Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 May 1894 — NOTES AND COMMENTS [ARTICLE]

NOTES AND COMMENTS

The Health Department of Brooklyn pays its public vaccinators $75 each a month. It has recently appointed two women to this position, the reason being that girls object to being vaccinated on the arm. The New Zealanders claim that the reason they do not feel the hard times like the rest of the world is because they have woman suffrage, the land tax and are too far removed from the old world to get the overflow of its paupers. In the opinion of the Hartford Journal the newspaper reader who does not daily rejoice that he lives in North America instead of Central or South America must be peculiarly constituted, unless he skips the news from our far southern neighbors. Lord Dunraven’b yacht, the Valkyrie, which was beaten last fall in the race for the America’s cup, and which has been in these waters ever since, has been ordered home. Her owner has despaired of success in America, and on her arrival will fit out the yacht to compete in the midsummer races for vessels of her class in English waters. A. R. Sutton, a Chicago engineer, is working on a plan to connect the great lakes with the Atlantic us a private enterprise. He proposes to deepen the Welland Canal and connect it with Lake Ontario by a cut to the Niagara near Thorold, Ontario; then deepen the St. Lawrence, cut a canal south to Lake Champlain, and from its southern point, Whitehall, dig a canal to the Hudson River at Troy or Albany. More than fifty army officers are now stationed at various State agricultural colleges, instructing students in military tactics. It often happens at the fresh water colleges that the military instructor is the only army officer ever seen in the village. The detail is not disagreeable, however, as it gives an officer a marked change from garrison life. Living is cheap, too, in the smaller college towns and the military instructor is a person of social consideration.

Postmaster General Bissell has issued an order providing that hereafter only short names or names of one word only shall be accepted as names for newly established post offices. Exceptions may be made by the department when the name is historical or has become local by long usage. Satisfactory reasons must be presented to the department for changes of post office names. The Postmaster General says that this rule will remove a source of annoyance to the department and of injury to the postal service. It was on board the United States war steamer Ranger, stationed in the port of Amapala, Honduras, that was signed the agreement which closed the recent civil war in that country, a war in which Nicaragua actively participated. In the commandant’s room of the Ranger met Belisario Vlllela on one side, with Dr. Francisco Vaca and General Manuel Bonilla on the other side. General Vlllela, who held the city of Amapala for President Velasquez, of Honduras, recently defeated and in flight, surrendered the city on honorable conditions, which saved besides the lives of the Honduranean surrendering soldiers. Cleveland is already putting forth her best efforts to make the Christian Endeavor Convention, to be held there in July, the most successful religious gathering ever held. Everything is being done on a large and liberal scale. Delegates are to be given a fine two-color map of the city, showing convention meeting places and all points of interest. Cleveland Is pre-eminently a city of homes. The hotels would not begin to accommodate the hosts that will attend, but the hospitable residents will throw open their doors. The latest statistics regarding this wonderful movement show that there are now more than 80,000 local societies, with a total membership of 1,886,000. The growth in foreign lands has been equally remarkable, England now having over 1,200 societies and Australia about the same number.

Among the women of New York city who are securing signatures to the petition to strike out the word “male" as a qualification for voters are Mrs. Charles Russell Lowell, Mrs. Joseph H. Choate, Dr. Mary Putnam Jacobi, Mrs. J. Warren Goddard, Mrs. Robert Abee, Mrs. Henry M. Sanders and Miss Addie M. Fielde. In speaking of these women the Sun says: “So far as we know, none of them has taken part in the wdman’s rights agitation of the last forty years, and hitherto they have not been among those who were active in demanding the suffrage for women. The radical women’s rights agitators like Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony have not had them among their followers and have not enlisted their sympathies. They have represented feminine conservatism, and hence have kept aloof from the little band of women who have struggled for years and against so many discouragements to arouse in their sisters a desire for political privileges which would put them on an equality with men in the state.”

In the development of western Australia the gold fields seem destined to play an important part. Gold was discovered there by Dampier as far back as 1688, but it was not until about ten years ago that the precious metal was found in sufficient quantity to start the industry in real earnest. To-day it is known that the gold country extends over a great area from north to south. New districts are being opened up ; townships are being laid out, stores, hotels, churches and banks are providing for the varied wants of rapidly increasing populations, settled, in some instances, on the desert wastes of only two or three years ago, while the transcontinental railway from Fremantle to Adelaide is regarded-as having already been started by the line to the Zilgarn gold fields. Southern Cross, the “capital” of this particular district, and a place whose origin dates back only a few years, can now boast of being a regularly organized municipality, and its importance has been greatly increased

by the opening up of the rich field* at Coolgardie, 120 miles further east, where the specimens of gold sent to London by the western Australian government for exhibition purpose* were obtained. British agricultural returns for 1898 show the remarkable fact that during last year some 150,000 acre* of land in Great Britain were withdrawn from cultivation and turned into pasture. This is spoken of aa an ‘‘actual abandonment of cultivation” of this area. The main point deduced is that Great Britain is rapidly ceasing to be a wheat-producing country. Comparing the present wheat area with that of 1878 the decline is 1,800,000 acres. The return* also show that fruit farming and market gardening are largely increaaing. In 1898 there were 65,487 acre* in this kind of cultivation, as against 62,148 acres in 1892. Argument ha* been largely made of late that if English farmers would give their attention to truck farming and fruit raising they might retrieve their almost ruined fortunes. They cannot compete with America and India in wheat growing and they lose moremoney every year. At the same time immense quantities of fruit, vegetables, butter, cheese, eggs and even milk are imported from abroad. Butter and eggs come in ship loads even from as far as Australia. Last year butter, cheese and eggs alone, to tho value of £25,820,000, were imported into Great Britain. The economists are seeking to learn why this splendid income cannot be secured for British pockets.