Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 213, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 September 1915 — Page 2

FolK We Touch In Passing

By Julia Chandler ManZ

<g> AACCLURE WEWSMPtR •SyTTDICATE-'

As the Man Stood Thus In the Midst of Hit Garden.

THE GARDEN AND THE FLOWER The Man had a beautiful garden. In it were flowers so many and so rare that everybody talked about it until its fame spread to the ends of the earth. For many years The Man traveled far and near in search of unusual plants and brought them to his garden. Indefatigably he worked to keep out the weeds, although iris friends said he was a dreamer whose wagon was hitched to an impossible star. They told him that no garden in all this world was without its weeds, and declared that they were natural and wouldn't do any damage. The Man only smiled, shook his head, and went on working to rout every ugly and obstinate growth. Sometimes he stood in the midst of his garden in the cool of the evening and looked about him to see that it was fair, but each time there seemed to him that something was lacking. He knew that the fame of his work had extended far; that men said his garden was the most perfect in all the world; but in his heart of hearts he was not entirely satisfied. Some shade of beauty was clearly missing; some needed perfume lacking. So The Man determined that he would find the flower needed, no matter whatHhe cost. He went on a long journey, searching in every nook and cranny, but he did not find out even so much as the name of the flower which his garden needed, so he returned to work among his plants in great dejection. One day The Artist came to visit The Man. He was as renowned for his painting as The Man for his garden, and, although he lived at a great distance, he had heard of the radiance of the garden in which The Man had cultivated rare and wonderful plants, and determined to see the place for himself. When The Artist had spent an hour in The Man's garden, it seemed to him that he must have died and gone to heaven. He simply reveled in the riot of color and steeped his senses in the perfume of the flowers. “It is a perfect place,” he told The Man.

“I wonder?” came the dejected plyAfter this The Artist said nothing; but he, too, began to wonder, for when the first impression of its radiance wore away The Artist became conscious of something wrong. The garden was not perfect, and it was clear enough that The Man, who had given all the years of his youth to making i* so, was sad and disappointed. “There is a flower missing." said The Artist. ■ “I know,” answered The Man. “but I do not know its name, and therefore I cannot find ft.” The Artist looked into the sad, sad eyes of The Man. “Why, of course," he cried out, suddenly; “I should hare known in the first place.' - Whereupon he whispered the name of the most beautiful flower in all the world to The Man. "I shall r*ek it at once,* cried The Man, “but Saw shall I know when t

“By its perfume,” answered The Artist. "It is like unto that of none other.”

The Man journeyed again over land and sea. He went into crowded places and again upon the mountain top, but he did not find any flower whose perfume was strange to him. He became weary and footsore in his search, and finally made up his mind that no such plant as that which The Artist had mentioned existed. Once or twice he stumbled upon lurid blossoms which were unfamiliar, but when he examined them he found that they sprang from th*e very weeds of which he had worked so hard to keep his garden clear for 10, these many years. “I will go home, and I will not tend the garden any more,” he told himself, "for I could never be satisfied now unless I gain for it the perfume which The Artist says is the sweetest and rarest in the world."

Heart-weary and discouraged, The Man returned. He arrived in the night Before the sun rose he went out into the garden to take a last look at all the beautiful things he had planted there and tended through many years. He stood in their midst and told them that he had come to say good-by to them. He told them that they were good to look upon; that they had satisfied him for many a year, but that he had now come to the crossroads where he needed a flower that did not grow in his garden, and Without which the garden was of no avail. And even while he talked the rare and beautiful flowers about him began to lift their wonderful heads, for the east had confessed a flush, and one by one (quite ignoring The Man) they raised their radiant faces for the first kiss of the morning sun. The Man watched them in amazement. He had come forth to tell >them good-by forever, and one and all they had been "clothed upon” with a new loveliness, a new radiance, inhaling, as it were, the spirit of the newborn day. As The Man stood thus in the midst of his garden he was suddenly conscious of a new perfume. Over and above all the others it rose, clinging like a fine, sweet mist over the garden The Man had made. It penetrated his entire being, suffusing him with great joy. When he lifted his eyes, The Man saw that the small vine which he had often noticed clinging to the outside wall of his Garden of Life had borne a flower —a single blossom, whose petals radiated the myriad lights of mother-of-peari as it glistened in the morning sun —and he did not need to be told that the name of the flower w r as Love, nor that it was the same that he had sought over the length and breadth of the land, although he has never ceased to marvel that it blossomed there, within the reach of his very hands, upon a vine which he had frankly despised and often been tempted to cut down.

Helped Themselves.

“Why did you cut out your hot soda department, with all those nice bouillons and wafers ana olives?” •Too many people,” explained the druggist, “seemed to think the stuff was free lunch.”— Louisville Journal,

THE EVENING REPUBLICAN, RENSSELAER, IND.

GLORIA’SGARDENER

He Cultivated the Rower of Love in His Mistress’ Heart By JOHN DARLING. James Randal strolled slowly past the Woodvine cottage. Certainly the lovely grounds were sadly in need of a gardener's care and just as surely •were bis fagged nerves in need of the restful tonic that working in that garden would provide. He had taken the day in the country that he might select a quiet boarding house in which to spend a month or two, but alas! The quiet boarding houses were so totally lacking in attractiveness that Randal had decided that of two evils the lesser was the city boarding house. Even the appalling set of people tn the city house was no doubt preferable to deadly monotony in the country. “But I would love to garden that bit of property,” he sighed and would have passed the Woodvine cottage for the last time save that a slip of a girl at that psychological moment happened to come out of the vinecovered porch. Her hair was braided in a long sunny plait and her smile traversed the distance between Randal and the porch. He retraced his footsteps and went up the path toward the girl. His walk was impulsive as were his intentions. The girl gazed questioningly at him though with a gleam of interest in her eyes; eyes that were far seeing, as if they expressed the beauty of a great mind* "Is there a chance in the world that you require a gardener?" Randal asked as he reached the girl's side. “I certainly require one,” Gloria Woodvine returned quickly, then with slight hesitation, "but I am not sure that I want one.” “Oh,” was Randal’s ejaculation, "then do you perhaps know anyone who does both require and want my services?” “Yours? Are you the gardener?” She looked him up and down with dawning wonder in her eyes. "Yes. And I would have this bit of property looking like a show place in two weeks if you would let me. There are wonderful possibilities here,” Randal said, and the peculiar look in his eyes brought a slight flush to Gloria’s cheeTrs.

“I couldn’t pay very much,” she said quickly, “because I keep this little place up myself. My family considers me mad for coming down here in the country to live. It is my own retreat for writing and I have not been able to get someone to make it beautiful, much as I wanted to.” “If you permit me to pitch a tent down by that clump of fir trees and camp there'l will care for the garden, plant some vegetables, get a few laying hens and help you a lot. Is it a go? I really need the work.” Gloria looked rather startled but a tiny smile played about her lips. Assuredly here was a type around whom she might write a story. She would chance the trial anyway. If he did not please her she could ’easily dismiss him. "I am down here for absolute quiet and concentration,” she told him. “I would have to ask you to go about your work without consulting me more than is absolutely necessary. My old black mammy will always be about.” Randall looked searchingly at Gloria Woodvine. Suddenly he knew who it was she reminded him of. It was Freddy Woodvine, but Randal had not associated the name of the cottage with that of the girl. Now he knew who she was and his task became one of trebled interest. She was Gloria Woodvine, Freddy’s sister, and an authoress of no small fame. “Sis is a bit daffy,” Freddy had said on one occasion when, Randal had wanted to meet her.. “She goes off into silences and retreats and never shows up until she brings a full-fledged novel back with her.” “I will pitch my tent tomorrow, if it is agreeable to you,” he said and realized that he could scarcely wait to shake the dust of newspaper offices from his feet and take up his abode in the garden of Gloria.

As he traveled on the Long Island railway back to town all he saw as he went past villages was two long braids of golden hair that hung down Gloria’s back.

"Absurd," he warned himself, “and remember,” he added to his mental conversation, “you are to consult her black mammy and not herself for anything you may require.” And Randal found after a few days in Gloria’s garden, that his nerves were beginning to respond to proper treatment, but that they were apt to play tricks when the girl with the sunny hair was anywhere in sight. He did not seek to talk with her. All that he wanted he obtained from Martha, and many a hint on cooking did he get from that source. He prepared his own meals on his camp fire and altogether enjoyed his eccentric actions more than anything he had tried for a long time. His holiday was goipg to be a great success. The garden, too, responded to proper care and looked much like a dainty flower basket set against a background of tall chestnut trees. Vegetables which found their way to black Martha’s kitchen and hence to the table of Gloria, were a great success, The chickens, too, produced Gloria’s breakfast, and Randal re-

joiced each day in the chance that bad sent him past Woodvine cottageGloria, apparently deeply engrossed with her hero of fancy, did, however, find time to discuss the new gardener with black Martha, and to learn from her faithful servant that Randal was all but a paragon. “He done cut down our ’spenses by half with his chickens and 'matoes and onions. Seems lak I never could make ’em grow.” Gloria had also found many moments to spare while thinking out passages of speech. These she employed by watching Randal's strong body as it plowed or built chicken coops or gathered sticks for his camp fire. Her speculating as to his real reason for working in a garden was more vague than she liked. "I I knew,” she repeated often to herself. It was her very Interest In him that kept Gloria away from Randal when she would often have strolled about seeking information from him about flowers or chatting on general subjects. She was curiously shy about seeing him and wondered not a little at her own silly reasons for not wishing to see much of her gardener. She had been sitting at her typewriter for many hours and was just stepping onto the porch when a great man threw his arms about her and held her struggling against him. "Thought I’d come down and pay a surprise visit,” the man told her with a hearty laugh. “Sis, you are daffy to live all by yourself,” Freddy Woodvine told her for the hundredth time, “but it’s jolly good to get into the country for a day. Hope you don’t mind and that I am not butting into one of those silences or something.”

Gloria laughed and hugged her big brother affectionately. “Hello! Who’s the man in the tent?” Freddy cast swift eyes at his sister. Much to Gloria’s disgust, she blushed hotly. “That- is my gardener—he takes charge of the chickens and —” "Guess I will go down and have a look at him,” Freddy said with more or less brotherly intolerance toward his sister’s mode of living. “I. am not sure that it’s respectable to have a strange man earning in the garden,” he flung back at her. Gloria was so indignant that she flounced within the cottage to- tell her troubles to Martha. Had she waited until Freddy reached the tent she would have seen the delighted meeting of the two men and would have heard the laughter that followed. She did, however, hear the returning footsteps of her brother, and, looking out, discovered that he was coming arm in arm with her gardener. Presented to her gardener in a most formal manner by her brother, she smiled the smile that Randal remembered as having lingered on the first day of their meeting in Gloria’s eyes. "You are a pair of dippies,” was Freddy’s comment in a disgusted tone.

“I done knows he was a gentleman,” Martha said, as she stood in tbe doorway watching developments. “I suppose you will be telling me next that you two have fallen in love with each other,” there was k hint of hope in Freddy’s tone. “You have no right to suppose anything of the kind,” flashed Gloria. “Besides, Mr. Randal has not given me a chance to fall in love with him even if I had wanted to.” "We can soon fix that up,” laughed RandaL “The sooner iny sister is tied up to a sensible man, the better off she’ll be,” Freddy said, and drew Gloria into his arms. “Isn’t that right, Martha?” “It sure am, Mars’ Fred,” Martha nodded, grinning broadly. “It’s a great pity Mr. Randal is not the sensible man,” Gloria laughed demurely. “I can be anything from a journalist to a gardener,” Randal told her. “Surely being sensible is not so difficult when there is so much at stake.” Gloria blushed with becoming modesty. (Copyright. 1915, by the McClure Newspaper Syndicate.)

Iron In Water.

Iron can be detected in water by taste when there is one-half unit of it to a million units of water; and more than four or five units would make the water unpalatable. In some mineral springs iron is the constituent that gives the water its medicinal value, but ordinarily, says the Youth’s Companion, it is undesirable. If more than 2.5 units in the million are present in the water that the laundress uses for laundering, the clothes will be stained. If more than two or three units in the million are in water that the paper maker uses, his paper will be stained. The ice made from water that contains iron is cloudy and discolored. If much iron is in the water that the engineer uses for making steam, it will do harm, for it contains acids that, when set free in the boiler, corrode the boiler plates. The amount of iron carried in solution by most waters is, however, so small that the damage it does to steam boHers is generally not great. Water with a good deal of iron in it has in many instances caused great trouble and expense in city prater works, for iron so favors the growth of crenothrix, musty, stringy bacteria, that the pipes every little while become clogged with it.

Something of the Sort.

"He posed as a railroad director.** ••Well, was it a fake?” “Not exactly. He presides ovt the information bureau at the UnlD station.**

Puteoli the Degenerate

IT IS thought by some that Paul’s defective eyesight may have prevented his appreciating natural scenery. However that may have been, it seems impossible that he should not have been impressed by the splendid views that anyone sailing up the coast of Sicily through the Straits of Messina and along the south Italian shore enjoys, says Rev. Dr. Francis E. Clark in his series, “In the Footsteps of St. Paul,” in the Christian Herald. He would have seen at first smiling, vine-covered hills; and before he had gone far, glorious Etna, snowcapped for much of the year. An ever-changing panorama delights the eye until we come to Reggio, the ancient Rhegium. Alas, a pitiful sight there greets the traveler today. Messina on one side of the narrow strait and Reggio on the other were both wrecked almost beyond recognition by the disastrous earthquake of 1908. On the Messina shore one sees great rows of little wooden houses scarcely larger than henhouses. These are the portable bungalows which were transported from America, ready-made, to relieve the sufferings of the houseless and homeless people. They are still occupied, for little has been done to build up the ruined cities. The authorized version of the* thirteenth verse of the twenty-eighth chapter of Acts says in describing St Paul’s Journey after leaving Syracuse, “and from thence we fetched a compass and came to Rhegium.” An amusing story is told of an infidel who declared, misquoting Luke’s words, that now he had proved the Bible to be a lie, since “in the book of Acts it was said that they fetched a compass aboard Paul’s ship, and everybody knew that this was long before the compass was invented.” The revised Version has taken the wind out of the Inaccurate infidel’s sails, to speak nautlcally, by translating the passage in more modern phrase: “And from thence we made a circuit, and arrived at Rhegium.” Here St. Paul’s ship evidently waited for one day, perhaps to discharge some cargo, or possibly waiting for a fair wind, which soon blew, for we are told that “after one day a south wind sprang up, and on the second day we came to Puteoli,” 182 miles to the north of Rhegium. Between Scylla and Charybdis.

Shortly after leaving Reggio we pass between Scylla and Charybdis, the fabled monsters of antiquity, the rock and the whirlpool, which have been robbed of all their terrors since steam navigation came to bless the world, and to make the traveler’s burdens and dangers light. Soon after, the active volcanic mountain of Stromboli, on one of the Lipari islands, is seen, and all the way along the glorious South Italian shore reveals itself; splendid mountains rear their heads in the near distance, their sides clothed with vineyards and olive and orange orchards far up their slopes.

As we approach the Bay of Naples the scenery becomes constantly more entrancing. We see the promontory of Sorrento acrostTthe Bay of Salerno, and soon Capri with its blue grotto comes in sight on the left, and towering Vesuvius with its constant plume of smoke on the right Sailing across the Bay of Naples, past the spot where the notable city of the present day is situated, a place which was then comparatively insignificant our travelers came to Puteoli, or Pozzuoli, as it is now called, at present a decadent suburb of Naples.

This miserable and dirty town of some 16,000 inhabitants, as it now is, is connected by trolley and steam railway with Naples, and is often visited by the modern -tourist who wishes to see the remains of the ancient temples and amphitheater and the mighty mole, which still tell of the ancient glories of Puteoli. Nearby, too, is the volcanic field of Solfatara, not a mountain, but a flat plain, the crater of a low volcano, into which one can thrust his cane in many places and find smoke and sulphurous vapor issuing from the hole as he withdraws it. Probably there are few more dreary or disreputable places in Italy than this modern suburb of Naples. It has not the ragged picturesqueness which somewhat redeems the worst slums of Naples, but is a squalid, unwholesome town of the worst type. Was Noted Roman Resort. It is difficult to realize that it once might have been called “the Liverpool of Italy,” that here was the Lucrine lake, which supplied the pampered Romans with their famous oysters, *nd that the whole bay was

covered with the beautiful yachts of the fashionable folk who made Baiae, Just beyond, the most noted resort, as corrupt as it was noted, for the invalids and fashionable idlers of Rome. There were famous springs here, which attracted the sick from many quarters, and it is said that the ancient name came from the sulphurous stench which they emitted. Puteoli is no longer a fashionable watering place, but from other causes the same name might be applied to the modern Pozzuoli. Yet here we can look upon many of the things which St. Paul saw; the sea itself, fresh and clean as ever; the encircling hills, no less beautiful in their spring greenery than on that spring day when Paul sailed within their encircling arms. We can even see the 17 piers of the great mole which stretched far out into the bay, within whose shelter vessels anchored, one the Alexandrian grain ship on which Paul had arrived. Today we can see T.be ruins of the temple of Serapis, or the splendid marketplace as it is now thought to be, which very likely was in its pristine glory when Paul landed. Tens of thousands of travelers from many lands sail into the famous harbor of Naples every year, but comparatively few of them realize how near they are to the footsteps of St. Paul, and how, after a short trolley ride from the city, they can plant their feet where he trod. Let us take the electric car from Largo Vittoria, where the beautiful park, Naples’ famous promenade and Rotten Row, begins; a park that stretches for nearly a mile along the water front. Soon, however, we get beyond the fashionable quarters and the innumerable hotels. The car makes its slow way through a slummy region where the air is rent with the ■raucous cries for which noisy Naples is famous, and the nose is assailed by more than the seventy odors of Cologne. Tunnel Under Poslllpo. Shortly a tunnel is reached under the green hills of Poslllpo, a tunnel almost as ancient as Naples itself, for it was dug by the Romans to avoid the steep climb over the precipitous tufa rocks of Posillpo. Seneca, we are told, grumbled at the dust and darkness and the odor of this tunnel, and they have not been improved since his day. The noise is deafening from the clatter of horses’ hoofs, the patter of herds of goats, the grinding torture of the electric car wheels, and above all the brazen throats of the Neapolitans who urge on their donkeys with an indescribable noise, guttural and grating, which seems to come from the innermost parts of their anatomy. Imagine all this noise, duplicated and reduplicated by the resounding arches of the tunnel, and one can have some idea of the grotto that leads him to Pozzuoli, the ancient Puteoli of St. Paul. Another slum awaits us at the other side of the grotto, followed by vineyards and orange groves and truck farms, until, after a ride of four or five miles, the last part of which affords glorious views of the bay and its islands, which never lose their charm, we at last find ourselves in another slum, more hopeless than any we have yet seen on the way, and find that we have at last reached the old Puteoli, and that the electric car leaves us but a few steps from the spot where the great apostle must have come ashore. The Immediate surroundings of the great pier where St. Paul landed are as filthy as any other part of Pozzuoli. Indescribable old hags leer at us from the doorways; ragged and dirty children, wholly unacquainted with the use of a pocket handkerchief, swarm around us. Several small fishing boats are drawn up on the shore, and a little church, called St. Paul’s Chapel, stands immediately behind the ancient mole. „ The modern pier, built over the ancient mole, is a truly magnificent one of solid cut stone, which runs far out into the sweet, clean water, and by going out to the far end wo get beyond the reach of the importunate tout. If one can forget the approaches to the pier, he can here enjoy the enchanting scenery of sea and shore, while his mind is stimulated by memories of the mighty past. But y>e volcanoes have brought blessings as well as curses, for the ash which they pour forth becomes in a few years a soil of almost incredible fertility, like the volcanic soil of the Yakima valley on our own Pacifia coast •>/