Ligonier Banner., Volume 14, Number 39, Ligonier, Noble County, 15 January 1880 — Page 3

The Ligonier Banmer, C e

W PATOHIE THE bell had rung, the school was out, = ! And from the hall with busy feet - . | The boys rushed forth with laugh and shout, And crowded through the village street, Like prisoners from their cells; broke loose, Escaping from the calaboose. .- | Across the street, and all alone, o A small boy walked with rapid gait, Like one unknowing and unknown,/ With head erect and form so straight; { He heeded not the crowd that cried, “See ‘ Patchie’ on the otherside.” I wondered much why this should be, ; But when I looked I knew too well: The noblest of them all was he. - : But sad to think, more sad to tell, - He from the crowd had been detached Because his pantaloons were patched.: No answering word escaped him there; I watched him as he climbed the hill, Then thought, * Each other’s burden’s bear, And thus the law of Christ fulfill;” And 8o I joined him on the road, : - Hoping to lighten his sad load. I spoke in loving words and kind; He, smiling, looked up in my face— He had a true and noble mind— And answered with a manly grace: ** My father, sir, has long been dead, - And mother earns our daily bread. ° - . ** To school she sends me every day: I do the best there that I can; And mother says she’ll get her pay s When I grow up to be a man; : And, sir, 1 hope that I shall be All that my mother wishes me. § 5 *“They call me ¢ Patchie;’ T don't care,” Said he while passing through the gate; * It’s what we are, not what we wear, . That makes us good and makes us great.” He touched his cap and said, ‘“Good-night;” I whispered, ** Noble, brave and right!” I started on my homeward way : : Not only boys, but men, I thought, - * Pass by the poor ones every day; <. Only the rich and %r-rand are sought; This world, so full of foolish pride, Puts ‘‘ Patchie” on the other side. ' - —Mrs. S. T. Perry. in S. 8. Visitor.

LIFE AND DEATH OF A WORLD. Lecture by Professor Proctor, in New York—-Growth of the Stars Through Milllons of Years—Slow bu;l. Steady Decay—-The Future of the Earth Foreseen by the Present Condition * of Other Planeis, e YESTERDAY afternoon Professor Proctor addressed a large audience in Steinway Hall, under the auspices of the Teachers’ Association. The subject was ‘‘The Life and Death of a World.” The lecturer consideréd the various members of the solar system, so far as they tended to throw any light upon the beginning, the middle life and the old age of the earth, and briefly summarized the processes through which the earth must have passed in reaching its present condition. He estimated the time consumed in these processes as not less than 500,000,000 years, and said that 25,000,000 years will elapse: before it will reach the present condition of the moon. -He saw no obstacle presented by these vast periods of time to a belief in Him who works through all things. i b — PROFESSOR PROCTOR’S ADDRESS.' - We have this evening to consider the various members of the solar system, as representing to us the beginning, the middle life and the old age and death of a planet. I forbear from troubling you with any considerations as to the various arguments concerning the creation of the universe, as I think that the students of science have satisfied them selves that the planets and the earth on which we live have arrived at their present condition bg processes analogous to growth, and which are commonly known under the one head of evolution, but I may particularly indicate them in-this way. ' The changes of the earth’s crust such as are now going on we find have been going on during {)eriods- of time which in reality frows’ onger the wore we study the evidence, and I don’t think it would be exaggerating—in fact I know from the evigence which has been gathered that it does not fall far short of the truth—to sa that 100,000,000 of years must hav% elapsed, during which the frame of the earth has been very much as it is at present. Various processes have taken place during that time which have aided in the course of formation, such as the gradual defiosit‘ of matter and other processes which we call denudation, by which the surfaces of continents have been worn away, passages have been cut by the rivers, and other details in the formation have taken.place. By estimating at what rate the processes have taken place we are able to form some fllea of the lerg,’,‘th of time which must have elapsed during which these processes have been continually going on. Then the earth’s crust shows us clearly that -anterior to this there must have been atime when there was far too great a heat upon this globe for it to be the abode of life, and this period has been carefully estimated at 800,000,000 of years. Then we have the preceding period, when the earth was in a vaporous state. Of that we derive evidence, -not from the earth herself, but from the {.»resent state of the solar system, which eads us to the conclusion that the whole system must have been in a form of vapor, and therefore our earth must have had its beginning in a vaporous state. : -

We find another line of evidence of this fact in regard to the mioon, which shows that the frame of the earth must once have extended so far as to include that luminary, and that could not have been unless she had been in a vaporous state. So we have to take into account, also, the length of time that ‘would be occupied in the change of our earth from a vaporous to a solid and liquid state, and we cannot regard that as less than 100,000,000 of gears. This brings us to the very moderate estimate of 500,000,000 of years during which our earth has existed as an independent whole, first in a vaporous state; secondly, the solid and liquid form, and its gradual cooling so that at length, 'ancfthirdly, its surface was fit to be the abode of liyin% creatures of various kinds, and by the processes of wearing <down and denudation, such as are now taking place, reaching her present condition. U N

It is essential that we should %rasp the idea of the long Eeriod which has elapsed during which these various processes of %orm’ation have been in operation; but there is, of course, an escape from that by accegting the theory that everything we find upon the carth’s surface, and everything iwe

have discovered in regard to the solar system, is evidence that the system was created just as it is; that thoufh all the evidences of the processes of development are presented to our reason, we have been misled; that reason, not our own, but given to us, has led us astray; and that all these relations of earth were created at once for no other purpose apparently but: to contradict our reason. Why shculd we be conscious to save time or limit our ideas of space if this were not so? In the eyes of Him who works through all things there is no difference between great and small; and “these longer periods are as easily to be believed in as resulting from His action as the shorter periods we are so much better able to deal with. Where we admit §row'th and development on a small scale, we ought to be able to admit it on a large scale; and where our reason seems to point to these efl(\)rm()us' periods of time, I do not think we ought to reject its teachings and refuse to accept them as read-. ily as we do the processes of development affecting plant or animal, or those smaller detaifi we are unable to understand more clearly. COOLING PERIODS OF THE WORLDS. But after all it matters very little whether we take the longer periods of time or the shorter. We are not concerned with the periods of time, but the amount of development for each period in the past of our earth, and it matters little whether the processes of development were quicker and so required a shorter period, or were slower in their operation and so required a longer time. What we have to consider is whether the various members of the solar system represent to us the remote past of our own earth in some cases, and in others the remote future; and I think 1 shall be able to show you that they do, for I am going to adopt a principle that will allow us to view our own planet and the sun as different ages, and this principle is that the larger the orb is the longer has been its period of growth, because it would take a longer time for a-large mass to cool than for a small one. Take two balls of heatediron, for instance; one of which is four times greater in size, and has a volume, eight times greater than the other. At the beginning the larger ball will have eight times as much heat as the other, and as the surface is only four times as great the supply of heat would las* four times as long.” Apply that principle to the planets. The diameter of Jupiter: is seven times that of the earth, and his volume would be in the same ratio were it in the same shape of compression as that of our earth. Then if we multiply our 500,000,000 years of existence by seven, we get 3,500,000,000 years; or, in other worcfs, if the planets began their existence at the same time as independent orbs, which assumption is adopted for conveniénce only, it would be 3,000,000,000 years before Jupiter would be in the same state as our earth. Without insisting on these figures, we may fairly assume that Jupiter will have to go through a very long period of time before he reaches the same state as this globe. Take the smaller orbs. The moon is one-eighty-first part of the size of our earth, and one-thirteenth part of our supply of heat would last the moon six times as long. Every stage of our earth’s cooling, therefore, would last six times as long. Therefore, instead of 500,000,000 of years we get for the moon only about 80,000,000 of years. In other words, the moon would have reached the same state as our earth is now 420,000,000 of years ago. :

The sun was probably formed, as all the planets were formed, in a state of vapor, and probably still remains in great part in a vaporous state. He is the youn%-er member of the solar system simply because he surpasses all the rest in mass. By the same principle as we have before applied, it would take 35,000,000,000 of years to bring%the sun to the same state as our earth; therefore we will consider him as a younger member of the system, not, of course, in years, but development, and so pass onward from its present state to the changes our earth is passing through and &en‘ to her old age. : | CHANGES OF THE PLANETS. The hall at this point was made completely dark, and the Professor brou%ht the stereopticon into active use. The first illustration was a chart of the relative position of the solar bodies, the lecturer explaining their comparative dimensions and volume. The dots on the sheet, he remarked, represented’ the asteroids. In reality they were too large, but if they had been their right size relatively on the chart they would have been invisible, and therefore not very instructive. More than 200 of these stars had been already discovered, and thousands doubtless existed. Nineteen were discovered last year—the lm'gest nurfiber in a‘I)IJ one year—and, as Professors Peters, Watson and others were studying ‘them assiduously, we should, no doubt, see more of them every year. Among other views of the solar bodies, a splendid photograph of the sun, b{; Dr. Rutherford, was shown, from which many details of the character of that orb could be gleaned. It showed, for instance, that the atmosphere was dense, but not very deep, compared with that of the earth. The spots on the sun had been held to be openings in the clouds which enveloped the su’r%gce of the sun, and which were known as the solar granules. These granules were swept aside, and the ark figures appeared, but how it was that they were swept aside periodically, and how the sun came to show many spots at one time and then again none at all, and why these changes averaged about eleven years, was as yet a problem to which no solution had been offered. Dr. Kirk, of Indiana, was very near it, probably, when he concluded that these spots were meteors followin, ‘in the track of some comet which hafi fallen upon the surface of the sun. The next picture showed one of these sEots enlarged, 'which has a surface three times as large as that of the earth. In ‘the next the granules of the sun were shown, and several followed upon the same sub({ect. The next series of views urported to show what lies outside gh‘e sun, the prominences, and the corona, and in reference to a picture showing the direction of the axis of the zodiacal light, the lecturer made the important statement: “I believe it proceeds from the central region of a great

nebulous disc, extending to the limits of the solar system itself.” The Jovian system was next shown and considered. The sun, said the Professor, is surrounded by cloud layers, and it is these layers, and not the sun, that meet our eye. You have heard of a variety of changes taking ‘place in these cloud.layers, and recently a similar change has taken place in the cloud layers of Jupiter, by which a long elliptical opening in the southern hemisphere, e€qual to threefourths of the surface of our own earth, is now seen. Therefore we have to infer that vhe clouds must have been swept to one side by some mighty force exerted, we cannot doubt, from below, and brought into view the real surface of the planet. And it is proved that the planet has intense heat and is constantly working these changes, by the fact that these cloud layers are in no way influenced by the sun. I think the evidence we have is that in the youth of the planet the waters that are one day to form the planet’s oceans were raised into the atmosphere in the form of these clouds. S Now let us pass to the planet Saturn, of which a picture is here shown. Here we find the same evidence of great cloud masses. These discs upon the planet are unquestionably formed of cloud, and are what will be the oceans of that planet. lam almost disposed to think that Saturn, although not so large as Jupiter, is even younger in development. I think we find evidence of that in its incomplete system that travels round it. There are his rings and his eight moons, and recently three other moons have been formed. Changes.are certainly taking place in the rings of Saturn, which show that it is, as it were, a kind of laboratory of nature at present. I .wish you to notice that it is generally believed that the central planet is intended to be the abode of life, and the satellites are intended as sources of light and heat. It is not soinregard to the noble orb, the sun; and in regard to the satellites, take those of Jupiter, for example—you will find several equal to support life. The larger is as large as the planet Mercury and has a surface of 14,000,000 square miles, and is entirely fitted to support a great number of living creatures. And it is proper to notice that what is commonly supposed to be the purpose of these moons is not fulfilled by them. If all these four moons were at the full at the same time, which they could not be, they would only reflect on Jupiter one-sixteenth part of the light—we know nothing of the heat —that we get from our moon; while Jupiter can supply to the nearest of them thirteen times as much light as we receive from our moon. Saturn’s system is a miniature of the solar system, first the central orb, then the ring system, a multitude of minute fragments, and outside of them eight moons, just as in the solar system there are eight primary planets. The larger of these moons could be compared to Jupiter, the next to Mars, and the next to Mercury; and the very least could be the abode of many millions of living creatures. Saturn himself could not be the abode of life, even . if he were not, as I think, intensely heated. :

THE EARTH'S FUTURE. A comparison of the various other members of the terrestrial part of the solar system will tell us much of the earth’s future, the moon especially telling of the earth’s future just as Jupiter has of its past. Upon the pictures of Venus very little reliance can be placed, and few favorable opportunities are offered for studying her, because when at the full she lies on the other side of the sun, and at the only time we could study her she turns her darkened - hemisphere toward us. In this view of the transit of Venus half her disc is shown on that of the sun. We must not assume that this is not sunlight, for it must be light of the sun brought into view by the effect of reflection. Therefore, we learn that the planet has an‘ atmosphere, and ‘it is said to be at the very least as dense as that of our own earth. Then we learn, also, that oceans are on her surface, because it has been shown by the spectrum. It appears, also, that it closely resembles our earth in condition, and that it is the one planet fit to be the abode of living creatures like those which exist on the earth. In Mars we begin to recognize the effects of planetary old age. These greenish patches we must regard as seas, and we find that they are much less in comparison to the rest of the areathan in our earth. On our own planet 72.00 is covered with water, ang on thisonly about 50.00. The older planet has the smaller water surface, and the idea is suggested that in old age of a planet the waters gradually diminish in extent. ; We pass to the moon to answer that question, and here we certainly find no traces of water. Also, we trace no atmosphere of appreciable density, and everything tends to show that she had water on her surface, but that it has disappeared. Does this seemingly cold and dead world appear to have passed through the same stages as our own earth? I think we cannot doubt this when we look at her volcanic craters. I think, too, there must have been there such life as exists on our own planet.. There were oceans on her surface, which formerly occupied these spots, which, the waters being withdrawn, present this finely-granulated appearance from its action. %‘his seems to be a natural explanation: as the planet becomes old the oceans become soaked into the planet’s interior, the crust of the surface, as the planet cools, being formed into large cavities such as exist in porous substarces, and into these the water is withdrawn. Dr. Franklin, of England, has shown that four times as much water as now finds gl‘ace on the earth’s surface could be found room for in the interior of the earth, when the process of cooling has gone sufficiently far. Then, in regard to the atmosphere, there is certainly no trace on the moon, but we have a picture here showing that the volcanic action of the moon was at one time no less than in our own earth. Here are the craters of Capernus compared with those on the Bay of Naples. You notice that they are larger on the moon’s surface than those ofg Nagl}es-, with the exception of Vesuvius. But we have to remember that the volcanic action of

the moon had more to contend with, and therefore, although the volcanoes are large, they may not have exerted so great a force. &ere we have a picture representing the moon without an atmosphere, an% this, it may be generally stated, represents the future of our own earth. The moon probably represents the future of our own earth at a distance of time of 25,000,000 years; so not only in the first place have we not sufficient time for these changes to occur, but our emotions are also satisfied, so far as they are affected by the painful thought that when the old age of the earth will come it will cease as the abode of life, by the reflection that ourselves and thousands after us, to the remotest generations, will still have ample time and ample room to remain on the earth’s surface. . AN INFINITUDE OF STARS. Let us pause to consider some of the stars in this regard. Many of them are too old and many too young to sustain life on their surfaces, but that they were formed for some purpose beyond that of being useful to this particular planet there is ‘mo doubt. A study of the heavens seems to tell us that all life should occupy all space and all time, and not be crowded into one portion of time or one portion of space. So I think we may look at the heavens, with the thousands .of stars to be seen with the naked eye, and hold this thought. There you have 6,000 suns, each a brother of our own sun; though many belong to higher orders, and we may believe they have thousands of orbs circling round them which are the abodes of life. And if each one has but a single world in its system as the abode of life, we have then thousands of inhabited worlds similar, perhaps, to our own. ;

- In the one single polar map here shown there are 324,000 stars, all to be seen with a small telescope, and by one of Herschel’s telescopes 20,000,000 stars would have been brought into view in the same section of the firmament. We here find in the depths of space the worlds that will take the .place of those already known to us. But after all there still remains the thought that each planet is tending toward death, and though the periogs of time are so vast that they seem like eternity, the dying out of the larger of these suns appears to us like the geath of the universe itself. But itake such an orb as Sirius, which is a thousand tinies larger than the sun, and after his death all the smaller orbs will have died, but can we escape the thought that there will still remain others to take their places? It seems to me we cannot, if we remember how thoroughly we have been deceived in the past. We thought the earth the center of the universe; then the . solar system was everything, then that system became one in a galaxy of stars, and in turn the galaxy of stars is lost in the infinitude of stars. So may it not be in regard to time and space as it is in regard to matter; that time is-one of many formations of the universe, that there are higher orders so much grander in form that very miracles of time in regard to them are like the suns and planets that we see. There is a lower order that wander through space in which all the waste energies of suns —our own sun included—are continually being poured; they may be in turn reviving the next lower order of the universe, and may it not well be that we in turn may receive from the higher orders something of their waste energy? so that instead of death we may rather undergo a continual interchange by various orders of the universe, which shall be carried on through all time.— N. Y. Tribune. ;

Expensive Exercise. - A PROFESSIONAL gentleman who resides on Elizabeth street has noticed for some weeks past that his appetite was leaving him. He felt so wea‘ll)( and debilitated that he at last consulted his physician, a practical old fellow, who said to him: , , . “Young man, you need nothing but exercise.’ “ All right, doctor, I'll purchase a pair of dumb-bells and some Indian clubs at once.” = ¢ Dumb-clubs and Indian bells! fudge! Burn your street-car tickets and buy yourself a bucksaw and a saw-horse and cut your own stove-wood. Acting on this suggestion the young gentleman assaulted a hardware store and victoriously carried off the best wood saw in the establishment. Then he had a four-dollar horse made and bought two or three cords of four-foot wood and began to take ‘‘ treatment.” The first morning he sawed for an hour before breakfast and thoufiht-it delightful. The next morning he felt a little lame and sore, but took the prescribed ‘“dose’ regularly. In the evenin%(the saw ¢ pinched,” and he left it sticking in the {)og which lay across the horse. His wife suggested that he had better bring the saw and buck into the house, as some person might steal it. ““]1 wish they would,” he replied, as looked at his b{istered hands. ~ Saturday morning he found his sawhorse and saw were gone, and havin expended about twenty dollars for Woog and saw, and experiencing no beneficial results in this treatment, he has concluded to try seme other.—Detroit Free Press.

—An American physician,, who has given attention to the study of alcohol--Ism, said in the course of an address recently delivered before a learned society: ‘‘There are constantly crowding into our insane asylums persons fifty to eighty gears of age, who in early life were addicted to the use of alcoholic liquors, but who had reformed, and for ten, twenty or thirty years have never touched a drop. The ixgury which the liquor did to their bodies seemed to have all disappeared, being triumphed over by the f& vigor of their manhood, but when their natural force began to decrease, then the concealed mischief showed itself in insanity, clearly demonstrating that the injury to their hodies was of a permanent character.”’

—Mr. O'Flanigan: ‘Well, Barney, when you come to see your landlord, ye moight put a coat on you,”” Barney—‘“ls it coat, your honor? Shure, thin, the ownly dacent coat I'll be having is jist a bundle of howls stitched tigethwrt, and sorra a rag else—and that same in pawn--bad ¢ess to it intoirly."”

Youths’ Department. T —— INO AND UNO. INo and Uno are two little boys Who always are ready to fight, - Because each will boast - That he knows the most, And the other one cannot be right. . Ino and Uno went into the woods, Quite certain of knowing the way: : “Tam right! You are wrong!” They said, going alon&'. ok And they didn’t get out till next day! Ino and Uno rose up with the lark, To anglc awhile in the brook, ut by contragx’ signs They entangled their lines, And brought nothing home to the cook! Ino and Uno went out on the lake, And oh, they got dreadfully wet! While discussion prevailed They carelessly sailed, And the boat they were in was upset! Though each is entitled opinions to have, They need not be foolish-lg strong'; And to quarrel and fight Over what we think right, Is, ¥ou know, and T Immv,rguite wrong ! —Josephine Pollard, in St. Nicholas.

HOW SUNKEN SHIPS ARE RAISED. WHEN a ship sinks some distance from the ' shore in several fathoms of water, and the waves conceal her, it may seem impossible to some of our readers that she can ever be floated again; but if she rests upon a firm; sandy bottom, without rocks, and the weather is fair enough for a time to give the wreckers an opportunity, it is even probable that she can be brought into port. : In Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Norfolk and New Orleans, large firms are established whese special business it is to send assistance to distressed vessels, and to save. the cargo if the vessels themselves cannot %e prevented from becoming total wrecks; and these firms are known as wreckers —a name which in the olden time was given to a class of heartless men dwelling on the coast who lured ships ashore by false lights for the sake of the spoils which the disaster brought them. When a vessel is announced to be ashore or sunk, the owners usually apply to the wreckers, and make a bargain with them that they shall. receive a certain proportion of her value if they save her, and the wreckers then proceed tothe scene of the accident, taking with them powerful tug-boats, large pontoons, immense iron cables and a massive derrick.: i

Perhaps only the topmasts of the wreck are visible when they reach it; but even though she is quite out of si%ht, she is not given up, if the sea is calm and the wind favorable. One of ,the men puts a diving dress over his suit of heavy flannels. The trousers and jacket are made of India-rubber cloth, fitting close to the ankles, wrists, and across the chest, which is further protected by a breast-plate. A copper ‘helmet with a glass face is wused for covering the head, and is screwed on to the breast-plate. One end of a eoil of strong rubber tubing is attached to the back of the helmet, to the outside of which a running cord is also attached, and continued down the side of the dress to the diver’s right hand, where he can use it for signaling his assistants when he is beneath the surface. His boots have leaden soles weighing about twenty-eight pounds; and as tfiis, with the helmet, is insufficient to allow his descent, four blocks of lead, weighing fifty pounds, are slung over his shoulders; and a waterproof bag containing a hammer, a chisel and a dirk-knife is fastened over his breast. .. . - v o “He is transferred from the steamer that has brought him from the city to a small boat, W%ich is rowed to a spot over the wreck, and a short iron ladder is put over the side, down which he steps; and when the last rung is reached, he lets go, and the water bubbles and sparkles over his head as he sinks deeper and deeper.

The immersion of the diver is more thrilling to a spectator than it is to him. The rubber coil attached to his helmet at one end is attached at the other to an air-pump, which sends him all the breath he needs, and if the supply is irregular a pull at the cord by his right hand secures its adjustment. He is not timid, and he knows that the only thing he has to guard against is nervousness, by which he might lose his presencée of mind. The gsh dart away from him at a motion of his hand, and even a shark is terrified by the apparition of his strange globular helmet. He is careful not to approach the wreck too suddenly, as the tangled r;iging and splinters might twist or break the air-pipe and signal line; when his feet touch the bottom he looks behind, before and above him before he advances an inch. i

Looming up before him like a phantom in the foggy light is the ship; and now, perhaps, if any of the crew have gone down with her, the diver feels a momentary horror; but if no one has been lost he sets about his work and hums a cheerful tune. v It may be that the vessel has settled low in the sand, that she is broken in two, or that the hole in her bottom eannot- be repaired. But we will snppose that the circumstances are favorable, that the sand is firm and the hull in an easy position. The diver signals to be hauled up, makes his report, and in his next descent he is accompanied kgr several others, who help him to drag massive chains of iron underneath the ship, at the bow, at the stern, and in the middle. This is a tedious and exhausting operation, which sometimes takes many days; and when it is completed, the pontoons are towed into position at each side of the ship. | The pontoons, simply described, are hollow floats. They are oblong, built of wood, and possess great buoyancy. Some of them are over a hundred feet long, eighteen feet wide. and fourteen feet deep; but their size, and the number of them used, depend on the‘l_ength of the vessel that is to be raised. Circular tubes, or wells, extend through them; and when the chains are secured underneath the"shi'{),' the ends are inserted in these wells by the divers, and drawn up ,thrqu%h them by hydraulic power. The chains thus form a series of hoops like the common swing of the plagr'ground, in which the ship rests; and as they are shortened in being drawn ug thromfih} ‘the wells, the Shilp lifts. The ship lifts if all be well—if the chains do not part, or some other . y NGy A P §

accident occur; but the wreckers need great patience, and sometimes they see the labor of weeks undone in a minute. We_ are pres:gposing - guccess, however,hfimf.}l instead of si 'f;Qg‘.tfigsiz‘ ing the ship appears abo¥ethe bubbli Wagter, andget}:vg:;m the s f’?“ g, Whigfi groan andfremble with- herv eight. As soon as her docks are above water, so much of the cargo is removed as is necessary to efi&bfi? the divers to reach the broken part of the hull,which they patch ‘with boards and canvas if she is built of Wood, or with iron plates if she is of iron. This is the most perilous partiof the diver's work, as there are so many projections upon which his air-tube 'may - catch; but he finds it almost as easy to ply his hammer and drill in making repairs. under water as on shore. i e The * ship is' next pumped out and borne between the pontoons by powerful tugs to the mnearest dry-dock, where all the damages are finally repaired, and in a month or two she is once more afloat, with nothing to indicate her narrow escape.—Harper's Young People. - ol | :

Freddy’s Mitten. -« IT was nearly nine o’clock, quite time for Freddy to be starting for school, and yet he didn’t go, because he could not find his mitten. . Up stairs and down stairs he ran, pulled open drawers, hunted in pockets, looked in closets, and yet there was no mitten. b He knew he had it on when he came in yesterday, and grandma, too, remembered to have seen it on his hand when he ran in after school, so it must be somewhere in the house, but where wasit? - - : o . Now some one wished once that clothes were made with ears, so th%y i would come when they were called, and I dare say Freddy wished so very much that day, but mittens have only thumbs, not ears, and thumbs are of no use to help, when one is hunting about to find something. : ; " So the end of it was that Freddy had to go to school with only .one miitten, and the other hand was stuck into his pocket to keep it warm. In the course of the morning, Betty thought she would make some cookies for tea, so - she measured out her flour, and then took a cup to get the sugar, and there, in the sugar bucket, she saw, when she lifted up the cover, a little red mitten! How- could . it have got there?— Youth's Companion. : ,

FACTS AND FIGURES. NEBRASKA has an area of 75,995 miles, or 48,636,800 acres. Or the 686 soldiers sent by Baltimore to the Mexican war thirteen survive. - : OF the 650 conviets in the Tennessee Penitentiary there is not one sick inthe hospital. StaTistics of the failures in New York City in 1879 show that they were much' less in number and amount than those of 1878. ' They numbered 460, with debts of $16,383,932 and assets of $5,160,033.« : THE French Assembly has voted 59, 000,000 francs—2,ooo,ooo more than asked—for education—against 26,000,000 in 1870 and 16,000,000 in 1851. The grant includes $40,000 traveling expenses for explorers. ; THE openness of the feathers of fowls which do not throw off the water well, like those of most birds, enables them to cleanse themselves easier from insects and dirt, by dusting their feathers and then shaking off the dirt and these minute pests with the dust. For this purpose one or more ample heaps of sifted ashes or very‘idr{ sand or earth for them to roll in must be placed in the sun, and, if possible, under shelter, so as to be warm and perfectly dry. The dust heap is as necessary to fowls as water for washing is to human beings. It cleanses their feathers and skin from vermin and impurities, promotes the cuticular or skin secretions and is materially instrumental in preserving their health. 1f they should be much troubled’ with insects, mix in the heap wood ashes and a little flour of sulphur. —N. Y. Herald. S : THE following table of comparative prices of farm produce in New York at the end of 1878 and 1879 will be found of use to all who have followed the run of the articles under the head of CrOfs and Market Reports the Fast year. It is not expeeted_%enera ly by dealers that prices will fall much below present rates for some time to come unless it may be for dairy products and cotton: 1878, ——— ——lB79.—— Butter, creamery. .20 @ 28 29° @ 38 “ 'dairy.. . 15 @-2 -3%31 @ 83 Cheese, factory... 6 @ 9% 11 @ 134 ¢ M,’da_irg. 5 @ 8 .9 @ 12X Cotton, middling. B%@ 9% 12%@ 13% Wheat, spring.... 8 @ 9 137 @l4B “ winter....loo ‘@ 109 149 @ 1 56% RYO....vccereenee 55 @ 60 8 @ 91 Corn, western.....- 46 @ 48 62 @ 64% Oats, western..... -80 @ 3% 50 @ bH55% Barley, State,2r'd ‘75 @ 8 70 % 80 “’wirowd 85 @ 9% B 90 “ Canada.. 90 @l2O 90 @lO7 Hope.... .\ oo o Ihedl 45 80 @- 40 P0tat0e5.......... 200 @287 10 @212 Catt1e.............. 750 @ll 00 6% @ll 50 “ average.. 850 @..... 9% @..... 5heeg..............; 3@ O 4 @ 6% TAmbR G s IY@ 6. 6 @ T 4 Hogs, 1ive......... 300 % 8315 47 @ 500 “ dressed.. 3%@ 44 B4@ 6% —lowa State Register. . oy A REPORT just issued by the municipality of Berlin gives some inberesting information =~ as to .the growt of the population of that city. At the end of the seventeenth century, when London and Paris each contained considerably more than 100,000 inhabitants, Berlin was an unimportant town, with a poPulafi&m of little over 10,000. It was enlarged and embellished under the %eat “elector and the two first Prussian Kings; and in the time of fo'egerick,.the.(};'egt,.at {,he beinning of the present century, its po fiatiohghad flrgady risen to ;{out' &in: 000. It increased still further after the ‘close of the war with Napoleoh and during the l‘onf pewg that{'&lqwefi’, but at the end of 1860, t 611%11.]1:1:’& "innni@i?gal‘ ‘district of Berlin had been considerably eextended, it did not contain much more than ;500,000 inhabitants. ‘During the sixteen years that followed, however, its population was almost- doubled. ‘This has not been the case with any ‘town of the same size except New York. Since 1877 the%Wd%r& has ‘been over 1,000,000, and it is now the iam' est city in Europe after London and PRER Y 0 SBR RIS e SRR aed B anitpieS el