Newspaper Page Text
From the PWadelphilnquirer.
OPIUM SMOKING AND LAUDANUM
DRINKING. Y 1
The practice of chewing opium which
prevails to so serious and fatal ail extent
in China ami which, it is fair to presume,
is in a considerable measure tlio cause of
the present struggle between Great Brit
ain and the “Celestial Umpire,” lias been
the theme of more than one work, and is
the source, not only of much exquisite
enjoyment, but ofniiscry unspeakablo. O- ,
pium chewing & smoking, are not however i
confined to China. There arc hundreds'!
of unfortunates in this country, to whom j
opium either in small pieces and chewed
like tobacco, or made into laudanum, is
sought for with far more keenness than the j
drunkard seeks for his stimulant. A
friend who keeps a drug store in the low
er part of the city, informs us that there
are dozens of confirmed opinm eaters or
laudanum drinkers, who visit his establish
ment daily. They are generally speaking
abandoned women, who have imbibed the
the habit in hours of gloom and desponden
cy ; hut he states there are other cases iu
which the needy and unfortunate have be
come opium paters in moments of sickness
and pain, and having once resorted to the
drug for the alleviation of their bodily mis
ery, they have found it impossible to aban
don the habit. In some cases these miser
able beings are indeed to be pitied. With
out opium or laudanum they arc wretched,
and unable to obtain money to purchase a
ny, tlieir condition is appalling in the ex
treme. Our informant assures us that in
some cases, four ounces of laudanum are
consumed daily, enough to kill four people
under ordinary circumstances. Women
will sometimes conic into his store tremb
ling in every limb, in consequence of tlieir
being deprived of their usual portion of the
potion. They will grasp it with the utmost
impatience, and swallow it down instantly.
Not unfrequently they pawn their clothes
and the furniture in tlieir houses, in order
to obtain money to buy opium. Nav, still
more deplorable alternatives have been re
sorted to. Opium eaters are readily recog
nized by one who is familiar with such per
sons. They have a haggard and wo-worn
appearance ; tlieir eyes glow with an un
natural light, while misery and despair are
traced upon the features in indelible lines.
Are not these miserable beings fit subjects
for philanthrophy ? The habit may be
cured, we believe, in most cases, and its
effects are sometimes frightful. The Turks,
as is well known, are great opium eaters.
A paper on opium smoking in China was
recently read by Dr. Johnson, before one of
the European Societies. The opium, savs
the Doctor, is made into a sort of composi
tion called the Chandoo, which is smoked.
“ In Penang, the opium smokers are the
Chinese, the Malays, and a very few of oth
er nations, chiefly the native Portuguese.
It is calculated that 10 per cent of the Chi
nese, 2jj of the Malays, and about 1 per ct.
of other natives, are addicted to the vice of
opium-smoking. The poorer classes smoke
in the shops erected for that purpose, but
the wealthier orders smoke privately in
tlieir own houses. The practice is almost
entirely confined to the male sex, a fe.v a
bandoned prostitutes of the other sex parta
king of the vice. A young beginner will
not be able to smoke more than five or six
grains of chandoo, while the old practition
ers will consume 200 grains daily !
1 The causes which lead to this dreadful
habit among tiie Chinese are—first, their
remarkably social and luxurious disposi
tion. In China, every person in easy cir
cumstances, has a saloon in his house, ele
gantly fitted up, to receive his friends, with
pipes, chandoo, &c. All are invited to
smoke, and many are tints induced to com
mence tiie practice from curiosity or polite
ness, though few of them are ever able to
discontinue tiie vice afterwards.’
‘Parents arc in the habit of granting in
dulgence to their children, apparently so
prevent them from running into other vices
still more detestible, and to which the Chi
nese are more prone than perhaps, any peo
ple on earth. In painful and incurable dis
eases, in all kind of mental and corporeal
sufferings, in mercantile misfortunes, and
in other reverses of fortune, the opium-shops
is resorted to as an asylum, where for a
time at least, the unfortunate may drown
the recollection of his cares and troubles in
an indescribably pleasurable feeling of'in
difference to all around. The Malays are
confident that opium-smoking inspires them
with preternatural courage and bodily
strength ; it is, therefore, resorted to when
ever any desperate act is in contemplation.
“ The smoking.shops are the most miser
able and wretched plaees imaginable ; they
arc kept open from six in the morning till
ten at night, each being furnished with from
four to eight bedsteads, constructed of bam
boo spars, and covered with dirty mats and
rattans. At the head of each there is pla
ced a narrow wooden stool, which serves as
a pillow or bolster; and in the centre of
each shop there is a small lamp, which
while serving to light the pipes, diffuses a
cheerless light through the gloomy abode
of vice and misery. On an old table are
placed a few cups and a tea-kettle, together
with a jug of water, for the use of the smo
kers. At one side of the door the sub-far
mer, or cabaret-keeper, sits with chandoo,
pipes, &c., for the accommodation of his
customers. The place is filled with the
smoke of tiie chandoo, and with a variety of
other valors, most intolerable to the olfae-
Tories of an European. The pipe is com
posed of a shank and a head-piece, the for.
mer made cf hard and wood, fourteen
inches long by three inches n-nd a half in
circumference. It is bored through the
centre, from the mouth-piece to tire h?ad,
where there is a kind cf cup to collect the
“ tye chandoo.”
The smokers generally go in pairs, and
recline on the bed-stead, with head resting
on the wooden stool. The mode of proceed
ing is as follows : First, one of the pair take
up a piece of chandoo on the point of a short
iron needle, and lighting it the lamp, ap
plies it to the small aperture (resembling
: be touch-hole of a rg.n,'; ri ‘':o head of the 1
pipe. After a sow whiffs he hands the pipe
to his friend, who lights another piece of
chandoo at the lamp, and thus they go on.
It is said that the present emperor of Chi
na was a slave to tiie pernicious habit of
smoking opium for many years ; but that
by great moral courage, he succeeded in
curing himself of the vice, and has ever
since been known as its most violent oppo
nent. He issued edicts against the smoker,
vender, and importer; and finally lie made
capital, and punished it with
death. But Dr. Smith says it is a notorious
fact that many, perhaps most of the officers,
employed in preventing tiie importation and
smuggling of opium, are tlremselvcs opium
eaters, or opium smokers, and consequent
ly that they wink at the elicit trade, or take
bribes of opium or dollars for the introduc
tion of tiie drug. It is well known now that
in several of the southern provinces of Chi
na, opium is cultivated to a great extent,
without any check from the local authori
ties, and doubtless, witiiout any knowledge
of tiie emperor himself. The propensity to
opium smoking is becoming so universal
and so irresistable in China, that no sump
tuary laws, however sanguinary, will bo
able to stem the torrent. In Penang, ex
cessive duties have only increased the thirst,
for opium, and what is worse, they have
quadrupled the number of murders and oth
er crimes committed in order to obtain the
means of procuring the drug !
Is not tin’s dreadful ? Is it not deplora
ble, that Great-Britaiii, a civilized and
Christian nation, should blacken her char
acter by an effort to keep up this infernal
traffic in opium! It will he observed that
the difference between the victims in China
and those in this country is, that they smoke
the drug, and are thus affected through the
nervous systerti ; while here, it is swallow
ed, and is probably calculated in a still
greater degree to injure health and shorten
life. The habit is a dreadful one, and pos
sibly more deplorable in its consequences,
moral and physical, than even (lie brutali
zing vice of intemperance.
From the Brother Jonathan.
AN ANCIENT TEMPERANCE SO
CIETY.
It is stated in tiie thirty-fifth chapter of
Jeremiah that tiie prophet was directed to
offer wine to the men of tiie house of Recha
bites. “ But they said, We will drink no
wine : for Jonadab tiie son of Recbab, our
father, commanded us, saying, Ye shall
drink no wine, neither ye nor your sons for
ever : Neither shall ye build house, nor
sow seed, nor plant vineyard, nor have any:
but all your days ye shall dwell in tents ;
that ye may live many duys in the land
where ye be strangers. Thus have we o
beved the voice of Jonadab, the son of Re
chab, our father.”
This was about three hundred years after
Jonadab, tiie son of Rechab, moved by the
wickedness of Ahab, had thus commanded
his children. After thus trying their fidel
ity to Jonadab’s instructions, “Jeremiah
said unto the house of Rechabites, Thus
saitii the Lord us llusfs,*TTre God of Israel,
because ye have obeyed the commands of
Jonadab, your father, and kept all his pre
j ee.pts, and done according to all that he
i hath commanded you ; therefore, thussaith
the Lord of Hosts, tiie God of Israel, Jona
dab, the son of Rechab shall not want a man
to stand before me forever.” Now for the
fulfillment of tills prophecy.
The Ilev. Joseph Wolf, well known in
this city as a converted Jew, and a mission
ary to Jerusalem, met in Mesopotamia a
man who was pointed out to him by some
Jews, as a descendant of the house of Re
chab. Mr. Wolf showed him the Bible in
Hebrew and Arabic, which he was rejoiced
to see, as he could read both languages.
When asked whose descendant he was:
“ Mousa,” said tie, “is my name, and I
will show you’who are my ancestors.” He
then read from the chapter of Jeremiah
which we have quoted. Upon being asked
where he resided, lie turned to Genesis,
capterX., towards.the latter part, “at Ha
doram, now called Simar by the Arabs ; at
Usal, now called Sanan by the Arabs ; at
Mesha, now called Mecca, and the deserts
around those places. We drink no wine,
and plant no vineyard, and sow no seed ;
and live in tents, as Jonadab, our father,
commanded us : Hobab (Jobab) was our fa
ther too. Come to us and you will find us
00,000 in number, and you see thus the
prophecy lias been fulfilled.”
The prophecy w’e have already quoted.
In tho preseflt passion for investigating
Eastern history and antiquities, we trust the
observations of Mr. Wolf will be followed
up ; for if certainly is a very interesting
subject.
PERILS OF THE SEA.
Tht Stilcrn Mercury of 31st lilt., gives
tiie following account of a case of mutiny
and murder at sea :
“The ship Sumatra, Silver, hence, was
at Batavia May 3, —119 days passage—in
a letter from Captain S. he says, “On the
21st of April, Java Head bearing S. by W.
i W. 25 miles distant, I saw under our lee
a sail, that appeared to be in distress. I
immediately bore down for her, and brought
to, under tiie lee of the Br. barque Kilmars,
of Glasgow; her topsails were lowered,
courses hauled up partly, thrashing and
badly split, and to my great astonishment,
saw no one upon deck but a female, who
appeared to be almost frantic with despair.
We immediately got our boat out, and went
along side and brought her on board the Su
matra.
She was a young'lady eighteen years of
age, the wife ofCapt. Smith of the barque
she stated that tiie Kilmars left Batavia two
months previous, with a cargo of sugar for
Europe ; that soon after leaving, the crew
mutinied and came near killing the cap
tain (her husband) and herself—but the
captain finally succeeded in securing them
below in different parts of the ship; and en
deavored, with only two boys to assist him,
to work tire ship back to Batavia; and on
the morning previous to my meeting them,
she missed her husband and the boys
She thought that part of the (vow in tiie
night had freed themselves, and thrown the
captain and boys overboard, and taken the
bout and pulled for the land.
Her feelings can l>e better imagined than
described. After searching the ship for
her husband, and being convinced that ho
could not be on board, she took her stand at
the ‘rail,’ firmly resolved, should (he muti
neers break loose, to commit herself to tiie
sea, rather than fall into tlieir merciless
hands.
In twenty minutes after she got on board
the ‘Sumatra,’ and while I was considering
the practicability of getting tiie ship into
port, 1 perceived, by the aid of my glass, the”
men crawling from the hatches and liber
ating each other; they then ran aft, and put
her ‘helm hard up,’ and her head sails fill
ed. I immediately ‘filled away;’ the ‘Su
matra’ gathering head way very quick en
abled us to avoid them, or otherwise they
migiit have given us much trouble, as there
was a high sea on at the time—they tacked
several times after us—tiie next morning
she was fifteen miles to leeward. The
Dutch Government took care of the lady,
as there is no English consul here.”
NEWS AND GAZETTE.
WASHINGTON, GA.
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 1842.
FOR PRESIDENT,
FOR CONGRESS,
RICHARD W. HABERSHAM,ot Habersham.
ROGER L. GAMBLE, of Jefferson.
THOMAS BUTLER KING, qf Glynn.
RICHARD 11. WILDE, qf Richmond.
ABSALOM H. CHAPPELL, of Bibb.
AUGUSTUS 11. KENAN, of Baldwin.
HAMILTON P. SMEAI), of Talbot.
AUGUSTUS R. WRIGHT, of Cass.
05” Wo are authorized to announce the
names of the following gentlemen as Can
didates to represent Wilkes county in tiie
nCM Legislature:
For the Senate,
GEORGE W.CARTER.
For Representatives,
ROBERT A. TOOMBS.
WILLIAM Q. ANDERSON,
LODOWICK M. HILL.
JAMES D. WILLIS, for Senate.
LEWIS S. BROWN, i,, ~
HENRY P. WGOTTEN, f for nepre-
RICHARD L HALLnxSYVY
05” The lines of our correspondent “Oc
tavius” shall appear next week.
05” Mr. Taylor, the reformed drunkard
as he is pleased to style himself, has been
lecturing here during the past week, and
lias effected some good. We understand
that 97 men, and 74 ladies joined his soci
ety in this place, a few of whom (not of the
ladies) occasionally drank to excess. His
success here was not so great, as in some
other places where the community was less
temperate.
05” We have received from the publish
ers of the “ New World” several more of
their cheap publications. Bulwer’s novel
“ Godolphin,” “Letters from the shores of
the Baltic” arc both interesting works.—
They have lately published a life of Hen
ry Clay, a work which no American, no
matter of*what party, should be without.—
His history is so inter wo vend n tiie history of
his country, that he who is ignorant of the
first,must be wofully deficient in knowledge
of the latter.
05“ The Oeion for August has just been
received. It is a great disadvantage to
this Magazine, that its subscribers cannot
get their No. for any one month, until near
ly the middle of the next month. The No.
for August fully sustains the reputation,
acquired by its predecessors for this publi
cation.
The Crops.
The excessive heat and drought of the
last week or two has had a tendency to has
ten the maturity of the cotton crop. The
bolls are opening very fast, and we are
told by farmers that the frost, unless earli
er than common, will find very few bolls
miniatured ifthis dry weather continues.
Tiie quality will bo better than common,
and the crop above an average in quantity.
Many have already sent loads to market,
much earlier tiian common. As the sea
sons have been so favorable throughout the
year, and cotton is bringing a living price,
we may expect much relief to the present
pecuniary embarrassments of the State,—
we anticipate when our farmers get their
pay for their cotton that some of them will
succeed, without much effort, in remem
bering that they owe us something, and
will plank lip like honest men.
~~
05” Daniel Webster has retired to his
estate in Massachusetts “ not to return,”
says the N. Y. Express, “as the mass of
hia friends hope and believe, officially to
Washington,”
05“ The efforts of Messrs. Black and
Cooper, to relievo themselves from the
charge of having voted for a duty of 20 per
cent, on Tea and Coffee are as amusing pie
ces of shuffling as we have seen in many a
day. They are fairly caught in doing the
very same tiling which they and tlieir party
condemned Mr. Dawson for doing, and their
attempts at justification in the Democratic
prints remind us (to use a homely simile,)
of the squealing of pigs hitched in a gate.
To free themselves from the charge of in
consistency, they are obliged to plead guil
ty of ignorance too gross for a member of
Congress—to confess that they thought
Coffee was a manufactured article !! Why
any school-boy ten years of age, could have
informed you that Coffee is not manufac
tured—it grows, gentlemen !! Perhaps you
thought it was manufactured from having
heard of Coffee-mills; but such machines
arc little of kin to tiie Cotton-mills uiiioh
you anti-tariff folks have such a holy ab
horrence for.
Tlic Currency.
Tiie issues between political parties in
Georgia have narrowed down to almost the
sole question of the currency.
The advocates of a bad currency—those
who support the Central Bank in its ruin
ous course—consist of the Democratic pa
pers and partisans. True, some of the for
mer, located in commercial cities where
Central Bank money passes only at its true
value, pretend to oppose that institution ;
but the opposition they offer is weak and in
efficient, they are forced by the circumstan
ces of their situation to make some show of
resistance to that great political machine of
their party ; but the reluctance they mani
fest, wiien compelled to discuss tiie ques
tion, shows that they had much rajher say
nothing about it. The democratic candi
dates, too, “ run with the hare and hunt
with the hound,” as the proverb says.—
Electioneering with tiie advocates of a
sound currency, they pretend to be opposed
to the Central Bank ; but they tell Demo
crats they are its supporters and admirers,
and at Milledgeville they vote with their
party to maintain it in its ruinous influence
! over the prosperity of the State, and ardent
jly recommend it to tiie people. In this
! part of the State, where the people arc soon
to be heavily taxed to support this institu
tion from which they have not received a
particle of benefit and whicii does not sup
ply a single dollar of the currency,an open,
bold and manly opposition at home and in
tiie Legislature, would better become them.
The VYhigs have strenuously opposed the
abuses of this institution and the impositions
practised by other worthless hanks upon
community. They have labored heart and
soul to impress upon the people right ideas
of their true interests. Their papers have
again and again denounoed the Federal U
nion and other kindred prints which are en
deavoring to gull the public into the belief
that “ the People’s Bank” cannot fail—
that it was the best Bank in the State, &c.
They have pointed them as examples to the
State Banks of Alabama and Mississippi,
institutions on the same plan with our Cen
tral Bank, which are broken and worthless,
notwithstanding they were the “ People’s
Banks,” and were managed with at least
| as much, if not greater ability and honesty
j than ours. Their candidates have denoun
| ced all manufactories of spurious currency,
from the stump, in all political assemblies
and in the Legislative halls, while the rag
money men (formerly the advocates of a
hard-money, specie currency !) have pre
served a suspicious silence, or, in sections
where such doctrines were popular, have
dared to plead in favor of the rotten Banks.
The action of tiie ne*t Legislature in re
lation to tiie currency of tiie State must ne
cessarily be important. The time lias come
when the prevalent derangements can be
endured no longer. Tiie people are begin
ning to awake on this subject, and to see
into iiow lamentable a condition the action
of. the (so called) democratic party has
brought them, when so great difference as
39 per cent, exists between tiie currency of
one section of the State and of another not
fifty miles distant. If the Democratic par
ty has the majority in the next Legislature
these abuses will continue, they will at
tempt to do nothing to correct them, and if
they adopt any plan of remedy, it will be
some weak and impracticable one, only in
tended to gull the people into the belief
that they desired to do something, but really
(as was their conduct in relation to the dou
ble tax,) with no sincere wish to do any
thing effectual.
The freemen of Georgia, in their selec
tion of. Representatives, have then to ciioose
eith’er those candidates who pledge them
selves to do every thing in their power, to
give them a sound and equal currency, and
whose conduct heretofore has proved them
its sincere advocates, or those who talk one
way at home and vote and act diametrical
ly the contrary way at Milledgeville.
GO” Our devil says that the mention of
Lard Oil always reminds him of that poem
of Byron, commencing ‘‘The Res of Grease,
The Res of Grease!
FOR thR news & planters’ gazette.
“ The Act to revive ami render efficient the
Central Bank, and thus to enable it to discharge
its important duties to the State and to the Peo
ple—and the Act to diminish the burdens of ex
traordinary taxation imposed by tiie last Legisla
ture, arc measures of such deep and pervading
importance as to merit special notice, and must
elicit universal commendation.”
Fellow-Citizens :
The above is an extract from the famous
Democratic Address put forth by Lewis S.
Brown and ten other members of the Demo
cratic Legislature of last year, at the close
of the session. As Judge Brown is again a
Candidate for your suffrages, and is even
attempting to procure your votes by strong
declarations of hostility to the Central
Bank ; you should look a little at least in
to that wonderful Act which was “tore
vise and render efficient the Central Bank
and thus to enable it to discharge its im
portant duties to the State and to the Peo
ple.” You might readily suppose from
this precious effusion of self-praise and
boasting, something had been done far sur
passing alt former legislation,and peculiar
ly calculated to spread prosperity over our
distressed and embarrassed community.
You might reasonably, after such exten
sive promises of comfort and consolation,
have expected a sound currency and its
concomitant blessings. Yet how wofully
have we, one and all, been disappointed !!
That Act which afforded the Honorable
Judge so much matter for self-congratula
tion, and urged him to lay aside his usual
timidity and step boldly forth to demand
your “special notice” and universal com
mendation, has had no more effect in stay
ing the downward progress of that rickety
concern called the Central Bank, than the
nostrums of a quack our keenest physical
maladies.
That famous Act, which was to bring so
much praise and glory to its authors, and
so much happiness to the people, contains
two sections: The first repeals the Act of
the Legislature of 1840, which took away
from the Central Bank its power of distribu
tion, and of using the promissory notes of
individuals as Banking Capital, and placed
it exactly in the same position it occupied
from 1828 to 1837. Let us pause for one
moment just here. The Act of 1840 was
passed to clothe the Central Bank with the
few powers, and no more, which it held
when tiie Institution’ equalled any in the
wide world for solvency.
The Act of 1841, that of the last Legis
lature, was passed to repeal that of 1840.
Here, then, we hear Judge Brown openly
boasting of hawing repealed one of the wisest’
and most wholesome laws to be found in
the Statute Books. Yes, Fellow-Citizens,
notwithstanding at this particular crisis and
in this community, you may be told Judge
Brown is opposed to the Bank, wishes it
wound up, and all that kind of soft talk,
you find him, according to his own boast,
laboring at Milledgeville last year to rein
state and revive it. I iiope there is yet suf
ficient indignation left in your bosoms to
.vent upon these men,who boast so loudly of
their iniquity and folly, merited punish
ment.
But, now for the second section of that
famous Act, of which the Honorable Judge
is so proud :
“ It shall not be lawful fur the Central Bank
of Georgiy to make any further loans of its bills
until it. shall be able to sustain its circulation a;
par with the Bills of Specie-paying Banks, and
make a general distributor. . ccordmg to law—
nor shall any inaoive: .’ideflee oi debt due said
Bank be considered as banking capital up>..
which an issue may be made.”
It impliedly gives the Central Bank full
power to issue its own notes upon \\\e prom
issory notes of men scattered all over the
State, and whose circumstances change
daily—the very power which lias brought
our State to its present disgraceful situation.
To be sure, the loans are to be discontinued
until the Central Bank shall be able to sus
tain its circulation at par with Bills ofSpe
cie-paying Banks. When that end is at
tained, once more is to be commenced a
general distribution, and the abominable
practice of using the promissory notes of
individuals, instead of real money, as bank
ing capital.
Such is tiie 2d Section, and now I ask
you, Eellow-CLtizens, if a man who will
boast of having perpetrated so much folly
deserves the least countenance ?
Is it wonderful when such Laws are sub
ject matter for public boasting, that Central
Bank Bills should have sunk from ten to
thirty-five per cent, discount?
How mean must these empty braggarts,
who called upon the people from the house
tops and street corners to praise them, now
feel, when, instead of reviving and render
ing efficient, their famous Act lias reduced
the value of Central Bills 25 per cent.!!
The Honorable Judge goes on. further,
Fellow-Citizens, to ask your praise and spe
cial notice, for passing an Act to diminish
the burdens of extraordinary taxation im
posed by the Legislature of 1840. Now,
what was the attempted Reduction by
Lewis S. Brown, and his worthy associates
of the extraordinary taxation imposed by.
the Whigs ? One hundred per cent ? No.
Fifty ? No. Twenty-five ? No. Twen
ty ? Yes, the paltry amount cf 20 per cent. !
It is wol 1 wc know this fact, or else the high
sounding boasts of demagogues would lead
us to believe it much more. The paltry a
mount of twenty per cent, they vainht at
tempt to magnify into a monstrous reduc
tion. I cannot but flatter myself thore is
no man so blind as not to see through this
miserable effort to catch popular favor.—
But what renders this boasting so thorough
ly ridiculous, is, that they boast of reducing
a Tax Bill which their organ, the
had told them did not produce sufficient
funds to pay current expenses, and then
were compelled to see their famous Law
vetoed by the same organ. Verily, if there
is a particle of shame in the breasts of the
eleven men who, in December last, called
upon the people of Georgia to take special
notice of them and praise them, now at
least wiien tlieir works have produced so
little good and so much harm, they should
call upon the rocks and Hills to Jiide them
from the anger and scorn of a deceived peo
ple. “ONE OF THE PEOPLE.”
FOR THE NEWS & PLANTERS’ GAZETTE.
Mr. Editor : —ls it the pure Democratic
principle to discourage the industry of
white Mechanics and to praise up that of
Niggers ? Does such a course result from
the free-trade, anti-tariff notions of the De
mocrats, preferring African to Home In
dustry ? I wish some of the Candidates in
this County would answer these questions ?
A MECHANIC.
FOR THE NEWS AND PLANTERS’ GAZETTE
Mr. Editor : —Permit me, through your
columns, to disclose the unfortunate pre
dicament in which I am situated, respect
ing some customs prevalent in Wilkes—
and to request of some of your readers, clear
and satisfactory explanations, if possible.
To explain, briefly, my position, I would
mention that I have just emerged from the
Piney Woods, or Wire-Grass country, and
cast anchor near you, and should deem tiie
exchange a happy one, if I understood the
causes of scenes that I frequently witness.
You doubtless are aware that in the section
of country alluded to, the term etiquitte has
no meaning—but all are thrown promiscu
ously upon the bread platform of democra
cy ; consequently, one hailing from that
quarter would likely have about him some
of those rough and jagged pro jections of na
ture which would disfigure, unless worn off
jby social intercourse. For reasons then,
! which must be apparent, I would inquire if
there is any order, denomination, or society,
of ancient or modern origin, in tiie country,
which compels females, at churchps or oth
er places, publicly to kiss each other ? I
have observed this practice often, and wish
to bo referred to some place where I can
obtain membership—if such does exist. I
am under the impression that such an o-fler
in all probability, might have sprutg frpm
Paul’s writings, inasmuch as lie equires
| his brethren to salute (does it mem kiss)
I some of the sisters who were to vist them.
In tiie second place, I would ask if itis con
sidered good taste in females to assurm tho
hue of the liily instead of the rose ? If not,
why such extravagant use of flour upon the
face ! And lastly, I wish to know th cause
of so many deformed young ladies through
out ibis part of Georgia ! I have been in
formed, ‘hat it originates from something
cal! and a bustle! If this is not a hoax, I
should be pleas, i with a description of the
artie Any information relative to the a
o:ve, would be most cordially received by
WIRE GRASS.
FOR THE NEWS & It.ANTEHs’ GAZETTE.
BOOKERS VILLE ACADEMY.
In placing before tiie public a Report of
tiie Examination of tiie above Institution,
we wish it understood that we mean no in
discriminate praise, but to state our con
victions us a Committee appointed for the
occasion.
Wo wero particularly struck with the
number of branches in which’ the pupils
were examined, consisting of Orthography,
Reading, Punctuation, Geography, Arith
metic, English Grammar, Natural Philos
ophy, Astronomy, with the use of Globes
and Orrery, Botany, Algebra, Latin and
Declamation. It was evident, fronvthe
questions answered, that tliq reflective fac
ulties, as well as tiie memory, had been
cultivated—tiiat the pupils had been assid
uous in tlieir studies, and that tiie energies
of tlieir Teacher, Mr. L. Slusser, had not
been misapplied.
We deem it unnecessary to speak of tiie
skill and qualifications ofMr. S. as a teach,
er ; nothing more is necessary to convince
the public that he is deserving his well
earned reputation, and that lie lias been
successful in making education what it
should be, thorough and substantial, than for
them to attend his public examinations.
The deep interest manifested by the re
spectable audience that assembled on the
occasion, was a source of much gratifica
tion to us, and augured well for the cause of
education.
Wo would mention, in terms of commen
dation, the zeal and liberality of Esquire
! Book°r and the sow associated with him jn
