Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 159, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 July 1917 — Page 2

The Man Without A Country

by Edwuard Everett Hale

THIRD INSTALLMENT. “I am showing them how we do this to the artillery, sir.” And this is a part of the story where all the legends agree; that the commodore said: “I see you do, and I thank you, sir; and I shall never forget this day, sir, and you never shall, sir.” And after the whole thing was over, and he had the Englishman’s sword, In the midst of the state and ceremony of the quarterdeck, he said: "Where Is Mr. Nolan? Ask Mr. Nolan to come here.” And when Nolan came, the captain said: ——- “Mr. Nolan, we are all very grateful to you today; you are one of us today; —you will be named in the dispatches." And then the old nfan took off his own sword of ceremony, and gave it to Nolan, and made him put It on. The yn«n told me this who saw it. Nolan cried like a baby, and well he might He had not worn a sword since that Infernal day at Fort Adams. But always afterward, on occasions of ceremony, he wore that quaint old French sword of the commodore’s. The captain did mention him in the dispatches. It was always said he asked that he might be pardoned. He wrote a special letter to the secretary of war. But nothing ever came of It As I said, that was about the time When they began to ignore the whole transaction at Washington, and when Nolan’s imprisonment began to carry Itself on because there was nobody to stop it without any new orders from home. I have heard it said that he was with Porter when he took possession of the Nukahiwa islands. Not this Porter, you know, but old Porter, his father, Essex Porter, that is, the old Essex Porter, not this Essex. As an artillery officer, who had seen service in the West, Nolan knew more about fortifications, embrasures, ravelines, stockades, and all that, than any of them did; and he worked with a right good will in fixing that battery all right. I have, always thought it was a pity Porter did not leave him in command there with Gamble. That would have settled , all the question about his punishment. We should have kept the islands, and at this moment we should have one station in the Pacific ocean. Our French friends, too, when they wanted this little watering place, would have found it was pre-occupied. But Madison and the Virginians, of course, flung all that away. All that was near fifty years ago. If Nolan was thirty then, he must have been near eighty when he died. He looked sixty when he was forty. But he never seemed to me to change a hair afterward. As I imagine his life, from what I have seen and heard of it, he must have been in every sea, and yet almost never on land. He must have known in a formal way, more officers in our service than any man living knows. He told me once, with a grave smile, that no man in the world lived so methodical a life as he. "You know the boys say I am the Iron Mask, and you know how busy he was.” He said it did not do for anyone to try to read all the time, more than to do anything else all the time; but that he read just five hours a day. “Then,” he said, “I keep up my notebooks, writing in them at such and such hours from what I have been reading; and I include in them ' ; my scrapbooks.” These were very curious indeed. He had six or eight, of different subjects. There was one of his- _ torv. one of natnral science, one which he called "Odds and Ends.” But they were not merely books of extracts from newspapers. They had bits of plants and ribbons, shells tied on, and carved scraps of bone and wood, which he had taught the men to cut for him, and they were beautifully He drew admirably. He had some of the funniest drawings there, and some of the most pathetic, that I have ever seen in my life, I wonder who will have Nolan’s scrapbooks. ... - Well, he said his reading and his notes were his profession, and that they took five hours and two hours respectively of each day. “Then,-” said he, “every man should have a diversion as well as a profession. My natural history is my diversion,” That took two hours a day more. The men . used to bring him birds and fish, but on a long cruise he had to satisfy himself with centipedes and cockroaches and such small game. He was the only naturalist I ever met who knew anything about the habits of the house fly and the mosquito. All those people can tell you whether they are Lepidoptera or Steptopotera; but as for telling how you can get rid of them, or how they get away from you when f you strike them, why, Linnaeus knew as little of that as John Foy, the idiot, did. These nine hours made Nolan’s regular dally “occupation.” The rest of the time he, talked or walked. Till he grew very ojtt, ha went «loft a great deal. He alwftyk kept up his exercise and I neverbba r 4 b® was ill. If any other mad win 111, he was the kind- («* nurse is tbs world; and ne knew

more than half the surgeons do. Then if anybody was sick or died, or if the captain wanted him to on any other occasion, he was always ready to read prayers. I have remarked that he read beautifully. My oven acquaintance with Philip Nolan began six or eight years after the war, on my first voyage after I was appointed a midshipman. It was In the first days after our slave trade treaty, while the reigning house,, which was still the house of Virginia, had still a sort of sentlmentalisui about the suppression of the horrors of the middle passage, and something was sometimes done that way. We were in the South Atlantic on that business. From ,the time I joined, I believe I thought Nolan was a sort of lav chaplain—a chaplain with a blue coat. I never asked about him. Everything in the ship was strange to me. I knew it was green to ask questions, and I suppose I thought there was a “Plain-Buttons” on every ship. We had him to dine in our mess once a week, and the caution was given that on that day nothing was to be said about home. But if they had told us not to say anything about the planet Mars or the book of Deuteronomy, I should not have asked why; there were a great many things which seemed to me to have as little reason. I first came to understand anything about “the man without a country” one day when we overhauled a dirty little schooner which had slaves on board. An officer was sent to take charge of her, and after a few minutes he sent back his boat to ask that someone might be sent him who could speak Portuguese. We were all looking over the rail when the message came, and we all wished we could interpret, when the captain asked who spoke Portuguese. But none of the officers did; and just as the captain was sending forward to ask if any of the people could, Nolan stepped out and said he should be glad to interpret, if the captain wished, as he understood the lan-

Hushed the Men Down.

guage. The captain thanked him, fitted out another boat with him, and La this boat it was my luck to go. When we got there, it was such a scene as you seldom see, and never want to. Nastiness beyond account, and chaos run loose in the midst of the nastiness. There were not a great many of the negroes; but by way of making what there were understand that they were free, Vaughan had had their handcuffs and anklecuffs knocked off, and, for convenience’ sake, was putting them upon the rascals of the schooner’s crew. The negroes were, most of them, out of the hold, and swarming all round the dirty deck, with a central throng surrounding Vaughan and addressing him In every dialect and patois of a dialect, from the Zulu click up to the Parisian of Beledeljereed. - . . —.... ... As we cHme on deck, Vaughan looked down from a hogshead, on which he had mounted in desperation, and said: - “For God’s love, Is there anybody who can make these wretches understand something? The men gave them rum, and that did not quiet them. 1 knocked that big fellow down twice, and that did not soothe him. And then I talked Choctaw to all of them together; and I’ll be hanged if they understood that as well as they under* stood the English.” * Nolan said he could speak Portuguese, and one or two fine-looking Kroomen were dragged out, who, as it had been found already, had worked for the Portuguese on the coast at Fernando Po. a * “Tell them they are free,” said Vaughan; “and tell them" 1 that these rascals are to be hanged as soon as we can get rope enough.” Nolan explained It in such Portuguese as the Kroomen could understand, and they In turn to such of the negroes as could understand them. Then there was snob a yell of delight,

THE EVENING REPUBLICAN, RENSSELAER. INP«

clinching of fists, leaping and dancing, kissing of Nolan’s feet, and a general rush made to the hogshead by way of spontaneous worship of Vaughan as the deus ex machina of the occasion. “Tell them,” said Vaughan/' well pleased, “that I will take them all to Cape Palmas.” ■nils did not answer so well. Cape Palmas was practically as far from the homes of most of them as New Orleans or Rio Janeiro was; thaLlft they, would be eternally separated from home there. And their Interpreters, as we could understand, instantly said, “Ah, non Palmas,” and began to propose Infinite other expedients in most voluble language. Vaughan was rather disappointed at this result of his liberality, and asked Nolan eagerly what they said. The drops stood on poor Nolan’s, white forehead as be hushed the men down, and said: “He says, ‘Not Palmas.’ He says, ‘Take us home, take us to our country, take us to our own house, take us to our own pickaninnies and our own women.’ He says he has an old father and mother, who will die, if not see him. And this one says he left his people all sick, and paddled down to come and help them, and that these devils caught him in the bay just in sight of home, and that he has never seen anybody from home since then. And this one says,” choked out Nolan, “that hfe has not heard a —word from his home in six months, while he has been locked up In an Infernal barracoon.” Vaughan always said he grew gray himself while Nolan struggled through this Interpretation, I, who did not understand anything of the passion involved in it, saw that the very elements were melting with fervent heat, and that something was to pay somewhere. Even the negroes themselves stopped howling as they saw Nolan’s agony, and Vaughan’s almgst equal agony of sympathy. As quick as he could get words, he said: “Tell them yes, yes; tell them they shall go to the Mountains of the Moon, if they will. If I sail the schooner through the Great White Desert, they shall go home!” And after some fashion Nolan said so. And then they aW fell to kissing him again and wanted to rub his nose with theirs. But he could not stand It long; and getting Vaughan to say he might go back, he Reckoned me down into our boat. As we lay back in the stern sheets and the men gave way, he said to me: “Youngster, let that show you what it is to be without a family, with : out a home, and without a country. And if you are ever tempted to say a word or to do a thing that shall put a bar between you and your family, your home, and your country, pray God in his mercy to take you that Instant home to his own heaven. Stick by your family, boy; forget you have a self, while you do everything for them. Think of your home, boy; write and send, and talk about it. Let it be nearer and nearer to your thought, the farther you have to travel from it; and rush to it, when you are free, as that poor black slave is doing now. And for your country, boy,” and the words rattled in his throat, “and for that flag,” and he pointed to the ship, “never dream a dream but of serving her as she bids you, though the service carry you through a thousand hells. No matter what happens to you, no matter who flatters you or who abuses you, never look at another flag, never let a night pass but you pray God to bless that flag. Remember, boy, that behind all these men you have to do with, behind officers, and government, and people even, there is the country herself, your country, and that you belong to her as you belong to your own mother. Stand by her, boy, as you would stand by your mother, if those devils there had got hold of her today 1” I was frightened to death by his calm, hard pass:on; but I blundered out that I would, by that was holy, and that I had newer thought of doing anything else. He hardly seemed to hear me; but he did, almost in a whisper, say: “Oh, if anybody had said so to me when I was of your age!” I think it was this half-confidence of his, which I never abused. ior Lnevea told this story till now, which afterward made us great friends. He was very kind to me. Often he sat up, or even, got up, at night to walk the deck with me when it was my watch. He explained to me a great deal of my mathematics. He lent me books, and helped me about my reading. He never alluded so directly to his story again; bnt from one and another officer I have learned, in thirty years, what I am telling. When WeTparted from him in St. Thomas harbor* at the end of our cruise, I was more sorry than I xan teU. I was very-glad to meet him. again in 1830; and later inlife, when I thought I had some Influence in Washington, I moved heaven and earth to have him discharged. But it was like getting a ghost out of prison. They pretended there was nc such man, and never was such a man. They will say so at the department now! Perhaps they do not know. *lt will not be the first thing in the service of which the department appears tQ know nothing! (TO BE CONTINUED.)

South’s Farm Production.

The Manufacturers’ Record says that the total value of the South’s agricultural products, including animal products, in 1916 was more than $4,650,000,000, or only 8 per cent less than the total for the United States in 1900. The total value of the South’s crops, omitting live slock, in 1916 was $3,658,332,000, or $1,072,280,000 over 1915. To this cotton contributed $1,079,598,000, grain $1,283,369,000, and hay, tobacce and potatoes $440,494,000,

AROUND THE WORLD

Spain restricts sale of merchant vessels. » British Columbia is increasing output of paper pulp. Dominican 1917 sugar crop is estimated at 150,000 tons. Dominican republic in an area of 20,000 square miles has a population of 700,000. Kentucky reports 16 distilleries who will stop production of whisky during the war. American Sugar Refining company last year paid SIOO,OOO in pensions and sick benefits to employees.

STRAY PLANTS

If no other objection, the U-boat Is too confoundedly impertinent. A man who isn’t afraid of the world can easily turn the devil’s flank. Ambition without energy is a beautiful car with four punctured tires. A congressman wants the "Record abolished. That's the trouble with most of us. Talk of a dry state makes the sentimental toper’s heart ache for the poor corn raisers. His bait is the lure of treafchpry—and the angler gets mad if the fool fish won’t swallow it. Memory is a great mirror—and lots of people would like to scratch tho plating off the back. Don’t be too resentful with the “bcry desperado.” Welcome him with jeady shingle to hospitable knees. Boys don’t stop to think that the lost motion in a crap game would make an honest living for the whole bunch. Our language possesses elasticity—but don’t promise to “see about” a thing when you only intend to see arqund it. No wonder the poor poet is ridiculed. Often he presents a beautiful thought to a man who would rather have a chew of tobacco. Old glories are not all passing away. Auctioneers and patent-medicine venders still strive to perpetuate the grand old Burnside whiskers. The young man who is always looking for “snaps” is at least as aspiring as the turtle hunter—J. H. Mackley, in Ohio Farmer.

EVER STOP TO THINK

That a motion picture scenario writer is born every three minutes? And that many of the pictures we see lead us to believe they were written three minutes later? That some men have two or three automobiles? And that others only have ordinary debts and business and such minor troubles? That vacations are great things? And that it rests many a weary man, when he stays home alone? That money comes easier today than it did ten years ago? And that it goes ten times faster than it did then? That an awful lot of gunpowder is bping used with fatal results? And that a lot more face powder is being usetb with fatal vesults? ' That some people never worry about anything? And that the reason is they haven’t anything In their heads to worry with?

DO YOU KNOW THAT

Fly destruction is4ts own reward-? A small mosquito is a dangerous thing? '> fceing healthy is 4he first duty of a Citizen? _ • : Disease is the greatest foe to human progress? A walk in the open air Is worth two in the house? It’s the unused body that deteriorates quickest? Personal hygiene Is the first requisite for community health?

DON'TS FOR HOUSEWIVES

Don’t be a household grind. Don’t knock his friends. You need QOt accept them, but you can be courteous always. r - Don’t invite, company to dinner and then serve something you have never ried out before.

SOMETHING NEW UNDER SUN

An Inventor has patented a motor driving machine for splitting apart cakes of ice that stick together when stored. Swedish chemists have developed a method for removing carbon from coal tar, leaving a clear, transparent, golden brown liquid. A n’ew to be fastened to an automobile steering wheel Is Incased In rubber to make it vibration, shock and dust proof. A Kansas Inventor claims to have perfected a device that permits the use of kerosene instead of gasoline as an automobile fuel without changing carburetors. Mounting the magneto 'ln the .flywheel, the inventor of a new type of motorcycle has been able to dispense with the usual series of driving gears and sprockets. An Inventor believes he has made a safe hammerless shotgun by requiring It to be held against the shoulder with the right hand In position for firing before the trigger -can be released. Locomotives and cars specially designed for passage through sand storms and to offer resistance to the metal-cutting sand have been built for "the French railroad in the Sahara. A safe Invented In England Is fastened with a wire stretched to respond to a musical tone produced by some Instrument, its vibrations affecting electrical mechanism that opens locks. Weighing less than 200 pounds, a portable track-welding outfit that gets its electricity from trolley wires has been invented for small railways that do not require elaborate plants of the kind. Operated by one man, a gasolinedriven machine has been Invented that delivers more than a thousand hammer blows a minute to newly laid concrete foundations for roads to give them an even density.— • To lessen the labor of cotton' pickers, a Virginian has invented a low-wheeled truck, on which a person can sit close to the plants and push himself along, the vehicle also holding a bag to receive the cotton and an umbrella for shade.

VERITIES

No man ever toiled so high but what he could find a harder climb ahead. The head that rises the highest must expect to become the target for fools. The crook can’t expect to retain both the cash and the confidence of the community;

POINTED PARAGRAPHS

Women with pretty teeth will laugh at any joke. It takes a strong man to hold fast to an opinion. It is easy to convince a man that he Is smarter than you are. Trouble Is the most thorough teacher in the school of experience. Only a man who is never 11l wonders how doctors manage to make a living. A woman is willing to give a man advice on any subject except the art of shaving. « * When a woman gets a love letter from her husband she appreciates it if it has a check in it. Of course we all want to get on the safe side, but it’s often a question which is the safe side. It takes a woman with nerve to carry a $lO purse with nothing in it b,ut a safety pin and a dozen dry goods go News.

SEARCHING THOUGHTS

There is far greater equality between men in sentiment than "in thought As soon as a becomes exaggerated the-faculty orreasoning disappears. Men of superior intellectual power are at times far below the savage in sentiment. A truth which Is opposed to feelings, passions and beliefs, ceases to be a truth to many persons. . We are not always worthy of the love which yre inspire, but we generally deserve the friendship which we hold. —M. Le Ban.

IN THE BIG CITIES

San Francisco is waging war on shacks. Philadelphia is to have an agricultural college. Chicagoans are compelled to economize in lawn-sprinkling water. A.

SEEING THE UNSEEN

The Invisible World Becomes the Real World Through the Eye of Faith. Text —“And Elisha prayed, and said. Lord, t pray thee, open his eyes, that he may see. And the Lord opened the eyes of the young man; and he saw; and, behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha.”—n Kings 6:17. “The entrance of thy word giyeth light,” says the psalmist. No book in the world is so full of the light of truth as the Bible. This is not only true of the New Testament of our Lord Jesus Christ, but it is also true of the words of Jehovah In the Qld Testament. There are three things notable about the Old Testament. First, it is a revelation. This Is what It purports to be. It Is no attempt of a great thinker to solve the hard problems of life. Revelation alone explains the Book of books. It gives us truths from the mind, the heart, the mouth of God. Again, the Old Testament is a prophecy. It heralds a better age to come. It is a preparation. It looks forward to a consummation of a great divine purpose. It points to the lifespring from on high visiting men. It makes ready the way for the coming of God's only begotten son. And thirdly, the Old Testament is a history. It is a record of God’s dealings with his people. It shows him time and again revealing himself to them, and taking a hand in their fortunes. It is this third feature which gives the Old Testament so perennial an interest, and makes its study so practically helpful for us. In this Scriptural history, in these thrilling narratives, we see God’s dealing with men, we learn his providential ways, and we know how to expect him to -act with us. Of all these historic incidents related in the Old Testament, it seems to me this one we have chosen for our text is one of the most suggeiw Hve and beautiful. The Invisible World. The great truth revealed here Is the fact of an invisible world. This material world which we see, touch and feel, we are certain of. We know it exists, and we shape and mold our lives with respect to its wants, and so we live amid two worlds; there is another world than this outer, material one. All around and about us lies an invisible world. We are inhabitants of a world seen and of a world unseen; a world of time and a world of eternity. This invisible world, too, is peopled. A whole concourse of existences and agencies fill it that we never dream of. They are, also, of a higher type and quality than any earthly ones. These are symbolized here by “horses and chariots of fire.” The other great truth taught by this grand Old Testament scene is the providence of God over his servants. This is shown in a marvellous and wonderful manner. When Elisha, without sword or shield, is surrounded by mail-clad barbarous hosts, so that by all material tests his death is imminent, he is really not in the slightest danger. The powers and forces of tho invisible world are incomparably stronger than those of this finite one. And so the pibus soul- can ever calmly say: “I will fear no evil, for thou art with me.” God and his holy angels girdle me with a cordon of fire. The Great Lesson. The great lesson of this majestic Biblical narrative is the closeness with which we are surrounded by the spiritual world. It Is just as real as this visible one. /Its inhabitants are spiritual personalities far stronger and mightier than we who are flesh and blood. They do the will of God in heaven, and they hold themselves ready at the command of the Almighty King to do his will upon the earth. And our fortunes are very much more in the keeping of these invisible hosts than they are dependent upon the earthly causes and forces,that we see, and that man is blind who walks through life without recognizing this fact. We need then to have our spiritual eyes opened, that we may see and take into our spiritual eyes and purposes this invisible world that everywhere overarches and presses upoix us. It is the worldly man, who sees only with his carnal eye, who Is impractical, and who must fall in his blindness. But the Christian, with, true vision, sees two worlds, and walking by the invisible, G»e God who saved endangered Elisha Svill be his preserver ip life ancLin death. —Rew Junius B. Itemensnyder.

Tried as by Fire.

All external circumstances, whether direct from God or indirect through man, whether from open enemies or dearest friends, whether Intended or simply casual, through willful sin or unavoidable infirmity, are component parts of th’at furnace through which our nature is passing, and in which, if at all, our sanctification is to be attained. —Rev. T. T. Carter.

The Coming Age.

In this coming age catholidty of faith will supplant toleration as toleration has supplanted bigotry. The age in which I hate my neighbor’s faith is gone; that in which I regard his faith with religions indifference, which I call tolerance, is going; that in which I respect his faith and wofk with him to a common end is coming in,-—Lyman Abbott,