Rensselaer Republican, Volume 26, Number 33, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 April 1894 — WORDS WITH THE BARK ON THEM. [ARTICLE]

WORDS WITH THE BARK ON THEM.

j Editor Rett-bi/ican. —I see by the ; columns of your paper some allusions jto gravel roads, drainage, etc. Will I just say these improvements are very needful in Jasper county, for the ; health and convenience to all, as well ! as financially, if conducted on upright ; principles. But if conducted to till i the wallets of a few king frauds and 1 as many of their hirelings of like ilk as they can control, is ah injury and 1 a drawback to this county, as it al- ! ways has been. Contractors in bridges, ditches, etc., have run along with loose reins, just as their desires led them, and always had the needed aid by some Barrister of like foul principles, There nmst be a reform and honesty be adopted in place 9f fraud „ So it may be a general benefit to all taxed for the purpose named, roads and ditches, and the tax levied on sSUrid jUdg6lfienr“and honesty. On this latter basis Jasper county can be improved. And on the swindle or fraud plan, to rob honesty to fill the craving wallets of a few, Jasper will remain a mud hole—just the right sort of a place to deposit fraud and its servants when their ungodly work is ended here on earth. I don’t name any persons, they themselves should know when they try to rob and lie and such like, without being named. But they have marked themselves sufficiently. Hopeing they may become more honest if they can possibly see what honest}' is, in their seared condition. Please, editor, write up the principles of honesty in a more vivid form than I can. Perhaps those would-be lords of land and purse of other men’s, and widows, may yet see aod retract before they will be given over entirely to believe lies and practice tb& same altogether. Barkley Township.

End of tbe Whlic County Court House. ilonticello Herald. Mr. Amos Johnson, of Wolcott, began Monday to execute hia contract of tearing down the old court house, and no event short of a balloon ascension has ever Compared with it as a drawing attraction on the public square. If Mr. Johnson could have conducted his operations under a tent and charged an admission fee, his ticket sales would have yielded him more than hia contract — Elisha Warden with his Arehimidean lever and chains was employed, and the first attempt to pull ihe structure (iown was made by liitchtng on the northeast corner of the building at the top of the [wall. It failed to budge, and the point of attack was changed to the north wall of the old auditor’s office, which was pulled out with a crash. But the rest of the wall remained, and then the clerk’s office wall was pulled out, and still the roof was supported by the intervening column of brick and mortar. This was next pulled out, and then there was a tumble that shook the earth, but the other walls still "stood, and the same process was rtquired on the west and south sides before the offices and court room were leveled to the ground. By ttiis time the day was gone, and the peristv le with its Corinthian pillars, tesselated brick floor, mediaeval stairway and kiJndried board ceiliDg was left standing in us majesty all alone over night. Next day the work of pulling down was finished, though the nortbaast corner refused to yield until a charge of dynamite was applied under it.