Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 7, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 November 1874 — Page 3

RENSSELAER UNION. JAMES * HEALEY, Proprietor*. RENSSELAER, - INDIANA.

OUR VILLAGE. Along ska old accustomed paths with musing steps we go. The green trees arch above our heads, and every branch we know; The meadow' has its tale for us, the lane its storied hour, Companions in each hedge we hail, a friend in every flower. i The head-stones /by the grassy graves bear old familiar names. Each, as we glance them idly o’er, its flash of memory claims; There, a sweet touch of pathos wakes, here loving laughter tells. On some quaint, long-recorded trait the roused remembrance dwelJs t ___L__. The little child that gazes up. with wide, blue wistful eyes. Unconscious of what charm for us in their soft , luster lies. Will answer with her mother’s smile, or in her father s voice, And in the accent of whose ring our hearts can still rejoice. . The cottage doors are shut that ne’er closed to our steps of yore, -Beside th®-dveaing hearths they talk of its ansL ours no more. Oh. sad and strange, and hard it seems, there are so few to greet, As slow and silently we trace the winding village street. Yet, half-forgotten as we stand, amid the haunts of youth. The golden past asserts for us its strength of love and truth; Though other pathways woo us now’, and other boons may bless, The home that 'childhood’s halo crowned claims separate tenderness. —All the Year Round.

VELVETEEN BOOTS.

She never should have said it! But first I should observe that Mr. Messeps (Solomon Messeps, floor-walker in Constant & Stirling’s dry-goods establishment) possesses a straightness of back, a length of limb, a perfection of coat and trousers, a look and die-away glance in his muddy but large and dark eye, and a glamour of whisker, that make a calm description of him simply impossible to any woman under forty. These attractions* may be the reason why he story transacted itself, or rather to the young ladies thereof, in some such relation as a prize racing-cup or a champion’s belt. Certain it is that Miss Moblot, whose father owned his own house, was as well known at Constant & Stirling’s as the lay-figure in the window; that Miss Matilda Mason and Miss Selliquips were intimate friends of the deadliest type for no other purpose than to reckon up this young gentleman; that a dozen other young women were at sWord’s points about him; and that all united in detesting Miss Jennie Millfugus as half a length ahead and likely_to win, in virtue of her good looks and undeniable gentility. Therefore, I repeat, she never should have said it, even if there had been no such thing as the Millfugus TnysTery. And there was such a mystery. Jennie Millfugus, with her sister Harriet, lived in No. 10 of a block of three-story buildings well over toward the west—brick houses with high steps, wearing, in some indefinable way, the air of a person with well-cleaned gloves, and old boots scrupulously blacked. According 40 the way in which you choose to put it, these houses are the last bulwark of the street against the tide of poverty rolling in from the river, or they are the connecting link between life, four blocks away, on SIO,OOO a year and life on ten dollars a week. And being thus, as it were, on neutral ground, it was natural that they should express the ill-at-ease condition of all neutrality; also that all the inhabitants should be engaged in a desperate hand-to-hand struggle with appearances, and that they should be very high with an outside world, and observe toward each other an awful punctilio. p Foremost among this little army of {inched and struggling martyrs were larriet and Jennie Millfugus, as girls of an excellent family; one of the sharpest stings, that of poverty. For if one must be poor and can take it in the natural way, planted squarely on feet, stout and long and wide, with sleeves rolled up to the elbow, the affair is not so hopeless. The lady who delighted me but now with a nod of recognition from her barouche fifteen years ago smoked a pipe and was seen of mornings with bare feet. But, weighted with their ancestors about their necks —as were Harriet and Jennie — those two girls lived the life of a border baron of old, forever on the alert, forever menaced by the foe, forever battling with the facts that were continually forcing their way through the weak defense of appearances. Harriet was thirty-four, the family-mother, as often happens with an elder sister; and a most properly plain and practical one, adapted to her position. Jennie was twenty and the women declared there was nothing in her. Nevertheless, she was of a very wholesome and womanly- appearance—a rarer charm than is apt to be imagined. Girls are jaunty, stylish, pretty, by the sfcbre; but how often comes one to whom you are drawn, as thoroughly and essentially a woman? Just this Jennie continually suggested. You. observed the

dimples at her wrist, the white parting of her abundant hair, the wholesome redness of her lips and whiteness of her skin, a pair of fine gray eyes with black lashes and readily-dilating iris, a round waist, an easy grace in the very flow of her skirts, involuntarily, and with a quick sense of pleasure. Perhaps this was why men and Mr. Messeps found her charming. Perhaps, also, it was why the gentler inhabitants of the block had a fashion of speaking of her with a slighting smile, and as “ poor thing!” But why she should never have been seen with her sister—why, when you called on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, as often as you pleased, you found Miss Harriet, fresh and sipiling, to receive you, and no hint of Jennie; and, if you came on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, whenever you pleased, you found Jennie, fresh and smiling, and no hint of Harriet ; and why the two sisters, differing so widely in years, should have dressed precisely alike, even to the last bow and rufflp—ah, that was the Millfugus mystery. No one ever saw them out of the little, dark, horse-hair-furnished parlor. No one ever saw them together. No one had ever dinhd, or lunched,'or taken tea with them, and no one had yet comprehended it. But to keep a mystery wholly within the compass of one’s life, and no loose end hanging out, is impossible; and a steady and cautious pull at such an end —what might it not bring pell-mell after it, should some one’s interest warrant the laying hold of it? So, as I began by saying, she should never have said it. It was. Jennie who said it, and w ith an air of triumph. A

triumphantairis always a wanton attack on human jealousy, a gratuitous waving of the red flag in the very eyes of the bull. It is true, she must have been almost more than human had she not stopped to say she could not stop, and dropped the word “Gardens,” and remarked that she was going there that evening. And that Miss Mason should say, “ With the Smith family, of course,” was vexatious; for why “or course?” as if she were a girl that could get nowhere unless pinned to the skirts of some family! And so she said it: “It might be ‘of course’ if it were you, Miss Matilda; but I am going with Mr. Messeps!” That was fairly throwing down the glove! Very imprudent in a ISdy hampered by a mystery! and with a great blush, too, that flamed from her cheeks all over her fgde! I suspect Matilda could have forgiven the speech more readily than the. blush; the latter was such an unimpeachable witness of happy consciousness on Miss Millfugus’ part; but, assuredly, she was not the girl to refuse the challenge. Could Miss Millfugus have seen—but which of us does foresee? We open the door ourselves to Fate almost invariably; yet, which of us recognizes her? Beyond a satisfied expression of “ serves her right,” Jennie thought very little about it. She was absorbed in more important considerations. It was a saying between her and her sister that “if either were called suddenly to die,’ their first impression would be that it is impossible, as they had nothing fit to die in.” And another, that “ they lived on the income of a wolf, as in it there was no more provision for clothes to an if they had been born furry creatures.” Purchasing a dress they styled shooting the rapids, so great were the perils, so nice the calculation necessary for the venture; while their wardrobe itself, i it could pretend to such a name, they christened “All the Year Round,” as in buying a gown say for the summer it was necessary to calculate also how it could be re-made in the fall and what could be done with it in the winter —a prophetic style of shopping in which only a clairvoyant or spiritual medium might be supposed to achieve complete success. And let none think lightly of these perplexities. So long as human nature is constituted as it is at present, so long not all the frowsy sayings extant about silk-worm and sheep-wool ■will console a womanly woman when she disguises dainty feet in coarse, misshapen shoes; when a wrist and shoulders that would become silk and camel’s-hair are disfigured in rusty and darned alpaca; when sashes, gloves, fans, chatelaines, flowers, perfumes, combs, pendants, ribbons, the thousand trifles that are the real secret of woman’s toilet, hang in the shop-windows as unattainable as the apples of Hesperides. And Jennie winced daily under these privations as did Gulliver under the darts of the Liliputians. Something more than mortified pride, however, was involved ,on the present occasion. The prize Messeps, the parti of the block, was in that critical condition where he might be said to be tottering on the verge of a declaration. Jennie felt, instinctively, that the approaching expedition to the Gardens involved a crisis. A touch only was needed to finish the woric; while, on the contrary, if he were allowed to recover himself it would be no easy matter to lure him back to this most desirable position. By that curious freemasonry existing among women Miss Harriet was quite well aware of the position of affairs, though up to this time not a word had been said between them on the subject. She listened to her younger sister with an anxious, pondering face, and sighed deeply. “If rent-day were only not the day after to-morrow!” she said. “If it could be any other time !” “ But I could not tell him that,” returned Jennie, half laughing, half crying. “ The usages of society won’t allow a girl, you know, to say—‘lf you will come next week I will wear the butter in my hat, the tea in my gloves, the sugar around my neck; but you must excuse me this evening, as the rent is due. and we have disposed of those articles already!’ ” “Or if we were like those story heroines,” pursued Harriet, as if thinking aloud, “who always have some wonderful old lace of satin or velvet that can be covered over an<f made to look finer than anythingfrom Worth’s. But one old gray dress, that. has done duty for two girls since spring—cotton goods at that! Do you know, Jennie, among all the bits of Italian lace wisdom going the rounds, I am not sure that there is oni) more exasperating to me than that saying about a lady’s character as revealed in her dress? Does it ever occur to anybody, I wonder, that it costs more to dress plainly and appropriately out of what odds and ends you have, or the cheap goods you can afford to buy? And that there is such a being as a lady in taste and feeling without money?” “ But to-night, to-night!” insisted Jennie,, half gleeful, half anxious; “ what can Ido for td-night? Our old gray dress is too shabby; besides, when you wore it last you greased the front.” “There is the old Victoria lawn. It is a little short-—” “And my shoes!” interrupted Jennie, putting out a foot on which the stocking was plainly visible. Oh, sis, why not give it up? Hire a room at once in some tenement-house and stand in the door with the others—those women whom you see arms a-kimbo and hair twisted up in a hard knot? Resign ourselves and tell our friends that concerts and courtships and other decencies of civilized life are not for our—income?” “There is the old black sijk basque,” continued Harriet, as if she heard nothing. “ The silk was never good, but it will not show so much in the evening. Yon can take out the sleeves and wear it as a sleeveless basque. And that three dollars that we saved ” ” “ We! —you saved for your shoes!” interpolated Jennie. Harriet put that aside with a wave of the hand. -

*• I saw ladies’ boots on Eighth avenue —don’t scream, Jennie—velveteen boots —for two dollars. Dreadful, I know, but not so dreadful as to show one’s stockings. You must put your best foot foremost, or rather keep it out of sight, and pray that there be no wind. And you can get lavender gloves to match the ribbon on your hat (with the remaining dollar.” i ' “ I will keep that,” said Jennie, doggedly, “ to buy the ears and >nout and make myself the pig complete that I should be if I listened to you, who have had no shoes in -i.\ months, and who limp on all the down-hid sides of the street because of those dr ad'Ul heels'; you, who go nowhefe; you who staid at home from the parsonage reception; you give me that three dollars that you' have pinched off from your bread arid butter-! Never!

I’ll stay at home with you”—throwing her arms about her sister's neck. Cannot you understand,” retorted Harriet, “ that this is a speculation and the purest selfishness?” Then she pushed her away, not ungently, though. “ Now’, listen. Since I must speak out, that three dollars I mean to invest in Messeps stock with an eye to future profit. Y’ou are not a woman of business. I am. I see so clearly that I want words to express it that the income on which two starve will support one in luxury, when I am left alone.” Jennie grew' scarlet. “As for that, it is all nonsense. I wonder you talk so. But if—say anything did happen—O Harriet! you know very well where I go you would go too!” “ And there would be a clause in the marriage ceremony,” said Harriet, smiling slightly— ‘ I take this woman and her sister to be my wife.’ My poor little Jenfiie, my poor child, take your money and buy your boots. Indeed, you must. If you don’t go I will, and have them fitted on my own foot, a little tight, and then I shall lose my morning’s sewing.” So adjured, Jennie w’ent. But remorse kept fast by her, and disgust half choked her.——— r / : *4 “It is like murdering your neighbor for two-and-sixpence,” she told Harriet. “To be guilty of such a meanness for velveteen boots and dollar gloves!” Nothing pleased her. She looked at her Victoria lawn and its scant plaitings with a sneer. “ I should Wear a placard, ’ s2.so—cheap,’ on my back,” she observed. “ That is what such suits are selling for.” The old silk w r aist w'as intolerable. She vowed she would prefer a shilling calico, could she afford to buy one. The wind was rising—indeed, it was a sullen, cloudy afternoon, “ I shall look like a hen on a wet day,” she told her sister, drawing on her righthand glove. Just then the bell rang, and at the same instant the glove split entirely across the back. She glanced at herself in the glass (for her eyes were red and the sunshine out of - her face), and turned to her sister with an indescribable look. “ You have invested your three dollars badly, my dear.” Mr. Messeps was waiting for her in the little dark, horse-hair furnished parlor ; gloves and trowsers cream color, coat and necktie perfect, collar and studs. If anything were wanted to complete the poor gild’s depression it was the air of fashion and prosperity that seemed actually to radiate from his handsome and satisfied self. All in a moment she felt herself half-starved, as she truly was, pinched, woe-worn, awkward, inappropriate, and advanced toward him rather with the air of a convicted felon than of the high-spirited and coquettish girl she really was. Mr. Messeps glanced at her clouded face, then at her dress, and started—at least to the girl’s sensitive fancy —and.a subtle, chilling reserve at once seemed to form itself between them. He was daunted by her manner. She was as happy and comfortable as a girl could feel in a high wind, with short skirts and dreadful velveteen boots and one bare hand, that will get red and swollen, resting conspicuously on a gentleman’s arm, and a consciousness that she is in every way at her worst. As they neared the corner they met Matilda Mason. She smiled knowingly at Mr. Messeps, took in Jennie in one long, woman’s look, till her eyes reached the ground, and started theatrically. Mr. Messeps instantly looked down. At that moment the sullen wind, tearing up the avenue in a cloud of dust, caught them, seized on Jennie’s light skirts, wrapped them tightly about her ankles, and held them there. Mr. Messeps saw, the whole world saw, the whole of the velveteen boots. It is hardly reasonable to suppose that from that moment, as Jennie told her sister, Mr. Messeps turned the conversation to velveteen boots and declared that Curtius jumped into the gulf for no other reason than that he was caught in a pair of them; or that Horatius refused to come off the bridge, and preferred to fight the whole of Lars Porsena’s army for the same reason. Nor is it credible that Thomas’ band played an overture on the same subject, as she furthermore insisted; but that the unlucky incident disturbed the whole evening and altogether startled Mr. Messeps out of the declaration on which Mr. Messeps had determined, is only too true. He certainly liked Miss Millfugus better than any girl he knew. But then Mr. Messeps had been used to speak of her as a young lady of independent income. Now did young ladies Of independent incomes wear velveteen boots? And if there Were no such income, on what did she live? Mr. Messeps felt much like a man suddenly arrested on the brink of a yawning chasm. And now one might have thought that fate had accomplished he,r worst; but if that were so fate had not consulted Matilda Mason. For it now occurred to that young lady to propose, with much artlessness of manner, a surprise call —surprises, Mr. Messeps, Miss Moblot, Miss Mason and Miss Selliquips; the surprisees the Misses Millfugus. If you are an evil-minded person very possibly you divine her motive. For me, I am innocence itself, and cannot see why this most unfortunate idea should have led them, not into the little horse-hair parlor, but straight up the stairs. Motioning for silence at a little back-room door she knocked. A voice cried “ Come in!” Miss Mason at that flung wide the door, pushing Mr. Messeps ahead, w’ho made a step forward ahd recoiled. The nnearpeted floor, the poor little bed, the few ehairs, were heaped w ith piles of what is called shop-work. Miss Harriet (it was her night—that is, the night on which she was always seen attired in the gray dress) stood amazed in the center of the floor. Before the sewing-machine, in calico sack and skirt, with sleeves rolled to the elbow, sat Jennie in the middle of a long seam. At the silence that followed the opening of the door she looked up, saw Mr. Messeps recoiling, her sister’s “ struck” face, Matilda’s malicious eye, the embarrassment of the other girls, comprehended it on the instant and came forward. <-

“ Yes,’.’ she said, “it is true. We live in thisToom. We are only allowed the use of the parlor by our landlady, who desires it should be supposed there is but one family in her house; ahd we earn our living by this sewing. But we are very glad to see you. Harriet, dear, .give them chairs, louwill excuse me; this is my sister’s company night, for we do everything on system. You see we have but one dress between us and cannot aflord, both of us, to lose an evening. What, you are going? Oh, no excuses, I beg! Come again. Then a courtesy down to the ground that would have been worthy of an Empress. •< What happened next? Did she faint? Did she cry? No one ever knew. In another week their apartments were va-

cant. No one knew' where they went. •In a month from that date Mr. Messeps and Miss Moblot were announced—engaged. She Bad won the race —by a pair ot velveteen XtQolSi—Appleton's Jvur~ Adi. < ’Y ■' ■ ■X

The Hunny Bee.

The hunny bee iz about 10 times the s(ze ov the lious fly—i never meazured them—tlfey won’t stand still long enuff, but i think I hav got their dimenshuns about right. If i hav made a blunder in this matter i am reddy to rfepent and be forgiven for it. They are az bizzy az a type-setter on the New York Weekly, in thoze countrys whare hunny iz skarse, but (share sweet meats are a drug they won’t work at all. I dont kno az we kan blame them for this, for if beefsteak lay hot and well buttered bi the roadside all the time, and bivalves were running around on the half shell, peppered and salted, crying “ Who’ll eat me?” i would like to see the man yu could hire to thrash out fye that waz wet in the bundle for 10 shillings a day. Hunny bees are bilt w ith a sting, which iz quicker than a ghost when a good bizzness chance offers; but I never knu onrr to use it just ibi* the-diviltry -ov the thing. Theze little workers travel about five miles a day during the sweet seazon, and bring their hunny home stuck onto their legs. If thare iz a lazy one in the hive he gits lynched at once. Lynch law iz the hunny bee’s justiss. Man stole this code from the hunny bees, jist az he haz stole pretty mutch everything else he haz got. Killing oph the lazy may look a little tuff, but after all thare iz something like mercy in it, for it iz the only way known az yet to put an end to their torments. Hunny bees hav a queen, but never a king; this iz a grate compliment to the sex, and iz an argument for “ Wimmin's Rights," which the beleavers in this doktering are welkum to use without giving me kredit for it. The hunny bees are the only nation i kno ov who hav allways had a queen for their ruler, and w’ho hav been more prosperous and hav existed longer than enny people we kno ov< I luv the hunny bees bekause they are allwuss bizzy, and hav a stinger alhvuss hot and reddy for the lazy, and for thoze who poke their noze into their bizzness.— Josh. Billings, in N. Y. Weekly.

Antidote to Hydrophobia.

The artificial excitement which our learned city fathers have managed to create during the past summer by their wise legislation on the subject of vagrant dogs will give interest to the following brief abstract of a paper presented at a recent session of the Medical Society ot Wilna, Poland: It appears that Mr. J. Jitzki had observed during the preceding year that a certain ill-tempered housedog of that city frequently attacked and killed serpents of a venomous description, such as are frequently seen in the environs ; and that after having been bitten by these reptiles he suffered from swelling of the neck and throat. This dog one day encountered another dog in which rabies had fully declared itself, and which had already bitten dogs and cattle which afterward became mad. Having received deep bites from this animal he was shut up and watched, the intentionbeing to destroy him on the first appearance of the symptoms of madness. The dog, however, got welt and remained in perfect health. This fact excited Mr. Jitzki’s surprise. On instituting an inquiry he presently encountered a woman who, having once been bitten by a venomous serpent and afterward by a mad dog, escaped any ill-consequences from the second bite. From thetfe rather narrow data Mr. Jitzki was led to conclude that there is probably pome antagonism between the venom of a poisonous serpent and the virus of a mad dog’s saliva. He imagines some such relation to exist here as between the active principle of contagion in the small-pox and the cow-pox. Supposing this to be case he imagines that immunity from hydrophobia may be secured by inoculating human beings with serpent poison before they have been exposed to the bites of mad dogs. -JCbere are perhaps timid -or fastidious persons who would esteem a remedy like that which is here proposed to be worse than the disease. And others might be disposed to take their moderate chances of death by hydrophobia, which are perhaps about one in one hundred millions, rather than to run she rjsk of going off prematurely by so igrfonjinious a cause as the poison of a serpent, Mr. Jitzki, however, is not disposed to relinquish his hope of being recognized as a second Jenner for lack of perseverance. He notified the society that before leaving the country he had taken measures "’to catch and shut up a considerable number of the poisonous reptiles, to whose bites he intended to submit all animals in his neighborhood which should happen hereafter to be bitten by mad dogs.— New York Times.

Sailing by Kite Power.

The Springfield Union has the following account of an attempt to sail the Connecticut in a small boat drawn by a kite: “At last it was well mounted, and then, the breeze being just a little better than at right angles with their course, the little boat glided merrily into the ‘ teeth’’of the current and almost into the ‘teeth’of the wind. The steam ferryboat was passed with cheers. On, on .went the novel craft so successfully that its crew were almost beside themselves with delight and triumph, and but for the necessity of hugging the bottom of the boat and keeping every faculty fixed" on the management of rudder, paddle and keel as for their lives they would have danced a double-shuffle on the spot. Probably if the boat had had a more prominent keel or had the wind been a point or two more southerly nothing but the old toll-bridge would have stopped the unique voyage; but again, in spite of most deliberate and at the same time desperate efforts, the freshening westerly breeze drew them to the lee shore and close by the building of the New England Card and Paper Company at the foot of Broad street, in this city. The line caught in a talLjtree, and after repeated efforts to make a new start the kite was lowered awav over in a garden some hundreds of yards from the river, and secured without an injury from any of it? numerous bumpings sufficient to make a stitch necessary befbre another trip." ’... '■

Some people complain about their children being non-observing, but we’d like to see the child who won’t observe how the family pie is cut and who gets, the biggest piece.— Detroit Press.

Our Young Folks. THREE LITTLE NEST-BIRDS. Wc meant to be very kind; —————‘ But .il'ever we And Another uoft, gray green, moHS-coated, featherlined nest in a hedge. We have taken a pledge— Susan. Jemmy and I—with remorseful tears, at this very mtuutf. That if there are eggs or little birds in it. Bobin or wren, thrush, chaffinch or linnet, We’ll leave them there, To their mother’s care. There were three of us—Kate and Susan and Jem— And thyee of them — I don’t know their names, for they couldn’t speak ■ .. •' Except with a little imperative squeak Exactly like Poll, Susan’s squeaking doll. But squeaking dolls will lie on the shelves For years and never sqneak of themselves. The reason we like little birds so much better ..... . r •’ -’ ‘j: / Is because they are really alive, and know how to make a noise. There were three, of ns and three of them; Kate—that is I—and Susan and Jem. Our mother was busy making a pie. And theirs, we think, was up in the sky. But for all Susan. Jemmy, or I can tell. She may have been getting their dinner as well. They were left to themselves (and so were we) In a nest in the hedge by the willow-tree. And when we caught sight of three red little flufftufted, hazel-eyed, open-mouthed, pinkt.hrmHed.heatGv.vve.alLahoMei.ferj'lee, The way we really did wring was this: We took them for mother to kiss. And she told us to put them back, While out on the weeping willow their mother was crying, “ Alack"l” We really heard ■ •• - Both what mother told us to do and the voice of the mother-bird. But we three—that is, Susan and I and JemThought we knew better than either of them; And, in spite of our mother’s command and the poor bird’s cry, We determined to bring up her three little nestlings ourselves on the sly. We each took one, „ It did seem such excellent fun! Susan fed hers on milk and bread! Jem got wriggling worms for his instead. I gave mine meat, For, you know', I thought: “Poor darling pet! why shouldn’t it have roast beef to eat?” But, oh dear! oh dear! oh dear! How we cried When, in spite of milk and bread and worms and roast beef, the little birds died! It’s a terrible thing to have heart-ache. I thought mine woulcLbreak As I heard the mother-bird's moan, And looked at the gray-green, moss-coated, feather-lined nest 'she had taken such pains to make, And her three little children dead and cold as a stone. Mother said, and it’s sadly true: “ There are some wrong things one can never undo.” And nothing that we could do or say Would bring life back to the birds that day. The bitterest tears that we could weep Wouldn’t wake them out of their stiff’, cold sleep. But then, We—Susan and Jem and I—mean never to be so selfish and willful and cruel again. And we three have buried that other three In a soft, green, moss-covered, flower-lined grave at the foot of the willow tree. ' : - . And all the leaves which its branches' shed We think are tears because they are dead. —Harper's Bazar.

HOW THE CARS STOPPED.

BY CHARLES BARNARD.

I was waiting for the train to take me to the city. Very soon the engine appeared, far away up the line; and looking like a black speck in the distance. It grew bigger and bigger and came faster and faster toward us, so that I began to think it was an express train and didn’t mean to stop. Just then the engineer began to blow off steam, and with a loud roar the engine swept past and the train came to a sudden stop. “ What lively brakemen they must have on this road!” “ Oh, nd! TVe don’t use brakemen. We have the vacuum-brake,” said the man to whom I spoke. “ There it is under the car.” —“ I looked under one of the cars, and there I saw a round box, made of iron and rubber, and having creases on the sides, just like a bellows when it is shut up. As I looked at it, it seemed to swell out longer and longer, and the creases flattened out smooth, just like the leaves of an accordeon when it is stretched out to its full length. There was an iron rod fastened to the end of the rubber box, and as the box spread open the rod moved backward. This rod, I could see, was fastened to the chain that moved the brakes on the car wheels. Just then the conductor cried, “ All aboard!” and I was obliged to get in and take a seat. 1 thought no more of the vacuum-brake till we came to the next station, when I heard the roaring sound of the steam blowing off on the engine , and felt the brakes holding the train back. We slid softly into the station, and the cars came to a step without any jar and with none of that awkward start andjerk that we feel when the brakemen do not stop all the cars at once. At the next station the same thing happened again. Certainly, the vacuum-brake was a very fine thing.

Let us see just how this contrivance works. Under each car is a bellows. These are joined together by pipes and rubber hose that stretch from car to car, and finally come up through the floor of the engine-cab. When the air is sucked out of the bellows they shut up tight and so pull the brake-chains. Most of you boys and girls understand this. You have heard about a vacuum in the' philosophy class and have seen the experiments with the air-pump in school. A rubber ball cut in halves is a capital thing to show what a vacuum is. Press qne of the pieces on a board or the table, so as to squeeze all the air out and see how it will stick to the table. All around us is the air in which we live and move. When it is pushed or sucked out of any place, it presses on the surface of whatever shuts it out, and thus becomes an actual weight upon it. Under our ball we have a vacuum. In the vacuumbrake they use this pressure of the air to pull the brake-chains and so save the trouble of having a man on each car to turn the brake-wheels every time the train is to stop. In the philosophy class you have seen the teacher use an airpump to obtain a vacuum; but I did not see how they could have an air-pump here to be worked by the engine. It would take up room and be in the way. Besides, our engine Was coming into the station and about to stop, and when it* stopped the pump must stop too and, then the brakes would not work. ‘f Perhaps it would be a good idea to go forward and s>and on the platform of the first car where I could look into the engineer’s cab. The wind blew pretty strong and the cinders flew about in a shower; but I could look right into the engine, and, really; I couldn’t see anything that looked'like an air-pump. Just then a cloud of steam burst out of a small pipe on the top of the cab, and with a deafening roar the engine rolled into another station and came to a stop. x\s the cinders were pretty lively I went back into the car and looked out through the glass door to see the train start. Just therrthe train moved on, and the conductor came round for the tickets. As I gave him mine, I said ;

“You use the vacuum-brake?” “ Yes, sir. It’s a fine thing. It stops the cars quickly and without any bad jerks or strains.” “ How do you obtain the vacuum?” '» “ Oh! The engineer does that.” “Well, how?” “Oh! it’s some kind of exhaust. Don’t you hear the exhaust when she stops?” “Then it is not a pump?” “Oh, no; it’s an exhaust—the exhaust from the-engine.” “Not the waste steam from the engine? I thought that went up the smoke-stack.” “Well, no—you see—it’s exhaust steam. The engineer—he —the fact is, I haven’t looked into it. They get a vacuum with the exhaust—l heard the engineer say so—and that’s all f know about it.” The next station was the end of the route; so I went forward and climbed up into the engine, where ihe engineer sat on his high seat reading the morning jpaper. Now, railway engineers are generally pleasant people to meet. A trifle greasy and grimy, perhaps, but good-natured and sensible. They know everything about cars and engines, and are always ready to talk about their great machines, for they love their iron horses and are alw’ays glad to show them off end to tell hoW they work. As soon as I entered the cab the engineer laid down his paper and very politely asked me what he could do for me. “Tell me about the vacuum-brake, sir. Do you use a pump to obtain the vacuum?” “ Oh, no! We get it by a blast of steam from the boiler. Those two brass pipes on each side of the boiler lead back under the tender and under the cars to the rubber boxes you see under each car. This iron pipe that is joined to the brass pipe near the top of the boiler comes from the boiler. When I turn this crank the steam rushes through it and escapes out of the top of the cab.” “Is that the sound I heard when the train stopped?” “Yes, sir. It sounds just like an ex-haust-pipe, or the safety-valve. Well, as I was saying, it rushes out into the open air, and as it goes it sucks the air out of the brass pipes, and so makes a vacuum. Y’ou see it cannot get down the brass pipe because it is full of air ancTclosed up tight. It can get out through the top, and away it goes, and the air goes with it,, and we get a firstrate vacuum in a jiffy. I tell you, sir, it’s a neat thing, and works to a charm. I can stop any train they please to put behind my engine with just a turn of my finger.” “Then, when you have stopped the train, how do you let the air in again?” “ I shut oft the steam and open this valve, and the air rushes down the pipe where the steam went out, and the boxes under the cars swell up again, just like a pair of bellows when the wind comes in again. Why, sir, it’s just like a boy blowing over a key or a little vial. He blows across the mouth of the vial, and the water or dust or the air in it spurts up in his face. His breath rushing past the mouth sucks the air ont of the vial and makes a vacuum in it. If it is full of water he can see just how it works, for the water will fly up in his face, just as the air flies out of these pipes when the steam blows past the end. Any boy can fill a key with water and see just liow it works.” . This was so very simple that I felt almost ashamed to think that I had not guessed just how it was as soon as I heard the roar of the steam whenever the train stopped. :: .. _ The engineer then explained that the two brass pipes were simply to prevent accident. If one broke down he could use the other. I told the engineer what the conductor had said. He laughed and said: “Law, sir, some folks would go round the world and never see a thing.” — St. Nicholas.

Model Sons.

I must tell you a little story of two little Swiss boys who showed uncommon devotion to their father. He was veryill, and too poor to buy the only medicine that could cure him; so these boys resolved to earn money enough to obtain it. They had heard that an English traveler had offered a large sum for two young eagles who were in an eyrie on the top of a rock, the ascent of which was so difficult and dangerous as to imperil life. Indeed it was considered almost impossible to reach it. Nevertheless these lads determined to try. They arose very early, and climbed the mountain very slowly and carefully, for not only their own lives but their father’s depended on their safety. After long hours of patient toil they succeeded in reaching the nest, and while the old eagles were away they took the young ones and returned joyfully to their village. The traveler paid them the sum he had promised, and their father was restored to health.— Hearth and Home.

A Heroine of the Commune.

The following was related to me yesterday of a noble woman whose should live in history. She, together with her lover, a young surgeon, had taken care of the wounded Communists during the days and nights of their tierce fighting with the Versailles troops. Upon the entry of the latter into the city, when excitement was at its height and when every one suspected of complicity with . the Commune was shot without a question being asked, the surgeon was arrested and brought before the drum-head tribunal in the Place du Chatelet. His life trembled for the moment in the balance, but was finally saved by the intercession of one of the Judges present, who was an intimate friend of the accused. As the latter was being led from the room he met the woman whom he loved, who had helped him in the care of the wounded, and who was now accused of the same crime as himself had been. “Good God, Marie!” he exclaimed, “are you here, too?” The woman took the whole scene in at a glance, saw the danger into which she would plunge her lover should she recognize him, and drew herself up coldly, saying: “YoW' are mistaken, sir.”—JVete iork Evening Post. One cause of accident in blasting but little understood and which applies to powder as well as nitro-glycerine is thus stated: “ The blaster, not aware that he is a walking charge of electricity, proceeds to his work, inserting cartridge after cartridge of nitro-glycerine until he comes to the last, which is armed with the electric fuse. The moipent his hand touches one of the naked Wires the current passes through the priming and explosion follows. 'Let a blaster before he handles these wires invariably grasp some metal in moistened contact with the earth of place both hands uguiust the moist walls of the tunnel.” ■. *