Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 1, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 September 1874 — Page 7

Coming Down in a Parachute.

George August* B*l* contributes the following to the Belgravia Magazine: During the early part of 1851 there bad been quite *n epidemic of balloon accidents. Two young aeronauts whom I knew had been smashed within a fortnight ; and Albert Smith, whom 1 greatly loved and esteemed, had been within an aoe of losing his life in falling from the car of a balloon on some scaffold'poles. Thus on my mental line of railway the “danger” signal was displayed very plainly indeed; but I was young and foolish, and endowed neither with superstition nor ’frith common sense. (The first is very often an excellent substitute for the last.) So I said I would go. My brother, who was accustomed to my having my own way. let me have it. Soycr was unable to grant me a free pass for the skyey realms, since the balloon was worked as the inventor’s own speculation, and ascending and descending—what with charges for gas and manual labor, carting the dead body of the machine, when its gaseous soul has expired, to the nearest railway station, and the contingencies of damages to property — are somewhat expensive matters. Withal the inventor, in consideration of my being “connected with the press" (with which I had at the time about as much connection as a call-boy on board a penny steamer has with an iron-clad man-of-war), agreed to take me up at “cost price,” which he opined, barring accidents, would not exceed a couple of pounds. A minute afterward I had shaken hands with half a dozen friends and had clambered into the car. Then there was a Cry of “ Let go-!” the crowdcheered—they would have been pleasurably excited had we been going to be hanged—the band in an adjacenft pavilion struck up “Sec the conquering hero comes” (a slightly inappropriate melody, seeing that we were departing and not arriving), and up we went. So many ladies and gentlemen have made “captive” and “free” balloon ascents within the last few years that it would simply be an act of impertinence on my part to describe minutely the phenomena of an ascent from the neighborhood of London; how you do not at first appear to he rising but stationary, while the earth, on the other hand, seems to be sinking beneath you; how, if there arc j any clouds in your part of the sky when i you have passed through the lowermost i banks of vapor and look down on the j fleecy, floating masses beneath you, you j experience a momentary feeling of pride j —sheer assinine pride; or how, being j free from clouds, you look down and see stretching around you the great green earth, and immediately below. London, diminished to the size of a model in a museum, St. Paul’s seeming no bigger than a pea and the monument looking ‘no longer than a pin, while the smoke of London seems stationary over it, a thin, sleezv, blue blanket in two strips, one for t he Middlesex and oue for the Surrey side and cut precisely to the shape of the city and suburbs, through the whole running the glinting river like a skein of quicksilver. 1 must mention that my view of the wondrous panorama around and beneath was somewhat impeded by the fact that Ve were top-hampered by a quantity of toy-balloons, mere inflated linen bags fashioned as lions, dragons, fish and other preposterous forms, and all emblazoned Willi the cognizance of the Symposium. These wretched little trifles were indirectly the cause of our undoing. The aeronaut had instructions to cut the wind-bags adrift when he ascended a short distance, in order that they might amuse the gobemouche* |of Brompton and Fulham road, and scatter adv ertisements of the Symposium far and wide. Thus the little old man, durtng the first five minutes of his ascent, had been so busy with his pocket-knife, loosing these impediment* i, that he had forgot ten a precaution very necessary to Our safety. While the balloon is on the ground it is customary to close the neck of the machine by means of a handkerchief tied in a slip-knot, in order to prevent the admixture of the heavy lower stratum of atmospheric air with the more buoyant carburettcd hydrogen inside the balloon. Directly the balloon ascends the prudent aeronaut slips off' the handkerchief. Our aeronaut, busied with his trumjiery windbags, did no such thing. The assistant may have been unaware that the thing ought to be done. He cried out gleefully that we had risen to the altitude of one mile—that we were just over Fulham Church, and that we were about to cross the Thames. Just then 1 heard a sharp, crackling report, precisely like that of a musket shot, above my head. The balloon had burst. It could scarcely, under the circumstances, have done anything but burst. The gas in the machine had become rarefied. and had rapidly expanded. it could not escape from above, the valve was closed; it could not escape from below, the neck was elosed. So it went to smash, just as an inflated and air-tight bag of paper goes to smash between the palms of a school boy's hands. So we fell, as a stone falls, half a mile. When we ascended, it, had appeared to me that the earth was sinking beneath us. Now the glober-fields, houses, lampposts. chimney-pots —seemed to be rushing up to us with literally inconceivable rapidity. There was'in particular one tall church-steeple which by the celerity of its approach seemed to >be horribly anxious that I should be impaled upon its apex. It could not have been Fulham Church; but whatever and wherever was the edifice, it was there rushing up at me : and I declare that the grotesqueness . of the position of impalement—all legs and wings, like a cockchafer—distinctly and visibly occurred to me. T declare also, nan* phrases. that there arose before, me no ••panorama" of mv early life or of my bygone acts arql deeds, as such panoramas are said to have arisen before the eyes of persons rescued at the very last instant from hanging or drowning. Yet I do plainly and literally remember several things: that I heard a voice cry with an oath, “ Let go!” and “ Cut! cut!” and that a knife was thrust into my hand: and it seemed afterward that the assistant and I had pitched out all the ballast in the balloon—bags and all—and that I had cut away the grapnel or anchor from the side of the car. That I had -done so was plain from two of my fingers being jagged across by the knife* What became of the grapnel we never knew; but if it nad fallen in a populous street it would in all probability- have killed somebody. The heavy bags of ballast, too, must have fallen like stones. The f final thing I remember during our de- | scent was droll enough. Just before the balloon left the Pre d’Orsay, my dear, kind brother had thrown over my>shoul- j deis a light paletot, observing with a laugh that I might feel it rather cold “ up j there.” I donned this garment as we ; ascended, and I remember saying as we , came thundering down, “ Charley’s coat i will be tom to ribbons.” So much for I

panoramic effects when the jaws of death seem to be yawning for us. To the possession of what J* ordinarily termed " presence of mind on the occasion I disdainfully decline to lay claim. What 1 did in the matter of the grapnel and the ballast was done mechanically and well-nigh unconsciously; and I was desperately and mortally “terrified. A few days after the accident I met the aeronaut's assistant, and 1 had the curiosity to sound him as to my demeanor during the fall* “ Sir,” he very candidly replied, “you kept your mouth wide open, and ywt wire as wy your breeches." I had been clad at the time in light summer attire. “ And you? I continued. “Well out of it,” quoth the aeronaut’s assistant, who was seemingly a philosopher; ami so went his way. Meanwhile —the tennis well-nigh inappropriate, since there was scarcely any ” while” to be “ mean '—the aeronaut, who looked like a sailor, had not lost his presence of mind, and had not been idle. He saw at a glance—this brave little old man—although he had been forgetful in the matter of the slip-knotted handkerchief—wherein our only chance of safety lay. He jumped up into the shrouds of the balloon, cut the cords which attached the neck of the machine to the hoop, and away to the very top of the netting flew the whole of the exhausted silk body of the sausage. Then it formed a cupola’of the approved umbrella pattern — it formed a parachute} It steadied instantly. There was no collapse, and down we came swiftly but easily, in a slanting direction, alighting among the cabbages in a market garden, Fulham Yields. The ear struck the elastic earth with violence, and rebounded, clearing a hedge a distance of some twenty feet. Then the silk, and the netting, and the hoop, and the car itself fell atop of us among the cabbages. We were dragged forth from the ruins of the Sausage only to be hustled and robbed of all the money in our pockets by a ruffianly crew of working market-gardeners; and the proprietor of the light cart who consented to drive me from Fulham to Kensington Gore demanded a guinea as his fare, on the ground that “ balloons didn’t fall every day.” Tie was far from complimentary too about the accident itself, remarking ironically that this “wos cum Of carrying up a lot of dogs and monkeys.” This ingenuous hut mercenary person had mistaken our windbag dragons and fishes swaling through the air, when we ascended, for living animals. 1 will omit any account of the congratulations iiliich were indulged in on our return to Gore House ; vet I cannot conclude this paper without noting a preg mint but somewhat strongly-worded remark made by the little old aeronaut. While everybody was grasping his hands JtUldjiayiPK him well-deserved compliments on his intrepidity; lie suddenly drew on one side, folded his arms, and sternly inquired: “ Who will say now t/uit you c<int come down ina parachute?" The manner of putting the query was irreverent, hut the matter thereof was cogent. Three-and-tweuty years after the event 1 have narrated I find myself forcibly imbued with the conviction that it is possible to descend in safety from any height by means of a parachute, but that there are ten thousand chances to one against the man who tries the venture surviving to tell the tale. And please to remember that I had* no intention of coming down in a parachute. I contracted ti/ come down in a Sausage balloon; but I will do the inventor the justice to mention that he never asked me for my’share of the expenses.

Max Adder’s Grape Vine.

I iuvs not been very, successful with my experiments in grape culture. 1 bought a vine some time ago, and the man Who sold the cutting to me enjoined me to be careful to water it thoroughly every day; I did so, but it didn’t seem to thrive. One day I asked my neighbor Pitman what he thought was the matter with it, and when 1 mentioned that I watered it daily lie said: '>“ Be gracious. Adeler, tliat’d kill any one! A grape vine don’t want no artificial waterin’.” Then he advised me to discontinue the process, and to wash the vine with soapsuds in order to kill the bugs. My anxiety to know why ft still didn't thrive was relieved some time afterward by hearing a man in the cars remark that " soundmen kill their grape vines by their durned foolery .in putting soap-suds,on ’em.” He said that all a grape vine wanted was to have the earth around it loosened with a spade. Then I began to dig around my vine every morning; but, one day, while engaged in the exercise, Cooley came and leaned over the fence and said: “ Adeler, you’ll kill that there vine if you don't stop diggin’ at it. Nothin' hurts a vine wuss than disturbin’ the soil around the roots, now mind me. That vine don't want nothin' but to be trained up on a fcellis an' fastened with wire.” I ordered a trellis that afternoon, and tied the tender shoots of the vine to the cross pieces. The job cost me thirtyfour dollars. On the following Tuesday I read in my agricultural paper tnat if a man wants to ruin a grape vine the quickest way is to tie it up with wire, as the oxidization destroys the bark. So 1 took off the wire and replaced it with : siring. 1 was talking about it to the j man who came over To bleed my horse for the blind-staggers, and he assured me that there was only one sure way to make a grape vine utterly worthless, and that was to run it up on a trellis, fir France, he told me, the vineyard owners all trained their vines on poles, and that was the right way. So I got the ax and knocked the trellis do pieces, -and then j , fixed the vine to a bean pole. Still it ; didn’t thrive very well, and I asked a ] nurseryman near me to yome and look at it. He said lie couldn't come, but lie j knew what w;as the matter with that j , vine as well as if he saw it.. It wanted j pruning. I ought to cut it down within • ten feet of the roots and then manure it well. I did cut it down, and emptied a 1 bag of guano over it; but as it seemed sort of slow. I insisted on the nursery- i man coming over to examine it. He said , that his fee was ten dollars in advance. I paid him and he came. He looked at the vine a moment: then he smiled: and then he said: *By gosh. Adeler. that ; isn't a grape vine at all! It’s a Virginia j creeper.” - So I have kind .of knocked off on grape ji culture and am paying more attention to | my cabbage. —Danbury Nett*. —The local papers of Little Rock,; Ark., are calling for missionaries or religious teachers. They state that out of \ ?,962 school, children only 1.360 attend Sabbath-school; that 194 convicts' in the penitentiary “have no religious teaching whatever, and thatvl3o persons in the. poof-house are equally destitute.

The Celebrated Spouting Springs of Iceland.

Bavaru Taylor writes as follows to thtoNew York Tribune from Iceland; We all fell into a condition of nervous expectancy which could not, be escaped, comical as were some of ks features. There was a pile of turf—perhaps a cartload—beside the Strokr, which lay jusit below our tent, and we were told that the eajdron would be compelled to spout for the King as soon as lie had 1 finished lus breakfast; so we sat down contented to the second plover-stew which Mr. [Gladstone and I)r. Hayes"bsd provided for us. The farmer from whom we had procured fuel sent us several bottles of delicious cream, and a large salmon for dinner. The Strokr is a pit about five feet in diameter, and eight feet deep to the ordinary level of the water, which is always in a furious boiling state. Prof. Stecnstrup assured me that it is not con- I nected with the Great Geyser, as the analysis of the water shows a difference; but the people are equally convinced that it is, anil that to provoke its activity diminishes the chances of the former spouting. However this may be, the royal command was given. The pile of turf was pitched Into the hole, and all gathered around, at a sate distance, waiting to see what would follow. For ten minutes we noticed nothing except a diminution of feteam; then the water gushed up to the level of the soil in a state of violent agitation; subsided, rose again, spouted the full breadth of the hole to a height of fifteen or twenty feet, sank back, and finally, after another moment of quiet, shot a hundred feet into the air. The boiled turf, reduced to the consistency of gravel, filled the jet, and darkened its central shaft, but I did not find that it diminished the beauty of the phenomenon. -r~. Jet after jet followed, sending plumelike tufts from the summiuand sides of the main column, around which the narrow drifts of steam whirled and eddied with a grace so swift that the eye could scarcely seize it. At such moments the base was hidden, and the form of the fountain was like a bunch of the Pampas grass in blossom—a cluster of feathery panicles of spray. The performance lasted nearly ten minutes, and was resumed again two or three times after it seemed to have ceased. Two or three of the last spoutings were the highest, and some esti-, mated them at fully 120 feet. Finally, the indignant caldron threw out the last of its unclean emetic, and sank to its normal level.—The King, who hud t urned aside to salute our company, was in the act of expressing to me his admiration of the scene, when the Little Geyser gave sudden signs of action. There was a rush of the whole party; his Majesty turned and ran like a boy, jumping over the gullies and stones with an agility which must have bewildered the heavy officials. It was a false alarm. The Little Geyser let off a few sharp discharges of steam, as if merely to test the pressure, and then, as if satisfied, resumed its indolent, smoky habit. The cone of the Great Geyser is not more than twenty feet high, and appears to have been gradually formed by the deposit of the silicious particles which the water holds in solution. The top is like a shallow wash-bowl, thirty feet in diameter, full to the brim, and slowly overflowing ofi the eastern side. In the center of this bowl there is a well, indicated by the intense blue-green of the water, and apparently eight or ten feet in diameter. It has been sounded, and bottom —or at least a change of direction —reached at the depth of eighty-five feet. At the edge, where the water is shallow, one can dip his fingers in quickly without being scalded. Smalt particles placed in the overflow are completely ineruated with transparent silex in a day or two. Prof. Steenstrup informed me that the water has important healing properties. The steam has an odor of sulphuretted hydrogen, but the taste thereof is so soon lost that where the stream becomes cold we used it for drinking and making co flee.

Egyptian Funerals.

A coRRESPQXDEXT of the Cincinnati Gmette, writing from Egypt, says: ■ “ At the cemetery in Cairo we saw' a funeral procession, and followed it out of curiosity. Half a dozen men, some of them blind and each resting a hand on the shoulder of another, led the way and chanted a melancholy air. Then came a man with a small coffin, borne on his head, and behind him were a half-dozen women and as many boys, the women closely veiled, according to the custom of the country. The procession did not move in couples, according to the Occidental custom; there was no observance of regularity, except that the men were in front of the coffin and the women and boys behind it. They moved through the country to a spot where a grave had been opened; near it the women stopped and sat down, and the bearers placed the coffin on the ground, a priest uttered a prayer, and then the man who had brought tfie coffin—a sort of oblong box with a shawl over it—removed the shawl, and took from beneath it the corpse. It was that of a child about two years old, and was completely wrapped in cloth and bound around with cords, somewhat as one might wrap a bale of goods to keep it from falling apart. The man advanced to the edge of’the grave ! and placed the corpse inside with very little ceremony, or rather ♦ith no ceremony at all. The women set up a mournful cry, and one of the men of the party approached us and told our guide that*they wished us to retire. As soon as the request was translated We walked away, not without feeling that we had been guilty of an intrusion. I liaye seen ; : several funeral processions in Cairo, and j had previously seen them in Damascus, j Smyrna and other Oriental cities. At | all of them the custom has been the! same, the singers preceding the corpse j and the mourners following it. The one j here described was ‘ the burial of the j child of a poor woman, and there was ; little display and little ceremony. Some of the processions that have come under my notice were of considerable extent, the singers or chanters numbering from fifty to a hundred, and being accompanied by mollahs or priests. The ■ corpse in such cases was covered with; rich shawls, and at the head of the coffin : there was a small post to sustain the cap worn by the deceased. In the tombs of the wealthy these caps remain at the head of the coffin, and the visitor to the tombs of the various Sultans of Turkey will not fail to notice how invariably the fez is placed at the head of him who once wore it. The coffin is supported on the shoulders of four bearers, and there is frequently a relay to take their places from time to time ;*and there is a large following of friends of the deceased, some on foot and some mounted on donkeys, and from time to time a sound of wailine rises from the mourning party.

Some of the mourners are said to be professionals hired for the occasion, while others belong to the family of the defunct. The crowd in the streets does not suspend its avocations or pay the slightest sign of respect for the procession beyond making room for it to pass. Afid frequently persons in a hurry, and wishing to cross the line of the procession, do ,bo without ceremony."

The Couriers of the Czar.

The Russian couriers, or pony expressmen, or mail-carriers, as you may choose to call them, travel neither on foot nor on horseback. You will fiqd that in this matter, as in almost every custom and habit of every people, nature compels man to alter his arrangements to suit her conditions. In Tartary they have fine horses, great wide deserts, and splendid' 1 roads and- naturally, the couriers there are mounted: in England, where the roads are bad, running through boga and marshes, the old couriers were footmen ; in Russia, -where snow lies on the ground nearly the whole year, sleighs are used by the couriers. The “ Couriers of the Czar,” as the mail-carriers are called, travel with great rapidity. Fresh horses and drivers are ready at stations every twenty mile# apart; but the couriers themselves sleep in the sleighs, and travel from one end of a mail route to the other. Special messengers of the Czar, on public business, travel by these same routes, and with even greater rapidity than the mail-carriers. During the Crimean war there occurred an incident illustrating the severity of this service. The Russian General, Prince MentchikoS, who defended Sebastopol, had oeeasion, during the siege of that city, to send an important message to the Czar at St. Petersburg; and ordered a faithful officer to be his messenger, giving him directions not to halt or delay . until lie stood before the Czat, and, above .all, not to lose sight of the precious message which he bore. Away went the officer in a sleigh belonging to the Czar’s couriers. At the end of each twenty miles he found fresh horses awaiting him; these were quickly harnessed to his sleigh, in place of the weary animals, and the servants and stable-men would cry out: “Your Excellency, the horses are j ready.” “Away then!” the officer would say to the driver; and ofi" lie would go again at the mosj rapid pace of which the horses were capable. Riding in this way for several days and nights, suffering with cold and pursued by wolves in the forests, the officer, weary with watching his dispatches, day and night, at length reached the palace of the Czar and was immediately ushered into his presence. He had no sooner handed the Emperor the letter of the General than the ~messengex..sank into a chair and fell fast asleep in the royal presence—an offense which, in some ages, would have been punishable with instant death. When lie had finished reading the dispatch the Czar wished to ask the officer a question but found he could not awaken him. The attendants called to him, touched and shook him, all in vain; and at last one declared the poor fellow was dead. The Czar was- much grieved thereat, and went to the officer and examined his pulse, put his ear down to his side and declared he could hear his heart thumping. He was only asleep. But he soon found that the exhausted officer could not be aroused by the usual means. At length the Czar, stooping down, cried in his ears: “Your Excellency, the horses are ready.” At the sound of these words, which he had heard every twenty miles of his journey, and the only ones which he had listened to for days, the faithful officer sprang to his feet and cried; “ Away then!” Instead of driver and horses lie found the Czar before him laughing heartily at his confusion and dismay. You may be sure bis offense was forgotten; instead of being punished for sleeping when his work was done the officer was rewarded for his faithfulness. — From “ The Pony Express ,” in St. Nicholas for September.

Certificate for Farmers to Sign.

Hoopstown, 111., Aug. 26,18T4. Mr. “ Rural"—Sir: All; he canvassers that have come this way of late, when they take an order for a farm windmill, sewing-machine, or similar goods, demand that the farmer sign the followirig-eertiticate: , ••For the purpose of obtaining credit. certify that owhs in own nameacres* of land, with ——- acres improved, worth § over all incumbrances. own $ worth of personal property over and above all indebtedness.” What is the particular use of this paper? A Signer. The point is, that the signer guarantees that, at the time, he is good for the debt, and, failing in this, becomes a criminal, and is liable to be sent to the Penitentiary, for not less than a year, for obtaining goods under false pretenses. A better way is to do as he has done beforedo without the goods until the money is ready, and then the same goods may be purchased at 20 to 30 per cent, less, and all this trouble is avoided. If yob want a sewing-machine let your wife wait a year and get along as before, and not put her husband in an unpleasant position, and in the end make the machine cost him two prices. One of my neighbors took this course, and a few weeks since presented his wife with a first-class machine for $37.50, while another has just paid his note, given a year ago, forji no better machine at SBS, and to do this a part of the money had to be borrowed. There is an economy of purchase as well as an economy of labor that must have,, the attention of the farmer. The purchasing power of a farmer’s note isabbtir one-half that of ready cash; and, sb long ! as he makes use of it, so long is he the ! subject of the wicked monopolist. Few | farmers fail to meqt notes that have such j j memoranda attached thereto, but many | I times at great sacrifice; and no true wile j will consent that her husband shall sign | such a paper for the purpose of giving ! her a sewing-machrfie, a buggy, organ, or a farm windmill for pumping, or a new reaper for himself. A little-attention to, these matters will make no small difference in the year’s result. The other, day a banker told me that he held a large number of these j farmers’ notes, with certificates attached, land that he considered them the best ! kind of security. In this case they were ! givqn for sewing-machines, and the agent ! (?) borrowed money jon them, and paid cash in hand for the machines, getting a large discount —much larger than he paid fpr the use of the money. And for cash in hapd he made sales on (private terms most astonishingly low; billing the goods at- the usual price, but taking a much smaller sum.— -Rural, in Chicago Tribune. —The number of people out of Work in Hartford, Conn., is so large that the city is obliged to restrict itself to married men principally in giving employment. '

London Threatened With an Ant Plague.

No little anxiety has been caused in the neighborhood of London during the last few days by the sudden appearance of myriads of ants. A vanguaid of these -insects has been seen marching over Waterloo bridge, and it i 9 impossible to deny that our position is at the present moment one of, extreme peril At any moment tbe invading army may be upon us, and we shall then be exposed to all the horrors of an ant plague. Those who are accustomed to look at the ant as an industrious but insignificant creature will proMHy smile at the idea of its presence, even in swarms, being a source of serious inconvenience. Without any wish to cause an unnecessary out merely with the view of nroeAficg Londoners for possible con*' -11 *® 110 * 68 ' ft ma y be as well to can attention to the proceeding* “ u anny ot aunts that some , ears ago invaded the Island of Grenada. The ants on that occasion “ descended from the hills like torrents, and the plantations, as well as every path and road for miles, were filled with them. Rats, mice and reptiles of every kind became an easy prey to them, and jeven the birds, which they attacked whenever they lighted on the ground in search of food, were so harassed as to be at length unable to resist them. Streams of water opposed only a temporary obstacle to their progress; the foremost rushing blindly on certain death and fresh armies instantly following, till a bank , was formed of the carcasses of those which were drowned sufficient to dam up the waters and allow the main body to pass over in safety. Even fire was tried without effect. When it was lighted to arrest their route they rushed into the blaze in such myriads as to extinguish it.” To such straits was the unfortunate island reduced by the ants that a reward of £20,000 was offered, but in vain, for an effectual means of destroying them; and it was not until a hurricane in 1780 came and blew them away and drowned them —doing, by the way, almost more mischief than the ants—that Grenada was freed from these terrible destroyers. Happily, in London we have the steam-roller, which should be kept ready for immediate action in the face of the calamity with which we are now threatened. — Pall Mall Gazette.

Popular Fallacies.

The age of war and conflict is fast passing away, and the industrial and commercial age is taking itsf place Pmarons is tlie world’s watchword to-day audit is the boast of the nineteenth century that, since its birth, the march of discovery and invention, in all the sciences and arts most conducive to man’s comfort and civilization, has been greater than any preceding half-thousand years. Science is now the measure of a nation's standing: for general scientific knowledge means education, which means refinement and religion, which means death to superstition. And in this country especially, where education and true religion are so generally difiused, science seems to have a stronghold upon - the respect and admiration of all but the most ignorant and backward minds. In view then of Ibis general diffusion of scientific knowledge, which, in this country, though not in itself astonishing, is "yet great when compared with that in most other lands, it does seem remarkable oft-times that so many old and long-exploded fallacies should still find credence among the majority of the people, and even among the well educated. It is feirly astonishing to see what out-rageously-absurd stones will circulate through the popular press, often published in the fullest good faith, and accepted as true by simple-minded readers. The scientific hoaxes perpetrated in the United States are almost innumerable; and that they continue to be published, republished, revamped, and, strangest of all, believed, and solemnly discussed in journals that ought to know better, does not speak well for the thoroughness of this scientific knowledge, on which diffusion we so often pride ourselves. We remember a recent example in the story, lately published in a California paper (these li*oaxes generally emanate from the fertile West), concerning a magnetic cave, said to have been just discovered, possessing such powerful attraction that hatchets w r ere drawn from the hands of the explorers and flew to the roof, remaining glued there; while unfortunates in hobnailed shoes had to leave their foot incasements behind them. This story, though laughed at by one-half the community, was received with open eyes and gaping mouths by the other half, who could not comprehend that the size of the attracted body might have something to do with the force of attraction. But it is not merely of these ingenioushoaxes that we wish to speak, but of a far more injurious state of ignorance among the common people. We refer to pojiular fallacies concerning the sciences of every-day life, and to the general ignorance about the great forces of nature, and the first principles of science in all its departments. Some of these fallacies are simply ludicrous; others are worse. What absurd blunders are made in matters of hygiene ! The prosperity of quack doctors who have medicines, each one of which will cure all the ills that man is heir to, „is a forcible example of the latter case. “By looking into a looking-glass inclined at fortydive degrees, Mr. , of Northampton, obtained last night a fine view of Jupiter’s satellites,” says a certain Springfield paper. How Prof. Snell, of Amherst, must have chuckled to read it! Mr. ’s wonderful glass would have conferred satellites upon every star in heaven. He should have known that plain looking-glass has .no telescopic power, and that his “satellites” were only repeated reflections, between the quicksilver and the front surface of the glass, of the planet he was gazing at. “Mrs. was recently saved from death by a lightning stroke by her son, who dashed a pailful of cold water upon her. It is supposed that the water carried off the electricity remaining in her body, and saved her!” Such is the Boston JimrnqV* lucid-explanation of a simple cure. The poor lady, almost, killed by the terrible stroke, was saved by the sudden nervous shock caused by the cold water which her son with such presence of mind threw at her. It is not the presence of electricity in k human body that endangers, nor even the discharge of that electricity, since the body can hold but a small amount; it is the passage through the body of an immense discharge, between clouds and earth, that kills and destroys. !_ . Old maids, and young ones, too, throw themselves upon a feather bed for protection from “ thunder,” or descend to the cellar. An iron bedstead would be safer than either of these places, because it would keep the charge away from them by receiving it through itself. Timid

ladies are terrified when a boiler discharges steatn through a safety-valve, f6r fear it will burst; when the roar of escaping steam is proof positive that it will not burst. And to Crown all, some misguided victims of an insane fever, forgetful that “ action and reaction are qtial,” and that “ gain in power is loss in time, when the force is given,” still labor and strive to create force out of nothing, and make what science has, time and again, declared impossible, a perpetual motion. = “ rr \ Such absurdities, of course, will never cease until ignorance ceases. But they are altogether too common among those tL«t should Know better, and reveal a great lack ol logical reasoning and definite knowledge. Superficiality is perhaps the great fault’of our common education, especially in science; where exactness is essential. The natural and exact sciences .are, we are happy to say, taking more nearly their deserved stand in our American educational courses; and we hope the time may come, and come soon, when such nonsense as we have discussed cannot possibly be found, much less believed in, among those who have been fairly educated.—A. H., in Scientific American.

What Crops to Cultivate.

There is an extensive laqfe of proper adaptation of crops to tie soil cultivated. Farmers are required to take the soil as they find it, as it /s not practicable to effect any considerable change in .the geological formatim of any plat of ground, unless the tosk.is performed at an enormous expense. Hence, when clay soil preponderates on a farm it will be found more profitable to cultivate such crops as may be adapted to heavy land. OH the contrary, if a mucky or peaty spil prevails, it will be more profitable and satisfactory in every respect to raise such crops as may be produced at the lowest expense, and which will return the most profit. Some farmers will persist in their efforts to raise wheat every season on some part of the farm, when there is not an acre of ground in any field that is at all adapted to this grain. Others will persist in raising barley, when the soil is of such a character that with excellent cultivation the product per acre will not'exceed fifteen or twenty hqshels of marketable grain. There are numerous sections of countrywhere nearly all the soil consists of muck and peat, with only slight traces of argilaceous and calcareous soil. Such land can never be made to produce paying crops of wheat or barley unless a heavy dressing of clay be spread over the land and - ” afterward —thoroughly incorporated with the soil, which would be an outlay that the returns would not warrant. On such land the proprietor should study adaptation. If the soil consists largely of heavy loam, or is composed of several kinds ot soil, with a large portion calcareous clay, grain of all sorts may be raised with profit. Or grass, stock and some grain may be produced at the same time. Heavy land may be used as grass land quite as profitably and often more so than light land. The error consists in attempting to produce certain crops on light land which can be raised with satisfactory profit only on heavy soils. Hence it will be perceived that an excellent rotation of crops for one farm and for one section of country would not be properly adapted to other sections where the character of the soil is different. It will require critical observation on the part of an intelligent tiller of the soil for several successive seasons before he will be able to determine with satisfactory certainty what crops are well adapted to his land and what crops cannot he raised with profit. ’ ' Tr Certain writers have asserted that “ wherever abundant crops of red clover will grow wheat and barley and other cereals will grow.” Wheat, rye and barley will grow, it is true, where red clover will flourish. But the product will not always be a paying crop. Every farmer, by exercising his good judgment in this regard, may soon determine whether he is cultivating such crops as are most congenial to his particular soil. The most successful farmers of our country feel satisfied that a mixed husbandry constitutes the most profitable farm management, especially where the soil is considered rather light for producing fair crops of grain. The question then arises, shall sheep he kept in connection with the cultivation of grain to a limited extent? Or will the land be better adapted to dairying? There is great profit in raising sheep and in producing wool; and so there is satisfactory profit in keeping cows, whether the milk is employed for making butter or cheese or sold to dealers in milk. If one chooses to keep either cows or sheep on light land it will be necessary to plow the ground occasionally for the purpose of developing the fertility, exterminating weeds and reseeding. IlencC it will be advisable to raise grain of some sort. If land will produce abundant crops of good grass, Indian corn, oats and flax may be raised with profit. In numerous instances the oats or corn raised on one acre will be worth more than the quantity of wheat that could be produced on two acres of the same kind of ground. If a man is a judicious managed, and his soil is of a light, mucky and peaty character, sheep of the right sort, in connection. with some corn and oats, will be found the most profitable system of husbandry that can be adopted.— Observer.

The Pilgrim and the Knight.

Is a noble castle there once resided a very rich knight. He expended much money in adorning and beautifying his dwelling, but he gave very little to the poor. A weary pilgrim came to the castle and asked for a night’s lodging. The knight haughtily refused him, and said: “This castle is, not an inn.” The pilgrim replied: l( Permit me to ask two and then I will depart.” “Upon this condition speak,” replied the knight; “ I will readily answer you." The pilgrim then said to him: “ Who dwelt in this before you?” “ My father,” replied the knight. “And who will dwell here after you?” still asked the pilgrim. =-*=- The knight said: “With God’s will,my son.” . “Well,’’.said thg pilgrim, “if each dwells but a time in the castle and in time must , depart and make room for another, what are you here otherwise than guests? The castle, then, is truly an inn., Why, then, spend so much money adorning a dwelling which you will a short time? Be charitable, for he that hath pity upon the poor lendeth it-to the Lord, and that which he hath given He 4 will pay him again.” The knight took these words to heart. He gave the pilgrim shelter fSr the night, and was ever afterward more charitable to the poor. V