Rensselaer Standard, Volume 1, Number 21, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 November 1879 — ODDS AND ENDS. [ARTICLE]

ODDS AND ENDS.

The English Jockey Archer has an income from his profession of slo,ooo* year. France’* wine crop will be below the average in quantity and quality this season. " Oxk firm in Boston has imported and sold SIO,OOO worth of English bicycles since May. 'Phiuejj gentlemen of leisure rode from Milan Italy, to Lyons, France, a a distance of 530 miles, on bicycles, in five days. , • . Ex-Senator Dorsey of Arkansas has a Colorado farm eighty miles long and forty-five miles wide. Thirteen hundred head of cattle graze upon it. It is estimated that over one hundred and fifty thousand miles of wire fence have been constructed since its first use for this purpose. The increase of flouring mills in the four States of lUinois,Wisconsin, lowa and* Minnesota from 1860 to 1878, was was from 1.138 to 3,000. - SH.K culture has been successful at the New Orleans Convent of St. Augustine since 1854. The product compares favorably with foreign competitors. On seeing Harmon Boyers, aged 18, sent up from Cynthiana for arson, Governor Blackburn said he wanted no boys in the penitentiary, and ordered his immediate release. The Duke and Duchess of Norfolk made a pilgrimage to Lourdes to pray for an heir, and now that their petition has been granted, they will make another to return thanks. Rich and pretty Miss Lillie Ayer, daughter of the liver pill man, is engaged to the poor and titled Prince Phillippe Louis Marie de Bourbon, grandson of Doro Pedro. In writing letters put your name and address on the outside. They will be returned to you if not deli'ered to those to whom they* are addressed, whether you ask the return or not. The Walla Walla valley farmers in Washington Territory raise from twen-ty-five to sixty bushels of wheat to the the whole cost of raisiug and marketing is only twenty-four cents a bushel.

I? he town of Astoria, founded in 181Uby John Jacob Astor, as a trading was the first white settlement in Oregon. Its early history is recorded in Washington Irving’s “Astoria.” At present it has two thousand inhabitants. A brilliant young graduate of Harvard College and the Harvard Law School, has just died in the penitentiary. If his talents had been confined to writing essays and briefs he would not have got there; but he took to writing notes and signing other people’s names. . Mbs. Babtlett, a wealthy Georgia widow, aged fifty-nine years, recently married, after a three-months’ widowhood, one of her late husband’s employes, John Childrews, aged twentythree years, and she is now thoroughly educating the young man at college. Statistics show that the inhabitants of New Jersey who are in the State Prison have better health aid longer life than those who are out of prison. Whether this is due to the strong constitutions of the convicts, or to their forced observation of the laws of health is not shown by the figures. But, from either standpoint, the facts are significant. At no lormer period has the lottery been so flourishing in Rome, whtre there are now open no fewer than eighty-nine oflices now ready to take in the hard earned pittance of the people. Now here else is the institution so demoralizing as among the Romans, who are w edded to old games, and who, in order to play at the “lotto,” will sell the last, mattress off their beds, the shirt off their backs, or starve, beg, steal, or stab.

Four Scotchmen, one of whom was Lord Dunmore, ltave been indulging in real heroism. A pleasure yacht was wrecked in the Hebrides, leaving four men, three women and two children on a desolate, storm-swept rock, eleven miles from the coast. They clung theVe, with nothing to eat, and suffering intensely from cold, for a day and a half. No beat Would attempt the perilous voyage necessary for their rescue, until Dunmore and his companions put out in an open fishing smack. The lives of all the nearly exhausted party were saved.

What is reputed to be the largest and handsomest collection of postage stamps in existence has iust been purchased by. Edward Wolfer, a dealer in papeterie and postage stamps of Frank-fort-on the- Main, for §2,000. Von Volpi, a leading physician in the Bavarian arm y in 1866, and now a journa ist of Trieste, took ten years to get the collection together. It contains specimens that are amoug the rarest and haudsomeSt to be found, some of them having a market value with collectors of sl2 to S2O each. The total number of stamps in the collection is about twelve thousand. English and French collectors are travelling to Frankfort to examine it. Before he began this collection Von Volpi had made another, which, though uot equally fine and extensive with the one now sold, was the. best in existence then. It was purchased by the British Museum. A “Medical Man” reports to the Liverpool Courier the following incident which came under his own observation : ' “I was called the other night to see a man in the agonies of cholera cramp, apparently the result of drinking freely on the occasion of his niece’s marriage. I found not less than a dozen persons, mostly young women, in a room with fall glasses before them, a three-gallon jar of strong ale on the table, and several bottles of whisky. The latter had been replenished over and over again. The revels were kept

up for five day*, and I have been assured by the uncle of the bride that ‘the drink’ alone oost them the sum of £2O. Sundry young fellows had been ‘saving up’ for weeks previously, so as to have a regular spree, with their sweethearts on the occasion of their friend’s marriage. The father pawned his watch and several articles of furniture; one young fellow pawned his coat, bat, and watch; and the sum of £5 was advanced on the security of their names by the publican, to findits way back into his till as fresh supplies of liquor were called for! The debauch lasted five days, and the whole party of revellers—twelve to thirteen in number—slept together on the floors or anywhere of a small three-roomed cottage. The revels ended, the whole party proceeded to the house of Father Nugen* and sighed the pledge.” A two-years convict Just released from the Milwaukee house of correction, whose veracity is vouched for, tells a most revolting story of the atrocious practices in that institution. During his incarceration he was not allowed to write to friends or counsel, and bis family supposed him dead. He gays the flour furnished the convicts for which the county pays $6 per barrel, is damaged cow feed and can not be baked, and that the meat is putrid, and that immature and diseased animals have been furnished for meat. He says the convicts were beaten and put in the black hole, which is a filthy dog kennel 5 feet and 4 inches by 5. A man can not 'lie atlength in it. It has no ventilation, and the floor is covered with the most disgusting filth. Men have been placed there for twenty days, and two died in it. A young man named Powner, arrested on the charge of stealing at Columbus, but since acquitted, makes grave charges against the Globe Light-ning-Rod Company of Chicago, under whose employ he has been for the past two years. He claims that by a neat swindle perpetrated in different counties in the State, the above company have obtained about $30,000 for rod that should have cost not more than SB,OOO. From his statement the operations of the agents are about as follows: They go to the trustee of a township and contract with him to furnish an amount of rod for the different school houses. In order to make the contract they give him a certain sum for “managing,” etc., for which he signs a receipt. Then instead of sending him the amount of rod he ordered, they send several hundred dollars worth. When he protests against payment they confront him with his receipt and threatened exposure fQr selling his influence upless he pays the amount. He then realizes that he is in their power, and pays the required amount out of the Township fund. This, according to Powner’s statement, has been carried ou all over Indiana, and if true, it is not only a huge swindle of the “Globe LightningRod Company,” but also places a countless number of township officials in an awkward position, as it is unlawful 011 their part to go in such a transaction.

The New York Evening Post tells a touching story ot a young lady who navigated her father’s ship, the Templar, from South America to San Francisco. Captain Armstrong, the father, sailed from New York to San Francisco, having his wife and daughter on board. All went well till they left Rio Janairo. Then yellow' fever broke out on board the ship, Sailor after sailor died, and was lowered into the deep. The Captain’s wife died too, and he and his daughter were attacked. Both survived, however, the Captain weak and helpless as a child, the daughter weak too,, but strong-hearted as a hero. The first mate became panic-stricken, and headed the vessel back to to the Rie De la Plata. The daughter resolved it should - reach its port of San Francisco. She obtained her father’s premission to command the ship herself. Then she deposed the first mate put the second mate in his place. The second mate knew how to take observations ofjatitude and longitude, but not how to make the calculations reducing them. Miss Armstrong did know, however. At high noon he took observations and submitted them to the girl for her calculations. These she made and gave her commands. At length, after a terrible voyage of nearly a year, Miss Armstrong headed her ship into the port of San Francisco. For many weeks of the time her father lay unconscious, hovering between life and death. There was a daughter worth having.