Jasper County Democrat, Volume 2, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 August 1899 — CURRENT COMMENT [ARTICLE]

CURRENT COMMENT

Admiral Dewey has a double in New York, who, strangely enough, is a Spaniard. When the war with Spain broke out Senor A. B. I’lanas sympathized with his mother country. At that time the battle of Manila had not been fought, and his likeness to Admiral Dewey was not generally noticed. After the defeat of the Spanish fleet, however, when Senor I’lanas had enough, as he thought, to mourn about, the men of his acquaintance began to twit him with his resemblance to the man who had destroyed the sea power of his country. That worried the Spaniard to such an extent that he shaved off his mustache and thus escaped persecution. Now his mustache is growing once more, and Senor I’lanas finds life again a burden. Farmers in North Dakota, who report 250.000 acres of standing wheat destroyed by hail, met with a similar loss thirteen years ago. On July 24, 1880, a great hailstorm swept over Minnesota and North Dakota, wiping out nearly 3,000 acres of wheat and doing immense damage in other ways. Some of the hail stones were as big as hen's eggs. The biggest hail stones on record, however, fell at Whitehall, 111., in 1881. They were as big as goose eggs and drifts ten and twelve inches deep were found the day after the storm. In August, 1883, hailstones measuring thirteen inches in circumference fell and at Dubuque. lowa, in 1882, monster hail stones weighing two pounds were picked up. The West Indies, which have been devastated by a cyclone, are peculiarly liable to such visitations. In 1880 nearly the whole island of Jamaica was devastated, hundreds of buildings being destroyed and twelve lives lost. In October, 1882, a hurricane crossed Cuba, killing forty people and thousands of cattle. In 1888 a cyclone killed 1,000 people in Cuba. Three years later a hurricane struck Martinique, wrecking all the shipping in port and killing 340 people, in addition to a property loss estimated at $10,000,000. August is the month of the dog days and of falling stars. Venus is now a morning star, rising only three-quarters of an hour before the sun. Mercury is an evening star, but he will begin to get up in the morning on Aug. 19. Jupiter may be noticed at sunset, far down in the western heavens. Mars and Uranus are both evening stars. The moon was new on the Oth, and will be full on Aug. 20. Yellow fever is distinctively an American pestilence. It first appeared in Philadelphia in 1669. Again in 1762 it ravaged the Qty of Brotherly Love and in 1791 broke out in New York. During this century it has appeared many times in New Orleans and other Southern cities. During the great epidemic of 1878 there were 65,000 cases and 15,000 deaths in the United States.

It is an honor to represent a whole State in Congress, instead of a district, but it is not a popular one. In Kansas no one seems to desire the nomination. Kansas, Pennsylvania and South Dakota have Congressmen representing the State at large, the Legislature having failed to make a reapportionment of the State since the census of 1890. The position is unpopular, because there is no patronage, and there is no chance of continuity in office, as the territory is likely to be dlintn Hiatrinta at anw dma