Rensselaer Republican, Volume 21, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 January 1889 — Page 6

The gicpuMicatt. Gbo. E. Masrhalu Publisher. RENSSELAER, L- INDIANA

Tub origin of the bands of White Caps in Ohio is said to hare been the depredations of the laborers employed on a new railroad. At first their acts were excused by their acknowledged justice, but finally the society drifted into acts of lawlessness prompted by personal spite. An organisation of the White Caps’ victims has been formed to regulate their persecutors. They are called Black Caps. The introduction of leprosy into the United States must be stopped and the terrible disease stamped out at Once, or it will be the most unmanageable of all "epidemics that ever visited oun land. There is no longer any questi on of its being communicable. The lepers have invaded British Columbia, and had such free access to the Indians that,the whole race of red men is infected. The antagonism to Chinese immigration Will be more widespread than ever, and will be based onsomethipg besides race prejudice. It would be far better to stop quarantining against yellow fever and small-pox, for while the latter kill more qnickly, leprosy devours its victims with a living death. When will our authorities get well aroused to appreciate the danger that is coming upon us?

Phi French for once have well beaten Bismarck and the Germans. Russia has long found it impossible to convert her debt and float a new loan because the Germans held so large a proportion of her bonds. This enabled Bismarck to constantly keep the ruble depreciated by throwing bonds on the market. Some time ago France secretly began to buy up all offered bonds, and now nearly all the Russian debt is owned at Paris instead of Berlin. When the new Russian 4 per cents were offered the other day the Bourse was the scene of astounding enthusiasm, four times as much was subscribed as was called for. The French have played a sly and sham game, and the Caar will np| forget it This brings to the front the alliance of Eastern and Westirn Europe, and explains why there is so much stir in military affairs in the Southeast. Russia at last has the sinews of war, without which horses and men do not avail much-

If anything approximating the state of things reported to have occurred at Coteau Rouge, near Montreal, be true, our Canadian neighbors are not wanted in this Union for some time to come. It seems that the diphtheria broke out in a man’s family early in the month of December, and he could get no physician to come into his house until four £ were dead. No neighbor would go near the house, or lend any assistance. , The man took the bodies to the cemetery,but the sexton would not bury them, and he was compelled to leave them on the ground—one of them without a coffin and a second in a coffin too small, so that iis legs protruded. At last a physician from a neighboring town has volunteered his services, and the family is eared for. It is hard to feel much regret that other families are now suffering. Such barbarism is incredible. It stands in marked contrast to the heroism displayed in Florida during the yellow fever.

A BLOODY RIOT.

Two Men Killed and Twenty Badly Wunnded in Virginia. A bloody battle between whites and blacks is reported as having taken place at Tackett’s Mills, in Stafford county, Va. The conflict occurred during a political discussion. A few of the whites and all the colored men at the meeting contended that Stafford county was preeminently Republican. ' The remaining whites championed the Democratic party and said that Democracy was the creed of Stafford. This led to a wrangle between a white man named Bennet Hiflen and a colored man. Both indulged in personalities and ended with a fight. A gereral riot was the result Hiflen was shot and instantly killed. His colored enemy was also shot, but lived for several minutes. -Twehtv people were dangerously wounded. Whites predominate in that portion of Stafford county, jand for the most part are Democratic!! in politics. Every effort will be made to pnnish the guilty parties and prevent further trouble.

Au Old-Time Remedy. It is seldom in these days that yon hear of a person being leeched or cupped. It is rapidly becoming a lost art Not a great many years back it was a very important business in connection with a tonsorial establishment In fact it was almost a profession of its own. Cupping and leeching were very popular among the Germans, and, whether weak or strong, they followed the use. Not a great many years ago an apprentice barber invariably had to become as proficient in the application of the leech as he did in the shaving line. Barbers also did a good deal of tooth jerking, but that part of the business is also nb mote since dentists are so numerous.

The New South. i The town of Bessemer, Ala., was laid out in A pril, 1887, and in September, 1888, it bad a' population of 3,500; Roanoke, Va., with 4&0 people’ in 1881, counted 12,000 in 1888; Decatur, Ala., with 1,500 people in March. 1887, reported 7,000 in July, 1888. Sheffield, Ala., with 700, Jan. 1, 2887, reached 3,500 in August, 1888, while Dallas, Tex., had 10,500 in 1880, and in 1888 comes up with 40,500. These are only a few samples of what the new South is doing.

BARNLIKE BIRTHPLACES.

THK MANGER AND THE STAR OF BETHLEHEM. •N. ~ Marking the BlrthplacfeOf a Savior Sent a<« a Sacrifice of a Rebellious World. «. Rev. Dr. preached at the Brooklyn Tabernacle last Sunday. Text: Luke ii., 12-13. He said: At midnight from* out of Abe galleries of the sky a chart broke. To an ordinary observer there was no reason for such a celestial demonstration. A poor mail and wife—travelers, Joseph and Mary by name—had lodged in an outhouse of an unimportant village. The supreme hour of solemnity haa passed, and upon the pallid forehead and cheek of Mary God had set the dignity, the ;■ grandeur, the tenderness, the everlasting and Divine significance of motherhood. , But such scenes had often occurred in Bethlehem, vet never before had a star been unfixed dr had a baton of light marshaled over the hills-winged orchestra. If there had been such brilliant and mighty recognition at an advent in the House of Pharaoh or at an advent in the House of Casar, or the House of Hapsburg, or the House of Stuart, we would not so much have wondered, but a barn seems too poor - a center for such delicate and archangelic circumference. The stage seems too, small for so great an act, the music too grand for such unappreciative auditors, the window of the stable too rude to be serenaded bv other worlds. No, sir. No, madam. It is my joy this morning to tell you What was born that night in the village barn; and as I want to make my discourse accurdulative and climacteric, I begin, in the first place, by telling you that that night in the Bethlehem manger was born (1) encouragement for all the poorly started. He “had only two friends, they His parents. No satin-lined cradle, no delicate attentions, but straw, and the cattle and the coarse joke and banter' of the camel-d’iver. No wonder the mediae va painters represent the oxen as kneeling before the infant Jesus, for there were no men there at that time to worship. From the depths of what poverty He rose until to-day He is honored in all Christendom, and sits on the imperial throne in heaven. What name is mightiest to-day in Christendom? Jesus. Who has more friends on earth than any other being? Jesus. Before whom do the most thousands kneel in chapel and church and cathedral at this hour? Jesus. For whom could one hundred million souls be marshaled, ready to fight or die? Jesus. From what depths of poverty to heights of renown? And so let all those who are poorly started remember that they can not be more poorly born, or more disadvantageously.than this Christ. Let them look up to His example while they have time and eternity to imitate it. Do vou know that the vast majority of the world’s deliverers had barnlike birthplaces? Luther, the emancipator of religion, born among the mines; Shakespeare, the emancipator of literature, born in an humble home at Strat-ford-on-Avon; Columbus, the discoverer of a world, born in poverty at Genoa; Hogarth, the discoverer of how to make art accumulative and administrative of virtue, born in a humble home at Westmoreland. Yea, I have to tell you that nine out of ten of the world’s deliverers, nine out of ten of the world’s Messiahs—the Messiahs of science, the Messiahs oi law, the Messiahs of medicine, the Messiahs of poverty, the Messiahs of grand benevolence—were born in want I stir your holy ambitions to-day, and I want to tell you, although the whole world may be opposed to you, and inside and outside of your occupations or professions there may be those who would hinder your ascent on your side and enlisted in your behalf and the sympathetic heart and almighty arm of One who one Christmas night, about eighteen hundred and eighty-eight years ago, was wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a manger. Oh, what magnificent encouragement for the poorly started! 2. Again, I have to tell you that in that village barn that night was born good will to men. whether you call it kindness, or forbearance, or forgiveness, or geniality, or affection, or love. It was no sport of high heaven to aend its favorite to that humiliation. It was a sacrifice for a rebellious world. After the calamity in Paradise not only did the ox begin to gore, and the adder to sting, and the elephant to smite with his tusks, and the lion to put to bad use Tooth and paw, but under the very tree from which the forbidden fruit was plucked were war and revenge,and malice and envy and jealousy, and the_ whole brood of cockatrices. Blit against that scene I set the Bethlehem manger, which says: “Bless rather than curse; endure rather than assault;” and that Christmas night puts out vindictiveness. It says: “Sheath your sword,, dismount your guns, dismantle your batteries, turn the war ship Constellation, that carried shot and shell, into a grain ship to take food to famishing Ireland; hook your cavalry horses to the plow; use your deadly gunpowder in blasting rocks and in patriotic cele* brations; stop your lawsuits; quit writing anonymous letters; extract the sting from your sarcasm; let your -wit cate, but never burn; drop all the harsh words out of your vocabulary. ‘Good will to men.’”

“Oh!” you say, “I can’t, exercise it; I won’t exercise it until they apologize; I won’t forgive them until they ask me to fqrgive them.” You are no Christian, then—l say you are no Christian, or you are a very inconsistent Christian. If vou forgive not men their trespasses, now can you expect your Heavenly Father to forgive you? borgive them if they ask your forgiveness, and forgive them anyhow. Shake hands all around. “Good will to men.”

Oh, my Lord Jesus, drop that spirit into our hearts this Christmas hour. I you what the world, wants more than anything else—more helping bands, more sympathetic hearts, more kind words that never die, more disposition to give other people a ride, and to carry the heavy end of the load and give other people the light end, and to ascribe good motives instead of bad and to find our happiness in making others happy.* Out of that Bethlehem crib let the bear and the lion eat straw like an ox. “Good will to men.” That principle will yet settle all controversies andunder it the world will keep on improving until there will be only two

antagonists in all the earth, and they will, side by side, take the jubilant sleigh-ride intimated by the propbet when he said: “Holiness shall be on the

bells of the horses.” 3. Again, JI remark that, Christmas nigUt in the village bam, was sympathetic union with other worlds. The only skepticism I have ever had about Christianity was an astronomical skepticism, which said: “Why would God out of the heavens and amid the jupiters and Saturns of the universe have chosen oiir little bit of a world for the achievements of His only begotten Son when He might have had a vaster scale and vaster worlds?” But my skepticism is all gone as I come to the manger and watch its surrondings. Now I see all the worlds are sisters; and that when one weeps they all weep, and when one sings they all sing. From that supernatural grouping in the cloud-banks over Bethlehem, and from the especial trains that ran down to the scene, I find that our world is beautifully and gloriously and magnificently surrounded. The meteors are with us, for one of them ran to a point down to the” birthplace. The heavens are with us because of the thought of our redemotion they roll hosannas out of the midnight sky. Oh! yes; I do not know but our world may be better surrounded than we sometimes imagine, and when a child is born angels fetch it, and when it hies angels take it, and when an old man be: ds under the weight of years angels uphold him, and when a heart breaks angels soothe it. Angels in the hospital to take cAre of the sick. Angels in the cemetry to watch our dead. Angels in the church ready to fly heavenward with the news of repentant souls. Angels above the world. Angels under the world. Angels all around the world. Rub the dust of human imperfection out of our eyes and look into the heavens and see angels of pity, angels of mercy, angels of pardon, angels of help, angels charioted. The world defended hy angels, girdled by angels, cohorted by angels—clouds of angels. Hear David cry out: “The chariots of God are twenty thousand. Even thousands of angels.’ But the .mightiest angel stood not that night in the clouds over Bethlehem; the mightiest angel that night lay among the cattle —the A ngel of the new covenent. As the clean white linen sent in by some motherly villager was being wrapped around the little form of that Child Emperor, not a cherub, not a seraph, not an angel, not a world but wept and thrilled and shouted. Oh! yes, our world has plenty of sympathizers. Our world is only a silver rung of a great ladder, at the top of which is our Father’s house. No more stellar solitariness for our world, not a friendless planet spun out into space to freeze, but a world in the bosom of divine maternity. A star harnessed to a manger. 4. Again, I remark that that night born in the village barn was the offender’s hope. Some sermonizera may say I ought to have piojected this thought at the be ginning of the sermon. Oh! no. I wanted you to rise toward it. I wanted you to examine the cornelians and the jaspers and the emeralds and the chrysalis before I showed you the KohinooT—the crown jewel of the ages. Oh! that jewel had a very poor setting. The cub of bear is born amid the grand old pillars of the forest, the whelp of the lion takes it first step from the jungle of luxuriant left and wild-flower, the kid of goat is born in cavern chandeliered with stalactite and pillared with stalagmite. Christ was born in a bare barn. Yet that nativity was the offender’s hope. Over the door of heaven are written these words: “None but the sinless may enter here.” “Oh, horror!” you say, “that shu,ts us all out.” No. Christ came to the world in one door, and He departed through another door. He came through the door of the sepulcher, and His one business was to wash away our sin that one second after we are dead there will be no more sin about us than about the eternal God. I know that it is putting it strongly, but that is what I understand by full remission. All erased, all washed away, all scoured out?, all gme. That undergirding, and overarching, and irradiating, and imparadising possibility for you and for me, and for the whole race, was given on that Christmas night. Do you wonder we bring flowers to-day to celebrate such an event? Do you wonder that we take the organ and cornet and youthful voice and queenly soloist to celebrate it? Do you wonder that Raphael and Rubens and Titian and Giotto and Ghirlandajo, and all the old German and Italian painters gave the mightiest stroke of the pencil to sketch the Madonna, Mary and her Boy? Oh! now I see what the manger was. Not so high the gilded, jeweled and embroiderea cradle of the Henry’s of England;, or the Louises of France, or the Fredericks of Prussia. Now I find tnat the Bethlehem crib fed not so much the oxen of the stall as the white horses of Apocalyptic vision. Now I find the 8 wadding clothes enlarging and emblazoning into an imperial robe for a conqueror. Now I find the star of that Christmas night was only the diamond sandal of Him who hath the moon under His feet. Now I come to understand that the music of the night was nota complete song, but onlv the stringing of the instruments for the great chorus of the two worlds, the bass to be carried by the earthly Nations saved, and the soprano by Kingdoms of Glory won. Oh, heaven, heaven, heaven. I shall meet you there. After all our imperfections are gone, I shall meet you there. I look out to-day, through the mist of years, through the fog that rises from the cold Jordan, through the wide, „ppen door of solid pearl, to that reunion. I expect to see you there as certainly as I see yoibhere. What a time we shad have in high converse, talking over sins pardoned and sorrows comforted and battles triumphant. lam going in. lam going to take all my family with me. lam going to take all my church with me. lam going to tike all my friends and neighbors with me. I have so much faith in the manger and cross. I feel sure of it. I am ' gbing to coax you in. I am going to | push you in. By holy stratagem I am ; going to surprise* you in. Yea. with all the concentrated energy of my naturesphysical mental, spiritual and immortal—l am going to compel you to go in. I like you so well I a ant to spend eteri nity with you. I Some of your children have already gone. Some time ago I buried one of

them, and though people passing along the street and seeing white crape on the door-bell may have said: “It is only a child,’ yet when the broken hearted father came to solicit my service he said; “Come around and comfort us, for though she was only fifteen months old we loved her so much.” Ah! it does nott take lo g for a child to get its arms around the parent’s whole nature. What a Christmas morning it will make when those with whom you used to keep the holidays are all around you in heaven! Silver-haired old lather young again,and mother who had so many achesand pains and decrepitudes well again, and all your brothers, and sisters and the little ones. How glad they will be to see you! They have been waiting. The last time they saw your face it was covered with tpars and distress, and pallid from long watching, and one of them I can imaging to-day, with one hand holding fast the shining gate, and* the other hand swung out toward you, saying: ‘ Steer ttite wav, father, steer airafaht for me: Here sate in He even I am waiting for thee.” Merry Christmas! Merry With the thought of sins forgiven, merry with the idea of sorrows comforted, merrv with the raptures to com s. Oh! dist that Christ from the manger and lay Him down in all our hearts. We may not bring to Him as costly a present as the Magi brought, but we bring to His feet and to the manger to-day the frank--incence of our joy, the pearls of out tears, the kiss of our love, the prostration of our worship. Down at His feet, all churches, ali ages, all earth, all heaven. Down at His feet the four-and-twenty elders On their faces. Down the “great multitude that no man can number.” Down Michael the archangel! Down all worlds a His feet and worship. .“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace,goodwill to men!” >

A SPANISH INDIGNITY.

An American Vessel Held and Compelled to Pay a Large Sum Without Beason. The brigantine Josety, which arrived at Philadelphia, Tuesday, from Montego Bay, Jamaica, brings news of an outrage suffered by that vessel at the hands of the Spanish Government. While discharging her cargo on her outward trip from New York to Arroyo, Port Pico,the Spanish custom officials discovered that twenty packages of corn starch, which were marked on ithe vessel’s manifest, were missing. After extended search the goods could not be found, andthe vessel was seized by the Spanish authorities, who held her until a fine of $4,000 was paid, although the value of the goods in question did not exceed S2O. The master and crew were forced to suffer many indignities at the hands of the Governor of the Island, and officials acting under his authority offered to settle the matter if the Captain of the vessel equid satisfactorily explain the whereabouts of the missing packages. After the fine had been paid, it was ascertained that the missing goods were delivered by mistake on board the ship Josephus, which lay next to the Josefa in New Xork, but were placed on the Josefa’s manifest. Explanations were made to the Spanish authorities, and the return of the fine was requested, but was refused, and the vessel left Port Rico to load cargo elsewhere for Philadelphia. James Brett, of New York, managing owner of the Josefa, has filed a complaint against the Spanish Government with Secretary Bayard and asked that his immediate attention shall be given to the matter. It will be urged that the war ships Galena and Yantic shall be ordered to continue their cruise to Port Rico and summarily secure redress, for the imposition suffered by the Josefa.

DISM ISSED IN DISGRACE.

Minster Astwood to San Domingo Turns Out to be Dishonest. H. C. C. Astwood, for six years past the United States Consul at San Domingo, has been dismissed in disgrace from, his position. The information leaked out at the Treasury Department Friday where an order has been recently issued to honor no more of Astwood’s drafts for salary or allowances. Astwood was appointed to tiis present position from Illinois, and one of his indorsers was the late Senator John A. Logan. He was dismissed it is learned, for retaining possession of money intrusted to his keeping. About three years ago a young New Yorker named J. J. Platt, who was engaged in business in S. - Domingo, was killed by a detachment native soldiery. The defense was that the killing was accidental, and that the soldiers mistook Mr. Platt for a noted insurgent who was fleeing from justice. After some delay, however, the San Domingo Goyerment agreed to pay the wife of the-murdered man an indemnity oi $23,OOfFin money by installments. The San Domingo authorities paid the money through Consul Ast wood, who forwarded it to Mrs. Platt, New York City. It is alleged as the reason for Astwood’s dismissal that he has made no returns to Mrs. Platt for a number of months past beyond sending her his personal drafts, which are said to have been worthless. The State Department, after endeavoring to secure a settlement for some timedecided to remove Astwood, and the order to that effect was telegraphed to him a week ago.

WASHINGTON NOTES.

Congressman Moffett of Pennsylvania has been placed in an insane asylum on account of nervous troubles. Captain Oscar Dunlap, of Illinois, has commenced a suit in the courts at Washington against Commissioner of Pensions Black for $100,(hM) damages for not increasing his pension. The collections of internal revenue during the first five months of the fiscal year ending June 30, 1889, amounted to $53,091,736, being an increase of $1,231,186 over the collections during the correspQnding_period of last year. Michael Keating, a messenger in the War Department, aged 50, while drunk, on the 27th, fell from the fourth story of the building to the marble floor below and was instantly killed. He obtained his liquor from the restaurant in the building. « Representative Meek has announced his intention of pressing to passage a memorial to Congress asking the abolition of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments. He claims that the disfranchisement of the negro will avert revolution. -. A feather thief was recently arrested in a Southern he

MISCELLANEOUS NOTES.

Is marriage a failure? the bachelor cried, ' And the youth wto is courting a girl replied. ••I’ve never been matrled and cannot guess But enur(ship I know is a big success. A Connecticut newspaper speaks ' of “the Duchess of Marlborough, nee Widow Hamereley.” In Kentucky recently the funeral of Mr. Shivvers was postponed on account of the cold weather. Florida aligator hunters Bay that the saurians will be looked noon as curiosities ten years hence. One of the hotels for the winter visitors in Southern California has a “spacious ladies’billiard parlor.” Vermont factories turn out 600,000 snow shovels per year, and New Hampshire and Maine send the figures up to 100,000. Observations recently made in England show that atorfoise can walk a mile in four hours. So can a-District messenger boy, but he won’t. V hen eveiybody’s had a whack— De Lefeeps, France, et al. A Yankee shovel then may dig The Panama canal. Insurance companies figure on about so many grist mills and planing mills being destroyed by fire each year, and .last year they hit the number exactly. It is said that Saxony furnishes the largest percentage of suicides of any civilized state. The number last year was 1,104, or one to about every 3,000 of the population. In 1881 the total number was 1,248.

Though cold’s before ns. And the song bird’s chorus Is heard no more in the lebfless grove, And the sunshine coy is, The nights are joyous,. When we sat with our girl near the parlor stove. In excavating for the foundation walls fora new mill near Rutland, Vt., the workmen found three twelve pound cannon balls and one four pounder, thought to be relics of the Burgoyne campaign of 1777. ' J • • Slavery times jyere recalled in Wilmington, N. C., the other day, when two darkies got into a loud dispute and almost came to blows, quarrelling in regardlo the social standing and personal accomplishments of the men who owned them before the war. The old oak tree at Waltham, which so excellent authority as professor Alexander Aggasis said was 700 years of age has been cut down. It has been dead for some time and stood in the path of modern improvement. Part of the ven erable tree will be preserved in the library.

A peculiarly novel letter has just been sent by an inhabitant of Bath, England, to a friend at Trowbridge. It was written in shorthand on the back of a postage stamp, the address being in ordinary writing/ The missive was dropped into the letter box at the General Postoffice, and was duly delivered at its destination. A carpenter, while demolishing a house at Black Point, N. Y., knocked down a wasp’s nest. The nest fell on his neck and several of the wasps,which were benumbed with the cold, went down his back. The heat of his body soon warmed the insects into life again. The remarks of the carpenter will not be given. There is only one woman in the United States who is entitled to the privileges of the floor of the Senate on all occasions. This is the wife 6f Senator John H. Reagan, of Texas, who has been appointed private secretary by her husband,with all the honors and emoluments of that position, amounting to some $2,000 a year. This is said to be the first case of the kind in the records of the Senate.

The Parisian sharpers have a new method of getting their hats without jQsjling the hatter’s. Going into an es—„oiishment the sharper picks out the best looking hat on the table and quietly slips a copy of the Univers, an eminently respectable paper, into it. Then he takes a glass of wine, pays for it, and eays: “Waiter, .bring me my hat —the one with the copy'of the Univers in it.” Nobody has deposited a Uni vers in his hat, so, of course, the owner of the hat never looks up. Mr. Powderly will issue a circular directed to Knights of Labor, pointing out the necessity for laws making employers liable to employes for loss of life or time through accidents occurring through the negligence or indifference of employers or their agents. He will advise a course of action for every Assembly in the Order throughout all the States. Officers of the Miner’s National Trade District also issue an appeal to their members, urging them not to join the American Federation of Labor, but to remain with the Knights of Laoor. A new charade is going the round. It is said to be origirial Vith a party of ladies very recently, and is a good one. Nine persons stand in a row in the floor. A tenth comes in clad in a loose robe with long, flowing hair and beard which are white. From his neck is suspended an hour-glass. He bears a scythe, and of course represents Father Time. He approaches those standing in the floor and mows vigorously. Suddenly he drops his scythe and grasps convulsively at his side. The play is done. What does it mean? Diana Middleton, a negress who died recently near Clifton, Tenn., is,believed to have been tne oldest person in the world. According to the best accounts she had reached the remarkable age of 126 years. She was kidnaped in Africa | and brought to this country before the Revolutionary War. She was at that

time a slave in Virginia. Later she was sold into North Carolina, and from there she went to Tennessee. She was freed because of hqr extreme age before the late war, and had been looked upon for many years as the oldest person in the world. Her face and hands were heavily tattooed, and those tattoo marks lasted till her death. She was said] to have been a cannibal in her native country. ~ , . / ' - For four years Mrs. Benjamin Mover of Souderton, Pa., was totally blind. Not longago she was taken ill, so that she had to stay in bed several days. On the fourth day she awoke in the morning and exclaimed: “My God in heaven, I see.” Her husbahd rushed to her bedside and was recognized. Then the other members of the household came in and were recognized. She pointed out different articles of furniture in the room, told different persons what they were wearing, and in different ways proved that she saw. She asked that all her children and grandchildren, twenty-five in all, come to her bedside, and they did. She told them that she had earnestly prayed that she might see them all once before she died, and this was the answer t<J her prayer. Then she said: “This is the last day that I shall ever have the use of my eyesight.” She awoke the next morning as blind as ever, and has been so ever since.

They Tempt Thieves.

It may look queer, but it is true, that the stores that have large exhibitions in their show windows do more toward educating young boys to steal than anything else. The reason of this is that large crowds, most women, gather about the windows to look at the displays. Well a young gamin comes along and sees a pocket-book protracting out of a womanls pocket, and the temptation is so great that he sneaks up behind her and steals the wallet. ‘ Maybe this is his first time, but when once given a start in this direction there seems to beakind of infatuation about it which leads him to follow it up, and ofttimes results in his becoming a~ professional housebreaker.

Double Cradle Keeps Rocking.

The wife of Mr. John E. Meeks presented him on Saturday with a bouncing pair of twin babies. They have now t iventy liying children, eighteen girls and two boys. Mr. Meeks is only fortynine years old and his wife forty-four. A peculiarity of Mr. Meek’s household is that two cradles have been going since the first two years of his marriage, and he has never had but one doctor’s bill. All the children are living.

An Orphan.

Harper’s Magazine. “What is an orphan?” asked the teacher of a class in,definitions. Nobody seemed to know. “Well, I’m an orphan,” paid the teacher seeking illustration that would not reveal too much. At this a hand popped up, and the owner of it exclaimed, “An orphan is a woman that wants to get married and can’t”

Plenty of Food.

Scholar (in Sunday school class to teacher)—Miss Brown, after the flood and when the waters had dried up what had Noah and his family to live on? Another Scholar—Kin I answer that question, Miss Brown? Miss Brown, (very much relieved) — ♦ Yes, Tommy, I wish you would. Tommy —Dey lived on fish and game.

Had Had Lots of Fun.

A man who recently committed suicide in St. Louis left letters in which he said: “I am 62 years old. In eight years I would be 70, an old, dilapidated, tottering fossil. I have played the world out and it don’t owe me a cent. I’ve had more fun than a mule in a cornfield and I’ve got enough. Therefore I will cheat the course of nature and jump the time to come.”

Trusted, if Not Tried.

Popinjay—l see Bigsby hangs around your store a good share of the time. I suppose he is getting to be your tried and trusted friend? Blobson—Yes, he is my trusted friend; and by and by, if he doesn’t pay up he will be my tried friend.

Some Relationship.

Boston Journal. 1 “And now little girls,” said a Sunday School teacher, “you may tell me about < the Epistles.” A little girl held up her hand. “Well,” said the teacher. “The Epistles.” said the little girl—“the Epistles are the Wives of the Apostles.” _

Another Case of $’s.

Troy Times. The editor of a magazine published by the students “of the New Jersey Normal School at Trenton, says: “There i$ a litt'e Something which some of our subscribers forget whensending in their subscriptionß.” _____

Creeds on Trial.

Philadelphia Record. Little Dot—Our miniate? prays ever so much louder than your’s does.. Little Bub —I don’t care if he does. Our minister jumps the highest when he preaches,so there now!

JOY.

- Take Joy home Ahd make a place,in thy great heart for her. And give her time to grow and cherish her; Then will she come and oft sing to thee. When thou art working in the furrow; aye, Or weeding inXbe sacred hour of dawn. It is a comely fashion tobegUd---Jean Ingelow.