Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 October 1875 — Page 8

Bob.

“Bob Noyes, do stop your racket Nobody can have a minute’s peace if you are within hearing.’’ Bob’s face flushed scarlet, and he laid down the hammer, leaving the hail half driven. He turned the toy wagon he had been Working on over and over, with a wistful look which told of a pitiful heartache. It was a pretty toy wagon in his eyes. and he made even’ bit of it himself, sad if he could only drive six nails more -it would be finished. But there must be no racket, so he laid it away carefully, and going into one corner of the yard stretched himself under a tree, and kick- * ing the turf with his heel pondered over his many troubles. His mother had said there was no peace for anybody if he was within hearing; but oertainl.v there was no peace for him anywhere about home. He had slipped into the parlor after dinner, and was having a good chat with Mrs. Somers, and she was telling him of three wonderful black and white spotted poppies at her house, when Sister Jennie came in and asked him what he was imposing on Mrs. Somers for.. He wasn’t imposing. Mrs. Somers said so. Guess he could talk as well as Jennie, if she was eighteen two months ago. But Jennie made him leave the room without learning how the littlcst and prettiest spotted puppv got out of the cistern when he fell in. Maybe he didn’t get out. Bob kicked harder and wished he knew. After liis ejection from the parlor Bob started to the garret to console himsell bv rocking in the old-fashioned reu cradle Grandmother Noyes rocked papa and Uncle John in, but Nell and the boys would not let liifti in; they were getting up surprise tableaux and “ didn’t want any little pitchers around.” He sought Ins father’s study to look at an illustrated edition ot natural history.. But papa objected; ‘‘he couldn’t have Bob in there making a disturbance.” Almost heart-broken lie turned to his mother’s room. “Go right away, you will wake the baby,” met him at the threshold. He looked into the kitchen and begged to help make pies, but Bridget told him to clear out. He next went to the woodliouse and sought to assuage Ins sorrows by working on bis wagon, and now he was forbidden that. He could not understand why he was driven from everything; he had not been a bad boy and lost his temper. It was beyond bis six-year-old philosophy. Ills poor little brain puzzled over what older children called “certain inalienable rights” without finding a solution of bis troubles or coming to a conclusion. Had he been strong-minded he might have called a convention and declared that m the present order of things little boys have no rights which big folks are bound to respect, and dratted petitions for a change; but he was sensitive and submissive and let people snub him and trample on liis toes without remonstrance. The tea-bell roused him from' liis cup of bitter, puzzled thoughts. “ Bob, come to supper.” He wouldn’t have so wait, that was some consolation. At the table Mrs. Noyes was telling Mrs. Somers about a troup of performing monkeys. “ One of the monkeys with a striped tail, played on the violin, and ” “ Mamma, it was ring-tailed,” interrupted Bob, eager to have the account exact. “ Bob, how many times have I told you not to interrupt ?" Bob subsided, but he knew it was ringtailed, for lie had Counted the rings and had watched it half an hour while his mother gossiped with Mrs. Layton. “ All the monkeys turned somersaults when the keeper played Captain Jinks," continued Mrs. Noyes. “ Mamma, it wasn’t Captain Jinks, it was ‘Oh, varc is myne little tog.’ ” “ Bob, if 3’ou talk any more at the table I’ll send you to bed.” Bob was correct, and he knew it; he could whistle like a mocking-bird, while Mrs. Noyes did not know one tune from j another.* The two reproofs in the presence of Mrs. Somers was too much for his sensitive, bashful temperament, and mortified him beyond self-control. His little fingers trembled and dropped a glass of water, spilling its content i upon the cloth. “ Bob, where’s your manners? Leave the table instantly!" commanded his fattier. The children all laughed, and Jennie called Bob an “ill-mannered little boor,” and the mortified little fellow crept sadly into bed and sobbed until he fell asleep. This boy’s experience was a fair sample of Bob's whole boyhood. He must not sing, whistle, shout, ask questions or pound,"yet he must keep liimselfkandy to run on errands and pick up chips. He must not talk to company, lor little boys are to be seen and not heard—he must not have any company of his own, because he did not know liow to behave properly. The idea that Bob had any feelings or rights was not tolerated. The family did not intend to act unjustly; they loved Bob, but they were selfish and did not want to be disturbed, and Bob was noisy, and such an inveterate talker and questioner if given liberty. He was clothed and led, and sent to school and to church and Sunday-school; surely that was all duty required. Bob made a discovery after a while. He could pound and saw ana bang as much as he pleased in Tom Smith’s carpenter shop. Smith’s wild, half-dissipated apprentice made a discovery, top—that bashful Bob Noyes had a wonderful faculty for saying witty tilings, and for whistling and singing when lie became ac quainted—ana they coaxed him off more man once to enliven the evenings at the “Excelsior” and “ Star” saloons. They were blind as moles at home until * reckless, almost criminal, deed, committed during the tumultuous period between boyhood and manhood, showed them that Bob’s young life was being oteeped in degradation and sin. They wept bitterly, but not in sackcloth and ashes. Wrapt in self-righteousness, they shifted the responsibility from their own shoulders, and as he went from bad to worse washed their hands of that unavoidable family affliction—-a black sheep. Crusader.

Feminine Duplicity in Burlington.

It was a South Hill girl. No other human divinity could play such a heartless trick on an admiring, nay, an adoring and adorable, young man. *He always praised the flowers she wore, and talked so learnedly about flowers in general that this incredulous young angel put up a job upon him, if one may be so sacrile- , gious as to write slang in connection with so much/ beauty and grace. She filled the bay-window with freshly-potted weeds which she had laboriously gathered from the sidewalk and in the hollow under the bridge, and when he came around that evening she led the conversation to flowers andjujr admirer to the bay-windotC. “ Such lovely plants she had,” she told him, and he just clasped his hands and looked around him in silly ecstacy, trying to think of their names.

“ This Patagonia influensis,, Mr. Bogardus,’’ she said, pointing to a miserable cheat of a young rag weed—“ did you ever see anything more delicate?” , “ Oh,” he ejaculated, regarding it rgvererentially, “fteat/tilul, 6«<iutifuT; what del icHtely-serrated leaveg.” “And," she went on, withaface ascalm and angelic as though she was only saying “ Now I lay me down to sleep," “It breaks out in the summer in such curious green blossoms clinging to long, slender stems. Only think of that—green blossoms." And she gazed pensively upon the young man as though she saw something green that probably never would blossom. . ” “Wonderful, wonderful indeed,” he said; “one can never tire of botany. It continually opens to us new worlds of wonders with every awakening flower and unfolding leaf.” “ And here,” she 6aid, indicating with her snowy fingers a villainous sprout of that little bur the boys call “beggar’s lice,” “ this mendicantis parasibihs, see wliat " . “ Oh,” he exclaimed, rapturously, “where did you get it? Why, do you know liow rare it is ? I have not seen one in Burlington since Mrs. O’Glieminie went to Chicago. She had such beautiful species of them, quite a charming variety. She used to wear them in her hair so often.” “No doubt,” the angel said, dryly, and the young man feared Tie bad done wrong in praising Mrs. O’Gheminie’s plants so highly. But the dear one went on and, pointing to a young jimson weed, said: “ This is my pet, this Jimeonata Filiosenis.” The young man gasped with the pleasure of *a true lover of flowers as he bent over it, in admiration, and inhaled its nauseous odor. Then he rose up and said: “ This plant has some medicinal properties.” “Ah?” she said. “ Yes,” he replied, stiffly, “it has. I have smelled that plant in my boyhood's days. Wilted on the kitchen-stove, then bruised and applied to the eruption, the leaves are excellent remedial agents for the poison of the wild 117." He strode through the smiling company that was gathered in the parlor and said, sternly: “ We meet no more,” and, seizing her father’s hat from the rack, he extinguished himself in it and went banging along the line of tree-boxes which lined his darkened way.— Burlington Hawk-Eye.

City “Shoppers.”

Every one connected with a dry-goods establishment knows them. _ They come sailing into a store with an air "well calculated to convey the impression that their resources are unlimited amT that the purchases tliey make will require a special conveyance for delivery. It is only the unpracticed eye, however, which is deceived by them. The advent of one of them is a source of misery to the clerk un. fortunate enough to be singled out as a victim. He knows that the department over which he presides will in a few moments be a scene of confusion; that article after article will have to be displayed, examined andcommented upon; that he will have to submit to an ordeal of cross-ex-amination equal to any inflicted upon a prisoner at the bar of justice, and that he is debarred the privilege of which prisoners often avail themselves of making sharp or pertinent retorts. He must be all smiles and attention to a woman whom he intuitively knows—if he has not learned the fact from dear experiencehad not the remotest idea when she honored the store with a visit of making a purchase more extensive than a paper of pins, or who, perchance, may have made the matching of an almost unattainable shade of antique goods the pretext for an examination of an innumerable variety of articles. These “shoppers,” as they are called, apparently delight in producing disorder. For them the regular “opening day’’ has no particular attractions. Employers and clerks are then fully prepared to receive them, aud would only be too happy to spread out the novelties of the season for their inspection. But they prefer to wait until the customary rush is over—until everything is again in its place, and the admirable system which prevails in a well ordered dry goods store has again been established. *” Then they come out. and have, as it were, an opening day all to themselves, while the poor clerk* behind the counter suffers martyrdom. “Will it wash?” they ask of this piece of goods ; “will this hold its color?” of anotner; and so on through a labyrinth of questions, paying no heed whatever to the answers, though they would be greatly incensed were they not treated with all deference and prompt replies made to their inquiries. When they have fully satisfied their curiosity—if their propensity for overhauling can be so denominated—they sail out of the establishment as if they had done some node action, and as if tliey had placed everyone, from proprietor to call-boy, under everlasting obligations. As likely as not they leave one store to enter a* rival house, where they go through the same operation, using the knowledge they acquired at the first establishment cited for the purpose at the second of “ cheapening” fabrics which they really have no desire ()f possessing. It is related of a woman who had acquired some slight notoriety for her achievements as a “ shopper” that, having made some purchases in one establishment, she immediately bent her steps to a neighboring one. Here she journeyed from one counter to another, each one she left being littered in promiscuous heaps after her, until finally she had made a complete tour. Then turning to the clerk who had last waited upon her she condescended to explain: “ I bought some tilings at Blank & Blank’s, you know, and I thought I would just run in here and see if I had been cheated.” And there that woman had spent the stood part of an afternoon pawing over and pulling at dry goods of every conceivable kind, consuming as much time as twenty customers would have done, putting everybody to as much trouble as she possibly could, and all for the purpose of seeing: if she had been cheated in some trivial purchase at another place. It is no wonder that the “ shopper” is recognized by the clerk as a veritable nuisance; but she has her uses for all that. Ifßhe is not a source of profit to the merchaij|, she at least takes especial pains to give his employes opportunities for the exercise of patience and courtesy; and for fb£cultivation of these qualities on the part of dry-goods salesmen she is largely responsible. —Detroit Free Free*. —lt happens, after all, that Prof. Tice’s forecast of the weather was quite correct, except, perhaps, that it was a little too forecast. This Galveston gale has beerf* identified as the one he promised to bring on in the latter part of August. It isltd cut across the Gulf States, then fly up the Atlantic coast, and finally shoot across the Atlantic from some point about the mouth of the SL Lawrence.

The Desert of Sahara.

Now that the idea of turning the Desert of Sahara into an inland sea has been broached some geologists are remonstrating against the plan; urging that it would tend to reduce the temperature of the climate of Europe and bring on another glacial period. Within a few weeks Mr. Kinahan, of the Geological Survey of Ireland, has written to the London Timet “ that it is well known that the hot south winds from Africa have a material effect on the snow and ice of South Europe, and in those years that there is a continuation of winds from this-quarter the snow-line is raised, while the glaciers retreat further up the valleys than ordinanr. From this it appears probable, as has befen suggested by an eminent geologist, that the retreat of the ice and the snow into the higher portions of the European mountains followed the drying up of the sea that A once occupied the Sahara Desert. The hot winds generated on the large expanse of sand thus exposed have altogether changed the climate of Europe. If the suggestion above-mentioned is correct it would appear that the inundation of the Sahara, if practicable, would affect not only Africa but also Europe. It should, therefore, be inquired: Would the climate of South Europe be sochanged that eventually the snow-line would descend tp its ancient limits; that considerable portions of Italy, Spain, France, Switzerland, etc., would be enveloped in perpetual snow; while the Rhine, Danube, and other rivers would he changed into great glaciers?” Geologists are more ready nowadays than formerly to perceive the slight changes in the contour and physiognomy of a country, and varying portions between masses of land and water may bring about important changes in climate ancl the distribution of animals and plants. It strikes us, however, that the notion expressed in the above quotation is based on a too narrow view of the subject. There are probably few geologists who could be induced to say that the glacial period in Europe was brought on by changes in Northern Africa. They rather look to Northern and Arctic Europe and Asia. On the other hand, we believe, if the matter was canvassed among leading European geologists, few would be willing to acknowledge that a partial glacial epoch, such as is indicated above, could be brought back by turning the Sahara into an inland sea. ' The wind that blows over the Sahara is tempered by the Mediterranean, and greatly lowered in temperature by the time it reaches the Apennines and Alps. We have felt tlie hot breath of the sirocco on the slopes of Vesuvius. As this same wind sweeps over the Apennines and Alps, it undoubtedly tends to produce the heavy annual rainfall of the southern slopes-of the Alps, which amounts from sixty to ninety inches a year; and the great precipitation of snow which feeds the Alpine glaciers may be largely owing to the influence of this/e/m, as the sirocco is called, in the form it appears in Swiss valleys. Possibly the change of the Sahara into an inland sea might so reduce the rainfall of the Italian and Swiss Alps that the glaciers would actually diminish. At all events the climate of Northern Europe and of the plains about Vienne would not be much affected by the change. Here th&lowering of the climate would be due to a change in tlie climate of Northern Europe and Asia. Probably while the Sahara was in times a Bea, the rhinoceros, mammoth and cave bear and other quaternary animals lived about the foot of the Alps, and in summer were fanned by the moist and temperate, not hot and dry, south winds blowing over the well-watered basin of the Sahara, and tlie Mediterranean Sed, and the Italian lakes.— AT. Y. Tribune.

High Heels.

A cursory view of the customs of society or of some neighborhoods might convince one of the truth of the doctrine of depravity (total or otherwise), or at least of the itlea that many persons are apparently trying to do as much violence as possible to this physical organism so “ fearfully and wonderfully made.” This thought is naturally suggested by an acquaintance with many of the prevailing customs and fashions of the present day, prominent among which, as illustrating prevailing follies, is the high-heel fashion. We cannot avoid the conclusion that the human foot was original ly made just right, and that ease in locomotion, not only for man but for the low T er orders resembling man iu structure, is best secured by the original form of the foot. In other words, if a high heel is really necessary for ease in walking the Creator would have placed a prominence on this part of the foot corresponding with the “hump” of the camel. But such a hump would now be regarded as a deformity, a malformation, if inside of the boot. The most that we can claim in this respect is that a broad, low heel may be of service in rapid walking, but experience and observation can but teach us that heels worn by both sexes are a nuisance, if worn as the manufacturers intend. Many of these are so high and so small at the top that walking—naturally a fine exercise, among the best—generally becomes irksome, a task, and proauclive of many, many deformities and ailments. It is not t@o much to say that most of the deformities —of which so little is known in savage and barbarious life —such as corns, bunions, incurvation of the nails, sprained and deformed ankles, the misplacement and crooking of the toes, etc., are attributable to this cruel custom. In the words of a medical writer: “ Fashion is at best a cruel tyrant; but the whole history of her capricious rule does not exhibit a grosser violation of natural laws, and a more unpardonable assault on the beauty and health of woman, than the invention of high-heeled boots.” If the natural position of the foot is the best for comfort r and ease of motion, it is evident that any elevation of the heel above its natural position must crowd the foot forward into the boot, resting too much of the weight of the body on the fore-part of the toot, crowding the toes into the front of the boot, of course chafing them and in a variety of ways doing violence to the foot, of course deforming them and making business for a class of men now in demand, the chiropodists. Lameness, sprains, turned ankles and distortions in general are the inevitable results, and most of the wearers of these know die sact —at least in some degree—yet these high heels are still tolerated, high heels versus brains. Custom rules, at least, a certain class, compelling such to submit to arrant cruelty. —Christian Monitor. The Boston editor said he vftote as plain as could be, “ The sacred heavens around him shine,” when the blasted ' printer went and made it, i “ The scared hyenas around him whine!” Bayard Taylor says that there is alcohol in fresh bread, but one has to eat 180 loaves before he imbibes enough of the liquid to feel happy. I

Fashion Report.

WEDDING DRESSES. A great many trousseaux are made in September for the weddings that take place later in the autumn. The new fabrics for wedding-dresses are creamy-white brocaded silks, or else white with the faintest pink tinge, covered with brocaded white roses. There are also very rich white velvets with blocks and broken plaids ot hedvy pile, and also matelasse velvets with raised leaf and arabesque patterns. White rose brocaded silks in cream and in snow tints are $7 a yard; those with scroll and leaf pattern are |6. Some of these rich bridal dresses are made in princesse sEape. They are quite plain as low down as the knee, but below this they are richly flounced with plain gros grain and lace. Others are made with a long cuirass basque with sleeves of point lace, or else transparent sleeves of some kina. The cuirass has a jabot of lace straight down the back and down the front. The Lamballe fichu of lace or of the silk edged with lace, trims other basques. White roses will'be much worn mixed with orange-blossoms for bridal parures. j ENGLISH WALKING-JACKETS. ! Double-breasted English walking-jack-ets are made in large numbers for fall and winter wraps. The materials employed are Scotch Cheviots, diagonal cloths as finely twilled as vigogne, and other soft wool cloths. The trimmings are broad Titan braids, loosely woven, like Panama canvas, and buttons covered with this braid. Black is the prevailing color. They cost from sls to $lB. SILKS. The novelties in fall silks are now displayed on counters of retail stores, and some idea of their prices is obtained. One of the most tasteful novelties is natte silk in loosely-matted tresses woven in basket checks. This is meant for over-dresses to be used with X velvet or plain gros grain, and cost $4.50 a yard. It comes in all the dark stylish shades for suits, such as myrtle green, prune, seal brown, slate blue, gray, navy-blue and black. Moyenage brocaded silks or single color, blue, green, or brown, are also shown for parts of suits. They measure twenty-four inches, and cost $3.50 a yard. The winter gros grains are exceedingly soft and of medium fine reps. They are to be made up in connection with plain and figured velvets and with natte silks; hence merchants have imported them in shades to match the handsome novelties just described. At every large house the announcement is made that myrtle green, seal brown, and slate blue will be the leading colors. Prices range lower than those of last season. Uress silks begin as low as $1.50 a yard, in new colors as w’ell as black, antHnereaserto $5 or s(i. For $3 and even less can be bought handsome gros grains for costumes. Trimming silks in all the rich dark shades are $1.35 a yard. Striped silks for parts of costumes, black with a colored stripe, can be bought for seventy-five ednts a yard in qualities that formerly sold for sl. Hand-woven black silks are highly commended by reliable merchants. They are spun and woven entirely by hand instead of by the power-loom. They are richly repped lustrous blue-black silks, very soft and finely finished; and as this softness and lustre are in the silk itself they are not lost by usage. They are imported in four different grades and sold for $2, $2.50, $3 and $3.50 a yard. They are said to wear better than any other silks. Those at $3 are as rich ana lustrous as many silks sold for $4 or $5 a yard. ENGLISH PRINTS AND CAMBRICS. English calicoes are in the plaid patterns so popular in wool stuffs. They come in blocks, cross-bars and in bias plaids as well as in plain ones. Shaded brown plaids, black barred with violet, blue barred with black or with w’hite, and black plaided with gold are the best patterns. These colors are also shown in irregular stripes. Price twenty-eight cents. The soft-finished cambrics imitate twilled Chevoits and have diagonal stripes and plaids. Blue, brown and gray are the prevailing colors. Navy blue grounds are barred with white in Greek key pah tern. The slate blues are also pretty. These goods are a yard wide and cost twenty-eight cents. They are being made up with side-plaited basques or else with loose basques. They have long, round over-skirts plainly hemmed or else bordered with a stripe of calico. The lower skirt may also be quite plain, but one gathered flounce does not detract from the neat style appropriate for such dresses.— Harper's Bazar.

Air-Plants.

Many are familiar with the fact that a sprig of the wild orpine or live-forever will retain its freshness’ arid often continue to grow for a considerable time when fastened to the wall or suspended in an upright position in places where it can have access to neither earth nor water. The plant belongs to the natural family Crassulaceie, many of the members of which fix themselves to dry rocks or walls where there is little or no soil. One species, the Bryopliyllum calycinum, is called the air-plant or leaf-plant, because a detached leaf will grow and even flower when hung up in a moist, warm atmosphere. The leaf thus suspended sends out little buds along its edges, and these develop into perfect plants, with roots and fibers of their own. When fully formed these plants may be separated from the parent leaf and are then capable of sustaining an independent life. Another species, having the same curious properties, grows in tropical countries, and is known to botanists as the verea crenata. Like our live-forever it has thick, succulent leaves, but it makes a much taller and handsomer plant, its spike of greenish flowers rising to a height of three feet. A single leaf of the verea hung in the window, or even thrown into a dark drawer, will, in the course, of a week or two, develop roots from tts base and become a growing plan). A cross section of a leaf will often do the same. The tenacious vitality of the plant is such that to dry specimens for the herbarium it is necessary first to kill them by immersion in hot water or the application of a hot iron.— Chicago Tribune. One morning at an early hour a huge wild-cat dashed through the front window of a Nevada hotel, made its way to the sleeping apartments and created a most terrible consternation among male and female boarders, whose fright was made wonderfully ludicrous by their general stampede in deshabille through all parts of the house. One young man awoke to find the huge monster almost within i reach of him, and with a wild shriek - called the landlady to his relief. The most laughable thing of all was that the affrighted crowd, some twenty in all, should have allowed the animal, after a half-hour’s rumination, to escape unscathed. Cape Cod liver oil is extensively,manufactured at Provincetown, Mass., from dogfish.

How the Rust Grows.

The transformations in the growth of a Dutterfly are so evident that the merest school boy may try the experiment and observe the truth of it for himself; but in the rust the objects are so very small that the changes can only be seen by the keen eyes of skilled observers, aided by the best powers of the microscope. Beginning with the spores of the mature rustplant, as seen in the black stains on the old stubble of any grain field, it will be found that when the warm and moist days of spring come these spores germinate, producing in a few days a short stem bearing a crop of other spores of very much smaller size. To avoid confusion, these must be called by their scientific name, sporidia , while the parent spores arb the ieleutospores. The sporidia have never been seen or made to grow upon the grain; but when they find their way to the leaves of a barberry bush they soon begin to germinate, and make themselves manifest on the under surface of the leaves in what ate commonly known as “cluster-cups.” The interior of' these pretty little cups is closely packed with spores of a still different kind, styled the secidium spores. These will not grow upon the barberry, but when they fall upon a blade or stalk of grain they soon produce the yellow, rusty covering so often seen as the grain is beginning to ripen, and caused by a multitude of u~edo spores. Later in the season this uredo state produces the final perfect teleutospores, thus completing the circuit of life in this little rust-plant. Long before this rust was discovered to be a plant farmers had noticed that there was a close relation between it and the barberry, and at present the latter is being rapidly destroyed with good results, though it can scarcely be expected that the rustplant will thereby become extinct, as probably the secidium state grows on other than the barberry, though not yet discovered elsewhere. This is an excellent illustration of polymorphism, so common among fungi, and "it also answers well to show the vast number of spores these microscopic plants produce. The teleutospore usually bears from five to ten sporidia, and allowing that only one of these finds the barberry leaf there may he from one to fifty cluster-cups as the result. In our case suppose only one , and a low estimate, for its contents would be 250,000 secidium spores, and if only one in a thousand finds a place on the grain-stalk ■and each brings forth its 250,000 fold there would be under such circumstances 62,500,000 spores from the single one with which we started. Taking the same teleutospore, and supposing every spore in all the stages found its place to fill it, the result would be 1,602,500,000,000,000,000 spores, which may be looked upon as its true descendants for the season. Or, giving each inhabitant of the globe his equal share of these reproductive bodies, he would have nearly as many as there are individuals in the whole human race. This may seem like a very large story about a very small matter, but it is not the only strange truth the microscope has revealed. —Scribner for October.

A Man Supposed Dead Returns After Five Years’ Absence.

Five years ago Benj. S. Grosvenor lived in Dowagiac. In June, 1870, he left "home for the purpose of going to St. Jo to butcher. He did not return, and his wife could only learn that he got off the cars at Niles but did not reach St. Jo. She heard nothing of him until the following September, when in a huckleberry marsh near Buchanan a body was found so badly decomposed that the features were unrecognizable. Some of those who saw it were positive that it was Grosvenor, and sent to Dowagiac for his wife to come and view the body. She went down and was met at the depot by a dentist of Dowagiac who had seen it, and he told her that he was positive it was Grosvenor, as he recognized the teeth from some work he had performed on them. She went down to see the remains, and, though she could not positively identify them as her husband, all the indications looked that way, and a day or two after she wept over the grave of her husband, as she supposed. Not long after a son, who was lying very sick when the father went away, died also, leaving her with one child, a little girl. She left Dowagiac and came to this city, and is now cook in the Grand River House. From that time she lived a widow and believed herself such, though she says that there was always a presentiment on her mind that they had all been deceived and that her husband was still alive. But her friends were confident that he was no longer living, and as the years passed by without tidings of him she had to give up hope, and only at times would dpubts arise in her mind. Any doubt she might have felt was not shared by others and it was supposed that he had been murdered, and she has received a number of letters from de-' tectives—one from Europe—offering to ferret the mystery and bring the murderer to justice. She had some reason to hold to her doubts, for her husband, when absent before, had threatened to stay away till he had acquired a competence, but she did think that if he carried this threat into execution he would have written to her. Tuesday night at midnight a man got off the cars and presented himself before her. It was the lost husband. He had gone to Missouri and had been living there. He had not yet become rich but sot sick of the country and returned East. [is wife was so indignant at his leaving a sick family as he did 'and leaving her to work for herself, without letting her hear from him—though he says ire did write but the letter miscarried—that she gave him a reception more cool than that which is popularly supposed to b« the thing in such cases, and rather intimated that as she had got along very well without him for five years she could keep on doing so. This somewhat dismayed him and he went to see a brother hear Saginaw and is there still. —Jackson {Midi.) Fat riot. A letter from Wavnesburg, Pa., to the Allegheny Mail says: “On Nebow Ridge, in this county, about four miles from Jacktown and on the farm belonging to Henry Miller, there is what is called the 1 gas spring.’ This is probably the greatest curiosity in Pennsylvania. The water is cold, but bubbles and foams as if boiling, and the greatest wonder is the inevitable destruction of life produced by inhaling the gas. No living thing is to be found within a circuit of 100 yards of the spring. The very birds, if they happen to fly over it, drop dead. We experimented with a snake of the copperhead variety on its destructive properties by holding it a few feet above the water. It stretched dead in two minutes. It will kill a human being in twenty minutes. We stood over it about five minutes, when a dull, heavy, aching sensation crept over us, and our eyes began to swim. The gas which escapes here is of the rankest kind of carbonic acid.” A bad position: Imposition.

Victor Emmanuel as a Hunter.

J. Adolphus Trollope writes from Rome to the New York Tribune: Victor Emmanuel, none the worse for the worries of a very worrying season, is enjoying his best loved sport _in high feather among the higher mountains of the Piedmontese Alps. At the last accounts His Majesty, who seems every whit as ardent and enterprising a sportsman as he was twenty years ago, was on the point of starting on an expedition among the higher summits qf the vale of Aosta in search of the “ steihbok.” This large and mag-nificently-horned variety of the chamois, or wild mountain goat, is, as is well known, very nearly extinct, and is only to be found, if found at all, in its remotest and most inaccessible fastnesses. To bring home a “ steinbok” confers the blue ribbon of Alpine sportsmanship! Victor Emmanuel had already had good sport, having sent his second son, Prince Amadeo, who was assisting at a review of troops on a large scale in the lowlands, many a thousand feet below his happier sire, two magnificent chamois which had fallen to his own gun the day before. Those who know anything of the conditions of Alpine sportsmanship will be aware that this is a measure of success of which any hunter in Tyrol or Switzerland might well be proud. 1116 chamois is in fact an exceedingly difficult quarry under the most favorable circumstances. But the fact is that the King is really a first-class shot. It is not so many years ago that, having in a mountain expedition wandered away from all those who were with him, he came to a solitary mountain farm just after he had shot a hare. The farmer, who had seen tlie shot, complimented the* stranger sportsman on the excellence of his shooting. The King admitted that he did consider himself a pretty fair shot. “ I wish to Heaven,” said the farmer, looking at him wistfully, “ that you could shoot a fox that robs my poultry-yard almost every night! I’d give a motta fan obsolete Piedmontese piece, worth eight cents) to have him killed!” “Perhaps I could!” said the King. “ But you must be here by three o’clock in the morning. That’s about the time he always comes!” “ Well, a motta, you say! I’ll try for it. I’ll be here about that time to-morrow morning!" Accordingly, without allowing anyone to know the errand on which he w r as bound, the King found himself at Sie mountain homestead at the appointed hour, and posted himself in a favorable position for watching the proceedings of the depredator of the farm-yard. Reynard did not make himself long waited for, but fell dead at the first slmt of the royal marksman, to the great delight of the farmer, who, true to liis word, came down with his motta on the nail handsomely. The King pocketed the coin, and went off to exhibit it with great glee as “ the first money lie had ever earned by the w’ork of his own hands.”

A Warning to Sewing-Machine Agents.

The usually quiet little village of Leesport, on tlie line of the Philadelphia & Reading Railroad, eight miles above Reading, has had a sensation which caused a good deal of amusement. A Reading sewing-machine agent induced the head of a family there to take a machine and pay for it in monthly installments. Before the machine was paid for the husband and father died. The widow was in destitute circumstances, with half a dozen children, and unable to pay the balance owing on the machine, when the agent came around to take the machine away. She was determined that helhould not remove the machine until ha had handed back at least some of tlie money that had been paid on it by her husband. He was apparently just as determined to secure the machine without returning any of the filthy lucre, insulted the woman, and endeavored to take by force what he said belonged to tlie company by reason of the payment of monthly installments having been stopped. While the agent was inside the house she locked both the front and back doors, put tlie keys in her dress pocket, and, being a robust woman “ went for” the agent. She took hold of him, and a severe and prolonged tussel ensued, while the children were frightened and cried and screamed. The widow threw the agent over the hot kitchen stove, and finally succeeded in setting him down on the top of it and held him there, when he begged piteously for mercy. “For God’s sake, let me go, and I’ll pay you back every cent-your husband paid me.” Being satisfied that he was severely scorched, if not partially roasted, she pulled him oft the stove, but held on to him until lie had paid back every one of the installments, and then she gave him two minutes’ time to take the machine and clear out with it. Tlie name of the plucky woman, and also that of the agent, are withheld by special request. —Brooklyn Argus.

Magnificent Costumes.

Writing of the dresses worn by Mdlle. Persoons as the Baroness de Cambri, in a Eerformance of “ Frou-Frou” in Paris, ucy Hooper says: “In the second act she had on a costume which must have made a serious hole in a 2,000-franc note. It was of marine-blue velvet and silk. The bodice was of velvet cut loose and square,- * and the upper part filled in with silk to make it High in the neck; the sleeves were also of silk. The front of the dress was of silk, with a broad band of velvet around the bottom. The back of the skirt, which fell in a long train, was of velvet, drawn back in the center, and confined with a large bow of gold-colored satin. The top of the bodice, the edge of the skirt, and the sleeves were bordered with a broad band of embroidery in gold-en-yellow floss silk. The bonnet was of the toque shape, of blue silk and velvet, with a single gold-yellow feather. In the . third act she w r ore a long trailing skirt of black velvet, finished with a wide-gathered flounce, and a long, loose sacquc-shaped cloak of velvet, with wide sleeves falling to the knee, and widened with fur and richly embroidered with jet. The bonnet was of black velvet, edged with fur and Adorned .with a single glistening green bird.” She was an elderly lady, and as she seated herself on ODe of the stools in W&llach’s store and asked to be shown some “ caliker,” she remarked that when she was a “gal” she was powerful lucky it she got sixteen yards in a dress, and she thought it a “sinful” waste to stuff to put in more; but she had just “heern” that Mrs. X. was agoin to hev forty-two yards in her new caliker, and she hoped that there might be a cloud burst in seventeen minutes if that air woman should stare round at her in church and make remarks about her olothes. “You kin jist cut me off forty-three yards and I’ll have it made pin-back fashion, with an overdress and a square mainsail, and a flvin’ jib and a back-action; then I’d just like to see that stuck-up Mrs. X. pat on airs over me.”— Austin (Nes.) BeveilU.