Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 May 1895 — Page 5

'x'"7 >; nor on derrate the woman you choev w Vj7Z —A-JH — yon thought would make you happy. A "(L, ‘fa -Si I make you happy, even if we i az> iT —SUjL not rich.” .rJv “ The heart of her husband doth saf _p§_ytrust in her,’ ” said he, fondly. “B come, this is nonsense, and quite bes! ■ Jl' f^e question. What is the question, ’- ’ the bye? for I am getting rather confua 11 an d”—looking at his watch —“I must r s. 'j/J'j/f'/*. off to my work. Oh, what a comf, Lypina work is! Don’t you perceive that Iha * ' Jr/ zJ«| K been twice as happy, and therefore tw tts good, since I was at the mill?” She saw through the little loving n ♦rt sovta how noin- ts- mode V-> aw laal firm!

CHAPTER Xll—Continued,

A week afterward, coming back from meeting the postman, which he always did, though few letters ever came, and never those which, his wife could see, he missed and looked for still, Roderick threw down before her a heap of notes. “It never rains but it pours. Evidently, as old Black says, the ‘hale countrie’ has fallen in love with young Mrs. Jardine. Four invitations to dinner and one to a dance —extending over three weeks, and an area of fifteen square miles. To accept them would take half our quarterly Income, in carriage hire, etc., and to refuse them, why, six Caleb Balderstones could scarcely accomplish that feat.” She read and laid thd notes aside, with a rather sad face. “You would like to go? Well, then, my darling, shall we don our purple and fine linen —we have a few rags of splendor left—and fare sumptuously at our neighbors’ expense for four days? We can starve afterward for fourteen; Pm willing if you are.” “Roderick!” “Else—we must get up some excuse — you must have a cough, and be unable to go out evenings.” “But I am able —they may see me at church every Sunday.” “Most literal of women! Of course It Is a ‘big lee’ —as Black would call it But any lie will do; the bigger the better, since we can not possibly tell the truth.” “Why not?” The question was so direct and simple, yet so perfectly natural, that it staggered him. He laughed, though not very mirthfuly, and made no reply.' “Why not tell the truth?” Silence repeated. “It would be much the easiest way. Why not say to everybody, what everybody must know, or v ill soon, that we are not ric h enough to keep a carriage or give entertainments, but that we appreciate our neighbors’ kindliness, and will be glad to meet them whenever chance allows. Shall I write and say this? Nobody could be offended, for it is just the simple truth. And surely the truth is better than even the whitest of lies.” He had lived beside her and with her for a whole year now—this woman, so different from all other women he had ever known; and yet he seemed always to be finding out something new in her —some flivine simplicity which made all his worldly wisdom useless; some innocent courage which put even his manliness to shame. But he was too truly manly not to own this. “My darling,” he said, not laughing now, “I did not propose to tell a lie—not seriously. But the truth must be hid sometimes, when it is an unpleasant and humiliating truth. Come, then, shall we make a great effort, and appear at all these fine houses en grande tenue, and in a carriage and pair (Black’s, perhaps, borrowed for the occasion), and ‘make believe,’ as children say, that we are rich people?” “Would not that be acting a lie, which comes to the same thing as telling it? Did not your father once say so? And you once told me that if”—she paused a moment—“if you had boys you would teach them exactly as your, father taught you, that eith.er to tell or act a lie was absolutely impossible to a gentleman and a Jardine!” “You little Jesuit!” “Don’t call me that!” and her eyes filled With the quick tears, which, however, she rarely allowed to fall—she was not a “crying” woman. “I cannot argue, I can only feel and think. Dearest, I sit and think a great deal —more than in all my life before. I ought, you know ” Her head dropped and a sudden flush came over the sweet young face, firm through all its sweetness, much firmer than even a little while ago. Her brief eight months of married life had made a woman of her. And there.were the long lonely hours —alone, yet not alone—when a wife ever so young, cannot choose but sit thinking of what God is going to give her; of the mingled joy and fear, and solemn responsibility, stretching out into far generations. Well, indeed, may she say, even as the holy woman of whom it Is recorded, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it unto me according to thy word.” Something of this —expressing what she never said—was written in Silence’s face. Her husband could not quite understand it—no man could; but he saw the soft, tired look—tired, but not weak —there was nothing weak about her; and he put his arm around her very tenderly. “My darling, speak; you know I will always listen to you, even though I may differ from you. No two people can always think alike. But I want a wife, a counselor; I did not want a slave.” She laughed; still she. paused a little before?answering. It was hard to go against him—hard to put into plain, ugly words the fact that she, a wife, dared to think her husband wrong. Dear as he was to her—this passionately loved Roderick—there was something in the other love, dimly dawning, growing daily into a mysterious yet most absolute reality, which made her at once clear-sighted and brave, with the courage that all women ought to have when they think of themselves, not as themselves, but as the mothers of the men that are to be. “Roderick”—he was startled by the sweet solemnity of her tone—“this seems a smaller thing than it is. Whether we accept these invitations or not, matters little; but it does matter a great deal whether we begin our married life with truth or untruth; whether xfe meet the world with an utterly false face, or else a sullen face«. rejecting all its kindness'. Why not with a perfectly honest face, saying oper.ly, ‘We are poor; we know it, and it.is not pleasant; but it no disgrace; we are neither afraid nor ashamed ?' ” “That might be all very well in Utopia; but here? Did you ever know anybody who did it?” “Yes; my father and mother did it. Yours ” Roderick hesitated. “Perhaps my father might, only ” They were both silent. “Think, dearest,” she continued; “it is a question not merely for to-day or tomorrow. but for all our lives.” “God forbid!” The hasty mutter, the gloomy look—they went to his wife’s heart, and he eould see they did; but still she never shrunk. “I, too, say ‘God forbid!’ for I know even better than you do how hard poverty is. Oh, my Roderick! when I think of what I have cost you”—her voice faltered—“of all you have lost through me!” “Lost—and gained.” “Yes, I will not lightly value myself,

nor underrate the woman you choe,, who you thought would make you happy. And I will make you happy, even if we are not rich.” “ The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her,’ ” said he, fondly. “But, come, this is nonsense, and quite beside the question. What is the question, by the bye? for I am getting rather confused, and”—looking at his watch —“I must be off to my work. Oh, what a comfort work is! Don’t you perceive that I have been twice as happy, and therefore twice as good, since I was at the mill?” She saw through the little loving ruse to save her pain; it made her feel doubly the pain she was giving—was obliged to give. “You are always good”—taking his hand and kissing it —“and inexpressibly good to me, no matter how great a burden I am.” ‘The heaviest burden I ever had to carry, and the sweetest. But that is neither here nor there”—with a sudden change to seriousness, the serious, almost sad look that sometimes came over him, showing how the youth had changed into a man, the man into a husband—truly a husband —house-band, the stay and support of the house. “Dear, we have chosen our lot; we cannot alter it; we would not if we could. It is not all bright; I know that; but we must not make it darker than it is. We must not look back." “No.” “And for the future ” Then her strength seemed to come into her—strength born of a “further-looking hope” than even he could take In. “It is of that future I think,” she said. “We may be poor, as I said, all our lives. I hope not; but we may. Are we, and more than we, to make life one long struggle and deceit, by ‘keeping up appearances,’ or are we to face the worst, to appear exactly what we are, and trust the world to accept it as such? I believe it would —at least the good half of it. For the others, why need we care?” Gently as she spoke, it was with a certain resoluteness, and the hand which clasped her husband’s felt firm as steel. “For me,” she went on, laying her hand on his shoulder, and creeping close to him, “I am so proud, both for myself and you, that when these people invite me, I believe they really want me—me myself, and not my clothes or my carriage. And when they come and see me, I flatter myself it is really to visit me. And if I liked them, and felt them truly my friends, I would go and see them, and wish my husband to do the same, whether they were poor professors—like ours at Neuchatel or your English dukes and duchesses.” “Even if they said to us, as I have seen condescendingly affixed to church doors, ‘Come in your working clothes;’ for I am not even a professor; I am a workingman.” “Certainly; but something else as well. Look in the glass; you don’t do it too often! could anybody mistake you for anything but a gentleman?” Roderick laughed, coloring a little. J“My dove, you are growing a veritable serpent. Mistress Eve, you tempt your Adam on man’s weakest point—vanity.” “No, you are proud, not vain. Do not be afraid; I see all your faults clear as light.” “Thank you.” “As you mine, I hope; because then we can try and cure both. Dear, we are like two little children sent to school together. We may have many a hard lesson to learn; but we will learn them—together.” He was silent. As she had said, things were harder for him than for her. She recognized this fully. You could have seen by her face that her heart bled for him, as people call it—that cruel “bleeding inside,” which natures like hers so well understand; but she did not compromise or yield one inch even to him, and he knew her well enough by this time to be quite certaifi she never would. A weak man might have resented this, have taken refuge in that foolish “I have said it, and I’ll stick to it,’ or keep up that obstinate assertion of masterdom which usually springs from an inward terror of slavery; but Roderick was prone to neither of these absurdities. He had .that truest strength which never fears to yield, if there is a rational need for yielding. “My wife,” he said, at last, taking her hand and looking up with some gravity, but not a shadow of anger, “what do you wish me to dd?” “ ‘Do richt and fear nocht,’ as your motto—our motto—says. That is all.” “What is the right?” “The simple truth. Say it and act it.” “How?” “Let us tell our neighbors that we are not rich enough for what is called ‘society,’ but that we feel their kindness, and will accept it, whenever we can. Occasionally we will go and visit them— Symington, for instance, is quite within a walk; and when they visit us”—she smiled —“I hope I shall be able to give them a little hospitality, without need of a Caleb Baldersione.” “My darling!” “Do not be afraid of me”—she kissed him with a slightly quivering lip. “I may be young and foolish, but I know how to keep my husband’s dignity, and my own. Now, shall I write the notes, or you?” “You,” he said, and, plunging into a favorite book, referred to the matter no more. At supper time she laid before him silently a little bundle of letters, which he read, and then looked up with the brightest smile. “What a comfort is a wife who can get one out of a difficulty! You have the prettiest way of putting things—French grace added to Scotch honesty. How do you manage it?” “I don’t know. I just say what I feel; but I try to say it as pleasantly as I can. Why not?” “Why not, indeed! Only so few do it.” He looked at her, sitting at the head of his table—young, indeed, but with a sweet matronly dignity, added to her wonderful crystalline simplicity—looked at her with all his heart in his eyes. “People say that though a man’s business success rests with himself, his social status depends uporrtis wife. I think, whether rich or poor, I may be quite sure of mine.” A glad light was in her eyes, but she made no answer, except just asking if the letters would do. “Yes. But, little law-giver. I see you have accepted one invitation—the Symingtons’ ?” “You do not object? You liked them? And they will have a house full of pleasant people for Christmas—Lady Symington told me so. It is not good for man to be alone—not even with his ow mvife, who is half himself, and therefore no variety. I cannot bear you to hide your light under a bushel.” “Always me—nothing but me.” “It is always you—it ought to be,” she cried, with that rare passion less expressed than betrayed. “You think so little of yourself that it is right some ode should think for you. Everybody will by-and-by.” “We shall see. Once I had ambitions for myself.” “And now I have ambitions for you. They can wait. We are young. We bide our time. Only we’ll leave nothing (un-

done. Well watch the turn of the Ude. - “And meanwhile we’ll go to the Sym- I ingtons,” said he, with a smile. “You . see, I let you have your own way." “So you ought, if yon think it is the right way. And I may send off these notes? You agree?” “Yes. But.” half jesting, half earnest, . “suppose I had not agreed, what then? There is a little word in our English mar- j riage service—it was not in the Swiss one, ' I think—‘love, honor, and obey.’ ” ‘The two former imply the latter; but I if an English wife does not love or honor, , must she obey ?” “Would you obey?" Silence paused a moment, and then answered softly, but very distinctly, I “No. Neither God nor man could require | it of me. Oae must both honor and love : the man that one obeys, or obedience is | impossible. If a wife sees her husband ' doing wrong she should try to prevent him; if he tells her to do wrong she should refuse, for God is higher than man, even though it be one’s own husband. Roderick, you might ‘cut me up in little pieces,’ as the children say, but not even you could make me do what I felt I ought not to do, or hinder me from doing what I thought was right." “My little rebel! No,” snatching her ; to his bosom, “my little Conscience—the best conscience a man can have—a wife who is afraid of nothing and nobody; not even of himself.” “And are you not angry with me?” “Angry—because you spoke your mind; even though I thought one thing and you another—as may happen many and many a time. My dearest, did I not tell you once I wanted a wife, not a slave? Time enough for you to turn slave when I turn tyrant. I may like to rule —most men do; and it is fair they should if they rule wisely, but I should despise myself if I attempted to tyrannize. Now, kiss me. Our discussion is over; oar quarrel ended.” “Not a quarrel—only a difference of opinion.” “In which each holds his own till satisfactorily convinced to the contrary.” “Or till both see that there may be a wisdom beyond both theirs, which is perhaps the best lesson one learns in marriage. Except one —my husband!” And for the second time she took and kissed his hand, not in humiliation of repentance—what had she to repent of?— but in that tender reverence, that entire trust without which obedience is a fiction and love an impossibility. Then, ceasing to talk, he put her on the sofa, with her work-table beside her, and threw' himself on the hearth rug at her feet, to “improve his mind,” he said, and hers—by reading aloud. But, as often happened now, he was so tired that all these laudable intentions failed. He laid his head against his wife’s lap, and fell fast asleep with the hook in his hand. (To be continued.)

Her Subscription.

At the time of a passing rebellion in Ireland, known as Smith O’Brien’s, the region where Frances Power Cobbe lived and worked among the poor was tiansformed, as she says, into a small Hecla; not under snow but mud. Clubs were used for the purpose of buying pikes, to be used whenever the leaders at Dublin should call for an insurrection. The result was as harmless as the bursting of a bubble, but meantime there had been real danger for all landed proprietors, whose downfall had been determined upon. One incident related by Miss Cobbe showed her innocent participation in the rebellion. She says: I was visiting the fever patients at Balisk, and w’as detained in the village quite late qne summer evening. So many were ill that it took a long time to supply them with food and all things necessary. At one house, where three persons were ill, I lingered, questioning and prescribing, until about nine o’clock. When I went away I left money to purchase the articles I had prescribed. Next morning my father said to me: “So you were in Balisk last night?” “Yes, I was kept there.” “You stayed in Tyrell’s house until nine o’clock?” “Yes; how do you know?” “You gave six and sixpence to the mother to get provisions?” “Yes; how do you know?” “Well, very simply. The police were watching the door, and saw you through it. As soon as you were gone the club assembled there. They were waiting for your departure. The money ypu gave was subscribed to buy pikes; of course to pike me!”

What Life Gives.

Life gives to the individual precisely what he gives to life. Its divinest possibility is to offer place and power to work for some good outside one’s range of immediate personal interests. Life is a flue art in itself and demands the artist. It offers him his material, and he can shape it as he will—according to his own beauty and dignity of ideal conception. Force can be plucked from the unknown, as electric power can be evolved from masses of water. The habit of concentration cannot be too strongly insisted upon. In the hour of concentration lies the opportunity to pluck Force that will be transmitted into courage, into patience, into faith, into divination. As particles of sound arrange themselves in harmony with a musical note, so all outer circumstances rearrange themselves in harmony and beauty if the right spiritual note be struck. The power to strike it aright is gained in the hour of silence and solitude, when one lifts up his heart to the divine. One does not find, but creates, his future. The coming day, the coming month, or year, is plastic to the impress of spiritual force. It can be stamped into beauty and loveliness that will precisely correspond with the beauty and loveliness of purpose or thought Force—spiritual force—is the key to this diviner destiny which makes heaven here and now.—Lillian Whiting in Boston Budget The greater part of what we see when we look at Jupiter is probably a mass of more or less heated clouds, suspended around the hot core of the planet within—a cloud ball, 86,500 miles in diameter. Above Jupiter’s equator the surface of those clouds is whirling along at the rate of more than 27,000 miles an hour, In consequence of the planet’s rapid rotation on its axis. When through with wash tubs or wooden palls, turn them bottom side tip on the floor of the wood house or cellar, and set a can of fresh water under them to keep them from coming to pieces. -+Be not righteous overmuch, lest you use up the supply of a lifetime in a single season, and have not sufficient left to leaven the rest of your years.. Kate Field has been decorated by the French Government for her literary services. i

THE JOKERS’ BUDGET.

JESTS AND YARNS BY FUNNY MEN OF THE PRESS. Unavoidable--In the Menagerle--Uncertain--Under Subjugatlen--Eto., Eto. UNAVOIDABLE. “William,” said Cholly Anglomane, as he laid down his newsi paper, “I shall be obliged to dispense with youah services heahafter.” “Whathave I done, sir?” “Nothing at all. my good fellow. You’re a vewey good man, and I hate to paht with you. But the Pwinceof Wales has just discharged his man, so I cawn’t help myself." IN THE MENAGERIE. “If this place should catch fire what would you do? ” asked the giraffe of the elephant. “I’d pick up my trunk and run for the entrance. What would you do ?” “I’d go to that window and slide down my neck to the sidewalk,” said the giraffe, with a wink at the monkeys. UNCERTAIN. “Were you ever up before me?” asked a Police Justice. ‘Shure I don’t know, yer anner. What time does yer anner get up?” UNDER SUBJUGATION. “Are you married?” said the manager to a man who was looking for a situation. “No, sir.” “Then I can’t employ yon. I have a place into which I could put you, but we engage only married men.” “May I ask the reason of this discrimination? Is it that families may be provided with support? ” “Not at all. It is because we find that married men know better how to obey than bachelors.” EXPLAINED. “Why do you punch that hole in my ticket? ” asked a little man of the railroad conductor. “So you can pass through,” was the reply. UNSATISFACTORY. Minnie—ls “dude” good English? Mamie—Most of them are very poor imitations. NO ESCAPE. Mrs. Getthere (enthusiastic worker at church fair) —Now, Mr. Slimpurse, you really must take a chance in this beautiful pipe; you really must. Just think, the pipe is worth S2O, and the chances are only $1 each. Mr. Sllmpurse (edging off) —Very sorry, madame, but I don’t smoke. Mrs. Getthere—Oh, but you can learn, you know. Mr. Slimpurse—Tobacco does not agree with me. I would have no earthly use for a pipe. Mrs. Getthere (struck with a bright idea)—Well, there isn’t the slightest probability of your drawing it, you know. UNDERSTOOD HIS BUSINESS. Irate Customer—See here! All my friends are laughing at this bargain suit I bought of you. They say it’s a mile too big. Dealer (gently)—Mine frient, I know de cloding peesness hotter dan your frients do. Shust you vait till it rains. THROUGH NO FAULT OF HER OWN. “Miss Skylie appears to have lost her attractiveness for thp gentlemen,” said one girl. “Oh, no,” replied the other; “she didn’t lose it. Her father lost it in Wall Street.” NOT LACKING IN ANCESTORS. Aristocratic Father—And your ancestors? Aspiring Youth—Oh, I have ’em. I had a father and mother, and so did all their people before them. HOW IT GOT OUT. Mrs. Gadd —Oh! have you heard the news? Miss De Ledger and her father’s bookkeeper wer® secretly married six months ago. Mrs. Gabb—Dear me! How did it leak out? Mrs. Gadd —Some one overheard them quarreling. BABY’S MASTERPIECE. “I’m sure that baby is going to be a great artist,” said the fond mother. “Isn’t he rather young to evince any talent?” “That’s just where he shows his genius. I left him where he could get some red ink on his fingers, and before I knew what he was doing he had decorated the library wall with one of the loveliest magazine posters you ever saw.” BROADMINDED. “Van Dabbles is very kindly disposed toward his brethren in art. He has a good word for nearly everybody’s work.” “Yes,” replied Miss Pepperton, “even his own.” DISAPPOINTED. Mrs. Wickwire threw down the paper in a way that betokened some irritation. “What’s the matter, dear?” asked Mr. Wickwire. “Oh, nothing.” “Oh, yes, there was 'something. What was it?” “Well, if you must know, I saw a line in the paper about ‘Chinese worsted’ and it turned out to be something about that tiresome war. I thought it was some new kind of dress goods.” ( FORGOT HIS NAME. Magistrate—“ Why didn't you answer to your name?” Vagrant—“ Beg parding, jedge, but I forgot wot name I gave las’ night.” Magistrate—“ Didn’t you give your own name?” Vagrant—No, jedge, I’m travelin’ incog.” MONEY THAT DOESN'T TALK. “Paw, what does it mean when they say money talks?” asks Johnny. “It means,” said Mr. Billus, after reflecting a moment, “that it sometimes helps a man that’s got it to talk a little louder than the other fellow.”

“Does all money talk?” persisted Johnny. “N-no. Not exactly.” “Then money that can’t talk is hash money, ain't it?” “Er —ah—haven’t you anything to do? Suppose you go out and bring in your kindling wood.”

Rise of the Woman M.D.

In the United States and Canada there are forty-seven medical colleges open to both sexes and nine for women alone. The average number of graduates each year from all of the colleges is about eight hundred, and as most of the colleges have been established from periods ranging from ten to forty years, it is estimated that there are nearly fifteen thousand women physicians practicing in this country. Abroad Belgium, England, Finland, France, Ireland, Italy, Norway, Switzerland and Wales have universities where women may study, and they allow these women to practice also, differing in that respect from Denmark, Holland, Ireland, Roumania, Scotland and Sweden, where women may study but may not practice. In Germany, with magnificent educational advantages for men, it is impossible for a woman to obtain a medical education and only under certain conditions are they allowed to practice. There are now nine women practicing in Germany and thirteen in Russia. In the United States the restrictions on a medical education vary in the different States. In New York, for Instance, it is necessary for a woman to pass a State Regents’ examination in spelling, arithmetic, elementary English, English composition, geography. United States history and physics before she can matriculate at a college. After the degree of Doctor of Medicine has been conferred, another State examination, embracing all of the knowledge acquired during the course, must be passed before she can practice. This applies equally to men and women. The importance of the woman M. D. is becoming more and more apparent every day. That there is a wide field in medicine open to women of natural ability in this direction is also apparent, and it is admitted that many women doctors are of more practical helpfulness in a sick room than some of the men.

The Utility of Flattery.

“Say,” began Raggles, “you see before you—” “Oh. I know what you are going to say,’ interrupted the man. “Your wife is sick, your children are starving, your house leaks and you yourself haven’t had anything to eat for thirty-six hours—” “ You’re on to me, ain’t you?” “ Well, I should say.” “Been round a good deal, ain’t you?” “That’s what I have IV “It’s a pretty smart man that w’orks you for a coin. I knowed that when I first seen you. I says to myself that a man with sech an intelligent face as you has can’t be fooled, but I goes against my better jedgment and tries it, and now see what a fool I’ve made of myself. I humbly axes your pardon,” and Raggles made a humble obeisance. “Oh, you needn't feel so bad about it,” replied the man. “Here, take this,” and he deposited a quarter in Raggles’ uncalloused palm and strode on. “Flattery pays, and it don't cost much,” said Raggles to himself as he started to find his friend Dusty and tell him to head off the soft and shining mark on the next block.

Where Old Car Horses Go.

Just as we are getting rid of our horses by substituting electric traction on street railways, the inhabitants of European countries are complaining that their equine population is increasing beyond all reasonable bounds. Electric traction has as yet made comparatively little progress there, and we are dumping on their shores many of our wornout old car horses, to such an extent that from one country—Scotland—an energetic protest lias just gone up. In France 'they are no better oft. Recent statistics show that that country has no less than 3,000,000 horses and that the horse population of the cities (about 800,000) is continually increasing ata greater rate than the human population. This, without doubt, is due to the increase of urban street car lines, which are making much progress in France,especially in the smaller cities. In Paris there were twenty-five years ago 70,000 horses,now there are 120,000, which travel collectively every day a distance equivalent to two and one-half times the circuit of the globe.

The American Eagle.

The probabilities are that in the near future the officers of the United States Army will take on another designation of rank in the shape of metallic eagles, to be worn on the front of their hats. The question is under advisement among the head officials of the War Department, and it is understood that the project is very favorably regarded by many of them. Some of the army officers are urging it. on the ground that in European countries the officers wear on their hats the colors of their sovereigns. They hold that it is a plain and unmistakable evidence of nationality, as well as of rank and military service, and that as the eagle is the national American emblem it can be adopted to the benefit of the service.

Her Explanation.

That was a delightfully ingenuous and budlike remark that a certain young girl made at a reception the other evening. “You say you don't know who any of those young men are,” some one said to her; “ but I notice they seem to know who you are.” “Oh” said she, “that’s easy enough to understand—there areq’t so many of me to know as there are of them I”

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Prof. Hiram Forbes, of the , Stevens Institute of Technology, says that in fifty years from now twoth'rds of the work now done by men and women will be taken off their hands by electricity. Steel shipbuilding for the traffic of the great lakes is in a highly prosperous condition. The size of lake vessels steadily increases; two ships of 6,000 tons burden are now on the stocks in South Chicago. In the five years ending April 2, 1900, there will be 180 retirements in the army. The list includes one lieutenant general, two major generials, seven brigadier generals, forty- | four colonels. seventeen lieutenant colonels, twenty-five majors and thirty-four captains. According to an English writer, who has made a recent football game played near London by feminine elevens an excuse for discussing the running powers of women, “even the most athletic of them can never rise beyond a compromise between a scuttle and a scamper.” This phrase is certainly ungallant; if numberless legends, ancient and modern, are to be trusted, it is also untrue. Very few people understand the enormous scope of the operations of a modern railway company. There are now probably nearly 900,000 persons employed directly by the railways of the United States, and if any account is taken of the families dependent on many of these employes it will be seen that possibly 2,000,000 of the residents of this country derive their support from these companies. A great international exposition of industries and fine arts, authorized by the federal government of Mexico, will be Inaugurated in the City of Mexico on April 2, 1896, and will remain open for a period of at least six months. This will be Mexico’s first exposition. The exposition is to include all kinds of industrial, scientific, commercial and artistic productions, and to embrace, in fact, the whole range of human activity. The English journals are concerned about the state of the Queen’s health and are advising her to restrict her diet. Truth recommends her to give up tea, to eat as sparingly as possible of meat and fish, and to make luncheon her heaviest meal of the day. Queen Victoria has long been threatened with loss of the use of her logs, and as she is unable to stand erect at times without support, her attendants find it hard to dross her. Sales of postage stamps by the Postoffice Department have long been regarded as furnishing a reliable indication of the condition of the business of the country. Official figures for the last three months of 1894, which have just been given out, show that more than $19,405,000 worth of stamps wore sold, this being the greatest amount over sold in any quarter year. The officials regard this as irrefutable evidence that trade is rapidly recovering from the recent depression, and as good cause for general rejoicing. There are nt present in round numbers 180,000 miles of steam railroads in operation in the United States, but neither this fact nor the remarkable growth of the electric systems can be taken as meaning that the construction of steam roads In this country has approached anything like a termination. When the vast area of the country is taken into consideration, affording as it does ample room and the necessity for almost countloss miles of new roads, and when, also, the demands for the transportation of heavy and varied traffic are not lost sight of, it will readily be seen that the construction of steam railways is in hq ‘linger of being discontinued, but that, oh the contrary, there is a bright and profitable future for all those engaged in the industry, provided, of course, that the long delayed revival in general business may be counted upon with any degree of certainty. To bring the products of the West to the Atlantic Ocean and send them across to Europe as cheaply as possible is always being studied by wealthy men and companies. The latest plan Is to build a ship canal from the great lakes to the Atlantic, using on the way the waters of Lake Erie, Lake Ontario, the St. Lawrence River, Lake Champlain and the Hudson River. These bodies of water will be joined by wide canals twenty feet deep, which will have a steady flow to the Hudson, as the lakes are higher than the river. Beside carrying freight the company will supply towns and villages along the Hudson with pure water. Every year there are shipped 60,000,000 tons of freight from the West which could be taken through the canal. When the canal is in use ships will be loaded in Chicago and sent direct to foreign countries, saving the cost of loading cars and then unloading again into ships at New York. The canal might also be useful in tiiho of war. A highly interesting study of what a hundred years of war have cost France in human life has just been made public by Dr. Lagneau, member of the Academy of Medicine of Paris, and is found in the Lancet. When the revolution broke out France’s effective army was only 120,000 men. For the wars waged during ten years in Belgium, on the Sambre, the Meuse, the Rhine, the Alps, the Pyrenees, in the Vendee, and in Egypt, there were called out 2,800,000. At the census made in the ninth year of the republic there remained of these only 677,598. In killed and in dead by disease the wars of the first republic cost'France 2,122,402 men. From 1801 to Waterloo 8,157,898 men scarcely sufficed to fill the blanks which, in an incessant war against combined Europe, France incurred at Austerlitz, Jena, Auerstadt, Friedland, Saragossa, Eckinuhl, EsslTng, Wagram, Taragona, Smolensk, Moscow, Lutzen, Bautzen, Dresden, Leipzig, and Waterloo. Under the restoration Louis Philippe, and the Second republic, in s>pite of the war in Spain (1828), the conquest of Algiers (1880), and the taking of Antwerp, France passed through a period of comparative calm. The army numbered about

T ! 218,748, and the mortality averaged 122 per 1,000 In 1853-5 commenced 1 the epoch of the great wars—the Crimea, Italy (1859-60), China I (1860-1), Mexico (1862-5), and the I disasters of 1870- In the Crimea, ; out of 800,268 men 95,615 succumbed; in Italy, out of 500,000 there died 18.678; in China 950, and in Cochin China, 48 per 1,000. The Second empire cost France about i 1,600,000 soldiers. According to I Dr. Lagneau s demographic tables the i century from 1795 to 1895 witnessed ' the death in battle or by disease of | 6,000,000 French soldiers. It is understood that the effort which was made toward the close of the last session of Congress to secure a new international commission for the consideration of the seal question, and with the view of preventing the I entire annihilation of the species, I will be revived at the beginning of the next session, when it is believed that Congress, having more time for considering the matter, will be favorably disposed toward action. It was urged when the bill was before Congress last session that there was great danger if the present regulations were allowed to remain in force another year there would be very few of the saals left to protect, but this view is not pressed now, and the opinion is expressed that even after this year’s crop of pelts shall have been harvested there will be a sufficient nucleus remaining to allow a rapid increase in case those left are sufficiently protected. The experts on the question estimate that there yet remains about 800,000 seals in the American herd, and they expect it to be reduced at least one-third during the approaching season. This estimate allows for the killing of 100,000 of these seals in 1895. This is in excess of the number of American seals known to have been killed last year by about 44,000, but there are reasons for believing that the British sealers will enjoy some privileges this season which they did not have In 1894, and It is also surmised that they will make special effort to increase the catch, In view of the possibility of gre’ater restrictions In the future.

SKY SCRAPERS.

Thirty-Five Storiea th* P>*obabla Limit In Tall Buildings. “The height of a building is limited only by the convenience of its tenants,” said the architect who designed the skyscraper in course of tion at the corner of Broadway and Pino street, New York. “This convenience is dependent more or less upon the speed of elevators. When the time comes that the journey from ground floor to top story becomes too long for comfort, then the distance will have to be lessened; that’s all. “The strength of material has nothing to do with the case. We could build a good part of the distance to the moon if we could get persons to rent the upper floors. Practically, though, under existing conditions, I imagine that thirty-four or thirty-five stories will be about the limit. This is only a guess on my part, however.

“The steel construction so much used now in tall buildings is surprisingly simple and wonderfully strong. It is nothing, in fact, but plain truss work, like a bridge. The iron mills have helped us wonderfully, too. It is now possible to get steel beams for girders thirty inches in diameter. The steel work is much quicker and easier to put up and makes a more substantial building than masonry. “My building at Pine street would, I am sure, stand an earthquake that would shatter a much lower stone structure.. To make such a building fall it would have to be tipped over beyond its center of gravity. Then it would all fall together like a log and would not crumble until it struck the earth. * “ If this building were of masonry its walls at the base would have to be seven feet thick. They are now less than three. The steel construction lessens the cost of building very greatly and the time even more. As each story is supported on girders, and nothing on the walls, it is not necessary to wait for the cement to set. “The elevator people are keeping up with us nobly. The newer elevators are very fast. There are more elevators now th New York than there are street cars.”

Weeds in the Future.

Fifty years ago the tomato was considered unfit for food, yet to-day it is, with the exception of the potato, the most extensively eaten vegetable. It would be a bold person who would predict what additions will be made to our diet within the next fifty years. What new grains, fruits and vegetables may not our scientists develop for us? The field is almost limitless. So far only six out of our 800 grasses have been turned into cereals through cultivation, and the possibilities of fruit and vegetable development are equally good. Some of our most pestiferous weeds may be regarded by our grandchildren as nature’s choicest and sweetest gifts-