The Cartersville express. (Cartersville, Ga.) 1875-18??, July 12, 1881, Image 2

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Th CarlsrsFille : Jgjja CORNELIUS WILLINGHAM, Editor. For the cause that needs assistance, For the wrong that needs resistance, For the future in the distance, And the good that we ean do. CARTERBVLLE~ : I GEORG laT THK FA liMER'S n OOINO. The daisies nodded In the art sc, the buttercup* were deeping, And juet across the rirer sang the farmer* at theli reaping; Upon the hill*, ao blue and far, the maple leave* were showing Their soft white beauty In the breeze that from the sea waa blowing. k little maid came through the lane, with aong and rippling laughter; The buttercup* mad* way for her, the daisiea nodded alter. ▲ strong young farmer saw her pauae beside the parting river; ■he drew a lily from its depth* with golden heart a-qulver. M Thou art more fair than llliea are,” said he with head uplifted, And threw a poppy, as th# stream toward the maiden drifted. Bhe the Cower* in her hair, the red and white to gether; A cloud grew black before th* son, and rainy was the weather. He came across th* river then, the farmer from hi* mowing; He minded not the water’* depth, he cared not for its flowing. “ O love I ” said he, “if gleaming sun and cloudless skies o’erlean us, The river’s barrlg width may sail unpassed, untried between us; But when loud thunder fills the air, and clouds and rain come over, I’ll crosa the ooean to your side, I am no fairday lover! ” An so one day the village bolls rang out across the river; Their music set the buttercups and daisies all a-qulver, While some one drew a from th# stream so blithely flowing, And plucked a blood-red poppy that amid the wheat was growing; The maiden set them in her hair, the red and white together, With many smile, a tear or two, and glances at the weather. They passed beneath the chapel’* shade, the farmer and the maiden, Where arche* crossed above their heads, with snowy blossoms laden, And in that place of holy calm the binding words were spoken; He In his heart bora out the truth, *he on her head the token. The year* went by, and some were bright and *ome were clouded over, But ever stood he at her aide—ho wa* no fair-day lover. JOHN'S WIFE, Whatever possessed Brother John to go up to the city and marry that yellow haired, blue-eyed bit of a school girl, when he could have had just his pick of girls nearer home, was something I could not understand. There was Lida Handscombe, just dead in love with him, as anybody oould see, and the best bread-maker in the whole country, be side taking prizes at the State Fair for pickles and jellies, and ever so much better looking, too, than Myra. No yellow bangs over her eyes; she just combed it back off her face and did it up in a hard knot that staid. She sent John a birthday cake, and knit him a comforter, and everybody thought it would be a match, but John said he didn’t like her eyes ; they were hand some eyes, to my idea, and could look you through and through, they were that clear and bright; but did you ever know a man to take advice? “Marry that ferret,” said John, “ and never have any peace of my life; well, I guess not! ” and with that off he goes to town and telegraphs back, “Expect me and my wife.” Dear ! such a shock as it gave me, and our spring cleaning not done, and the minister coming to board with us while his wife went home on a visit—it was a trial, you may be sure I And when she did come, it was more like having a wax doll in the way than anything else, with her big wondering eyes, and childish ways, and silly ques tions, and hanging on John’s arm, and leaning over John’s chair, with two lit tle insignificant feet in the rungs at the back, and her clothes I Such fallals, just like a doll's rigging, and I just set my foot down that if she was to live with us, she must conform to our ways. I hadn’t been forty years in this world for nothing. If she wanted to wear fine white laces and ruffled aprons, she had to wash and iron them herself. I wouldn’t be her slave. And such silly questions as she asked, they just made e sick : “ When did the cows shed their horns ? Which oow gave the but. bennilk ? Were there any dear little fellow chicks ?” Dear little yellow chicks, indeed! They were dear enough before we raised them and got their heads off and we had them ready for market, and if that silly child didn’t sit down and cry because they were killed; said she had named every one of them and watched them prow up. And she waa our John’s rife! bah ! Then she did the silliest thing of all— rent and bought a book called “What f Know About Farming,” and used to lit out under a tree studying it by the bonr; and one night, when she went Sown to the bars to meet John, I heard her ask: 1 “John, why don’t you get a washing machine and a wringer, and save your own flesh and blood. Look at the blis ters on my hands 1” And the next thing it was the talk of the neighborhood that we Elliots, who had set our faces against modern im provements, had given out before that little pale-faced thing, and not only got a wringer and washer in our kitchen, but several hundred dollars’ worth of farm machinery at work. John said he could afford it* but I spoke my mind, and told her what I thought of it after he went out to his work. She looked kind of frightened, and pretended she was going to cry, and than she spoke up quick like and said: “Sister Janet, it’s a triumph of mind over matter. Ton can wash now, and not be all tired out, and sick and nerv ous, and—and—John can afford it.” Perhaps if I had known that she had paid for it all, and it hadn’t cost John a cent, I might have been more forgiving, but I just straightened up and said : “ Mrs. Elliot, you may go on and ruin jrour husband with your boarding-school ideas, but, as for me, I’ll never touch the things. I can work, thank good ness, while I’ve got my health. I wasn’t brought up in idleness.” She never took it to heart a bit; the next thing I knew she was at the little parlor organ she had, singing and play ing as if that was all there was in life. And that silly old minister—men never do have a bit of sense, but you expect more of a preacher of the gospel—but he just sat and talked to her as if she was a companion for him, and they walked about the fields and si ayed down where John was working, ant] all around 'em souls a-perisliing for want of the bread of life ; such a sinful waste of time I never saw ! “Janet, do you love the hills?” she asked, one day when I was scouring the knives outside the door. She had of fered to do them for me. but law ! her white Hands were no"! fit for anything so useful. “Love the hills I Well, I’d like to know what there is to love about them. I guess if you climbed them a spell you wouldn’t love ’em much.” “They’re so high and grand,” she said, looking up at them; “ they seem so near the cool, far-off heaven ! I love to climb to the top and drink in the sweet, fresh air; it does me good here— here.” She laid her hand on her heart, and stood looking off with a strange ex pression on her face, and I thought maybe she was homesick, and I told her to go in and cut some carpet rags, and sew ’em together, and, would you believe it, she up and refused. “No,” she said, “I cannot cut any carpet rags. I hate them ! ” I never saw her so excited before. “A fine temper you have ! ” was all the answer I made her, but I never felt so insulted in all my life. For a week or two I didn’t see much of her; she was either out with John “ sketching,” as she called it, dabbling away at some bits of pasteboard with a lead pencil, or up in her room where I never went. She came down, singing away, with a large package in her hand, and soon John came up with Hie ponies, and they drove off to town together, laughing like two children. I hope none of the neighbors noticed them. Any wayJJ they never saw him conduct himself in that way with me. When they came home she was all tired out, and they had a big roll of stuff they dumped down in the entry. “It’s something for you, Janet,” she said, laughing hysterical-like. “It’s carpet-rags. ” I unrolled it, and there were twenty yards of bright ingrain carpet! “ Myra,” said I, “ this is wicked ex travagance,” for I knew her money was all paid out. “But it isn’t,” she said, laughing ; “I eafned it myself by drawing and paint ing those bits of sketches. I sold them all, and can sell all I can do. That was my way of cutting carpet rags. ” Well, we put the carpet down, and it did look pretty—though I didn’t say so. It isn’t my .way to spoil anybody with flattery, and I saw John’s wife was get ting the upper hand too fast. The neigh bors were beginning to notice her, and that foolish old minister, when his wife came back, had been over there; and she led the singing in church and pre tended she had got religion, and all the time she never scrubbed a floor, or washed a dish, or put her hands to the churn. “ John can afford to hire help,” she said to me one day, “ and I’m not very strong, and my mother died of consump tion.” Then she began to cry like a baby, and John came in and looked at me as if it was my doing. I must say she could succeed in doing all sorts of useless things—raising flow ers in every nook and corner, making pets of all the animals, and painting, or playing on the organ. She was real orna mental, and I suppose some folks thought she was pretty. John did for one. I don’t know that she made me much work eithei. She did her own washing as long as John would let her, and kept her room neat enough, though it was mostly littered up with flowers and birds and her sketches, and at first she sang from morning till night, and she did have a real lovelv voice. rn aiiow mat, but atier a while she didn’t sing and didn’t talk much, and then John began taking her meals up to her. The first time I saw him getting a tray ready, I said : “ It’s a good tiling yon were brought up to be handy, John, seeing you’ve got an invalid wife.” He didn’t say anything then, but a few days after he came to me and said “ Janet, get a girl as soon as you can, and let Aunt Betsy come over and stay with Myra; she is nervous and low spirited, and needs company. ” “Well, I suppose you’ve guessed the upghot of it all; a little daughter was born to John, and it seemed to me that s miracle was worked in the house. Per haps I had never really loved John’s wife—she was so different in her ways from me—but when I heard that baby cry, I felt thrilled to my very soul, and I just threw my work-apron over my head and cried for the first time in years. Myra didn’t get strong, and the days went on and still she didn’t get up, and I felt it was my duty to go and tell her that she mustn’t favor herself that way, that she couldn’t lie abed and let stran gers take care of her child, and that she’d never get strong till she’d got out, but I made up my mind to speak in a gentler sort of way. I had been think ing it over and about concluded to let Myra live her own way and not try to make her over, especially since John seemed so well satisfied with her, and I went up-stairs and opened the door softly and stepped inside. John was standing at one window looking out at the sunset—it was all red and gold, and the room was in a flame. He turned as I came in, and the tears were rolling down his cheeks, I never saw John ory before since he was a grown man! “ What is it ?” I whispered, going up close to him. He made a motion with the back of his head in the direction of the bed. I went over there. Aunt Betsy was in a rocker by the side of it, reading the Bible. Myra was looking at the sunset, then at her baby’s sleeping face. I’m not dull to see things, and I saw there what made my heart turn cold—it was the valley of the shadow of death! That all happened these three years ago. There is a simple rustic cross up in the graveyard with “Myra” carved on it, and little Myra and I go up there every Sunday and carry flowers to deco rate it, and the dear child sits in my lap and puts her blessed little arms about my neck and whispers : “Auntie, talk about my mamma in heaven,” and I tell how patient and gentle she was, and how she sang and played, and how she shall do the very same thing some day —for I know, now, that flowers are as necessary to God’s creation as the wood and grain, and the least little thing that makes sunshine in the world is of great value in the dark places, and I feel sure, when I look up to the hills she loved, that Myra has reached far-off heaven before me. Perhaps—perhaps, she will intercede for me there. There was anew oompositor in the office this morning. He was a wander ing “snb.” After wrestling a few min utes with a “take” of manuscript, he put down his “ stick,” remarked “ I’m sick,” slipped on his coat and walked out. A proof of his was soon taken with the following result: “I can’t read Chinese. The man who wrote this is evidently laboring under a fit of alco holism. Before I would try to * yank ’ antimony from this manuscript I would steal a jaok-knife and make shoe-pegs at 2 cents a quart. The foregoing confes sion I make in a moment of despair, after having turned this copy upside down, t’other side up, and every other way. One way it is Greek, another some antediluvian dialect or Egyptian hieroglyphics from Cleopatra’s needle. If you are after reputation, for humani ty’s sake stop where you are. I go, I know not where. ” —New Haven Reg in ter, A BIG TOT FACTORY. The largest toy factory in the world is in New York, where playthings in tin are manufactured literally by the million. It stands five stories high, and turns out 1,607 distinct varieties of tin toys. No. 1 is a tin horse, No. 1,607 a tin menag erie. The out-put of circular tin whis tles is 12,000,000 per annum. Every thing is made in the establishment ex cepting wheels, which are ordered in lots of thirty tons at a time from a foun dry in the East. Two hundred men, women and boys are constantly employed in toy-making. To make a tin horse twelve inches long, dies have to be cast, costing S6OO. Toys are exported from New York to all parts of the world. The children of ilifferent countries have dif ferent tastes. The passion of the young Brazilian is for a toy water-cart, while in the States the rage of the American boy is for tin horns and putty-blowers. Tin swords are wanted all over the world, the military instinct being as universal in the nurseries as in the courts and cabinets of the world. Perpetual motion is perhaps impos sible to obtain, but you can approximate it by putting a boy on a chair at a funeral and telling him to be still. Boston Post. THE TREATMENT OF WOMEN . It fell in the way of Maithtis In his celebrated work on population to search in the accounts of travelers for those oauses which operate, in different coun trie of the world, to check the progress and to limit the numbers of mankind. Foremost among these is vice, and fere most among the vices is that most un natural one, of the cruel treatment of women. “In every part of the world,” says Malthus, “ one of the most general characteristics of the savage is to de spise and degrade the female sex. Among most of the tribes in America their condition is so peculiarly grievous that servitude is a name too mild to de scribe their wretched state. A wife is no better than a beast of burden. While the man passes his days in idleness and amusement, the woman is condemned to incessant toil. Tasks are imposed upon her without meroy, and services are re ceived without complacence or grati tude. There are some districts in Amer ica where this state of degradation has been so severely felt that mothers have destroyed their female infants, to de liver them at once from a life in which they were doomed to such a miserable slavery.” It is impossible to find for this most vicious tendency any place among the unities of nature. There is nothing like it among the beasts. With them the equality of the sexes, as re gards all the enjoyments as well as all the work of life, is the universal rule. And among those of them in which social instincts have been specially im planted, and whose systems of polity are like the most civilized polities of men, the females of the race are treated with a strange mixture of love, of loyal ty, and of devotion. If, indeed, we con sider the necessary and inevitable re sults of the habit prevalent among sav age men to maltreat and degrade their women—it effects upon the constitu tion, and character, and endurance of children—we cannot fail to see how grossly unnatural it is, how it must tend to the greater and greater degradation of the raoe, and how recovery from this downward path must become more and more difficult or impossible. But, vi cious, destructive, unnatural as this habit is, it is not the only one o c the worst of similar character which prevail among savage men. A horrid catalogue comes to our remembrance when we think of them—polyandry, infanticide, cannibalism, deliberate cruelty, syste matic slaughter connected with warlike passions or with religious customs. Nor are these vices, or the evils result ing from them, peculiar to the savage state. Some of them, indeed, more or less changed and modified in form, at tain a rank luxuriance in civilized com munities, corrupt the very bones and marrow ef sooiety, and have brought powerful nations to decay and death.— Duke of Argyll , in Contemporary Re view. O’CONNELL OVERTHROWN. It is not strange that no one sympa thizes with 2 lawyer when he is over thrown by a witness whom he is cross examining. So many have suffered from lawyers’ sharp questions that they enjoy seeing one of them fall. Daniel O’Con nell once received a witty reply that turned the laugh against him, from a witness whom he was cross-examining. It was a case of riot committed by a mob cf beggars, and the witness for the pros ecution had represented the affair as very serious : “Pooh, pooh!” said O’Connell, “ now Just tell the court how many there were.” “Indeed, I never stopped to count them, your Honor, but there was a whole tribe of them.” “A whole tribe of them! Will you tell us to what tribe they belonged ? ” “Indeed, your Honor, that’s more than I can do at all; but I think it must have been the tribe of Dan ! ” “ You may go down, sir,” cried O’Con nell, in a rage, while bench, bar and spectators laughed CHINESE WITTICISMS. The awful dignity of the Chinese gentleman will not allow him to manu facture his own witticisms. He appre ciates wit, and is fond of tea; but he w ould as soon grow his own tea as make his own jokes. When he goes into socie ty, he carries in liis pocket a package of witticisms and repartees, which he pur chases at the nearest joke-shop. When conversation flags, and he perceives an opportunity for doing something brill iant, he draws a humorous remark from the top of his package and gravely hands it to his neighbor. The latter asgravely reads it, and, selecting from his bundle of repartee the one which is appropriate, returns it with a bow to the original joker. The two then solemnly smile in a courteous and undemonstrative way and resume their conversation, satisfied as to their having acquitted themselves with conspicuous brilliancy. This pro ceeding has one marked advantage— the witticisms are generally very good, “They tell me,” said the reformer, “that you have quit smoking. lam glad to hear it. Now, tell me, why did you quit?” Reformed smoker, feeling for a match, “’Cause my cigar went out.” THE LIME-KILN CLWB. “Let me warn ye, 5 ’ began the old man, as Pickles Smith hung up the wa ter dipper and sat down with a heavy jar, “ let me warn ye dat de man who has de mos’ ininlies am de man who flat ters hisself on his bluntness, truthful ness an’ common sense. De grandest motto on airth am de one which says: ‘ Spoke de truf at all times, ’ but it ain t the wisest one to foller. I has foun dat exaggerashun pleases whar’ truf hurts, an’ dat flattery amuses wkar’ truf engen ders anger. Spoke de truf of your nay burs, an’ one of ye will have to move inside of a y’ar. Spoke de truf of your friends, and you will be confronted by a legion of inimies. You may know in yer own mind dat dis man am a rogue, dat one a rascal an’ de odder one right up an’ down wicked, but you musn’t talk what ye know. One blunt word will upsot a whole nayburhood. One truful statement will raise up a host of howlin’ inimies. De pusson who won’t flat ter and cajole am avoided and sus pected. De biggest inimies I have in all’dis world am people who have had my honest opinyun, an’ to whom I have spoken de plain truf. Only one man out of fifty axes yer honest opinyun wid any ideah of ’ceptin’ it if it differs from his. Not one in 100 axes yer advice wid any ideah of follerin’ it onless it jibes wid his plans. “ Darfore, I say to you, be blunt only when you have no keer for friendship. Be truful only when you am ready to make inimies. Condemn only when yon am all packed up and ready to become a hermit. Tell a lie about a man an’ he’ll grin ober it. Hit him wid de truf an’ he will foller you until he has seoured revenge. In walkin’ aroun’ for half a day I can make a score of men friends by praisin’ de looks of a hat, de set of a coat, de grace of a step or de fit of anew p’ar of butes. Months and months ago I dropped a word of praise fur a cur dog which was trottin’ ’longbehind a citizen. De odder day dat same man walked past twenty to gib me a job of whitewashin’. Fact is, though I’m old an’ bald-headed an’ stoop-shouldered, it does me a heap of good to have some man stop me on de street an’ lie to me like blazes in say in’ dat I’m looking as young as a man ef 80.” —Detroit Free Press. SLOW GROWTH OF TREES. To make no mention of the cost of pre paring it for the stove or grate, wood is a very expensive sort of fuel when pro duced by cultivation, and raised on land capable of yielding valuable cultivated crops. Ten years are required to pro duce trees of the quick-growing varie ties of sufficient size to cut for fuel. The fuel they will then afford will be of infe rior quality, being what is known as sap-wood. Only trees that afford soft wood, as poplar, bass or linden, or the willow will attain sufficient size to make it an object to cut them in ten years. Twice that time will be required to produce oak, ash, beech, bircli, wal nut and hickory trees of a size tit to be cut for fuel. During five years, at least, the ground on which the trees grow must be kept in cultivation. Seeds or cuttings must be planted in the first in stance, end they cannot b© obtained without some expense. During twenty years’ time the taxes on a piece of land will amount to the sum it will bring in the market. The growth of trees that afford good fuel is very slow. The grand forests of Maine and Michigan afforded much the appearance they now do not only in colonial days, but before they were ever penetrated by white men. Elizur Wright says on this subject: “ I not long ago, in Ohio, measured the stump of a sugar maple, recently cut, and found it thirty inches in diameter. The tree had lived 125 years. In the first sixty-three years, while it had stood in the dense forest, it had acquired but nine inches in diameter. After the for est was cut away, and it was left with only a few scattering companions, it soon assumed a superior rate of growth, which it maintained till nearly the last, so as to add twenty-one inches of diam eter in sixty-two years. The rings av eraged about seventeen-hundredths of an inch in thickness, whereas, in the first sixty-three years they had averaged but seven-hundreths. ” —Chicago Times. SILENT SUFFERING. Silent suffering is a thing often un known to the world, for there is much pain that is quite noiseless, and vibra tions that make, human agonies are often mere whispers in the roar of hurrying existence. There are glances of hatred that stab and raise no cry cf murder, robberies that leave man and woman for ever beggared of peace and joy, yet they are kept secret by the sufferer—commit ted to no sound except ©f low moans in the night—seen in no writing exoept that made on the face by the slow months of suppressed anguish and early morning tears. Many an inherited sor row that has marred a life has been breathed into no human ear. Aim the good things of this world ar% no further good to us than as they are of use; and, whatever we may heap up to give to others, we enjoy only as much as we can use, and no more. Isn’t it a little curious that a man will denounce marriage as a delusion, and yqt eagerly embrace this delusion a sec end time when opportunity offers ? THE READING HABIT. Charles Dudley Warner says, in the Qhristian Union, that the extent of ilte* reading habit is overestimated. Even in the United States, where the habit of read ing is most prevalent, few of th© popu lation read a book. In support of. his opinion, Mr. Warner brings out tNe fol lowing i Nearly everybody takes a daily snatch at the newspapers, at the summary of news or at the telegraph columns, and tile base-ball record, and occasionally persons follow for days the columns de voted to some singular accident or curi ous jnurder— eveii women have acquired the art of deftly skimming the cream off the morning journal; comparatively few of the entire population, even tne edu cated, read books. Unless a book by some good luck be comes a fashion, and is recommended in conversation, few see it; the number of people who riginally seek out the read able book from their habit of craving is very small. When a story becomes the fashion, everybody reads it; but who is every body ? Why, a novel is said to have a “run” if 10,000 copies of it are pub lished for 40,000,000 people. And there are books that “ everybody has read, and all the newspapers talk of,” which have not got beyond the third or fourth thousand. The late Samuel Bowles once told me of his experience. He had written his capital book on the far West at the time of the Pacific-railway excitement, when millions of people were eager for the in formation his book contained. Never did a book seem to be in greater demand ; it was sold in England as well as in America, and all the newspapers of both countries quoted from it and com mented on it. Mr. Bowles said that he never met a person who had not read it—or who did not say he read it, I forget which. And yet, he asked, how many copies do you suppose satisfied this enormous demand of everybody? Fifteen thousand filled the market. I believe that the majority of business men read a book very rarely; the ma jority of young men in business and in society, I fancy, read little—they do not give their evenings to reading, and are not apt to take up a book unless it be comes the talk of society. People who spend a great deal of money on dress, on dinners, on amuse ment®, would think it extravagant to buy a book, and, if one is commended to them, they will wait till they can borrow it or get it from the library. They do not hesitate two minutes about an ordinary $2 dinner, but they will wait months to borrow a 50-cent book. - AUTHORS' OPINIONS OF AUTHORS* Says an English paper: Pitt told Wilberforce, respecting Bishop Butler’s great work, “You may prove anything by analogy.” Sydney Smith says the book is “ the most noble and surprising defense of revealed religion ever made* ’ Fielding was “ the prose Homer of hu man nature,” according to Byron; “a blockhead,” if we believe Dr. Johnson. Johnson himself was dubbed “Ursa Major” by Lord Auchinlec. “He has nothing of the bear but the skin,” said Goldsmith. “Johnson was an odious and mean character,” according to Hor ace Walpole; Mr. Thomas Carlyle praises him as “ a mass of genuine man hoed. ” “ Sir, I don’t think Gray a first rate poet,” quoth Johnson. “I have been reading Gray’s works, and I think him the only poet since Shakspeard en titled to the character of the sublime, ” wrote Cowper. “ The first of solemn coxcombs,” says Warton of Goldsmith. “An inspired idiot,” says Horace Wal pole ; while Bishop Percy speaks of his “elegant and enchanting style.” Cur ran tells us that “Edmund Burke’s mind was like an over-decorated chapel rilled with gauds end shows and badly assorted ornaments. ” Sir James Mack intosh held he was “ the greatest phil osopher in practice the world ever saw.” “ There could not,” said Porson, “ be a better exercise for a schoolboy than to turn a page of Gibbon’s ‘ Decline and Fall’ into English.” “The luminous page of Gibbon,” said Sheridan ; though tho wit afterward declared he meant voluminous. ” A negro, one night at a meeting, prayed earnestly that he and his breth ren might be preserved from what he called their “ Upsettin’sins. ” “ Brad der,” said one of his friends, “you ain\ got de hang of dat ar word. It’s ‘ be settin’,’ not ’upsettin’.” “Brudder,” replied he, “if dat’s so, it’s so. But I was prayin’ de Lord to save us from de sin of ’toxication, and if dat ain’t a up settin’ sin I donno what am. ” The papers have a deal to say about the means of egress from our theaters. Fogg says he is more troubled about the means of entrance.— Boston Tran script, A young gentleman once sent a bas ket of apples to his lady-love and told her to read Solomon iii., 5. It reads : “ Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples; for lam sick of love.” Tt is estimated that the loss by lung plague in cattle in this country amounts to $2,000,000 annually.