Rensselaer Republican, Volume 25, Number 33, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 April 1893 — Russian Despotism. [ARTICLE]

Russian Despotism.

The total destruction by fire in tlie United States for eighteen years before 1892 was $1,760,944,617. Hiss Rose Elizabeth Cleveland, ■who has been in Europe for some time, will return to this country this month. I New York was first incorporated as a city in 1644, and its charter antedates that of any municipality in the United States. The Woman’s Christian Temperance Union of New York has petitioned the Legislature to restrict the sale of hard cider, on " the ground that it produces the worst kind of intoxication. TnE entire population of Canada is less than that of New York State. There are sixty counties in the State, one of which, St.. Lawrence eounty, is as large as Delaware and more than twice the size of the State es Rhode Island. Among the Indians of Washington, Oregon and. British Columbia all white men are known as “Boston men.” This appellation is supposed to have come from the fact that the majority of the early traders in the far West hailed from Boston. In Table Rock, Nebraska, the wife of the present Republican postmaster, whose term has about expired, has appealed to the new administration for the appointment on the ground that she is a Stalwart Democrat and has experience in the office.

The shingle industry of the great Northwest is assuming vast proportions. From fifteen to twenty car loads a day was the average shipment .from Seattle during March, and one day a solid train of thirty car loads left that city for the East. Girard, Kansas, is the “dryest” town, probably, in the United States. The State prohibition law has always been strictly enforced, and last week the water works bnrned. The inhabitants, therefore, are not likely to succumb to the habit of excessive drinking for some time at least. Her Majesty, Queen Victoria, has raised her envoy to this country from the rank of minister to that of ambassador, and the British Foreign Office has been informed of the intention of the United States government to credit an ambassador to the court of St. James in reciprocation of the friendly action of the British government.

The Governors of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Florida, Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Georgia, Alabama, Maryland, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Texas tod West Virginia will meet in Richmond, Va., April 12, to devise some concerted plan of action for the encouragement of immigration and the development of the natural resources of the South. The street railway company of the City of Mexico has a unique monopoly, having bought up all the hearses in the place in order to secure the funeral business. It runs funeral cars, of special designs, and the mourners ride to the cemetery in a richly upholstered car with lace curtains, following the car that contains the coffin. Horse and mule roads run out of the city to great distances, one being seventy miles in length. Free thought in politics is making remarkable progress in the United Kingom. The students at Aberystwith University, in Wales, recently gave a smoking concert, at which the song “God Save the Queen,” which has been an inspiration to loyal Britons for two generations, was shouted down, the students preferring to sing a college jargon instead. Such demonstrations are said to be of frequent occurrence in the British Isles. The State of Washington has no “nick-name” or pet name, as yet, and the residents of, that commmonwealth feel as unhappy as a small boy would if continually addressed as “John”. They feel too young to sustain the dignity of the appellation given the State at christening and are not satisfied to be called “Wash”. So they are casting about for something attractive and appropriate in cognomens. “The Evergreen State” ,has been suggested, but is thought to be a trifle heavy, although appropriate. __ Shocking barbarity and brutal cruelty has been unearthed at the Connecticut State Prison at Wethersfield. The Connecticut Legislature has taken steps to remedy the

evils, but that they should have occurred at all is a disgrace that ean hardly be removed from the escutcheon of the Nutmeg State. The tale of horrors with which a recent issue of the New York World regaled the public reads Tike the vivid fictitious descriptions of Dumas and cause the reader to pause and ask if the Caucasian has really made any progress in civilization since the days of antedates and inquisitions.

In spite of the wholesale slaughter by European tourists, and the equally wanton waste of our own countrymen in hunting game in the Far West, some portions of Nature’s great reservations in the almost boundless territory near the Great ..Divide still retain plenty of material for future sport and profit. One trapper brought into Sand Point, Idaho, the other day, the pelts of sixty-eight martens, sixteen beavers, three wolverines, one bearaad two minks, the result of his winter’s work in the mountains around that place.

The tender sensibilities of public sentiment in New Orleans, which at least tolbrates if it does not indorse prize fights, are being sadly lacerated in trying to find a satisfactory solution of the problem of separating the races on street cars, ft has been proposed to divide the car into two compartments—one for whites and one for blacks, —but the scheme does not appear practicable. The colored population of the South is rapidly increasing in spite of the occasional depletion of their numbers by hanging and roasting, and this question is likely to be one of - the issues for for some -time to come- throughout Dixie.

TnE iconoclastic tendency of the age, which wilfully and wastefully destroys our forests, seeks to build railroads through the Yellowstone Park, and heedlessly slaughters the buffalo of the western plains to afford amusement for British aristocrats, has found a new field for its vicious efforts in the enterprise of a quarry company at New York, which is engaged in blasting away the famous Palisades and selling the rock for paving purposes. Earnest protests against this shameless vandalism are being made from all sides, but the work of demolition goes on, and already some of the most distinguishing features of that mighty wall have fallen, and the damage that no earthly power can repair has marred one of the grandest works of the Great Architect. The typical American we read about is a trifle too enterprising in many cas es, and, this seems to be one of them.

St. Louis Globe Democrat. “Why does Russia linger in ignorance?” answered David S. Jordan to a friend in the Southern. “Let me tell you a story. When I was in college aTCornell there came a bright young Russian to study, by the name of Dabrolohoff. This young man was of quick-perceptive powers and deeply interested in the progressive..practical sciences and questions. He studied very hard for four years, did much more work than any single term required, and graduated with the honors of his class. He removed to New York and entered into a successful practice of civil engineering. Some time later I learned that he had gone back to his native land. I heard no more of this young man outside of a few scientific articles in some Enropean magazines for nearly ten years. While making a tour of Europe and Russia I bethought myself of him and wondered why his brilliant parts had not long since brought him into prominence. In Russia I made inquiries and there learned, to my astonishment and sorrow. that the student had been suspected of treason, tried and sentenced to Siberia, where he had died in filth and chains. Do you imagine that a country which -hides the light of its young genius beneath the bushel of despotism can grow intellectually?”