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Nelvs of Interest Gathered Here and There
A professional diver said that he had in his
house —what would probably strike a visitor as a
very strange chimney ornament —the shells of an
oyster holding fast a piece of printed paper. The
possessor of this ornament was diving on the coast,
when he observed .at the bottom of the sea this
oyster on a rock, with a piece of paper in its
mouth, which he detached and commenced to read
through the goggles of his headdress. It was a
Gospel tract, and, corning to him thus strangely
and unexpectedly, so impressed his unconverted
heart that he said, “I can hold out against God’a
mercy in Christ no longer, since it pursues me
thus.” He became, while in the ocean’s depths,
a repentant, converted and (as he was assured)
sin-forgiven man —“saved a/t the bottom of the
sea.” —The Silent Evengelist.
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‘Ethical Hair-Splitting,
It is proposed in the new Sunday law that is
about to be enacted by the Massachusetts legisla
ture —the measure that will replace the “Lord’s
Day” with “Sunday” —to forbid fishing on the
first day of the week, but to permit the digging of
clams on all days and at all times and seasons.
We are surprised, not to say pained, to find the
Boston Post complaining that “it is hard to un
derstand the ethical hair-splitting that brings about
this discrimination. If clams may be dug on Sun
day without offense, why not potatoes, or post holes,
or subways? And, per contra, if it is wrong to
take the nimble fish, why is it right to pursue the
elusive clam? Os our ancestors it was said that
they took their pleasures sadly. Perhaps the pro
posed law is based on the fact that there is some
fun in fishing, ev®n if nothing is caught, while there
is no fun at all in digging clams.” There are
thousands of people in the Bay State residing close
to the seashore and within easy reach of an almost
unlimited supply of clams, and not a few of these
citizens are poor in purse. It would be oppressive
to cut these people off from a natural right to dig
clams for a Sunday dinner. That is not only a na
tural right, but it is fully justified by the precept
and example of the Saviour. He gathered and ate
food on the day of rest. He said: “The Sab
bath was made for man. not man for the Sab
bath. ’ ’
As to fishing on Sunday, we do not imagine that
a law against it will be enforced. Such statutes
have not been enforced in any part of this coun
try for many years. But the same reasoning that
applies to clam digging is not applicable to the
pursuit of the finny tribe with hook, net, or seine.
Clam digging does not build up a distinct class of
liars. No one ever heard a clam digger bragging
of the size of any product of his digging. He is
not heard lamenting the demise of the venerable
William Jones because he is thereby deprived of
proof of his tough tales. The principal use of
Sunday fishing is that it is a powerful stimulant
of inventive genius in order to fit competitors for
attaining high honors as a reward for the produc
tion of amazing narratives. Our Boston contempo
rary does not err in its declaration that “there is
some fun in fishing even if nothing is caught,” for
the smaller the catch the bigger the lies, and no
catch at all brings out the most gigantic lie. —The
Washington Post.
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Olvlish Wisdom.
Poultrymen dislike the owl, in fact regard it
with positive hatred, and the reason is not far to
seek. The Bird of Jove, held sacred to Minerva
in the Roman mythology, has lost caste since pagan
days. He has no friends among farmers, especially
those who make a specialty of breeding domestic
fowls, of which he is supposed to be an enemy of
high degree. It can not be denied that the owl
loves chicken, which proves his claim to that wisdom
of which he stood as an emblem in “the ancient
days of yore.” Truth to say he is as fond of a
tender piece of breast, or a wing or thigh, as any
Methodist preacher at an old-fashioned camp meet
ing. And his way of catching these tidbits of owl-
The Golden Age for June 13, 1907.
dom affords other evidence that he is a very wise
old guy and considerable of a strategist in the feath
ered world. He does not make a frontal attack,
like the hawk, darting down and seizing his prey
by main force. The owl’s method is much more
diplomatic and comes under the head of what the
military critics call sapping and mining or the
gradual approach. The owl, which operates only by
night, waits until the chickens have gone to roost
in the tree and arranged themselves for sleep on
the limbs. Then Mr. Owl takes his perch on the
inner side and begins to quietly crowd his neighbors
until he forces the farthest off the roost. As he
falls the owl darts after and either catches the
chicken before he lights or when he reaches the
ground.
From this it will be seen that the poultrymen
who keep their chickens in closed coops need have
no fear of the owl. Only tree-roosters and those
which dwell in open sheds need fear visits from
this soft flying and noiseless nocturnal depredator.
Right here the American Farmer, which is the
friend of the friendless and always with the under
dog in the fight, wants to put in a word for the
owl. He has many good traits to offset his one
cardinal fault. Not being able to defend him of
the charge of loving chicken, we hereby file a plea
in confession and avoidance. The investigations
of the ornithological branch of the Department of
Agriculture have proven conclusively that the owl’s
food consists chiefly of rats and mice. For one
helpful bird or chicken that he destroys, he kills
hundreds of noxious rodents, vile vermin in the
shape of rats and mice, who do far more injury
to the farmers’ crops and the poultryman’s fowls
than is done by all the birds of prey. Tn fact,
young chickens have no greater enemy than rats,
and if the owls help to keep down these sharp
toothed ravagers, the poultry-raiser may well spare
them a chicken or two occasionally. Farmers,
therefore, instead of exterminating should actually
protect the owls, which on investigation will be
found to do much good and little harm in the
world.
The owl’s method of feeding is one of the most
curious things in nature, and affords one of the
rarest studies in ornithological science. When he
catches a mouse or chicken or squirrel, ho does not
pick the meat off, as do the hawk and other birds
of prey. The owl gulps down bones and all, but
by some queer process of assimilation the meat is
separated from the bones and feathers or hair in
the bird’s stomach, and in time this refuse forms
into a fuzzy ball an inch or so in diameter. The
owl has the power to regurgitate, or throw up, this
ball of bones and hair, and only meat remains in
his digestive apparatus. In this power to “cough
up” the undesirable, while retaining the part he
wants, the owl is peculiar and differs from all other
animals or birds known to scientists. —The Progress
ive Farmer.
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Agassiz in His Summer School.
Tuesday of last week was the centenary of the
birth of Agassiz. In “The Independent,” Presi
dent David Starr Jordan, of Leland Stanford Jr.
University, writes of the summer school conducted
by the famous scientist on the island of Penikese,
at which he and some fifty others were students in
1573. With Agassiz, we read, the study of nature
was “the joyous expression of the play impulse,”
and from his love of the out-of-doors study arose
his influence in stirring up enthusiasm among his
students at this summer school. The school-house
at Penikese was an old barn. This building served
for both lecture-room and dining-hall, and “the
lecture and the dinner went together.” Dr. Jor
dan writes:
At the end of one of the three long tables, a
movable blackboard always by his side, sat Agas
siz, and when the dishes were being cleared away
the lecture would begin. One day we had soup for
breakfast, and the lecture was on the osteology of
Stenotomns. while the bones of the fish we were to
study lay nicely cleaned about our plates.
It was on the second morning that occurred the
memorable incident of the summer.
He arose as the dishes were taken out, this time
without chalk in his hand, and began to speak, with
that wonderful touch of eloquence which is denied
to most men of science, of his purpose in calling us
together. The swallows flew in and out of the build
ing, grazing his shoulder in their flight. He told
us that the people of America needed a better edu
cation, one that would bring them in closer contact
with the realities of nature, and therefore with
truth. He told us how this training of people to
think clearly and rightly and righteously ought to
be accomplished, and he dwelt on the results which
might come to our country from the training and
consecration of fifty teachers, young men and young
women armed with enthusiasm and with youth on
their side.
This summer at Penikese was to be no ordinary
piece of school-work, still less a merry summer’s
outing. We were there for a mission work of the
highest possible importance. He spoke with intense
earnestness and with great dramatic power and this
was heightened by the deep religious feeling so char
acteristic of his mind. For to Agassiz each object
in nature, as well as each law of nature, was a
thought of God, and trifling thoughts and conduct
in the presence of God’s ideal expressed in na
ture was to him the most foolish form of sacrilege.
What Agassiz actually said that morning can
never be said again. No reporter took his lan
guage, and no one after all these years can call
back the charm of his manner or the simplicity and
impressiveness of his zeal and faith. At the end,
he said abruptly, as he sat down. “I would not
have any one pray for me now.” For a moment
we were surprised, not knowing what he meant.
Then it flashed over us that he wished to say that
he would not like to call on any one else to pray
instead of him. And he concluded with the hope
that each one of us would utter his own prayer in
silence. Whittier has perfectly described this
scene:
“Even the careless heart was moved,
And the doubting gave assent
With a gesture reverent
To the Master well beloved.
“As thin mists are glorified
By the light they can not hide,
All who gazed upon him saw.
Through its veil of tender awe,
How his face was still uplit
By the old sweet look of it.
Hopeful, trustful, full of cheer
And the love tha't easts out fear.”
And after this, during the summer at Penikese
with its succession of joyous mcrnings, bright days,
and calm nights, with every charm of sea and sky,
the master was with ns all day long, all the time
ready with help and encouragement, always ready
to draw on his own wide experience in Europe and
in' America, always ready to give us from his own
stock of knowledge. Whatever he said was trans*
lated into language we could understand, and to be
intelligible is the best mark of the great teacher.
The boundless enthusiasm which surrounded him
like an atmosphere was always present. In this
atmosphere relative values were sometimes distort
ed, and little discoveries and little achievements
appeared very large when seen in its light. But
all this was good for us, for the world has plenty
of means of taking away delusions. He was always
an optimist, and a large part of his strength lay
in the realization of the value of the present mo
ment. The thing he had in hand was the one thing
best worth doing; the people around him were the
men best worth helping, and “the bit of sod under
his feet” was “the sweetest to him in this world,
in any world.” Picturesque and dramatic he was
in every situation, as befits the race from which hp
sprang. He rejoiced in the love and approbation
of students and friends, and the influence of his
personality was thrown into every scientific discus*
sion. This, again, has been a matter of criticism,
but it was helpful to ns. With no other leader of
science has the work and the man been so unified
as with Agassiz.—The Literary Digest.
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