Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 July 1875 — A Fishy Lot. [ARTICLE]

A Fishy Lot.

The fishvomen of Boulogne, says a correspondent of the Chicago Tribune, are a peculiar people, who are to themselves and of themselves apart from the rest of the world save in the business of moneymaking. These women are Amazons in strength and in muscular development. For some reason they have the right to one franc apiece for every article of luggage landed at Boulogne, and dozens of them stand in waiting when the boat arrives, not only to collect their dues, hut to act as porters as well for those who wish trunks, etc., carried to hotels or railway stations. Size or weight seems nevqr to deter them, and such Saratoga trunks as our countrywomen travel with, and such as mark them at once to the European eye as American, trunks heavy enough to demand the sweat of the brow of two or three English porters in lifting, and “tips” all around, are to some of these -women seemingly a mere bagatelle. Old women and young take such trunks upon their backs as if it were but child’s play, and probably wqpder much at the unmitigated horror and surprise with which American women, the most petted and tenderly reared women in the world, look upon this desecration of womanhood into beasts of burden. These womgn are the wives and daughters of fishermen, themselves not fishers, save of shrimps, but venders of fish from door to door and keepers of stalls in the fish market. They live entirely by themselves, in a neighborhood completely apart, and are as separate in habits, interests, social and domestic relations from the rest of the world as if they were a different order of beings. So strong is the feeling of seclusion among them that if a girl ventures to receive the attentions of other than a fisherman she is reprimanded and made to feel the indignation and scorn of all the people among whom she was born. If one marries outside the community, which is so rarely done as scarcely to be known in their history, she is from that time forth ostracized from her people, their contempt is upon her, their hearts are closed against her, and the places which once knew her know her again never more. In the fish market at Boulogne some of these women and girls stand by their stalls for a lifetime, many who now occupy them having followecl grandmother and mother in the same spot.

There is a negro boy at Henderson, Ky„ who, for the hardness of skull, is without a parallel in the State. Last month AVasli Smith (that’s his name) and a companion were out shooting near the railroad, when by some means a disorderly and angry altercation ensued between them, and a struggle soon followed, where-, upon the other negro cocked his gun, and, taking aim at AA’ash's head, discharged a full load of No. 4 hard-shot against this important feature of his constitution. Strange to relate, the shot were hurled back against the aggressive party with such violence as to wound him in several places. Nat so much as even a dent could be detected on any part of Wash’s forehead, although the shot struck him on several places. He was, a week or so after this, passing the base-ball grounds w hen one of the boys offered to give him a cigar providing lie would not object to being struck across the forehead w ith a bat. To this AYash readily assented, and Bill Grayson, who proposed to do the striking, hit him a lick sufficient to fell an ox. ihe negro was hardly staggered by the blow, and now wants to know “ if any pus'on is go; any mo' segars to gib way-.” —Chicago Tribune. * > The ice works of Alacon. Ga., are on the banks of the Qemulgee, the waters of which are so muddy that the fish cannot see to bite. The water is passed through surface condensers and nicely molded in forms of clear and very handsome ice. These machines have a capacity .of making -5,000 pounds a day, and they-are used in many Southern cities, producing ice for the small sum of $6.40 a ton. They met—that,is. she went to the store, And made him turn his department o'er. Till he ' anished behind his goods, and then She pleasantly said she would call again. It is said that the female house-fly never bites.a man. but that isn’t much consolation to a fellow who finds two or three of them in his cup of coffee.