coo” is historical. That even a greater animal than a “coo” wilP fail to score a touch-down against a locomotive, except under favorable conditions, is amply shown in a report from Siam. It seems that a full-grown elephant broke a fencing of the railway near the Oktwin Station, and then coolly walked down the line between the rails. The mail train from Mandalay shortly afterward put in an appearance, and, frightened by the noise and the sparks from the stack, the elephant turned and charged the unknown antagonist. The traiu kept on the track, but tho rash attacker was nowhere. It was swept away with such force that the carcass was hurled down an embankment with the skull crushed in. An elephant oi large size will weigh about three or four tons, and if this particular one had attained any speed in the charge which proved so disastrous to its valiant career, the collision must have been a most serious one. An elephant with a thin skull can hardly expect to be victorious in a conflict of this kind; nevertheless, the escape of the traiu without injury is very fortunate.—[Hong Kong Gazette.

The population of London now exceeds that of New York, Brooklyn, Philadelphia and Chicago combined, and these four arc the only American citie? having one million or in or- inhabitants

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

A VLiL-KxowN Episcopal Bishop from a Western State was in New York a short time ago, and during his visit ran across a young English curate walking the streets foot-sore and weary. “I came over to America,” he said, “just to get a bit of experience, don’t you khow, and am hoping to find a small parish with a vacancy.” “Just come right along with me,” said the Bishop. “I am going away out into the Southwest and will give you a chauce to get all the experience you want.” The young curate gladly availed himself of the opportunity and shortly afterwards arrived at the scene of his- future labors. That very day the Sheriff of a neighboring county came in with a six-footer who was jailed on a charge of triple murder; there was a freight, collision “up the road;” the police raided the “Half Acre;” a crapshooter slashed another with a razor; there was an alarm of fire and a suicide. To add to the young curate’s “experience,’’ the local paper that night apologized for the lack of local news, saying that there wasn’t much going on of a sensational character and police circles were unusually quiet. But the curate will remain and thinks he has struck a field where he can do good work. The great Yukon River of Alaska is soon to be made a highway of commerce by the establishment on it of a regular service of side-wheel steamers. The first boat of the proposed line, now building, will run from St. Michael’s Island, fiftyfive miles from the mouth of the Yukon —at which point it will connect with Norton Sound steamers—over 2,200 miles up the river. The fact that Alaska has the third—possibly the second—largest river in North America is not often remembered. The new steamer, the P. B. Weare, will establish trading posts along the river, will trade in all kinds of merchandise, and the returns will b& in gold dust and furs. It will carry a complete assaying outfit aud everything that a miner requires in taking out and testing valuable mineral. It will also take along a sawmill to cut timber for trading stations. The frame of the Weare was laid and fitted at Seattle, and she will be put together at St. Michael's Island. She will be 178 feet long, 28 feet beam, and 4 feet deep. The Yukon is only navigable during July, August, and September, and it is thought that for the pres ■ ent probably but three or four trips a year may be made. Ax interesting feature of the report of the Connecticut Bureau of Labor Statistics is the part showing the growth of mutual benefit societies among working men and women in that State. The largest increase was in the group for aiding sick members and burying the dead. There is similar evidence of growing forethought and provision among the laboring classes of other States. It is well, however, warns the New York Press, to look into the character of the societies which promise benefits. “Where the prominent feature is speculative there is danger ahead. Losses to investors through associations whose promises of return have far exceeded the legitimate results of investment or other accumulation have beeu too frequent during the past year.” It seems rather incredible to speak of the candle power of search-lights as in the millions and hundreds of millions, but according to the Electrical World, this is warranted by facts. The lamp itself does not give a very high candlepower when measured in any one direction, but when a magnifying lens is used, which collects all the light, as it were, and throws it in one direction, the intensity of the light is enormously increased. For instance, in the search-light which is being experimented with upon the World’s Fair grounds, the candle-power of the arc light, alone is only 150,000 candles, the carbons being I*2 inches long aud 1 3-10 inches in diameter. When this is surrounded by a reflector four feet in diameter, the candle-power is multiplied to the somewhat startling figure of 460,000 candles.

They arc trying what they call a Good Will Farm in Maine, with a considerable degree of success. Bad boys are sent to it instead of to reform schools. On the farm they are separated, as far as possible, into groups, in a number of qottages that have been erected. The idea is that in this way the boys may be subject to the beneficial influences of home life. The household work in each of these families is divided up among the boys, who also work on the farm or in shops. The same thing is to be tried in Massachusetts also. A farm has been bought in Danvers, on which it is proposed to care for 500 homeless and destitute children. Its distinctive feature, the cottage system, might well be tried on a larger scale in other States, in place of the great institutions in which so many boys and girls are huddled together. Tiierb is a rush of gold hunters to the new diggings in the San Juan country, Colorado. Claims have been staked out on the San Juan River for seventy-five miles from its mouth, aud for twenty-five miles up the Colorado River. Men are pouring in from all the adjoining regions, and from Utah and Arizona. They are staking claims over each other, and lively trouble is looked for. Living is enormously high. Supplies cannot be obtained anywhere in the vicinity; those persons who brought supplies won’t sell, and those who didn’t are suffering. Few, if any. took tents, there is no material at hand with which to build houses, and the prospectors are sleeping under ledges of rocks-and wherever a little shelter can be found. Some are making money now, a few gaining as much as sls a day panning out dirt, but much of the ground can be worked only at great expense.

Olive growing, olive pickling, and the manufacture of olive oil have become a highly important industry in California. This year the industry has a remarkable boom, and the dealers are entirely unable to meet all the orders they have received. This is especially the case in the Pomona Valley. Everybody engaged in the olive trade—growing, making oil, or acting as broker—is making unusual profit, aud there is a demand for five times the amount of the crop. One order that could not be tided came to Pomona last week from a New York grocery house for 20,000 gallons of pickled olives. Many orchardists have made $250 an acre from olives this season, and some have .made a clear profit of $350 an acre.

During 1891 about 450 more persons were killed by wild beasts in India than during the preceding year. The number killed in 1890, however, was very low, still the figures for 1891 are about 250 in excess of the mean. The yearly average of persons killed by wild beasts in India is between 2,500 and .3,000. The mortality from snake bites is much greater, varying from 21,000 to 22,000 annually. In one district of Bengal, Hazaribagh, no fewer than 205 deaths were due in 1891 to a single brood of man-eating tigers. Pirn. Armour, according to the Chicago papers, has a hundred dollars placed

on his desk every morning, which he distributes in charity during the course of the day. His bill for luncheon often runs up as high as 40 cents, while some of his clerks spend nearly a dollar. But then they don’t have to drop a hundred dollars a day in charity. A North Carolina genius proposes a novel scheme for providing an endowment for a college in his vicinity. He suggests that the trustees insure the lives of fifty men, between the ages of 40 and 50, for SIO,OOO each, and as the insured die off and the amounts of the policies are turned in convert the money into a fund for the college. This would mean an endowment of $500,000 at some time or other. «

One of Butler’s Fees.

The late General Butler used to delight in telling of one fee that he secured. His son, Paul Butler, owned a fine dog which he kept at the family home, in Lowell. Paul, on his way from the house mornings, would sometimes drop into the meat market where the family supply came from and leave orders. The dog knew the store and formed the bad habit of going around there to have the butcher throw him a bone. This the butcher neglected to do one morning, and the dog satisfied his want by takingfrom the block a fine sirloin steak and running off with it. A few days later the General and the butcher happened to meet. The butcherhad allowed the theft of the steak by the dog to rankle in his mind. “General,” said he, “if a dog should come into my meat market and steal a. line steak, what remedy should I have?” “Send a bill for the steak to the owner of the dog,” answered the General, and off he walked. The butcher took his advice and sent him a bill for $1 for the steak stolen byPaul Butler’s dog. The bill was promptly returned with a check for sl, but with, it was a bill for SIOO for legal advice. “I collected that bill, too,” the General used to chuckle when relating the story,, “though the butcher made a tight about, it.”

The Old Engineer Reminiscent.

“It makes me mad,” said the old engineer, “to hear people ask why a man don’t do so and so when his engine strikes. It all comes like a stroke of lightning. When we piled ’em up in the Whitesville cut and killed eight, year before last, I was sitting in my window that night looking ahead as careful as anyone could. We had started on the curve aud she was going as fast as the wheels could turn, forty minutes behind time, aud the deuce to pay if we didn’t make it up by morning. Jimmy Hartsell was feeding ’er every minute. “I thought I saw a glimmer of light on the bank ahead. It was the flash from the headlight around the other end of the curve. Between the time when I caught that flash and when I saw the headlight swing around the cut as big as a tub it couldn’t have been the hundredth part of a second. We were nose to nose before I realized—no, I don’t think I realized—but I put on the air with-one yank, yelled to Jimmy aud fell out of the window. When they threw water in my face I s’posed I was cut all up. The wreck was on fire, an' people was hollerin’ underneath. I laid there feelin’ of myself, expectin’ every minute to find a soft, bloody place, but I was all right, and three days after I went to Jimmy’s funeral. After that I don’t want no man to tell me what you ought to do.” —[Chicago News.

OLLA PODRIDA.

The longest word in the Century Dictionary is “palatopharyngeolaryngeal.” A Russian can plead infancy for a long time as he does not come of age till he is 26 years old. Wolves in Russia destroy annually upward of 800,000 head of domestic animals, valued at 8,000,000 rubles. Their number does not apparently decrease. One of the most interesting magazines has no pictures, though it has a few advertisements. It is Kneass’ Philadelphia Magazine for the Blind. The pages of raised letters have a strange and sometimes pathetic novelty. They give news, curious information, stories, &c., in brief form. The Osage Indians are said to be the richest community in the world. They are but 1,509 in number, but they have $8,000,030 deposited to their credit iu the Treasury in Washington, on which they draw SIOO,OOO interest every three months, and they own 1,470,000 acres of the best land in Oklahoma. Most of them wear blankets, despite their wealth.

Balky Razors.

Anthony Chryst, a delegate to the International Barbers’ Convention from St. Paul, in speaking of the tonsorial trade, said: “I know there arc quite a number of persons who do not believe that a razor gets just as tired as a barber, but it is a fact just the same, and I speak from personal experience. I have been busily engaged removing the beard from a man’s face when all at once my razor would refuse to work; it would actually not cut a hair. I would strop it, but all to no purpose, for it would not do service. I had one of these razors on hand about a year ago when a most decrepit individual entered my shop. My chair was vacant and it fell my lot to remove his hirsute appendage. I'had it in for him on the start, and in order to get my revenge 1 hauled out my tired razor, expecting for my customer to endure ten thousand agonies during the operation, but I was most beautifully fooled, for that old razor went through his old crusty beard just the same as silk thread, and as a consequence I have had him on my hands ever since. I don’t know how to account for it, nor do the numerous scientists I have consulted, but it is a, well-known fact that a razor gets tired and will refuse to work just the same as a balky mule.—[St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

AROUND THE HOUSE.

Tomatoes or lemon juice make bad gtains, often upon one’s clothing. This discoloration can be easily aud entirely removed by washing in a weak solution of ammonia. Marble is a veiv difficult article to clean if it is stained in such a way that the stain has sunk into the stone. Slight stains may be removed with a pumice stone or with vigorous scrubbing. Greasy stains are best removed with a paste of fuller's earth applied in the same manner it is applied to wall paper. Ii is said that stains of ink on marble may be removed by hydrochloric acid, which is a powerful poison, and which must be washed off with water almost as soon as it is applied, to prevent its eating into the stone.