Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 December 1874 — Page 1

HORACE E. JAMES & JOSHUA HEALEY, Proprietors.

VOL. VII.

CHRISTMAS ECHOES. BY GKORGIS COOPER. Oh, sweet bells, chiming everywhere, Waking the keen, blue, frosty skies! Oh, glad aay, beaming crystal fair. Crowning the year that dies! O’er bird-forgotten vale and glen Your happy song sounds once again. Breathing of *• Peace, good-will to me— Good-will to men 1” Echoed along the hurrying years, The self-same words that angels hymned Fall softly on our listening ears 1 And Bethlehem’s star, undimmed, Gleams o’er the lone and gloomy waste, And guides the feet of those who haste Where, lowly, like a star misplaced, The Babe is seen. Echoes the ring of genefous mirth Where loving ones meet round the board, And sparkling eyes make glad the earth, And hearts neat in accord. Heap high the rousing, crackling fire That cleaves the gloom—a golden spire I We’ll laugh to scorn the north wind’s ire, At Christmas time! Echoes—oh, may we heed it still I The cry of homeless, weary ones Who beg the streets, while piercing chill The white storm whirls and moans, When the gaunt wolf, Winter, crouches near, Think of the lives so sad and drear; Oh, to the endless cry give ear—- “ For Christ’s dear sake!” Echoes of those who dream alone, Of Christmas Days long, long ago, When love and beauty round them shone Amid the pearly snow. Oh, still in dreams of dear delight. Though summer days have taken flight, And dark forebodings fill the night— May joy be theirs I Echoes from yonder sweeping seas. Where the swift petrel hears the cry Of wrecked men in their agonies, And storm-wrack blots the sky l God’s pity for the ills that be! Save those who brave for us thessx So may we utter prayerfully, This blessed day! Oh, spirit of this kindly time! Oh, gentle hearts who fondly meet I Oh, bells with ever wakening chime, Bring us your message sweet! „ O’er bird-forgotten vale and glen, Ring out your happy song again, Breathing of “ Peace, good-will to men— Good-wifi to men!”

IN A TRUMPET.

BY ISABELLA T. HOPKINS.

“I know it,” said Miss Pamphylia, answering a rueful glance from Miss Mehitable’s brother; “ still it’s a great comfort to reflect that she could have the trumpet.” Miss Pamphylia certainly had a very Seculiar way of looking at human griefs, he would stand still for one moment of dire dismay and then suddenly illuminate with “reflection” about something that had or hadn’t been, or could be, after all. It always reminded Miss Mehitable’s brother of a cluster of ripe grapes he had noticed one October day when the skies were fitful. For one instant, while a cloud crept over the sun, they hung heavy and dark as the leaden shadow behind them; then, as a quick, strong ray of sunlight pierced the cloud, the red wine that was in them took fire and gleamed and blazed until his very pulses warmed as he looked. He felt them suddenly warming again in just the same way as Miss Pamphylia uttered the words “ she could have the trumpet.” What a thing it would make of life if that “ could” only began with a “w” instead of a “c”! But as it did not, and there wasn’t the least prospect that it ever would; Miss Mehitable’s brother patiently took it with the “ c,” much as he would have hugged a warm soap-stone, if wandering in the dark among the glaciers of the Alps. Miss Mehitable, meanwhile, peacefully unconscious that either of them had said anything, sat gazing into the glowing hearth of coals with a satisfied little smile on’ her face and a fresh-folded handkerchief in her lap. She always did have a fresh handkerchief in her lap—it was so tidy just where the hands lay; and as for her smile, her very features were as likely to disappear. That was because she found life always so pleasant; indeed it contained but two regrets for Miss Mehitable, and it would have been foolishness to let such a minority disturb all the rest. One of these regrets was that Pamphylia did not feel quite inclined to marry Phenix; He had asked her every Thanksgiving Day for ten years in succession—though never until after dinner, for he liked everything hot, and the faintest hope is a warmer sauce than disappointment —but it was of no use. Miss Pamphylia’s inclinations did not quite agree, and the trial was put over till another term, leaving the first part of the evening a little downish, until Miss Pamphvlia regularly brightened with a consoling thought. “ After all,” she said, “it is a great comfort to reflect that he needn’t ask me if he didn’t choose.” “ Don’t be a goose, Phenix,” Miss Mehitable always said, gently, the next morning, to comfort him; and though perhaps he had seemed a little like one pluming himself and picking up his crumbs so many months, only to be slain on this fatal day, still, when Hetty said this he remembered what he really was, and rose from his ashes to begin another year. But it seemed stich a pity about spoiling the evenings, particularly as Miss Pamphylia only came once a year, that she had at last I 'insisted upon a different arrangement. “ Don’t ask me again until I am ready to say yes,” she • said, with the firmest air. “And when will that be?” asked Miss Pamphylia hesitated a moment, and then looked up with a sudden gleam of mischief in her eyes. “ Whenever Hetty asks for* the trumpet,” she said. That was coming very near the second Of Miss Mehitable’s regrets in life, which was simply the miserably indistinct way in which people were allowing themselves to speak the last few years. It was growing upon them, too, instead of improving, until she had really given up expecting to hear anybody unless they came and Spoke directly to her. Then,'of course, they took care to enunciate properly, knowing how much she disapproved the modern carelessness, but the moment they turned away it was all forgotten, and even Phenix and Pamphylia, who were as well brought up as her-

THE RENSSELAER UNION.

RENSSELAER, JASPER COUNTY, INDIANA DECEMBER 24, 1874.

self, did no better than the rest. One said, “ M-m-m-m,” and the other answered, “ M-m-m-m,” and it was only a miracle that they ever made head or tail of each other’s remarks. But Miss Mehitable always preferred her friends should please themselves rather than her; so she sat peacefully by, heard what she could and let the rest go. It was not till the circle of those who attempted proper enunciation had thinned down to the very strong-winded ones, and Miss Mehitable’s replies to even their remarks sometimes fitted about as well as if she had put her own bonnet on Phenix’s head by mistake, that one of the bravest of them ventured a suggestion. Would it not be a little strange if all her friends had lost their voices at once? Might it not be possible that her hearing had lost a trifle of its acuteness? The suggestion was repudiated with only the least perceptible sharpening of Miss Mehitable’s usual gentlefiess, but when Phenix brought home from the city one day, as a delicate offering, an eartrumpet, new in design, graceful and light, she rose to her feet and flamed into such a blaze of indignation as all the rest of her gentle life could hardly sum up.

“An ear-trumpet! Was she to be the scape-goat of everybody’s carelessness, and wear this crooked horn as the badge of it? Deaf? How should she be deaf any more than he was, when their birth‘days were the same ? Would he have the great kindness to carry that instrument into his own room and keep it there, since waste was sinful, until she should ask for it?” It did not seem to Phenix that Pamphylia could say anything this time, but as he passed between her and Miss Mehitable her face brightened. “ Still,” she whispered, “ it’s a comfort to think you’ve increased the regular sale.” The grapes had purpled and been gathered five times since then; to-morrow Woujd be Thanksgiving Day once more, End the ear-trumpet lay on the piano in Phenix’s room, shining and bright as on the first day it had been banished there. “Turkey, of course,” said Phenix, as they sat round the fire after tea, letting the lights and shadows give lessons in blind man’s buff in advance. “ Couldn’t there be anything else for a change? This will be my fifty-fifth in annual regularity.” “And my fiftieth; a real old maid,' laughed Miss Pamphylia, softly. “Nonsense,” began Phenix, with a glance at her bright brown eyes and chestnut hair; but Miss Mehitable turned gently from the fire. “ Oh, yes, dear; they often live to a great age. I remember one allowed to wander in your father’s field that was over a hundred; at least the inscription on its back said so. I suppose it is because they are so slow about everything.” ; “ Not turtles—turkeys,” shouted Phenix. “ Dindons for dinner to-morrow.” “But, please, don’t speak so loud, brother," said Miss Mehitable. “ I like distinctness, that is all. Though I am surprised at your thinking of dandelions, so altogether out of season; and, be sides, cranberry sauce is Latin for roast turkey always.” And Miss Mehitable laid her hands on the folded handkerchief with a peaceful smile. This was what drew the despairing look from Phenix and sent Miss Pamphylia to take refuge in reflecting that Hetty “could have the trumpet?’ Not that they cared in the least on their own account; it was only the thought of tomorrow, when there would be company. They were so proud of Hetty, and couldn’t bear to have her make herself ridiculous.

Nothing seemed less probable as Miss Mehitable took her seat at the table the next day, faultlessly dressed, and smiling benignantly upon every one, with Cousin John, a clergyman of the Methodist persuasion, on her right hand, and a distinguished professor of elocution on her left. “ Pretty strong outposts, and Hetty always (does look well,” thought Phenix, with a sigh of relief, as he took up the ball she had gracefully set rolling, and croquetted it among his neighbors. It flitted about for a while in a velvety way most soothing to his fears, when suddenly, just as his anxiety began to subside, there was a crash at Miss Mehitable’s end of the table, reverberating like a clap of thunder. She had set out on a series of reminiscences with Cousin John, who had just returned after a twenty years’ absence, and he was inquiring at the extreme of his pulpit tones: ’ “Where is the Judge now?” Miss Mehitable nodded and smiled, as she always did when she felt pretty sure, but not quite, that “ O yes” was the right answer. This wouldn’t do, for every one had started at the crash and was listening; so Cousin John tried again. *• The Judge; where is the Judgen&wl" “ Oh, standing on the very same spot,” said Miss Mehitable; “ just on the crown of the hill. Very windy on a cold day and a little conspicuous, but local attachments are strong, you know, and we have worshiped there a great many years.” “Ah," said Cousin John, looking suddenly into his plate, and Phenix told him it would not be New England Thanksgiving if he did not send it up for more turkey; and one began to say what a terrible thinning thete was in the rank and file of the poultry-yards to-day. Miss Mehitable nodded and smiled so appreciatingly that the Professor wondered how Cousin John managed to get into such trouble.

“A tSftible sacrifice among the feathered tribes,” he said; addressing her. “ Oh, very sad!” said Miss Mehitable, with a sudden shadowing of her face. “ I’m afraid very few of them will ever come back. And to think the only return we can make is to decorate their graves' We did a great many last year, and there will be more than’ ever I’m afraid when this campaign is over.” After this it struck Miss Mehitable that the conversation became very general ; so much so that she really could not catch the opportunity to ask Cousin

John as many questions as she would like, or to be particularly polite to the Professor. However, everything seemed going on delightfully, though she noticed the same general carelessness of enunciation; still, she was used to that, and she would catch Cousin John after they returned to the parlor. But Cousin John wasn’t to be caught; he was very busily engaged with so atn one else whenever she passed near him, and, indeed, every one grew very talkative, and even the candles and the firelight seemed to Miss Mehitable gayer than on other nights. “ Strange ways New England people are falling into,” said Cousin John’s nearest neighbor. “ Thanksgiving dinner at 1 early candle-light’ is something equally new and nice.” “ Is it new or old?” asked Phenix, and then came a free discussion of dinnerhours in times past, present and to come. “ I wonder what time Abraham dined?” said Miss Pamphylia, suddenly. Cousin John said that was a tentative question; it would be easier to say what he dined upon; and some one answered: “ Oh, yes, that was on a Mess-o-pot-amian plain.” Miss Mehitable nodded and smiled, but the Professor thought he would make it a little more distinct for her. “We are wondering at what time Abraham dined,” he enunciated, coming ,very close, on pretext of picking up the ’handkerchief which had slipped from her lap. “ Oh, he dined at four o’clock; I was intimately acquainted with him,” said Miss Mehitable, a glow of pleasant recollection suffusing her gentle face. But, at the same moment, she caught a very peculiar one on the Professor’s; she glanced at Cousin John’s. Was it possible the turkey had not agreed with him that he was looking so very red? She looked at Phenix —he was white; Pamphylia was blue, and the rest were all looking the other way. A sudden and dreadful suspicion seized Miss Mehitable. A professor of elocution must enunciate well; if she had misunderstood him whose fault must it be? “ Cousin John,” she said, turning toward the white necktie that had eluded her so many times that evening, “who did you understand the Professor to speak of ?” “Abraham,” replied Cousin John, with truth and distiuctness united in tremendous force. ’ts’ “ Did you, Pamphylia?” Miss Pamphylia, and, one after another, Phenix and all the rest, nodded assent. Two round red spots came into Miss Mehitable’s cheeks, and she dropped her hands on the handkerchief with a gesture of surrender. Then she looked up with the unfailing smile. “Then, Phenix, will you have th£’ kindness to bring that instrument you have been keeping in your room for me?” Phenix cast one leok at Miss Pamphylia. She stood petrified, and her brown eyes seemed leaping after him as he left the room. Hetty had asked for the trumpet! But by the time he came back Miss Pamphylia had vibrated to a “ reflection,” and found her balance again “ Still,” she was saying to herself, “it is a great comfort to feel that it will be keeping a promise; and I’ve got on my new black silk, and Phenix is a great deal too good for me—that is the only trouble.” “ Now, Phenix,” said Miss Mehitable, inserting the trumpet in her ear, “ let me hear something pleasant through this, if you can.” He looked once more at Miss Pamphylia. Her eyes shone this time, and he went across to her with the tread of a conqueror. With his right hand he led her to Miss Mehitable, the left he raised the mouth of the trumpet to his lips. “If you will give us your blessing and allow Cousin John to perform the ceremony, I believe we are ready," he said. It is strange how much less time it requires to do things than to get ready for ■them- It did not seem five minutes to Miss Pamphylia before it was all over, and Phenix was showing the last guest out at the front door. Miss Mehitable sat holding the trumpet as if she would never let it go again. I“ If I had only had sense enough to ask for it five years ago!” she said; “ But 1 do hope, Pamphylia, you will find it pleasant having a husband at last!" Miss Pamphylia grew suddenly serious. “ I don’t know,” she murmured, over the edge of the trumpet; but in a moment her face cleared and shone into Miss Mehitable’s. “ But if I shouldn't, it will be a great comfort to me to reflect that I have lived single as long as Lhave!” she said. —Scribner'4 Monthly. —A little advice to farmers. Help your wives in every way you can, trivial though it may seem to you. For instance, keep an extra pair of shoes or slippers in the hall or entry, and always remember to change your dirty boots before entering her clean rooms. Then you may be sure of a smile of welcome, as no dirt will be left after you for her to clean up. In the evening comb your uair as carefully as ever you did in your courting days, put on a clean coat or dressinggown, and when you take your paper to read do not read to yourself and leave her to lonesome thoughts while sewing or mending, but remember that she, too, has been working hard all day, and is still working. Read to her whatever interests you, so that her interest and opinions may grow with yours, and that she may comprehend something besides love stories, of which too. many have read more than they should. You will both be happier, and being a farmer’s or mechanic’s wife will not be such a dreadful •'tiresome and lonely life as many girls have every reason to think it is.—Massachusetts Ploughman. —A Shawmut avenue grocery store is ornamented by a new placard which reads: “My Back is Up! Fresh milk only six cents a quart!”— Boston Globe.

John Quincy Smith's True Love.

Monday afternoon a young man named John Quincy Smith, who works in a carriage factory, called upon Justice Potter and asked His Honor to appear at a certain house on Macomb street at a certain hour that evening and wed two fond hearts together. “ The Court" said he’d be on time, and he was, but he found the lover looking disconsolate and the bride’s mother looking flushed and annoyed. “ Isn’t this the place where I was to come and unite two sympathetic souls?” inquired Mr. Potter in an anxious voice, thinking he might have made a mistake. “ You =>ee, I’ll tell you how it is,” explained cue old lady. “ Betsey Jane’s young and foolish and she’s afraid some one will make fun of her if she gits married.” His Honor thought it was rather strange and went off feeling about as blue as the lover felt. Wednesday morning John Quincy entered Justice alley again to tell Mr. Potter that he could come up to the house that evening and that there wouldn’t be any backing out again “It’s dead sure, is it?” asked His Honor. “ You can bet on it,” replied John Quincy— 1 * bet a hundred to one.” His Honor was on hand again at the appointed hour and he found the lover and the mother looking about as sad as before. The girl herself was concealed behind the door and as soon as Potter entered the mother pulled the door back so as to expose the hider and exclaimed: “Now, then, Judge, look at her—look at the big booby, and see what a fool she is making of herself!” The girl made a skip and jumped under the center table, and from thence shouted back: “ I hain’t any more of a fool than you are, and you know it!” * “Then why don’t you come out and git married?” asked the parent. “ Do you s’pose I want to be made fun of?” squeaked the daughter. After awhile the Justice put in his voice, telling the girl that it was the lot of women to marry; that she’d live a happy life, and that it wouldn’t take two minutes to tie the knot. “Come, Betsy Jane!” called the mother. “ Come, my own love!” pleaded John Quincy. ~ “ Come, my dear girl!” added the Justice, raising the table-spread and extend 1 ing his hand. “Oh, go away!” she sobbed, hands over her face, “go away and leave me here to die! I can’t bear to think of gittin’ jined and leavin’ mother!” They coaxed and pleaded and scolded, but Betsey Jane was firm, and she was still resting under the table when His .Honor left. John Quincy put on his hat and walked down the street a piece, and when Potter remarked that he guessed there wouldn’t be any marrying in that house the young man responded: “ That’s what I think, and I wouldn’t turn my hand over if I knew that a buzzsaw was a coming slap for me.”— Detroit Free Press.

Tying Up Bundles.

There is one kind of a package that the non-professional mancannot do up without losing his temper and profaning the hallowed radiance and the peaceful quiet of the day with immoral remarks. That is a bundle of shoes. He goes to the store and watches the deft motions of the clerk who ties up half a dozen pairs, more or less, in one great symmetrical package for the unhappy man to take home to his wife and daughter. Of course not a single pair will do; there never was an instance of such a thing happening yet. So when the man gets ready to go down to the office the next morning his wife tells him that he’ll have to take those shoes back, and she guesses that they will go down to the store in the afternoon and get fitted there. And to this his daughter adds a sarcastic remark about bringing home shoes that he could use fbr a cistern cover. The man asks if the shoes are ready and his wife says yes, she tied them up last night. She then brings him a great shapeless package, wide open at both ends, and a ream of paper pinned around the middle. If woman suffrage ever does carry and a woman is elected Sheriff, when she has to hang a man she will pin the rope around his neck. Words cannot describe the snort of contempt with which the man pulls out those ridiculous pins and rolls a small colony of shoes on the table. It is only equaled by the calm complacency with which he tells hjs wife to “ gim’me that string." and proceeds to tie up the bundle store fashion. As he proceeds with the work he is; a little disconcerted to observe what a huge mass four pairs of shoes will make. It didn’t look nearly as big at the store. He piles them up first with the toes all the same way, and the first movement he makes to wrap the paper around them they shoot out, heelward, like a morrocco avalanche. Then he builds them up, heels and toes, and laying them on the sheets of thin paper like the clerk did begins to roll them up. They bulge out away from him and he makes a sudden dive at them that starts a rent in the paper. Then they begin to out at one end and he drives them in with a blow and a remark that sends them out at the other. By this time he has come to the end of the first sheet of wrapping paper, which comes up with a sudden flip, shoots clear over the pile and spreads out bn the other side, and there the shoes are, just where he began with them. The mah dtoesn’t lost his patience yet; he only says to his wife and daughter that he’d “ like to know what under the sun they’ve been doin’ to them shoes,” and rearranges the paper for another start. He is a trifle nervous and has more trouble to ~ keep the shoes in their places: they bulge and slip and buckle, but he gets them rolled up at last. He puts one end of the string between his teeth and, lifting the package gingerly, passes the string underneath it and is reaching around it a second time when the mass develops alarming symptoms of a general disintegration, and the man

clasps it to his bosom and throws his arms around it and leans forward on the table with it, and the next minute shoes foam out all over him, under bis arms and between his fingers and over his shoulders. It occurs to him that he never thought there were so many shoes in the world as come tearing out of that paper. Then he does get mad. He says: “ Gim’me that newspaper,”- and be makes a kind of a cone out of it, and shoots the shoes into it and bends down the ends and flattens in the corners, and chucks it against the wall, and sits on it to bring it into shape, and ties it up with yards of string, and flatters himself that if it is big nobody can tell what is in it. But before he gets to the first corner he is making furious clutches at fluttering corners of the paper, and he goes through the streets at last with all the shoes in the bundle staring at the passers-by through grinning apertures innumerable in the paper. And when the shoe-man looks at those shoes he is ready to swear that some one has slept in every pair of them, or else that they have been dropped into a feed-mill. The man who has not been educated to it from early infancy cannot tie up a bundle of shoes.— Burlington Hawk-Eye.

Brought to Justice.

Readers of the Globe may perhaps remember the account, which was published a little over a year ago, of the robbery of Mr. Walter Grayson, a prominent citizen of the Creek Nation. Mr. Grayson, or “ Uncle Wat,” as he was familiarly called, was possessed of a good deal of wealth, which he had'accumulated by a strict attention to business and the practice Of rigid economy. He was known throughout the whole Creek Nation, and held in high esteem by all who once formed his companionable acquaintance, so that the robbery, and the circumstances attending it, raised a storm of indignation which it took months to quiet. About the time alluded to a stranger called at the residence of Mr. Grayson and, by representing that he was endeavoring to purchase a number of ponies, managed to obtain permission to remain at his house during his stay in that neighborhood. The stranger seemed to the kind old man to be a first-rate sort of a fellow, and he had no hesitation in giving his friendship and telling him a number of his secrets. He little knew that he was entertaining a member of the squad of Gad’s Hill Cavalry, whose exploits were the talk of the whole country; but it only took him a few days to find out his mistake. One morning the stranger was joined by hfs comrades, and the old man was taken out, a halter placed around his neck, and he was suspended from a tree until life was nearly extinct, his captors telling him, as they proceeded with their work, that they wowd kill him unless he told them where he had his money concealed and allowed them to make off with it. But Mr. Grayson had the courage to meet death, if he must, sooner than comply with such a demand, and he stubbornly refused to disclose the hiding-place of his treasure. After keeping him pendent from the tree until his face became black and blue and he was almost dead, they cut him down and tried persuasion for a time, when, finding this method useless, they would again resort to the hanging torture. It made no difference to the old man, however, what they did: his stubborn will would not permit him to succumb, and the robbers were at length, much to their disgust, forced to leave him. But their devilish ingenuity hit upon another plan. Mr. Grayson had a wife whom he fondly loved, who had been his daily companion for years, and they knew that if her life was attempted the old man would "yield, and they would secure the money. The old lady was then taken from the house and the baiter tied around her neck in the presence of her prostrate and helpless husband, and the villains were in the act of hanging her to a tree when Mr. Grayson’s courage, will, everything failed him. and he told them to leave him his wife and they could have his money. The whole party then returned to the house, where Mr. Gravson turned over to them the sum of $32,000, $28,000 of which was in gold, with which handsome amount they immediately made off. The stranger who remained at Mr. Grayson’s house was named Wilder, and he was the leader of,the gang who aided him in the robbery. He has recently been arrested in Texas, and is now confined in the jail at Fort Smith, Ark., awaiting his trial in the United States Court for the crime. Soon after his arrest Mr. Grayson was sent for and identified him, beyond the shadow of a doubt, as the man who stopped at his house under the pretense of being engaged in buying ponies, and the one, also, who put the halter around his head when the gang hanged him Wilder, finding that there is no possibility of escaping conviction, has made a confession, and acknowledges the crime charged upon him, but he asserts that he was prompted to the deed by a noted Cherokee citizen, who took the greater part of the booty himself, and gave him (Wilder) only $450 for his services. He also says that one of the gang who aided him in the robbery was the noted Reed, who was killed in Texas not long since by Detective Morris, who had been on his trail for several months. Reed was once a citizen of Vernon County, Mo., and was one of the men connected with Wilson and sent to the ' Penitentiary from Henry County for robbing an old farmer, several years ago, near Lamonte, in Pettis County. The authorities are now at work hunting up*evidence against the Cherokee citizen alluded to, and, if Wilder’s story is truer he will be made to suffer the severest penalty that the law can inflict. There haji been a good deal of talk among the friends of Mr. Grayson of dealing in a rather suipmary manner with Wilder, but the jail authorities will prevent any interference with due course of law.—St. Louis Globe, Dec. *l. —Baltimore hoists the flag for the meanest man. He steals wreaths off the graves in the cemetery Ind sells them.

SUBSCRIPTION; $9.00 a Year, in Advance,

The following very singular occurrence took place at Flint and Mount Morris simultaneously on a recent date, the truth of which is well vouched for: Two persons, one a white man, the other a negro, died at points distant from their homes; the bodies were forwarded to their friends, and the coffins in the course of their transit came aboard the same train, whence they were delivered at the respective stations. The funerals at each place were in waiting; the colored people received the body of their fallen brother, and the mourners sadly followed it to the church, where they listened to a pathetic discourse. When the speaker had concluded his sermon the coffin was opened, and, horror of horrors! the sable African was found to be bleached out perfectly white. The short, crisp hair had given place to the long, straight locks of the Anglo-Saxon, the features were European, and the general semblance was that of a fullblooded white man. The consternation, horror, and superstition of the distressed mourners and friends of the departed colored man were boundless as they gazed with amazed countenances upon the face of the dead, so suddenly and unaccountably metamorphosed into that of a white man. That was at Flint. As soon as reason could assert its sway it became evident that there must be a mistake somewhere, and that the right man had somehow got off at the wrong station, and the corpse was immediately boxed up again and carried back to the depot, where it was ascertained that at the time of the delivery of the coffin to the colored mourners there were two coffins on board, and the corpses had merely been exchanged. At Mount Morris a scene was enacting similar to that described at Flint; at the close of the services the mourners gazed with agonized features upon the horrible spectacle before them. In the coffin lay, not the form of the loved friend whose ftmeral services had thus far been performed, but that of a stalwart negro! The feelings of the afflicted relations and friends can be better imagined than described. Matters, however, soon became understood, and a telegraphic dispatch was received from the managing officer of the Flint & Pere Marquette Railway explaining things. The corpses were exchanged, and representatives of both nationalities finally had the satisfaction of receiving their own dead for interment. The apparent fearful discoloration of the white and the unaccountable bleaching out of the colored man was now no longer a mystery, and the friends were relieved of any superstitious anxiety that might have attended the circumstances. The baggage-man whose gross blunder in the delivery occasioned the difficulty was promptly discharged. — Adrian (Mich.) Press.

A paper in Pittsfield, Mass., relates the following: ‘ * They were trying a ‘ horse case’ in court the other day, and the lawyer was questioning a witness in reference to the animal’s habits and disposition. ‘Haveyou ever driven her?* was asked. ‘I have,’ was the reply. ‘ Was there any one with you at the time,?’ was the next question. * There was a lady with me,’ the witness answered, and he blushed a little. ‘ Was she a good driver?’ was the next question, the lawyer referring to the animal, but the witness understood that he meant the lady. ‘ She was,’ he replied. * Was she gentle and kind?’ asked the legal limb, and the reply was in the affirmative, though the witness, still thinking of the lady, looked a little surprised. “She didn’t kick?’ was the next interrogation, and a decisive ‘No’ was the answer. ‘ She didn’t rear up or kick over the traces, or put her hind feet through the dash-board, or try to run awav, or act ugly, or’ —the witness was boiling over with indignation by this time, and interrupted the lawyer with, Do you mean the horse or the lady?’ ‘ I mean the mare we’re talking about,’ thundered the counsel. ‘ Oh!* was the response, ‘ I thought you meant the gal.* And with this explanation the pursuit of justice was resumed.”

Among the unpleasant facts observed by Sir Samuel Baker in his wanderings on the shores of the White Nile was one similar to that recorded by the African traveler Bruce, who declared to an unbelieving public that the Abyssinians cut beefsteaks from living cattle. He found that it is the practice in a certain district to remove the humps of the native buffaloes while the animals are alive, and that the meat thus obtained being much valued this horrible, operation is repeated several times during the lives of the miserable creatures. This is disgusting enough and the people guilty of such methods of increasing the meat supply are no doubt steeped in cruelty and bloodshed; but a traveler from Unyoro might, had he been in Glasgow the other day, nare turned the tables on white critics and pointed to an ugly sight in Christian and civilized England. Here a charge was lately proved against an engineer gs having cruelly tortured a dog by putting it into a pot over the fire, filled or partly filled with boiling water, and allowing the animal to remain there howling and barking until the hair, skin and flesh were about to separate from its bones, when it died. It was also stated by witnesses that they found the defendant standing looking'at the poor brute struggling in the pot and askingit to give an Recount of itself now. We could wish in the case of its trial that the venue has been changed to Africa, where, if the law had taken cognizance of the ofiense at all, its majesty would have been vindicated with a hippopotamus whip instead of a fine of twenty-one shillings or fourteen days* imprisonment —Pall MM Gazette. —The weather-wise say that the first three days of December forecast the succeeding winter season. If that be the case we are to have a very moderate winter.

NO. 14.

An Awkward Mistake.

A Puzzled and Indignant Witness.

Horrible Cruelty.