Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 January 1915 — Page 2

BRINGING THE HOLIDAY SPIRIT TO THE POOR

sap-|T IS * question whether the f ■ I families helped or the work--1 I ers helping them get moat L fr I Joy out of the Christmas diatribution. A real settlement 35 worker, one imbued with the right spirit, will tell you that only one who has visited the homes of the poor and the suffering on Christmas eve can realise the pleasure of bringing happiness and sunshine into these homes. Many settlement visitors, who have given up the work for tiMne reason or another, but wbo return to assist with the Christmas distributions, give generously from their own purses thgt the baskets may be larger and more families aided.

Wdhlthy women, ■who have never done settlement work; enter into the Santa' Claus spirit and visit the alley and tenement districts of the large cities on the night before Christmas, their automobiles heavily laden with toys, turkeys and good things to eat. They employ investigators .to canvass the section th which they are Interested a week before the holidays, and the distribution is made

according to their reports. Oftentimes small trees are sent to the homes, with glass balls, trimmings and candy toys, and the donors, with the aid of their chauffeurs and the parents of the children, fix the tree while the little tots are asleep. v Though little known, Santa Claus’ work in the alums of the big cities is carried on along systematic lines to overcome any overlapping of the multitude of good Intentions. In days gone by, charitably inclined women would leave a large basket of provisions in a house in ignorance of another basket hidden in the closet And it was not unusual for two or three workers to meet in the same kitchen at the one time, each burdened with good things for the one . family. This is an error of the past; for now the Christmas giving has been systematised. Settlement workers of the Various societies and representatives of the wealthy private givers compile a list of those- they will assist, and all go over their lists carefully together. Although the Christmas giving is nil cat and dried a few days before the time, Santa Claus’ secret is not given away. Half of the pleasure would be gone if the families knew that the viaitor* were coming with food’ and . toys in abundance. It is true that those who are visited and quizzed by the private workers have a shrewd suspicion, after they have told their tale of -woe and received the sympathy of the visitor, that something substantial is to follow. The regular settlement workers know their ground pretty well; they know which families have had a hard road to trhvel and are putting up a good battle against the tide of misfortune.

The settlement workers have little investigating to do before the holidays; their entrance into a home or tenement Is always greeted with surprise, for they generally make it a point to go where they are least expected. "The poor are always with us” is doubly true at Christmas time. Families who can barely exist, who do not know where the next day’s bread is coming from, can certainly not afford any extras for the holiday season. They consider themselves fortunate if they fiave a loaf or two of bread and a small piece of meat for the Christmas dinner and coal for the kitchen fire.

No one appreciates this seamy side of the bright Christmas story more than the charity ■worker. She knows that tribulations exist at Christmas time as during any other part of the year. Years of experience have shown her how to use tact and good judgment on her travels and where she cannot leave good cheer, she can at least make the sorrows and troubles easier to bear. The “Angel of the Settlement" knows, more than any one else, that there are many cases when the word .“Merry Christmas” would sound like a mockery; where the hand of death, for instance, has been heavily felt when it takes away the chief provider of a large family. She knows, also, that the Christmas spirit is cherished by the poor as well as the wealthy. While they cannot spend the day in feasting and merrymaking, they can at least forget old

TELEGRAPHESE’ BEST TO USE

Correspondent Finds English Lai* guage to ?*e the Tersest in Europe. Which language makes the. best telegraphese” At so ranch a word one might hasten to say German, because nf ita purely typographical device of sticking a number of words together to look like one compound word. We really do exactly the same thing in only we print the elements of

grudges and let bygones be bygones, shake hands with their enemies and wish one another good luck. How many reunions and reconciliations take place then is known only to these good women. The hearts of many men who have been separated from their wives and families become softened as the holidays draw near, and It isn’t uncommon for the settlement worker to find them together when she comes with the Christmas basket Many prodigal sons return on Christmas eve. A striking case of this kind that occurred two years ago was run across by a settlement workar in Philadelphia. She said that she had never witnessed a scene on any stage that could equal it - It was a real case of where the Christmas prayer of a broken-hearted mother was answered by the return of her boy. The son ran away from home seven years earlier, when a youth of sixteen years. He had a good home and the family consisted his permits, an older brother and a sister. His father was a hard-working man and used all his earnings for his home. The younger boy, being the baby of the family, was the pet of all; but he had a wild disposition, and he wanted to see something of life. He decided to run away from home and go West When he reached the ranches of Arizona he found that the cowboy life wasn’t as bright as it was painted. He longed for home many a time, but vowed that he- would not return a failure. He persevered until he had made good, though it took seven years for him to do it. His fearlessness and daring attracted the attention of the owner of the - ranch, and he placed him in charge of another place. When the young man had a goodly wad of bills accumulated he decided to return in time for Christmas. He reached the old house to find that another family was living there, and he learned from neighbors that his father was dead; that his sister had grieved so over his disappearance that she died Portly after he had left, and that his brother had been killed in an accident. The mother, doubly aged with grief, had been left alone and was subsisting as best she could in a third-story room. The son lost no time and strived in the room just after the settlement worker had reached there with .her basket of provisions. The,mother had just finished telling her story to the sympathetic listener when this latest prodigal returned. .

“No one can really appreciate,” said a settlement worker in another city, 'how happy one feels after visiting the homes of the poor on Christmas ere. gratitude of one woman alone last year was enough to recompense me for the work I did. This woman’s husband was in the penitentiary serving an IS-year term for murder. It appears that he and a companion were working in the cranberry bogs. They quarreled, and in a scuffle this man stabbed his opponent He made his wife promise she would never allow the family of six to be separated. She not only kept them together by taking in washing and working until all hours of the night, but she refused, to accept outside aid in any shape, or form. There would have been no Christmas celebration

the compound as separate words. But in international telegraphing there is a word length limit' (or, as the Germans would print a wordlengthlimit). Ten letters is the maximum allowed tor a single word. Any word, longer that counts as two; or as three —if it gets beyond the second ten, as some German Words do. When it comes to counting letters or making up intelligible telegraphese, English; it seems, is the tersest language in Europe. An Italian newspaper correspondent has lately dlscov-

THE EVENING REPUBLICAN. RENBSELAER, IND.

in this home, and it was a delicate undertaking to hrWg.a woman like this any provisionsfߣ&it£>l explained to her that It and her joy was only equaled by that of her children, who'were more than delighted with their new toys. “I have been in homes where the children never had toys, and I have brought them their first playthings. In one case there were two children, a boy and a girl, Pepino and Mechalmo. Their father died when they were babies, and the mother supported them. She had come to this country a bride and was not well versed with the American way of doing thing.}. She did not even know how to make a rag doll for the children. We brought those children a small tree, decorated it, and gave them plenty of toys. Words couldn’t tell the happiness of those little ones.

“There 1b more pleasure in the work than you would imagine. We see many sad scenes, sorrow and joy mingled together, 'but, we also find much to amuse us. Last year we took a basket to an old colored woman. Her husband was a paralytic and she had two orphaned grandchildren to keep. Christmas to her was to be the same as any other day until we arrived with the provisions and toys. She glanced ai us as we entered the room, and when we put the basket on the table, she stared at it and pointed to herself, as much as to say, ‘For me?’ I said. ‘Yes, Liza, that's for you.’ You could see nothing but the whites of her eyes, and she raised both of her hands above her head, clasped them together and said, ‘De Lord bepraised.’ That was all she said; but she repeated it time and again. One time her eyes would be as large as dollars and she would joyously sing the ‘De Lord be praised’ and again she would be sad and mournful and moan ‘De Lord be praised.’ * “Finally her husband, who was unable to leave his chair, lost his patience and he shouted, ‘Liza, good Lord, woman, has you done lost your head altogether? Why don’t you thank the ladles?’ Then, as a sort of apology to us, he said: ‘You’ll have to excuse her, ladies, for she has surely done lost her head altogether.’ As we left the room and glanced back, poor Liza was still standing there, looking at us with her hands clasped before her and slowly nodding her head saying: ‘De Lord be praised.’ W T e concluded Liza knew better than her husband. She was thanking the right one;

“I have witnessed many reconsiliations ■of families of foreigners on Christmas eve. The afternoon that I spent at the immigration station last year was one of the pleasantest of my life. It was interesting to note the expression of gladness on the faces of the children in the costumes of their various fatherlands. They couldn’t speak a word of English, but they could show you that they were grateful for the playthings.

“I will never forget my first Christmas visitation. It was my initial experience with social service work. One of the first places we visited was in a court, a poor German family. When we arrived at the house the mother w r as telling the three children Christmas legends. She had gilded apples, and that was their only other reminder that the morrow was a great festival. She had no meat nor vegetables in the house for the next day’s meals, and there was no coal In the bin. But the place was as clean and neat as a new pin. “The mother was ah educated woman. and you could tell at a glance that she had seen better days. _ She had married against the wishes of her family and she was top proud to let them know of her poverty. Her husband had go*e West to “try to better his condition, but was unable to get work there and became stranded. The wife kept the wolf away from the door as best she could by sewing. We brought her a turkey, vegetable* fruits and cranberries, then went out and got a tree and a doll for the children and. left an order to have coal sent there Immediately. It is lmpos» sible to tel! how grateful that pool woman was.”

ered this In telegraphing news from ■London to his paper jn Italy. At the beginning of the war he used Italian Then when all languages except Eng lish an.^ -French were forbidden hi took French. Later, finding that French, though accepted by the post office, seemed to cause delay, he changed to English, and to his surprise he finds that he is saving quite a lot of money in telegraph fees owing to the superior brevity of the English language as compared with French or Italian.

AT LANTANA STATION

By A. WEINSTOCK.

(Copyright.) Ferguson had been at Lantana less than a week when he made his first vigorous roar to the chief dispatcher for relief. The solitude and isolation were making him a nervous wreck, he complained; and if relief were not forthcoming mighty quickly, they would have to remove him from the station in a strait-jacket The chief dispatcher treated the' matter facetiously, but promised Ferguson a more congenial assignment as soon as a vacancy occurred. Lantana, on the International, Shoshone A Gulf railroad, was a bdx-car station perched among the clouds of the Declez range. To the esthetic the view from Lantana wa| soul-satis-fying. Snow peaks were transformed by the alchemy of the morning sun into an effulgent glare of towers and minarets, and leagues upon leagues of steep declivity merged into fir-cov-ered slopes that sank away into the haze and were lost to sight in the lower world. Ferguson was not esthetic, and to him Lantana was desolation, loneliness, a foretaste of perdition and the place that plod forgot. . Ferguson was the product of a metropolis. For him all that was great and good and beautiful in the universe —all that he thought -worth striving, so to be found in New York. The raging medley of incessant sound that assailed the senses of kn outlander in a great city was sweetest mtisic in his ears, and the bewildering kaleidoscope of motion in the busy streets was as the painter’s masterpiece to him. He longed for it with an aching heart, and his brain rebelled at the magnificent distances of the Declez range.

Ferguson’s Social instinct was highly developed. He lived for and in companionship. In his happier days his friends had dined with him, and his cronies had smoked his cigars. There was no wife or babies, and the affection men usually bestow on their families Ferguson showered upon his friends. But at Lantana Ferguson had no friends. There were no restaurants, no saloons, no hotels, no- theaters. There was nothing; only a box car, in one corner of which he slept; in another was the sheet-iron stove on which he cooked his meals, and in the center of the car was a table to which was attached the telegraph equipment. Over all was spread a thick layer of dust, and suspended from the ceiling were weird festoons of cobwebs.

With picturesque and fluent profanity Ferguson cursed his environment. With added fervor he cursed the circumstances that had driven him to Lantana. And finally, with a vigor that jarred his box-car home, he cursed the telegraph company, which he blamed for hia misfortung. - P\>r one-half of the 45 years of his life he had served them faithfully. Then the fate which overtakes so many telegraphers befell him. His fingers lost their cunning, and he could no longer form the Morse characters with speed and accuracy. From continuous use, the delicate muscles of the fingers and wrist had become paralyzed. He lost his grip, and the telegraph company dispensed with his services.

Starvation in New York, or a job at Lantana! Which should it be? He had chosen Lantana. And now this product of th? complex life, this hothouse plant whose fibers and tendrils were intertwined among the surging hordes of humanity in a great city, was transplanted to a harsh and primitiye sqil, and was suffering a withering blikht in consequence. ‘Ferguson vainly regretted his choice. Starvation in New York would have been the very apex of delight in contrast to the oppressive silence, the vastness and the emptiness of Lantana.

Ferguson prepared his own meals, the one indispensable utensil being a can-opener; he cleaned the dishes and dried them in the sun, washed his own clothes, mended socks, smoothed the blankets on his bed, and swept the floor. Then, in a wild passion, he revolted at the blacking of his own boots, and calling up the chief dispatcher, demanded immediate relief. “Fefguson insists upon being relieved,” reported the chief dispatcher to Division Superintendent Jenkins. ‘‘He nags at me from early morning until late at night. I suggest sending him relief, if—” “Do you think Ferguson will desert his post?” interrupted the superintendent. "Oh, no,” said the chief dispatcher. “He’s too old a hand at the business to play a trick like that He will stay until he’s relieved, no matter how much he dislikes Lantana.” “Well,” growled the superintendent, “we can’t relieve him just now.” On the International, Shoshone jfc Gulf, between Rawdon and Lantana, and about a quarter of a mile from the latter place, wa3 a sharp curve in the road at a point which ah enthusiastic tourist, inspired by the beauty of the view, had named Gabriel’s Balcony. The rough and unfeeling trainmen on the mountain division ridiculed the mellifluous title—and accepted it. On the left of the track beetling cliffs arose abruptly.- On the right, and only a few yards from Jhe rails, was an almost perpendicular declivity of 40 feet emerging into a slope that sank away as steep as the roof of a house until it disappeared in the hazy distance far below.

On the down-grade every engineer took the curve at Gabriel’s balcony respectfully and prayerfully, with his brakes clinched and hie soul In his eyes. Ferguson’s duties at Lantana were not onerous, and he wandered, up and down the track in search of some slight occupation as an antidote for the poison of homesickness coursing through his veins. His first view from Gabriel s Balcony fascinated him. Almost unconsciously he picked up a rock and dropped it from the edge of the precipice. It thudded against the rocky slope after its 40-foot drop, bounded, rolled and rebounded on its swift journey, gaining velocity as it progressed, until it darted out of sight fftr below “That’s great,” murmured Ferguson.

As the days passed, the fascination of Gabriel’s Balcony strengthened and, with its growth, Ferguson s desire to leave Lantana diminished. His entreaties for relief ceased, for which the chief dispatcher was duly grhteful. All the time that Could De spared from his trifling diflijß at the station was spent at Gabriel’s Balcony. To hurl rocks from the brink of the precipice devedpped into a mania. Liko morphine, the dose oust be taken in ever-increasing quantities to satisfy the craving.

The sight of small rockß diving down the incline was no longer satisfying to Ferguson. Each rock must be larger than its predecessor. Bowlders that taxed his strength to the utmost to poise on the edge of the precipice were sent crashing -down * .the slope, followed by satellites of slate and earth they had loosened in their flight. Ferguson wondered vaguely whither these rushing boulders hastened so eagerly, and meant some day to mount a massive rock and journey down with it, to learn their destination. And one day there came the Voice just as Ferguson had started a monstrous rock down the incline. “What if that had been the Eagle Limited?” the Voice suggested. “What’s that?” asked Ferguson, not comprehending. No answer. Ferguson glanced up and down the track. There was no one in sight “Huh!” said Ferguson. “Mighty funny,” and resumed his absorbing occupation. As he sent another Sphere of granite catapulting from the Balcony, Ferguson heard the voice again, “What if that had been the Eagle Limited?” With eyes Btaring at the fast vanishing rock, he answered: “Yes, that would be exciting.” It was a friendly Voice, and it often came to cheer his heartrending loneliness. Ferguson pleaded with it to stay and share his quarters it the box car. And the Voice knew New York—his New York —and Boon a bond of eternal brotherhood Was sealed with team of joy on Ferguson’s part for the presence of this unexpected comrade in the wilderness.

Not many days after the Voice had first made its presence known, it spoke long and earnestly to Ferguson, and hs he harkened, the light of wild anticipation gleamed in his eyes. From under the couch jn the corner he drew a crowbar, wrench, and sledgehammer. These he carried to Gabriel’s Balcony, and, according as the Voice .commanded, he wielded the tools, singing as he toiled. When the work was done, the Voice and Ferguson waited impatiently. The Limited came to its fate with no warning. From the verge of Gabriel’s Balcony it plunged, coach trailing coach. Rocks and earth detached from the precipice pursued it as it fell. Down the steep incline rolled twisted metal and splintered timbers, enshrouded in an ever-swelling mass of rock and soil. It grew into a roaring avalanche, and as it struck the timbered slope it added trees of century growth to its appalling bulk. It was no mean death that Ferguson had wrought for passengers and crew, and no man may say, in truth, where they found sepulcher. At Gradyville, Superintendent Jenkins ordered out the wrecking train. The Limited had.left Rawdon on time, but was hours overdue at Lantana, and repeated efforts to gain a response from Ferguson were fruitless. The wrecking crew found Ferguson seated on a huge bowldbr where the 1., S. and G. track made the turn at Gabriel’s Balcony, gibbering incoherently. The impalpable spirit of the mountain, the immensity of space, had crushed him with its mystery. It was the fertile imagination of Superintendent" Jenkins that evolved the landslide theory for newspaper consumption, to account for the absolute disappearance of the Eagle Limited. Jenkins knew railroading from a fishplate on a spur to the manipulation of stocks in Wall street, from the construction of a shoo-fly track around the debris of a wreck to the concoction of a shoe-fly tale for the reporters, and he handled the situation with masterly resourcefulness. And the Voice came no more to Fer-. guson. ■ • *, wj

Probable First Use of Mortar.

. Th& use of lime as binding material for ihbrtar originated in the remote past It is probable that some savages when using limestone rocfs to confine their fire noticed th%t the stones were changed by the action of, the heat. A passing shower may have slaked the lime to a paste, and they discovered that the paste was smooth and sticky, and- was a better materi* than clay to fill the crevices In Iheii rude dwellings. From this discovery it was but a step to add sand to the paste in order to produce a mortal; ■

GOOD PROSPECT FOR SPORT

Quail Not Only in Profusion, but Beemlngly of High Cf_ _ Intelligence. They were talking about fine hunting the other night when Dr. Elmer B. Cooley, Uncle Joe Cannon’s congressional opponent, was reminded of an Incident that happened in his home state. 4t the beginning of the hunting season, the doctor said, an nlmrod named Smith telegraphed a hotel friend in the game region for reservation, and at the appointed time he was right on the job. “Hello, Harry!” he exclaimed, saluting mine host, as he dragged his dogs and guns to the hotel veranda. “Everything all right?” “Couldn’t be better,” was the prompt response of mine host! “How about the game?” returned the sportsman, eagerly. “Are there apy quail around?” * ; "Well, I should say so!” declared mine host. “Every time the cook throws a refuse piece of toast out of the back window four or five fat quail fight to see which one shall lie down on it!”—Philadelphia Telegraph.

Long Journey.-

A railroad from Nome to Cape Horn is being considered, and sometime we may be able to take a through sleeper from one end of the American continent to the other. In that case we would sample "all kinds of climates from.arctic to tropical and we would encounter endless variety of surface ahd scenery. Popular Mechanics says that several routes for such a railroad are being considered, but which ever one may be chosen the lines already built find covering over half tho distance would be utilised. The fact that these exist makes the project seem less like a dream, hut if we smile over it we might remember that men of affairs laughed at Cecil Rhodes when he suggested a railroad from the Cape of Good Hope to Cairo —the entire length of Africa —but that road is now being built —is more than half done, Indeed.

Getting Double Value.

Senator Sniffensnuff likes to get double value out of his cigar. After snipping off the pointed end he generally Inserts two-thirds of the weed into his mouth and munches it until all but the lighted end looks like a salad. One afternoon while Sniffensnuff was sitting in front of his hotel a small boy tugged at the corner of his coat. “What Is It, son?” asked the senator, good-naturedly. Pointing with a small,, brown finger, the lad replied: “If you please, sir, your chew is going qut.” —Youngstown Telegram.

Respect for Trees.

“It is said that the German invaders of Belgium whatever else they may have destroyed, have been careful not to injure park trees. The cavalrymen, ,so a report goes, are forbidden to tie their horses to trees for fear that the animals will gnaw the bark. Germany was the first nation to apply forestry on a large scale, some of the crown forests having been under scientific management for over a hundred years. 4 «

Hers.

"I suppose that you end your wife are two souls with but a single thought?” “That’s about the situation, but about hjsilf the time she will not tell me what that thought is.”

Socially Impossible.

“I thought you liked your new friends so much?” “So I do, but I just had to give them up—they own such a cheap car.” — Puck. Many things are well done that are not worth doing.

To Build Strong Children Supply their growing bodies with right food, so that Bfatn, and Muscle, and Bon? development may evenly balance. Grape-Nuts rooo was originated to supply, in proper proportion, the very elements required by the human body for growth and repair. To supply children a dish of Grape-Nuts ami cream for breakfast regularly, is to start than on the road to sturdy health. '“There's a Reason* for Grape-Nuts Sold by grocers.