Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 25, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 July 1894 — Page 4

«WHILE WE HAVE TIME” The peaceful hour of summer dusk Is nigh: Swift «wallows hawk beneath an opal sky Along the west faint bars of crimson die; Under the low-browed porch your chair i set, , Amid sweet scents of musk and mignonette You muse of things ybu sometimes half forget. Can you forgive her then? Or when, within some sacred, ancient sane. Where holy rest and peace forever reign, As falls the tinted sunlight from the pane Unto your ear the solemn words are given “While we have time.” “Forgive and be forgiven.” The angels wait to take your prayers to heaven. Do you forgive her then? “While we have time!” The years are not our own: The clock ticks on with calm, unaltered ,tone, Until our little span of life has flown; A sad bell tolling in a narrow glen, A quiet aisle astir with tramp of men; She would not know if you forgave her—then.

JOANNA'S ROMANCE.

Where I first saw Joanna was In the draper’s shop of a stagnant little country town, a place storied enough for a hundred towns, small and great. The place was quite dead, and given over to its illustrious ghosts, and to the lashing, tearing voices of the j Atlantic, that even in the mild autumn shouted and smote incessantly, making a tumult in the air. The shop was hung with shawls and cheap, shoddy prints and linseys, so that in the dark one could scarcely see Joanna’s bright head at first, as one came blinking out of the daylight ; the shop was sunk a step or two below the street. She was a big, generously built, handsome girl. Her hair, twisted in splendid coils, was of that pale color which Is as much silver as gold; her face, with its regular, large features, was suffused with a healthy color; she looked at us from large gray eyes, clear as agate and as hard. Our business was t>o make some small purchase of a basket, if we could find one, to carry home a specimen of the town’s manufacture of rough red pottery. Joanna assisted us in this to the best of her power, and then some remark about the slowness of business brought down upon us a perfect avalanche of explanation. Joanna had little to do at that moment; indeed, for an hour or more we conversed with her, her customers were a small child for a half penny spool, and a girl who came back repenting a purchase, and wanting the money restored. With these Joanna dealt summarily and came back to the chat she was apparently eager for. She set us a couple of chairs between the lines of shawls, and leant forward herself with her arms akimbo on the narrow counter. Here was a discourse on the Irish Land Laws, the relation between landlord and tenant, the deterioration in the condition of the Irish poor, with divergencies to the general subject of labor, the cause of strikes, and a great many other things. We were well content to listen. The girl was extraordinarily well informed and intelligent. The soft brogue was musical. Also we were in the very midst of a disturbed and distressed district, and were both keenly interested. We were not English tourists, but a pair of Irishwomen with a certain knowledge of the matter, though without Joanna’s illumination from within. We were both filled with admiration for the creature before us. For in the excitement of her voluable talk Joanna had grown brilliantly handsome. What a girl to be doling out farthing purchases in this melancholy, haunted little place, which was only tolerable because of the contrast to one’s own vivid life far away in the world. As we talked the wind lashed the sea-blown alders and a dreary patter of dead leaves came down the street, where,-at long intervals, a human footfall sounded. “Yep will not always stay here,” Rosa said, with sudden, quick sympathy. “You are saving your wages, no doubt, and will get away some day to a bigger place, because you are such a clever girl.” “Saving!” echoed Joanna scornfully. “No indeed then; if you knew what my wages were ’tis little you’d talk of saving. And what for would I save? lam as happy here as if I Went foreign to Dublin or Cork. What for would I go saving an’ roaming?” Rosa answered deprecatingly. “But a fine, handsome girl like you won’t spend all your life behind this poor little counter? You will want a business of your own, and it is perhaps possible you might think of marriage.” “Marriage!” said the girl almost fiercely. “ There’s not a man to be had here less nor three hundred pounds. An’ them ould shows of widowers, for ther’s nothing else here. Why, if I ever could have under the sun three hundred pounds, is it on the like of them I’d spend it?” Her wailing Cork brogue rang out vehemently in her indignation. It was our first experience of the results of the Munster match-making system. Rosa looked rather shocked. I felt vastly amused. “ But, my dear,” said Rosa, “you are young and clever and handsome. There are many men in the world who would love you just for your own sake. Do you only think of marriage in the way you have said, and not at all as a union in which you would be dearly loved and love in return?” “Men and love,” said Joanna emphatically; “I don’t set any store by them. People marries for love foreign in Dublin and Cork, not here. A friend of mine married for love, find what came of it? ’Twaslove they had to live on, no more. Och, he was the worthless stravager with his love. He brought her to live on his father as long as the ould man would let them. Then when they were turned out he took her to America. But there was no place there for him and his Idle ways and his love. And now

1 they’re back, and she is supporting I the great lazy sturk. Him an’ his love!” It is impossible to express the disI dain with which Joanna used the | little noun, which has wrought such great havoc and turned to such great issues in this world of ours. She | hammered out the word every time ; she spoke it as if she was shattering j the thing itself to atoms. She had i drawn herself up till she looked like 1 a fierce, handsome young Amazon, her cheeks flushed, her eyes sparkling, her fingers pointing her contempt. Rosa looked as if she eouH scaree!ly endure. these unnatural opinions iin Joanna. Perhaps the girl saw she I was shocked. At all events her attitude suddenly relaxed, her face and voice suddenly softened. “Deed,” she said, and you could hardly recognize her for the same girl, “ ’tis not that I’d be saying love wasn’t good for married people. Who’d know what it is between husband and wife better than me, James O’Connell’s own sister? But ’tis married love, love that comes with the priest’s blessing, and none of that sort of miaulin an’ stravagin. Look here ladies,” she said with another sudden change of tone, “ye were talking about the evicted tenants.

“Well, if yem like to know one that has been through with it, I’ll take ye any Sunday to see my own brother that old Poltimcffe evicted. He’s under Major Hannay now, glory be to Ged! but ’tis long he and the wife and the little ones were in a cabin with the wet coming through the thatch, and only the black shadow of Bari ass Hill for shelter against the north wind.” “We’ll go gladly,” said Rosa for both of us, “and t next Sunday after mass, if that will suit you, Miss O’Connell.” Joanna joined us at the hotel on Sunday about 1 o’clock. We had a rickety hotel-car, and a ragged driver in high spirits, who kept incessantly urging the little lean mare. We flew down-hill and up-hill at breakneck pace, but the urchin who was driving never relaxed his long whistle, which seemed perfectly maddening to the horse. However, a 3 he left our entreaties unheeded, we soon got used to our flight through the air. As we passed we scattered stones and flints freely from the road, set the hens screaming wildly, and made' an occasional old woman at a cottage door lift up her hands in amazement. Agleesh, when we reached it, was a poor little place enough, but an oasis of cultivation after lierry Moor. There we had seen the wide, boggy country, traversed by streams of water stained red with the iron washings, patches of partially reclaimed land were fast returning to bog-land; and we saw the remains of roofless cabins standing up here and there black and smoke-dried. Joanna was an entertaining companion. She knew every man, woman and child along the road, and could tack a history to each. She pointed us out this and that evicted farm, and far away under Barlass Mountain, made us see, through our spy-glass, as she called it, the huts of evicted tenants, hive-shaped, like the hut of a New Zealand aborigine. “But, Joanna,” one of us said—she had prayed early in the day that we should call her Joanna—“how is it that if your brother couldn’t pay rent to Col. Poltimore he is able to pay for the land of this Major Hannay, who you say is of the old stock, and a kind landlord?”

For once Joanna’s loquacity seemed frozen. She answered sententiously and with a vague flush, It was an answer that told nothing, and we felt that somehow we had presumed. There was an awkward silence for quite five minutes. Agleesh was an ordered little place, with tiny patches of fields, cropped, and in a way to prosper. The house was long and low, a house of three or four . rooms, perhaps. The dunghill was'out of sight at the back, and the place, though bare, as if they were newcomers, had a tidy look. As the car drew up at the house door, a pale, pretty young woman ran out. She had a baby in her arms, andia boy or two hid his shy eyes in heii skirt. Following came her husband, a tall young man, happy-looking, but with a certain pallor and thinness as from late privation. We were welcomed with genu: ne courtesy and hospitality ; but J 3anna seemed to disappear in her sis er-in-law’s embraces, and the kisses of “young Jemmie.” This scion of Ihe house seemed to be a source of mingled'pride and embarrassment o Joanna. “Quit h ding your face, you rogue,” she said, Itrying to disentangle the fat arms a jout her neck. “What’ll the ladies think of you at all at all, for an unmannerly rogue?” It was a new light on Joanna. We felt a little; out of it amid the enthusiastic affefction of which she was the centre. We lingered, therefore, in “the room j to which Mrs. O’Connell presently conducted us to lay aside our wraps. A charming room it was, with the til y window framing purple Barlass, tE e gay patchwork quilt on the bed, th i altar with its statue and lamp, and Ihe perfect purity we had scarcely locked for. We concluded that we sho aid have to remake our impressions of Joanna. When wn went down at last she was sitting at the tea table, voluble as usual, ahd buttering hot potato cakes as they came from the griddle. The father ind mother were looking at her with pleased admiration; the placid baby lay on her extended knees; young Jemmie was standing by her skirt with an air bf proprietorship. We had said to each other upstairs that the brother and his wife were of finer clay than Joanna, a judgment we afterward thought upon Remorsefully. However, there was no doubt that the simple refinement and good will written in the faces of the pair did not belie them. I have seldom spent i pleasanter evening than in that farmhouse kitchen. It |was cold enough to enjoy the big turf fire; the tea and eggs and cake were dolicious, and served with a cleanliness that left nothing to be desired. Then James O’Connell, though slowsr-witted than the redoubtable Joanna, who often reminded him of this or that as he pain takingly elu-‘ eidated for us the problem of land--

lord and tenant as shown on the Pol* timore estate, was a man of much intelligence, and a fair-mindedness which came of his extreme gentleness. He said very little of his own suflere ings in the bleak winter of eviction, when the shelter for him and his was one of those conical huts under th* lee of Barlass. “I wouldn’t live through it again, ladies,” he said, “not for a power. We carry-the traces of it still, me an’ Mollie, and even little Jimmie, the creature. But, thanks be to God, and another who’ll be nameless”-he lifted eloquent eyes to Joanna—“sure it’s in heaven we are now, an’ God knows if we’d be as happy if we hadn’t had a taste of the other place.” The mystery of this speech was elucidated when Mrs. O’Connell took us to put on our hats. Joanna had gone out with her brother to see "a bit that needed drainin’.” Nothing had amazed us more in this extraordinary girl than the practical knowledge and enthusiasm she showed about farming. We had left them to set forth up the boreen; Joanna with young Jemmie by her side, and with the baby clasped to a breast suddenly, it seemed to us, grown maternal, Mrs. O’Connell watched them forth with much pride and tenderness, and then led the way to “the room.” We said somethiug of Joanna’s cleverness and beauty. As we did a flush came up in her sister-in-law’s delicate face. In her excitement she became quite loud-voiced and assertive. “Handsome she is, an’ clever she is, ladies,” she said: “but our Joanna's better than any other. She hates to be talked about, an’ if she was here would be the first to clasp her hand over my mouth. She’ll neverewn it to any one that it was h r bit of a fortune that took us, as Jemmie says, in heaven. She had £BOO of : her own that the ould man scraped an’6aved.

“He left Jemmie the land, but what good was it when the old lord died, and Poltimore came in an’ riz the rint? When we were efut there under Barlass she never mentioned to us what was in her heart. She came often bringing the food and the clothes that was life to me and Jemmie—Jemmie that lay six months with a lung complaint caught in that rotten place. An’ little Jemmie at the breast, and little Jo, God bless her! expected. But the day that she could release her fortune, for the ould man had tied it up until she was 21, she was off to Cork to a ’torney, an’ she said nothing to any one till she had bought the lease of Agleesh from Major Hannay. “And one day, when Jemmie was that low that I feared he’d never lift his head again, she came marching in and flung the lecjse on the quilt. ‘Get up, Jemmie O’Connell,’ she said, ‘your farm’s waiting for you.’ And the next day we moved here; and from that hour Jemmie began to pick up life and hope. We’ve done finely since then, thank God; and Major Hannay, kind gentleman that he is, isj, maybe, a little kindlier to Jemmie than to another by raison of the good will he bears Joanna.” She stopped for breath, and then went on again more quickly. “Maybe ’tis shame to us for taking it,” she said, “but sure ’twas all done before we knew a word about it. The cruel thing was that Joanna’s match was nearly made with young Spelman of the mills beyond. He cried off quick enough when he heard where Joanna’s fortune was gone to. Joanna won’t speak of him now; but I often think she’d a liking for him. “Anyhow, he wasn’t fit for her, for he was rich enough to have taken her if he liked.” She looked at us with a certain trouble. “I'm often misdoubting,” she said, “that it’s right to have Joanna wearing out her days in Dunstable's. Sure, Jemmie talks of re-paying the debt we owe her. Godblessher! but we’ll be old before that comes about. She seems happy and well,” she added, looking at ua wistfully for corroboration. Outside the window Joanna’s voice rang out in emphatic assertion on some disputed point. She had young Jemmie by the hand, and her brother strolled by her peacefully, his two hands elasped behind his back. “He’s a picking up wonderfully,” said his wife, her eyes passing Joanna to linger on her husband’s face; “but there’s no doubt Joanna saved his life. Dr. Bogers said so; he said it was the damp of Barlass Moor was killing him, but I knew it was the heart break.”

We assured her that we thought Joanna was, happy and well quit of young Spelman. While she was at Agleesh she certainly seemed full of vicarious happiness. As we drove away she leant across the well of the car. “Now, there’s love for you,” she said triumphantly, “an’ that’s the love I believe in. There’s many a one talks of love before marriage. It’s myself doesn’t believe in it then. ‘Tis all lies an’ deceivin’—so it is. Sure, I’d rather be behind the counter of Dunstable’s all my life long than believe some that comes smelling after money-bags. A woman’s heart ought to be worth more than even $800.” They were the first words approaching sentiment we had heard from Joanna. Rosa and I look at each other sympathetically, having a clew to their meaning. A week later we left Y , and since have heard no more of Joanna.—[Good Words.

Economy in Pure Food.

There are many persons who, from a misguided sense of economy, purchase food which they know to be inferior, so that they may thereby save in order to meet other demands of the family. Handsome clothing and fine houses in aristocratic neighborhoods are deferrable, we admit; but not at the expense of the most important factor of our existence: especially when we know that pure, nourishable food is the immediate cause of pure blood, and, consequently, more perfect nerve and brain power. It is not only false economy but positive crime to obtain edibles below the standard for the use of sustaining both the mental and physical health of any human being.—[Baltimore Telegram.

New York stands first in the number of patents applied for.

WHAT WOMEN WEAR.

STYLES FOR THOSE WHO WANT TO LOOK PRETTY. Balloon Sleeve* Are StlU in Favor—Wom- *•** Riding Habit* Have Experienced a Great Change—Shirt YVaUti the Dominant Part of the Outing Dresses. Gotham Gossip. New York correspondence:

__ LEEVES on fashiooable summer JSV dresses are quite %&§ as big as those worn in the spring 1 1A and winter, and jPjf the shape remains NK much the same rr 1 about the shoulj\l der and upper arm. It would JfjgW certainly be nonJw/ sensical to retain big sleeves till Jw hot weather was 'jjk at end and then i®L resort to tight -“fv\ ones, but it seems if the next KP? change would surely bring

small sleeves, though knowing ones still assent that in the autumn even more material will be put about the arm than is now used. Big sleeves are comfortable wear in hot weather, and the omission of the tight cuff still further permits of ease. Sometimes the big shoulder puffs end in a short tight cuff, little more than a band, but an even better finish is a frill of lace, or the sleeve puff is caught in at the elbow and ends in a frill of. the sleeve stuff ornamented in any one of a variety of dainty ways. Thus completed are the sleeves of the first pictured costume in this column, which is a very stylish dress in dark-blue flowered challie, the skirt having panniers of silk crepon with hemstitched edges. At the top the sleeves have challie straps fastened with velvet buttons, and the bretelles end in a plain belt that encircles the waist. The overskirt of the figured goods comes to about six inches of the underskirt’s hem, and is looped up at both sides, while the underskirt beneath is from plain blue challie pinked out about the edge. The sleeves of the second gown shown are much larger at the bottom than at the top. end just above the elbow, and are finished by bands of mousßehne chiffon. With them are worn long gloves, which is not so comfortable a thought, but summer maids, when dressing for garuen fetes, will first consider style and appearances.

GOWNED FOR A GARDEN PARTY.

The bodice of this dainty costume, which is composed of gray silk, comes inside the skirt, hooks in the center, and the draped plastron of white mousseline chiffon laps over. Its lower part forms a fitted vest, from which straps of the dress stuff extend upward to the shoulders. A belt of wide ribbon ties in front in a large bow, with fancy passementerie. The skirt may be either gored or circular, and has a front breadth of the mousseline chiffon, the oorners of the stuff at the bottom being ornamented, as shown, with steel passementerie. Even cooler are the sleeves on the next dtess shown, which are puffed full to the elbow and end in a lace frill. There is a suggestion of coolness, too, in the gown’s cut at the neck. The wholo consists of a slightlv trained skirt of cream-colored figured pongee and a princess overdress of gray crepon, which has a small vest of lotusrod sicilienne let in at the side seam. The vest is finished with large re vers of yellow taffeta, and a deep blouse plastron of white lace fills the opening at the neck. The gored skirt is lined with silk foulard. Women’s riding habits have experienced a great change of late and now are net unlikp street dresses. Tailormades are responsible for this, because the latter are now so much worn, and they combine so many touches of masculinity that the mannish suggestions have ceparted from the riding habit, till the only pronounced one remaining is the footwear. When women first took to the stovepipe and skin-fit habit, it was because it was about her only chance to copy the severity of a man’s get-up and she felt such a chance ought to be made the most of. Now the girl on horseback need not look a

OP STRIKING CUT.

fright unless she insists on it. Very swell effects are gotten out of chocolate cloth with scarlet waistcoat, putty color with white, and stone-gray with dark-blue. The jacket may button closely to the throat if the linen is to be avoided for any reason. Very slender women wear a bodice that has no skirts and which shows off the figure strikingly, while the old-time basque with the postilion back simply ruined woman’s contour. Shirt waists are the dominant part of outing dresses, and a change of waist seemingly puts" the wearer into an entirely different costume. . This is a point taken advantage of by many a maid of slender means, and by another trick she may make herself doubly en-

vied at little expense. She can easily give the impression that she has a sailor hat for each shirt waist by providing herself with a lot of hat bands. These are cut just the right length and have button* holed places for the prongs of the buckle to go through. The buckle is silver and a modest outfit is complete with one or two of them, which may be adjusted to each change of band, though it is better if each of the bands has its own buckle al l passed through. In this case the buckle has a little under row of hooks and these catch into tiny silver rings on the hemmed end of the band. There is just a single move and the new band is adjusted, buckle and all, and after being put in position it can be tightened or loosened. The ribbon should match the color of the waist or of the trimmings. It is deemed the very best taste to have the waist trimmed with ribbon and to have the band of hat and ribbon exactly matching. This sort is very stiffly filled ana has a decided rep. With a white duck gown, the swagger thing is a made band of duck that runs through a strap of the same, and fastens with a single pearl button, which fits in cuffbutton fashion. There is a fancy also for “studding" the hat band instead of running it through a buckle. In th<g case three dress studs are inserted along the width of the band, just before its tailor-made point, and go

FOR SUMMER AFTERNOONS.

through both thicknesses, holding the band quite secure. They may be connected by tiny gold chains, and the set of little studs formerly sold for fastening baby dresses are new dignified in the shop window with a placard calling them “hat studs.” It is much better to have 'souvenir” studs instead of purchased ones, and, if the summer’s men are nice, it will prove much cheaper, too —for the girls. While tailor cuts predominate for morning wear, they are away in the minority by the middle of the afternoon, when gowns cannot be too daintily designed. An example of tasteful elegance is shown in the fourth illustration, wherein heliotrope mousse line chiffon and black point d’esprit tulle are combined. The skirt is made of accordion pleated chiffon, and the overdress consists of the tulle, hooks in front, and has a vest of pleated mousseline chiffon which laps over. The pleated skirt is lined with silk, may be slightly stiffened, if desired, ana is fini-hed on the inside with a fathered chiffon frilL The bodice part as a fitted silk lining, and the tulle fronts are rounded at the bottom and draped from the middle of the skirt to the shoulders. The sleeves consist of large puffs finished with a triangular piece of tulle bordered with heliotrope and black tinsel galloon, and a deep heliotrope silk fringe. The long cuffs are plain. A current trick is to wear the belt loose, so that it droops at one side, as do the sailors’. It is claimed for this notion that the effect is prettier than the tight belt, but the 'ruth is that a tiny waist encircled with a manifestly loose belt looks smaller than ever. The

FOR ANOTHER SORT OF AFTERNOON.

secret of this effect is, of course, that all neces.ary compression must be managed without giving to the belt any responsibility. The most becoming belt is a thick, heavy leather one that is made almost like* a man's; indeed, she is a wise girl who buys her belt at a men’s furnishing place, and then has it cut short and repunched to suit her waist. Such a belt worn loose is far prettier than the flimsv ribbon belt pulled so tightly that the'threads stretch and the filagree buckle is strained out of line. The final picture shows a nattv tennis costume for which blue and "white striped flannel, serge or cheviot will be serviceable. The gored .skirt is perfectly plain and the fullness in back is gathered The blouse is worn inside the skirt, hooks at the side, and is finished by a small black satin tie and white standing collar. The eton has pointed revers, turned down collar and double epaulettes, while the sleeves have big puffs that reach to the elbows, and long, light cuffs. The eton jacket should be made of solid darkblue stuff, either serge or cheviot. Ribbon bows are set on gowns in such erratic ways that sometimes a dress will look as if bespattered by a passing shower of ribbon knots. The only rule discoverable in this notion seems to be, get ’em on! The last fancy is for a bow set to one side 'of the yoke. This sort of bow is almost a pompon, so many are its loops, and from it ends float almost to the hem of the dress; that is, when not floating in the air, enwrapping the tile of the unwary passerby, fliching in the face of the gentleman in the seat behind, or attaching themselves to door knobs and arresting the wearer’s progress. Try one of the bows for yourself and see how many things they can do while you are doing one. Copyright, 18M.

There were 11,435,487 barrels of salt produced in the United States in the year 1893, as against 11,785,754 barrels in 1892, a falling off of 350,267 barrels. Each barrel weighed 280 pounds, making a total of 3,201,391,660 pounds.

LIGHTNING’S FREAKS.

SOME QUEER PRANKS OF ELEC* TRIC DISCHARGES Cutting a Bay Window From a Housa -Incessant Thunder and Lightning. A Dangerous Plaything. The freaks of lightning are extraordinary, says the Washington Star. A Wooster, Ohio, in June, 1892, a twostory bay window was cut from the main structure of a house as if by a knife. In the same month, at Norwich, Connecticut, a bolt went into the ground and jerked out of the earth 100 feet of iron water pipe. In October, 1848, three men were struck at the bottom of a mine shaft 880 feet below the surface. It was supposed that the electricity must have passed down into the shaft by a chain. There are many cases on record where people killed by lightning under trees have been marked in one part of the body or another with the image of a tree or of a leaf. This has been considered very mysterious ; but it is probable that such phenomena are largely attributable to imagination. Marks made by lightning are apt to be forked and branched in such a fashion as to suggest likenesses of the sort to excited minds.

There have been instances where lightning has entered a powder magazine and dispersed the gunpowder without setting it on fire. This is more easily understood when it is learned that there is difficulty in setting fire to gunpowder by sending a charge from a Leyden jar through it. The powder is simply scattered without being ignited. If anything interferes with the free passage of the electricity, however, the powder will explode. There have been several frightful disasters caused by light- | ning striking powder magazines. At midnight, August 10, 1857, a magazine at Joudpore, in the Bombay presidency, was blown up in this way, killing 1,000 residents. At Luxembourg, June 26,1807, a magazine containing twelve tons of gunpowder was struck, ruining a large part of the town. But the worst accident of I this kind happened at Brescia, .Aug. | 18, 1769, when 207,600 pounds of powder belonging to the Republic of Venice were exploded by lightning, destroying a sixth part of the city and 8,000 human beings. There are some parts of the world where at certain seasons thunder and lightning are practically incessant, the sky being lighted continuously by vivid flashes, while the ears are deafened by a roar of celestial artillery without pause. One of these localities is the east coast of San Domingo, a region shunned on this account by men and beasts at the rainy time of the year. There is a place in the Republic of Kew Genada where nobody will live on account of the frequency of lightning strokes. Thunder, by the way, is caused by the electric fluid rending the air, which has not time to get out of the way. The “rolling” of thunder is due to echoes thrown back from the clouds. Practically all of the 200 deaths caused by lightning in the United States annually occur in the five months from April to September, the highest being in June and July. Such strokes are very apt to produce a condition of suspended animation. Accordingly, the weather bureau recommends that everything possible shall be done to stimulate respiration and circulation in the person who has been struck, even though there are no apparent signs of life. Cattle and sheep suffer from this cause much oftener than human beings, sometimes an entire flock of sheep is wiped out literally in a flash. In nine years ending in 1892, 2,235 barns, 102 churches and 664 dwellings were struck in this country. During the same period there were about 4,000 fires from lightning, with a property loss of $14,000,000. Risk from lightning in rural districts is five times greater than in cities. Oak trees are struck fifty-four times as often as beeches, though nobody knows why.

•J - Though physicists 3ay that electricity is a form of motion, the fluid is a mystery yet. Its presence everywhere helps to make it interesting. Children shuffle over the carpet with their feet and thus generate enough electricity to light the gas with a spark from a finger. Anybody can do that, though the carpet must be of wool and very dry, as well as the floor beneath. Tesla, the famous expert, makes a light burn in his hand from electricity passing through his body. When a powerful electrical machine is being worked in a room, projecting sharp points about the furniture or fixtures are apt to be seen in the dark tipped with light. This is an artificial production of the so-called St. Elmo’s fire, which sometimes appears on the masts of vessels at sea, exciting the superstitions of sailors. On rare occasions church steeples are illuminated in the same strange fashion. During thunderstorms people’s heads have exhibited the phenomenon, each hair being terminated by a minute luminous tuft. Electricity has not always been found a safe plaything. The kite experiment of Franklin was repeated in France in June, 1758, by M. Romas, a provincial judge of scientific tastes. He made a kite eight feet high and three, feet wide, the string used being wrapped with copper wire. At the beginning of a thunder-storm he raised it to a height of about 550 feet. Instead of sparks he obtained flashes of fire a foot long and three inches wide, accompanied by loud noises like the cracking of whips. This performance was imitated in August of the same year by Professor Richmann, of St. Petersburg, the apparatus being set up in his dwelling. In the midst of the entertainment a large globe of bluish-white fire appeared, with a report like a gun. The experimenter fell back and died instantly, while his assistant was rendered unconscious. The house was filled with sulphurous vapors and was considerably damaged. Marks of burning were found on the dead man’s body. In 1857 lightning drawn from the clouds was made to yield sparks ten feet in length.

Hagar is believed to be. from the Hebrew, and means the Stranger.

A HOME-MADE OTTOMAN.

Suggestions for a Piece of FurnrtJ for the Summer Home. The sugar barrel lends itselfl convenient uses, and at this seai of the year is especially of val The ottoman in the illustration s gests the mechanism necessary to manufacture and the appears] after completion. To make it, the barrel in two, three inches ab« the middle dividing line, allow: just eighteen

BEFORE UPHOLSTERING.

inches of a thirty-inch barrel fori height of the seat. With some clinch nails fasten hoop all around the lower edge of ti staves on the inside. This hoop w strengthen the lower edge of the i verted tub, and it is then ready] be upholstered and draped. There are a great many differs materials of inexpensive and gew quality that may be used to cov such pieces of furniture with, andj you have nothing on hand that d be used, then purchase a few yan of blue or gray denim, some figud cretonne, or other material of a sin lar nature that will wear well ai not wrinkle. Spread.curled hair thickly all ov the top of the barrel, and draw ov it some unbleached muslin or hea l cheese cloth, and tack it all aroui the top outer edge of the barn This will form a good cushion, ai over the top of it place a piece of tl covering material; tack it all aroui the edge of the barrel also, and tin tuft the seat in the following ma ner.

AN OTTOMAN.

With a soft lead pencil mark on the top of the seat where want the buttons, and with a awl bore holes through the and through the wood top so point of the awl will penetrate to th®| under side of the wood seat. Make as many holes as you buttons; then turn the barrel and with the awl bore a hole side of eacli hole already made. obtain some metal buttons provide® with eyelets, and cover them with upholstery goods. Pass a long, stoiß needle threaded with strong string through one of the holes, through the seat pass the through the eyelet of a button, then run it down through the seafl| again, and through the hole the one that it was passed up through®| so that an end of the string will hang from each hole, leaving the ton on the top of the cushion. Secure all the buttons in a manner, and then tie the ends string together at the under side the seat until all the buttons been securely fastened, and the spit will be a tufted top, as shown the drawing. jjfl Hem one edge of several yards material for the side drapery, ancH| shir it on a string; tie this string® tightly around the top edge of th<® barrel and fasten it at intervals two or three inches with double driven into the wood; with gimp to match the draping and about three-quarters of an wide, cover the line where the top ofli the flounces and the outside of seat come together, and tack it with large brass oval-headed terer’s tacks, driven about two apart, all around the top edge, as a result you will have a very com]® sortable seat or ottoman, as shown inH| the illustration. '^R

A Future Fig Land.

“ California has a wonderful future before it in the cultivation of fruits, and the greatest source of its wealth in this connection will be, I believe, in the growing of figs,” said R. H. Martin who resides in Los Angeles, and has a promising plantation of young fig trees in Sonora, at Willard’s. “It is only recently that the Californians have learned the proper variety of figs to plant. Like most of our early fruits, the blue fig was found growing by the early settlers at the various missions, and for many years it was the only variety cultivated While excellent for home use, the blue fig was almost worthless as a dryer, and for some time the lack of any substitute led to the neglect of fig culture. Of late years, however, many varieties of the white fig have been introduced into California, notably the white Adriatic and the brown Smyrna, and these are fully equal to the imported article when dried or crystallized. There are ten million pounds of dried figs consumed in the United States every year, andthere is no reason in the world why California shouldn’t supply the entire demand. It is easy to realize what immense profits can be made in the cultivation of figs, when one welldeveloped tree will produce one thousand pounds of the fruit, after it is dried, which will command a price ofj six cents per pound, at least, in the market. Almost all soils and locations in Southern California, both in the valleys and on the foothills, are suitable to its cultivation, and I anticipate that within the next twenty years California will produce almost as large a crop of figs as gmyrna itself, which export? something like thirty million pounds of dried figs every year.—-[Washington Star.