Democratic Sentinel, Volume 21, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 September 1897 — PROFIT IN BAD DOLLARS. [ARTICLE]

PROFIT IN BAD DOLLARS.

Margin of 60 Cents on Every Silver Dollar Privately Minted. The United States secret service bureau is struggling with an epidemic of counterfeits. Hardly a day passes without the arrest of from one to half a dozen persons detected in passing spurious notes or silver coin. It is evident that there is a large volume of counterfeit silver certificates of last year’s issue afloat and that the circulation is continually being diluted with that sort of material. When these certificates were first put out expert engravers predicted that counterfeiters would be tempted to resume activities, and the result shows that they were not wrong in their prophecy. As works of art these certificates may be very fine, but for purposes of money they were shockingly deficient in many of the safeguards which the department had provided against counterfeiting. Government detectives have been instructed to be on the watch for bogus silver dollars, the tip having been given the treasury department that a move was being made in some mysterious and unknown quarter for the minting of such dollars on a large scale, the coins to have the same amount of silver as the genuine and to be in exact similitude of the coin bearing the stamp of the United States mints. Thus far the department has not been able to locate any of this illicit product and it is not believed any of the bogus dollars of that sort arc yet in circulation, but that is no guaranty that the country may not at any time be flooded with them. At the present price of silver bullion there is a margin of CO cents on every dollar privately minted.

THREATENED WITH FAMINE. Plight of Klondike Miners—Yukon Very l ow for N.ivagation. News received in letters to the Alaska Commercial Company that famine is almost certain on the Klondike next winter receives confirmation from Mr. Goodhue, 1 newspaper correspondent at St. Michael. He states that the Yukon is unusually low and that the chances of getting enough food to Dawson to support those now there and those Hocking in are slender. A letter has been received in Vancouver from Henry Hehnson, who left for the Yukon via Skaguay with a well-equipped party in July. The party consisted of eight, but one grew faint-hearted under the hardships and ieturned. They had reached the summit Aug. 22 and expected to arrive on Stewart river before winter sets in. Dead horses are reported along the trail and at one spot, where their party lost one horse through falling over a precipice, six horses were killed the same day. Two men were caught stealing and were shot. Large numbers of people are turning back and outfits can be purchased cheaply. Ex-Sergt. Haywood of the Vancouver police force, who went up to Dawson City in the spring, says in a letter that “God only knows what will become of the crowds now beading this way.” At the time of his writing provisions were scarce in Dawson, but a steamer was expected daily.

MAIMED IN A STUbENTS’ “RUSH.” University of California Freshman Sustains Serious Injuries. There will be no more “rushes” at the University of California if President Kellogg’s latest mandate is obeyed. Halfdazed, his jaw broken, his face a bleeding mass, Benjamin Kurtz, a newly entered freshman, was found wandering about the campus Monday night after the rush between the two lower classes. In the struggle some one put his heel on Kurtz's face, and as a result he is disfigured for life and may have sustained an injury of the brain. There were two other serious casualties. Frank Marshall, freshman, bad his right leg broken just above the ankle. Condon, another freshman, also came out of the combat with a broken leg.

TRAIN WRECKS A STATION. Buildings at Blodgett Milla, N. Y., Demolished by Cars. Train No. 4, the New Y'ork vestibuled train on the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Kailroad, jumped the track at Blodgett’s Mills, the first station south of Cortland, and plunged through the station buildings. The locomotive, baggage car and two coaches went entirely through the structure. Several people were reported killed.

Talks of Assessment. 'taking the stand that he is dealing with a professional tax-dodger, a strong and caustic letter lias been addressed to George M. Pullman by Z. 8. Holbrook, president of the Chicago Taxpayers’ Defense League. Mr. Holbrook has opened the vials of his wrath and poured the contents over the multi-million-aire in a merciless flood. He has compared the palace car magnate to the anarchist in the slums; has referred to his class as a menace to the land; a host of genteel criminals; beggars who ply their calling at the front doors of those befoie whom they stoop to ask >i sordid blessing. The occasion of the open letter is the figures nt which the millions of property owned by the Pullman Palace Car Company have been assessed. Instead of $3,960,063, which the president of the league declares should be the valuation placed upon the company’s assets, according to the corporation's own estimates, the aggregate assessments amount to $1,561,955. Land estimated by the league to be worth $40,000 an acre is assessed at $741, and other glaring discrepancies are pointed out in the exhaustive report of values and assessments which accompany the open letter. The writer refers to the strike of 1894 and points out to Mr. Pullman the fact that at the cost of more money to the government, State and city than they have ever or possibly will ever receive from the Pullman Palace Car Company its property was protected during the strike. He asks what has Pullman done in return. The answer is forthcoming: “Some one has generously loaned to the assessor a smoked glass, through which to strain his virtuous eyes when he was estimating the value of your property.” In conclusion, the writer says: “It is cruel, it is dishonest, it is criminal to let the humble taxpayers, who seldom ask for protection, bear the heavy burdens they are now carrying, while some rich corporations shirk their duty and escape by methods that demand the attention of the grand jury.”

Die Like Rate. The Empress of China has arrived nt Victoria with oriental advices to Aug. 19. By floods in a prefecture of Japan over one hundred houses were destroyed and five or six lives lost in the Nishima district. All bridges on the Oshima Railway line in Higashi-Kubiki district were broken down by floods, and the roads also damaged in many places. Over forty bouses and twenty go-downs were swept away by the water, and twenty-four lives lost in the village of Matsugaski, Sado district. By the swelling of the Aga no River, 1,300 houses in Sanjo Machi and 700 houses in the village of Icfijnikido were submerged. At Izimukais one shrine, two go-downs, four temples and half a score of dwellings were crushed by laudslides from the mountains, and five lives lost and ten persons severely wounded. A dispatch from Naoetsu says that the houses flooded numbered 1,600, and the killed and wounded 300, while 600 persons were saved from drowning. To the Lone Star State. The Farmers’ National Congress decided on Fort Worth, Tex., a* the place for the meeting in 1898. More than an hour

was given to the discussion of the matter, and cn the roll call only Kansas, Michigan, Montana, Nebraska and South Dakota were solidly for the Omaha proposition. There were scattering votes from New York, North Dakota and Wisconsin, but fully two-thirds were for Texas. Before the result of the ballot could be announced, on motion of the Nebraska delegates Fort Worth was selected. An invitation was extended from Niagara Falls for the congress of 1899 and from Boston for the congress of 1900.

BITTEN BY SNAKES. Two Little Kentucky Boys Are Killed by Venomous Rattlers. Willie, aged 7, and Eddie, aged 9, sons of Matthew Cox, a farmer living near Mannsville, Taytor County, Ky., met terrible deaths from rattlesnake bites. They were playing hide and seek with some other children and Willie ran into the bushes and failed to reappear at the proper time. Presently Eddie heard cries from his little brother and, hastening to his aid, found, as he at first thought, that he had become fastened in the hollow of an old stump. In trying to pull the child from the stump Eddie discovered that four big rattlers were biting Willie time and again. Badly frightened, but determined to rescue his brother, Eddie reached in for a better hold, and was himself bitten repeatedly. The cries of the two children attracted some men and they were finally rescued from tlieir perilous position, but not until they were past all aid. One died in five minutes and the other in ten. The four snakes were killed, and it was found that the youngest child had jumped into their nest in the hollow of the old stump.

WILL PAY A VISIT TO HAWAII. Trip Is Planned by Joseph Cannon and Other Congressmen. Several Congressmen who have been in .San Francisco will visit the Hawaiian Islands before returning East. Those who have thus far determined to visit the islands are Joseph Cannon of Illinois, H. C. Loudenslager of New Jersey and J. A. Tawney of Minnesota. Their purpose in visiting the islands is to acquire information on matters that are likely to be considered at the coming session of Congress, and since they are on the coast they have determined to take advantage of the opportunity to see something of the islands that mn'y be annexed when Congress meets in December. KLONDIKE GOLD 13 POOR. Assay of Two Specimens In New York Do Not Pau High. Two lots of gold from the Klondike have been assayed at the New York assay office in Wall street, one lot weighing 44.45 ounces assaying 749 per eent fine gold and 246 per cent silver, which made the value $15.48 an ounce. The other lot, which weighed 10.16 ounces, assayed 8216,4 fine gold and 174 silver, making the value $16.95 an ounce. Supt. Mason said this Klondike gold was poor stuff. Ordinary California gold assays 850 fine — $17.57 an ounce. The finest gold comes from Madagascar. American houses trading with Madagascar take their pay in crude gold.

Huisger Pinches Many. The general situation iu Havana and in all Cuba is unchanged from that of the past month from a military point of view. No battles of importance have been fought, though many skirmishes have taken place, with one or two killed here and there and three or four wounded. The ravages from disease in the island increase weekly and the hospitals are overcrowded. The foreign consulates in Havana are besieged with people demanding food. It is announced that Senora Cisneros will probably be released from custody in a month or two. The insurgents, it is stated, have about 35,000 men under arms and are possessed of sufficient supplies to last through the coming winter. All business is at a standstill and gold is quoted at a premium of 100 In paper money. Weyler has left his camp on the sugar estate San Antonio, near Medruga, and has gone in the direction of Loma Grillo mountain, where the insurgents in the Havana province have again concentrated their forces. Deodly Gold Fields. George W. Adams of Cripple Creek arrived in Denver from the gold fields of South America. Fourteen months ago Adams left to try his fortunes in South American mines. He went to the gold fields, ”00 miles from Georgetown, in company with eight Americans, remaining there eleven months. Of the entire party of nine he alone escaped death from the fatal fever. supreme Court Moves. The records and papers of the Supreme Court of Illinois have been removed from Ottawa to Springfield, where the court will sit hereafter. Yellow Fever Reported. Yellow fever in virulent forr is reported raging in the little surf-bathing resort city of Ocean Springs, Miss. Money for the West. In the last six days over $7,000,000 has been shipped from New York to the West to move the crops. Had Liy;d More than a Century. Lazarus Greengard, the oldest Jew in the United States, died in St. Louis, aged 105 years.