Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 December 1893 — Page 4

ONWARD. Sometimes when the growing dirkness At the close of day, To the stress of daily labor, Brings a rofflnent’s stay. All st ono9 tho mind will wandor Back to other years, See, as in a panorama, Toothful hopes and fears. Onoe again upon the threshold Of our life we stand, And discern the future glowing Like the Promised Land. And the hopes of eaily manhood Pntting forth their leaf, Green as are the leaves in Spiiugtime, And their life ws biief. With a pang do we remember That we meant to be, In the battlefield a hero, Crowned with victory. But, discredited and beaten. Have been forced to yield: Or at best are barely able Still to keep the field. On onr brow no crown of laurel Tells of victory won; Hot for us the song of triumph When the day is done. Other men have reaped the harvest That we thought to reap; Other men have gained the summit Of the mountain Bteep. And our hearts are bowed with sorrow, Gasingon that scene, For a moment, as we p : cture All that might have been. For a moment! Then our manhood Puts the sorrow by. Crashes down again the heart throb, Quells the rising sigh. And once more we set our faces Cherniy toward the front, Brace again our nerves and sinews For the lattle's brunt. Onward! Wi;h success or failure, We have naught to do. Onrs to do our duty nobly All 1 fe’s journey through. And, although success would cheer us. As we onward p'od, We can bear the doom of failure, By the help of Ood. —[Alfred 0. Shaw, in Good Words.

SICKIM’S REFORM.

BY MCPHERSON FRASER.

Tho police force is not the place for a man with much physical strength and little moral principle. His impulses will run riot and some time or other cause him to overstep his official authority, and commit perhaps, murder. That is a rule. Here is the exception to prove it. Jim Sickim was a heavily built young fellow and possessed a vast amount of hidden genial blackguardism, and he dwelt in a section of the city which contained the concentrated essence of all the iniquity and all the vice in the universe. One day—-it was long before African geese were deposited in Back Bay Park—one day this fellow Sickim was slouching up an alley in his neighborhood, swinging a big stone jug, which was to be charged, along with Mr, Sickim, at the handiest saloon. Suddenly there was a great hullabaloo in the street on which the alley opened. Sickim scouted trouble and made tracks, but was disgusted to discover only a hot headed horse trying to turn a back somersault over on top of a little fat man in a buggy. The little man was scared to death, and shouted and. yanked at the reins hard enough to twist the beast’s head off, but it was of no use. The horse had evidently made up his mind to slay him. Sickim enjoyed the fun for a while, then set his jug on the sidewalk and went over a-d pulled the horse back to earth again. For which he expected a quarter, but when the little man got his breath he simply thanked Sickim profusely, and asked him to call next day at the office of the park commissioners. “Are yon one o’ them?” asked Sickim. “I am. My name is Smythe,” said he who had been scared, and drove away. Sickim picked up his jug and went on his way, deep in thought. He was thinking so bard that only the jug was filled at the saloon. Now, it had often been truthfully said that Sickim liked many things better than he liked work, and, moreover, he was President of the Sons of Best, a local society distinguished for its philharmonic principles. So he wondered whether the possible reward for saving the commissioner's life would pay for extreme trouble of going after it. A happy thought settled the whole argument. It occurred to Mr. Sickim that the street railroads granted—on the quiet —free passes over the city to all Sous of Rest. He decided to go.

Next morning Sickim increased his apparel by a white shirt and a collar, and presented himself before the commissioner. Who promptly rewarded him with a five-dollar bill. “Now," said Mr. Smythe, as he looked his rescuer over, “what is your occupationT" Sickim was dazed, for beyond an occasional impulse to get drunk he had but one view in life—he wanted to be a policeman. He said:, “I am not doin' anything now, sir, but I’m goin’ to try for the police some day.” The commissioner put up his eyebrows. How would you like to try now? We require a good solid man like you for Back Bay Park. I think I can secure your appointment at an early date. You will be given a nice gray suit with brass buttons, and you will get invigorating, wholesome employment at good wages. What do you say?” “I’m agreed, sir,” Sickim answered, insanely, and it was all over. The commissioner complimented himself for his usefulness to the park department, and then pulled the string whioh woke up the other commissioners and the police department. Whereupon Sickim underwent “ mental and physical examination,” and “qualified.” The machine moved very smoothly, you see, and made the man who was being run through it feel that the softest job of his life was before him. That was—as it is to-day—a big illusion, and Sickim fonnd it out in less than a week—to his sorrow. But it made a man of him. He was put into a uniform that might have fitted an elephant, given a little advice on matters of courtesy and a great deal on matters of discipline, and then he was turned over to the policeman at the Stonybrook Bridge. From that time on he got a taste of a sort of life that did not at all agree with him. On the first day—a beastly hot one—he had to tramp all over the park a dozen times so that he might know his bearings. On the second day—also very hot—he had to repeat the rules and regulations

forward and backward, chase loafers and unleashed dogs, and practice throwing a big life-preserver at a stump half way across the marsh. On the third day—still hot—he was told to polish his boots and clean up generally, —and to hurry up about it, too; then he wts assigned to a lonely night beat in a corner of the park, far away from everything except a couple of spooklike poplars and the memory of his own checkered career. Sickim travelled back and forth like a pendulum over that gloomy beat until a few thin pencils of gray light began to steal up from the eastern horizon. He had had no sleep for forty-eight hours and he was as hungry as a wolf. He wonld have gladly given his new helmet for a doughnut and a drop of whiskey. Often during the night he felt like taking French leave and jumping on a passing freight train bound for anywhere. He could easily cut off his buttons and jam his helmet into some unrecognizable shape. But something—perhaps just the least trace of inherent manliness—made him change his mind. He took a chew of tobacco, and was about to lean up against a tree when he heard something with a noisy voice coming down the road toward him. He drew his club, determined, if he got a chanoe, to vent his feelings on somebody’s head. A man’s form shambled into sight, followed by something that cried and resembled a small shadow. The man was beastly drunk, and cursed and waved his fist at the shadow, and remarked that he would like to break the shadow's neck. “Perhaps I’ll take a hand, too,” said Sickim as he stepped out from under the tree. The man pulled himself up and stopped his bellowing, but the small shadow behind him gave a little cry of glee, and, assuming the form of a bit of a girl of nine, raced by him, and threw herself sobbing into Sickim’a big hands. “Leave that young one be!” growled the man.

“Shut up your snivelling jaw,” said Sickim, “or I’ll-” “Yer not big enough!” Sickim’s pride boiled. He pushed the crying child aside and sprang at the man and gripped him like a vise. “Don’t you talk that way to Jim Sickim if you want to live any more,” and he shook him till his teeth rattled. The man knew that his game was up, and pleaded for mercy. “Now, Sissy,” said Sickim, “who’s this man, and who are you?” She whimpered between her sobs that he was her father, Johu Muggins, and she was Kitty Muggins. “Ain’t yer got no mother: Sissy?” “No, sir,” she whined, “an’ he beat me ’cause I didn’t stay to home.” Sickim held out at arm’s length the snarling, growling object under discussion and frowned at him. Then he said to him: “Aintyergot no res pec’ for yer own young one, y' drunken fool. Es it wasn’t for thb little one I’d learn yer somethin’ you wouldn’t forgit!” Apd he punctuated his remarks with a shake or two. “Now, Sissy—er—Kitty,” said Sickim, “you stop right here till I come back. Meantime, yer daddy an’ me'll take a walk. Now, don’t you cry any more.” With that he tightened his grip on Mr. Muggins’s arm, and the two moved away in the darkness. When they suddenly reached the border of the Park stream, Muggins mumbled that he would like to know the rest of the programme. “Yer faoe is kind of dirty-like,” said Sickim, “and yer boots wouldn’t‘look so bad es. they was cleaned a bit. So I’m goin’ to give yer a free bathe before we go up to the station.” Then Sickim caught him by the coat collar, and doused him in the water until he began to get sober and weep pathetically. Which took about twelve minutes, for the water was quite chilly. ******* About twenty minutes later there was a great hurroosh up at the police stationSickim had just marched in with a cute little blue-eyed girl in one hand and something that looked like a bundle of wet rags in the other, and now stood in the middle of the room with a smile on his face that was fully five inches long. Then the sergeant inspected the bundle and said: “Old Muggins again! Well, I’ll be—; this is the sixth offence, Muggins, me boy. I guess you had better go down on the Island for a couple of months aud give this child a ohance to grow. Lock him up, Sickim.” “That being the case,” said Sickim, if the court has no objections, I’ll take the young one ’round to my house. I got a sister that’ll take good care of her." Two weeks later Muggins died down at the Island. After that, Sickim moved away from his old neighborhood, for somehow or other he took a dislike to it. He baa been transferred from Back Bay to a suburban town and made sergeant. If you ever meet him and mention this story, perhaps he may tell you what a fine cook and piano player Kitty Muggins is.-- [Boston Cultivator.

Two Miles a Minute by Rail.

Engineers are always, like the great Alexander, seeking new worlds to conquer. F. B. Behr, associate of the Institution of Civil Engineers, finds steam locomotion on the surface of this planet 100 slow at a more or less dangerous maximum of sixty miles an hour and he proposal to whirl the man of the twentieth century at the rate of two miles per minute. Under the title of “Lightning Express Railway Service” he publishes a full statement of his plans with all the necessary technical details. The motive power proposed is electricity and the method that which is known as the Lartigue single-rail system, which, in a rudimentary form, is now at work on a short line of nine miles and a half from Listowel to Ballybunion, in Ireland, and from Feurs to Panissieres, in the department of the Loire, France. There are many advantages claimed for this idea, including the absolute impossibility of a train leaving the metals, its cheapness of constrnction as well as a speed that brings Edinburgh within three hours of London. The King of the Belgians has accepted the dedication of Mr. Behr’s interesting little work. —(London Telegraph.

The Stamp Collecting Hobby.

The expenses and eccentricities of the •tamp collecting hobby were illustrated at the Portland, Me., postoffice the other day, in the reoeipt of a registered letter bearing a postage stamp of the four-dollar denomination. The fees due on the letter only called for ten cents postage, and the reason for using so oostly a stamp was that cancelled it is of much greater value to the collector than an uncancelled one, and he took this method of attaining his end. It is not an uncommon thing for a collector thus to use a rare and costly stamp on an ordinary letter, registering the letter as a safeguard against its going astray.— [Now York Sun.

SOMEWHAT STRANGE.

ACCIDENTS AND INCIDBNT3 OF EVERYDAY LIFE. Queer Facts and Thrilling Adventures which Show That Truth Is Stranger Than Fiction. Everett Chauncey Bumpus, of the freshman class at Harvard, has been totally blind since he was six years of age. He is a son of Judge E. C. Bumpus of Guincy, and is twenty years of age. He has been a student at the Per kins Institute for the Blind in Boston’ and at the Thayer Academy in Braintree, Mass., and took high rank in his class at the latter, where he prepared for college. An English pickle dealer, described as a hearty, strong man, recently became the victim of a comic tale. He was at a tavern one evening, aud laughed uproariously over a story told by one of the company. The laughter brought on a fit of convulsive coughing, in the course of which he fell to the floor, striking against a wooden bench. It was found that all bis ribs on the right side were broken, and that one lung had been injured. He died, and the jury returned a verdict of “Death from suffocation.” A large and curious white owl held captive on board the Red Star line steamship Pennsylvania, which recently arrived from Antwerp, creates a great deal of interest among all having any business on board the ship, and has become quite a pet among the sailors. The strange visitor came on board the Pennsylvania when about 1,400 miles off from the English coast. It flew into the rigging of tne Pennsylvania early ia the morning in an exhausted state, and had, no doubt, been carried off from the coast in a gale of wind. The Bank of France is not entirely free from apprehension regarding the ability of the burglar, and guards itself in a very careful manner. Every day, when the money is put into the vaults in the cellar, masons are waiting, and at onoe wall up the doors with hydraulic mortar. Water is then turned on and kept running until the cellar is flooded. A burglar would thus have to work iu a diving suit and break down a cement wall before he could even start to loot the vaults. When the officers arrive next morning the water is drawn off, the masonry is torn down and the vaults opened.

The people of Manitou, Col., were entertained by the spectacle of a man carrying a stone around a triangular track, letting it drop, and shouldering it again at every turn. The performer was a man who has a reputation for a disinclination to labor, and the incident was the outcome of a wail he was making about the hard,times and his Inability to get work. A citizen told him he would not work if he got a chance, and offered him fifty cents an hour ns long as he would carry the atone. To the surprise of all he accepted the offer, and held out for five hours. A large crowd gathered to watch the performance.

Mrs. Mary Gilman, wife of a well todo farmer, residing near Bird Mountain, in Ira, Vt., has had a fierce encounter with an eagle. She saw the bird about to swoop down upon her fowls and endeavored to frighten it away. The eagle attacked her, and it was only after a vigorous fight that she s ucceeded iu killing it with a hatchet. She had some fearful marks of the struggle, and went to Rutland to have a physician dress her bruises, taking her trophy of victory with her. The eagle measured five and one-half feet, and is one of the largest and handsomest in the vicinity.—Boston Herald.

Edward Lane, a painter employed in painting the smokestack of a flouring mill in San Diego, Cal., recently passed through a thrilling experience. He had painted half of the stack, 120 feet high, and bad just boen drawn to tho top when the hook holding his platform gave way. He fell twelve feet, striking a guy, rope with his legs, which he wound around the rope in a twinkling, but without effect. He fell again, dropping forty feet further, where he struck another guy rope, luckily catching it with both hands aud feet. He held on pluckily, although considerably bruised ou the breast and shoulder, until help reached him, and he was lowered to the f round. It was a narrow escape, but he id not appear to be specially disturbed over his accident, and was at work next day as usual.

The dress of the Northern Eskimos Is made of the skins of reindeer and seals. The latter are worn during rainy weather and in the kyak. The women wear mittens of hare or fox skin, but the skins bt these timid oreatures are reserved for the females alone. No man would disgraoe himself by appearing clad with a particle of the fur of the hare or the white fox. Either sex may wear the skins of all other mammals, except at certain times, under restrictions imposed by superstition. An important duty of the women is taking care of the family boots. At intervals they must be turned inside out and dried, then chewed and scraped by some old hag, who is only too glad to have the work to do for the few scraps of food she may receive as pay.

Among the many quaint customs whioh are gradually disappearing in England is the so-called “Lion Sermon, ” whioh. after having been annually preached in the Churoh of Bt. Catharine, in the city of London, for nearly three centuries, has just been abolished. It owes its origin to an adventure which befell a medieval lord mayor of London, Sir Richard Guyer. According to the legend, being attacked by a lion while he was traveling with a caravan in Arabia, he fell upon his knees and vowed to devote his life to charity if spared from the lion’s jaws. The animal Is stated to have thereupon turned tail; and in pursuance of the vow thus made the “Lion Sermon” has been regularly preached ever since. The fund bequeathed bySir Riohard for the purpose will in future be devoted to other charitable uses.

The earth has not been put in a scale and balance against a known weight, but mathematicians have calculated ita weight. Professor Maskelyne first attacked this subject in 1772, when by repeated experiments, he determined the attraction exerted at Mount Schihallion, in Pertshire, Scotland, on a plumb line, which it caused to deviate from the per pendicular nearly six seconds. Playfair, Cavendish, Hutton and other scientists then determined that the structure of this mountain made it have a density, as compared to the mean density of the earth, of five to nine. Then the Comparative density of Schihallion to water was ascertained, and that of earth to water being known as about five and a half to one. It was not hard to calculate the rest, knowing the cubical contents of the earth- It has been stated as

5,842 trillions of tons of 2,240 pounds each, or a value iu pounds avoirdupois represented by thirteen and twenty-four ciphers. A Biddeford (Me.) attorney had in his possession a lease the like of which local lawyers do not believe can be found in existence. The names of the parties to the lease, according to the Kennebec Journal, are given, but its provisions are none the less strange. The lease is of a lot of land at an annual rental of |440 for twenty-five years, with the provision that the lessee should within one year build and maintain a substantial hree-story building of brick, iron and stone. When the lease expired the lessee was to have his choice between buying the building be had himself erected or of taking a perpetual lease of the lot at S3BO a year, just double the original rent. The lease expired a year or so ago, and the lessee, to whom it was a case of “ Hobson’s choice,” elected to take the perpetual lease of the lot. What puzzles the attorneys who have seen the lease is why a man of the property which the lessee must have been possessed should bind himself to such a one-sided condition. The gentleman who has the lease intends to present it to the Bar Library Association.

It is a common mistake of Americans to think that the predicate “van” before a Dutch name signifies nobility. In the low countries—that is, in the kingdoms of the Netherlands and of Belgium—“van” has no particular meaning. Names with “van” are to be read on shops, as well as on the doors of the most aristocratic mansions. The humblest persons have it as well as the most refined. Ou the other hand, a great mumber of the very oldest families are without it. In Germany “von” means noble, and all persons belonging to the nobility have “von” before their family names without any exception. Persons who do not belong to the nobility cannot put “von” before their names, as they have no right to do so, and it would be found out directly if they assumed it, and make themselves ridiculous But in case of a man being knighted for some reason or other he has the right to put “von” before his family name. For Instance, when Alexander Humboldt was.knighted he became Alexander von Humboldt, and all bis descendants, male and female, take the prefix. The Churchman is responsible for this marvellously strange story: In the western part of Massachusetts a man had a fine stock farm. But a few weeks ago a fire broke out in the barn, and burned not only the building and the hay, but most of the animals also. After the fire the owner walked over the ruins. It was a sad sight to see the charred bodies of bis fine Jersey cows and his high-spirited horses, to say nothing of the money lost with them. But at the end of the barn he saw a sight which touched him more than all the rest. There sat an old black hen. He wondered that she did not move her head to look at him as he came near her, but he thought she must be asleep. He poked her with his cane, and to his susprise the wing which he touched fell into ashes. Then ho knew that she had been burned to death. But out from under her wing came a faint little peep, and pushing her aside with his cane, the man found what do you think?—ten little live yellow chickens 1 The poor hen had sacrificed her own life to save them, and had held her place in the fire as Casabianca held his on the burning deck. That sight touched the man more than everything else.

Seven miles northeast of Nachogdoches, Texas, there is a most wonderful yellow jacket’s nest—wonderful in size, and locality. These little stinging flies, or whatever they should be called, I usually nest in the ground, and have one door for entrance and exit. Their ! nest is built of material like wasps’ nests, about the size of half a bushel, with several rooms or apartments, and many cells in which the young one are raised. They usually occupy a nest but one year. The nest is question is located upon a pine tree, or rather around the trunk of a pine tree, that is about a foot in diameter, and is about eighteen feet above the ground. The tree -appears to pass through the very center of the nest, which is conical in shape, or, as a farmer expressed it, “shaped like an old-fash-ioned hoop skirt,” but much larger, being about five feet high and same in diameter at the base, which is as flat as if it had been sawed off. It appears to be as many years old, and is built of the usual wasp nest material. The yellow jackets may be seen standing at the many holes in theLsse of the nest, or on the under side. They are not fighty, because they are out of reach of disturbance. The ordinary ground neater is always ready to raise cain, and woe be to the animal that stands and stamps upon it. The record for the rapid travel of a needle through human flesh was broken in a case which recently came under the notice of the surgeons at Hahnemann Hospital, Philadelphia. A large needle which became imbedded in the back of the left limb of Mary A Walsh, a domestic in the employ of Mrs. Mary K. Bardsley, had worked itself through five inches of fleehy tissue in a few days. The woman was sewing one morning, and it was on that day that the needle in some strange way must have penetrated the back of the limb. She felt some slight pain, but was not seriously inconvenienoed by it. Day after day the pain seamed to shift a trifle, but she did not pay particular attention to it until it became so severe that she went to the Hahnemann Hospital, where she complained of a sharp pain in the fore part of the thigh. Dr. Waaser made an examination and found the point of the aeedle above the surfaoe. He made a email incision, and laid bare enough of the needle to permit of its being seized with a pair of tweezers and pulled it out. The needle was black as ink, having been oxidized by the action of the blood. The patient recognized it, by the peculiar way in which it was bent, as the needle with which she had been sewing. It had travelled five inches in a little over three days, which, according to the Hahnemann surgeons, beats all previous sprinting records among needles.

Sherman’s Resignation Asked.

I heard a rather good story on General Sherman the other day. Ic occurred away back in 1816, while he was on the Pacific coast, with the title of Captain. For some reason or other his men took a violent dislike to him, and after standing it as long as they thought they could they prepared a petition requesting him to resign. The paper contained the signatures of ail but five of his company and was handed to him by a committee of three. When it was presented Captain Sherman glanced over it and said: “Has every man signed this?" '“All but five,” replied the spokesman. “All but five?” “Yes, sir,” “Then will you kindly convey my thanks to those five and say that I hav# decided to remain with them?”— LSv Francisco Chronicle.

FOR THE YOUNG FOLKS.

A littlb secret. About the meadow all the day Itsee the bumblebee at play; Abo the lazy butterfly Beneath the shining silken sky. Bat when the autumn’s brown and red Ihe merry bumblebee has fled; And no fair butterfly is seen Drifting about on wing serene. I know the secret: when ’tis cool These pretty insect* are in school; Bat in the summer’s golden prime They’re out for their vacation-time. —[Once A Week.

A FIGHTING BIRD. Pootor Franklin, when he recommended the adoption of the turkey as our national emblem in place of the often unclean and not particularly courageous bald eagle, had a great many good reasons to give on behalf of his candidate. Among them he did not fail to include its lighting qualities. A turkey cock is not a bird of prey, it is true, but he is a gallant fellow when he engages in battle, and decidedly more willing to meet an adversary of his own size than is an eagle; at least an eagle of the particular species selected to hold our American thunderbolts in his talons. We are used to hearing tales of unfortunate infants carried on by eagles, and likewise of rash boys in search of eagles’ eggs or young eaglets, who are attaoked by the wrathful parent birds while clinging to the sides of precipitous cliffs, and just esoape with their lives. A few—a very few—of these tales are probably true. But tot every youth terrified by a shrieking eagle flapping about his ears, how many young Americans have trembled at the gobble of a well-grown turkey cook, with his wattles flaming, his breast ruffled to the utmost, his wings half spread, and wrath in his every feather? How many have ignominiously fled before such an aroused monarch of the barn-yard? And now, if the capacity to slay be really an addition to the dignity of a bird of power, we find that the can claim that also. There have been various anecdotes of the arms and legs of small children broken by the blow of his mighty wing; but these do not count because the same tales are related of geese. But an antiquarian searcher amoDg ancient newspapers recently discovered in an old journal * published in Ncwburyport, the obituary notice of a man killed by a turkey. He was a very aged gentleman, it ap - pears, and slightly childish. A mild day of Indian summer having come, his relatives put him in a comfortable armchair on the porch, wrapped in a loose dressing-gown and wearing on his head, to keep off colds and neuralgia, a peaked red nightcap with a tassel on the end. ThCt(?he unfortunately'fell asleep; and as he drowsed, his head nodded; and as his head nodded, his nightcap wagged. The scarlet tassel bobbing thus conspicuously caught the eye of a turkey that was wandering about the place, undergoing his autumn fattening no doubt, and was regarded in the light of a challenge. Swelling and gobbling meeting with no response, the bird at length new at the poor old gentleman, plucked his nightcap off, beat him with his wings until he fell out of his chair, and as the paper puts it, “so ill-used and maltreated him as he soon thereafter died.” Perhaps, despite Doctor Franklin, to be eaten is a more suitable fate than glorification for so dangerous a bird.— [ Youth’s Companion.

a butterfly’s bath. Standing on tho banks of the Hop River in Jamaica one brilliant July day, watching the dragon-flies, or “darning needle*,” darting over the wiiter, I saw * sight that was entirely new to me, and one that filled me with wonder. A beautiful butterfly, of a sort common in the West Indies, known to the naturalists as Victorina Steneles, and oddly banded with pale green and deep black bars across its wings, floated lazily down to the water’s edge and settled on the damp sand. Walking quickly to the very edge of the water, where the breeze sent in little rippling waves, the butterfly waded in so that its body and head were completely submerged, and then slowly beat ita wings to and fro, seemingly in an attempt to cover them with the water also. Of course it could not do this, for it was so light in proportion to the expanse of its wings that whenever it attempted to force them under the water its feet lost their hold on the ground and for an instant it floated on the surface. Quickly flying up from this perilous position, it regained the shore and again began the attempt to get entirely under water.

All this was a most interesting spectacle to me, and I was entirely at a loss to understand its meaning. I had been a student of butterflies for nearly twentyfive years and a collector in many different countries, yet I had never witnessed such a sight before. The weather was not especially warm, in fact “the doctor,” as the Jamaicans call the strong sea breeze that daily makes life more endurable, was unusually cool that day. So it could hardly be for the purpose of cooling itself that the insect indulged in these strange proceedings, or it would have been a sight long since familiar to me and to other collectors. I was well aware that butterflies do get overheated and out of breath; often after watching two of them fighting furiously in the hot sunshine, or having raced them myself across the fields. I had seen them flapping their wings lightly up and down, thereby forcing the air more rapidly through the little holes at the base of the wings through which they do their breathing, and thus cooling themselves off. Falling to fathom such queer ani apparently unnatural actions on the part of this butterfly, I was just preparing to capture it to make a closer examination when I was thwarted by a third party. Evidently I had not been the only interested watcher, for at that instant a whip-poor-will dashed out from the gloom of the bordering woods and in his attempt to capture the butterfly effectually frightened it away. It was some months after this, on another stream in Jamaica, that I saw precisely the same performance repeated —again on the part of the beautiful banded Victorina. This time, however, I was more fortunate, and quickly had the butterfly in my net and a moment after it was between my fingers and under the powerful lens, which is my constant pocket companion. At once all was clear to me, for here and there on the hairy covering of its velvety body, but especially near the bases of the wings, were little bright carmine patches, which on close examination, after stirring them up with a pin, ptoved to be made up of scores of tiny rod parasites. If elding the butterfly carefully between my thumb and finger by the whig*

so as not to hurt It, I immersed it in the water and held it there until the kicking of its legs plainly told me that it was growing uncomfortable for want of air. Then, on re-examining it, I found that most of the tiny parasites had been drowned off; and after three or four such baths I could not find one remaining. Then I allowed my captive to fly away, and I have often wondered just what its thoughts—if any it had—must have been concerning the giant who thus aided it to get rid of its microscopic tormentors.

Since then I have ascertained, with the aid of a powerful microscope, that the minute parasite I discovered on the butterfly is armed with a most formidable proboscis, or beak, which is attached to a powerful pumping apparatus within its head. With this outfit and its eight legs, each armed with many claws, it is able to cling to the butterfly, and extract its life juices. Thus it is plain that these pests must become a terrible drain on the butterfly’s system, and it is in self-defense driven to this most effectual, though apparently very unnatural procedure of taking a bath—for taking to the water is about the last thing that most of us would expect of so fragile a creature as a butterfly.—[St. Louis Republic.

Trapping the Beaver.

The famed beaver, in both structure and habits, isrby far the most interesting animal killed and hunted for the sake of its skin. So much was its fur in demand prior to the introduction of silk and rabbit’s fur in the manufacture of hats that the poor little chap had in some districts become nearly exterminated. The beaver trapper, be he white man or Indian, must of necessity lead a solitary, desolate, and dangerous life. To be alone in the wildest solitudes of unknown wastes demands a courage and endurance of no ordinary kind. A beaver is a very difficult animal to trap. The trapper knows at a glance the various marks of the animal, called signs. These discovered, the next step is to find out how the beaver gets to his house, which is generally in shallow water. Then a steel trap is sunk in the-water twelve or fourteen inches below the surface. Immediately over the trap is the bait, made from the castor, or medicine gland of the beaver, suspended from a stick, so as just to clear the water, with a long cord and log of cedar wood as a buoy, the latter to mark the position of the trap when the beaver swims away with it. The fated little builder—perhaps returning to his home and family—scents the tempting castor. He cannot reach it as he swims, so he feels about with his hind legs for something to stand on; this,too, has been craftly placed for him. Pitting down his feet to stretch up for the coveted morsel he finds them suddenly clasped in a steel embrace; there is no hope of escape. The log, revealing his hiding place, is seized by the trapper and the imprisoned beaver dispatched by a single blow on the head. The principal use made of the beaver fur now is in the manufacture of hats and coats. The long hair is pulled out and the under fur shaved down dose and even by a machine.—[Chicago Times.

Made the Judge Listen.

Judge Van Brunt of New York has a habit which sorely distresses members of the bar who appear before him, particularly young men, of talking to his associates on the bench while the lawyers are delivering their speeches. Mr. Choate was about to make the closing speech in a highly important case recently. Forty minutes had been allotted him for the purpose. He had scarcely uttered a dozen words when Judge Van Brunt wheeled around in his chair and began a discussion with Judge Andrews. Mr. Choate ceased speaking immediately, folded his arms and gazed steadily at the Judges, his handsome face a trifle paler than usual. A hush fell upon the courtroom. Judge Van Brunt, noticing the stillness, turned around and looked inquiringly at the silent advocate. “Your honor,” said Mr. Choate, “I have just forty minutes in which to make my final argument. I shall not only need every second of that time to doit justice, but I shall also need your undivided attention.” “And you shall have it,” promptly responded the Judge, at the same time acknowledging the justice of the rebuke by a faint flush on his cheeks. It was an exhibition of genuine courage, but one that was more fully appreciated by members of the profession than by the laymen who witnessed it.—[New York Tribune.

“America.”

The remarks sent to us by “A. C.” about the tune of our national hymn, “America,” are satisfactory. The tune was not English originally, though the English use it for their royal anthem. It was used by the Germans long before it was taken up by the English, and we are assured by a musical explorer thht the Germans got it from the Norsemen, who had probably heard it sung by the Finns, who most likely captured it from the Huns, who doubtloss brought it from Asia when they entered Europe. We told in the Sun long ago of our attempts to trace this very old tune through the ages, from country to country, and to its birthplace. We found that it has been known to various races and we found it as far back as we could go. It, or something like it, was perhaps sung by the Jews in the first temple and they may have borrowed it from the Egyptians. It is of a solemn and majestic strain, suitable to some of the Psalms of David. It is certain that the English did not invent or concoct the tune to whioh they sing the words of “God Save the Queen” and to which we sing the words of “America.” We need not be ashamed to use the tune because it existed in other countries before we adopted it or was used by generations that lived before Columbus discovered America, or was known to musicians before the times of St. Ambrose. It is a noble tune.—[New York Sun.

Surgical Instruments.

Within the last ten years there habeen a complete revolution in the manu_ facture of surgical instruments. Anti septic methods now govern all operations. Not only are wounds kept free from bacterial germs by spraying them with preparations of carbolic acid and other substances destructive to such life,but all the tools employed by the surgeon are steralized by heat. Even the dressings are cooked in an oven before they are appl’ed. By such means many operations are now performed, with almost invariable suocess, which until recently, were nearly always fatal. For instance, such operations as laparotomy—lately performed on James Gordon Bennett—requiring the cutting open of the abdomen, now succeed in ninsty-five cases out of every 100, while formerly only five persons in 100 recovered. This result is wholly due to the discoveries of the bacteriologists.—(Washingtou Star.

OF MANY NATIONALITIES.

Inhabitants of the Storm, ravaged Re. gion of Louisiana. Of the 2,008 counted victims of the Louisiana coast floods only fifty-three were negroes, says a letter to the Troy Times. There are few colored people in the section visited by the storm. They are a mixed-up people in that part of Louisiana. The predominating races are Acadians, Austrians, Creoles, Islingues, Italians, Manillamen, Chinese, and Spaniards, the number of each ranging in the order named. The Acadians are descendants of the people who have been immortalized in Longfellow’s poem “Evangeline." These people have large families, frequently from twelve to fifteen children each. The Manillamen are full-blooded Tagais from the Phillippine islands; these peoEle had no women among them; they ad only one 'stove in the whole colony, and they eat their fish raw. They fraternize well with the Chinese, and are treated by the whites on equal terms. The people called Austrians are genuineSlavs, generally Morlachs from Dalmatia. They speak Italian, a relic of the days when Venice ruled Dalmatia. They are all fishermen, and are an industrious, bold and hardy people. The Islingues ire the descendants of a colony of Canary Islanders, who came over to Louisiana during the Spanish invasion. They have a dash of the Berber blood of the Canary aborigines and are darker than the average Spaniard. Scattered among these various people are a few Americana and Germans and many creoles. In spite of their propinquity,' these races generally live separate, and one can in traveling a few miles find settlements of pure-blooded people of each nationality. This is a remarkable fact, as many families are natives who can count their American descent back for ten or a dozen generations. They live in the swamps and lowlands, and this accounts for the terrible destruction of life by the storm. They control the entire fishing industry, but the packing houses for oysters and.shrimps are owned by Americans. There were 1,800 fishermen lost in the flood; the others were sailors, traders, storekeepers and farmers. The absence of negroes is due to the fact that they have been driven out by the overwhelmisg numbers of these queer prople.

Policemen in Japan.

There is no human being quite so polite as the Japanese polioeman. Not to his fellow-countrymen, be it understood; by no means. He regards the bulk of them, probably, with good-natured contempt, for, in the language of Mi. Chevalier, “he is a gentleman by birth and education.” When in the pursuit of Western civilization, Japan cast oft feudalism and put on a frock coat and a silk hat, thousands of samurai, or twoswosded retainers of the old nobles, found their occupation gone. No mort exhilarating little expeditions into tlfi territories of the neighboring prino-s were possible and chopping loreigneis into little bits soon became a game hardly worth the candle. The swords rusted in their scabbards and finally wera, by imperial decree, discarded altogether, and helped a few years later to decorate the drawing-rooms of Belgravia. What was to be done with these swashbucklers, trained to militarism quite impossible in the modern army modelled on the French pattern? The Government wantid police. The samurai knew noth! ng about the status of the British “bobby” or of the French gendarmes, so they enrolled in large numbers, happy in being able to wear at any rate one sword, and chat a two-handed one. Thus it happens that the Japanese police are the most aristocratic force of constabulary in the world. They are a finely disciplined body, small in stature, but well drilled and expert in the use of the steel-scabbarded weapon which dangles at their heels. —[Pall Mall Budget.

Nocturnal Creatures.

Most curious in origin of all nocturnal insect-hunters, however, are the leatherywinged bats, which may be regarded, practically speaking, as very tiny monkeys, highly Bpeoializd for the task of catching nocturnal flees and midge*. Few people know how nearly they a re related to us. They belong to the selfsame division of the higher mammals as man and the apes; their skeleton answers to ours, bone for bone and joint for joint, in an extraordinary manner; only the unessential fact that they have very long fingers with a web between as an organ of flight prevents us from intantly and instinctively recognizing them as remote cousins once removed from the gorilla. The female bat in particular i* absurdly human. Most of them feed off insects alone, but a few,* like the famous vampire bats of South America, take a mean advantage of sleeping animals, and suck their blood after the fashion of mosquitoes, as they lie defenseless in the forests or on tho open pampas. Others, like the flying foxes of the Malay arohipelago, make a frugal meal off fruits and vegetables, but even these are persistent night fliers. They hang, head downward, from the boughs of trees during the hot trophical daytime, but sally forth at night, with Milton’s sons of Belial, to rob the banana patches and invade the plantain grounds of the industrious native. The bat is a lemur compelled by dire need to become a flying night bird. —[Cornhill Magazine.

Dutch Gardens.

A hint which our florists might take with advantage from their English cousins is the cultivation of what are called Dutch gardens. These stiff beds of low flowers, which are so that the whole group is onfl' mass of bloom, either of one variety alone and arranged so that the smaller plants ».-e on the edge, the others sloping up to a comparatively high apex. For instance, in spring there would be late crocuses, then hyacinths, anemones, daffodils, and finally tulips, all blooming together, the time of planting regulating their simultaneous flowering. Some English women have caried this style of gardening to a high degree of perfection, and their stiff geometrical beds and neat walks recall the old-fa-hioned gardens (~w here ladies in high-heeled slippers and stiff brocades drank tea and gossipped with their friends.—[New York Tribune.

A Machine to Pick Cranberries.

The latest invention of a labor saving machine is that of an apparatus for picking cranberries. A harvester of cranberries who uses his hands to pick the cranberries can make only from $3.50 to $3 per day; but by employing the cranberry picking machine he can make from $5 to $9 a day. Unluckily, however, the owners of the cranberry marshes suspect the machine harms the cranberry bushes, and many of them will not permit it to be used.—New York Telegram.